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After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

forbes.com

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Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#241

Post by manfredo »

jayd16 wrote: post #110
TeMPOraL wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> nuclear accidents can make a place uninhabitable for thousands of years Note that this is not special to nuclear materials; it's true for a good chunk of industrial chemistry in general as well. > peak uranium I'll need to look up some more up-to-date numbers, but going by https://www.withouthotair.com/c24/page_162.shtml , there's more than enough for couple centuries (and new reactor designs can make one-two order…

>Note that this is not special to nuclear materials; it's true for a good chunk of industrial chemistry in general as well. Hmm interesting. Where has this happened on the scale of Chernobyl or Fukushima? I can't thinking of any exclusion zones in once populated areas caused by industrial chemicals. Is the fact that plants are built near populated areas a factor?

A town in Pennsylvania was rendered uninhabitable due to a coal mine fire.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia,_Pennsylvania

There are also plenty of cities that remain populated despite immense pollution, because of no economic alternatives. For instance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norilsk#Pollution

Hydroelectricity also renders large areas of land uninhabitable due to submersion. Granted, that's a deliberate and planned event. But collapse of dams have displaced tens of millions of people: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Banqiao_Dam_failure

Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#242

Post by skissane »

Aerroon wrote: post #219
losteric wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is that worth noting? I feel like you're being intentionally ambiguous by leaving unstated implications. Do you believe public operation had an impact on safety? Better or worse, and based on what evidence? If neither, how is your statement relevant to the discussion?

I don't know why the parent poster brought it up, but it does seem relevant to me. The government isn't going after quick profits, so you can't blame it on that. You might be able to blame profits if it had been a private corporation though.

The public and private sectors are, in principle, equally capable of incompetence; the causes tend to be somewhat different, but the outcome can be the same.

Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#243

Post by dredmorbius »

Dahoon wrote: post #118

There isn't enough material to run enough nuclear plants to make a difference. This is or should really be common knowledge.

At present consumption rates (10% of global electrical generation), 230 years' supply. That's expected to increase with technological improvements, but would of course be reduced by an increase in either nuclear fraction or total electrical generation, each likely.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-long-will-glo...

If we relied on nuclear for all electrical generation, about 20 years or less.

Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#244

Post by dredmorbius »

lucb1e wrote: post #186
Dahoon wrote: post #118

There isn't enough material to run enough nuclear plants to make a difference. This is or should really be common knowledge.

Could you elaborate or link to a source that does? Edit: Another comment[1] says "there's more than enough for couple centuries (and new reactor designs can make one-two orders of magnitude better use of what's available)". Your statement "not enough to make a difference" seems quite different from "enough for centuries". If you think this is wrong, a bit of elaboration beyond the simple statement couldn't hurt... Th…

Consider that rising populations and standards of living, as well as shifts from fossil fuels, mean increasing total electrical generation likely by ~500% in the next 50 years or so.

The alternative is a large number of very disappointed people.

Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#245

Post by cm2187 »

notJim wrote: post #28
notRobot wrote: post #4

For the uninitiated, nuclear power is actually much, much safer than it was in the previous century, and fossil fuel power plants have killed exponentially more people through pollution than all nuclear power accidents combined – it's just not something that happens all at once so it doesn't seem like a big deal to most people. We will not be able to "defeat" climate change and keep this planet inhabitable for future…

Partly I think nuclear triggers a cognitive bias where humans will tolerate ongoing low-level shittiness, but really struggle with large catastrophes, even if the catastrophe is far less damaging than the ongoing low-level damage. However, I think the resistance is also because the nature of the catastrophe is different. Have coal or gas plants ever created a Chernobyl-style exclusion zone? I know that mining/drillin…

But also can you point to a WW1 plane and say "you see, planes are unsafe"? Chernobyl was designed in the early days of nuclear energy.

Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#246

Post by Spooky23 »

notJim wrote: post #28
notRobot wrote: post #4

For the uninitiated, nuclear power is actually much, much safer than it was in the previous century, and fossil fuel power plants have killed exponentially more people through pollution than all nuclear power accidents combined – it's just not something that happens all at once so it doesn't seem like a big deal to most people. We will not be able to "defeat" climate change and keep this planet inhabitable for future…

Partly I think nuclear triggers a cognitive bias where humans will tolerate ongoing low-level shittiness, but really struggle with large catastrophes, even if the catastrophe is far less damaging than the ongoing low-level damage. However, I think the resistance is also because the nature of the catastrophe is different. Have coal or gas plants ever created a Chernobyl-style exclusion zone? I know that mining/drillin…

Gas no, but coal and other burning based fuels create similar hazards, in addition to nasty waste products and mining related pollution.

Coal spreads radioactive ash and various noxious chemicals. In my area of the country, many lakes were “killed” by coal related pollution from the Midwest in the 70s and 80s, for example.

Nuclear waste disposal is a real issue that needs to be deal with, but overall the technology has potential to be much better than it is today.

Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#247

Post by DangitBobby »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #76
notJim wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To elaborate on the policy part, in the second poll linked, majorities of Republicans are opposed to scientists being involved in making policy.

To be fair, this is following a period of time which saw Democrats funding a lot of "scientific research" structured to study things like "would reducing the number of guns reduce gun violence" etc. Which is a foregone conclusion in the same way that reducing the number of red cars would reduce the number of collisions involving red cars. It's a government-funded study structured in such a way as to produce a "scient…

Which is unfortunate, since such social policy matters relatively little to the future of our nation and world when compared to, say, policy informed by climate science.

Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#248

Post by defnotashton2 »

Ancapistani wrote: post #40
khuey wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Existing already-operating nuclear plants can barely compete with cheap fracked gas in the United States. Capital investment in new nuclear is never going to pencil for a private operator without carbon taxes or enormous price drops.

The existing regulatory structure for nuclear power was designed for the previous generation of reactors. I don’t have deep knowledge in this area, but it’s clear to me that more modern designs have very different risk profiles, and the regulatory structure should change to reflect that. This should reduce the compliance cost, which is a very large portion of the initial and operational costs of nuclear power. In sho…

As stated by others it was designed by to bankrupt them. They have to lease the raw material from the fed at huge markups.

Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#249

Post by dredmorbius »

29athrowaway wrote: post #207

Once I saw a TV show about the challenges of constructing a deposit for nuclear waste that is expected to operate for thousands of years. In this show, they mentioned that they did not want to use skulls to represent danger, because skulls are not seen as dangerous in some cultures (with "Dia de los muertos" as an specific example).

A real problem and challenge. Notions of language and culture are unstable over such periods, let alone organisations, institutions, and governments.

https://wipp.info

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long-time_nuclear_waste_warnin...

https://www.vox.com/videos/2018/1/29/16932718/biohazard-desi...

Re: After 48 years, Democrats endorse nuclear energy in platform

#250

Post by DangitBobby »

sigotirandolas wrote: post #189
cure wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Everyone today should be absolutely livid over what happened. Why? Perhaps additional serious nuclear accidents ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_and_radiation_accident... ) were avoided because nuclear plants were never built.

Almost certainly nuclear accidents & other externalities were avoided. But would those have been more costly than the costs of fossil fuels (e.g. international conflicts, tens or hundreds of gigatonnes of CO2, many other contaminants, oil spills, etc.)?

We will never know. Stop acting like you know the wrong decision was made because the sports team you bet against made it.
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