If we continue to consume fuel at an increasing rate, however, it appears probable that the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere will become high enough to raise the average temperature of the earth by a few degrees. If this were to happen, the ice caps would melt and the general level of the oceans would rise. Coastal cities like New York and Seattle might be inundated. Thus the industrial revolution using ordinary chemical fuel could be forced to end before the advantages of civilization have spread all over the earth. However, it might still be possible to use nuclear fuel. With nuclear fuel the industrial revolution and its countless benefits for man could continue to every part of the globe. The by-products of the nuclear age are less bulky and therefore are more easily handled than the by-products of our coal- and oil-economy. The main advantage of nuclear energy may yet turn out to be this: With proper care nuclear energy may turn out to be the cleanest among the available sources of power. CHAPTER XIX The Nuclear Age The future depends on people. People are unpredictable. Therefore, the future is unpredictable. However, some general conditions of mankind depend on things like the development of technology, the control won by man over nature and the limitations of natural resources. These can be predicted with a little greater confidence. The future is unknown but in some respects its general outline can be guessed. Such guesses are important. They influence our present outlook and our present actions. The nuclear age has not yet started. Our sources of energy are not yet nuclear sources. Even in the military field, where development has been most rapid, the structure of the armed forces has not yet adjusted itself to the facts of the nuclear age in a realistic manner. In politics the atomic nucleus has entered as a promise and as a menace—not as a fact on which we can build and with which we can reckon. Some technical predictions seem safe: Nuclear energy will not render our older power plants obsolete in the near future. But nuclear energy will make it possible to maintain the pace—even the acceleration—of the industrial revolution. It will be possible to produce all the energy we need at a moderate cost. Furthermore—and this is the important point—this energy will be available at any place on the globe at a cost which is fairly uniform. The greater the need for power, the sooner will it be feasible to satisfy the need with the help of nuclear reactors. Nuclear energy can be made available at the most outlandish places. It can be used on the Antarctic continent. It can be made to work on the bottom of the ocean. The expanding front of industrialization has been called the “revolution of rising expectations.” That nuclear energy should be involved in the current and in the turbulence of this expanding front, is inevitable.