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Another look at the energy density of fuels

Here is a fascinating website that brings together a bunch of disparate data and compares them in a very understandable fashion. The entry for a 1000­MWe Power Plant catches my eye; this is an electrical power plant that generates enough energy for an "average" city of one million people:

Coal: 9000 tons/day of 1 "unit train load" (100 90 - ton cars/day)
Oil: 40,000 bbl/day or 1 tanker per week (note: "bbl" means barrels)
Natural Gas: 2.4 l08 SCF/day
Uranium (as 235U): 3 kg/day

Much less impact from the mining, much less waste to process. The waste is dangerous but we are talking about small volumes here once the stuff from the 50's and 60's is dealt with. (Thanks again Jimmy Carter) Posted by DaveH at August 12, 2005 10:24 PM