Live data from Hacker News

EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

reuters.com

491–500 of 567 posts

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#491

Nuclear power seems incredibly expensive and complicated, even more so than large coal power plants. The logistics alone are crazy. Nuclear power's inherent radiation danger to living organisms and our shiny new 3nm GPUs is also real. Additionally uranium ore seems quite limited on earth and thus makes nuclear fission seem like a non-scaleable technology. Maybe this resource is better used to solve rare edge cases li…

Sustainability: Nuclear fission fuel on earth can last about 4 billion years using breeder reactors [1]. Safety: Fossil and biofuel waste kill 8 million per year, compared to "up to 4000" total, ever, from commercial nuclear power. Cost: Fossil and biofuel cause those health effects and climate change. Nuclear does not. If those were considered in markets, nuclear would be excellent. Furthermore, modern nuclear build…

Can you point me to some operating breeding reactors? Especially in western nations? What were the reasons the few operational ones were shut down and not replaced?

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#492
post #470

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Renewables seem like a great way to cap the total possible energy usage of humanity and keep us in a lower-evolved state. I want the future promised by unlimited nuclear energy instead.

Don't worry, it won't. At some point a large nation will eventually start using nuclear at scale and the competitive advantage will be clear so then everyone will have to follow suit. That is, of course, presuming civilization does no collapse because of climate change. Fingers crossed!

For a while it seemed like it would be Japan since they were experimenting with a breeder reactor way back in the ‘80s. After a bunch of false starts it really seemed to be happening in 2010 but then of course the Fukushima accident happened the next year and put a stop to everything: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monju_Nuclear_Power_Plant

It’s just frustrating to see energy programs fail due to public opinion shift brought on by random perfectly-timed coincidence since there’s not really anything to blame or at fault. Like how The China Syndrome talks about “an area the size of Pennsylvania” and came out exactly twelve days before the actual Three Mile Island accident lol

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#493
post #51

There's a lot of straw men being fought in the comments again. The main issue with nuclear power in Europe has always been the storage of nuclear waste, for which many countries still don't have a long-term solution. Proponents of nuclear power like to pretend the opposition exists merely on the basis of "but what if it goes boom!", so they don't need to face the reality that countries like Germany are sitting on a l…

> The main issue with nuclear power in Europe has always been the storage of nuclear waste, for which many countries still don't have a long-term solution. Nuclear waste isn't a problem. It's actually the best type of waste that exists. It's extremely dense, is solid and any leakage can easily detected. And the best part of it, 95% of it can be recycled: > https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/5-fast-facts-about-spent-.…

> Nuclear waste isn't a problem. It never was.

If its so easy as you say, why doesn't every country have a small room to keep all the waster?

Why do we often "just" throw it in the ocean instead?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_disposal_of_radioactive_...

Why do these "so easy to maintain rooms" leak?

https://www.dw.com/en/radioactive-waste-leaking-at-german-st....

Why do managers of nuclear reactos "loose" all the waste?

https://www.nti.org/gsn/article/missing-german-nuclear-mater...

Etc.

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#494
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The main issue with nuclear power in Europe has always been the storage of nuclear waste, for which many countries still don't have a long-term solution. Nuclear waste isn't a problem. It's actually the best type of waste that exists. It's extremely dense, is solid and any leakage can easily detected. And the best part of it, 95% of it can be recycled: > https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/5-fast-facts-about-spent-.…

> And the best part of it, 95% of it can be recycled: That number is not actually supported by your source, as a matter of fact, your source points out that the US it not recycling any of the fuel at all. > Oh, but Germany has a storage for highly toxic chemicals in Herfa-Neurode with already over 3 million tons of waste Sorry, but I don't see the argument there? Just because there's already toxic waste, does not mea…

You critique his sources without posting any sources of your own. That's why your arguments (and those of chmod) can be simply waved away.

> That which is asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#495
post #492

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't worry, it won't. At some point a large nation will eventually start using nuclear at scale and the competitive advantage will be clear so then everyone will have to follow suit. That is, of course, presuming civilization does no collapse because of climate change. Fingers crossed!

For a while it seemed like it would be Japan since they were experimenting with a breeder reactor way back in the ‘80s. After a bunch of false starts it really seemed to be happening in 2010 but then of course the Fukushima accident happened the next year and put a stop to everything: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monju_Nuclear_Power_Plant It’s just frustrating to see energy programs fail due to public opinion shift…

The closing of the Japan breeder had nothing to do with public opinion. It was a long list of technical failures and accidents, plus extreme costs which broke its neck.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monju_Nuclear_Power_Plant#Deta...

Like: 'On August 26, 2010, a 3.3-tonne "In‐Vessel Transfer Machine" fell into the reactor vessel when being removed after a scheduled fuel replacement operation.'

Plus the Fukushima earthquake (and the following tsunami) showed that a lot of Nuclear installations in Japan were not safe against heavy earthquakes.

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#496
post #490
post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not shutting down plants is an alternative to instead slowing down phasing out coal, like Germany did. Germany accelerated the development of renewable energy. That was the goal. Nuclear had to go first. Coal is following. The Germany time scale to rebuild its electricity landscape goes over many decades. By investing many many billions into renewables, instead of investing them into nuclear, Germany helped to kick…

By taking out nuclear first instead of coal they killed thousands of people.

By investing into renewable they saved millions of people.

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#497
post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. Have you any idea how much his study pushed up the mean or got a summary of how his study differed? As you say, the estimates vary wildly and I haven’t really got any idea where his sit relative to others

For this thread, your previous uninformed comments sadly made my post three levels up end up at -2, so all of this is kinda hidden. Please post again with this "newfound knowledge" in future threads.

[deleted]

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#498
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if we made a giant four sided pyramid out of stone, and used the inner 1% of its volume to store your box? We could put it in the middle of the desert, and hope it gets covered in sand.

begins quest for ancient nuclear waste in Egypt

There is a genuine pyramid theory which posits that the Great Pyramid was, in fact, used for power generation.

It's actually quite fun: the theory goes that the huge mass of the pyramid was used to couple seismic vibrations into the enormous granite blocks above the King's Chamber. Being stuffed with quartz crystals, this generated a varying electric field which excited a hydrogen atmosphere (provided by a chemical reaction in the Queen's Chamber. Or the Subterranean Chamber, can't remember which). The Grand Gallery was apparently filled with Helmholtz resonators which set up a standing wave of some sort, the portcullises at the entrance of the King's Chamber being acoustic baffles to control the resonance. The net effect of all this was apparently that the comparatively thin-walled sarcophagus in the King's Chamber (also granite) would set up an appropriate vibration in the hydrogen to cause a maser-like concentration of microwave energy to be directed up one of the "air passages". Damage in the Grand Gallery is taken as evidence that there was some sort of catastrophic failure that knocked the whole thing out of commission.

It's remarkably complete, and totally, utterly bonkers. I love it.

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#499
post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. Have you any idea how much his study pushed up the mean or got a summary of how his study differed? As you say, the estimates vary wildly and I haven’t really got any idea where his sit relative to others

For this thread, your previous uninformed comments sadly made my post three levels up end up at -2, so all of this is kinda hidden. Please post again with this "newfound knowledge" in future threads.

[deleted]

Re: EU experts to say nuclear power qualifies for green investment label: document

#500
post #87
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The big problem with recycling spent nuclear fuel is that the required reprocessing is much worse in terms of safety than the nuclear power plants themselves. Lots of lovely, toxic, highly radioactive solutions which are practically iching to go prompt critical and ruin everyone's day. I think the only reprocessing program which managed not to be a safety train wreck is France's, and I half-suspect they might have ju…

The French have been doing it for decades already with not a single casualty: > https://www.orano.group/en/nuclear-expertise/from-exploratio... It's not that they are doing the recycling in a cookie factory.

If only it could be so easy!

The reality is that the French try hard to put high-level waste deep in under the ground. After more than 50 years of atomic plants and nearly 80 of lab reactors the French haven't a single adequate repository.

The most advanced project may open in 2025. An English concise description is already amusing, please read it at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meuse/Haute_Marne_Underground_...

A more complete version, in French: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cig%C3%A9o

Post reply on HN