3 ms·
How many major nuclear disasters have there been in the last, say, 50 years? Three mile island and Chernobyl are the two big ones that everyone knows about, and
by sorbus 16y ago
How many major nuclear disasters have there been in the last, say, 50 years? Three mile island and Chernobyl are the two big ones that everyone knows about, and considering that people are saying that this is the third largest [EDIT: actually the second largest, at this point], I take that as an endorsement of nuclear power. As compared with coal, oil, natural gas, and so forth, which function by spewing pollutants into the environment continuously, during normal operation.
Yes, I would be thrilled if we switched entirely to solar, wind, geothermal, and hydroelectric power sources, but nuclear power isn't anywhere near as disastrous as the people strongly against it would like us to believe. It's also not as safe as a lot of people would like to think, but, by and large, it is fairly safe.
- dchest 16y agoHydroelectric? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroelectricity#Ecosystem_damage_and_loss_of_land http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroelectricity#Ecosystem_dama...
- rbanffy 16y agoThe problem with hydro is that you can't build it where you need the power (unless geography - or real estate - is uncannily nice to you) Most of Brazil depends on a single hydro facility with endless miles of aluminum wires crossing the southeast part of the country. If anything serious fails there, the country pretty much stops. Renewables like solar, hydro, biomass, and wind have their place, but you don't generate solar during night, you may want to spare your water during a drought, you may need to eat the biomass and you may have days without wind. Nuclear too has its place. Technology is a tool we should wield with reason, not passion.
- whateverer 16y agoIt should be noted, though, that solar thermal plants can indeed generate electricity during the night, by collecting heat in reservoirs to later produce steam, be them water or molten salt[1] heat reservoirs. [1] http://www.research-in-germany.de/61660/2011-03-08-molten-salts-for-efficient-solar-thermal-plants,sourcePageId=12358.html http://www.research-in-germany.de/61660/2011-03-08-molten-sa...
- jerf 16y agoYou've got a good link there, but the wrong anchor. The anchor you are looking for was #Failure_hazard, and possibly a better link would be http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam#1975_Flood http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam#1975_Flood . 26,000 dead in the flooding and 145,000 dead due to subsequent epidemics. If some of you anti-nuclear types get frustrated that I and others are not rushing out to forswear nuclear forever and ever amen, it's not because we don't understand the risks. It's because we don't ignore a death just because it happened in a non-radioactive flood or a non-radioactive coal mining accident and didn't involve any OMGRadiation!!1!. Nor are deaths caused by nuclear issues magically worse than being killed in a flood or a coal mining accident. Dead is dead. Someone who wants to be seen caring waves around their fashionable concerns and waits for congratulations from their peers; an engineer who wants to care considers the costs and benefits of the whole system, and doesn't simply assume either is zero without evidence. Regardless of how bad this particular crisis may become, it still nets out that people are dying every year because we're too cowardly to look at nuclear head on and use more of it and less of the even-more dangerous other technologies we are using, so that we can feel good about our irrational fear of OMGRadiation!!1!.
- nl 16y agoSmall correction - this current disaster is worse than 3-Mile-Island.