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CAN NUCLEAR ENERGY DECREASE OUR RELIANCE ON FOREIGN OIL?

International crises, such as the oil embargo of the early 1970s and the Persian Gulf crisis in the early 1990s, occasionally threaten the supply of oil to the United States. Supporters of nuclear energy point out that our dependence on foreign oil would be lessened if all oil-burning power plants were con­verted to nuclear plants. This claim is not as con­vincing as it seems, however, because oil is respon­sible for generating only 6 percent of the electricity in the United States; we rely on oil primarily for automobiles and for home heating. Thus, the re­placement of electricity generated by oil with elec­tricity generated by nuclear energy would do little to lessen our dependence on foreign oil, because we would still need oil for heating buildings and driv­ing automotive vehicles.