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Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

nytimes.com

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Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#81

Post by masterofpuppets »

fhars wrote: post #76
beloch wrote: post #71

"Nuclear energy, to start with, is ultimately not safe, and the Germans have always been particularly uneasy with it. After the nuclear accident at the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan in 2011, Chancellor Angela Merkel ordered the “Atomausstieg,” the exit from nuclear energy once and for all. Why? Because, as Ms. Merkel put it back then: “The residual risk of nuclear energy can be accepted only if one is convinced th…

> Updated studies indicated the reactor was vulnerable to tsunami, but were ignored. Repeatedly. And this is why nuclear power is fundamentally unsafe: the operators have conclusively proven that they just cannot be trusted. Repeatedly.

The Fukushima accident had more to do with the culture in Japan than the industry globally[1]. The government and the regulator were basically in bed with TEPCO.

1. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2017/...

Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#82

Post by ofrzeta »

Dagonfly wrote: post #63

I'm pro-nuclear, but I find these articles about Germany's anti-nuclear stance extremely frustrating. Blaming the current situation on Fukushima is historically inaccurate. Imo, there are 2 major reasons for the current stance: 1. Chernobyl: After the disaster in 1986 the anti-nuclear movement gained massive traction. The radioactive cloud spread all the way to West Germany and warnings had to be issued (mushrooms, v…

> 1. Chernobyl: After the disaster in 1986 the anti-nuclear movement gained massive traction. The radioactive cloud spread all the way to West Germany and warnings had to be issued (mushrooms, venison, crops, ...). It was a real turning point, since everyone was made aware of the concerns.

That is true. And also, still today, when in our forests a boar gets killed by a hunter it has to be brought to the administration to meter the radioactivity (due to Cesium 137). A lot of boar gets discarded instead of being eaten because it exceeds the threshold (600 Bq/kg). I don't know what they are doing with it though.

Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#83

Post by stkdump »

beloch wrote: post #71

"Nuclear energy, to start with, is ultimately not safe, and the Germans have always been particularly uneasy with it. After the nuclear accident at the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan in 2011, Chancellor Angela Merkel ordered the “Atomausstieg,” the exit from nuclear energy once and for all. Why? Because, as Ms. Merkel put it back then: “The residual risk of nuclear energy can be accepted only if one is convinced th…

You make the common mistake of assuming one can scientifically prove a given nuclear plant is safe like one can prove that the square root of 2 is irrational or that carbon emissions cause warming. That is not the case and it boggles my mind how many people think it is.

If you know so sure what causes these accidents, then you can predict what plant(s) will have them next. Can you? Can anyone? Saying after the fact: it can easily be explained why that happened... that isn't science.

Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#84

Post by mikeyouse »

masterofpuppets wrote: post #81
fhars wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Updated studies indicated the reactor was vulnerable to tsunami, but were ignored. Repeatedly. And this is why nuclear power is fundamentally unsafe: the operators have conclusively proven that they just cannot be trusted. Repeatedly.

The Fukushima accident had more to do with the culture in Japan than the industry globally[1]. The government and the regulator were basically in bed with TEPCO. 1. https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2017/...

Do you think that this is somehow unique to Japan? How close do you think regulators and operators are in the US? Is there any industry that even remotely seems like it has a healthy relationship with its oversight bodies?

Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#85

Post by fbender »

beloch wrote: post #71

"Nuclear energy, to start with, is ultimately not safe, and the Germans have always been particularly uneasy with it. After the nuclear accident at the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan in 2011, Chancellor Angela Merkel ordered the “Atomausstieg,” the exit from nuclear energy once and for all. Why? Because, as Ms. Merkel put it back then: “The residual risk of nuclear energy can be accepted only if one is convinced th…

But this is exactly the point. Catastrophes like Fukushima are practically always a combination of individual deficiencies in design, process, and operator errors. Designs can be improved, processes adapted, and people trained better, but that will not prevent accidents from happening. This is mostly because human imagination is limited and humans are fallible, and what‘s not covered by the previous two is lack of knowledge & understanding.

Said in other words, if you wait long enough, a catastrophe is inevitable. And history, both old and recent, has told us that the time you‘ll have to wait is much shorter that you‘d think.

I work in aerospace operations and every freakin‘ day things go different than planned and anomalies happen. In „my“ „industry“, we try to prepare for off-nominal situations and that buffers the effects, but you can only do so much and you end up in contingencies very often. You can also easily see when a new player enters the stage as they very quickly (should) learn that you‘ll have to react and adapt your plans very often and tone down any promises …

Long story short, whatever means you put up to prevent catastrophic events, they will never be enough. Then the question of cost arises, which is undoubtedly extremely high for nuclear events, especially in such a densely populated and small country like Germany, and you’ll quickly realise that you probably do not want to take that risk even if probability is very low.

And finally, we have yet to find a working way to handle our nuclear waste for the next 10k-100k years. (I am aware of the options but obviously we are not there yet and it‘s unclear if we ever reach the state of „acceptable solution“ instead of pushing the issue to generations to come.)

Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#86

Post by antris »

fhars wrote: post #76
beloch wrote: post #71

"Nuclear energy, to start with, is ultimately not safe, and the Germans have always been particularly uneasy with it. After the nuclear accident at the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan in 2011, Chancellor Angela Merkel ordered the “Atomausstieg,” the exit from nuclear energy once and for all. Why? Because, as Ms. Merkel put it back then: “The residual risk of nuclear energy can be accepted only if one is convinced th…

> Updated studies indicated the reactor was vulnerable to tsunami, but were ignored. Repeatedly. And this is why nuclear power is fundamentally unsafe: the operators have conclusively proven that they just cannot be trusted. Repeatedly.

> And this is why nuclear power is fundamentally unsafe: the operators have conclusively proven that they just cannot be trusted. Repeatedly.

So let's just keep reliably killing people with coal around the year like we do now...?

The fact is that nuclear power kills the least amount of people per unit of energy produced, with all accidents taken into account. If that's "unsafe" then you cannot consider any electricity production method safe.

Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#87

Post by close04 »

lispm wrote: post #68
close04 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this narrative of the demise of nuclear energy largely being politically motivated It's politically motivated to the extent that people are scared of nuclear and any political move to support it or finance research could be career suicide. Without any attempt to research improvements we are stuck using old technology and anyone advocating against nuclear power has good reason to keep doing so. It's a bit of a vicio…

Germany has invested zillions in Nuclear. Breeder technology, Thorium pebble bed reactor, storage sites... Failed costly experiments. Nuclear is simply not cost effective in a democratic society.

> Failed costly experiments.

The battle for finding cancer cures had so many dead ends but it's the worthiness of the cause that keeps you going. The promise of single power plants able to produce an almost endless supply of cheap, clean(ish?) energy still tickles the imagination more than vast swaths of land covered by PV panels or wind turbines.

> Nuclear is simply not cost effective in a democratic society.

Democracy is about picking your aim, not making the target more cost effective. And the more complex the topic, the less qualified regular people are at even guessing if something is cost effective or not. Also absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Just because we failed to make the tech cost effective until now doesn't mean it cannot be and never will be.

You suggest anything that we've failed at for a few decades (even if some attempts are half-hearted) should just be halted because that's proof it cannot be done. Some of our greatest achievements came from people who wouldn't give up. Some are yet to come. Or we can just stop it all because democracy and cost effectiveness.

This is exactly why the move away from nuclear is politically motivated. Not because it's a foregone conclusion that it cannot be solved but rather because a politician will find it easier to convince "the democracy" that spending tens of billions on a stealth democracy dispatcher is more cost effective than spending the same on trying to improve nuclear to the point of eliminating the key downsides.

Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#88

Post by lispm »

Spooky23 wrote: post #28
this_user wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So after Fukushima shrewd politicians moved to shutter nuclear plants and return to coal. That's not true. The phasing out of nuclear energy was decided in the late 90s after the Social Democrats and Greens had taken over the government. This was part of a larger green energy package. This had been a major issue for the Greens since at least the 80s when the party was founded. The Merkel government attempted to rol…

> The Merkel government attempted to roll some of that back in 2010, but was blindsided by the Fukushima accident that caused public opinion to become much more polarised again w.r.t. nuclear energy. In a democratic society, the will of the people is relevant. Fukushima caused the end of nuclear energy in Germany.

> Fukushima caused the end of nuclear energy in Germany

The end of nuclear was decided by the red/green government a few years earlier. The conservative successor government (Merkel) tried to reverse that decision and after Fukushima they joined the German mainstream position to end nuclear and to invest further money into a new type of distributed electricity production with the focus on renewable energy.

Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#89

Post by yohannparis »

cma wrote: post #53
magduf wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Expensive compared to what? Are you comparing the full costs of coal plants to nuclear, or are you just externalizing the costs as most comparisons do? The costs of coal need to include all the effects of coal emissions into the atmosphere, which may very well be incalculable. Solar and wind of course are great, but has anyone figured out how to make those supply 100% of a nation's power needs, 24/7? I don't believe…

Nuclear costs are heavily externalized ($12 billion liability cap, rest paid by governement and there are plausible >$1trillion accident scenarios). It is as if they only have to pay insurance on a deductible.

The lack of a carbon tax makes any fossil fuel technology heavily subsidies.

When all externalities are taking into account, then we can talk about the cost of Nuclear.

Re: Germany is moving beyond nuclear power, but at what cost?

#90

Post by number6 »

antris wrote: post #86
fhars wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Updated studies indicated the reactor was vulnerable to tsunami, but were ignored. Repeatedly. And this is why nuclear power is fundamentally unsafe: the operators have conclusively proven that they just cannot be trusted. Repeatedly.

> And this is why nuclear power is fundamentally unsafe: the operators have conclusively proven that they just cannot be trusted. Repeatedly. So let's just keep reliably killing people with coal around the year like we do now...? The fact is that nuclear power kills the least amount of people per unit of energy produced, with all accidents taken into account. If that's "unsafe" then you cannot consider any electricit…

Or kill them in a single event that causes the surroundings uninhabitable.

If only we had alternatives to generate power

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