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Activists who embrace nuclear power

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Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#161

Post by throw0101a »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #136
fulafel wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This study starts with existing laissez-faire energy demand projections. Hopefully another large part of the emissions reduction will come from people adopting less wasteful living, transport, eating etc behaviours and preferences.

> Hopefully another large part of the reduction will come from people adopting less wasteful living, transport, eating etc behaviours and preferences Zero chance. This would require reductions in quality of life. Even minor fuel tax increases have spawned capital-freezing protests from the Arab world to Paris.

Buildings are responsible for 40% of the total amount of energy needed (US, EU). Mandating better air tightness (Residentially, you can built a 5000 square foot (500 sq. m) home that needs only 1500W (1.5 kW)—basically a hair dyer—to heat/cool:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vul4vMFdkA

Using an HRV/ERV with an air filter per ASHRAE 62.1 and 62.2 gives you very good air quality.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#162

Post by nitrogen »

jscipione wrote: post #149
vlovich123 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you think I’m saying it’s an either or? Wind and solar are an important part of the energy mix. But if you truly care about minimizing the impact our energy use has on the world around us, you have to take a mix of all of it. Wind and solar alone will never rid us of fossil fuels on their own. Nuclear has lots of important properties that make it a much better overall true replacement for our fossil fuel depen…

According to the EPA: "Generally, [coal] wastes are only slightly more radioactive than the average soil in the United States. The amount of natural radiation in wastes from coal-fired power plants is so small that no precautions need to be taken." https://www.epa.gov/radtown/radioactive-wastes-coal-fired-po...

That page doesn't actually give any numbers.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#163

Post by mlthoughts2018 »

runarberg wrote: post #153
nharada wrote: post #140

I'm sick of every single thread on nuclear turning into a flame war of wind/solar vs nuclear. It really detracts from the real issue of high carbon sources -- why is the conversation never about nuclear vs the natural gas plants that are being built at an astoundingly fast rate? Those two things are even more similar since they are both baseline power sources.

I’m guessing that is because nuclear is often framed as a solution to the climate disaster. If the discussion was simply: “see how cool of a technology nuclear power is; see how nuclear powers the latest mars rover” I would not guess there would be a lot of backlash. However in this thread you see a lot of: “wind and solar has some problems too” , or “nuclear waste is better then the warming of the planet” . The prob…

It’s framed as a solution to energy reliance on fossil fuel because it is a solution.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#164

Post by durandal1 »

hannob wrote: post #143
vlovich123 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deserts are not ecosystems devoid of all life. Here’s a life long anti-nuclear activist talking about how his direct experience in this space evolved as he started looking into the data more: https://www.ted.com/talks/michael_shellenberger_why_i_change...

You know that by now he's a climate denialist? (Technically he would probably deny that, but he's published a lot of "stop these climate alarmists" messaging lately.) (Update: Can't reply to the reply, but here's some actual scientists on Shellenbergers latest output https://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/article-by-michael-sh... )

I have not seen him in any way deny climate change, what he does is trying to reason trough the probabilities of outcomes and figure out where it makes sense to focus our efforts. We must understand the threats to efficiently counter them, and fear mongering around edge case outcomes does not help.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#165

Post by epistasis »

vlovich123 wrote: post #138
epistasis wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Compare your best estimates of land usage to the amount of land the US uses to grow corn for ethanol. Or compare it to the amount of land used for parking. Or for roads. Or for roofs of buildings. I've never, not once, ever seen a comparison of this sort that sounded the least bit scary. 2. I'm a bit flabbergasted that you think we can scar nuclear production to what we need. We can't even scale nuclear production to…

Nuclear is actually intentionally crippled through legislation under over-hyped concerns over dirty bombs accidents (for the right and left politically inclined respectively). Nuclear can be done safe, efficient, cheap and at-scale. All it requires is to allow for the secondary market of spent fuel like was originally started when nuclear first starting to get rolled out. The security concerns can be handled in other…

Can you explain this a bit more? I don't see how these things could have helped any of the construction failures that have plagued all nuclear attempts.

Operating costs are low for nuclear, it's the construction that is the problem.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#166

Post by dongobongo »

wavefunction wrote: post #2

I think it behooves the US and any other country serious about both climate change and extra-planetary exploration and colonization to develop a robust terrestrial nuclear power program as well as encouraging a trained cadre of nuclear engineers who can manage nuclear power sources on other planets, satellites and space-craft.

I think that's their plan: https://usnc.com/space/

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#167

Post by dongobongo »

nharada wrote: post #140

I'm sick of every single thread on nuclear turning into a flame war of wind/solar vs nuclear. It really detracts from the real issue of high carbon sources -- why is the conversation never about nuclear vs the natural gas plants that are being built at an astoundingly fast rate? Those two things are even more similar since they are both baseline power sources.

These guys explicitly want to couple their nuclear plant with wind/solar: https://usnc.com/mmr-energy-system/. And from top level, it looks a lot like a natural gas plant.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#169

Post by johncolanduoni »

epistasis wrote: post #8

Articles like this miss the main point and instead focus on culture war material. There are plenty of sites that would happily accept more nuclear being built, but all other forms of energy have undercut the cost of nuclear. It's no longer cost competitive, and places like China that adopt a "let's try everything and see what works best" approach have heavily pulled back on nuclear. The issues aren't safety, waste, a…

Solar power (or any other type of terrestrial power source) does not generate or capture electrons, so I don’t know what you’re trying to say about steam cycles. Similarly I can’t imagine what you mean by arbitrage of renewable electrons, a charged battery doesn’t have any more electrons in it than an empty battery.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#170

Post by colinmhayes »

reedjosh wrote: post #35
afterburner wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just buy solar and wind, avoid both.

Solar & wind != nuclear. Solar and wind are not on demand and require storage that's not currently practical.

Nuclear isn't really on demand either, it takes days to change production capacity.
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