Bush getting fired up over nuclear power; Says it's time to start building plants again

LUSBY, MARYLAND - Nearly 50 years after President Dwight Eisenhower waved a "neutron wand" ceremonially to fire up America's first atomic power plant, President Bush sought to launch a new round of plant construction financed in part with federal dollars.

Bush visited the Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant, one of several sites under consideration by industry and government for a new generation of reactors, to make the case for nuclear power as an essential element of a diversified energy supply.

"Nuclear power is one of America's safest sources of energy," said Bush, the first president to set foot in a nuclear plant since Jimmy Carter's 1979 emergency trip to Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania following the partial reactor meltdown that helped bring the first round of plant-building to a close.

"It is time for this country to start building nuclear power plants again," Bush said.

The nuclear pitch was part of an ongoing bully pulpit campaign to pressure Congress to pass energy legislation containing many of the provisions first proposed by the Bush White House in 2001. The House has approved a comprehensive energy bill, and the Senate has been debating its version.

The pending bills contain incentives to spur construction of nuclear plants, including a renewal of federal risk insurance and tax credits for companies that develop new reactors. In addition, the Bush administration has launched a $1 billion initiative to help underwrite the cost of licensing plants.

No new plant projects have been undertaken since the Three Mile Island incident.