3 ms·

Okay, how about; it's safer than literally every other method of energy production? Less deaths per thousand terawatt-hours produced (90) than wind (150), solar

Okay, how about; it's safer than literally every other method of energy production? Less deaths per thousand terawatt-hours produced (90) than wind (150), solar (440), or hydroelectric (1400). https://www.statista.com/statistics/494425/death-rate-worldwide-by-energy-source/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/494425/death-rate-worldw...

pfdietz 4y ago
I already addressed that argument. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32295591 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32295591 If a statistical human life is worth $9 M, then 440 deaths per thousand TWh adds $0.004/kWh to the cost of solar. This cannot overcome the large cost advantage solar and wind have over nuclear in most places (even with storage costs included). Also, the 440 figure is, I believe, assuming rooftop solar. At scale to power the world solar will be mostly ground mounted. If you don't agree with that statistical value, and think it should be higher, why you've just argued we're not imposing enough safety systems on nuclear plants -- because $9 M is the value the NRC uses when determining if additional safety systems are warranted.
- endominus 4y ago
  And I happen to think the NRC is wrong and the vast number of safety regulations imposed on nuclear power is harmful to the ultimate goal of getting off coal as quickly as possible. We should be building more nuclear reactors, even if we lower safety standards to do so, to reduce dependency on fossil fuels and the ongoing ecological disaster they entail. But that won't happen because both fossil fuel lobbyists and environmentalists loathe nuclear power. Decades of accumulated safety regulations have added massively to the capital costs to nuclear reactors and offer covering fire for fossil fuel lobbies to continue to distract people with renewables, which are always just around the corner and about to overtake everything (between 2009 and 2019, the global share of energy produced by renewable sources has risen from 7% to 10% - a real green revolution!). But here's the real kicker - when nuclear reactors get taken offline, as happened in California and Germany recently, they are replaced by fossil fuels. Not solar. Not wind.
- LorenPechtel 4y ago
  You can't count solar or wind deaths at present because neither is a viable power system. To count deaths you need to look at a whole system--solar, wind + the gas plants that cover the gaps, or the hypothetical storage system that covers the gaps. Since we can't count deaths from a tech that doesn't even exist it's solar + wind + gas -- and most of those deaths will be from the gas.

pfdietz 4y ago

I already addressed that argument. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32295591 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32295591 If a statistical human life is worth $9 M, then 440 deaths per thousand TWh adds $0.004/kWh to the cost of solar. This cannot overcome the large cost advantage solar and wind have over nuclear in most places (even with storage costs included). Also, the 440 figure is, I believe, assuming rooftop solar. At scale to power the world solar will be mostly ground mounted. If you don't agree with that statistical value, and think it should be higher, why you've just argued we're not imposing enough safety systems on nuclear plants -- because $9 M is the value the NRC uses when determining if additional safety systems are warranted.

endominus 4y ago
And I happen to think the NRC is wrong and the vast number of safety regulations imposed on nuclear power is harmful to the ultimate goal of getting off coal as quickly as possible. We should be building more nuclear reactors, even if we lower safety standards to do so, to reduce dependency on fossil fuels and the ongoing ecological disaster they entail. But that won't happen because both fossil fuel lobbyists and environmentalists loathe nuclear power. Decades of accumulated safety regulations have added massively to the capital costs to nuclear reactors and offer covering fire for fossil fuel lobbies to continue to distract people with renewables, which are always just around the corner and about to overtake everything (between 2009 and 2019, the global share of energy produced by renewable sources has risen from 7% to 10% - a real green revolution!). But here's the real kicker - when nuclear reactors get taken offline, as happened in California and Germany recently, they are replaced by fossil fuels. Not solar. Not wind.
LorenPechtel 4y ago
You can't count solar or wind deaths at present because neither is a viable power system. To count deaths you need to look at a whole system--solar, wind + the gas plants that cover the gaps, or the hypothetical storage system that covers the gaps. Since we can't count deaths from a tech that doesn't even exist it's solar + wind + gas -- and most of those deaths will be from the gas.