Texas is known as the energy capital of the world, and for good reason -- but the state has fallen behind others in its advancement of nuclear power, no now state leaders are working to change that.
South of Houston, Ft. Bend County Precinct 3 Commissioner Andy Myers is working with Governer Gregg Abbott and lawmakers currently meeting at the State Capitol to greatly increase the number of small nuclear power plants around the state, and the reasons are numerous.
For one thing, the plants are considered a lot safer than the previous generation of nuclear facilities, which have raised concerns for decades because they've generated dangerous radioactive waste, and the nation, in all the years since the first nuclear plants more than 65 years ago, still hasn't settled on a central national depository for that waste.
Commissioner Myers says the new generation of nuclear plants are much more efficient than the older ones.
"Advanced nuclear reactors can be designed to burn that nuclear waste as fuel -- and burn up 95-percent of it," he says.
And there are plans underway to make these designs even more productivem, which would greatly help the sometimes energy-deficient Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) grid, which is in great need of new sources of electrical generation.
"We've created a plan for Texas to follow that we believe will put Texas in the lead among states.
"Right now we probably rank about 6th or 7th among the 30 states that are very active in advanced nuclear."
Texas has done it's best to lead in renewable power generation, in addition to keeping its traditional place as the oil and gas capital of the world, with the state now number one is both solar and wind power generation in the US.
And now it's time for the state to catch up on small "modular" nuclear power, Commissioner Myers says.
"Y'know, the Houston region is the energy capital of the world and I think it's important for us to lead in advanced nuclear -- to maintain that position," he says.