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Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

nytimes.com

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Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#401

Post by differentView »

scarygliders wrote: post #128

Can we just get something straight about the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant? Although it was a 1960's design, the reason it failed the way it did was because of one design flaw... Its backup generators were not placed up on the hills above it. Rather, the backup generators were situated below sea level underneath the reactor buildings. DERP. Fukushima Dai-ichi survived the Magnitude 9 earthquake. It did not s…

There will always be unknown unknowns. It's 2019, we can't even not fuck up with a commercial aircraft.

Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#402

Post by DoreenMichele »

danmaz74 wrote: post #397
eigenvector wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the biggest advantages renewable energy has over both nuclear and mega-dams is that the size of project required to achieve the commonly quoted LCOE (levelized cost of energy) is much, much smaller. 50 MW or perhaps less per site, versus 1000+ MW. This means: 1. no mega projects that attract similarly sized public opposition 2. 1-2 year construction timelines instead of 10+ 3. much, much less financial and reg…

Dams produce renewable energy.

There are a lot of problems with large scale dams.

They interfere with fish migration. For some species, this means disrupting their reproductive cycle.

They gradually accumulate sediment, so their reservoir slowly fills up and turns into land. This is one of the issues with the Aswan Dam, which is projected to have a much shorter lifespan than was initially projected due to high sediment accumulation.

The Aswan met all of its goals, but it's a disaster. The sediment rapidly accumulating behind the dam used to provide free fertilizer for farmers. Use of commercial fertilizer skyrocketed.

It's also the cause of a serious health crisis. Schistosomiasis cases have also skyrocketed.

The annual floods used to keep snail populations in check. The snails are the vector for this gruesome parasitic infection.

Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#403

Post by michaelmrose »

andness wrote: post #387
dirkt wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My point is that nuclear power is safe, as long as all disaster scenarios are taken into account I don't know if you are old enough to remember it, but that's exactly what nuclear energy proponents said in the 70s. Since then, actual experience showed that about every 20 years, there has been a big incident with global impact, and it will take decades if not centuries until the affected area is usable again. And th…

I agree with you that I don't think we can make nuclear safe. But if the choice seems to be between millions of deaths from global warming or thousands of deaths from nuclear, isn't the latter vastly preferable? Shouldn't we set out and build out nuclear to steer us away from the edge, and then worry about better solutions once we're safe? I suspect the reason people don't buy this argument is that they don't truly b…

Can you provide a timeline and justification on "millions of deaths from global warming".

Why can't be invest the money in better alternatives and save the same "millions of lives" with actually sustainable tech that doesn't produce what you are describing as "thousands of deaths"

Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#404

Post by lazyjones »

Gondolin wrote: post #400

I am flabbergasted that some commenters here argue against nuclear because of waste and accidents, while ignoring that - coal produce radioactive waste too - it kills a lot more persons (without taking into account global warning) due to air pollution - the economic cost of nuclear may be underestimated, but this is nothing compared to the economic cost of global warming. Renewable (wind and solar) are extremely impo…

> I am very concerned for the future of my children that even well educated people (I have these same arguments with my university colleagues) don't realise that.

Perhaps it's not very convincing to claim that "a few potential large nuclear explosions due to accident/malice" aren't as bad as an average temperature increase of 1 degree or so. Certainly seems borderline insane to me.

Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#405

Post by michaelmrose »

jfnixon wrote: post #377
asaddhamani wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but what about having to evacuate the area for decades / more to come? And the radioactive waste problem?

The counter risk is having the entire planet rendered uninhabitable for human life, right? Let's see, some area rendered uninhabitable versus the planet rendered uninhabitable... I'm going with A.

Why are you arguing that the only options are the end of the planet or building nuclear reactors?

Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#406

Post by michaelmrose »

masonic wrote: post #346
dirkt wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My point is that nuclear power is safe, as long as all disaster scenarios are taken into account I don't know if you are old enough to remember it, but that's exactly what nuclear energy proponents said in the 70s. Since then, actual experience showed that about every 20 years, there has been a big incident with global impact, and it will take decades if not centuries until the affected area is usable again. And th…

Are you unaware that more nuclear waste enters the environment from burning coal than from all nuclear plant incidents combined?

Nobody wants to burn more coal except people who own stocks in coal. In other news being beat with a stick sounds like a better alternative to being blown up but most of use would prefer a massage.

Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#407

Post by turbohz »

jokoon wrote: post #393

Greenpeace has been known to fight nuclear power, as have far left green parties. It really saddens me. Reaching good power output with renewable energies is laughable. I keep hearing that germany generated a lot of power with wind, like 80%, but it lasted one week, and it makes me really wonder about the accuracy of that news. Wikipedia is moot about germany wind energy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_G…

Maybe that's a feature. Forcing to make more efficient use of energy.

Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#408

Post by michaelmrose »

roenxi wrote: post #361
asaddhamani wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that?

We burn a tiny amount of fuel to get a lot of nuclear energy, and we burn a huge amount of coal to get a lot of thermal energy. You need to consume orders of magnitude more coal than atomic fuel to get the same amount of energy; so the trace elements in coal become a big deal. The radiation from coal isn't even the worst contaminant, you get all sorts of trace elements. Sulphur (causes acid rain around the power plan…

Pretending nuclear waste isn't an actual problem basically means your entire analysis is disastrously wrong. Consider contributing after doing further analysis.

Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#409

Post by michaelmrose »

sjwright wrote: post #372
dorgo wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Per kw produced it is safer than even solar or wind how do you define "safer"?

The definition of "safer" is fewer people killed per kilowatt hour of energy generated. By that very reasonable metric, nuclear power is objectively less deadly than rooftop solar or wind turbines.

People are usually more ok with predictable risks that can be mitigated by the parties involved. Example taking proper safety precautions against falls vs oops we melted down and gave you cancer 10 years later.

Re: Nuclear power is the fastest way to slash greenhouse gas emissions, decarbonize

#410

Post by Brakenshire »

jokoon wrote: post #393

Greenpeace has been known to fight nuclear power, as have far left green parties. It really saddens me. Reaching good power output with renewable energies is laughable. I keep hearing that germany generated a lot of power with wind, like 80%, but it lasted one week, and it makes me really wonder about the accuracy of that news. Wikipedia is moot about germany wind energy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_G…

Nuclear is cheap if governments back the loans (all the cost is up front so a 2% or 5% interest rate has a massive impact on final project cost), and if the projects can be delivered consistently on budget (conspicuously not the case for any of the most recent designs with passive safety features).
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