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All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

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Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#231

Post by chefkoch »

q1w2 wrote: post #223
lostmyoldone wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it is Prometheus' fire, we are not ready to handle that fire yet. When one of the core concerns of using a technology is to prevent it being used to create weapons capable of obliterating entire cities, we are not as a species mature enough to use it on a wider scale. This is only one example of why we are not ready yet. Nuclear (fission) technology is not the problem, we are the problem. Looking at the recent his…

Running a nuclear reactor does not produce nuclear weapons. This is simply fear-mongering fake news. Also, modern nuclear reactors are dangerous. The GenIII+ specification for all new reactors requires the use of passive shut off. Which means the operator must actively keep the reactor on. If they were to all turn into zombies, for example, the reactor would simply shut off. Omega Tau podcast also did an extensive se…

> We have a PROVEN solution ready to go that can be deployed in literally 10-15 years. We just need to end the ignorance.

No we don't. We don't have even one new Gen reactor running and even more important we don't have the people educated to build them in a massive scale.

It would take at least ten years to educate the nuclear engineers needed to build dozens or even hundreds of them. And even then they don't have experience, they are juniors building very complex multi billion dollar installations.

Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#232

Post by q1w2 »

vlovich123 wrote: post #228
LatteLazy wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first person to build a safe, economic, waste free reactor will be a billionaire. But so far that hasn't happened.

We have so many nuclear power plants running and the amount of waste so comparatively negligible (compared with coal, oil, natural gas) that it's moving the goal posts to require it to hit everything. Humanity doesn't get better at doing something by doing it less. We need more power plants so that we build experience and costs go down. The market has to be there so that power plant design is invested in to drive dow…

This so much. One barrel per year per reactor means we can run the US on 100% nuclear and store all the waste for the next 1000 years in the one existing facility in Nevada.

Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#233

Post by kortex »

q1w2 wrote: post #223
lostmyoldone wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it is Prometheus' fire, we are not ready to handle that fire yet. When one of the core concerns of using a technology is to prevent it being used to create weapons capable of obliterating entire cities, we are not as a species mature enough to use it on a wider scale. This is only one example of why we are not ready yet. Nuclear (fission) technology is not the problem, we are the problem. Looking at the recent his…

Running a nuclear reactor does not produce nuclear weapons. This is simply fear-mongering fake news. Also, modern nuclear reactors are dangerous. The GenIII+ specification for all new reactors requires the use of passive shut off. Which means the operator must actively keep the reactor on. If they were to all turn into zombies, for example, the reactor would simply shut off. Omega Tau podcast also did an extensive se…

> Also, modern nuclear reactors are dangerous. The GenIII+ specification for all new reactors requires the use of passive shut off. Which means the operator must actively keep the reactor on.

This seems confused. Shouldn't this read not dangerous?

100% agree though on the broad point. Newer reactors have way better passive safety, and the way to cheaper, safer nuclear energy is build more new plants and retire the old ones.

Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#234

Post by newacct583 »

lokimedes wrote: post #182

As long as nuclear energy is treated as PICK_ANY(obsolete, uneconomical, systemically dangerous) it leaves me with zero hope for humanity. Nuclear is way more than technology, it's Prometheus' fire. It may burn the unprepared but it is incomparable to anything else we possess. That factor million more energy per gram than chemical reactions should be enough for us to treat it as literally unlocking the next level of…

> treat it as literally unlocking the next level of human development

That was literally the way it was thought about a three quarters of a century ago. It... didn't work out.

It's just not there. It's fine. It's safe enough. But it's outrageously expensive relative to other equally advantageous sources, and all the magic technologies needed to "fix" that are always a decade away.

Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#235

Post by neither_color »

malthuswaswrong wrote: post #83

That's how you know none of this is real. If mankind was actually on the brink of extinction all options would be on the table. Especially one that offers free unlimited energy. Mankind does not have an energy generation problem. It only has an energy storage problem.

That's how I interpreted it. If the end of the world was being triggered in 10 years we would use any and all options at our disposal, even experimental ones, all concurrently. We have enough labor and resources to go all in on energy production.

Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#236

Post by LandR »

mlindner wrote: post #63
6510 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuke plants make great targets to bomb.

They're not "nuke plants". "nuke" is a word that means "nuclear weapons". Secondly, they're heavily surrounded by highly reinforced concrete with extremely high levels of security. The furthest any activist with a bomb belt could get is jumping a fence and getting immediately caught. Even if they could drive a truck through the front gate and set off a car bomb, they're not getting through the extremely thick concret…

Aren't they designed such that you can fly planes into the power plant without causing a nuclear disaster?

Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#237

Post by lokimedes »

lostmyoldone wrote: post #207
lokimedes wrote: post #182

As long as nuclear energy is treated as PICK_ANY(obsolete, uneconomical, systemically dangerous) it leaves me with zero hope for humanity. Nuclear is way more than technology, it's Prometheus' fire. It may burn the unprepared but it is incomparable to anything else we possess. That factor million more energy per gram than chemical reactions should be enough for us to treat it as literally unlocking the next level of…

If it is Prometheus' fire, we are not ready to handle that fire yet. When one of the core concerns of using a technology is to prevent it being used to create weapons capable of obliterating entire cities, we are not as a species mature enough to use it on a wider scale. This is only one example of why we are not ready yet. Nuclear (fission) technology is not the problem, we are the problem. Looking at the recent his…

I tend to agree with you, but it should not be the conclusion. We must become ready to handle this, it is in my opinion the real underlying challenge behind the climate problem.

We have started this technologically driven expansion of the human footprint, and either we revert to pre-industrial levels or progress. Assuming that non-nuclear technology will let us have the cake (of prosperity) and eat it too (without drowning our cites) is the collective lie I see propagated politically.

In the spirit of the recent TV series release of "Foundation", this is our Seldon problem.

Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#238

Post by go_elmo »

vlovich123 wrote: post #216
go_elmo wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree with you regarding the political dimension, the technical, especially regarding safety may not be underestimated regarding cost implications. But the right political setting could imply cheap, mass produced plants, e.g. SMR's. The problem is that were too late, would take several decades to scale up to where we we should be already...

I'm not sure I follow this. Nuclear power is significantly less deadly than coal and that's just talking about accidents in power generation. If you include general death by radiation pollution, that difference grows more disparate (coal energy production emits an enormous amount of radiation into the atmosphere as pollution).

Almost. Youre right & I agree - I meant the dev cost to guarantee spill freedom etc which causes billions in costs for development.

Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#239

Post by JoeAltmaier »

newacct583 wrote: post #234
lokimedes wrote: post #182

As long as nuclear energy is treated as PICK_ANY(obsolete, uneconomical, systemically dangerous) it leaves me with zero hope for humanity. Nuclear is way more than technology, it's Prometheus' fire. It may burn the unprepared but it is incomparable to anything else we possess. That factor million more energy per gram than chemical reactions should be enough for us to treat it as literally unlocking the next level of…

> treat it as literally unlocking the next level of human development That was literally the way it was thought about a three quarters of a century ago. It... didn't work out. It's just not there. It's fine. It's safe enough. But it's outrageously expensive relative to other equally advantageous sources, and all the magic technologies needed to "fix" that are always a decade away.

No longer true. New reactors coming that are way, way less expensive. If we can stop thinking in terms of a quarter century ago, we can finally get to that future we used to imagine.

Re: All Applications for Nuclear Energy at COP26 Rejected

#240

Post by devonkim »

vlovich123 wrote: post #228
LatteLazy wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first person to build a safe, economic, waste free reactor will be a billionaire. But so far that hasn't happened.

We have so many nuclear power plants running and the amount of waste so comparatively negligible (compared with coal, oil, natural gas) that it's moving the goal posts to require it to hit everything. Humanity doesn't get better at doing something by doing it less. We need more power plants so that we build experience and costs go down. The market has to be there so that power plant design is invested in to drive dow…

Repeatedly building and improving is how South Korea and France have nuclear power plants that work pretty swell despite the massive political obstacles in their way. A great deal of the costs of nuclear come not from intrinsic technological or process costs but the bureaucracy setup that will almost guarantee non-viable economics. It thus becomes nearly impossible to compare nuclear and solar / wind sources in terms of cost efficiency honestly whatever you support. Costs of anything are a function of the technical, market, and political factors.
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