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There's more than one hindrance to turning to pollution-free nuclear power to help contain the escalating costs of energy and reduce the increasingly dangerous climatic impact of fossil fuels - oil, coal and natural gas.

Although no good way has yet been discovered to safely store radioactive nuclear waste or to completely put to rest lurking fears produced by the catastrophic meltdown in Chernobyl in Ukraine and by the Three Mile Island near-meltdown in Pennsylvania, in the last years nuclear power has been viewed as the most effective antidote to the growing perils of global warming.

The Bush administration advocates nuclear along with efforts to reverse bans on oil exploration off America's shores and in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve. More and more, a revival in nuclear power, dormant in the United States for nearly 30 years, is seen as a major part of the answer to the endlessly spiraling cost of oil that is increasingly stifling the American economy.

Nuclear also gains support because it is not coal, which currently produces most electrical power but in the process emits contaminating carbon gases. Governments are tinkering with imposing limits on such emissions involving monetary penalties and rewards. The Wall Street Journal reports that the penalties could result in the nuclear industry reaping windfall profits ranging in the hundreds of millions "to as much as $2 billion" a year.

Entrepreneurs already were doing very well these days with nuclear properties they bought at distress sales. Now they see the time is ripe for leveraging billions in government subsidies. But that very effort led to studies that showed that the always costly construction of a nuclear facility is estimated to double or even quadruple in the near future, according to a report in The New York Times.

We are talking plants being built at a cost of $5 billion to $12 billion each, depending on kind and size, a result of the ever more prodigious costs of the steel, copper and cement required for construction.

Consumers would wind up paying who can say how much more, to a point probably more discomforting than the $4 a gallon gas of today, or the $4.75 envisioned when oil will trade at $200 a barrel, as some experts envision.

Meanwhile, nuclear-related operations are having problems. The Times reported in Canada the world's largest processor of mined uranium, used by nuclear reactors, has been closed for months. The reason is toxic uranium may have leaked into Lake Ontario.

This is not making European governments any more shy than America's about reviving their interest in nuclear power that had been largely abandoned following Chernobyl. Italy, for one, is getting ready to abandon a 20-year prohibition imposed after a referendum and is planning to resume construction of reactors.

The high cost of oil impacts the United States so heavily that it has reached the point where people are driving shorter distances and cutting back on vacations and on the consumer spending that drives (no pun intended) the economy.

While Europeans have seen a smaller increase than Americans, they nevertheless are demonstrating for their governments to do something - anything - to control the price of oil.

It's even worse for Americans, who pay more than Europeans as the value of the dollar steadily declines and the price of oil is stated in dollars. Therefore a barrel of oil will continue to be high or even go higher as the dollar remains weak. This impacts other nations, but punishes Americans more.

Taking into consideration as well the speculators that drive up the price of oil, estimated to be by as much as 25 percent, remedies are limited and come with their own downsides. Opening new oil fields would take years, as would deploying new nuclear reactors. Wind, solar and biomass energy need steep subsidies to develop, and these have not been sufficiently forthcoming. At best, they would supply only a portion of what is needed.

The intertwining complexities of the crisis mean that governments not only need to put on the full-court press in their own countries, they also need to work collaboratively with other nations to bring a measure of stability to a world facing huge economic displacements.

Harry Rosenfeld is editor-at-large of the Times Union. He can be reached at 454-5450 or by e-mail at hrosenfeld@timesunion.com