Germany - the only country that still makes things in Europe really - is making decisions to jeopardise its industry and place in the world. It will surely end up as a basket case country if it carries on like this!
Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
31–40 of 480 posts
Re: Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Total war is less common than you might think. Ukraine for example isn’t a giant nuclear crater, yet they had a nuclear power plant being shelled. Meanwhile Ukraine isn’t shelling Russian civilians. So it’s quite possible for war between nuclear powers to avoid that level of escalation.
But Ukraine isn't a nuclear power. And there are no circumstances where you're better off fighting an adversary that supplies all of your energy than having your own nuclear reactors.
Moving the goalposts doesn’t actually solve this issue.
If you can’t conceive of a situation that having a nuclear power plant inside your country is dangerous you simply don’t know enough about them. Sabotage of a spent fuel cooling pond could get really nasty. It’s not the kind of risk anyone is taking that seriously for reasons I agree with, but it’s definitely possible.
Re: Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
#33What I read in this article is that German government did a thorough analysis, but the author dismisses the conclusions of it because the tolerated risk level there is too low and because it’s done by a minister from the Greens party.
If this was written by an expert, that could make some sense, but it is not. Nuclear plant is not a startup, where you can just skip the QA part to release faster or put a not working cookie banner for few months, because nobody really checks compliance. You have to conduct safety tests, there should be enough staff and replacement parts, fuel supply must be secured, waste disposal must be planned in advance. Calling to accept risks of not doing this properly is not exactly what German public supports. The polls are tricky thing to do. If you ask certain questions you will get whatever results you want. I’m sure it was not explained to the public in the poll that they will have to accept higher risks of nuclear disaster if reactors will be allowed to operate. Everyone thinks that it is as safe as it was in the past - no wonder majority would support it to help Ukraine.
The thing is, this majority also includes supporters of Greens and the party itself is not the same as it was in 80s. Greens are no longer unconditional pacifists and anti-nuclear hippies. They are the biggest supporters of sending heavy weapons to Ukraine now. They would extend nuclear if possible, because it advances the more important agenda of reducing emissions and helps Ukraine. They were ready to wait 20 years to phase out nuclear in 2000s, and it wasn’t Greens who accelerated shutdown after Fukushima. It was pro-business CDU with Merkel as a head of the government. This is why I would rather trust Habeck with his report than some random guy from the Internet with a political message.
Re: Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
#34> According to the text, they might even need a constitutional amendment. I am no expert in German law, but this strikes me as an unlikely requirement that would nevertheless be doable. A 2/3 majority is needed in both the Bundesrat (senate) and Bundestag (house). Not happening. > This is what they say: The existing nuclear reactors should have passed a lengthy security inspection in 2019, which they didn’t pass sinc…
> A 2/3 majority is needed in both the Bundesrat (senate) and Bundestag (house). Not happening. Absolutely not ever going to happen. > The author makes it sound like those are cars which can be easily refitted, upgraded and certified. This would take enormous amounts of time and money for the three plants which are still online, and who knows how much for the ones which are offline. Even Lindner says that extending t…
Also rationed gas, electricity only a few hours a day for retail customers, and others. Lots of basically free measures indeed, we don’t need no nuclear.
Re: Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
#35No post body was provided.
Re: Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
#36Shutting down the current reactors has been planned for a while, and that is simply not a decision that is trivial to reverse. You can disagree with that initial decision, but this does have significant effects and if you are in the process of shutting down everything it does get much more complicated to suddenly reverse course.
The article seems rather dismissive towards many real problems like availability of nuclear fuel and personnel. The report also clearly states that due to the lack of fuel the nuclear power plants would only be able to supply additional power in late 2023. And it does not mention at all one of the conclusions in the report, that if it comes to a situation where the gas supply from Russia is shut off Germany would compensate with coal power plants.
Re: Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
#37I went to school in Austria in the 80s/90s. The anti-nuclear stance was a big part of education (I assume similar to Germany). We had to read stories like Die Wolke (The Cloud) and were terrified and somehow traumatized in a young age. We discussed this stuff for hours. Also a final deposit site was planned in the mountains in my area, so after Chernobyl there was a big activism against it - thousands of people connecting the mountain peaks in a long human chain (Menschenkette). The site was abandoned.
I do not want to take sides, for our prosperity as humans I tend to agree that nuclear may be a big part of the solution. On the other hand realistically almost no area is safe from disaster (naturally, politically). Risk management is key here, you can not assume that everything works out as planned.
Re: Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
There have been concerns about the risks of flooding to nuclear plants in Germany. https://energytransition.org/2013/06/german-nuclear-plants-f... Restarting nuclear isn't a bad idea, but it needs to be approached systematically and cautiously such that the risks from natural disasters and economic impacts are minimized, while also weighing the risks of continuing to support Russia. Unfortunately, many plants across…
> Restarting nuclear isn't a bad idea, but it needs to be approached systematically and cautiously such that the risks from natural disasters and economic impacts are minimized, while also weighing the risks of continuing to support Russia. smells like $$$ and more delays. nuclear is already by far the safest method of power production, and emits far fewer radionuclides than coal, and those numbers are the old genera…
That’s not completely accurate.
Nuclear is less safe than grid solar, it slightly beats rooftop solar because standing on roofs is dangerous and most solar installs are new.
Hydroelectric vs nuclear is tricky because large dams save lives and by reducing flooding etc, and installing hydroelectric when building a dam is much safer than building the dam in the first place. Which makes calculating the deaths from hydroelectric power tricky. Low head dams on the other hand are dangerous, but are largely abandoned technology.
Re: Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is pattern-matching taking the place of reasoning. Even if you don't, I promise you Putin understands the difference between attacking a plant in Ukraine and attacking one in Germany.
Assuming war will never happen is at best wishful thinking. At the point where people are attacking something in Germany that line becomes meaningless.
You seem to be replying to something I didn't say.
> At the point where people are attacking something in Germany that line becomes meaningless.
Exactly my point. I'm not saying desperation and ego won't drive him (along with everyone else) into the abyss, I'm saying he's savvy enough to know that right now, that line is protecting him.
Re: Why Germany won’t keep its nuclear plants open
#40The best moment to start building a nuclear plant was 10 years ago.
The next best moment is today.