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Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

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Re: Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

#171

Post by kgarten »

innes wrote: post #169
kgarten wrote: post #167

I'm shocked, how can such a lobbyist piece be high-rated at Hacker News. I though the community would be more critical towards news in general. There are several factual errors (so much I don't know where to start), just check the press releases from TEPCO, the public statements of the Japanese Government and other public available information (e.g. http://www2.jnes.go.jp/atom-db/en/trouble/individ/power/j/j2... ) Th…

"lobbyist" doesn't mean 'I disagree with this'. Using it as such is just low-grade conspiracy-theorising.

As I said, most information in the article is plain wrong. Starting with the 3rd compartment, over the type of nuclear material used to the safety measures of the company that owns the plant, etc.

Would you believe me, when I told you, "Disregard regular tech news, just listen to what Steve Jobs and Gruber tell you about Apple?"

Re: Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

#172

Post by LaGrange »

adlep wrote: post #162
vog wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should have read the article which explains why this explosion wasn't nearly as dangerous as it seemed to be.

And you should read this: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/14/world/asia/14plume.html If the US Navy is fleeing for cover 60 miles away from the reactors, the situation is SERIOUS.

While I'm not really calmed by the original article ("my father has nuclear experience"), I'd suggest that it may be just a case of them not being really needed in the area, and moving just in case.

Re: Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

#173

Post by mzl »

adlep wrote: post #162
vog wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should have read the article which explains why this explosion wasn't nearly as dangerous as it seemed to be.

And you should read this: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/14/world/asia/14plume.html If the US Navy is fleeing for cover 60 miles away from the reactors, the situation is SERIOUS.

No, it doesn't have to be. The natural reaction to any nuclear threat is to over-react :)

Re: Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

#174

Post by khafra »

ugh wrote: post #69
dfox wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Point is that you are comparing effects of relatively unlikely accident with effects of normal operation.

It looks to me as though one or two Chernobyl sized disasters per century can very much upset that balance. Deaths obviously still matter but I don't think looking only at radioactivity is good enough. I would very much like to know the deaths per kWh for energy produced from coal and nuclear energy. It is certainly possible that infrequent nuclear disasters are, well, worth it. (A single airplane crash kills many mo…

http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/03/deaths-per-twh-by-energy-so...

Looks like nuclear is a huge win, even counting Chernobyl. Solar and Wind are also good power sources.

Re: Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

#175

Post by asharp »

shadowpwner wrote: post #152
asharp wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with solar is that they require large amounts of resources to produce but also that they also produce the wrong type of power. To give you an example, think of a way to run a large aluminium smelter overnight using just solar cells. There isn't any sun shining, so you arn't getting any power in. You need to somehow store enough energy to run the plant overnight, and do it in a form that can actually be pr…

> Wrong type of power. I don't think you explained this. It seems as though you're just arguing about the cost of batteries, not a certain "type" of power. (what types of power are there, anyways? I only know of one: electricity. There are many different ways to generate it though..)

The power for a particular grid generally has two components, that which is always on and that which fluctuates through the day. To give you an example, an aluminum smelter will always use a fixed (and very large) quantity of electricity, day or night, rain or shine. As it is impractical to store electricity anywhere near the scale required to power these types of buildings, you need a power plant that can provide cheaply a continuous supply of power. These are known as your base load power plants.

To show you that the storage of large quantities of is impractical by example, think of the last time you visited a data center, and remember the rows upon rows of of UPS batteries required to run one datacenter for a few minutes. It stands to reason that enough batteries to power the datacenter for an extended period of time (ie. days), would be utterly impractical. This is why datacenters have generators, ie. the batteries can't power the datanceter indefinitely and when the batteries run out, it needs to produce the power to power the datacenter.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_load_power_plant

Re: Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

#176

Post by vog »

stewbrew wrote: post #29
vog wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should have read the article which explains why this explosion wasn't nearly as dangerous as it seemed to be.

it's the first post on his blog and we are certain he is no lobbyist. citing foreign experts you happen to know personally somehow is commonly used in popular science literature. a catastrophe not as bad as chernobyl can still be pretty bad.

There are many really dangerous things going on there, but the explosion was relatively harmless.

Re: Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

#177

Post by asharp »

adrianN wrote: post #156
asharp wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with solar is that they require large amounts of resources to produce but also that they also produce the wrong type of power. To give you an example, think of a way to run a large aluminium smelter overnight using just solar cells. There isn't any sun shining, so you arn't getting any power in. You need to somehow store enough energy to run the plant overnight, and do it in a form that can actually be pr…

Photovoltaics are indeed not very cost efficient right now, but solar thermal[1] is a much more mature, cheaper technology. It's also easier to store large amounts of heat than to store electricity. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_thermal

Solar thermal is in fact a very interesting technology. I've looked into the pilot plants over in the desert in california and it seems like a real step forward.

Its also interesting that they seem to solve parts of the "baseload power" problem, ie. some plants store molten salt and can thus generate power for extended periods, but they would still have issues. For example, in non-equitorial climates I would assume it would have diminished capacity in winter, which could be a problem if a large portion of the grid was composed of solar thermal plants. Similarly you have efficiency losses/etc. associated.

Considering that the only alternative in terms of storing power involves pumping water up hydroelectric dams, though, it's certainly a step in the right direction.

Re: Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

#178

Post by Natsu »

varjag wrote: post #168
Natsu wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can't speak for the previous poster, but I started 'sipping the nuclear kool-aid' once I took a nuclear physics class. Same here. And I think I know why: understanding the risks puts you in control, to some degree. People are highly averse to risks they cannot control. I mean, the news is a joke. They talk about "radiation" but appear to have no idea how it's even measured. The news anchors don't seem to know wha…

Superficial understanding of subject is worse than no understanding at all. People who blew up Chernobyl knew what Sievert is, and in fact possessed nuclear engineering degrees.

We've learned a lot since then. Reactors have proper containment vessels and negative (instead of positive) void coefficients these days.

And heck, as bad as Chernobyl was, they managed to operate the rest of the reactors for years after the accident.

Re: Why I am not worried about Japan’s nuclear reactors

#180

Post by etherael »

eliasmacpherson wrote: post #154
etherael wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slightly off topic but not really question; Is there a defined term for the observation of continuous streams of information tailored to fit a particular popular ideology thus contributing to increased skepticism of said information?

I would say propaganda, but it does not always lead to increased scepticism unfortunately.

That's a good one actually, wrapped in another layer it works perfectly.

As there are code smells, so there are propaganda smells, but not everyone has a nose for either of them.

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