Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest • Hacker News Board

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#271

Post by dv_dt » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:41 PM UTC

hueving wrote: post #201

datenwolf wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's mostly due to the chemistry required to liberate the Uranium from the ore. What you have in the ore is mostly Uranium oxides. You have to strip away those pesky oxygen atoms in order to further process the Uranium. And in that process quite the amount of CO2 is produced. Now keep in mind that this must be done to all the Uranium, before it undergoes enrichtment. So for every atom of U235 you get about 200 (give…

How is that compared to mining for battery and solar material? It's a double standard to hold nuclear accountable for manufacturing when the same is not applied to solar/wind.

One can compare, but the nuclear industry pointedly ignores those areas, so I sort of assume it doesn't win on those points. Also solar/wind materials I would think are fairly recyclable.

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#272

Post by pps43 » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:41 PM UTC

mrb wrote: post #239

pps43 wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if you played Russian roulette a couple of times and lived, it must be safe, right? Probability is events over trials, zero events in two trials means probability of dying is 0/2=0%.

We have been operating thousands of nuclear generators for 60 years.

Based on that information, what is the probability of a nuclear power plant accident making a large city near it uninhabitable?

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#273

Post by Tomte » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:41 PM UTC

mrb wrote: post #219

Tomte wrote: post #197

Before Chernobyl blew up, nuclear energy proponents promised us, nuclear energy was safe. When Chernobyl blew up, it was obviously a stupid Soviet design, with stupid operating personnel. But now we've got new reactors, they are safe! Nothing could ever happen! Then Fukushima blew up. That was obviously okay, because it was a Tsunami in conjunction with a few other improbable acts, and we obviously can't expect the n…

" They have been playing with catastrophes of a magnitude we can't really comprehend " Did you even read the article? Statistics show you that nuclear is safer. Coal/oil/etc actually kill about 1000× more people than nuclear per TWh generated.

No, you're wrong. The statistics are based on "what happened so far" and "what we think could happen if things got really bad".

The last part has been proven untrue time and again. Every single time nuclear proponents said "that cannot happen" and after it happened they found a new fallback position "okay, that could happen, but it cannot ever get worse".

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#274

Post by beat » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:41 PM UTC

hueving wrote: post #242

beat wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Completely eliminates the possibility" sounds like something a supervillain would say. I'm not saying that this passive safety system won't work, or is a bad idea. It sounds great from the brief description. BUT. There's a terrible, terrible tendency of the pro-nuclear side to use bombastic language, and then sneer at those with doubts as ignorant and emotional rather than logical. Pricing promises are another probl…

>and then sneer at those with doubts as ignorant and emotional rather than logical That's because you reply with things like this. >sounds like something a supervillain would say.

When you tell me something "completely eliminates" the possibility of failure in complex industrial design - you're being emotional rather than logical.

Look, I'm actually pro-nuclear. But I think the arguments made for nuclear power are mostly awful, driven by techno-fetishism and wishful thinking rather than real logic. The "But I'm logical and you're just emotional!" argument is itself an emotional argument, a rush to claim a moral high ground (you'll see the exact same style and phrasing used in any political argument where privileged white guys are dismissing the points of women and minorities).

As others wisely pointed out in this thread, nuclear power suffers from a problem of feeling dangerous even when it's safe - and likewise, global warming feels safe even when it's an existential threat to civilization. If you want to make progress rather than score points, you need to take the emotional nature of the argument into account.

I didn't say your argument sounds like something a supervillain would say because I think the technology is bad. I said it because I think the phrasing is bad. Wise up.

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#275

Post by dsfyu404ed » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:42 PM UTC

lispm wrote: post #124

payne92 wrote: post #13

I believe the politicization of nuclear energy (the resulting lack of investment & innovation) will go down as one of the major blunders in human history. We'd be in a far, far better situation with greenhouse gasses if we (as a human race) had continued to invest in nuclear energy. There would have been mishaps along the way, but at a much smaller scale than we're experiencing now with deaths from air pollution and…

Nuclear energy was politicized from day minus one. It was developed out of government driven military technology. In day zero nuclear energy was set up by politicians: goals, strategies, financing, deployment, risk handling, etc. Everything was coming from energy politics. Investments were directed and the market&regulations for nuclear were set up. Government largely financed it and insures it. The large scale, the…

Yet the Japanese use/used the crap out of nuclear. You'd think they of all people would want nothing to do with it. At the end of the day it's all about dollars.

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#276

Post by tanderson92 » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:42 PM UTC

mikeash wrote: post #246

ekianjo wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then you need to count the whole refining process that goes in making usable petrol, too. This is not totally unique to nuclear.

Of course you also need to count that. But accounting for extraction and refining adds something like 20% to fossil fuel emissions, whereas it's claimed to vastly increase total nuclear emissions.

Sure, but this is a percents vs quantities problem. If nuclear has almost zero emissions in power production even the smallest increase will look like a massive increase percentage wise. It still may compare very favorably to fossil fuels for lifecycle emissions.

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#277

Post by meri_dian » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:42 PM UTC

China is charging ahead with nuclear in order to replace their outdated coal dependent energy infrastructure.

>https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-31/china-s-n...

As they develop and improve their reactor technology their plan is to export safer, more efficient fission reactors to the rest of the world.

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#278

Post by swills » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:43 PM UTC

Clean, safe, too cheap to meter! /s

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#279

Post by Tomte » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:43 PM UTC

Zak wrote: post #257

Tomte wrote: post #197

Before Chernobyl blew up, nuclear energy proponents promised us, nuclear energy was safe. When Chernobyl blew up, it was obviously a stupid Soviet design, with stupid operating personnel. But now we've got new reactors, they are safe! Nothing could ever happen! Then Fukushima blew up. That was obviously okay, because it was a Tsunami in conjunction with a few other improbable acts, and we obviously can't expect the n…

The default alternative to using more nuclear energy is to use more fossil fuels. Maybe we'd like to use less energy, or switch to wind, solar or similar, but that isn't a viable option in the short term in a lot of cases. We know that using fossil fuels will kill a few people every day, eventually adding up to a large number, as well as causing widespread, low-grade damage to the environment. On the other hand, nucl…

It may not be rational under your belief system (and that's a totally valid position), but you should realize that most people see it differently.

Many people are afraid of terrorism and plane crashes and sex crimes, but are still driving to work in a car.

Re: Out of all major energy sources, nuclear is the safest

#280

Post by quantdev » Mon, Jul 31, 2017, 5:44 PM UTC

Trying to understand risk by looking at historic data alone is wrong when you're talking about catastrophic ruin and uncertain tiny probabilities. Add the word weapon in the headline quote to see what I mean,

"Contrary to popular belief, nuclear weapons are the safest modern weapon"

Arguments that nuclear power are safe need to prove that while assuming the worst-case scenario, since the probability of such a scenario is a-priori unknown despite what much of this comment section seems to be claiming.

Solar is knowingly much safer because it is much easier to reason about.