5 ms·

> costs 1 Fukushima is too many, no?

luckylion 4y ago
No. Fukushima is a price I'd gladly pay and I expect every reasonable person to agree. The alternative isn't "no Fukushima", the alternative is hundreds of thousands deaths per year by burning coal. It's just not "one huge bang" so people don't realize it, because understanding abstract dangers is hard.
- aaaaaaaaata 4y ago
  Just improve decentralized energy storage and micro-grids.
- Veedrac 4y ago
  Absolutely. The Fukushima disaster: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster_casualties https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_di... The earthquake: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_T%C5%8Dhoku_earthquake_and_tsunami https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_T%C5%8Dhoku_earthquake_... Zero known fatal injuries out of 20,000 were caused by the reactor. If I've done the math right, a nominally operative coal plant over Fukishima's 40 year lifetime would have caused 5ish deaths. Fukishima did cause a few cases of cancer, but so does nominally operative coal. People can gripe about tail risks from environmental pollution when it's not displacing a worse modal risk. Right now it's unreasonable to. Proliferation risk is concerning; most of the rest is just scale insensitivity.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  Nukes' competition is not coal. It is renewables. Comparing to coal is tendentious and disingenuous, not to say dishonest.
  - ch4s3 4y ago
    Not really m. Something has to provide power when the sun and wind aren’t available. Right now that’s natural gas, coal, hydro, or nuclear.
    - ncmncm 4y ago
      "Right now". Right now all the nuke plants you are talking about don't exist, so produce exactly 0 watts.
      - ch4s3 4y ago
        We’ll there is a good deal in some places.
        ncmncm 4y ago
        For now, until their production cost exceeds alternatives. Then they will be mothballed.
    - pydry 4y ago
      Pumped storage and grid scale batteries provide that at much cheaper cost overall. Nowhere near as much is needed as people think either.
      - ch4s3 4y ago
        Where are grid scale batteries doing that today?
        ncmncm 4y ago
        Before a thing has been built, it needs to be built. Do you need this explained further? The overwhelming bulk of utility storage will not be batteries, because that is the most expensive alternative. Utility storage will be whatever is cheap and locally practical.
        ch4s3 4y ago
        That’s basically what I meant.
        pydry 4y ago
        California, Hawaii, Australia. In hawaii they canceled a proposed inter-island power connector because batteries + solar were just cheaper. Pumped storage is generally a lot more economic and can store a lot more than batteries but it cant be built quite as quickly & is somewhat geographically dependent. It takes 4-5 years to deploy rather than months.
omginternets 4y ago
You should look up the cost (in whatever metric you like: dollars, lives, cancers, etc.) and compare it to coal. Don't forget to normalize, since coal is much more common than nuclear power. The results will likely surprise you.

No. Fukushima is a price I'd gladly pay and I expect every reasonable person to agree. The alternative isn't "no Fukushima", the alternative is hundreds of thousands deaths per year by burning coal. It's just not "one huge bang" so people don't realize it, because understanding abstract dangers is hard.

aaaaaaaaata 4y ago
Just improve decentralized energy storage and micro-grids.
Veedrac 4y ago
Absolutely. The Fukushima disaster: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_disaster_casualties https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushima_Daiichi_nuclear_di... The earthquake: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_T%C5%8Dhoku_earthquake_and_tsunami https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_T%C5%8Dhoku_earthquake_... Zero known fatal injuries out of 20,000 were caused by the reactor. If I've done the math right, a nominally operative coal plant over Fukishima's 40 year lifetime would have caused 5ish deaths. Fukishima did cause a few cases of cancer, but so does nominally operative coal. People can gripe about tail risks from environmental pollution when it's not displacing a worse modal risk. Right now it's unreasonable to. Proliferation risk is concerning; most of the rest is just scale insensitivity.
ncmncm 4y ago
Nukes' competition is not coal. It is renewables. Comparing to coal is tendentious and disingenuous, not to say dishonest.
- ch4s3 4y ago
  Not really m. Something has to provide power when the sun and wind aren’t available. Right now that’s natural gas, coal, hydro, or nuclear.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    "Right now". Right now all the nuke plants you are talking about don't exist, so produce exactly 0 watts.
    - ch4s3 4y ago
      We’ll there is a good deal in some places.
      - ncmncm 4y ago
        For now, until their production cost exceeds alternatives. Then they will be mothballed.
  - pydry 4y ago
    Pumped storage and grid scale batteries provide that at much cheaper cost overall. Nowhere near as much is needed as people think either.
    - ch4s3 4y ago
      Where are grid scale batteries doing that today?
      - ncmncm 4y ago
        Before a thing has been built, it needs to be built. Do you need this explained further? The overwhelming bulk of utility storage will not be batteries, because that is the most expensive alternative. Utility storage will be whatever is cheap and locally practical.
        ch4s3 4y ago
        That’s basically what I meant.
      - pydry 4y ago
        California, Hawaii, Australia. In hawaii they canceled a proposed inter-island power connector because batteries + solar were just cheaper. Pumped storage is generally a lot more economic and can store a lot more than batteries but it cant be built quite as quickly & is somewhat geographically dependent. It takes 4-5 years to deploy rather than months.

omginternets 4y ago

You should look up the cost (in whatever metric you like: dollars, lives, cancers, etc.) and compare it to coal. Don't forget to normalize, since coal is much more common than nuclear power. The results will likely surprise you.