5 ms·

Ctrl+F "Solar", "Wind". No matches found. That's weird, huh? I'm all for a rational assessment of risk, but shouldn't they be on the list? Actually, I've seen

Ctrl+F "Solar", "Wind". No matches found. That's weird, huh? I'm all for a rational assessment of risk, but shouldn't they be on the list? Actually, I've seen such comparisons, and solar and wind do pretty well. They don't kill anyone from air pollution and global warming, but manufacturing and maintenance isn't risk-free. When you install things on roofs, sometimes people fall off. Most solar installation these days however are utility scale deployments in empty fields. It's pretty low risk, plus the same pollution and AGW benefits that nuclear benefits from. As an aside, I wonder if anyone has done the math on storing high-level nuclear waste on the Moon, now that a fully reusable SpaceX Falcon Heavy is almost here. That might be cheaper than the financial and political costs of places like Yucca Mountain.

CydeWeys 9y ago
I'd be surprised if the biggest source of injury from solar wasn't from installers falling off roofs. You can't count all of those injuries against solar itself, though, as roofing injuries will happen regardless, and putting up solar panels greatly extends the life of a roof, so the amortized total injury to installers doesn't go up as much.
- bmcusick 9y ago
  Plus with Tesla's solar roof, you might say that the additional risk of solar is zero, since it's (probably, I'm guessing) no more dangerous to install than any other roof.
  - CydeWeys 9y ago
    And if it lasts longer than a tar-asphalt shingle roof, which seems reasonable given the materials involved, it will actually reduce deaths.
    - bmcusick 9y ago
      Right. Great point. It could cut risks in half if it lasts twice as long.
      - iheartmemcache 9y ago
        We'd need long term statistics to fully develop a model of risk. I.e., (admittedly, anecdotally) within the first year or two of having his monocrystalline setup, Dave[1] suffered damage to one panel (aerial debris) requiring a service call to replace the unit. If this happens on a semi-frequent basis (i.e. one panel per ~3 years per install) the risk profile changes not insignificantly. [1] https://player.fm/series/eevblog/eevblog-844-solar-panel-replacement https://player.fm/series/eevblog/eevblog-844-solar-panel-rep...
        ZeroGravitas 9y ago
        I've had workmen on my roof for damaged slates due to high wind, so again, with a Tesla roof this could conceivably be a negative death rate of the solar tiles are stronger than standard tiles, which they claim they are.
- iheartmemcache 9y ago
  Probably true, though for what its worth OSHA[0] (yeah yeah "nanny state" and all) dictates pretty clearly the federal obligations on training and equipping roof workers with full body harnesses, lanyards, and proper anchorage points to effectively eliminate fall related injuries. Whether or not the employe(e|r) adheres to these regulations[1] is another issue, but the risk can effectively be mitigated almost entirely (the "total fall distance" is to be no more than 6 feet with a safety factor to the ground of no less than 3 feet)[2]. RE: Grandparent - the production of solar panels isn't as "green" as you may think. See: IEEE[3]. RE: Wind - The standard horizontal-axis blade design (i.e. what Siemens and other major commercial institutions offer) have ecological impacts on wildlife[4]. ==== [0] Forgive the US centric analysis. [1] I.e., cell-tower deaths are notorious for these sorts of violations -- both due to the endemic sub-sub-sub-contracting strategy that Verizon, et al, uses to distance themselves from the bad PR and litigation, as well as the employee these jobs tend to attract (risk takers/adrenaline junkies) who, even if given the proper gear will neglect to use it often due to machismo. Following full protocol, the injury risk decreases quite notably. [2] https://www.osha.gov/Publications/OSHA3755.pdf https://www.osha.gov/Publications/OSHA3755.pdf [3] http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/solar/solar-energy-isnt-always-as-green-as-you-think http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/solar/solar-energy-isnt-... Rare earth metals, processing with hydrofluoric acid, all the usual suspects one would expect. And this isn't a Koch-brothers funded gas/oil funded piece of propaganda. For goodness sakes, this is the IEEE -- about as pro-green (while keeping the science legitimate) as you can get. [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_wind_power https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_wind_p... - Just playing devils advocate here, offshore wind is basically the closest to a panacea IMO. There are events where 100% of the Dutch utility grid is powered entirely by their offshore wind. Their trains are 100% 'green' too (see: https://futurism.com/all-dutch-trains-now-run-on-100-wind-power/ https://futurism.com/all-dutch-trains-now-run-on-100-wind-po...)
  - bmcusick 9y ago
    One factor in Tesla's favor then is their stated objective of handling the solar roof installation in house. Unless they resort to the same shady practices that Verizon uses for tower installation, direct control (and responsibility for) their installers should lend itself to mandating best practices on the safety angle.
padseeker 9y ago
Everything has risks. Yes solar panel installers can fall off roofs. I'm sure there have been fatalities in the mining for the elements required for solar panels or making turbines for wind. Those are honest concerns that should be taken into account when comparing different energy sources. However this article did not of that - it just pretended that they did not exist. I believe the publisher of this article has an ulterior motive, something related to supporting the nuclear industry. So in oder to make its point it needed to leave it out. The title of this article is not just 'misleading' it is completely and deliberately dishonest.
m0skit0 9y ago
Nuclear "waste" can actually be used as fuel again, we just need to research that technology. You still need a lot more plastic and rare earths for solar and wind compared with nuclear (per watt). I think solar and wind are a good intermediate step but not for long-term.
- bmcusick 9y ago
  Maybe. I saw a Google X talk a couple years ago from some grad students at MIT that wanted to build a nuclear power plant that closed the fuel cycle loop. (which is what you're talking about). They made some very grand promises about how this would solve the HLW problem. Unfortunately a few years later they had to issue a correction, because older (more experienced) engineered stepped in and showed them where the mistakes in their work were, and they couldn't eliminate nearly as much HLW as they thought with existing technology. In other words, a closed nuclear fuel cycle doesn't exist. We could be better than we are currently with investments in molten salt and fast reactors, but I don't think we know how to get to zero HLW using fission. Considering that HLW lasts for a million years, that's imposing too high a cost on too many of our descendants, IMO. My personal belief is that solar and wind are the best way to go for now, and if we ever get zero-HLW fission or aneutronic fusion working, cool.
  - acidburnNSA 9y ago
    You're referring to the Transatomic 2-student company's claims that their epithermal-neutron molten salt reactor could burn nuclear waste as fuel without additional fissile feed stock. Professor Kord Smith and others pointed out their error. However, that their whimsical concept didn't live up to its hype is no reason to claim that the closed nuclear fuel cycle doesn't exist. Breeding more fuel than you consume in an advanced reactor was proven in the Experimental Breeder Reactor-1 near Arco Idaho in the early 1950s. The physical concept of breeding and closing the cycle is well-proven and 100% proven possible. No one debates this. People do debate how much it costs vs. the status quo of just mining uranium. Uranium is cheaper than recycling spent fuel, so we mine uranium. It's that simple. If we decided uranium was running low and drove prices up, reprocessing waste would become more economical and more people would do it.
horusthecat 9y ago
It's almost as if you can frame a 'data-driven' argument and limit the universe of what people imagine to be possible, while pretending to be 'rational' and 'scientific' the whole time! Of course it cuts both ways. A better headline would have been "Nuclear: sure it's dirty but are you really trying to tell us coal is safer".

CydeWeys 9y ago

I'd be surprised if the biggest source of injury from solar wasn't from installers falling off roofs. You can't count all of those injuries against solar itself, though, as roofing injuries will happen regardless, and putting up solar panels greatly extends the life of a roof, so the amortized total injury to installers doesn't go up as much.

bmcusick 9y ago
Plus with Tesla's solar roof, you might say that the additional risk of solar is zero, since it's (probably, I'm guessing) no more dangerous to install than any other roof.
- CydeWeys 9y ago
  And if it lasts longer than a tar-asphalt shingle roof, which seems reasonable given the materials involved, it will actually reduce deaths.
  - bmcusick 9y ago
    Right. Great point. It could cut risks in half if it lasts twice as long.
    - iheartmemcache 9y ago
      We'd need long term statistics to fully develop a model of risk. I.e., (admittedly, anecdotally) within the first year or two of having his monocrystalline setup, Dave[1] suffered damage to one panel (aerial debris) requiring a service call to replace the unit. If this happens on a semi-frequent basis (i.e. one panel per ~3 years per install) the risk profile changes not insignificantly. [1] https://player.fm/series/eevblog/eevblog-844-solar-panel-replacement https://player.fm/series/eevblog/eevblog-844-solar-panel-rep...
      - ZeroGravitas 9y ago
        I've had workmen on my roof for damaged slates due to high wind, so again, with a Tesla roof this could conceivably be a negative death rate of the solar tiles are stronger than standard tiles, which they claim they are.
iheartmemcache 9y ago
Probably true, though for what its worth OSHA[0] (yeah yeah "nanny state" and all) dictates pretty clearly the federal obligations on training and equipping roof workers with full body harnesses, lanyards, and proper anchorage points to effectively eliminate fall related injuries. Whether or not the employe(e|r) adheres to these regulations[1] is another issue, but the risk can effectively be mitigated almost entirely (the "total fall distance" is to be no more than 6 feet with a safety factor to the ground of no less than 3 feet)[2]. RE: Grandparent - the production of solar panels isn't as "green" as you may think. See: IEEE[3]. RE: Wind - The standard horizontal-axis blade design (i.e. what Siemens and other major commercial institutions offer) have ecological impacts on wildlife[4]. ==== [0] Forgive the US centric analysis. [1] I.e., cell-tower deaths are notorious for these sorts of violations -- both due to the endemic sub-sub-sub-contracting strategy that Verizon, et al, uses to distance themselves from the bad PR and litigation, as well as the employee these jobs tend to attract (risk takers/adrenaline junkies) who, even if given the proper gear will neglect to use it often due to machismo. Following full protocol, the injury risk decreases quite notably. [2] https://www.osha.gov/Publications/OSHA3755.pdf https://www.osha.gov/Publications/OSHA3755.pdf [3] http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/solar/solar-energy-isnt-always-as-green-as-you-think http://spectrum.ieee.org/green-tech/solar/solar-energy-isnt-... Rare earth metals, processing with hydrofluoric acid, all the usual suspects one would expect. And this isn't a Koch-brothers funded gas/oil funded piece of propaganda. For goodness sakes, this is the IEEE -- about as pro-green (while keeping the science legitimate) as you can get. [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_wind_power https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_wind_p... - Just playing devils advocate here, offshore wind is basically the closest to a panacea IMO. There are events where 100% of the Dutch utility grid is powered entirely by their offshore wind. Their trains are 100% 'green' too (see: https://futurism.com/all-dutch-trains-now-run-on-100-wind-power/ https://futurism.com/all-dutch-trains-now-run-on-100-wind-po...)
- bmcusick 9y ago
  One factor in Tesla's favor then is their stated objective of handling the solar roof installation in house. Unless they resort to the same shady practices that Verizon uses for tower installation, direct control (and responsibility for) their installers should lend itself to mandating best practices on the safety angle.

padseeker 9y ago

Everything has risks. Yes solar panel installers can fall off roofs. I'm sure there have been fatalities in the mining for the elements required for solar panels or making turbines for wind. Those are honest concerns that should be taken into account when comparing different energy sources. However this article did not of that - it just pretended that they did not exist. I believe the publisher of this article has an ulterior motive, something related to supporting the nuclear industry. So in oder to make its point it needed to leave it out. The title of this article is not just 'misleading' it is completely and deliberately dishonest.

m0skit0 9y ago

Nuclear "waste" can actually be used as fuel again, we just need to research that technology. You still need a lot more plastic and rare earths for solar and wind compared with nuclear (per watt). I think solar and wind are a good intermediate step but not for long-term.

bmcusick 9y ago
Maybe. I saw a Google X talk a couple years ago from some grad students at MIT that wanted to build a nuclear power plant that closed the fuel cycle loop. (which is what you're talking about). They made some very grand promises about how this would solve the HLW problem. Unfortunately a few years later they had to issue a correction, because older (more experienced) engineered stepped in and showed them where the mistakes in their work were, and they couldn't eliminate nearly as much HLW as they thought with existing technology. In other words, a closed nuclear fuel cycle doesn't exist. We could be better than we are currently with investments in molten salt and fast reactors, but I don't think we know how to get to zero HLW using fission. Considering that HLW lasts for a million years, that's imposing too high a cost on too many of our descendants, IMO. My personal belief is that solar and wind are the best way to go for now, and if we ever get zero-HLW fission or aneutronic fusion working, cool.
- acidburnNSA 9y ago
  You're referring to the Transatomic 2-student company's claims that their epithermal-neutron molten salt reactor could burn nuclear waste as fuel without additional fissile feed stock. Professor Kord Smith and others pointed out their error. However, that their whimsical concept didn't live up to its hype is no reason to claim that the closed nuclear fuel cycle doesn't exist. Breeding more fuel than you consume in an advanced reactor was proven in the Experimental Breeder Reactor-1 near Arco Idaho in the early 1950s. The physical concept of breeding and closing the cycle is well-proven and 100% proven possible. No one debates this. People do debate how much it costs vs. the status quo of just mining uranium. Uranium is cheaper than recycling spent fuel, so we mine uranium. It's that simple. If we decided uranium was running low and drove prices up, reprocessing waste would become more economical and more people would do it.

horusthecat 9y ago

It's almost as if you can frame a 'data-driven' argument and limit the universe of what people imagine to be possible, while pretending to be 'rational' and 'scientific' the whole time! Of course it cuts both ways. A better headline would have been "Nuclear: sure it's dirty but are you really trying to tell us coal is safer".