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The way you write this makes it sound like you care about the single solitary stories, but the huge numbers of people harmed by the lack of nuclear power doesn'

by ars 3y ago

The way you write this makes it sound like you care about the single solitary stories, but the huge numbers of people harmed by the lack of nuclear power doesn't matter to you because it's to many people to think about. All other forms of power have killed far far far more people. But the one dramatic story is what you care about?

reaperman 3y ago
In total a land area about the quarter of the size of California was contaminated with over 37 becquerel of radiation due to Chernobyl, including 10,000 farms in the UK alone. The solitary story was to get people to read the book. The debate is if fission is sustainable for the environment. I talked about contaminated agriculture and how much that was covered up and missing in the statistics — people still living in contaminated land and eating contaminated food today. “The huge numbers of people” is what I’m concerned about and why I advocate for wind and solar. I’m not in favor of the fossil fuel status quo. The radiation and pollution from coal ash and effects of global warming on agriculture are massive. But that’s not an argument for “fission is ecologically sustainable”, that’s an argument for “even though it’s not, we should still build dams and fission power plants anyways”. Which is a fine argument. It’s just a different one. A fission disaster or attack on a fission plant can take half of Californias agriculture out of the picture over night. You can’t say fission and wind have similar risk at the tail ends. Yeah, statistically it hasn’t happened, but the risk exists. Besides, new fission plants will take 20 years to build and by then we'll have actually clean baseload energy from fusion reactors. This video[0] is from 7 years ago, but it provides an amazing breakdown of the physics of fusion energy. The timeline and physics predicted in the lecture have come to pass perfectly since then, and SPARC is on track to produce true net positive energy in 2025. ARC will be capable of providing electricity to the grid within 10-12 years, far faster than a fission reactor could get online in the USA. 0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkpqA8yG9T4&t=2414s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkpqA8yG9T4&t=2414s
- ars 3y ago
  If you live in an imaginary perfect world, sure. But in the real world not building nuclear power causes actual real contamination from Coal and other fuels. You can shut down the nuclear plants after you finished your wind/solar buildout. Not before. Not to mention a grid with only wind/solar is impossible. Nuclear is a PERFECT complement for them! You are being your own worse enemy by opposing nuclear. The exact thing you don't want is happening because you oppose the one thing that could help.
  - reaperman 3y ago
    I'm not proposing shutting down existing plants. I'm opposing beginning new 20 year construction projects in the USA for new fission plants vs. investing in: - Energy storage - Energy transport - Nuclear fusion, such as ARC. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkpqA8yG9T4&t=2414s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkpqA8yG9T4&t=2414s It's the "perfect world" people who think fission plants will never contaminate 100,000 sq. km. of farmland ever again. I'm personally okay with spending a little more money on developing storage technologies. However, I'd also like to quote myself again: > That’s not an argument for “fission is ecologically sustainable”, that’s an argument for “even though it’s not, we should still build dams and fission power plants anyways”. Which is a fine argument. It’s just a different one.
    - pdonis 3y ago
      > I'm not proposing shutting down existing plants. This makes no sense if you actually believe the "Chernobyl comparison" claims you have been making. If those claims were actually true, you should be arguing for shutting down every nuclear reactor on the planet, right now. So why aren't you arguing for that? (To be clear, I would still disagree with you, but at least you would be taking a consistent position.) OTOH, if you are reasonable enough to admit that your "Chernobyl comparison" claims do not justify shutting down existing plants, then they don't justify building new plants either. Existing plants are going to be higher risk than any new plants we build in any of the areas you have been posting about.
      - reaperman 3y ago
- pdonis 3y ago
  > A fission disaster or attack on a fission plant can take half of Californias agriculture out of the picture over night. Nonsense. I don't know where you are getting your information from, but it's fearmongering with no basis in fact. > new fission plants will take 20 years to build Newer designs have shorter build times since they are simpler and can be made smaller, with more components made in factories instead of fabricated on site. And even for older designs, the 20 years is not the time it actually takes to build them; that's a few years. The rest of the 20 years is the time required to overcome NIMBY lawsuits--if that is even possible. In fact it mostly hasn't been, which is why virtually no new nuclear plants have been built in the US for quite a while. But that's a political problem, not a technical problem. > and by then we'll have actually clean baseload energy from fusion reactors Practical fusion has been about 20 years away for the past 40 years or so. It would be very nice if we finally get it, but I would not bank on any claims about the timeline given past history in this area.
  - reaperman 3y ago
    > Nonsense. I don't know where you are getting your information from, but it's fearmongering with no basis in fact. https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2019-12/chernobyl-1995.pdf https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2019-12... > The releases during the Chernobyl accident contaminated about 125,000 km2 of land in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia with radiocaesium levels greater than 37 kBq/m2 Land area of California: 423,971 km² So, a third of the land area of California could be half of its agriculture affected and reach levels of radiation which trigger intervention actions in the EU. Obviously a lot of that can be remediated and put back into use in future years.
    - pdonis 3y ago
      Your references are all about Chernobyl. But nobody is disputing what happened at Chernobyl. What we are disputing is your claim that any commercial fission reactor today is another possible Chernobyl. That claim is fearmongering with no basis in fact. And no amount of repetition of what happened at Chernobyl will change that.

by ars 3y ago

reaperman 3y ago

In total a land area about the quarter of the size of California was contaminated with over 37 becquerel of radiation due to Chernobyl, including 10,000 farms in the UK alone. The solitary story was to get people to read the book. The debate is if fission is sustainable for the environment. I talked about contaminated agriculture and how much that was covered up and missing in the statistics — people still living in contaminated land and eating contaminated food today. “The huge numbers of people” is what I’m concerned about and why I advocate for wind and solar. I’m not in favor of the fossil fuel status quo. The radiation and pollution from coal ash and effects of global warming on agriculture are massive. But that’s not an argument for “fission is ecologically sustainable”, that’s an argument for “even though it’s not, we should still build dams and fission power plants anyways”. Which is a fine argument. It’s just a different one. A fission disaster or attack on a fission plant can take half of Californias agriculture out of the picture over night. You can’t say fission and wind have similar risk at the tail ends. Yeah, statistically it hasn’t happened, but the risk exists. Besides, new fission plants will take 20 years to build and by then we'll have actually clean baseload energy from fusion reactors. This video[0] is from 7 years ago, but it provides an amazing breakdown of the physics of fusion energy. The timeline and physics predicted in the lecture have come to pass perfectly since then, and SPARC is on track to produce true net positive energy in 2025. ARC will be capable of providing electricity to the grid within 10-12 years, far faster than a fission reactor could get online in the USA. 0: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkpqA8yG9T4&t=2414s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkpqA8yG9T4&t=2414s

ars 3y ago
If you live in an imaginary perfect world, sure. But in the real world not building nuclear power causes actual real contamination from Coal and other fuels. You can shut down the nuclear plants after you finished your wind/solar buildout. Not before. Not to mention a grid with only wind/solar is impossible. Nuclear is a PERFECT complement for them! You are being your own worse enemy by opposing nuclear. The exact thing you don't want is happening because you oppose the one thing that could help.
- reaperman 3y ago
  I'm not proposing shutting down existing plants. I'm opposing beginning new 20 year construction projects in the USA for new fission plants vs. investing in: - Energy storage - Energy transport - Nuclear fusion, such as ARC. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkpqA8yG9T4&t=2414s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkpqA8yG9T4&t=2414s It's the "perfect world" people who think fission plants will never contaminate 100,000 sq. km. of farmland ever again. I'm personally okay with spending a little more money on developing storage technologies. However, I'd also like to quote myself again: > That’s not an argument for “fission is ecologically sustainable”, that’s an argument for “even though it’s not, we should still build dams and fission power plants anyways”. Which is a fine argument. It’s just a different one.
  - pdonis 3y ago
    > I'm not proposing shutting down existing plants. This makes no sense if you actually believe the "Chernobyl comparison" claims you have been making. If those claims were actually true, you should be arguing for shutting down every nuclear reactor on the planet, right now. So why aren't you arguing for that? (To be clear, I would still disagree with you, but at least you would be taking a consistent position.) OTOH, if you are reasonable enough to admit that your "Chernobyl comparison" claims do not justify shutting down existing plants, then they don't justify building new plants either. Existing plants are going to be higher risk than any new plants we build in any of the areas you have been posting about.
    - reaperman 3y ago
pdonis 3y ago
> A fission disaster or attack on a fission plant can take half of Californias agriculture out of the picture over night. Nonsense. I don't know where you are getting your information from, but it's fearmongering with no basis in fact. > new fission plants will take 20 years to build Newer designs have shorter build times since they are simpler and can be made smaller, with more components made in factories instead of fabricated on site. And even for older designs, the 20 years is not the time it actually takes to build them; that's a few years. The rest of the 20 years is the time required to overcome NIMBY lawsuits--if that is even possible. In fact it mostly hasn't been, which is why virtually no new nuclear plants have been built in the US for quite a while. But that's a political problem, not a technical problem. > and by then we'll have actually clean baseload energy from fusion reactors Practical fusion has been about 20 years away for the past 40 years or so. It would be very nice if we finally get it, but I would not bank on any claims about the timeline given past history in this area.
- reaperman 3y ago
  > Nonsense. I don't know where you are getting your information from, but it's fearmongering with no basis in fact. https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2019-12/chernobyl-1995.pdf https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2019-12... > The releases during the Chernobyl accident contaminated about 125,000 km2 of land in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia with radiocaesium levels greater than 37 kBq/m2 Land area of California: 423,971 km² So, a third of the land area of California could be half of its agriculture affected and reach levels of radiation which trigger intervention actions in the EU. Obviously a lot of that can be remediated and put back into use in future years.
  - pdonis 3y ago
    Your references are all about Chernobyl. But nobody is disputing what happened at Chernobyl. What we are disputing is your claim that any commercial fission reactor today is another possible Chernobyl. That claim is fearmongering with no basis in fact. And no amount of repetition of what happened at Chernobyl will change that.