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Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

euronews.com

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Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#111

Post by joecool1029 »

q1w2 wrote: post #93
mszyndel wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worth adding that in EU this is largely German public opinion. And somehow the tail wags the dog.

Angela Merkel was a disaster in this regard. The nation went collectively insane after Fukushima and she cowed to the public to win the next election rather than try to calm the public ignorance. Instead, Germany funded Russia's NordGas II pipeline to replace the nuclear power they turned off with gas. Insane stupidity.

As stupid as this policy was, it wasn't started by Merkel. She just sped it up.

The previous chancellor Schröder, now a foreign Russian energy minister, set the schedule into motion for nuclear shutdown.[1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerhard_Schr%C3%B6der#Relation...

Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#112

Post by beezischillin »

Cheap energy is the way to go green. I’d love electric heating and looked into it but the lowest monthly cost estimate I could come up with costs roughly the same for a month in electricity costs as a winter’s worth of firewood. (Well, maybe a bit less now with prices of everything skyrocketing, but the demand is there.) Still, it needs to go almost 6x to be worth it.

Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#113

Post by t0m4 »

blaze33 wrote: post #74
adt2bt wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The general concern there is a rocket malfunction spewing spent fuel rods over a large terrestrial area before it gets the chance to reach the moon.

Yes. Also, given the huge volume of radioactive waste (eg. like 10s of thousands cubic meters just in France) it would require thousands of rocket launches for such an endeavour. Launch failure rates at best nearing 1%, space don't look like our best option here.

It seems that’s quiet the same proportion of nuclear core meltdown. But yes the fallouts could be way worse and it’s actually a bad idea but in 100 years, who knows ?

Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#114

Post by LargoLasskhyfv »

A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #90
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rare earths aren't rare. Nor are they earths. It's just an old name

I suppose we can play a semantic game, but it does not change the actual result does it? They could be called Albino Chickens for all I care. Rare earths are rare on the market right now, because China managed to monopolize the market. To make it more amusing, extraction of those materials is not exactly easy on the environment, which makes it less likely that Western countries will allow it in their backyard. With t…

Self inflicted. See

[1 - 2015] https://www.hcn.org/issues/47.11/why-rare-earth-mining-in-th...

[2 - Info] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Pass_mine

But seems to be in reversal

[3 - 2019] https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/commentary/2019/11/12/th...

[4] https://www.nsenergybusiness.com/projects/mountain-pass-rare...

[5] https://www.wyomingmining.org/minerals/rare-earths/

[6 - 2019] https://web.archive.org/web/20210722231308/https://pubs.er.u...

[7 - 2020] https://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/2020/11/20/...

[8 - 2021] https://www.metaltechnews.com/story/2021/09/09/critical-mine...

Dig it?

Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#115

Post by philipkglass »

A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #90
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rare earths aren't rare. Nor are they earths. It's just an old name

I suppose we can play a semantic game, but it does not change the actual result does it? They could be called Albino Chickens for all I care. Rare earths are rare on the market right now, because China managed to monopolize the market. To make it more amusing, extraction of those materials is not exactly easy on the environment, which makes it less likely that Western countries will allow it in their backyard. With t…

With that out of the way what about my argument is wrong?

Solar panels do not use rare earth elements. The only element that's fairly rare and commonly used in solar panels is silver, which is used in conductive pastes for cell contacts.

Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#116

Post by LargoLasskhyfv »

GrumpyNl wrote: post #44
cletus wrote: post #34

This seems to be an unpopular opinion on HN but I just don't trust humans to manage fission power in the long term at scale. First, there are the issues of storage and disposal of enrichment byproducts, specifically depleted Uranium Hexaflouride ("DUJF" or UF6). Second, there's what to do with old fuel rods. Proponents argue this is a solved problem and it can be stored for the long term in geologically stable storag…

"Second, there's what to do with old fuel rods. Proponents argue this is a solved problem and it can be stored for the long term in geologically stable storage facilities." With space travel becoming cheaper and cheaper, cant we deposit that on the moon for example?

Sorry. Can't do that. Public opinion would go mad because of that:

Space: 1999 is a British science-fiction television programme that ran for two series from 1975 to 1977.[1] In the opening episode, set in the year 1999, nuclear waste stored on the Moon's far side explodes, knocking the Moon out of orbit and sending it, as well as the 311 inhabitants of Moonbase Alpha, hurtling uncontrollably into space.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space%3A_1999

Seriously!1!!

Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#117

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0 »

LargoLasskhyfv wrote: post #114
A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose we can play a semantic game, but it does not change the actual result does it? They could be called Albino Chickens for all I care. Rare earths are rare on the market right now, because China managed to monopolize the market. To make it more amusing, extraction of those materials is not exactly easy on the environment, which makes it less likely that Western countries will allow it in their backyard. With t…

Self inflicted. See [1 - 2015] https://www.hcn.org/issues/47.11/why-rare-earth-mining-in-th... [2 - Info] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Pass_mine But seems to be in reversal [3 - 2019] https://www.defensenews.com/opinion/commentary/2019/11/12/th... [4] https://www.nsenergybusiness.com/projects/mountain-pass-rare... [5] https://www.wyomingmining.org/minerals/rare-earths/ [6 - 2019] https://web.archive.org/web…

It is a lot of information to digest, but I appreciate it. Lemme dig through it.

Some questions do pop up though along the lines of 'everything shortage'.

Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#118

Post by LargoLasskhyfv »

estaseuropano wrote: post #66
Ekaros wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then I consider that I live in cold climate with long and dark winters. I wonder where is the truly grid scale energy storage to go over winter... Okay, currently it is Norway and it kinda works, but that really doesn't look too good just now...

Well Norway should probably not do solar (except marginal, e.g. instead of traditional roof tiles solar roofs instead). But Norway had plenty of hydro and thermal options, even wind should work well in the more southern areas.

Thermal? Where and what would that be?

Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#119

Post by moralestapia »

buran77 wrote: post #47
lrem wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it so? Constituting a quarter of the gdp, Germany doesn't seem to qualify as "the tail".

Is public opinion weight a matter of GDP? Should it?

Germany is also the most populated country in the EU.

Re: Led by France, 10 EU countries call on Brussels to label nuclear energy as green

#120

Post by kelsolaar »

q1w2 wrote: post #93
mszyndel wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worth adding that in EU this is largely German public opinion. And somehow the tail wags the dog.

Angela Merkel was a disaster in this regard. The nation went collectively insane after Fukushima and she cowed to the public to win the next election rather than try to calm the public ignorance. Instead, Germany funded Russia's NordGas II pipeline to replace the nuclear power they turned off with gas. Insane stupidity.

And they put back up many coal power plants which creates an insane amount of air pollution.
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