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Perhaps not! There's a famous blogpost that claims that rooftop solar panels are about ten times more deadly than nuclear power stations, because people might

Perhaps not! There's a famous blogpost that claims that rooftop solar panels are about ten times more deadly than nuclear power stations, because people might fall off the roof when installing them: https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2008/03/deaths-per-twh-for-all-energy-sources.html https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2008/03/deaths-per-twh-for-all...

erAck 8y ago
With the difference that one person dropping dead from a roof hurts one family, a nuclear plant going off spoils a huge area for generations.
- StavrosK 8y ago
  Which would make sense if one person fell off a roof for each exploded plant, but the ratio is a tiny bit bigger than that.
  - erAck 8y ago
    So we need 4400 persons falling off a roof to be par with nuclear power plants. I still consider this ratio a much better outcome than a power plant going off anywhere near (radius to be defined in Mm depending on wind direction).
    - StavrosK 8y ago
      How? There has been a handful of nuclear plant accidents ever, but hundreds of thousands of people work on roofs every year worldwide to install solar panels.
      - philipkglass 8y ago
        As far as I can tell, the original pro-nuclear "deaths per TWh" calculation, and follow-up work, neglects mundane industrial accidents that occur during the construction and operation of nuclear power plants. Only incidents involving unplanned radiation exposure are counted. But these same kinds of mundane accidents do get counted in the numbers for renewable energy. Further, as I note in another comment, the solar PV numbers neglect that more TWh come from solar farms than from rooftop solar installations, and that constructing solar farms is safer (lower risk of fatal falls). The methodological difference isn't significant if you just want to highlight how dangerous the fossil fuel status quo is compared to non-combustion options. But if you want to compare deaths-from-renewables vs. deaths-from-nuclear, it doesn't make sense to omit the mundane accidents from just one side of the balance sheet. As an example of "mundane" nuclear deaths, 6 workers have been killed at the Surry Nuclear Plant. 2 were fatally scalded by an accidental steam release in 1972. 4 were killed by a steam explosion in 1986. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surry_Nuclear_Power_Plant#Events https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surry_Nuclear_Power_Plant#Even... 5 Japanese workers were killed by a 2004 steam accident at Mihama-3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mihama_Nuclear_Power_Plant#2004_accident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mihama_Nuclear_Power_Plant#200... Falling equipment killed a worker at Arkansas One in 2013. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkansas_Nuclear_One#March_2013_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkansas_Nuclear_One#March_201...
  - gpderetta 8y ago
    People don't risk falling off scaffoldings when building and maintaining nuclear power plants?
    - StavrosK 8y ago
      OSHA is much more vigilant in power plants than on random roofs.
philipkglass 8y ago
The majority of American PV generation is from ground mounted solar farms, not rooftop systems. I have looked many times for statistics about worker mortality in solar farm construction, sadly to no avail. I believe that deaths-per-TWh is significantly lower for solar farms. Dangerous falls are much less common during the construction of large farms and panels in farms tend to be more productive than those mounted on rooftops. In California, for example, distributed rooftop solar installations generated 10.7 TWh in 2017 while solar farms generated 23.1 TWh. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_California#Generation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_California#Gene...
starbeast 8y ago
I wonder how the figures change if you require solar in the first place? Presumably, if solar was required by planning regulations (where sane), for new-build or major roof repairs, the installation risk could then be nearly eliminated as an extra factor, given you are going to have the problem of putting a new roof on anyway.
- leereeves 8y ago
  It would still take extra time or extra people to install solar alongside other work on the roof, and thus create extra risk.
  - starbeast 8y ago
    Depends on how you are doing it. If the solar is also your roof surface it isn't an extra job, it is just a materials choice. edit - also, given how much risk there is in the prep and teardown for scaffolding, combining roof jobs will generally reduce the overall risk a lot, even if you can't combine tasks any further than that.
mieses 8y ago
solar power produces more waste than nuclear. https://www.energycentral.com/c/ec/are-we-headed-solar-waste-crisis https://www.energycentral.com/c/ec/are-we-headed-solar-waste... https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/review-essay/2017-08-15/nuclear-option https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/review-essay/2017-08-...

erAck 8y ago

With the difference that one person dropping dead from a roof hurts one family, a nuclear plant going off spoils a huge area for generations.

StavrosK 8y ago
Which would make sense if one person fell off a roof for each exploded plant, but the ratio is a tiny bit bigger than that.
- erAck 8y ago
  So we need 4400 persons falling off a roof to be par with nuclear power plants. I still consider this ratio a much better outcome than a power plant going off anywhere near (radius to be defined in Mm depending on wind direction).
  - StavrosK 8y ago
    How? There has been a handful of nuclear plant accidents ever, but hundreds of thousands of people work on roofs every year worldwide to install solar panels.
    - philipkglass 8y ago
      As far as I can tell, the original pro-nuclear "deaths per TWh" calculation, and follow-up work, neglects mundane industrial accidents that occur during the construction and operation of nuclear power plants. Only incidents involving unplanned radiation exposure are counted. But these same kinds of mundane accidents do get counted in the numbers for renewable energy. Further, as I note in another comment, the solar PV numbers neglect that more TWh come from solar farms than from rooftop solar installations, and that constructing solar farms is safer (lower risk of fatal falls). The methodological difference isn't significant if you just want to highlight how dangerous the fossil fuel status quo is compared to non-combustion options. But if you want to compare deaths-from-renewables vs. deaths-from-nuclear, it doesn't make sense to omit the mundane accidents from just one side of the balance sheet. As an example of "mundane" nuclear deaths, 6 workers have been killed at the Surry Nuclear Plant. 2 were fatally scalded by an accidental steam release in 1972. 4 were killed by a steam explosion in 1986. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surry_Nuclear_Power_Plant#Events https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surry_Nuclear_Power_Plant#Even... 5 Japanese workers were killed by a 2004 steam accident at Mihama-3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mihama_Nuclear_Power_Plant#2004_accident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mihama_Nuclear_Power_Plant#200... Falling equipment killed a worker at Arkansas One in 2013. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkansas_Nuclear_One#March_2013_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkansas_Nuclear_One#March_201...
- gpderetta 8y ago
  People don't risk falling off scaffoldings when building and maintaining nuclear power plants?
  - StavrosK 8y ago
    OSHA is much more vigilant in power plants than on random roofs.

philipkglass 8y ago

The majority of American PV generation is from ground mounted solar farms, not rooftop systems. I have looked many times for statistics about worker mortality in solar farm construction, sadly to no avail. I believe that deaths-per-TWh is significantly lower for solar farms. Dangerous falls are much less common during the construction of large farms and panels in farms tend to be more productive than those mounted on rooftops. In California, for example, distributed rooftop solar installations generated 10.7 TWh in 2017 while solar farms generated 23.1 TWh. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_California#Generation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_California#Gene...

starbeast 8y ago

I wonder how the figures change if you require solar in the first place? Presumably, if solar was required by planning regulations (where sane), for new-build or major roof repairs, the installation risk could then be nearly eliminated as an extra factor, given you are going to have the problem of putting a new roof on anyway.

leereeves 8y ago
It would still take extra time or extra people to install solar alongside other work on the roof, and thus create extra risk.
- starbeast 8y ago
  Depends on how you are doing it. If the solar is also your roof surface it isn't an extra job, it is just a materials choice. edit - also, given how much risk there is in the prep and teardown for scaffolding, combining roof jobs will generally reduce the overall risk a lot, even if you can't combine tasks any further than that.

mieses 8y ago

solar power produces more waste than nuclear. https://www.energycentral.com/c/ec/are-we-headed-solar-waste-crisis https://www.energycentral.com/c/ec/are-we-headed-solar-waste... https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/review-essay/2017-08-15/nuclear-option https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/review-essay/2017-08-...