Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022 • Hacker News Board

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#131

Post by BruceForth » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:04 PM UTC

xenonite wrote: post #100

woodpanel wrote: post #91

Sorry for this rant, but we germans are rather stupid by going down that road. we keep saying that the costs of renewable energies have gone down, but thats only due to massive subsidies. Thanks to fukushima the green party is like a political Steve Jobs on steroids right now: they can promote whatever dumb legislation and nobody questions it. nobody talks about the coal plants that we gonna need to supplement this.…

come on, another german trait is that everyone believes that everyone is to be fooled easily. People are not that stupid. Most just do not care.

> another german trait is that everyone believes that everyone is to be fooled easily.

Historically, they have a reason to believe so.

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#132

Post by ljf » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:07 PM UTC

dexen wrote: post #16

Closing nuclear powerplants early makes for a self-fulfilling prophecy as well, unfortunately. The only solid argument against nuclear goes along the lines, ``nuclear power is too expensive because of the costs of disposal of wastes''. Thing is, in normal operation the cost is amortized year by year. Normal life of a nuclear plant is a few decades; say 30 years. Could be longer, but the technological progress is so f…

Sorry to repost this (I used it in a reply above) but spent fuel is not the only waste produced by a plant: http://www.euronuclear.org/info/encyclopedia/w/waste-radioac...

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#133

Post by pjscott » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:08 PM UTC

pella wrote: post #94

vladd wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear is the safest form of energy that we currently have. More people die from installing solar panels than deaths occurred in nuclear accidents: http://nextbigfuture.com/2008/03/deaths-per-twh-for-all-ener... .

>Nuclear is the safest form .. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_accidents_by_coun... "The nuclear industry says that new technology and oversight have made nuclear plants much safer, but 57 accidents have occurred since the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. Two thirds of these mishaps occurred in the US. The French Atomic Energy Agency (CEA) has concluded that technical innovation cannot eliminate the risk of hum…

Nobody claimed that nuclear power was absolutely safe; only that it's a lot safer than the alternatives we have right now. You're arguing against a straw man.

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#134

Post by alexqgb » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:16 PM UTC

ugh wrote: post #88

Typhon wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many people died at Fukushima ? 1 How many people die every year because of coal plants working perfectly normally ? 30 000 in the US alone. See http://squid314.livejournal.com/292620.html Nuclear waste is a bigger problem indeed, but using Fukushima as an argument against nuclear is both dishonest and stupid.

Expenses, not deaths, were the topic of discussion.

Death is the ultimate expense.

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#135

Post by alexqgb » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:18 PM UTC

Xixi wrote: post #78

bluedanieru wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I suspect will happen is more power will be imported from nations that flagrantly pollute the environment. The Chinese might be on to something with putting the engineers in charge. Sometimes the public really doesn't know what the fuck they're doing, and should be completely ignored.

I don't think Germany is surrounded by countries that flagrantly pollute the environment. What is more likely is that more power will be imported from France, which massively use nuclear energy (>75% of the national electricity production), and doesn't intend (so far) to move to something else.

Um, have you SEEN what goes on in Eastern Europe?

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#136

Post by andrest » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:28 PM UTC

lispm wrote: post #120

andrest wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't take this the wrong way, but when the scientists or the government set an ambitious goal like this, that are 4 decades away. It usually means that currently we have no clue how to go about solving it and hopefully our successors will figure it out. As Bill Gates explains the current renewable technology is not viable. This is because of various reasons, such as low ratio of energy invested vs energy returned, i…

You are on a discussion level of ten years ago. All the questions you mention have been discussed for a full decade here. Numerous research institutes have been working on that for a decade. Several plans have been proposed and discussed. As a first step Germany has jump started its renewable energy industry a decade ago. We moved from 6 to 16% during that decade and now have several hundred thousand employees in tha…

These numbers show the point I'm trying to make here. The resources currently occupied in putting the current inefficient technology to use could be instead used in R&D to develop the next generation solutions faster. During this period of time nuclear reactors (or thorium reactors in the future) could provide a fairly clean and stable source of energy until viable renewable alternatives are found.

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#137

Post by lispm » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:49 PM UTC

andrest wrote: post #136

lispm wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are on a discussion level of ten years ago. All the questions you mention have been discussed for a full decade here. Numerous research institutes have been working on that for a decade. Several plans have been proposed and discussed. As a first step Germany has jump started its renewable energy industry a decade ago. We moved from 6 to 16% during that decade and now have several hundred thousand employees in tha…

These numbers show the point I'm trying to make here. The resources currently occupied in putting the current inefficient technology to use could be instead used in R&D to develop the next generation solutions faster. During this period of time nuclear reactors (or thorium reactors in the future) could provide a fairly clean and stable source of energy until viable renewable alternatives are found.

There is little inefficiency.

Thorium reactors won't provide any sizeable contribution until 2050. Plus then we go the nuclear route, but again differently. Germany tried already:

* boiling water reactor * pressurized water reactor * Thorium pebble bed reactor * Fast Breeder

and more

enough is enough

Nobody wants a Thorium reactor in Germany. We had one already. It failed.

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#138

Post by lispm » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:54 PM UTC

tomp wrote: post #127

In march, I was flying over Germany on a sunny day. I saw hundreds of wind turbines polluting the landscape. They are ugly, inefficient, and apparently a huge danger for the birds. I really cannot see how that is environmentally friendly. AFAIK, nuclear fuel cannot be produced, it can only be distilled. So, we're only using whatever radioactive materials exist on Earth anyhow. Were they mined from deep underground? L…

I find wind mills much nicer than the huge nuclear sites heating up the rivers, their large cooling towers with the large clouds, their large power lines, ...

I find it much better if a city has their windmills, compared to huge mega corporations and monopolies of the nuclear industry backed by corrupt politicians.

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#139

Post by lispm » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:57 PM UTC

woodpanel wrote: post #126

Argorak wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany is also one of the main suppliers for regenerating power technologies. So they do have an industry branch that benefits from that move.

Highly subsidized industry. Everytime the government tries to reduce the subsidies, our glorious greentech-companies are near bankcrupcy. [ http://boerse.ard.de/content.jsp?key=dokument_533948 = "German solar panel companies loose millions" ]

Compare that to the fate of Tepco. How much was the government give them to survive?

Re: Germany to be nuclear-free by 2022

#140

Post by Staydecent » Mon, May 30, 2011, 5:58 PM UTC

junklight wrote: post #116

Staydecent wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"everyone chooses to live a more basic quieter life against our natural instincts." Serious? That's a huge claim. yet, so many people do live this "quieter" life. I am striving to live that life. There is quite a growing community (at least in British Columbia) of people concerned with things like food security and climate change. Ever since I was young, I was disgusted by the City. Yes, this is not a popular view, b…

it's not a bold claim at all. Look around at the planet. Humans are everywhere it is possible to be. Something drove us to do that. And given it is quite unlikely that there was a meeting 100,000 years a go in Africa where we as a species decided - "let's give overrunning the whole planet a go" I think that "instinct" for want of a better word is what drives that. Living in a sustainable way does not come naturally t…

I think you are right. But, I'm not sure.

Perhaps it's better to look at "destroying our planet" (or whatever) as a byproduct? Like you said, we didn't decide this in Africa, it's just a result of our drive to advance our way of life. But, now preserving our environment and adopting more sustainable practices is the next frontier in advancing our way of life.

Also, isn't the basic animal instinct to survive? Scientists claim with the 2C threshold (I think this covers it slightly, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8023072.stm) that we are at a time where without change, we may not survive (in large numbers at least, and in some years)? Maybe the instinct doesn't act on a tribal or global scale, but only personal. Like when a tiger is coming after you.

And, of course, I don't expect everyone to grow their own food. But, there are people who love farming, and if we help these young people get into it, they can provide on a smaller scale, within each community.

I suppose my point is, sure humans have the instinct to advance their way of life, but that does not necessarily go against producing ones own food, or living a quieter and simpler life.