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Except you can’t transport it. We built a giant cave for it in the desert and everybody agreed that the material was too dangerous to drive past people’s homes

by texuf 2y ago

Except you can’t transport it. We built a giant cave for it in the desert and everybody agreed that the material was too dangerous to drive past people’s homes so we just leave it sitting around on site hoping a natural disaster doesn’t wash it away. I’m pro nuclear but we need to be honest with ourselves.

roenxi 2y ago
I mean yeah. They do leave it sitting around on site. Because it takes up no space, they can build a bunker to store it without adding all that much to the cost and there are idiots hyperventilating at the thought of transporting dangerous goods around. I'd imagine the nuclear people decided it wasn't worth the hassle. I feel ridiculous having to argue that volumes of material this small represent a real threat. If you wanted to move it we could. Split it up into little loads and put it in a stupidly over-engineered shielded truck. Goodness me this is not a real problem. They've been ignoring it for decades and the consequences are somewhere between nil and nothing interesting. There is nothing here to be honest about, there is no reasonable threat to debate. We transport explosives, we transport poison, we sometimes get massive port explosions that can level a district. Then we've got old mate claiming 2,000 metric tonnes of a relatively dangerous material represents a serious national problem. The absurdity of that is frustrating to deal with.
- ok_dad 2y ago
  Yes, the powers that be have ignored the issue of nuclear materials sitting on site at power plants for decades, I’m not sure it’s a good idea to make 5 or 10 times more of the stuff at other sites and trust that the actual knowledgeable experts, who haven’t done shit for decades, will figure out a solution by the time it’s bigger issue. We should decrease our power usage as a whole planet, and reduce dependence on technology that has outsized biological risks, like nuclear and plastics, rather than rushing into some future that will only enrich the already wealthy.
  - alwa 2y ago
    Why? Using power meaningfully improves people’s lives, and many billions of people are still on the end of the spectrum where “improving lives” involves improvements like “not starving” and “having safe water”. The benefits of making power available are extremely (!) robust and well-understood, as are the health and safety benefits of switching from combustion-based power to non-combustion-based power. I have yet to hear skeptics raise specific nuclear concerns that are real, consequential, and also unmanaged. For all its cost and red tape, the past 60 years’ regulatory posture of “you must identify and mitigate every risk to the absolute maximum degree physically possible, damn the cost” seems to have resulted in a system where, well… they have.
    - ok_dad 2y ago
      Using power meaningfully, sure, but Bitcoin and AI are not meaningful. Using power to make steel or to use tools to make lives easier IS meaningful. Red tape in nuclear is there for a reason. I don’t trust anyone to do nuclear without tons of red tape. The only reason it’s safe is the red tape. Take red tape away from industries that aren’t inherently unsafe, fine, but not nuclear power.
  - pfdietz 2y ago
    We should greatly increase our power usage as a whole planet, to improve the quality of life for humanity. Much of humanity is energy starved.
    - ok_dad 2y ago
      Don’t go talking about “humanity” needing power, all of the power being built is so the developed countries can write books with LLMs and other stupid shit. Humanity might need more power some places, but it’s uneven and that probably won’t change. Your argument is moral and right, but the capitalists that choose where power go will continue to put power plants next to where their interests lie. Developed nations need to reduce power usage so that others who are poor may have power. That is my stance, I don’t care how unpopular.
richk449 2y ago
Nuclear waste is transported regularly: https://www.nrc.gov/waste/spent-fuel-transp.html https://www.nrc.gov/waste/spent-fuel-transp.html
chickenbig 2y ago
> everybody agreed that the material was too dangerous to drive past people’s homes Everyone? A vocal group of activists, perhaps. The same could be said for transport of chemicals by rail; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Palestine,_Ohio,_train_derailment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Palestine,_Ohio,_train_de... and still that goes on.

by texuf 2y ago

roenxi 2y ago

I mean yeah. They do leave it sitting around on site. Because it takes up no space, they can build a bunker to store it without adding all that much to the cost and there are idiots hyperventilating at the thought of transporting dangerous goods around. I'd imagine the nuclear people decided it wasn't worth the hassle. I feel ridiculous having to argue that volumes of material this small represent a real threat. If you wanted to move it we could. Split it up into little loads and put it in a stupidly over-engineered shielded truck. Goodness me this is not a real problem. They've been ignoring it for decades and the consequences are somewhere between nil and nothing interesting. There is nothing here to be honest about, there is no reasonable threat to debate. We transport explosives, we transport poison, we sometimes get massive port explosions that can level a district. Then we've got old mate claiming 2,000 metric tonnes of a relatively dangerous material represents a serious national problem. The absurdity of that is frustrating to deal with.

ok_dad 2y ago
Yes, the powers that be have ignored the issue of nuclear materials sitting on site at power plants for decades, I’m not sure it’s a good idea to make 5 or 10 times more of the stuff at other sites and trust that the actual knowledgeable experts, who haven’t done shit for decades, will figure out a solution by the time it’s bigger issue. We should decrease our power usage as a whole planet, and reduce dependence on technology that has outsized biological risks, like nuclear and plastics, rather than rushing into some future that will only enrich the already wealthy.
- alwa 2y ago
  Why? Using power meaningfully improves people’s lives, and many billions of people are still on the end of the spectrum where “improving lives” involves improvements like “not starving” and “having safe water”. The benefits of making power available are extremely (!) robust and well-understood, as are the health and safety benefits of switching from combustion-based power to non-combustion-based power. I have yet to hear skeptics raise specific nuclear concerns that are real, consequential, and also unmanaged. For all its cost and red tape, the past 60 years’ regulatory posture of “you must identify and mitigate every risk to the absolute maximum degree physically possible, damn the cost” seems to have resulted in a system where, well… they have.
  - ok_dad 2y ago
    Using power meaningfully, sure, but Bitcoin and AI are not meaningful. Using power to make steel or to use tools to make lives easier IS meaningful. Red tape in nuclear is there for a reason. I don’t trust anyone to do nuclear without tons of red tape. The only reason it’s safe is the red tape. Take red tape away from industries that aren’t inherently unsafe, fine, but not nuclear power.
- pfdietz 2y ago
  We should greatly increase our power usage as a whole planet, to improve the quality of life for humanity. Much of humanity is energy starved.
  - ok_dad 2y ago
    Don’t go talking about “humanity” needing power, all of the power being built is so the developed countries can write books with LLMs and other stupid shit. Humanity might need more power some places, but it’s uneven and that probably won’t change. Your argument is moral and right, but the capitalists that choose where power go will continue to put power plants next to where their interests lie. Developed nations need to reduce power usage so that others who are poor may have power. That is my stance, I don’t care how unpopular.

richk449 2y ago

Nuclear waste is transported regularly: https://www.nrc.gov/waste/spent-fuel-transp.html https://www.nrc.gov/waste/spent-fuel-transp.html

chickenbig 2y ago

> everybody agreed that the material was too dangerous to drive past people’s homes Everyone? A vocal group of activists, perhaps. The same could be said for transport of chemicals by rail; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Palestine,_Ohio,_train_derailment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Palestine,_Ohio,_train_de... and still that goes on.