> For all those accidents there is no consensus about the long-term impact on health and the environment. Chernobyl's victims scientific evaluations range from

> For all those accidents there is no consensus about the long-term impact on health and the environment. Chernobyl's victims scientific evaluations range from "a few hundred" to "nearly 1 million", with many intermediate values (4000, 19000, 60000...) This is like saying there is no consensus about climate change. You will always find nuts on each end. Some claim humanity will go extinct around 2030-2040, and some say climate change does not happen or if it does, it is mostly beneficial. If we cut away the crazy people on either end, the last three scenarios you listed (4000, 19000, 60000) represent the "mainstream" estimates. Regardless of which of those you use, Nuclear power in aggregate come out as remarkably safe per GWh. > At Fukushima cleaning-up (its efficiency is disputed) and compensations amount to hundreds of billions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_disaster_cleanup#Cos https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_disaster_cleanup#Cos... Japanese response was irrational. There are areas on earth where natural background radiation is higher than what they were "cleaning up". > Nobody here advocates coal! Up until today, the only real alternative to nuclear has been fossil fuels, and for a long time, primarily coal. Maybe that will change in the future (you seem to think so), but since Chernobyl until today, lack of investment in Nuclear has certainly been made up for primarily by coal. (Some of the development in wind and solar would have happened anyway.) >> Nuclear waste ranges > I don't see any kinds of existential dangers after 300-500 years > No, for example if this waste reaches a water table... That's pretty unlikely if the mine is deep enough. It's not like one would bury it in the sands under the beaches of Denmark. Anyway, even after such a time period, the dilution that will happen in such a case means that the polution from such an event would be marginal. Say it gets burried in the bedrocks of central Scandinavia, which has been geologically stable for billions of years, you're pretty safe. > That's some touted for Asse II https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asse_II_mine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asse_II_mine That wiki page mentions low- and medium grade waste, I don't see high grade waste mentioned. Also, 100Bq/l is not really scary, unless you use it directly for drinking water, before it is diluted. This is the thing about radioactivity, most people don't know the difference between 100Bq/g, 100Bq/l and 100Bq/m^3. And this is a worst case similar to Chernobyl, from the early days of Nuclear. > Moreover this is also tied to ethic standpoint: do we have the right to let such bad stuff to future generations (and yes, this also applies to fossil fuels)? This applies to almost everything we do, from plastics to various chemicals DNA modifications and so on. Not to speak of existential dangers, such as nuclear war, technological singularity, gray goo, etc. Imagine a world where humanity has already used up all economically available fissile materials as fuel. Maybe we can stop being scared about nuclear war? One could argue that it is our responsibility to make that happen. > Yes, multiple factors. One being that what was deemed adequate safety-wise isn't anymore, leading to new costs. Obviously paranoia, resulting from anti-nuclear scare-mongering. ;) But this is not the only factor. Even between reactors of the same nominal security class, there is huge variation in cost. I would claim this is due to poor execution, corruption, political medelling, etc. > Thanks to nuclear? This is impossible, as France doesn't hope to have more than 3 new reactors by 2040. France may keep up because it also deploys renewables, but using only nuclear will set it way back. My bet is that France will have lower per capita greenhouse gas emissions than Germany in 2032 and possibly all the way to 2040. Due in part to nuclear, in part to "renewables", and where nuclear is the differentiating factor, since Germany will have more "renewables". Again, nuclear and "renewables" are not mutually exclusive, and if France is able to deploy both, it proves that point. > Calculating the amount of reactors it implies then considering the global capacity to build them is taunting. Given the result I doubt simply accepting way lower safety standards will fix the problem, and as noted the NIMBY effect will soar I'm not arguing for lowering safety compared to what is in operation today. Just that maybe, most current plants have shown themselves to be safe enough. (Obviously, no Chernobyl-level plants should be constructed again). So what I'm arguing is that safety levels should be approximately at a Gen3 level, and that modern technology should be aimed at lowering prices instead of improving safety even further. > and as noted the NIMBY effect will soar. Take school (around 12-17 years old) children on school trips to places of high air polution, show them pictures and videos of what air polution is doing to human and animal health. Let them breathe the air near some old dirty coal plant for a few hours. Then take them to a nuclear plant. Teach about the relative dangers of nuclear and coal, in some visual way. (Ie 1000 corpses dead from lung diseases vs 1 corpse dead from cancer.) Teach about radiation from cosmic rays, radon gas and nuclear plants, and let them understand how radiation from the nuclear plant is going to be less dangerous than the cosmic rays of a single plane trip. Then take them to a windpower plant. Let them listen to the music of the windmills, and maybe allow them to see a few dead birds. This can be done in the very same manner that is used to teach about climate change, polution, etc, and indeed may be part of the same programme. Keep it fact based and within the scientific mainstream. Make them understand why coal that is really, really bad, on every dimension, and that nuclear vs wind power is debatable. Not through propaganda, just by facts and science. Obviously, in ares where the generic population is already heavily anti-nuclear, chances are they will not invest much in nuclear over the next 5-10 years. But in areas where nuclear is partially accepted, eductation through government controlled channels can absolutely be used to move the needle from "mixed" to "accepted". I'm not talking about spreading false propaganda, but rather to spread mainstream scientific knowledge and to (within legal limits) counteract misinformation from fringe special interest groups (whether in the fossile fuel industry or some kind of irrational climate activist group). And every contribution helps. If such an activity can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 10%, this will push back climate change by years or maybe a decade, and we will be that much closer to have fully developed the renewable technolgies needed to make renewables a fully viable approach. (If renewables are able to fully replace nuclear in this role in 2030, then great, if renewables continue to struggle with the stability and capacity issues until 2050 or beyond, having additional nuclear capabilities will postpone the adverse effects of global warming.