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Number of casualties from nuclear plant accidents: a few thousands. Number of casualties from coal mining accidents this past century [2]: 100,000. That's acc

Number of casualties from nuclear plant accidents: a few thousands. Number of casualties from coal mining accidents this past century [2]: 100,000. That's accidents in coal mines alone, not even counting lung diseases and similar. The fact that it takes a 9.0 tsunami after forty years of complete absence of nuclear accidents to bring this to the front page should be indication enough that nuclear is not just safer than most of the other energy production techniques, it's also the one that has the highest energy rendering. Any Green voter who's done their homework should be voting for more energy to be generated by nuclear plants, not less. [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_mining http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_mining

lispm 16y ago
I vote for neither.
- asharp 16y ago
  What would you suggest? Keeping in mind that basically all renewable sources sans hydroelectric can't be used to provide baseload power and hydroelectric power both has very few potential locations (most of which are in use) and has the nasty failure condition of washing away a good portion of the countryside.
  - Ratfish 16y ago
    I know it's easy to suggest as a New Zealander (lots of mountains, lots of rain, and not that many people), but that hydro you mention is ace, wish all our power came from it.
    - ctman 16y ago
      Dams aren't impervious to killing lots of people either: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vajont_Dam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vajont_Dam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam 2 incidents in 15 years: 175,000+ killed. Plus they emit methane in huge quantities (from the decay of plant materiel in the reservoir) I would bet that for New Zealand the best form of energy would be geothermal even though the long-term effect studies around cooling the earth's crust are lacking.
  - adrianN 16y ago
    Solar thermal with molten salt heat storage might be a viable baseload alternative.
    - kalleboo 16y ago
      As someone who lives in a country where half the year it's -10℃ with 2 hours of sunlight (zero hours if it's cloudy), I'd have to say it's not quite viable.
      - lispm 16y ago
        Most of the world's population is in more sunny areas.
    - asharp 16y ago
      It still has the same problem that you can't "turn them up" to cope with higher demand over longish periods, which makes dealing with them tricky. They are a good step though.
  - lispm 16y ago
    So, if all you know is hydro-electric, why not use it NOW? Germany is building two large underwater power lines in the latest HVDC technology to Norway. One is described here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NorGer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NorGer NorGer is one, NORD.LINK the other. These power lines will link Germany with Hydro electric power in Norway. Essentially technology like that will provide the base load for the huge offshore wind farms that Germany will build in the coming decades in the North Sea. Alpha Ventus http://www.alpha-ventus.de/ http://www.alpha-ventus.de/ is the first one of those. These are really far away from the coast and sitting in the North Sea exposed to the most severe weather conditions. It is just that a country needs to have a plan and a will to do it. You can imagine that the nuclear lobby does not like this project to get hydro-electric power from Norway at all. They are doing everything to delay it. Corrupt politicians like those from the FDP (Brüderle) are their puppets. Actually there are more alternatives and base load is not the same all the time. If you have a large grid distributing wind generated electricity from a large area, that provides part of the base load for most of the days of the year.
Ratfish 16y ago
"forty years of complete absence of nuclear accidents"? The same Wikipedia has a fairly large section on accidents at nuclear power plants, stating "worldwide there have been 99 accidents at nuclear power plants from 1952 to 2009 (defined as incidents that either resulted in the loss of human life or more than US$50,000 of property damage, the amount the US federal government uses to define major energy accidents that must be reported), totaling US$20.5 billion in property damages.[4] Fifty-seven accidents have occurred since the Chernobyl disaster, and almost two-thirds (56 out of 99) of all nuclear-related accidents have occurred in the USA." On a brighter note however, "There have been comparatively few fatalities associated with nuclear power plant accidents"
gnosis 16y ago
"Nearly one million people around the world died from exposure to radiation released by the 1986 nuclear disaster at the Chernobyl reactor, finds a new book from the New York Academy of Sciences published today on the 24th anniversary of the meltdown at the Soviet facility." http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/04/26 http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/04/26 Excerpts of the book here: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.2009.1181.issue-1/issuetoc http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.2009.1181.is...
- pella 16y ago
  full book: Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment: (PDF; 4,3 MB) http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl:_Consequences_of_the_Catastrophe_for_People_and_the_Environment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl:_Consequences_of_the_...
Tichy 16y ago
Your Wikipedia article also says that in China, 1000 times more people die while mining (per "coal unit") than in the US (China produces twice the coal of the US, 6000 deaths/year in China va 28/year US). So throwing numbers around like you do is dishonest. 28 deaths is still too many, but it is a big difference to the sob story you present.
billybob 16y ago
Doesn't uranium get mined? How safe is that?
- Groxx 16y ago
  It takes a few orders of magnitude less ore to power a nuclear plant for X time periods than it takes to power a coal plant. Even if they're equivalent in danger, you're still comparing whales and minnows.
gaspard 16y ago
You guys keep amazing me. Do you forget that nuclear plants produce tons of waste that has to be kept far away from any life form for thousands of years ? Do you know any written language or sign or whatever that is 10'000 years old and which human people can understand and use cautiously ? Nuclear waste is going to be the worst legacy we give to our children and grandchildren. They will hate us for this. And, even if the waste is going to give trouble (and to cost) people in the future, these same people handling our radioactive waste won't have any fuel left: Toxic waste is forever, fuel is for 50 years. Doesn't that look dumb to you ? [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste#Fuel_composition_and_long_term_radioactivityhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste#Nuclear_fuel_cycle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste#Fuel_composit...
- pdonis 16y ago
  Follow the link in the Wikipedia page to the article on reprocessing. It solves both of the issues you raise: it greatly extends the time the fuel lasts, and it greatly shortens the time that the remaining waste is dangerous. The only reason this was even an issue in the US (it isn't in other nuclear-using countries) is that the Carter administration banned reprocessing because of misplaced concerns about proliferation. In March 1999 the Clinton administration finally reversed that position (probably because it was obvious by then that reprocessing didn't increase proliferation risk--every other nuclear-using country has reprocessed its fuel from the beginning and there have been no incidents). So we can just take all the stuff that was supposed to be stored in Yucca Mountain for 10,000 years and reprocess it instead. Problem solved.
  - gaspard 16y ago
    I don't believe reprocessing means "no waste" but anyway, that's just half of the problem: what will we do in 50 years ? And how do you reprocess the lives of the 200'000 people who had to leave after the nuclear accident in Tchernobyl alone ? Tell the fishermen by Fukushima to go reprocess their lives because some over-confident engineers thought they mastered what they were doing. Nuclear power is just like the "green revolution": pure megalomania by people too afraid to consider alternatives like... a less power greedy way of living.

lispm 16y ago

I vote for neither.

asharp 16y ago
What would you suggest? Keeping in mind that basically all renewable sources sans hydroelectric can't be used to provide baseload power and hydroelectric power both has very few potential locations (most of which are in use) and has the nasty failure condition of washing away a good portion of the countryside.
- Ratfish 16y ago
  I know it's easy to suggest as a New Zealander (lots of mountains, lots of rain, and not that many people), but that hydro you mention is ace, wish all our power came from it.
  - ctman 16y ago
    Dams aren't impervious to killing lots of people either: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vajont_Dam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vajont_Dam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam 2 incidents in 15 years: 175,000+ killed. Plus they emit methane in huge quantities (from the decay of plant materiel in the reservoir) I would bet that for New Zealand the best form of energy would be geothermal even though the long-term effect studies around cooling the earth's crust are lacking.
- adrianN 16y ago
  Solar thermal with molten salt heat storage might be a viable baseload alternative.
  - kalleboo 16y ago
    As someone who lives in a country where half the year it's -10℃ with 2 hours of sunlight (zero hours if it's cloudy), I'd have to say it's not quite viable.
    - lispm 16y ago
      Most of the world's population is in more sunny areas.
  - asharp 16y ago
    It still has the same problem that you can't "turn them up" to cope with higher demand over longish periods, which makes dealing with them tricky. They are a good step though.
- lispm 16y ago
  So, if all you know is hydro-electric, why not use it NOW? Germany is building two large underwater power lines in the latest HVDC technology to Norway. One is described here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NorGer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NorGer NorGer is one, NORD.LINK the other. These power lines will link Germany with Hydro electric power in Norway. Essentially technology like that will provide the base load for the huge offshore wind farms that Germany will build in the coming decades in the North Sea. Alpha Ventus http://www.alpha-ventus.de/ http://www.alpha-ventus.de/ is the first one of those. These are really far away from the coast and sitting in the North Sea exposed to the most severe weather conditions. It is just that a country needs to have a plan and a will to do it. You can imagine that the nuclear lobby does not like this project to get hydro-electric power from Norway at all. They are doing everything to delay it. Corrupt politicians like those from the FDP (Brüderle) are their puppets. Actually there are more alternatives and base load is not the same all the time. If you have a large grid distributing wind generated electricity from a large area, that provides part of the base load for most of the days of the year.

Ratfish 16y ago

"forty years of complete absence of nuclear accidents"? The same Wikipedia has a fairly large section on accidents at nuclear power plants, stating "worldwide there have been 99 accidents at nuclear power plants from 1952 to 2009 (defined as incidents that either resulted in the loss of human life or more than US$50,000 of property damage, the amount the US federal government uses to define major energy accidents that must be reported), totaling US$20.5 billion in property damages.[4] Fifty-seven accidents have occurred since the Chernobyl disaster, and almost two-thirds (56 out of 99) of all nuclear-related accidents have occurred in the USA." On a brighter note however, "There have been comparatively few fatalities associated with nuclear power plant accidents"

gnosis 16y ago

"Nearly one million people around the world died from exposure to radiation released by the 1986 nuclear disaster at the Chernobyl reactor, finds a new book from the New York Academy of Sciences published today on the 24th anniversary of the meltdown at the Soviet facility." http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/04/26 http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/04/26 Excerpts of the book here: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.2009.1181.issue-1/issuetoc http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nyas.2009.1181.is...

pella 16y ago
full book: Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment: (PDF; 4,3 MB) http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl:_Consequences_of_the_Catastrophe_for_People_and_the_Environment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl:_Consequences_of_the_...

Tichy 16y ago

Your Wikipedia article also says that in China, 1000 times more people die while mining (per "coal unit") than in the US (China produces twice the coal of the US, 6000 deaths/year in China va 28/year US). So throwing numbers around like you do is dishonest. 28 deaths is still too many, but it is a big difference to the sob story you present.

billybob 16y ago

Doesn't uranium get mined? How safe is that?

Groxx 16y ago
It takes a few orders of magnitude less ore to power a nuclear plant for X time periods than it takes to power a coal plant. Even if they're equivalent in danger, you're still comparing whales and minnows.

gaspard 16y ago

You guys keep amazing me. Do you forget that nuclear plants produce tons of waste that has to be kept far away from any life form for thousands of years ? Do you know any written language or sign or whatever that is 10'000 years old and which human people can understand and use cautiously ? Nuclear waste is going to be the worst legacy we give to our children and grandchildren. They will hate us for this. And, even if the waste is going to give trouble (and to cost) people in the future, these same people handling our radioactive waste won't have any fuel left: Toxic waste is forever, fuel is for 50 years. Doesn't that look dumb to you ? [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste#Fuel_composition_and_long_term_radioactivityhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste#Nuclear_fuel_cycle http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste#Fuel_composit...

pdonis 16y ago
Follow the link in the Wikipedia page to the article on reprocessing. It solves both of the issues you raise: it greatly extends the time the fuel lasts, and it greatly shortens the time that the remaining waste is dangerous. The only reason this was even an issue in the US (it isn't in other nuclear-using countries) is that the Carter administration banned reprocessing because of misplaced concerns about proliferation. In March 1999 the Clinton administration finally reversed that position (probably because it was obvious by then that reprocessing didn't increase proliferation risk--every other nuclear-using country has reprocessed its fuel from the beginning and there have been no incidents). So we can just take all the stuff that was supposed to be stored in Yucca Mountain for 10,000 years and reprocess it instead. Problem solved.
- gaspard 16y ago
  I don't believe reprocessing means "no waste" but anyway, that's just half of the problem: what will we do in 50 years ? And how do you reprocess the lives of the 200'000 people who had to leave after the nuclear accident in Tchernobyl alone ? Tell the fishermen by Fukushima to go reprocess their lives because some over-confident engineers thought they mastered what they were doing. Nuclear power is just like the "green revolution": pure megalomania by people too afraid to consider alternatives like... a less power greedy way of living.