7 ms·

> We're decommissioning nuclear at a point in time just before we need it, environmentalists were bought by gas extraction people and Wall St. It’s insane that

> We're decommissioning nuclear at a point in time just before we need it, environmentalists were bought by gas extraction people and Wall St. It’s insane that the environmentalist movement is inadvertently supporting the fossil fuel industry due to their traditional stance on nuclear. Modern civilisation requires reliable base load and nuclear seems like the only viable option which satisfies both the reliability and globally accepted environmentally sustainable goals.

charcircuit 5y ago
>nuclear seems like the only viable option which satisfies both the reliability and globally accepted environmentally sustainable goals. Hydro?
- bottled_poe 5y ago
  Hydro is great, but is very limited in terms of viable locations.
- jimmydorry 5y ago
  Hydro causes massive environment destruction, takes up a large amount of area (typically the most agriculturally productive area at that), and can't just be thrown down anywhere.
willcipriano 5y ago
The environmental movement is 9/10ths feelings, and 1/10th science. A lot of environmentalists just don't like rural people so they do things like rail on and on about pickup trucks whilest on a plane bound for a European vacation. That three eyed fish on the Simpsons probably resulted in thousands of deaths due to the environmental folks choosing coal over nuclear. The goal is good vibes, not results.
- sofixa 5y ago
  > A lot of environmentalists just don't like rural people so they do things like rail on and on about pickup trucks What? I don't think there are many environmentalists who "don't like rural people" and have a problem with pickup trucks used where they're appropriate ( like on a farm). In a country like the US, they're often abused as a suburban vehicle, which is a preposterous waste which deserves railing on against.
  - vkou 5y ago
    The beauty of attacking a caricature of an environmentalist is that you can be as judgemental as you want about a fictional judgemental person. You can then safely lump that caricature in the same bucket as people with actual policy proposals, and ignore the latter outright.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - willcipriano 5y ago
    You may change my view today, but I have yet to meet a person who is passionate about pickup truck use, who will also decry air travel as a similar waste. I'm sure people like that exist, but I bet a lot of them don't use computers.
    - mrguyorama 5y ago
      I'm right here thank you very much
      - alternatetwo 5y ago
        Here as well. I'm even against SUVs which are the environmentally unfriendly car of choice here in Germany.
        willcipriano 5y ago
        I applaud all of you for consistency in your opinions. I don't do either myself if it matters. (This applies to the sibling comments as well)
- Aloha 5y ago
  I don't disagree really. They focus on ideal outcomes over what we can realistically accomplish - I've had plenty of discussions where people just ignore the trillions in infrastructure we have baked into steel and concrete, as well as people habits and lifestyle - folks honestly seem to think that with enough political will you can just turn all of that off in 2-5 years. As with everything in society, we didn't get here overnight, and turning a vast ship takes time.
  - tormeh 5y ago
    It would be super easy to turn off all fossil fuels. Just flick the switch and make do with what electricity generation is left. The question is just how much we're willing to pay. Taking most of civilization offline is a bit much to ask, obviously, so flicking the switch is off the table. That said, we could probably do it in less than 5 years of wartime effort.
    - Aloha 5y ago
      You made my point for me.
- KerrAvon 5y ago
- mkoubaa 5y ago
  I would gladly join a more scientific environmental movement but I haven't found one. And I looked
- floor2 5y ago
  This is just a completely imaginary attack on people you oppose. A textbook example of a "strawman argument". The problems of pollution, climate change, etc are real. The science is clear. Please don't make up an imaginary bad actor who has bad motivations for why they want to solve or improve some of these problems. This is a rhetoric device designed to distract people from the problems and solutions by getting them to dislike, distrust or hate the people trying to help.
- bamboozled 5y ago
  Sorry but this is one of the least productive and silliest comments I’ve seen on here for a long time…
Maursault 5y ago
> It’s insane that the environmentalist movement is inadvertently supporting the fossil fuel industry due to their traditional stance on nuclear. The environmentalist movement, anti-nuke section, had little to nothing to do with the downfall of nuclear power. It was always and only economics, nothing else contributed to this. Nuclear is very complicated and thus very expensive, and this has nothing to do with regulations. Everything about generating power from nuclear is just expensive. If there was any opportunity to turn a profit with nuclear power, and I mean even the slightest margin of profit, you could not keep investors away, nor prevent nuclear power plants being built in every county in the country. There is a false narrative that supporters of nuclear energy seem to insist on perpetuating, which is that if the idiots would stop being so irrationally afraid of nuclear, we could have cheap, clean energy. This is a completely false position. The scardies have nothing to do with it. It is all and only economics that is killing nuclear power, and nothing else whatsoever enters into it.
- cableshaft 5y ago
  Yep. Seems to be just a convenient excuse to hate on environmentalists, when nuclear power is just too damn expensive (and also takes too long to build), especially today when there are cheaper alternatives. I was all for nuclear power myself before I started seeing how infeasible it was to get us to carbon neutral with them. I'm still fine with any new nuclear power plants that want to be built but it looks like pretty much no one wants to invest in them anymore anyway. "The cost of generating solar power ranges from $36 to $44 per megawatt hour (MWh), the WNISR said, while onshore wind power comes in at $29–$56 per MWh. Nuclear energy costs between $112 and $189." "Capital flows reflect that trend. In 2018, China invested $91 billion in renewables but just $6.5 billion in nuclear."[1] "Nuclear power plant construction costs—mainly materials, labor, and engineering—rose by 185 percent between 2000 and 2007. More recently, costs have been increasing even faster: In mid-March, Progress Energy informed state regulators that the twin 1,100 MW nuclear plants it intends to build in Florida would cost $14 billion, which “triples estimates the utility offered little more than a year ago.” Jim Harding, former direc tor of power planning and forecasting for Seattle City Light, estimates that nuclear plants constructed today would provide electricity at between 12 and 17 cents per kilowatt-hour. To put this cost into perspective, the average U.S. electricity price in 2006 was 8.9 cents per kWh, and well-placed wind turbines can produce electricity for less than 5 cents per kWh."[2] "Study claims that investment in a new 1GW nuclear power plant leads to average losses of approximately 4.8 billion euros." [3] [1]: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-energy-nuclearpower/nuclear-energy-too-slow-too-expensive-to-save-climate-report-idUSKBN1W909J https://www.reuters.com/article/us-energy-nuclearpower/nucle... [2]: https://www.americanprogress.org/article/10-reasons-not-to-invest-in-nuclear-energy/ https://www.americanprogress.org/article/10-reasons-not-to-i... [3]: https://www.pv-magazine.com/2019/07/24/nuclear-a-poor-investment-strategy-for-clean-energy/ https://www.pv-magazine.com/2019/07/24/nuclear-a-poor-invest...
Melatonic 5y ago
I hear people say this but I also almost never meet environmentalists who are super against nuclear power. Most will say they of course prefer something extra clean like solar or geothermal but nuclear is usually the sort of middle of the road option in those circles. And many of the less idealistic I have met also think it is our only real solution.

charcircuit 5y ago

>nuclear seems like the only viable option which satisfies both the reliability and globally accepted environmentally sustainable goals. Hydro?

bottled_poe 5y ago
Hydro is great, but is very limited in terms of viable locations.
jimmydorry 5y ago
Hydro causes massive environment destruction, takes up a large amount of area (typically the most agriculturally productive area at that), and can't just be thrown down anywhere.

willcipriano 5y ago

The environmental movement is 9/10ths feelings, and 1/10th science. A lot of environmentalists just don't like rural people so they do things like rail on and on about pickup trucks whilest on a plane bound for a European vacation. That three eyed fish on the Simpsons probably resulted in thousands of deaths due to the environmental folks choosing coal over nuclear. The goal is good vibes, not results.

sofixa 5y ago
> A lot of environmentalists just don't like rural people so they do things like rail on and on about pickup trucks What? I don't think there are many environmentalists who "don't like rural people" and have a problem with pickup trucks used where they're appropriate ( like on a farm). In a country like the US, they're often abused as a suburban vehicle, which is a preposterous waste which deserves railing on against.
- vkou 5y ago
  The beauty of attacking a caricature of an environmentalist is that you can be as judgemental as you want about a fictional judgemental person. You can then safely lump that caricature in the same bucket as people with actual policy proposals, and ignore the latter outright.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- willcipriano 5y ago
  You may change my view today, but I have yet to meet a person who is passionate about pickup truck use, who will also decry air travel as a similar waste. I'm sure people like that exist, but I bet a lot of them don't use computers.
  - mrguyorama 5y ago
    I'm right here thank you very much
    - alternatetwo 5y ago
      Here as well. I'm even against SUVs which are the environmentally unfriendly car of choice here in Germany.
      - willcipriano 5y ago
        I applaud all of you for consistency in your opinions. I don't do either myself if it matters. (This applies to the sibling comments as well)
Aloha 5y ago
I don't disagree really. They focus on ideal outcomes over what we can realistically accomplish - I've had plenty of discussions where people just ignore the trillions in infrastructure we have baked into steel and concrete, as well as people habits and lifestyle - folks honestly seem to think that with enough political will you can just turn all of that off in 2-5 years. As with everything in society, we didn't get here overnight, and turning a vast ship takes time.
- tormeh 5y ago
  It would be super easy to turn off all fossil fuels. Just flick the switch and make do with what electricity generation is left. The question is just how much we're willing to pay. Taking most of civilization offline is a bit much to ask, obviously, so flicking the switch is off the table. That said, we could probably do it in less than 5 years of wartime effort.
  - Aloha 5y ago
    You made my point for me.
KerrAvon 5y ago
mkoubaa 5y ago
I would gladly join a more scientific environmental movement but I haven't found one. And I looked
floor2 5y ago
This is just a completely imaginary attack on people you oppose. A textbook example of a "strawman argument". The problems of pollution, climate change, etc are real. The science is clear. Please don't make up an imaginary bad actor who has bad motivations for why they want to solve or improve some of these problems. This is a rhetoric device designed to distract people from the problems and solutions by getting them to dislike, distrust or hate the people trying to help.
bamboozled 5y ago
Sorry but this is one of the least productive and silliest comments I’ve seen on here for a long time…

Maursault 5y ago

> It’s insane that the environmentalist movement is inadvertently supporting the fossil fuel industry due to their traditional stance on nuclear. The environmentalist movement, anti-nuke section, had little to nothing to do with the downfall of nuclear power. It was always and only economics, nothing else contributed to this. Nuclear is very complicated and thus very expensive, and this has nothing to do with regulations. Everything about generating power from nuclear is just expensive. If there was any opportunity to turn a profit with nuclear power, and I mean even the slightest margin of profit, you could not keep investors away, nor prevent nuclear power plants being built in every county in the country. There is a false narrative that supporters of nuclear energy seem to insist on perpetuating, which is that if the idiots would stop being so irrationally afraid of nuclear, we could have cheap, clean energy. This is a completely false position. The scardies have nothing to do with it. It is all and only economics that is killing nuclear power, and nothing else whatsoever enters into it.

cableshaft 5y ago
Yep. Seems to be just a convenient excuse to hate on environmentalists, when nuclear power is just too damn expensive (and also takes too long to build), especially today when there are cheaper alternatives. I was all for nuclear power myself before I started seeing how infeasible it was to get us to carbon neutral with them. I'm still fine with any new nuclear power plants that want to be built but it looks like pretty much no one wants to invest in them anymore anyway. "The cost of generating solar power ranges from $36 to $44 per megawatt hour (MWh), the WNISR said, while onshore wind power comes in at $29–$56 per MWh. Nuclear energy costs between $112 and $189." "Capital flows reflect that trend. In 2018, China invested $91 billion in renewables but just $6.5 billion in nuclear."[1] "Nuclear power plant construction costs—mainly materials, labor, and engineering—rose by 185 percent between 2000 and 2007. More recently, costs have been increasing even faster: In mid-March, Progress Energy informed state regulators that the twin 1,100 MW nuclear plants it intends to build in Florida would cost $14 billion, which “triples estimates the utility offered little more than a year ago.” Jim Harding, former direc tor of power planning and forecasting for Seattle City Light, estimates that nuclear plants constructed today would provide electricity at between 12 and 17 cents per kilowatt-hour. To put this cost into perspective, the average U.S. electricity price in 2006 was 8.9 cents per kWh, and well-placed wind turbines can produce electricity for less than 5 cents per kWh."[2] "Study claims that investment in a new 1GW nuclear power plant leads to average losses of approximately 4.8 billion euros." [3] [1]: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-energy-nuclearpower/nuclear-energy-too-slow-too-expensive-to-save-climate-report-idUSKBN1W909J https://www.reuters.com/article/us-energy-nuclearpower/nucle... [2]: https://www.americanprogress.org/article/10-reasons-not-to-invest-in-nuclear-energy/ https://www.americanprogress.org/article/10-reasons-not-to-i... [3]: https://www.pv-magazine.com/2019/07/24/nuclear-a-poor-investment-strategy-for-clean-energy/ https://www.pv-magazine.com/2019/07/24/nuclear-a-poor-invest...

Melatonic 5y ago

I hear people say this but I also almost never meet environmentalists who are super against nuclear power. Most will say they of course prefer something extra clean like solar or geothermal but nuclear is usually the sort of middle of the road option in those circles. And many of the less idealistic I have met also think it is our only real solution.