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It's not that statistically coal and natural gas are less dangerous, it's more how the disaster distribution works out. Coal and natural gas may have a constan

by jerrya 15y ago

It's not that statistically coal and natural gas are less dangerous, it's more how the disaster distribution works out. Coal and natural gas may have a constant payout that remains relatively low, rare, and random, perhaps a uniform distribution, and it's average value may be bigger than the distribution of nuclear. But the issue with nuclear is that its distribution might look like an enormous Dirac Delta function, and when it hits, it takes out many people even wiping out entire communities, if not regions, for hundreds of years. As a species we are probably used to hearing and feeling badly about the random ape being struck by lightning or forgetting to tend his fire and burning his tree down and being able to move on. But when we find an entire village is suddenly gone, their part of the forest gone, and strange unknown diseases attack us when we move through the now forbidden zones, we feel differently.

InclinedPlane 15y ago
When a Tsunami hits a 50 year old nuclear power plant bad things happen. Also, there was a Tsunami. I'm not sure how much it makes sense to lay all the damage caused by the Fukushima reactors at the foot of nuclear power rather than the Tsunami. If a CNG depot had been hit by a Tsunami and exploded, killing people with it how much would we blame natural gas and how much would we blame the Tsunami? Similarly, Fujinuma dam broke on March 11, 2011 due to the same disaster, resulting in several deaths and lots of additional destruction. Does that get tallied against the hazards of hydroelectric power or against the hazards of enormously powerful earthquakes?
quanticle 15y ago
"[...] and when it hits, it takes out many people even wiping out entire communities, if not regions for hundreds of years." First of all, how many people has nuclear taken out, even including Chernobyl? According to the WHO and the IAEA, Chernobyl was (or rather, will be) responsible for about 9000 deaths. This includes the people killed by acute radiation exposure and the expected number of people killed by premature cancer from sub-acute radiation exposure over a period of 20 years. This comes out to 450 deaths per year. By comparison, the Bhopal disaster killed approximately 3000 people immediately, and 8000 people in total from gas-related injuries. It's not at all clear to me that nuclear is more dangerous than other "everyday" technologies like chemical plants and oil refineries. As for the effects of radioactive contamination, well, chemical contamination can be just as long-lived. Just look at your average Superfund site. There's nothing special about the risks of nuclear energy. We tolerate the exact same risks with many of our current technologies. It's just irrational fear tied to the anti-nuclear weapons movement that's driving the freeze on new nuclear construction.

by jerrya 15y ago

InclinedPlane 15y ago

When a Tsunami hits a 50 year old nuclear power plant bad things happen. Also, there was a Tsunami. I'm not sure how much it makes sense to lay all the damage caused by the Fukushima reactors at the foot of nuclear power rather than the Tsunami. If a CNG depot had been hit by a Tsunami and exploded, killing people with it how much would we blame natural gas and how much would we blame the Tsunami? Similarly, Fujinuma dam broke on March 11, 2011 due to the same disaster, resulting in several deaths and lots of additional destruction. Does that get tallied against the hazards of hydroelectric power or against the hazards of enormously powerful earthquakes?

quanticle 15y ago

"[...] and when it hits, it takes out many people even wiping out entire communities, if not regions for hundreds of years." First of all, how many people has nuclear taken out, even including Chernobyl? According to the WHO and the IAEA, Chernobyl was (or rather, will be) responsible for about 9000 deaths. This includes the people killed by acute radiation exposure and the expected number of people killed by premature cancer from sub-acute radiation exposure over a period of 20 years. This comes out to 450 deaths per year. By comparison, the Bhopal disaster killed approximately 3000 people immediately, and 8000 people in total from gas-related injuries. It's not at all clear to me that nuclear is more dangerous than other "everyday" technologies like chemical plants and oil refineries. As for the effects of radioactive contamination, well, chemical contamination can be just as long-lived. Just look at your average Superfund site. There's nothing special about the risks of nuclear energy. We tolerate the exact same risks with many of our current technologies. It's just irrational fear tied to the anti-nuclear weapons movement that's driving the freeze on new nuclear construction.