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The worldwide nuclear power industry experiences a meltdown event about every 20 years on average. Not counting the many military nuke plant events, we can see

The worldwide nuclear power industry experiences a meltdown event about every 20 years on average. Not counting the many military nuke plant events, we can see this with the ones that are household names. Three Mile Island >> 1979 Chernobyl >> 1986 Fukushima >> 2011 Since the fundamental problems of nuclear safety have not changed (they can't; it's physics) and, despite promises to the contrary, no "safer" form of nuclear power has emerged, it's reasonable to conclude that, for as long as BWR and PWR nuke plants exist (today's technologies), we'll continue to see Maximum Credible Accidents (the industry's term) at the same rate. Molten salt reactors, for those who propose that technology, actually have a worse safety record which is why they're not used commercially anywhere. Fusion, according to the industry's own reports, is "just around the corner." The problem is that, for 50 years, it's always been just around the corner. Until today's nuke plants are shuttered, we'll continue to live with not only the threats but the reality of meltdowns on a predictable, repeating schedule.

pstuart 8y ago
For those hipster LFTR fans, care to elucidate on the "less safe" part?
trivenge 8y ago
What about thorium reactors?
- reallydude 8y ago
  Worse than Molten Salt - https://www.energycentral.com/c/ec/thorium-vs-molten-salt-reactor https://www.energycentral.com/c/ec/thorium-vs-molten-salt-re...
mhh__ 8y ago
Is nuclear power worse than alternatives at comparable scale? I'd much rather have a one meltdown - globally - every x years than have coal power dominate for example
- mimixco 8y ago
  First of all, you already have coal power dominating. Coal and oil energy together have provided a greater rise in standard of living for more people than any other discovery in human history. You would definitely not want to go back to life before coal power. Secondly, nuclear power at scale is simply not possible. There isn't enough uranium in the world to provide all the baseload power currently generated by coal. Nuclear plants take decades to build and are uneconomic to maintain. It is unlikely that the US will build even one more plant since there is only one under construction now and it's facing cancellation. All other proposed plants in the US that were approved or under construction have been cancelled. Even with the small amount of nuclear we have, the environment still suffers from the incredibly toxic acts of mining and processing uranium into fuel pellets. The waste created by nuclear power plants has a 270,000 year half-life. A single particle of plutonium, if ingested, is enough to cause cancer. There is no safe level of radiation exposure and it's simply irresponsible to keep generating this kind of waste when most of it is literally sitting around in swimming pools (on nuke plant sites) because it has to be kept cool and we haven't figured out anything better to do with it.
  - tropo 8y ago
    This is alarmist and mostly wrong. There is enough uranium for two reasons. First, we can recover 95% of the uranium in a fuel rod via reprocessing. Second, supplies change according to market demand, as happened with oil. Remember, we were to have run out of oil by now, but that sure didn't happen. Nuclear plants do not need to take decades or be uneconomic. This is self-inflicted due to political opposition, largely by an insane regulatory agency (won't discuss preliminary designs, gives only a yes/no on final plans) and the very same lawsuits that make every big project a mess in the USA. Having a long half-life means that the substance is not a problem. The longer the half-life, the less radioactive something is. An extreme example is tungsten, an element for which we recently observed radioactive decay and thus finally proved that it is in fact radioactive. A single particle of plutonium, if injested, will almost certainly do you no harm. You face a far greater radioactive risk from the common banana, which is laced with radioactive phosphorus. We have figured out what to do. First we reprocess the spent fuel rods, recovering about 95% of the fuel for making new fuel rods. (Japan does this) Next we bury the remainder in Nevada, for example in the already-contaminated underground test sites.

pstuart 8y ago

For those hipster LFTR fans, care to elucidate on the "less safe" part?

trivenge 8y ago

What about thorium reactors?

reallydude 8y ago
Worse than Molten Salt - https://www.energycentral.com/c/ec/thorium-vs-molten-salt-reactor https://www.energycentral.com/c/ec/thorium-vs-molten-salt-re...

mhh__ 8y ago

Is nuclear power worse than alternatives at comparable scale? I'd much rather have a one meltdown - globally - every x years than have coal power dominate for example

mimixco 8y ago
First of all, you already have coal power dominating. Coal and oil energy together have provided a greater rise in standard of living for more people than any other discovery in human history. You would definitely not want to go back to life before coal power. Secondly, nuclear power at scale is simply not possible. There isn't enough uranium in the world to provide all the baseload power currently generated by coal. Nuclear plants take decades to build and are uneconomic to maintain. It is unlikely that the US will build even one more plant since there is only one under construction now and it's facing cancellation. All other proposed plants in the US that were approved or under construction have been cancelled. Even with the small amount of nuclear we have, the environment still suffers from the incredibly toxic acts of mining and processing uranium into fuel pellets. The waste created by nuclear power plants has a 270,000 year half-life. A single particle of plutonium, if ingested, is enough to cause cancer. There is no safe level of radiation exposure and it's simply irresponsible to keep generating this kind of waste when most of it is literally sitting around in swimming pools (on nuke plant sites) because it has to be kept cool and we haven't figured out anything better to do with it.
- tropo 8y ago
  This is alarmist and mostly wrong. There is enough uranium for two reasons. First, we can recover 95% of the uranium in a fuel rod via reprocessing. Second, supplies change according to market demand, as happened with oil. Remember, we were to have run out of oil by now, but that sure didn't happen. Nuclear plants do not need to take decades or be uneconomic. This is self-inflicted due to political opposition, largely by an insane regulatory agency (won't discuss preliminary designs, gives only a yes/no on final plans) and the very same lawsuits that make every big project a mess in the USA. Having a long half-life means that the substance is not a problem. The longer the half-life, the less radioactive something is. An extreme example is tungsten, an element for which we recently observed radioactive decay and thus finally proved that it is in fact radioactive. A single particle of plutonium, if injested, will almost certainly do you no harm. You face a far greater radioactive risk from the common banana, which is laced with radioactive phosphorus. We have figured out what to do. First we reprocess the spent fuel rods, recovering about 95% of the fuel for making new fuel rods. (Japan does this) Next we bury the remainder in Nevada, for example in the already-contaminated underground test sites.