With a few minor and cheap design modifications, the Fukushima disaster could have been prevented. The nuke industry could learn a lot from the aviation industry about making unsafe things safe. The details are different, but the principles are the same.
Fukushima
161–170 of 227 posts
Re: Fukushima
#162I found the pictures fascinating, but the accompanying text marred my enjoyment. Considering the circumstances of the Fukushima disaster, the anti-nuclear sentiment really irked me. The Tōhoku earthquake & tsunami killed close to 20,000 people. The author completely ignored those victims. Instead, he focused on Fukushima, which will cause around 150 deaths from cancers. For every tragedy created by Fukushima, there a…
People overcame the tragedies created by the earthquake disaster. They grieved their dead and rebuilt their towns. Now life is going on - outside the Fukushima area. The Fukushima disaster is not going away anytime soon. About 100,000 people lost everything, no rebuilding in sight. Former house owners are still living in containers. Radioactive water is entering the environment since then. In 30 years, maybe someone…
>I doubt that figure of 150 deaths will hold then.
Why?
Re: Fukushima
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
1) Infrastructure projects always appear expensive to the layman. The correct way to price power generation projects is to look at the expected actual cost per MW over the lifetime of the generation facility, and to factor in -as best you can- actual externalities related to the operation of the facility. 2) As I understand it, the hard part of nuclear power isn't the engineering and construction; that's a solved pro…
I think the engineering and construction is not a solved problem (+nuclear waste). All new plants have construction delays and cost overruns. Of course, one could argue that overly strict regulations (which may only exist because of public concerns) are the reason for these problems. But the reason for the safety of the existing reactors are these strict regulations, so I think loosening these rules is not a good ide…
The US already has many-decades-old well-understood, field-tested fission reactor designs. The construction of those is a solved problem. As I understand it, France and several other countries have substantially newer, field-tested fission reactor designs. I've heard that there exist still-newer fission reactor designs that have not been constructed at large power-plant scale.
So, the engineering and construction of the power plant is a solved problem. The political problem of what to do with the fission products is -sadly- not a solved problem in the US.
> All new plants have construction delays and cost overruns.
Cost overruns are -sadly- a symptom of our not-infrequently-nuts-as-shit federal bidding process. Construction delays are a symptom of our failure to enact a system similar to some other countries where -after a lengthy plan-scrutinization and public comment period- approved public works projects become law and are immune to construction delays due to public outrage, outcry, legal challenge, or general meddling.
None of that is unique to fission power plan construction. :)
Re: Fukushima
#164With a few minor and cheap design modifications, the Fukushima disaster could have been prevented. The nuke industry could learn a lot from the aviation industry about making unsafe things safe. The details are different, but the principles are the same.
Even in the very safe world of commercial aviation, aircraft crash much more frequently than nuclear reactors melt down. That slows down the rate of institutional learning.
Of course commercial aviation has killed far more people than the nuclear power industry, anyway.
Addendum: I should say that I actually agree with you, I just wanted to point out that the dynamics of the two industries are quite different.
Re: Fukushima
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
"True believers" and "rose-tinted vision" and "spin" aren't particularly charitable phrases, either. You should engage with the opposing side's arguments instead.
Experience has taught that on the topic of nuclear power, HN is the wrong forum for that, for me. I tend to get wound up. 13years' original observation that radiation release should be compared on overall rather than "nominal" performance hasn't been contradicted in this thread, and my response to that is agreement. Others may prefer to discuss tone and comportment. I hesitate to add anything else, but the following…
If you know ahead of time that a topic is going to cause you to be discourteous, that's a pretty good signal that you should avoid the topic on HN.
Re: Fukushima
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's impolite to accuse people on an HN thread of being deceptive. It also doesn't add anything to thread itself, so why bother?
> It's impolite to accuse people on an HN thread of being deceptive. It's impolite to do it everywhere. However, just like people "being rude" happens, people being deceptive also happens in HN as well as in "real life" -- in which case it's not longer impolite to call them on it. But that's just theoritical. In this case I never accused anybody in particular, heck, I didn't even mention anybody. I said it's a decept…
All I see you doing here is doubling down on your accusation that 'fridek is being deceptive. That's bizarre, given their actual comment. It's as if you read something you didn't like, and decided that the only way it could have appeared before you is dishonesty. No: some people just don't agree with you. You have no cause to call anyone a liar, and doing so is uncivil. Please stop!
Re: Fukushima
#167The worst case scenario for a nuclear plant accident is millions of casualties and the long-term contamination of major population centers. 152 of the world's 211 nuclear power plants have more than 1 million people residing within 75 km. A plant in India has 16 million living within that radius. Fallout could be dispersed over an area thousands of miles wide. The worst case scenario for an accident at a solar power…
Just up voted this to balance down votes. It's a shame to down vote something just because you dislike an opinion.
Or, you know, it's being downvoted for blatant falsehoods like:
"Today's nuclear power plants are inherently unsafe. Most that are in operation depend on active cooling systems to prevent a meltdown."
Re: Fukushima
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are you really not sensing an anti-nuclear sentiment? For example, take this paragraph where he talks about Chernobyl? "Silence, lack of cries, laughter, tears and only the wind answers... Have we learnt anything since then?" I would say the framing of that question makes his stance pretty clear.
He also says - "The disaster could have been forseen and prevented. As in the Chernobyl case, it was a human, not technology, that was mainly responsible for the disaster." I'd say his stance is pretty nuanced and more to do with the care taken by people when designing and operating nuclear technology than being anti nuclear technology.
Except that excerpt is ridiculous, looking for an emotional hook where one doesn't exist. Humans were not responsible, a major earthquake and tsunami were responsible. Few structures of any kind would stand up to that.
Re: Fukushima
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
"True believers" and "rose-tinted vision" and "spin" aren't particularly charitable phrases, either. You should engage with the opposing side's arguments instead.
Experience has taught that on the topic of nuclear power, HN is the wrong forum for that, for me. I tend to get wound up. 13years' original observation that radiation release should be compared on overall rather than "nominal" performance hasn't been contradicted in this thread, and my response to that is agreement. Others may prefer to discuss tone and comportment. I hesitate to add anything else, but the following…
> Consider the fact that regular power plants are regularly built by mostly private investment, while nuclear power plants are only built by the state. This suggests that nuclear power is not profitable in a strictly economic sense.
That's quite possible, but if true, it just brings up the question of why it is not profitable. One might answer that it is not profitable because widespread public and media ignorance of the subject matter leads to NIMBY-ism that in turn makes construction too much of a hassle for private industry to bother with.
Re: Fukushima
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
He also says - "The disaster could have been forseen and prevented. As in the Chernobyl case, it was a human, not technology, that was mainly responsible for the disaster." I'd say his stance is pretty nuanced and more to do with the care taken by people when designing and operating nuclear technology than being anti nuclear technology.
Except that excerpt is ridiculous, looking for an emotional hook where one doesn't exist. Humans were not responsible, a major earthquake and tsunami were responsible. Few structures of any kind would stand up to that.
The structure stood up fine, we know how to build for that, it was the placement of the air fed diesel generators in a floodable basement that screwed Fukashima.