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I'd much rather deal with fossil fuels than the catastrophic risks uniquely posed by nuclear power generation. The excuse for incidents like Fukushima are "Wel

I'd much rather deal with fossil fuels than the catastrophic risks uniquely posed by nuclear power generation. The excuse for incidents like Fukushima are "Well, they made these mistakes...". Personally, I'd rather not risk zero-notice forced evacuations, permanent quarantine zones, and making significant portions of populated land uninhabitable for centuries on some people not making mistakes. For those who write this off, there are some very tragic photo essays from Pripyat and Fukushima that can make this impact feel very real. Do you want to risk that happening to your area?

massysett 10y ago
Fossil fuels simply dump the pollutants into the atmosphere, killing people without a paper trail.
- cookiecaper 10y ago
  Fossil fuel emissions and other pollutants build up gradually and can be controlled. You're not going to get kicked out of your home and neighborhood forever because of a malfunction at the coal plant. And nuclear power generation also emits a very dangerous pollutant: nuclear waste.
  - Griffinsauce 10y ago
    > You're not going to get kicked out of your home and neighborhood forever because of a malfunction at the coal plant. No, you get kicked out of life when you get diagnosed with cancer.
  - Nrsolis 10y ago
    I think you have a different definition of the word "emit" than I do. Nuclear waste is stable, does not migrate when handled properly in containment pools, and can be reprocessed if required. All existing spent nuclear fuel in the united states is stored on-site. It's been that way since the beginning of the industry. In contrast, particulate and greenhouse gas (including CO2) emissions from coal-fired plants migrate with the wind, often polluting areas far from the plant. I don't see how you can compare the two. It's true that spent fuel is very toxic but every single attempt to deal with this issue has been stymied with rampant NIMBYism and non-science based fear mongering. You can control the operational risks associated with nuclear power. Doing so with fossil fueled plants is not nearly as easy.
    - Spooky23 10y ago
      >Nuclear waste is stable So long as it's stored in stable geologic formations, or controlled by stable human institutions. Where "stable" is a period of time longer than human history in many cases. >does not migrate when handled properly in containment pools Which are dependent on active management and security indefinitely. This is challenging as the service life of the plant where the pool is located and revenue is generated is less than indefinately. > can be reprocessed if required. Which is also a proliferation risk.
      - Nrsolis 10y ago
        I've got news for you if you expect guarantees about every possible risk you might face in life: We've had not one but several nuclear disasters in the past several decades and in each case the sky hasn't come crashing down. The risks from a nuclear plant disaster are localized and controllable. The risks from runaway climate change are global and uncontrollable. The planet is going to be fine. Whether human society survives is going to be a whole different matter entirely.
        cookiecaper 10y ago
        >We've had not one but several nuclear disasters in the past several decades and in each case the sky hasn't come crashing down. Unless of course you're one of the people who lived in the nuclear exclusion zones created by Chernobyl and Fukushima, in which case, yes, everything you own and possess, very potentially including your long-term health, were destroyed in a matter of hours. Those residents can never go back for more than a quick temporary visit, and they can not take back their belongings because they've been irradiated. They will always be asking themselves if they got enough of a dose of radiation to cause early disease. Call that localized and controllable all you want, and if you propose building these plants in areas with no nearby inhabitants for many sq miles, maybe it works OK. The current system, where we say "Don't worry, it's all perfectly safe, we double-pinkie-promise that we won't make the mistakes those guys in Ukraine or Japan made, and if you disagree you're an idiot who hates science" is just not going to fly. This is not general alarmism about being unable to mitigate every risk in life. This is a comparative analysis of the potential risk profiles of fossil fuels and nuclear, and fossil fuels being much better because the cost of a catastrophic non-nuclear failure is much smaller than the cost of a catastrophic nuclear failure.
  - DiThi 10y ago
    > You're not going to get kicked out of your home and neighborhood forever because of a malfunction at the coal plant. Until we get a couple more of degrees globally and we'll see floods in many coastal cities. Not to mention destroying the stability of weather we had for ~12,000 years and allowed farming to thrive.
    - cookiecaper 10y ago
      That's not a malfunction at the coal plant, that's a failure by the government to regulate polluters and protect the commons.
      - opo 10y ago
        "Coal plants are the nation’s top source of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, the primary cause of global warming. In 2011, utility coal plants in the United States emitted a total of 1.7 billion tons of CO21. A typical coal plant generates 3.5 million tons of CO2 per year2." http://www.ucsusa.org/clean-energy/coal-and-other-fossil-fuels/coal-air-pollution#.WN2HTRLyse0 http://www.ucsusa.org/clean-energy/coal-and-other-fossil-fue... Ever wonder why you read that you should avoid eating fish because of mercury? "...Every state in America has issued health advisories warning people to limit or avoid eating certain species of fish due to toxic mercury contamination, many of which cover every waterbody in the state. ...Coal-fired power plants are the single largest source of mercury contamination in the U.S., responsible for approximately 50% of human-caused mercury emissions." https://www.nwf.org/~/media/PDFs/Global-Warming/NWF-Mercury-Power-Plant-Factsheet_March2011.ashx https://www.nwf.org/~/media/PDFs/Global-Warming/NWF-Mercury-... These are long terms effects of burning coal - in the short term tens of thousands die each year from the air pollution from coal plants. The failure of government is that we allow coal and natural gas to be burned when there are alternatives that are much better for the environment and much better for the general health.
hackuser 10y ago
The risks from fossil fuels are orders of magnitude greater.
faet 10y ago
>Do you want to risk that happening to your area? Already do. 55% of my state's power comes from Nuclear. Coal releases 100x more radiation and 68x more CO2 than nuclear for equal energy production. http://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045 http://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045 And it isn't like coal is immune from having zero-notice forced evacuation, and making land uninhabitable. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly_ash_slurry_spill https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly...
- Zigurd 10y ago
  That's for properly functioning plants. When a coal plant fails, how much radiation does it emit? Compared to Fuk?
  - nbanks 10y ago
    Although it's oil not coal, the deepwater horizon accident was probably worse than Fukushima from both an environmental standpoint and number of lives lost. The most tragic failure of a power generating facility of all time was probably the Banqiao Dam disaster, not Chernobyl.
    - fnj 10y ago
      Certainly true from a direct-deaths standpoint. There were zero killed by the Fukushima explosions, and zero acute deaths due to the radiation release. (It's a lot harder to settle on long-term chronic radiation sickness effects.) 11 were killed at Deepwater Horizon. Not sure how you could quantify the respective environmental damage, either financially or ecologically. But there is another effect to consider: total monetary damage. Deepwater Horizon cost BP $62 billion pre-tax[0]. The total cost of Fukushima including victim compensation is currently estimated at about $180 billion[1], but the estimate has skyrocketed over the past 6 years, so one could suspect further escalation. [0] http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2016/07/14/bp-deepwater-horizon-costs/87087056/ http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2016/07/14/bp-deepwater-... [1] http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-38131248 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-38131248
- 10y ago
headcanon 10y ago
In hindsight, yes they should not have built a nuclear power plant in an earthquake-prone area like Japan. But there are plenty of places that are completely safe to build nuclear reactors, and given the alternatives, we should lend the advantages credence. Hopefully the whole debate will be moot when either solar/wind gets to a certain point or we figure out nuclear fusion.
- beamatronic 10y ago
  The earthquake wasn't nearly as much of a problem as the tsunami
  - azinman2 10y ago
    Earthquakes cause tsunamis.
    - beamatronic 10y ago
      The location of the plant, next to the ocean, placed it in greater danger from the tsunami. Had the plant been located up higher, above the centuries-old tsunami warning stones, then there maybe would have been a different outcome.
      - cookiecaper 10y ago
        My understanding is that the plant was built seaside to make use of the ocean water for cooling. There are definitely alternatives to this, but in the cost analysis, how many other tradeoffs re: the expediency and safety of nuclear technology are we making that are going to prove to have been in the wrong direction? What is the failure cost going to be?
- fnj 10y ago
  No place is "completely safe" to build a nuclear power plant (or anything else!). If nothing else, no matter where you build it, it is not 100% proof against attack by military action or evildoers.

massysett 10y ago

Fossil fuels simply dump the pollutants into the atmosphere, killing people without a paper trail.

cookiecaper 10y ago
Fossil fuel emissions and other pollutants build up gradually and can be controlled. You're not going to get kicked out of your home and neighborhood forever because of a malfunction at the coal plant. And nuclear power generation also emits a very dangerous pollutant: nuclear waste.
- Griffinsauce 10y ago
  > You're not going to get kicked out of your home and neighborhood forever because of a malfunction at the coal plant. No, you get kicked out of life when you get diagnosed with cancer.
- Nrsolis 10y ago
  I think you have a different definition of the word "emit" than I do. Nuclear waste is stable, does not migrate when handled properly in containment pools, and can be reprocessed if required. All existing spent nuclear fuel in the united states is stored on-site. It's been that way since the beginning of the industry. In contrast, particulate and greenhouse gas (including CO2) emissions from coal-fired plants migrate with the wind, often polluting areas far from the plant. I don't see how you can compare the two. It's true that spent fuel is very toxic but every single attempt to deal with this issue has been stymied with rampant NIMBYism and non-science based fear mongering. You can control the operational risks associated with nuclear power. Doing so with fossil fueled plants is not nearly as easy.
  - Spooky23 10y ago
    >Nuclear waste is stable So long as it's stored in stable geologic formations, or controlled by stable human institutions. Where "stable" is a period of time longer than human history in many cases. >does not migrate when handled properly in containment pools Which are dependent on active management and security indefinitely. This is challenging as the service life of the plant where the pool is located and revenue is generated is less than indefinately. > can be reprocessed if required. Which is also a proliferation risk.
    - Nrsolis 10y ago
      I've got news for you if you expect guarantees about every possible risk you might face in life: We've had not one but several nuclear disasters in the past several decades and in each case the sky hasn't come crashing down. The risks from a nuclear plant disaster are localized and controllable. The risks from runaway climate change are global and uncontrollable. The planet is going to be fine. Whether human society survives is going to be a whole different matter entirely.
      - cookiecaper 10y ago
        >We've had not one but several nuclear disasters in the past several decades and in each case the sky hasn't come crashing down. Unless of course you're one of the people who lived in the nuclear exclusion zones created by Chernobyl and Fukushima, in which case, yes, everything you own and possess, very potentially including your long-term health, were destroyed in a matter of hours. Those residents can never go back for more than a quick temporary visit, and they can not take back their belongings because they've been irradiated. They will always be asking themselves if they got enough of a dose of radiation to cause early disease. Call that localized and controllable all you want, and if you propose building these plants in areas with no nearby inhabitants for many sq miles, maybe it works OK. The current system, where we say "Don't worry, it's all perfectly safe, we double-pinkie-promise that we won't make the mistakes those guys in Ukraine or Japan made, and if you disagree you're an idiot who hates science" is just not going to fly. This is not general alarmism about being unable to mitigate every risk in life. This is a comparative analysis of the potential risk profiles of fossil fuels and nuclear, and fossil fuels being much better because the cost of a catastrophic non-nuclear failure is much smaller than the cost of a catastrophic nuclear failure.
- DiThi 10y ago
  > You're not going to get kicked out of your home and neighborhood forever because of a malfunction at the coal plant. Until we get a couple more of degrees globally and we'll see floods in many coastal cities. Not to mention destroying the stability of weather we had for ~12,000 years and allowed farming to thrive.
  - cookiecaper 10y ago
    That's not a malfunction at the coal plant, that's a failure by the government to regulate polluters and protect the commons.
    - opo 10y ago
      "Coal plants are the nation’s top source of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, the primary cause of global warming. In 2011, utility coal plants in the United States emitted a total of 1.7 billion tons of CO21. A typical coal plant generates 3.5 million tons of CO2 per year2." http://www.ucsusa.org/clean-energy/coal-and-other-fossil-fuels/coal-air-pollution#.WN2HTRLyse0 http://www.ucsusa.org/clean-energy/coal-and-other-fossil-fue... Ever wonder why you read that you should avoid eating fish because of mercury? "...Every state in America has issued health advisories warning people to limit or avoid eating certain species of fish due to toxic mercury contamination, many of which cover every waterbody in the state. ...Coal-fired power plants are the single largest source of mercury contamination in the U.S., responsible for approximately 50% of human-caused mercury emissions." https://www.nwf.org/~/media/PDFs/Global-Warming/NWF-Mercury-Power-Plant-Factsheet_March2011.ashx https://www.nwf.org/~/media/PDFs/Global-Warming/NWF-Mercury-... These are long terms effects of burning coal - in the short term tens of thousands die each year from the air pollution from coal plants. The failure of government is that we allow coal and natural gas to be burned when there are alternatives that are much better for the environment and much better for the general health.

hackuser 10y ago

The risks from fossil fuels are orders of magnitude greater.

faet 10y ago

>Do you want to risk that happening to your area? Already do. 55% of my state's power comes from Nuclear. Coal releases 100x more radiation and 68x more CO2 than nuclear for equal energy production. http://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045 http://science.sciencemag.org/content/202/4372/1045 And it isn't like coal is immune from having zero-notice forced evacuation, and making land uninhabitable. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly_ash_slurry_spill https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingston_Fossil_Plant_coal_fly...

Zigurd 10y ago
That's for properly functioning plants. When a coal plant fails, how much radiation does it emit? Compared to Fuk?
- nbanks 10y ago
  Although it's oil not coal, the deepwater horizon accident was probably worse than Fukushima from both an environmental standpoint and number of lives lost. The most tragic failure of a power generating facility of all time was probably the Banqiao Dam disaster, not Chernobyl.
  - fnj 10y ago
    Certainly true from a direct-deaths standpoint. There were zero killed by the Fukushima explosions, and zero acute deaths due to the radiation release. (It's a lot harder to settle on long-term chronic radiation sickness effects.) 11 were killed at Deepwater Horizon. Not sure how you could quantify the respective environmental damage, either financially or ecologically. But there is another effect to consider: total monetary damage. Deepwater Horizon cost BP $62 billion pre-tax[0]. The total cost of Fukushima including victim compensation is currently estimated at about $180 billion[1], but the estimate has skyrocketed over the past 6 years, so one could suspect further escalation. [0] http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2016/07/14/bp-deepwater-horizon-costs/87087056/ http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2016/07/14/bp-deepwater-... [1] http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-38131248 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-38131248
10y ago

headcanon 10y ago

In hindsight, yes they should not have built a nuclear power plant in an earthquake-prone area like Japan. But there are plenty of places that are completely safe to build nuclear reactors, and given the alternatives, we should lend the advantages credence. Hopefully the whole debate will be moot when either solar/wind gets to a certain point or we figure out nuclear fusion.

beamatronic 10y ago
The earthquake wasn't nearly as much of a problem as the tsunami
- azinman2 10y ago
  Earthquakes cause tsunamis.
  - beamatronic 10y ago
    The location of the plant, next to the ocean, placed it in greater danger from the tsunami. Had the plant been located up higher, above the centuries-old tsunami warning stones, then there maybe would have been a different outcome.
    - cookiecaper 10y ago
      My understanding is that the plant was built seaside to make use of the ocean water for cooling. There are definitely alternatives to this, but in the cost analysis, how many other tradeoffs re: the expediency and safety of nuclear technology are we making that are going to prove to have been in the wrong direction? What is the failure cost going to be?
fnj 10y ago
No place is "completely safe" to build a nuclear power plant (or anything else!). If nothing else, no matter where you build it, it is not 100% proof against attack by military action or evildoers.