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Catastrophic accidents with large airplanes can also make airports dangerous places, right? We still have whole cities around them - is it because events like 9

by avmich 4y ago

Catastrophic accidents with large airplanes can also make airports dangerous places, right? We still have whole cities around them - is it because events like 9/11 are at least as rare as Chernobyl accidents? Why not to build nuclear powerplants away from lands used for other purposes? Aren't we better with both designing safer plants and containing them in case of something bad - except maybe Russia going to war to Zaporizhzhia near the station - happens?

ajross 4y ago
> Catastrophic accidents with large airplanes can also make airports dangerous places, right? Um... no? I don't see where you're going here. The Chernobyl Exclusion Zone is a real place that displaced real people. There's never been anything remotely similar in the history of aviation. In fact airplane accidents have never been a significant/measurable risk to urban populations, ever.
- pdonis 4y ago
  > The Chernobyl Exclusion Zone Is not a valid comparison to any commercially operating nuclear plant. The Chernobyl accident was the result of an insane government (the Soviet Union) building an insane reactor design (positive void coefficient of reactivity--no other reactor built by any other country has ever done this) and letting its poorly trained operators run uncontrolled experiments on it at high power levels. The obvious way to avoid such an event is not to do all those insane things. It is not valid to treat that insane event as any kind of benchmark of what is possible with commercial nuclear power as run by reasonably sane societies (i.e., every one on the planet except the former Soviet Union--even Communist China isn't stupid enough or ruthless enough to try something like this).
  - avmich 4y ago
    The point was that nuclear power plants are dangerous, and even outside of Soviet Union bad things sometimes happen with them. > Is not a valid comparison to any commercially operating nuclear plant. We sort of want to plan for unexpected. To model that unexpected, Chernobyl could be a good approximation.
    - pdonis 4y ago
      > The point was that nuclear power plants are dangerous By this definition of "dangerous", other forms of power plants are much more dangerous. All other energy sources have killed or harmed many more people per unit of energy generated than nuclear has. > To model that unexpected, Chernobyl could be a good approximation. No, it isn't. That kind of comparison is like saying that, because bombs can explode, and explosives in bombs are chemically similar to gasoline, we shouldn't use gasoline in cars. It's simply not valid.
    - himinlomax 4y ago
      > The point was that nuclear power plants are dangerous Dams are dangerous. To wit, they've killed many times more people than nuclear power plants ever have. People can and do fall off windmills. Gas can explode. Hydrocarbons cause global warming. PV cells are mostly made in tyrannical China with environmentally dubious sourcing and no independent oversight. Pick your poison; nuclear is the least of them.
  - blibble 4y ago
    > building an insane reactor design (positive void coefficient of reactivity--no other reactor built by any other country has ever done this) you may want to speak to the Canadians, as their reactor design also has a positive void coefficient (admittedly a small one)
    - pdonis 4y ago
      Yes, I forgot about CANDU. To fully describe the insanity of the Chernobyl design, we could add no secondary containment, graphite moderator but water coolant, poorly designed shutdown system, bad control rod design, and probably others I've forgotten. CANDU does not share any of those other insane features.
conqueso 4y ago
>Why not to build nuclear powerplants away from lands used for other purposes? Because the longer the transmission lines the more power is lost - so plants are generally close to where they are delivering electricity.
- Filligree 4y ago
  That, and they need water for cooling, so they're built next to rivers. Which is also usually where people like their houses.
  - AstralStorm 4y ago
    The newest designs are not requiring water cooling anymore, which is good since water shortages will become common. It'll take a while to shake them out in practice, but they look very solid.

by avmich 4y ago

ajross 4y ago

> Catastrophic accidents with large airplanes can also make airports dangerous places, right? Um... no? I don't see where you're going here. The Chernobyl Exclusion Zone is a real place that displaced real people. There's never been anything remotely similar in the history of aviation. In fact airplane accidents have never been a significant/measurable risk to urban populations, ever.

pdonis 4y ago
> The Chernobyl Exclusion Zone Is not a valid comparison to any commercially operating nuclear plant. The Chernobyl accident was the result of an insane government (the Soviet Union) building an insane reactor design (positive void coefficient of reactivity--no other reactor built by any other country has ever done this) and letting its poorly trained operators run uncontrolled experiments on it at high power levels. The obvious way to avoid such an event is not to do all those insane things. It is not valid to treat that insane event as any kind of benchmark of what is possible with commercial nuclear power as run by reasonably sane societies (i.e., every one on the planet except the former Soviet Union--even Communist China isn't stupid enough or ruthless enough to try something like this).
- avmich 4y ago
  The point was that nuclear power plants are dangerous, and even outside of Soviet Union bad things sometimes happen with them. > Is not a valid comparison to any commercially operating nuclear plant. We sort of want to plan for unexpected. To model that unexpected, Chernobyl could be a good approximation.
  - pdonis 4y ago
    > The point was that nuclear power plants are dangerous By this definition of "dangerous", other forms of power plants are much more dangerous. All other energy sources have killed or harmed many more people per unit of energy generated than nuclear has. > To model that unexpected, Chernobyl could be a good approximation. No, it isn't. That kind of comparison is like saying that, because bombs can explode, and explosives in bombs are chemically similar to gasoline, we shouldn't use gasoline in cars. It's simply not valid.
  - himinlomax 4y ago
    > The point was that nuclear power plants are dangerous Dams are dangerous. To wit, they've killed many times more people than nuclear power plants ever have. People can and do fall off windmills. Gas can explode. Hydrocarbons cause global warming. PV cells are mostly made in tyrannical China with environmentally dubious sourcing and no independent oversight. Pick your poison; nuclear is the least of them.
- blibble 4y ago
  > building an insane reactor design (positive void coefficient of reactivity--no other reactor built by any other country has ever done this) you may want to speak to the Canadians, as their reactor design also has a positive void coefficient (admittedly a small one)
  - pdonis 4y ago
    Yes, I forgot about CANDU. To fully describe the insanity of the Chernobyl design, we could add no secondary containment, graphite moderator but water coolant, poorly designed shutdown system, bad control rod design, and probably others I've forgotten. CANDU does not share any of those other insane features.

conqueso 4y ago

>Why not to build nuclear powerplants away from lands used for other purposes? Because the longer the transmission lines the more power is lost - so plants are generally close to where they are delivering electricity.

Filligree 4y ago
That, and they need water for cooling, so they're built next to rivers. Which is also usually where people like their houses.
- AstralStorm 4y ago
  The newest designs are not requiring water cooling anymore, which is good since water shortages will become common. It'll take a while to shake them out in practice, but they look very solid.