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In recent decades renewable have enjoyed much more investment than nuclear. People love renewables, so governments love renewables, so industry builds renewable

In recent decades renewable have enjoyed much more investment than nuclear. People love renewables, so governments love renewables, so industry builds renewables. However, they aren't going to displace coal any time soon, which is what we need to do to avoid the catastrophe we're heading for. Transmission, storage and integration are all problems that will certainly be solved, with time and many billions spent on research and new infrastructure. Nuclear gives us drop-in zero-carbon replacements for coal plants today, without major changes to existing grids. If we're going to avoid disaster, 0% fossil fuels must take priority over 100% renewables. I hope and pray that the green movement embraces nuclear as a brother in arms soon.

sebular 12y ago
In 2014, China produced nearly 1/4 of the world's CO2 emissions, with the US coming in second at 15% (however, I believe we're the worst emitters per capita). Within the US, 32% of our emissions come from powering the electrical grid. So globally, that's 32% of 15%, or a little less than 5% of the world's total emissions. If we were to start building nuclear plants and replacing coal plants, the most we could really hope for is a fraction of that 5%, maybe 2 or 3%. In my mind, the negatives of nuclear outweigh the positives of potentially reducing global emissions by a percentage point or two. Since you agree that nuclear is only a stopgap measure, doesn't it seem like a drastic move? We're talking about demolishing coal plants to build nuclear reactors within our borders that will produce long-lasting radioactive waste material and pose Chernobyl/Fukushima/Three Mile Island-style threats to public safety, simply so that we can demolish those in a few years when solar/wind/fusion "gets there." On the other hand, if we used a combination of wind power and home-installed solar panels to simply reduce the energy draw on our coal plants, that would also reduce our home electricity draw. And imagine the economic boost we could see if the government was suddenly offering vouchers for home solar. Not only would that provide a lot of jobs for people to do the installations, but it would boost public interest and investment in solar, strengthening the technology as we spread its adoption. This isn't to say that I don't think nuclear has its place. I think it belongs on the enormous ships that produce the world's worst pollution. You may have recently heard a report that 16 supertankers produce more (sulphur) emissions than all of the world's automobiles combined. These massive ships aren't held to environmental standards, and they burn some of the filthiest fuels. Yet we've been running nuclear subs without major incident, far away from the general population, for decades. Why not use nuclear reactors in the worst-polluting vehicles, and encourage the proliferation of safer technologies domestically? sources: http://www.statista.com/statistics/271748/the-largest-emitters-of-co2-in-the-world/ http://www.statista.com/statistics/271748/the-largest-emitte... http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/sources.html http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/sources.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1229857/How-16-ships-create-pollution-cars-world.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1229857/How-1...
bebop 12y ago
The green movement will not embrace nuclear for two reasons: One is that nuclear produces highly toxic waste with a very long half life. And two, we have already seen that we are not good at making our sites safe and resilient to disaster, nor containing waste post disasters. It is really to bad because without these facts nuclear would have solved our energy problems long ago.

sebular 12y ago

In 2014, China produced nearly 1/4 of the world's CO2 emissions, with the US coming in second at 15% (however, I believe we're the worst emitters per capita). Within the US, 32% of our emissions come from powering the electrical grid. So globally, that's 32% of 15%, or a little less than 5% of the world's total emissions. If we were to start building nuclear plants and replacing coal plants, the most we could really hope for is a fraction of that 5%, maybe 2 or 3%. In my mind, the negatives of nuclear outweigh the positives of potentially reducing global emissions by a percentage point or two. Since you agree that nuclear is only a stopgap measure, doesn't it seem like a drastic move? We're talking about demolishing coal plants to build nuclear reactors within our borders that will produce long-lasting radioactive waste material and pose Chernobyl/Fukushima/Three Mile Island-style threats to public safety, simply so that we can demolish those in a few years when solar/wind/fusion "gets there." On the other hand, if we used a combination of wind power and home-installed solar panels to simply reduce the energy draw on our coal plants, that would also reduce our home electricity draw. And imagine the economic boost we could see if the government was suddenly offering vouchers for home solar. Not only would that provide a lot of jobs for people to do the installations, but it would boost public interest and investment in solar, strengthening the technology as we spread its adoption. This isn't to say that I don't think nuclear has its place. I think it belongs on the enormous ships that produce the world's worst pollution. You may have recently heard a report that 16 supertankers produce more (sulphur) emissions than all of the world's automobiles combined. These massive ships aren't held to environmental standards, and they burn some of the filthiest fuels. Yet we've been running nuclear subs without major incident, far away from the general population, for decades. Why not use nuclear reactors in the worst-polluting vehicles, and encourage the proliferation of safer technologies domestically? sources: http://www.statista.com/statistics/271748/the-largest-emitters-of-co2-in-the-world/ http://www.statista.com/statistics/271748/the-largest-emitte... http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/sources.html http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/sources.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1229857/How-16-ships-create-pollution-cars-world.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1229857/How-1...

bebop 12y ago

The green movement will not embrace nuclear for two reasons: One is that nuclear produces highly toxic waste with a very long half life. And two, we have already seen that we are not good at making our sites safe and resilient to disaster, nor containing waste post disasters. It is really to bad because without these facts nuclear would have solved our energy problems long ago.