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"The nuclear power is used to take away demand from the power derived from oil & gas." That's not an answer as to what the power is used for. Your claim was th

by Tichy 16y ago

"The nuclear power is used to take away demand from the power derived from oil & gas." That's not an answer as to what the power is used for. Your claim was that the nuclear power is necessary to sustain earth's population. Is that the case or not?

Natsu 16y ago
You appear to be confused. The argument is that power in general (rather than nuclear, specifically) is required to feed the world. I thought that obvious from the part I quoted (i.e. the statement that we could get by with no electricity), but it seems that you misunderstood. Once "nothing" has been eliminated as an option for where we get power from, we move from there to the fact that nuclear is one of the safest options. Reducing our demand for the less safe power sources saves lives, but there are always tradeoffs. Who dies, for example. Probably one of the best things we could do would be to reduce coal usage with an increase in nuclear power. Several thousand people die each year in coal mine accidents alone. But they're mostly poor people in China, so the non-human costs (political, economic, etc.) have so far dominated. The whole point is that we ought to do the best we can to make the most realistic tradeoffs possible and to avoid taking worthwhile options off of the table, especially when the largest risks are political.
- Tichy 16y ago
  No I am not confused - answer the question then, how much power is needed to feed the world, as it seems the most people live in places with bad infrastructure and therefore don't consume that much power after all. You could have answered simply by saying how much power per human is necessary, and give the fraction that is generated with nuclear power. Your claim was after all that we need all the power that is currently generated. It seems unlikely, because as I said, most people are not even in a position to use a lot of power atm. Even if you claim that all their lives could be improved by access to electricity, by the time we could have built nuclear power plants everywhere, it might as well have been possible to reduce the population again. Remember, this is about options: your claim was that there are no other options than nuclear power plants. I am not saying we should reduce population numbers, just that there are certainly other options.

by Tichy 16y ago

Natsu 16y ago

You appear to be confused. The argument is that power in general (rather than nuclear, specifically) is required to feed the world. I thought that obvious from the part I quoted (i.e. the statement that we could get by with no electricity), but it seems that you misunderstood. Once "nothing" has been eliminated as an option for where we get power from, we move from there to the fact that nuclear is one of the safest options. Reducing our demand for the less safe power sources saves lives, but there are always tradeoffs. Who dies, for example. Probably one of the best things we could do would be to reduce coal usage with an increase in nuclear power. Several thousand people die each year in coal mine accidents alone. But they're mostly poor people in China, so the non-human costs (political, economic, etc.) have so far dominated. The whole point is that we ought to do the best we can to make the most realistic tradeoffs possible and to avoid taking worthwhile options off of the table, especially when the largest risks are political.

Tichy 16y ago
No I am not confused - answer the question then, how much power is needed to feed the world, as it seems the most people live in places with bad infrastructure and therefore don't consume that much power after all. You could have answered simply by saying how much power per human is necessary, and give the fraction that is generated with nuclear power. Your claim was after all that we need all the power that is currently generated. It seems unlikely, because as I said, most people are not even in a position to use a lot of power atm. Even if you claim that all their lives could be improved by access to electricity, by the time we could have built nuclear power plants everywhere, it might as well have been possible to reduce the population again. Remember, this is about options: your claim was that there are no other options than nuclear power plants. I am not saying we should reduce population numbers, just that there are certainly other options.