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Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

reuters.com

381–390 of 894 posts

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#381
post #131

One can wonder what does it takes for the west to military intervene. Sanctions are a long term plan but it won't save Ukraine.

The risks of nuclear war from a NATO militarily intervention are far too high to even consider it. I’m sorry to say, but there is really nothing that could happen in Ukraine that would be bad enough for us to accept the risk of nuclear annihilation.

It makes me wonder if there is a Russian information campaign to try to get public opinion in the West for NATO to enter, knowing that the US is not going to enter and then fracture NATO or cause division within NATO.

All the sudden all these Curtis LeMay types are coming out of the woodwork trying to drum up nuclear war.

We know Russia has ran information campaigns on social media in the past so it seems pretty irrational to believe they aren't running campaigns when actually at war.

Everyone should take what they think they know about the situation with a huge grain of salt. It is totally irresponsible to read a news headline that may or may not be correct and then from that headline extrapolate that it is time to go to DEFCON 1.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#382

Stock futures plunged because of fears of a meltdown, I presume. For that to happen requires a specific chain of events, not just a fire at some non critical part of the plant. Nuclear power plants are designed to withstand a lot. Likely the plant was shutdown anyway. Now stock futures have recovered almost all losses, would have been a good buying opportunity based on this fear. Shows how having an knowledge advanta…

The reactor was under renovation, but fueled.

Oh then it doesn’t really matter. If the reactor is off the concern is very low.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#383
post #368
post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't surprise me if they believe that considering the ridiculous stream of fantasy being spewed out of Russian leader and media.

Every country has its propaganda and lies, but they're generally couched in half-truths. It's truly remarkable how the Russian flavor of misinformation sounds just like a pathological liar making up wild bullshit that nobody could possibly take seriously. That's been a tradition for decades, as far as I know.

No post body was provided.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#385

Why not sign a pact saying "Nuclear Power Plants are Off Limits. Anyone caught messing around will be court martialled." It's quite naive I know but if you make the consequences very clear and extremely bad for the troops, it might really deter them. Or Russia is implementing a something similar to a scorch= the-earth policy.

Who gives a shit about a court martial? Like Russia would extradite soldiers to international courts or try them internally…

Or just submit some token soldiers and have them claim to have defied orders and acted on their own, not hard for an autocrat.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently Ukrainians have surrendered now. What a nerve wrecking situation. In the heat of the moment deciding when is the right time to surrender. Probably the smartest decision of the day.

Where do you get those news? Would you mind sharing the link?

There's a telegram channel:

https://t.me/UkraineNowEnglish

https://t.me/UkraineNow

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it provides 1/4 of the country's power, couldn't they leave the containment domes alone, and just hit the lines coming out of the plant? If you're the invading country, it'd be nice to have that power later when you're in charge, wouldn't it?

Doesn’t the power has to go somewhere. I don’t know what would happen to a nuclear power plant operating without a load to take the generated power. Maybe the steam just vents? Or bypasses a turbine? Hopefully it can operate without being connected to the outside, but I’m not sure.

> I don’t know what would happen to a nuclear power plant operating without a load to take the generated power.

The same as any other power plant: the generator is automatically shut down by its safety systems (if it didn't shut down, the generator would overspeed and violently break apart). Once the generator shuts down, the safety systems for the reactor itself should either automatically shut down the reactor too, or somehow bypass the steam to the generator and reduce power to idle (I thought they would always shut down, but recently there was a failure on the generator of the nuclear power plant near where I live, and the reactor went to idle instead of shutting down, so it seems nuclear power plants have this mode too).

The issue is what happens after a shutdown; as seen at Fukushima, the cooling pumps in the reactor need external power for a couple of days until the decay heat reduces enough that passive cooling is sufficient. Without power from the outside, the emergency generators take over; if these are damaged or out of fuel, and backup generators can't be brought by truck from outside after a couple of hours, disaster happens.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#388
post #205

I am absolutely livid and terrified for the state of the world right now.

Consider that there have been terrible things happening to people throughout the world, every day, for years. This is bad, of course, but I'd caution you that you're letting the media dictate your emotions. Did you feel this mad during the (still ongoing) Syrian conflict? How about when Russia invaded Georgia? Or the first Ukraine invasion in Crimea? In all three cases the threat of nuclear war was probably as high a…

How do the atrocities in this war pale in comparison to those of the war in Georgia or Crimea? A Reuters article from two days ago says there have already been 2,000 deaths of Ukrainian civilians from the invasion alone.

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#389
post #343

This has been a real reckoning for me, as somebody who has historically been very pro-nuclear. Quite simply, humanity is too good at screwing things up to harness such a fundamentally powerful and dangerous source of power. It requires a commitment to long lasting peace and stability that we're just not capable of.

This is an old power plant. Do your concerns hold true for newer designs?

Can newer plants be bombed? Can they be abandoned?

Re: Fire extinguished at Ukraine nuclear power plant, Europe's largest

#390
post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damn, maybe one of the sides should consider fixing that before they proceed with shooting at each other.

I can’t speak to why you’ve been downvoted, but it might be worth considering the incentives to fight aren’t the same between the “sides”. One is fighting to survive an attack by the other. It’s difficult to maintain safety measures while people are trying to kill you.

> One is fighting to survive an attack by the other.

This statement, while true, changes denotation depending on the scale at which you view this conflict. If you view it as a conflict between Russia and Ukraine, the existential threat is to Ukraine. If you view it as a conflict between Russia and NATO, the existential threat is to Russia.

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