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https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-production-per-twh https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-p... People die from t

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-production-per-twh https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-p... People die from the operation & externalities of every energy source, it's just that Nuclear power has orders of magnitude fewer deaths per kilowatt-hour than the dirtier energy sources these regulations have pushed energy production towards. I'm sure some lives would be lost if Nuclear Power faced the same regulatory costs that other energy sources do, rather than the egregious and absurd costs they face today. But many many more lives would be saved by deregulating nuclear energy and making it more cost competitive with coal and natural gas. Many children wouldn't contract asthma & the other respiratory illnesses they do today if nuclear energy hadn't been killed via overregulation and replaced by coal and natural gas.

inigyou 2mo ago
Where would unregulated nuclear power go on that chart?
- Hammershaft 2mo ago
  Most of the nuclear power that makes up that chart was built when there was significantly less regulation on reactors than there is today. Even if deregulation increased nuclear deaths per watt by two orders of magnitude (which I strongly doubt!), nuclear would still be orders of magnitude safer than the fossil fuels that have replaced it across the western world.
  - Kon5ole 2mo ago
    >Even if deregulation increased nuclear deaths per watt by two orders of magnitude (which I strongly doubt!) Why doubt it? Chernobyl alone was very close to causing millions of deaths. The actual accident released only about 5% of the core, but had the graphite fire not been extinguished, places as far away as Scotland and Scandinavia would not be able to grow enough edible food within their borders for decades. Europe would starve. Leukemia cases would be in the millions. The exclusion zone around Chernobyl would be hundreds of kilometers instead of 30. If the ground water barrier had been broken - which was likely - the ground water for tens of millions of people would be poisoned for centuries. The only reason to doubt it is that two orders of magnitude is probably not enough.
    - Hammershaft 2mo ago
      I hadn't heard any of these claims before. Without a source, I decided to ask chatgpt. Its assessment is that essentially every claim in this comment is false. If you think chatgpt is wrong can you explain why? https://chatgpt.com/s/t_6a72ee6f965c81919cc6e4bf8da64262 https://chatgpt.com/s/t_6a72ee6f965c81919cc6e4bf8da64262
      - Kon5ole 2mo ago
        By all means use chatGPT, but your linked chat session hasn't understood the conditions. It answers mostly based on what actually happened, not taking into account the scenario I described. Try asking chatGPT something like: "just a simple yes or no - Could the Chernobyl accident in theory under worst case conditions have developed to a disaster causing local food shortages in western europe and affect the water supply for millions of people in the Ukraine and neighboring countries?" For me, I get "Yes" from ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude Opus. You may argue that Chernobyl was a hunk of junk plant and that it can't happen anywhere else, so ask ChatGPT this as well: "just a simple yes or no - is there any scenario where fuel stored in ponds at US nuclear plants could ever release pollution like Chernobyl?" Yes. It really is in a class of its own when it comes to risk.
Kon5ole 2mo ago
>Nuclear power has orders of magnitude fewer deaths per kilowatt-hour By this logic the minuteman missile is harmless. It hasn’t killed anyone, right? Nuclear power has the potential to cause orders of magnitude more damage than any other power plant. Again, what has happened is irrelevant, the risk is all about what could happen.
- Hammershaft 2mo ago
  I think you're seriously misunderstanding the statistic I posted. I didn't post aggregate deaths from different power sources, I posted deaths per terawatt-hour of energy produced! This figure includes deaths from every nuclear accident, and yet it shows getting energy from nuclear power is orders of magnitude safer than getting the same energy from the fossil fuels that have replaced nuclear power in countries that have phased them out. (like germany)
  - Kon5ole 2mo ago
    > I think you're seriously misunderstanding the statistic I posted. Not at all, i am very familiar with this argument, but it’s flawed. It doesn’t matter at all how many people have died so far. It is entirely irrelevant for determining the risk.
    - Hammershaft 2mo ago
      How is it irrelevant? It establishes the base rate under specific regulatory regimes. Most of the nuclear plants that make up that base rate were built when nuclear regulations were much much more lax than they are now, and yet Nuclear ends up with the safest track record out of all energy sources.
      - Kon5ole 2mo ago
        >How is it irrelevant? Because it only looks at what has happened, not what could happen. And what could happen is the interesting thing. Before Chernobyl happened, the statistics didn't tell us it could happen. Before Fukushima happened, the statistics didn't tell is it could happen. They happened anyway. The next thing that happens will similarly be completely independent from anything that happened before. So - what happened before is irrelevant. What COULD happen is relevant.

inigyou 2mo ago

Where would unregulated nuclear power go on that chart?

Hammershaft 2mo ago
Most of the nuclear power that makes up that chart was built when there was significantly less regulation on reactors than there is today. Even if deregulation increased nuclear deaths per watt by two orders of magnitude (which I strongly doubt!), nuclear would still be orders of magnitude safer than the fossil fuels that have replaced it across the western world.
- Kon5ole 2mo ago
  >Even if deregulation increased nuclear deaths per watt by two orders of magnitude (which I strongly doubt!) Why doubt it? Chernobyl alone was very close to causing millions of deaths. The actual accident released only about 5% of the core, but had the graphite fire not been extinguished, places as far away as Scotland and Scandinavia would not be able to grow enough edible food within their borders for decades. Europe would starve. Leukemia cases would be in the millions. The exclusion zone around Chernobyl would be hundreds of kilometers instead of 30. If the ground water barrier had been broken - which was likely - the ground water for tens of millions of people would be poisoned for centuries. The only reason to doubt it is that two orders of magnitude is probably not enough.
  - Hammershaft 2mo ago
    I hadn't heard any of these claims before. Without a source, I decided to ask chatgpt. Its assessment is that essentially every claim in this comment is false. If you think chatgpt is wrong can you explain why? https://chatgpt.com/s/t_6a72ee6f965c81919cc6e4bf8da64262 https://chatgpt.com/s/t_6a72ee6f965c81919cc6e4bf8da64262
    - Kon5ole 2mo ago
      By all means use chatGPT, but your linked chat session hasn't understood the conditions. It answers mostly based on what actually happened, not taking into account the scenario I described. Try asking chatGPT something like: "just a simple yes or no - Could the Chernobyl accident in theory under worst case conditions have developed to a disaster causing local food shortages in western europe and affect the water supply for millions of people in the Ukraine and neighboring countries?" For me, I get "Yes" from ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude Opus. You may argue that Chernobyl was a hunk of junk plant and that it can't happen anywhere else, so ask ChatGPT this as well: "just a simple yes or no - is there any scenario where fuel stored in ponds at US nuclear plants could ever release pollution like Chernobyl?" Yes. It really is in a class of its own when it comes to risk.

Kon5ole 2mo ago

>Nuclear power has orders of magnitude fewer deaths per kilowatt-hour By this logic the minuteman missile is harmless. It hasn’t killed anyone, right? Nuclear power has the potential to cause orders of magnitude more damage than any other power plant. Again, what has happened is irrelevant, the risk is all about what could happen.

Hammershaft 2mo ago
I think you're seriously misunderstanding the statistic I posted. I didn't post aggregate deaths from different power sources, I posted deaths per terawatt-hour of energy produced! This figure includes deaths from every nuclear accident, and yet it shows getting energy from nuclear power is orders of magnitude safer than getting the same energy from the fossil fuels that have replaced nuclear power in countries that have phased them out. (like germany)
- Kon5ole 2mo ago
  > I think you're seriously misunderstanding the statistic I posted. Not at all, i am very familiar with this argument, but it’s flawed. It doesn’t matter at all how many people have died so far. It is entirely irrelevant for determining the risk.
  - Hammershaft 2mo ago
    How is it irrelevant? It establishes the base rate under specific regulatory regimes. Most of the nuclear plants that make up that base rate were built when nuclear regulations were much much more lax than they are now, and yet Nuclear ends up with the safest track record out of all energy sources.
    - Kon5ole 2mo ago
      >How is it irrelevant? Because it only looks at what has happened, not what could happen. And what could happen is the interesting thing. Before Chernobyl happened, the statistics didn't tell us it could happen. Before Fukushima happened, the statistics didn't tell is it could happen. They happened anyway. The next thing that happens will similarly be completely independent from anything that happened before. So - what happened before is irrelevant. What COULD happen is relevant.