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Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

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Re: Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

#31

Post by xg15 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #4
junon wrote: post #3

I'm a US expat living in Germany, and boy is the anti-nuclear sentiment real here. There have even been fights - physical altercations - between Green Party members at rallies for having differing viewpoints about nuclear. Unfortunately, it seems those who are against are working with very outdated information and 'tropes' w.r.t. nuclear safety and whatnot. Quite unfortunate.

> a US expat living in Germany, and boy is the anti-nuclear sentiment real here Is it the usual talking points on both sides? Or is there a Teutonic shade to the debate that doesn't surface in e.g. America?

German here. I can't really compare the viewpoints, but historically, the anti-nuclear movement has been an integral part of the german civil rights movement in the 60s and 70s. [1] I believe there have been two key events which have influenced this:

- Chernobyl. Being in close proximity, the event had a far stronger impact than in the US: There was widespread contamination from fallout drifting over from Ukraine and consequently restrictions in day-to-day life for many germans. As with covid: You tend to value a topic differently if it directly affects your life than when it just seems to happen on TV.

- Gorleben. [2, 3] Since the late 70s there have been efforts by the government to construct a permanent disposal site for nuclear waste in the Gorleben mine - against the explicit wishes of the nearby residents. This led to a decades-long resistance movement which tied into a general progressive movement for civil rights and an embrace of green technologies.

Those events mean that nuclear in Germany is both tied stronger to personal experiences and is much more aligned with political boundaries than it is likely in the US.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-nuclear_movement_in_Germa...

[2] https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomm%C3%BClllager_Gorleben (german only)

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Republic_of_Wendland

Re: Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

#32

Post by coyotespike »

throwawaysea wrote: post #24

Michael Shellenberger's TED talk from 2017, "Why I changed my mind about nuclear power", is still relevant: https://www.ted.com/talks/michael_shellenberger_why_i_change... He also has a great Substack where he writes on a variety of topics, including nuclear power. He just wrote an article titled "Nations Go Nuclear As Prices Spike & Renewables Fail" that is timely: https://michaelshellenberger.substack.com/p/nations…

I like Shellenberger's nuclear advocacy, some of his writing is pungent and balanced.

Regrettably he is unreliable in much of his other climate advocacy. He seems to have been radicalized by climate alarmism and has swung too far the other way, espousing poorly supported lukewarmist positions.

Re: Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

#33

Post by fsflover »

tscherno wrote: post #30
junon wrote: post #3

I'm a US expat living in Germany, and boy is the anti-nuclear sentiment real here. There have even been fights - physical altercations - between Green Party members at rallies for having differing viewpoints about nuclear. Unfortunately, it seems those who are against are working with very outdated information and 'tropes' w.r.t. nuclear safety and whatnot. Quite unfortunate.

Nuclear was also promoted as save decades before Chernobyl and Fukushima by the lobbies. So is there a guarantee that it is safe this time around?

It is statistically safer than almost anything even if you take Chernobyl and Fukushima into account.

Re: Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

#34

Post by outworlder »

CyanBird wrote: post #15

Biggest issue with older nuclear plants is the material degradation as a consequence of radiation, after a some decades of constant irradiation steel can become as brittle as glass, which is not only not reversible, but it also means that the actual rebar and concrete surrounding the core becomes damaged and the only way to replace that is to rebuild the whole core I am rather against setting up new reactors, given t…

> the more safe you try to make them, the slower to build and more expensive they will end up being

That doesn't follow. We have countless examples across multiple industries on technologies that became cheaper and safer at the same time.

If you try to make the old designs safe (created for weapons manufacturing first and energy production second), then sure. However, there are newer designs that are cheaper to build and safer to operate (can't 'meltdown', for one).

"Refactoring" old designs is not aways feasible. You are very limited in what you can do. Maybe you can replace the core with a similarly sized one, but what about everything else? Any significant changes in (say) your cooling system and you are now looking at an entirely new plant.

Re: Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

#35

Post by LatteLazy »

junon wrote: post #3

I'm a US expat living in Germany, and boy is the anti-nuclear sentiment real here. There have even been fights - physical altercations - between Green Party members at rallies for having differing viewpoints about nuclear. Unfortunately, it seems those who are against are working with very outdated information and 'tropes' w.r.t. nuclear safety and whatnot. Quite unfortunate.

Everyone thinks the next gen of reactors will finally solve the issues the last 3/4 didn't. This is one of those generational issues because young people (I'm 37) hear promises and old ones have heard them before...

Re: Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

#36

Post by Factorium »

deepsun wrote: post #28
junon wrote: post #3

I'm a US expat living in Germany, and boy is the anti-nuclear sentiment real here. There have even been fights - physical altercations - between Green Party members at rallies for having differing viewpoints about nuclear. Unfortunately, it seems those who are against are working with very outdated information and 'tropes' w.r.t. nuclear safety and whatnot. Quite unfortunate.

I wonder how much of that is supported by Russian govt, because Germany is one of the largest customer for their oil and gas.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-41447603

Former Chancellor Gerhard Schroder oversaw the shutdown of Germany's nukes.

Now he's on the board of Rosneft, a giant fossil fuel company controlled by the Russian Government.

Re: Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

#37

Post by deepsun »

zsmi wrote: post #16
handrous wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They were close enough (and downwind-enough) to experience direct effects from Chernobyl, no? Destroying contaminated produce, taking iodine pills as a precaution, that sort of thing, and, I'd guess, worries, for a time, about much worse consequences before the emergency was contained.

https://www.bfs.de/EN/topics/ion/accident-management/emergen... "To date, there is no evidence that the reactor accident has caused adverse health effects due to radiation in Germany."

Well, I heard the same statement for Belarus, the most impacted country by Chernobyl (with still-in-effect Evacuation Zone). The key? How to calculate "health effects".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_Exclusion_Zone#/medi...

Re: Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

#39

Post by [deleted] »

tscherno wrote: post #30
junon wrote: post #3

I'm a US expat living in Germany, and boy is the anti-nuclear sentiment real here. There have even been fights - physical altercations - between Green Party members at rallies for having differing viewpoints about nuclear. Unfortunately, it seems those who are against are working with very outdated information and 'tropes' w.r.t. nuclear safety and whatnot. Quite unfortunate.

Nuclear was also promoted as save decades before Chernobyl and Fukushima by the lobbies. So is there a guarantee that it is safe this time around?

[deleted]

Re: Intellectuals urge Germany to keep nuclear plants online

#40

Post by tscherno »

fsflover wrote: post #33
tscherno wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear was also promoted as save decades before Chernobyl and Fukushima by the lobbies. So is there a guarantee that it is safe this time around?

It is statistically safer than almost anything even if you take Chernobyl and Fukushima into account.

Sure, I just wanted to point out the sentiment which I feel most have. Smoking was also scientifically safe in the 70s.
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