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> how we deal with the latter, today News and images like this https://www.thelocal.de/20141010/one-third-of-barrels-leak-at-nuclear-waste-site-brunsbttel/ htt

> how we deal with the latter, today News and images like this https://www.thelocal.de/20141010/one-third-of-barrels-leak-at-nuclear-waste-site-brunsbttel/ https://www.thelocal.de/20141010/one-third-of-barrels-leak-a... (2014) don't exactly help restore confidence. (If you can't get that to load, here's the same in German https://www.n-tv.de/politik/Loechrige-Atom-Faesser-entdeckt-article5698126.html https://www.n-tv.de/politik/Loechrige-Atom-Faesser-entdeckt-...) Edit to add, the infamous old picture of a loader dumping barrels into a pit in the Asse II salt mine: https://static.dw.com/image/16445664_303.jpg https://static.dw.com/image/16445664_303.jpg - while this happened decades ago, the mine is an ongoing problem that makes the news every year with new leaks or progress of the remediation effort, lack of progress, or predictions of collapse before the remediation can be completed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asse_II_mine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asse_II_mine).

junon 5y ago
From the first article: > “The chambers are secure and there is no danger for the personnel or the local population,” Vattenfall said in a statement released on Thursday I don't see how that has... anything to do with anything. Proper inspection revealed this problem and it's been rectified. Mission accomplished. > the infamous old picture of a loader dumping barrels into a pit in the Asse II salt mine > while this happened decades ago Right, again, I don't see how this is relevant to modern nuclear handling. That's a cleanup effort from poor procedures from decades ago, and it's been pretty well contained. Compare that to the current cleanup efforts of decades of fossil fuel burning, and the effects that has had. I don't see how any of this is an argument against nuclear.
- tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
  The inspections caught it after almost half the barrel was gone from rust. That doesn't inspire confidence. Neither does the way Asse II is being handled currently. People also tend to not believe "no danger" claims - such claims, especially when coming from the companies running those plants, provide very little information, as we have learned that we should expect to hear the same claims even if a reactor core is currently melting its way through the containment (both in Chernobyl and Fukushima, false reassurances were given long after the people in charge knew of the seriousness of the accident). Likewise, officials claim that nothing is leaking from Asse and it is safe, yet there is an unexplained but very significant (p<0.01) increase in various cancers. Even if this was just feelings (and I disagree with that - seeing partial failures that get caught by other layers of a multi-layered safety system does provide information about the risk that one day the "holes in the Swiss cheese" [1] will line up), it explains why people in Germany are so opposed to nuclear. Fukushima was particularly devastating for public trust, because Japan is seen as a developed, industrialized, "orderly" nation, so if it can happen there, it can happen anywhere. Additionally, nuclear power plants in developed countries were portrayed as absolutely safe, so it's a "fool me once, fool me twice" situation. (Since this is usually countered by "they couldn't expect the Tsunami": that just means that when an unexpected event - e.g. a 300 year flood event, as has recently happened in Germany - comes, we should expect a similar outcome and similar attempts from the people in charge to weasel out of the blame. Again, not helpful for trust.) In short, people - me included - don't believe that the plants will be operated to the claimed safety standards. The trust in the industry is gone, and people don't want to take the gamble, even if rationally, it may be the lesser evil than e.g. coal. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_cheese_model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_cheese_model

junon 5y ago

From the first article: > “The chambers are secure and there is no danger for the personnel or the local population,” Vattenfall said in a statement released on Thursday I don't see how that has... anything to do with anything. Proper inspection revealed this problem and it's been rectified. Mission accomplished. > the infamous old picture of a loader dumping barrels into a pit in the Asse II salt mine > while this happened decades ago Right, again, I don't see how this is relevant to modern nuclear handling. That's a cleanup effort from poor procedures from decades ago, and it's been pretty well contained. Compare that to the current cleanup efforts of decades of fossil fuel burning, and the effects that has had. I don't see how any of this is an argument against nuclear.

tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
The inspections caught it after almost half the barrel was gone from rust. That doesn't inspire confidence. Neither does the way Asse II is being handled currently. People also tend to not believe "no danger" claims - such claims, especially when coming from the companies running those plants, provide very little information, as we have learned that we should expect to hear the same claims even if a reactor core is currently melting its way through the containment (both in Chernobyl and Fukushima, false reassurances were given long after the people in charge knew of the seriousness of the accident). Likewise, officials claim that nothing is leaking from Asse and it is safe, yet there is an unexplained but very significant (p<0.01) increase in various cancers. Even if this was just feelings (and I disagree with that - seeing partial failures that get caught by other layers of a multi-layered safety system does provide information about the risk that one day the "holes in the Swiss cheese" [1] will line up), it explains why people in Germany are so opposed to nuclear. Fukushima was particularly devastating for public trust, because Japan is seen as a developed, industrialized, "orderly" nation, so if it can happen there, it can happen anywhere. Additionally, nuclear power plants in developed countries were portrayed as absolutely safe, so it's a "fool me once, fool me twice" situation. (Since this is usually countered by "they couldn't expect the Tsunami": that just means that when an unexpected event - e.g. a 300 year flood event, as has recently happened in Germany - comes, we should expect a similar outcome and similar attempts from the people in charge to weasel out of the blame. Again, not helpful for trust.) In short, people - me included - don't believe that the plants will be operated to the claimed safety standards. The trust in the industry is gone, and people don't want to take the gamble, even if rationally, it may be the lesser evil than e.g. coal. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_cheese_model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_cheese_model