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> That’s the kind of public mood that politicians can ill afford to ignore. But is safety really the primary concern amongst the public? I mean there are perfe
by qwytw 4y ago
> That’s the kind of public mood that politicians can ill afford to ignore.
But is safety really the primary concern amongst the public? I mean there are perfectly valid economic arguments against developing nuclear power, especially nowadays. Of course stopping the expansion of nuclear power back in the 70/80s was a huge tragedy. If we stayed on the same trajectory as throughout the 60s well.. climate change would probably be viewed as a more or less solved (or at least an actually solvable) issue today.
And honestly, if nuclear energy was financially viable would it be hard to change this quite irrational 'mood'? I mean in the EU alone pollution form Coal plants causes about twice as much premature deaths as the Chernobyl disaster did over a 20 year period (according to the worst estimates, it would be about 8 times as much if we use the IAEA figures).
Nuclear is objectively one of the safest sources of energy. If we exclude Chernobyl (we should since it was a direct outcome of a multistage failure which is only possible in idiocratic states like the USSR) it's about a hundredfold safer than natural gas which is about 10 less harmful (when measuring in human lives) than coal for an equivalent amount of power generated.
> The “safe and reliable” part was wrecked in the general public’s perception
Unless we believe that the general public is completely mathematically illiterate (i.e. most people couldn't pass a basic 2nd grade level math test) this shouldn't be too hard to change with enough political will.
- RandomLensman 4y agoNuclear energy as-is is very expensive and the cost trajectory in the past wasn't great either (i.e., not dropping fast).
- qwytw 4y agoYes if you didn't include externalities it was relatively quite expensive compared to fossil fuels. Very competitive or even significantly cheaper if you did though. Of course climate change and pollution weren't huge concerns back in the 80s especially. Especially for the so-called "green" parties in Germany and other countries...
- RandomLensman 4y agoAlso very expensive compared to solar or wind.
- qwytw 4y agoYes. It is now. I'm mainly talking about the 80s and 90s.
- RandomLensman 4y agoBtw., why are you suggesting pollution was not a topic for the greens in Germany in the 1980s? I'd agree they had others topics, too, but not being concerned about pollution?
- qwytw 4y agoI suppose it was. But well clearly halting nuclear expansion was a higher priority so even if they didn't say it directly, they implicitly support increased reliance on fossil fuels which is what matters.
- RandomLensman 4y agoIf you believe only climate related pollution matters - yes.
- qwytw 4y agoNo, not at all. Why would you even say that? Actually the opposite at least where coal is concerned per kWh it emits "only" 2x more CO2 but (according to estimates) causes 10x more deaths than natural gas. 20-30 thousand people die every year due to pollution from coal power plants in the EU alone. That's basically 2 to 8 "free" Chernobyls every single year...
- RandomLensman 4y ago