5 ms·

> Opposition to Nuclear Power I feel a lot of people think of this as pro or anti, but for me, most of the concern seems to be about nuclear waste and meltdown

by nailer 6y ago

> Opposition to Nuclear Power I feel a lot of people think of this as pro or anti, but for me, most of the concern seems to be about nuclear waste and meltdown, and the half life of nuclear waste is changing, and we have tech where switching the power off stops meltdown. What was true in 1960 isn't true in 2020. I think we'd be better served by asking people what their concerns about nuclear energy are: - Nuclear waste - What is an acceptable half life for nuclear waste? - 10,000 years - 1000 years - 100 years - 10 years - 1 year - No waste is acceptable - Nuclear meltdown - Do you support Nuclear technologies that do not have a risk of meltdown? I have hope that we can work out what people are concerned about and address it. Sometimes that may require further scientific development, but sometimes it may require more dispersal of knowledge.

LatteLazy 6y ago
I won't pretend to speak for everyone but... * 100 (or less) year waste is something we could feasibly deal with. The cost of that needs to be built into the operating costs of the plant. Here in the UK nuclear plants have generally been allowed to take all the profit out and then declare bankruptcy. This dumps billion pound waste problems on the tax payer. * I'm not convinced there really is such a thing as a meltdown proof reactor. This is my primary objection to nuclear. We've had at least 4 generations of reactor that were all 110% safe, impossible to break, triple failure proof until suddenly they weren't. Partly that's because it's really hard to design one. Partly its because operators focused on meeting targets and maximising productivity/bonuses quickly find ways to break them (eg Chernobyl). * You should also consider cost. Nuclear is horrendously expensive even with the big costs (insurance and waste) being borne by government. I think we could spend the same money decarbonising other sectors and get a lot more decarbonisation for the $/€/¥ spent. Personally I think the biggest thing we need are new human social structures that actually value safety and ultra long term management. That would make nuclear safe and viable long term. Its not an engineering problem to me, it's a sociology/economic/political issue. I have zero idea how to solve that. It's probably not possible as current economic and political models tend to seep though any barrier we create...
- orwin 6y ago
  Chernobyl was really different than Fukushima. The design was really poor, and dangerous, it would have been hell to decommission (still is). Yes the human factor was important in the incident, but with a better design, this wouldn't have been such a disaster. Fukushima is a way better example of "what can go wrong will go wrong", and only a perfect team could've prevented the disaster [0]. EPRs are meltdown proof BTW. I still think its useless design, Fukushima meltdown showed us the risk of an unmitigated meltdown, and those risks were predicted in 1980s by french engineers during the second construction wave (that's why they have a third water circuit, and the secondary water circuit is in a loop). [0]https://hbr.org/2014/07/how-the-other-fukushima-plant-survived https://hbr.org/2014/07/how-the-other-fukushima-plant-surviv...
  - LatteLazy 6y ago
    I think in both cases we took designs that promised to be totally impossible to meltdown and then through either incompetence or bad luck melted them down. So how can we KNOW that today's "totally impossible to meltdown" design is not just safe, but safe when run incompetently and during an external disaster? This is the core issue with nuclear: I don't really care about the factory or power station 1km from my house because if it burns down, it will be a small inconvenience to me. But a nuclear plant, even one 50km away, has the potential to kill me. How do you manage that risk? I worry that right now a lot of the push is basically an appeal to authority ("engineers know how to design reactors"). But those same authorieis are undermined by both their source of funding and their historic record. That's the real issue here: we used up our credibility and don't have any left and can't work without it.
    - zapita 6y ago
      Isn’t that holding the nuclear industry to an impossible standard, though? Nuclear plants did become much safer, they just didn’t become perfectly safe. But neither did the oil&gas, aviation or automobile industries. Should we also deem the authority of engineers in those industries to be undermined, because planes and automobiles still crash?
lightgreen 6y ago
Nuclear waste is nonexistent issue. Earth has plenty of inhabitable space where that “waste” can be stored cheaply until it is ready to be processed by the next generation reactors. Take any dry deserts, stockpile it in the middle of it, problem solved. The problem with nuclear waste is not engineering or economic problem, it is voters and commenters ignorance problem.
- fsflover 6y ago
  More details: https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html.
- cratermoon 6y ago
  > inhabitable space Freudian slip? In any case, can you comment on the impact to the essential desert biomes you propose to dig up? What about the cost of safe transport from the power plants to the more remote areas where you say it's safe? How about security to keep out the curious or malicious? What sort of protections would you propose to prevent problems like those at Hanford? https://darrp.noaa.gov/hazardous-waste/hanford-nuclear-site https://darrp.noaa.gov/hazardous-waste/hanford-nuclear-site

by nailer 6y ago

LatteLazy 6y ago

I won't pretend to speak for everyone but... * 100 (or less) year waste is something we could feasibly deal with. The cost of that needs to be built into the operating costs of the plant. Here in the UK nuclear plants have generally been allowed to take all the profit out and then declare bankruptcy. This dumps billion pound waste problems on the tax payer. * I'm not convinced there really is such a thing as a meltdown proof reactor. This is my primary objection to nuclear. We've had at least 4 generations of reactor that were all 110% safe, impossible to break, triple failure proof until suddenly they weren't. Partly that's because it's really hard to design one. Partly its because operators focused on meeting targets and maximising productivity/bonuses quickly find ways to break them (eg Chernobyl). * You should also consider cost. Nuclear is horrendously expensive even with the big costs (insurance and waste) being borne by government. I think we could spend the same money decarbonising other sectors and get a lot more decarbonisation for the $/€/¥ spent. Personally I think the biggest thing we need are new human social structures that actually value safety and ultra long term management. That would make nuclear safe and viable long term. Its not an engineering problem to me, it's a sociology/economic/political issue. I have zero idea how to solve that. It's probably not possible as current economic and political models tend to seep though any barrier we create...

orwin 6y ago
Chernobyl was really different than Fukushima. The design was really poor, and dangerous, it would have been hell to decommission (still is). Yes the human factor was important in the incident, but with a better design, this wouldn't have been such a disaster. Fukushima is a way better example of "what can go wrong will go wrong", and only a perfect team could've prevented the disaster [0]. EPRs are meltdown proof BTW. I still think its useless design, Fukushima meltdown showed us the risk of an unmitigated meltdown, and those risks were predicted in 1980s by french engineers during the second construction wave (that's why they have a third water circuit, and the secondary water circuit is in a loop). [0]https://hbr.org/2014/07/how-the-other-fukushima-plant-survived https://hbr.org/2014/07/how-the-other-fukushima-plant-surviv...
- LatteLazy 6y ago
  I think in both cases we took designs that promised to be totally impossible to meltdown and then through either incompetence or bad luck melted them down. So how can we KNOW that today's "totally impossible to meltdown" design is not just safe, but safe when run incompetently and during an external disaster? This is the core issue with nuclear: I don't really care about the factory or power station 1km from my house because if it burns down, it will be a small inconvenience to me. But a nuclear plant, even one 50km away, has the potential to kill me. How do you manage that risk? I worry that right now a lot of the push is basically an appeal to authority ("engineers know how to design reactors"). But those same authorieis are undermined by both their source of funding and their historic record. That's the real issue here: we used up our credibility and don't have any left and can't work without it.
  - zapita 6y ago
    Isn’t that holding the nuclear industry to an impossible standard, though? Nuclear plants did become much safer, they just didn’t become perfectly safe. But neither did the oil&gas, aviation or automobile industries. Should we also deem the authority of engineers in those industries to be undermined, because planes and automobiles still crash?

lightgreen 6y ago

Nuclear waste is nonexistent issue. Earth has plenty of inhabitable space where that “waste” can be stored cheaply until it is ready to be processed by the next generation reactors. Take any dry deserts, stockpile it in the middle of it, problem solved. The problem with nuclear waste is not engineering or economic problem, it is voters and commenters ignorance problem.

fsflover 6y ago
More details: https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html https://whatisnuclear.com/waste.html.
cratermoon 6y ago
> inhabitable space Freudian slip? In any case, can you comment on the impact to the essential desert biomes you propose to dig up? What about the cost of safe transport from the power plants to the more remote areas where you say it's safe? How about security to keep out the curious or malicious? What sort of protections would you propose to prevent problems like those at Hanford? https://darrp.noaa.gov/hazardous-waste/hanford-nuclear-site https://darrp.noaa.gov/hazardous-waste/hanford-nuclear-site