9 ms·
> My point is that nuclear power is safe, as long as all disaster scenarios are taken into account I don't know if you are old enough to remember it, but that'
by dirkt 8y ago
> My point is that nuclear power is safe, as long as all disaster scenarios are taken into account
I don't know if you are old enough to remember it, but that's exactly what nuclear energy proponents said in the 70s.
Since then, actual experience showed that about every 20 years, there has been a big incident with global impact, and it will take decades if not centuries until the affected area is usable again. And the latter is something that might be tolerable in less densely populated countries or locations (Chernobyl), but in very densely populated ones it would be a major catastrophe.
And so far we've only seen disaster scenarios caused by human error and force of nature, and there's a third one (human malice), which thankfully hasn't happened yet, but which is impossible to guard against.
So my conclusion from reality is that no, we can't make nuclear power completely safe: The consequences of a disaster are too great, the monetary incentives are all wrong (it's not the nuclear companies which pay in case of the disaster, the state takes over; and the costs of the risk are not factored in into the actual running costs; and safety measures are expensive, so economics will always lead to, say, putting the backup generators NOT on the hill, because that would have cost more).
And then there's the problem that in some countries using nuclear energy and producing nuclear waste, the problem of actually storing that waste safely for the next few centuries is still not solved. Even after 50 years of producing it. And that is just insane.
I wish we could make nuclear safe. It would be a great way to reduce carbon emissions. Looking at reality, I can only conclude that we can't, and it's wishful thinking. (Yes, I know, that opinion is not popular, and the nuclear fanboys will be all over me, but so be it).
- kortilla 8y ago>but that's exactly what nuclear energy proponents said in the 70s. And how many plants failed that were built after the 70s? >The consequences of a disaster are too great Even with the disasters, it kills fewer people than coal even without taking into account the damage from global warming. It’s like refusing to fly because plane crashes stick out in memory and then choosing to drive instead, despite how much more unsafe it is.
- asaddhamani 8y agoYes, but what about having to evacuate the area for decades / more to come? And the radioactive waste problem?
- jfnixon 8y agoThe counter risk is having the entire planet rendered uninhabitable for human life, right? Let's see, some area rendered uninhabitable versus the planet rendered uninhabitable... I'm going with A.
- heeen2 8y agoSounds like a false dichotomy to me
- TheOtherHobbes 8y agoThe worst of the lies about nuclear is that it can somehow help create a carbon-neutral economy. Of course it wouldn't. Designing a carbon-neutral economy is a much bigger problem that requires much broader strategic thinking. The levelized cost of renewables is already cheaper than the equivalent for nuclear power, with much smaller capital costs, much faster start-up and build costs, and no concerns about long-lived waste. And the trend lines are clear. There is simply no case for nuclear power now - economic, political, or environmental.
- DennisP 8y agoThe levelized cost of renewables with enough battery storage to make reliable carbon-free power is higher than nuclear, except in areas where lots of hydro or geothermal is available.
- kortilla 8y ago>The levelized cost of renewables is already cheaper than the equivalent for nuclear power, Not if you want electricity when the sun isn’t shining and the wind isn’t blowing. If renewables were competitive for providing constant load, nobody would be having this fucking conversation.
- masonic 8y agoAre you unaware that more nuclear waste enters the environment from burning coal than from all nuclear plant incidents combined?
- asaddhamani 8y agoHow is that?
- roenxi 8y agoWe burn a tiny amount of fuel to get a lot of nuclear energy, and we burn a huge amount of coal to get a lot of thermal energy. You need to consume orders of magnitude more coal than atomic fuel to get the same amount of energy; so the trace elements in coal become a big deal. The radiation from coal isn't even the worst contaminant, you get all sorts of trace elements. Sulphur (causes acid rain around the power plant) leaps to mind, and there are other really nasty impurities. It is hard to understate the tiny, tiny nature of the nuclear waste 'problem'. Storm in a teacup stuff. It is barely an industrial quantity of dangerous material, and the energetic bits are Very Likely to be recyclable as diluted fuel for a more advanced reactor.
- michaelmrose 8y agoPretending nuclear waste isn't an actual problem basically means your entire analysis is disastrously wrong. Consider contributing after doing further analysis.
- roenxi 8y agoIt means my analysis is informed by a working knowledge of how we treat existing risk factors that affect human society. Everything I've seen suggests that in practice the macro-scale threat posed by radioactive material is similar to that posed by lead, but easier to deal with because the volumes are so tiny we can afford to isolate it completely from the biosphere. We produce tiny amounts of waste, I can't find a great source but the numbers seem to be of the order of 10,000 to 100,000 m^3 of material that needs special handling and a much larger quantity that can be scientifically measured to have come from a nuclear plant if you have the right equipment. Those are tiny numbers compared to what industrial processes working with waste have to deal with (for scale, 1 small mine open pit coal mine would move that much material a week). People are trying to protect the world from smaller risks than the environment already faces. It isn't rational, and it isn't very clever either. The volume of the problem is truly tiny compared to stuff we just walk on by as a society.
- andness 8y agoI agree with you that I don't think we can make nuclear safe. But if the choice seems to be between millions of deaths from global warming or thousands of deaths from nuclear, isn't the latter vastly preferable? Shouldn't we set out and build out nuclear to steer us away from the edge, and then worry about better solutions once we're safe? I suspect the reason people don't buy this argument is that they don't truly believe global warming is as bad as they say. We have a history of solving problems in the past, so we'll solve this one too. There's no need to panic.
- michaelmrose 8y agoCan you provide a timeline and justification on "millions of deaths from global warming". Why can't be invest the money in better alternatives and save the same "millions of lives" with actually sustainable tech that doesn't produce what you are describing as "thousands of deaths"
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- theshrike79 8y agoHow much money and time would it take to research battery technology that could put coal and nuclear plants out of business? We know how to build nuclear NOW. Let's do it. We can turn all the plants of the second someone finds out to store terawatts of power produced by renewable means in a cost-effective manner that doesn't rely on some geological anomalies.
- shanemhansen 8y agoI feel like it's bad to talk about safety of nuclear without comparing it to another option. What's the safety of fossil fuels? What bar would have to be met for nuclear to save lives when compared to alternatives? For the most part nuclear falls victim to the same human reasoning flaws that make us more worried about flying on a plane than driving even though driving is way riskier. For more info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_accidents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_accidents
- dirkt 8y agoSeeing the number of "nuclear energy is our saviour, and will solve all our problems, and is the only option" posts on the Internet, yes, the first step is to talk about the safety of nuclear without comparing it to other options. And no, the comparison to plane vs. car is not appropriate: In both kinds of accidents, a number of people get injured or killed. In case of a nuclear accident, a sizeable area becomes inhabitable for centuries. That's on a completely different scale. (And just for the record, I'm neither worried about flying in a plane, nor I am worried about driving a car. I am also not worried that the nuclear power plant near me will explode next.) If we can agree that nuclear is not safe in the long run, and should eventually be abandoned, then we've made progress in the discussion. It's also not "nuclear or coal". That's another thing in those discussions that bugs me. Fossil fuels (not only coal) are not the answer, either: they'll eventually run out, and they contribute to global warming. And comparing them by "counting deaths" and "how many lives can be saved" is completely missing the point. Neither nuclear accidents nor coal usage immediately kill people. And it gets totally ridiculous when people try to argue that "there are accidents during wind power constructions; people have fallen to death. So wind power is mucher more dangerous than both nuclear and coal (if you only count the deaths)." So in the long run, we need alternatives to both nuclear and fossil fuels. If those who say "nuclear is the only solution, it's so great" get the upper hand, we'll never develop those alternatives. And that's the point. As for the short run, I don't really care. If we can efficiently stop global warming by shutting down all coal plantes and keeping the nuclear plants for a few decades, I'm all for it. Though I doubt that will be enough to stop global warming; we must also drastically reduce energy usage; up usage of renewables, redesign the electric grid, and efficient means of storage to it, restart projects like Desertec, etc., etc. There's enough we can do. but arguing "let's just bet everything on nuclear, it's totally safe" is the wrong thing to do.
- MertsA 8y ago>but that's exactly what nuclear energy proponents said in the 70s. And they broke ground at Fukushima in the 60s. We've come a long way in reactor design in 50 years.
- tekknik 8y agoThis is interesting because you blame human error or malice on the failure of a reactor causing a potentially global issue. For about 60 years now we’ve had nuclear powered ships without a single issue (with exception to the russian subs rusting and decaying while waiting for decommissioning). Wouldn’t malice or human error be more of an issue here vs a land based reactor? I think most enemies would rather bring down a military naval ship over a land based reactor unless causing terror is their goal. Either way, the reactors generally manage themselves, get replaced every few years but overall are very stable and safe. Nuclear is here to stay in ships and the potential to irradiate the world is much higher when you’re floating in water.
- runjake 8y agoTack onto this you’ll have eras of better and worse regulation and privatization (with the accompanying emphasis on profit over all else), depending on which parties are in office. I think it’s inevitable you will have bad disasters. The human race is not smart nor mature enough.
- godelski 8y ago> Since then, actual experience showed that about every 20 years That's not really a good metric. What you need to do is a time varying analysis and consider the total number of reactors (globally). Eg. if we hold danger of reactors constant but we increase the number of reactors over time then you'd see disasters being more frequent (but the opposite is true). Alternatively if we hold the number of reactors constant and pretend that all new reactors replace old reactors you can determine if new reactors are more, the same, or less dangerous. But to do a real analysis you have to combine both of these (and some more stuff). Otherwise you're pretty much just saying that the average of the set {1,2,3} is 2. That 20 year thing is a bit contrived and I'm surprised it has popped up a few times.