4 ms·

You're worried about three meltdowns, but not the 2,000 nuclear weapons that have been detonated since the start of the atomic age? Compared to bomb tests, the

by ggreer 13y ago

You're worried about three meltdowns, but not the 2,000 nuclear weapons that have been detonated since the start of the atomic age? Compared to bomb tests, the fallout from nuclear power is a rounding error. But let's review those three meltdowns. Three Mile Island didn't cause a single case of cancer. Chernobyl was a ridiculously unsafe design run with incredible incompetence. The WHO estimates it caused 40,000 cases of cancer and 4,000 deaths from those cancers. That may sound bad, but pollution from coal kills around 30,000 people each year just in the US. Finally, there's Fukushima. It's expected to cause 100-200 premature deaths from cancers. Remember, the cause of that meltdown was an earthquake-tsunami combo that killed almost 20,000 people. If anything, shutting down nuclear power worsens public health. Demand for electricity isn't going to go down, so we end up burning coal, and coal plants are much worse than nuclear. From http://squid314.livejournal.com/292620.html http://squid314.livejournal.com/292620.html: According to the Clean Air Task Force, coal plants kill about thirty thousand people per year in the US through pollution (which causes respiratory disease). There are six hundred coal plants, so that's about 50 deaths per plant. These numbers are much higher - maybe even by an order of magnitude - in Chinese and third-world coal plants, which lack the US' stringent environmental restrictions. Even in the worst-case scenario, nuclear power still does better than coal: When you hit a nuclear plant with the fifth largest earthquake ever recorded, then immediately follow that with a twenty foot high tsunami, and then it explodes, it still kills fewer people than an average coal plant does every single year when everything goes perfectly. There are lots of things that cause long-term harm to the environment: toxic chemicals, heavy metals, and yes, radioisotopes. If we want to enjoy a first-world quality of life, we have to accept some pollution. The least harmful energy source today is nuclear power.

marze 13y ago
Uh, math. A reactor complex like Fukushima has ~100 tons of reactor fuel per reactor, not counting spent fuel rods. Say 1000 tons total. A bomb has a few kg of fissionable material, maybe 100,000 times less than a reactor complex. Do the math, if a reactor fails containment, the contaminants dwarf that of a bomb. I think Fukushima contaminants have tripled the radioactive cesium in the Pacific still left over from the 2000 bombs you mention. Nuclear is an outdated cold-war technology that won't compete with solar economically. They are slowly being phased out, down from 17% electric worldwide a few years ago to 10% now.
- spikels 13y ago
  I'm curious how you formed your opinions on the safety of nuclear power: What publications and which experts did you find authoritative? Have you reviewed any academic research on the subject? Do you understand the arguments of the pro-nuclear viewpoint?
- ggreer 13y ago
  I don't think you addressed most of my points, but I feel I need to respond to what you've thrown out here. Only 1-3% of a fuel rod's mass is fissile, and containment failure doesn't aerosolize a kiloton of fuel rods. Almost all the material stays at the site. While the smallest possible bomb is about 20kg of fissile material, actual bombs are an order of magnitude bigger. In addition, bombs cause neutron activation in the environment and create a mushroom cloud that lifts fallout into the stratosphere. The immediate effects are much worse and much more widespread. You can say scary things like, "tripled the radioactive cesium in the Pacific", but Fukushima leaked around 9kg of cesium radioisotopes. Outside of the immediate area, there's no risk to marine or human life. From http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3341070/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3341070/: We address risks to public health and marine biota by showing that though Cs isotopes are elevated 10–1,000× over prior levels in waters off Japan, radiation risks due to these radionuclides are below those generally considered harmful to marine animals and human consumers, and even below those from naturally occurring radionuclides. Instead of spreading FUD, look at the statistics. Again, from http://squid314.livejournal.com/292620.html http://squid314.livejournal.com/292620.html: A useful measure of power plant capacity is the "terawatt", equal to one trillion watts. Coal kills 2500 times as many people per terawatt as nuclear. In fact, nuclear power has the lowest fatality per terawatt of any form of power in existence. Rooftop solar power has a per terawatt death rate ten times worse than nuclear power because of - I kid you not - people falling off roofs when installing the panel. Hydroelectric power has a worse fatality rate because of dams bursting and flooding people. Even wind power has a worse fatality per terawatt rate - seventy three people have died in windmill related accidents. You responded with the economics of solar power instead of addressing my points about safety, but as far as I can tell, you're incorrect on that. By every measure I could find, solar was over twice the cost of nuclear. It would break the chart if it was shown on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cost_of_energy_sources http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cost_of_energy_sources. While nuclear power has decreased recently, the reason is political ass-covering, not economics. And it's not solar that's picking up the slack. Fossil fuels are the winners: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World_energy_consumption.svg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World_energy_consumption.s... There are two reasons for this: 1. Fossil fuels are cheap, mostly because their cost to the environment and public health aren't priced in. 2. They are reliable base-band sources of power. Coal works no matter how cloudy it gets or how calm the wind is. Without reliable, predictable generation, wind and solar require expensive (and sometimes dangerous) energy storage systems. At best, they can only supplement base-band sources.
Aloha 13y ago
Yes, this. I'd actually argue that the RMBK-1000 reactor is not horrifically unsafe, so long as it's operated within its design envelope - which is to say, for example, not overriding the automated safety systems. Had it been built with a containment vessel, I'd even argue it was within the safety margins of western reactors. Chernobyl was incompetent crew largely, taking a design well outside of its normal safety margins by shutting down nearly every safety system the reactor had - these choices compounded the design limitations of the reactor. Under no circumstances should the control rods have been removed all the way from the reactor - this single action caused the meltdown (combined with the graphite tips on the control rods). We know the risks of nuclear power, if you do it wrong it does kill people, and salts the earth in the vicinity of the unit for generations. This is better in my opinion than killing people who live in the vicinity of a power plant as a course of normal operation.

by ggreer 13y ago

marze 13y ago

Uh, math. A reactor complex like Fukushima has ~100 tons of reactor fuel per reactor, not counting spent fuel rods. Say 1000 tons total. A bomb has a few kg of fissionable material, maybe 100,000 times less than a reactor complex. Do the math, if a reactor fails containment, the contaminants dwarf that of a bomb. I think Fukushima contaminants have tripled the radioactive cesium in the Pacific still left over from the 2000 bombs you mention. Nuclear is an outdated cold-war technology that won't compete with solar economically. They are slowly being phased out, down from 17% electric worldwide a few years ago to 10% now.

spikels 13y ago
I'm curious how you formed your opinions on the safety of nuclear power: What publications and which experts did you find authoritative? Have you reviewed any academic research on the subject? Do you understand the arguments of the pro-nuclear viewpoint?
ggreer 13y ago
I don't think you addressed most of my points, but I feel I need to respond to what you've thrown out here. Only 1-3% of a fuel rod's mass is fissile, and containment failure doesn't aerosolize a kiloton of fuel rods. Almost all the material stays at the site. While the smallest possible bomb is about 20kg of fissile material, actual bombs are an order of magnitude bigger. In addition, bombs cause neutron activation in the environment and create a mushroom cloud that lifts fallout into the stratosphere. The immediate effects are much worse and much more widespread. You can say scary things like, "tripled the radioactive cesium in the Pacific", but Fukushima leaked around 9kg of cesium radioisotopes. Outside of the immediate area, there's no risk to marine or human life. From http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3341070/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3341070/: We address risks to public health and marine biota by showing that though Cs isotopes are elevated 10–1,000× over prior levels in waters off Japan, radiation risks due to these radionuclides are below those generally considered harmful to marine animals and human consumers, and even below those from naturally occurring radionuclides. Instead of spreading FUD, look at the statistics. Again, from http://squid314.livejournal.com/292620.html http://squid314.livejournal.com/292620.html: A useful measure of power plant capacity is the "terawatt", equal to one trillion watts. Coal kills 2500 times as many people per terawatt as nuclear. In fact, nuclear power has the lowest fatality per terawatt of any form of power in existence. Rooftop solar power has a per terawatt death rate ten times worse than nuclear power because of - I kid you not - people falling off roofs when installing the panel. Hydroelectric power has a worse fatality rate because of dams bursting and flooding people. Even wind power has a worse fatality per terawatt rate - seventy three people have died in windmill related accidents. You responded with the economics of solar power instead of addressing my points about safety, but as far as I can tell, you're incorrect on that. By every measure I could find, solar was over twice the cost of nuclear. It would break the chart if it was shown on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cost_of_energy_sources http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cost_of_energy_sources. While nuclear power has decreased recently, the reason is political ass-covering, not economics. And it's not solar that's picking up the slack. Fossil fuels are the winners: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World_energy_consumption.svg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:World_energy_consumption.s... There are two reasons for this: 1. Fossil fuels are cheap, mostly because their cost to the environment and public health aren't priced in. 2. They are reliable base-band sources of power. Coal works no matter how cloudy it gets or how calm the wind is. Without reliable, predictable generation, wind and solar require expensive (and sometimes dangerous) energy storage systems. At best, they can only supplement base-band sources.

Aloha 13y ago

Yes, this. I'd actually argue that the RMBK-1000 reactor is not horrifically unsafe, so long as it's operated within its design envelope - which is to say, for example, not overriding the automated safety systems. Had it been built with a containment vessel, I'd even argue it was within the safety margins of western reactors. Chernobyl was incompetent crew largely, taking a design well outside of its normal safety margins by shutting down nearly every safety system the reactor had - these choices compounded the design limitations of the reactor. Under no circumstances should the control rods have been removed all the way from the reactor - this single action caused the meltdown (combined with the graphite tips on the control rods). We know the risks of nuclear power, if you do it wrong it does kill people, and salts the earth in the vicinity of the unit for generations. This is better in my opinion than killing people who live in the vicinity of a power plant as a course of normal operation.