>Truth though is fly ash isn't really that much more radioactive than any common sample of soil (1 to 10X). And uranium and thorium aren't particularly problema

>Truth though is fly ash isn't really that much more radioactive than any common sample of soil (1 to 10X). And uranium and thorium aren't particularly problematic. Radium is an issue here. But like I said, the air pollution from burning coal is orders of magnitude greater than the risk from radiation exposure from coal. The only interesting thing about this is that the anti-science crowd that is afraid of nuclear power doesn't realize that if the NRC regulated coal plants, they would immediately be shut down due to excessive releases of radiation. >...As your link shows coal isn't growing very fast as a source of energy. yes, but your original comment was: >... Bonus, coal is going away and soon[1]. Most people wouldn't consider a slowing of the growth rate to be "going away and soon". Hopefully they will be gone before they cause an environmental catastrophe. >..R.ight now taking a 30 risk on a coal fired plant vs a 5 year risk on a natural gas plant, the choice is pretty obvious. Replacing a horrible fossil fuel with a less bad fossil fuel is not a huge improvement when there are safer non CO2 emitting power sources - nuclear for base load power and solar/wind as intermittent power.