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

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

#101

Post by yorwba »

lispm wrote: post #67
melling wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was politically motivated to shut down the plants early and rely on coal. Using the existing nuclear that you have for an additional decade or longer is much better than switching to coal. A lot can happen in a decade.

It's just that Germany did not switch to coal.

Well, they didn't shut down all nuclear plants either. The last ones are planned to go offline in 2022. It would probably have been possible to extend nuclear use a bit and reduce coal consumption faster instead.

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

#102

Post by magduf »

UncleEntity wrote: post #70
magduf wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you think it's better to have massive quantities of CO2 and various pollutants (including radioactive ones) pumped into the atmosphere? How exactly is that better than a few buckets of nuclear waste?

Well, presumably, you don't have to design signage that will be understandable in 10,000 years...

Why is that a problem? We can still understand all the writings on ancient Roman buildings without any trouble. And it isn't too hard to make pictograms showing that something is dangerous and radioactive. We put some effort into universal pictograms understandable by actual aliens for the Voyager probes; making pictographs understandable by humans is much simpler.

Finally, why are you so determined to believe that no one will have a solution for radioactive waste in a few hundred years? How hard will it be to launch it off the planet if necessary? With the cost/kg of rocket launches coming down, it shouldn't be too hard to dispose of it that way. But for some reason, people like you just insist on sticking with coal power and breathing in all the pollution that creates. I will never understand it.

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

#103

Post by dgellow »

number6 wrote: post #90
antris wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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

We only have worth alternative, that’s exactly the point here.

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

#104

Post by looping__lui »

Dagonfly wrote: post #80
looping__lui wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, well, the phasing out of coal has been decided long time even before that - and still nothing happened. So “was decided long time ago by the Green party” is more a “who cares - I believe it when I see it”. Merkel made it happen for real (unfortunately). The decision to end nuclear power has been one of the “Merkel just decides without really caring” decisions. Germans are not entirely stupid. We have lived thro…

> 2002 wurde der Vertrag („Atomkonsens“) durch Novellierung des Atomgesetzes rechtlich abgesichert.[100] In der Folge wurden am 14. November 2003 das Kernkraftwerk Stade (640 MW)[101] und am 11. Mai 2005 das Kernkraftwerk Obrigheim (340 MW)[102] endgültig abgeschaltet. Für alle anderen Atomkraftwerke wurden Reststrommengen vereinbart, nach deren Erzeugung die Kraftwerke abgeschaltet werden sollten. Feste Abschaltterm…

Thanks for the links - I appreciate you digging into things further.

I may just be a bit “disillusioned” by any political decisions as they are just amended changed and reversed so in my own subjective feeling everything always kind a is possible if political parties want it at the time.

A poll is a poll and not a vote. I personally don’t trust any of these to reflect public opinion. A question can be asked and interpreted in many ways. You can always get the opinion you want.

As for “that’s democracy”: well, it’s kind a the chancellor/government deciding. Not the people per se. I would be careful concluding that a poll stating 77% and Merkel “rushing” the nuclear exit (not extending as most believed certainly) is just a reflection if a thorough public thought and decision making process.

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

#105

Post by Melting_Harps »

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…

> 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.

This is such a horrible stat, especially when taken in this context; I'm not for coal, I think its filthy and and obsolete form of energy, but do you realize the affects of Chernobyl, 3 mile island, Fukushima et al will be felt for millions of years AFTER you are gone?

With so many other forms of renewable energy, you'd think it were possible to create another model.

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

#106

Post by looping__lui »

lispm wrote: post #72
looping__lui wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, well, the phasing out of coal has been decided long time even before that - and still nothing happened. So “was decided long time ago by the Green party” is more a “who cares - I believe it when I see it”. Merkel made it happen for real (unfortunately). The decision to end nuclear power has been one of the “Merkel just decides without really caring” decisions. Germans are not entirely stupid. We have lived thro…

> and still nothing happened Coal is on the move out. Most coal production in Germany has been closed or will be closed. Last year coal use for electricity production was on an all time low at 28%. > 100% higher than France The electricity price is political in France and electricity production is basically state owned. The losses are paid by the tax payer.

Yes, I stand corrected by coal.

I may have been biased living somewhat close to the Hambacher Forst and just seeing these giant holes in disbelief.

I did not know that electricity is state owned and subsidised. Maybe Germans should ask their french neighbor for an extension cable or two...

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

#108

Post by skywhopper »

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…

The lesson of Fukushima and Chernobyl is that an unexpected failure with nuclear power can become a massively damaging, insanely expensive, generational cleanup effort.

Sure, you can say newer designs are safer, but you can't say that the underlying technology behind nuclear power is inherently safe. Even a well-run, accident-free nuclear plant uses dangerously radioactive material and generates dangerously radioactive waste that must be dealt with. But if anything goes wrong with any of the processes surrounding all of that, the consequences can be dire. Why lean on dangerous, expensive, and risky tech when we have better solutions?

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

#109

Post by antris »

Melting_Harps wrote: post #105
antris wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

> 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. This is such a horrible stat, especially when taken in this context; I'm not for coal, I think its filthy and and obsolete form of energy, but do you realize the affects of Chernobyl, 3 mile island, Fuk…

> do you realize the affects of Chernobyl, 3 mile island, Fukushima et al will be felt for millions of years AFTER you are gone?

No, because that's simply not true. At least not in terms of radiation. Perhaps politically, or in the general feeling of fear among people who do not understand nuclear energy, the effects might be long-lasting but the no-go area around Chernobyl is very small, Fukushima is basically liveable today and I don't think 3 mile island affected any area to such extent that radiation levels would be above the safety limits.

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

#110

Post by DuskStar »

looping__lui wrote: post #50
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…

Yeah, well, the phasing out of coal has been decided long time even before that - and still nothing happened. So “was decided long time ago by the Green party” is more a “who cares - I believe it when I see it”. Merkel made it happen for real (unfortunately). The decision to end nuclear power has been one of the “Merkel just decides without really caring” decisions. Germans are not entirely stupid. We have lived thro…

> Electricity prices are now about 30 Ct/kWh in Germany.

That's insane - I thought California was bad at ~$0.15/kWh residential, but that's on par with Hawaii. At least Hawaii has the excuse of being an island...

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