Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants • Hacker News Board

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#131

Post by neoromantique » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:42 PM UTC

wildmanxx wrote: post #96

johnisgood wrote: post #3

Yeah, this has been known for a long time now that Germany is planning to shut down their nuclear plants. I have no clue why. There is a country in Eastern Europe and >60% of their electricity is from their nuclear power plants, and they are extending it. Imagine this country exporting electricity to Germany. Anyways, I believe it was a pretty shitty idea to say no to nuclear.

Quoted post unavailable.

many of Chernobyl survivors ended up moving elsewhere to continue working on a different plant :shrug:

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#132

Post by WalterBright » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:42 PM UTC

oaiey wrote: post #22

maxclark wrote: post #12

Nuclear power is an amazing energy source. It doesn’t look like we’ll ever get beyond the politics that would make small scale It’s really a shame.

It is amazing. But two major incidents within 30 years time range are not so amazing. When we continue in that rate we will have a serious problem. And with aging reactors and instability everywhere it does not look good.

Fortunately, we didn't abandon airline travel after a few terrible accidents.

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#133

Post by cinntaile » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:42 PM UTC

_dain_ wrote: post #85

cinntaile wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're not replacing nuclear with gas. Nuclear has a steady output, gas will be variable output. It will run when deemed necessary.

this is sophistry. "necessary" means sufficient to cover the shortfall from the lack of nuclear baseload. the effect of shutting down nuke plants will be to burn more gas, there is no way to dispute this.

Gas and nuclear don't fulfill the same purpose. It's not like they'll stop building out solar and wind and storage solutions. If your energy system depends on renewables and there is not enough storage (or other geographical interconnected solutions) then you'll need something like gas to quickly spin up and down if the demand requires it. Maybe new nuclear plants will be able to do this too, but right now they can't match gas.

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#134

Post by WalterBright » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:43 PM UTC

wildmanxx wrote: post #129

davidhariri wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is so wrong. If you look at the death rate from those incidents and compare them to the death rates of literally any other source of energy (including other renewables), they are much much lower. Nuclear is proven to be our most safe, clean and renewable source of energy. Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/494425/death-rate-worldw...

Maybe convince somebody then to have final storage for nuclear waste anywhere close to where they live. Once this crap is in your backyard, the armchair philosophers find excuses really fast. Similar with wind turbines, but at least those are so small scale that you can convince closeby towns fast by just letting them participate in the profits. Different story for leaking barrels stored underground. (And yes, that's…

Who likes the poisoning of areas around coal mines?

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#135

Post by bufferoverflow » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:43 PM UTC

SimonSword91 wrote: post #7

I live in Germany and I wonder, what the consequences will be of shutting down both coal and nuclear in very short time. My guess is, we will pay for nuclear energy from France and coal energy from Poland when wind slows down. The new government tries to accelerate the construction of renewable energy but I think their plans will fail because of worker shortage and supply chain problems.

Germany's primary energy source is now coal, now way they can shut it down.

https://www.dw.com/en/germany-coal-tops-wind-as-primary-elec...

This is so stupid, what are they thinking?

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#136

Post by jacquesm » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:44 PM UTC

protastus wrote: post #122

yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are delusional. Coal plants kill millions of people worldwide every year. How many people died from Chernobyl? About 50, despite over 100,000 people working at the site on cleanup. The adjacent reactors continued to run and provide power for about a decade after the incident. How many people died of radiation poisoning at Fukushima? Zero. Zero!

> How many people died from Chernobyl? About 50, despite over 100,000 people working at the site on cleanup. The adjacent reactors continued to run and provide power for about a decade after the incident. I am surprised you're quoting official Soviet numbers. Numbers that weren't updated since the early days of the accident. > How many people died of radiation poisoning at Fukushima? Zero. At what cost?

Besides the spike in thyroid cancers, from the Baltics to Poland, Romania and Ukraine on down.

https://news.un.org/en/story/2018/04/1008292

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#137

Post by WalterBright » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:44 PM UTC

luckylion wrote: post #123

la_fayette wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This summer a large part of germany was completely flooded. This was a natural disaster, which might happen at higher frequencies nowadays. The alarming systems in place competely failed and around 200 people drowned in Germany. There are so many things which could happen and countries like Germany are not prepared for.

> This was a natural disaster, which might happen at higher frequencies nowadays. You don't build nuclear power plants in narrow valleys with known flood events though. I mean, you also don't build wind turbines in swamps and hope they don't fall over, or put solar panels on your roof and don't fasten them.

Building a castle in a swamp can work, though.

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#138

Post by rmbyrro » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:44 PM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #121

rmbyrro wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe Brittons got tired of so many ridiculous policies from the EU shoving down their throats?... Not saying I'm pro or against Brexit, just that your point seems to corroborate their decision to leave.

I initially opposed the move but now it sort of makes sense. Previously I was influencing my own thoughts from the liberal media sphere but the more you dig into the reasons why UK left the EU, the more convinced I am. Just look at the vaccine fuck ups by the EU. UK has one of the best vaccination strategies in the world barring smaller nations like Israel, UAE and Qatar. And of course, China.

Yes, it's sad to admit but, from many angles, leaving do seem to be a relatively better choice.

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#139

Post by cjpearson » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:45 PM UTC

daenz wrote: post #27

I have skimmed these kinds of articles, and maybe I am missing another important reason for this happening, but I am not seeing it. Is it essentially: people are scared of nuclear?

Nuclear is pretty unpopular in Germany, especially since Fukushima. In 2012 73% of Germans were in favor of the phase-out compared to 16% opposed. I don't think it's fair to characterize that as people being scared though. Some certainly may be, but others have different reasons.

I think it's unfortunate given the climate, energy and geopolitical situation, but the Government is doing what the people clearly want it to do.

Re: Germany shuts down half of its remaining nuclear plants

#140

Post by jabl » Fri, Dec 31, 2021, 7:45 PM UTC

wildmanxx wrote: post #65

cheschire wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A bully (Russia) comes up to a child (Ukraine) and kicks them in the shin really hard (Crimea). Then grabs them by the shirt and rears back like they're about to punch the kid. You're right, why waste money teaching the kid Aikido when we could instead spend that money on school tutors to try to get them into schools that don't have bullies.

Right, playing world police should be right at the top of Europe's plan for saving the climate.

Why not both?

Build renewables and nuclear instead of increasing dependency on gas from a geopolitical bully?