English 421Y: Technical Writing Online

This week was spent researching nuclear energy and deciding how I wanted to incorporate it into my section of the white paper.

I had two credible internet sources that I found for my research blog that are maintained by the Nuclear Energy Institute and the Energy Information Administration. I found these sources very helpful because they give statistics for the United States for the past 10 years. The Nuclear Energy Institute page gives a really good explanation of how nuclear reactors work. The Energy Information administration gives summaries of usage, costs, and projections. This technical data was very valuable in writing the white paper because I could compare usage statistics for nuclear energy to the other forms of energy so that there was a basis of comparison.

We decided to use Adam W.'s thumbnail design for the final design of the white paper. I suggested the format we should use for each of our sections of different energy so that we could all be having similar sections conveying the same information for each different energy type. I thought it was important that we all had a brief introduction section to present the energy we were discussing. Then I suggested we have a section on how the energy works with an easy to understand diagram. The next sections that I suggested were to include the drawbacks, environmental consequences, and the positives. I also thought it was important that we include relative costs compared to other types of energy such as coal, oil, and the others that we are presenting in the paper.