6 ms·

How in the world is nuclear power more safe than friggin solar panels that just sit there in the sun?

thatswrong0 8y ago
> includes accidents in the mining of the raw material, the processing and production phases, and pollution-related impacts
- merb 8y ago
  and of course nuclear material won't be mined, processed and won't have any production phase at all. and building a plant is as harmless as anything else.... yeah, clearly. also their death toll article.... I mean most russion publications think that chernobyl caused the death of a million people, their article was in "the thousand". of course we can always think nicely about anything and be postivie till the end, however humanity can't work with technologies that causes a huge death toll when it comes to desasters, because the market will always bring us to a desaster. also the storage of waste is not a problem we can solve. no human lives over a thousand years, thus no storage will ever be safe.
  - joefourier 8y ago
    According to the WHO, outdoor pollution from burning fossil fuels and biomass causes at least 2 million deaths annually. Even if the 1 million death toll were true, nuclear would still be vastly safer than coal power. You could additionally push for the adoption of nuclear only in well-developed countries if you were adamant about safety, as in the United States the death toll from nuclear is 0.1 per year. But the primary benefit of nuclear would be the reduction in CO2 emissions, with the tremendous safety gains being a bonus. If you only cared about reducing CO2 emissions you could have a Chernobyl every year while still being safer and less polluting than coal power.
starbeast 8y ago
'Major' is the key word here. Solar and wind are not included in the analysis.
joefourier 8y ago
The article does not address solar (and wind power) as they are not major energy sources, but nuclear power is safer per TWh than solar if you take in account deaths in manufacturing and installing photovoltaic panels (same goes for wind power). You also have to add the energy require to produce the panels, which itself most frequently comes from non-renewable and non-nuclear sources, thereby contributing to pollution and causing more fatalities.
- starbeast 8y ago
  >nuclear power is safer per TWh than solar if you take in account deaths in manufacturing and installing photovoltaic panels (same goes for wind power). Do you have figures for that?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- CardenB 8y ago
  This is likely true. However, to scale nuclear power development, we would have to lower standards in some ways to meet more aggressive timelines, which would almost certainly increase the mortality rate. Nuclear can be the safest, but it's not the most efficient to build.
  - pitaj 8y ago
    > which would almost certainly increase the mortality rate This is not at all certain. There are ways of loosening regulations while not making them less safe. Even if there weren't, it is not guaranteed that having less safe regulations would result in less safe nuclear plants. Even if the nuclear plants were less safe[1], there is no guarantee that would result in more incidents. Edit [1]: meaning they operate under less stringent safety standards and procedures, not a comment on the outcomes
  - starbeast 8y ago
    One thing to take into account with nuclear is if you aren't happy to share an energy tech with your enemies, due to the risk of them using it to build civilization destroying weaponry, then that tech may not be the safest for global power generation. To pick an example that is constantly in the press, Iran having a nuclear program makes people nervous in a way that them having a wind turbine factory or PV fab does not.
shawnz 8y ago
They still require maintenance. And the amount of power they give is very small in proportion to how much hardware is required, unlike nuclear where a very large amount of power is produced from a small amount of hardware.
leecarraher 8y ago
they may not want to include intermittent sources of power.
qwerty456127 8y ago
Because solar panels production is incredibly toxic. Also coal-burning power power plants emit much more radiation than nuclear ones.
arduanika 8y ago
Are you volunteering to go work in some strip mine in South America looking for the necessary heavy metals? Or stick around in that poor village drinking the water?
- varjag 8y ago
  You'd be surprised to hear where uranium comes from.

> includes accidents in the mining of the raw material, the processing and production phases, and pollution-related impacts

merb 8y ago
and of course nuclear material won't be mined, processed and won't have any production phase at all. and building a plant is as harmless as anything else.... yeah, clearly. also their death toll article.... I mean most russion publications think that chernobyl caused the death of a million people, their article was in "the thousand". of course we can always think nicely about anything and be postivie till the end, however humanity can't work with technologies that causes a huge death toll when it comes to desasters, because the market will always bring us to a desaster. also the storage of waste is not a problem we can solve. no human lives over a thousand years, thus no storage will ever be safe.
- joefourier 8y ago
  According to the WHO, outdoor pollution from burning fossil fuels and biomass causes at least 2 million deaths annually. Even if the 1 million death toll were true, nuclear would still be vastly safer than coal power. You could additionally push for the adoption of nuclear only in well-developed countries if you were adamant about safety, as in the United States the death toll from nuclear is 0.1 per year. But the primary benefit of nuclear would be the reduction in CO2 emissions, with the tremendous safety gains being a bonus. If you only cared about reducing CO2 emissions you could have a Chernobyl every year while still being safer and less polluting than coal power.

starbeast 8y ago

'Major' is the key word here. Solar and wind are not included in the analysis.

joefourier 8y ago

The article does not address solar (and wind power) as they are not major energy sources, but nuclear power is safer per TWh than solar if you take in account deaths in manufacturing and installing photovoltaic panels (same goes for wind power). You also have to add the energy require to produce the panels, which itself most frequently comes from non-renewable and non-nuclear sources, thereby contributing to pollution and causing more fatalities.

starbeast 8y ago
>nuclear power is safer per TWh than solar if you take in account deaths in manufacturing and installing photovoltaic panels (same goes for wind power). Do you have figures for that?
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
CardenB 8y ago
This is likely true. However, to scale nuclear power development, we would have to lower standards in some ways to meet more aggressive timelines, which would almost certainly increase the mortality rate. Nuclear can be the safest, but it's not the most efficient to build.
- pitaj 8y ago
  > which would almost certainly increase the mortality rate This is not at all certain. There are ways of loosening regulations while not making them less safe. Even if there weren't, it is not guaranteed that having less safe regulations would result in less safe nuclear plants. Even if the nuclear plants were less safe[1], there is no guarantee that would result in more incidents. Edit [1]: meaning they operate under less stringent safety standards and procedures, not a comment on the outcomes
- starbeast 8y ago
  One thing to take into account with nuclear is if you aren't happy to share an energy tech with your enemies, due to the risk of them using it to build civilization destroying weaponry, then that tech may not be the safest for global power generation. To pick an example that is constantly in the press, Iran having a nuclear program makes people nervous in a way that them having a wind turbine factory or PV fab does not.

shawnz 8y ago

They still require maintenance. And the amount of power they give is very small in proportion to how much hardware is required, unlike nuclear where a very large amount of power is produced from a small amount of hardware.

leecarraher 8y ago

they may not want to include intermittent sources of power.

qwerty456127 8y ago

Because solar panels production is incredibly toxic. Also coal-burning power power plants emit much more radiation than nuclear ones.

arduanika 8y ago

Are you volunteering to go work in some strip mine in South America looking for the necessary heavy metals? Or stick around in that poor village drinking the water?

varjag 8y ago
You'd be surprised to hear where uranium comes from.