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Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

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Re: Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

#181

Post by V__ »

sllabres wrote: post #146
V__ wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whether one is pro nuclear or not, I think it makes sense to look at the specific situation at hand. Was it a mistake to shut down all nuclear reactors while not pushing for more renewables and replacing all gas and coal plants first? I think so. Should the last three remaining nuclear plants be kept online? I don't think so. Germany's main source of heating is gas and yes, gas is used to generate electricity, so nuc…

Yes, but it's not Germany alone. A lot of the electricity produced in Germany is exported to other countries. And if this is not longer possible this would be a problem for them too. More aggravating is the circumstance that France, another European country that usually exports electricity cannot too as many (half) of their fleet of nuclear reactors are in maintenance.

They are planning to get them up and running till winter, but I don't know enough to have an opinion on whether this is achievable and if not how much of a problem that would be and if those three nuclear plants would make a difference.

Re: Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

#182

Post by stjohnswarts »

dependsontheq wrote: post #87

While I agree that it would have been sensible to phase out coal and then nuclear, the german position is more complex. The fallout from Tschernobyl was measurable in Germany… measurable as in my science teacher measured it in his garden. Up to today boar and mushrooms have an elevated level of radiation in the forests around my home. So this is the emotional background, the risks are not far away. Fukushima gave the…

lots of things are measurable, but did cancer and other radiation related diseases spike in Germany or not?

Re: Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

#183

Post by andreasha »

pelasaco wrote: post #117
dependsontheq wrote: post #87

While I agree that it would have been sensible to phase out coal and then nuclear, the german position is more complex. The fallout from Tschernobyl was measurable in Germany… measurable as in my science teacher measured it in his garden. Up to today boar and mushrooms have an elevated level of radiation in the forests around my home. So this is the emotional background, the risks are not far away. Fukushima gave the…

unnecessary german angst. Just check the map https://www.wano.info/members/wano-world-map . We are surrounded by atomic power plants. Switzerland, France, Belgium, Denmark, Czech republic..almost all of them are situated in the german borders.

Denmark doesn't have any and five of eight reactors on that map of south of Sweden has closed, some soon almost two decades ago.

Re: Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

#184

Post by stjohnswarts »

wlll wrote: post #162
Cwizard wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> „If Japan can’t control the technology nobody can“. I don't understand this argument, isn't Japan known for its earthquakes? Which are essentially non-existent in Germany? In my opinion Fukushima should be an argument _for_ nuclear power. The death toll was really low, roughly 2000, and many of those death were caused by the evacuation rather than radiation. The death toll of the tsunami/earthquake was 15000 accord…

> In my opinion Fukushima should be an argument _for_ nuclear power. The death toll was really low, roughly 2000, and many of those death were caused by the evacuation rather than radiation. The death toll of the tsunami/earthquake was 15000 according to wikipedia. Isn't the pacific now significantly polluted by radiation from the plant? That seems like a pretty bad outcome, even if the direct number of deaths was re…

Has there been a spike in mutations in sea life? Humans? I have my doubts. The amount of radation dumped from fukushima is literally a drop in the ocean.

Re: Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

#185

Post by pantalaimon »

legulere wrote: post #42
maliker wrote: post #18

In case anyone was curious, Germany used to get 25% of its generation from nuclear (now more like 10%), and they had as many as 17 nuclear reactors as of 2010. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Germany

And all of it was replaced by renewables: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Energiemix_Deutschla...

And natural gas

Re: Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

#186

Post by pantalaimon »

Rygian wrote: post #67
legulere wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And all of it was replaced by renewables: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Energiemix_Deutschla...

Why is Germany using more natural gas now than in 2010? Did they replace coal by gas? Would it have been possible to replace coal with nuclear instead, and keep gas at 2015 levels?

Schröder was chancellor when the initial nuclear phase-out was decided. He later joined the board of Gazprom.

I no longer believe in coincidence.

Re: Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

#188

Post by andreasha »

mousetree wrote: post #164
pelasaco wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

unnecessary german angst. Just check the map https://www.wano.info/members/wano-world-map . We are surrounded by atomic power plants. Switzerland, France, Belgium, Denmark, Czech republic..almost all of them are situated in the german borders.

What do you mean they are situated in Germany borders? You mean other countries operate their nuclear plants within Germany? I clicked on a few that were marked Paris in that map (Neckarwestheim, Philippsburg, Gundremmingen) and they all very much seem to be German owned and operated. What am I missing? Would be very suprised to hear otherwise.

Well after Unipers bailout by Germany (99% ownership) and Unipers majority ownership of one nuclear power plant in Sweden (minority in the other two).

Re: Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

#189

Post by ohgodplsno »

wlll wrote: post #162
Cwizard wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> „If Japan can’t control the technology nobody can“. I don't understand this argument, isn't Japan known for its earthquakes? Which are essentially non-existent in Germany? In my opinion Fukushima should be an argument _for_ nuclear power. The death toll was really low, roughly 2000, and many of those death were caused by the evacuation rather than radiation. The death toll of the tsunami/earthquake was 15000 accord…

> In my opinion Fukushima should be an argument _for_ nuclear power. The death toll was really low, roughly 2000, and many of those death were caused by the evacuation rather than radiation. The death toll of the tsunami/earthquake was 15000 according to wikipedia. Isn't the pacific now significantly polluted by radiation from the plant? That seems like a pretty bad outcome, even if the direct number of deaths was re…

The pacific's radiation levels have increased by about 0%. The total releases from all of Fukushima was on the order of 30 PBq. Water has a natural radioactivity of 13 Bq/L. So, if you want to only double the natural radioactivity of water (which is still basically nothing), you need to dilute ask this radiation in 2e15 L of water.

The entire pacific is 7.10e20 L of water. Even the area around Japan is thousands of times more liters of water. To give you an idea, in 2011, 41% of caught marine species on the coast of Fukushima had Cs137 concentrations higher than the normal limits (100bq/kg, which is still really damn low). In 2015, that was 0.05%

So, no, the pacific doesn't give a damn about Fukushima. And so do the people. You're exposed to about 2100Bq in a year.

Re: Germany extends lifetime of all 3 remaining nuclear plants

#190

Post by stjohnswarts »

dane-pgp wrote: post #128
sokoloff wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are no doubt some people who are arguing against nuclear with exactly those pure intentions underlying their advocacy. Given the experience of the US Navy in nuclear power generation, I don't think their doomsday scenarios are inevitable. I think a lot of people are negatively disposed to nuclear based on beliefs that are not justified by the relative risk and reward of nuclear power generation at this stage in…

> Given the experience of the US Navy in nuclear power generation, I don't think their doomsday scenarios are inevitable. I often see this given as a reason for why nuclear power generation can be safe, but I think it overlooks the fact that military reactors operate in a very different context from civilian ones. For a start, do we know how expensive (per unit energy) US Navy reactors are? It doesn't matter how safe…

renewables make sense if you can prove to me that you can make them reliable like nuclear, but you can't. Someday I suppose a high density, cheap "battery" tech will happen that will make that true, but right now it's simply not true and the Germans are getting ready to find that out this winter, unfortunately via much higher prices via power imported from adjacent countries using dino-fuel and likely blackouts from time to time.
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