Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity • Hacker News Board

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#151

Post by eliasmacpherson » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 8:55 AM UTC

jedsmith wrote: post #55

kscaldef wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, for that matter, we don't have enough nuclear power production capacity to meet our needs either, so I don't entirely see your point. Reducing the amount of power we're producing with fossil fuels will mean needing to increase our production from other sources, but it doesn't mandate that we have to increase it from a particular source.

My point is that fossil fuels and nuclear power are the only two types that scale efficiently with current technology. Everything else doesn't scale as well. Not sure how else to word that, and that's exactly what I meant up there. It has nothing to do with current capacity. Nuclear has lost a lot to debates much like this one; however, if we wanted the capacity, nuclear would step up and fill it in at a reasonable p…

The reasonable price you talk about doesn't include the cost of disposal. Whatever about providing electricity to be consumed at scale, dealing with radioactive waste has not been successful at small scale, why would it work at large scale? A lot of people display hubris about the merits of the on paper research reactors, what about their unknown unknowns?

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#152

Post by asharp » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:02 AM UTC

justatdotin wrote: post #89

hmmm, the entire article excludes the words 'weapons' and 'waste'. all nuclear reactors produce long lived radioactive wastes which are left for humanity to manage well beyond the forseeable future. Here in Australia, we've come up with a state-of-the-art answer to our own burden of nuclear waste (arising from 30 years of experimentation and research reactors) - we're building a road out to a remote desert location,…

Nuclear power reactors can be produced without any real proliferation risk, see for example thorium reactors.

Similarly the thorium fuel cycle is a lot clearer, ie. assuming that you can recycle actinide wastes, there is very little radioactivity after the first few hundred years: http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/04/14/97/PDF/documen...

Finally, if you have waste of any sort that you want to keep away from humans (A large amount of chemical waste would also seem to fit this bill), where else would you put it, aside from the centre of the most geologically stable continent on earth? Thousands of kms from habitation, far from any groundwater, and most likely on a large sheet of granite given the geology of the outback. Assuming it was properly built underground, I can't think of a better place to put it.

Solar power is interesting, but it has two properties which make it less useful then it would first seem.

* First you need to find a place that is very hot and very dry. That generally requires that you move far inland and far north and away from the coastline. This then means that you somehow need to transfer the power to the major cities, which are built almost entirely on the coastline, causing massive amounts of energy loss.

* Secondly on any non-equitorial latitude you have the problem of seasons affecting your baseload capacity. This then means that trying to manage any power grid that derives a substantial amount of its power from solar thermal plants is going to be, well, an interesting problem.

* Finally you will always have the problem of trying to manage these types of power plants, ie. you can't simply "turn up" a solar thermal or photovoltaic plant like you can a gas fired or coal fired plant. This then causes issues when you have a sudden need for power.

Overall though, it is a very interesting source of renewable energy.

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#153

Post by RuadhanMc » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:06 AM UTC

asharp wrote: post #123

RuadhanMc wrote: post #111

What about Wave Power? It's pretty safe and has a very minimal environmental impact, almost constant output and for the most part is hidden from eye. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_power Just listened to an interesting podcast about it on Late Night Live: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/latenightlive/stories/2011/3176948.... Obviously this wouldn't work for landlocked countries or countries which don't have shores with a…

It's interesting, but from what i've seen of it (albiet not all that much), it has two major issues. * It has a low power density, hence requiring large arrays of collectors/etc. this makes it costly to build at scale. * It generally either takes up valuable land (land by the sea is costly), or it requires lots of engineering to try and build/maintain these things out to sea. It is very cool tech though.

The guys on the podcast were saying that the buoy is located 2 km offshore, so not an eyesore as such, though I have not seen one yet, so can't judge.

Seems to be a more reliable solution than wind or solar if it can scale and it is designed to withstand monster waves.

They say they are 3-4 years from deploying real installations (at the moment they have 3 experimental sites).

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#154

Post by lispm » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:08 AM UTC

asharp wrote: post #106

lispm wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I vote for neither.

What would you suggest? Keeping in mind that basically all renewable sources sans hydroelectric can't be used to provide baseload power and hydroelectric power both has very few potential locations (most of which are in use) and has the nasty failure condition of washing away a good portion of the countryside.

So, if all you know is hydro-electric, why not use it NOW?

Germany is building two large underwater power lines in the latest HVDC technology to Norway.

One is described here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NorGer

NorGer is one, NORD.LINK the other.

These power lines will link Germany with Hydro electric power in Norway.

Essentially technology like that will provide the base load for the huge offshore wind farms that Germany will build in the coming decades in the North Sea.

Alpha Ventus http://www.alpha-ventus.de/ is the first one of those. These are really far away from the coast and sitting in the North Sea exposed to the most severe weather conditions.

It is just that a country needs to have a plan and a will to do it.

You can imagine that the nuclear lobby does not like this project to get hydro-electric power from Norway at all. They are doing everything to delay it. Corrupt politicians like those from the FDP (Brüderle) are their puppets.

Actually there are more alternatives and base load is not the same all the time. If you have a large grid distributing wind generated electricity from a large area, that provides part of the base load for most of the days of the year.

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#155

Post by Tichy » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:13 AM UTC

asharp wrote: post #126

Tichy wrote: post #119

Not even one mention of solar power? Maybe the technology is not at its peak yet, but combines with saving a lot of energy, is it not an option? Let's not forget that a lot of money went into perfecting nuclear power, probably a lot more than into solar power. Comparing with coal deaths seems a bit like a strawman. Also I don't trust the way the victims of Chernobyl are calculated. Adding up victims from survivor sto…

Strangely enough it takes very little money, nor energy to produce nuclear power. It's very simple at its core. Have a look at the first research reactors and you'll find that you need basically no technology to produce reactors that produce useful amounts of energy. On the other hand solar power, especially photovoltaics is stupidly complex. Photovoltaics requires semiconductor processes, arguably one of the most co…

"Strangely enough it takes very little money, nor energy to produce nuclear power."

And since the new doctrine is that radiation is not dangerous at all, you will make us a good price for storing the nuclear waste in your backyard? I hear it helps grow bigger vegetables, too - win win.

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#156

Post by kalleboo » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:13 AM UTC

adrianN wrote: post #139

asharp wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would you suggest? Keeping in mind that basically all renewable sources sans hydroelectric can't be used to provide baseload power and hydroelectric power both has very few potential locations (most of which are in use) and has the nasty failure condition of washing away a good portion of the countryside.

Solar thermal with molten salt heat storage might be a viable baseload alternative.

As someone who lives in a country where half the year it's -10℃ with 2 hours of sunlight (zero hours if it's cloudy), I'd have to say it's not quite viable.

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#157

Post by kalleboo » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:22 AM UTC

asharp wrote: post #107

VladRussian wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why to promote that false dichotomy - either nuclear or coal. There are other options, better nuclear designs, natural gas, wind [ which is baseline type of energy if towers are high enough ], solar - we have so much desert on Earth, and start seriously develop nuclear fusion [ as its development has been practically stopped for the fear of proliferation ]

fusion development hasn't been stopped, especially not for fear of proliferation. Do you have any information about this subject that I do not? Also, the major problem with putting solar power plants in deserts is that you lose most of your power trying to get it somewhere useful. Expect this to change when we have commercially viable room temperature (ish) superconductors.

Another problem with desert solar power plants is political - Europe for instance would become dependant on the middle east and africa for power, which after the past couple decades of oil politics doesn't look like a very attractive option.

Of course nuclear isn't much better in this regard - while we do have uranium deposits, we don't have any uranium mines, and hence rely on imports for nuclear fuel.

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#158

Post by asharp » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:40 AM UTC

BasDirks wrote: post #92

You guys know about the problem of nuclear waste right? You've read plenty about it right? Because this whole "it hasn't caused an apocalypse yet" argument in favor of nuclear power is just a tiny bit short-sighted. If you make your software like you reason about nuclear power, send me a note naming your products so I know what to stay away from.

Eh.

Fossil fuels will destroy the biosphere. They regularly and fairly brutally destroy rather large swaths of it (see nigeria/etc.).

Hydroelectric plants destroy parts of the biosphere. They massively damage aquatic life and fish species and they have the rather nasty fact that if they fail they wash away a good portion of whatever is downstream (read: that city.).

Renewables tend to be very energy disperse, require large amounts of energy/land to produce and generally can't provide baseload power except for hydro power.

At the end of the day, there isn't any perfect answer, but all the effort directed at stopping nuclear power research seems very short sighted, seeing as it is currently the best answer to baseload power that we have.

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#159

Post by ctman » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:44 AM UTC

Ratfish wrote: post #108

asharp wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would you suggest? Keeping in mind that basically all renewable sources sans hydroelectric can't be used to provide baseload power and hydroelectric power both has very few potential locations (most of which are in use) and has the nasty failure condition of washing away a good portion of the countryside.

I know it's easy to suggest as a New Zealander (lots of mountains, lots of rain, and not that many people), but that hydro you mention is ace, wish all our power came from it.

Dams aren't impervious to killing lots of people either: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vajont_Dam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam

2 incidents in 15 years: 175,000+ killed. Plus they emit methane in huge quantities (from the decay of plant materiel in the reservoir)

I would bet that for New Zealand the best form of energy would be geothermal even though the long-term effect studies around cooling the earth's crust are lacking.

Re: Nuclear Power is Safest Way to Make Electricity

#160

Post by Natsu » Sun, Apr 03, 2011, 9:54 AM UTC

gnosis wrote: post #114

jedsmith wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> nuke power is the safest power we've come up with (among power sources that actually have produced a significant fraction of the power we use) This is crucial, and is why blanket statements like "nuclear power is safe" are dangerous. There is an absolutely essential qualifier required on the end of any assertion about nuclear safety, and I'm glad to see that you put it in parentheses here. Nuclear power is the best…

"Scientific American, a most conservative scientific publication, in a cover story on October 26, 2009 -- unveiled its 'A Plan for a Sustainable Future.' It declared in its 'Plan to Power 100 Percent of the Planet with Renewables" that, 'wind, water and solar technologies can provide 100 percent of the world's energy, eliminating all fossil fuels.' The British magazine New Scientist, in a special October 11-17, 2009,…

"Water" sounds like it would include such things as the Banqiao dam.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Banqiao_Dam

I'm also not sure that I would take a couple of magazine articles as proof that we can manage all of those at scale. Don't misunderstand, though. I would be very glad to be proven wrong by someone actually implementing these at scale.

It's easy to say "economically" after all and another thing to do it. After all, if power companies can save money doing this, they will.