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Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant: Finished in 1978 but never used

atlasobscura.com

21–30 of 147 posts

Re: Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant: Finished in 1978 but never used

#21
post #5

imho (!) ... nice articles ... but - there is always a but ;)) yes, part of it was the "anti-nuclear sentiment" ... but i would say, only a smaller part. the "real" reason was internal austrian politics. you have to know the background: during the 1970ties a left-leaning socialist government propelled the country into the future - implemented a large package of reforms -, after decades of societal backlash & stagnati…

You throw in left-leaning socialist and liberal-conservative as if it's supposed to clarify the story. Both of those terms meant vastly different things from now 50 years ago.

Can you be a bit more precise with your 2 cents so we can actually understand what you're saying?

Social Democracy isn't "socialist left", but leaving that aside, what you're saying is that the social democrats of the time tried to create energy independence(opposite of today's social democrats by the way), that's smart. So the Austrian people's party invested into what exactly? What did they do?

I see that he was in the Willy Brandt camp who was famous for his Ostpolitik, interesting. I just learned through the links that while he was working on normalizing ties to the east, he worked at the same time on anticommunist policies, which is also interesting.

If I get what you're saying correctly then this reminds me of when the plan for Fiber optic development in Germany was sacked to create copper to indoctrinate people with cable TV. It was in the same time frame actually.

https://netzpolitik.org/2018/danke-helmut-kohl-kabelfernsehe...

Re: Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant: Finished in 1978 but never used

#24
post #7

Would make an amazing set for a film.

> Would make an amazing set for a film.

Correlated: SVT did a concert in one[1][2].

[1] - https://www.svtplay.se/video/e56v35j/radiokoren-i-reaktorhal...

[2] - https://youtu.be/Q560cKnreSk

Edit: Added Trailer

Re: Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant: Finished in 1978 but never used

#26
post #5

imho (!) ... nice articles ... but - there is always a but ;)) yes, part of it was the "anti-nuclear sentiment" ... but i would say, only a smaller part. the "real" reason was internal austrian politics. you have to know the background: during the 1970ties a left-leaning socialist government propelled the country into the future - implemented a large package of reforms -, after decades of societal backlash & stagnati…

You throw in left-leaning socialist and liberal-conservative as if it's supposed to clarify the story. Both of those terms meant vastly different things from now 50 years ago. Can you be a bit more precise with your 2 cents so we can actually understand what you're saying? Social Democracy isn't "socialist left", but leaving that aside, what you're saying is that the social democrats of the time tried to create energ…

He's probably suggesting it was an indirect political move in a power struggle, so we should not take it as gospel that Austrians chose to end nuclear. The way, for example, democrats postponed the covid vaccine for about a month to win the elections, or the republicans are currently helping russia.

(I'm just trying to explain the concept, I have absolutely no idea about Austrian politics. Other than the commonly known fact that they're currently not energy independent)

Re: Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant: Finished in 1978 but never used

#27
post #12
post #7

Would make an amazing set for a film.

I live a 15 mins drive from Zwentendorf and I can assure you they are used for so much. They have a "Shutdown festival" (rave party), you can go on a tour in the reactor (even go in the main boiler) and it's also often used for movies or small local productions. Also fun fact: The plant is still producing energy but with Solar panels since they plastered the whole yard and the roof of the plant

I did that tour a few years back and it was truly impressive and mesmerising - especially standing in the reactor chamber with all the (empty) rods on top of you (they cut a hole into the wall so you can enter there - and it was never in use, so safe to be in there). Pretty crazy. The whole tour was like entering a time capsule and felt like being in a movie or computer game. Everything looking brand new and unused, but old and outdated at the same time. Apart from all the tech and science that they showed and explained this eery time capsule part was sticking with me. And the tour was even free, or almost free as far as I can remember, only getting a slot was hard. Can recommend a visit, if you get the chance.

Re: Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant: Finished in 1978 but never used

#28
post #16
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't rely on nuclear energy. They rely on the grid. Just like the rest of the connected countries. Just like nuclear country France does. What kind of energy is cheap at the moment there is irrelevant. If nuclear energy would be turned off on the grid, like it happens all the time when the French fleet needs repairs again for example, no lights go out in Austria. Just like no lights go out in France. What you d…

Following your metaphor, those humans eat meat while voting to outlaw the killing of animals. But only after spending a billion dollars on hunting equipment.

No. The metaphor is humans voting to stop hunting whales but eat whales before starving to death.

Re: Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant: Finished in 1978 but never used

#29

It’s mind boggling how a country can be so rich as to spend millions of manhours on a project and never use it. Maybe we have become too rich as a species.

The https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superconducting_Super_Collider comes to mind.

Emperor Nero invested millions of man-hours into the Corinth Canal, but that did at least eventually get some use a mere 1,800 years later.

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