3 ms·
In modern nuclear reactors, safety is not an issue.
by RivieraKid 9y ago
In modern nuclear reactors, safety is not an issue.
- chefkoch 9y ago"In modern nuclear reactors, safety is not an issue." Russian nuclear engineer, 1985
- eropple 9y agoGiven that the Chernobyl disaster can be traced to intentional disabling of safety systems to see what would happen, this is lousy, disingenuous snark. (For those not so afflicted, "Normal Accidents" has an awesome treatment of the Chernobyl disaster.)
- chefkoch 9y agoSo intentional circumventing of safety measures and (cost) cutting corners is not possible sich the new tech? Almost in every industry i can think of there are countless examples of how profit is traded for safety. Why should this be any different?
- guscost 9y agoSafety measures which cannot be intentionally circumvented (except by planting a bomb, I suppose) predate Chernobyl by many years. The RBMK was a horrible design which threw away passive safety[0] for convenience and cost savings. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_nuclear_safety https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_nuclear_safety
- dsfyu404ed 9y agox2. Modern designs for things that can fail dangerously incorporate features that cause the system to go down a branch that ends in a safe failure mode high up the tree rather than allowing the possibility of a less safe failure many more steps down the tree. It's like how Uhaul overbuilds the living crap out of it's trailers then puts relatively (compared to the rest of the system) light duty tires on them. Better to have idiots blow out tires than other less safe failure modes.
- RivieraKid 9y agoNot sure what your point is.
- chefkoch 9y agoMy point is many technologies were thought of being safe untill you encounter this one error, iceberg, negligence.
- RivieraKid 9y agoYeah, but at this point, I think the risks of modern reactors are understood well-enough to say with confidence that safety is not a major argument against nuclear energy.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]