Nuclear Power Prevents More Deaths Than It Causes 599
MTorrice writes "NASA researchers have compared nuclear power to fossil fuel energy sources in terms of greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution-related deaths. Using nuclear power in place of coal and gas power has prevented some 1.8 million deaths globally over the past four decades and could save millions of more lives in coming decades, concludes their study. The pair also found that nuclear energy prevents emissions of huge quantities of greenhouse gases. These estimates help make the case that policymakers should continue to rely on and expand nuclear power in place of fossil fuels to mitigate climate change, the authors say."
Long term? (Score:4, Insightful)
I am still wanting to see a viable long term storage solution for the waste, with at least one example of a spent rod finding a final and safe resting place. Otherwise the tail risk of nuclear power is just a myth.
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Informative)
How about like the french. We reprocess what we can, and bury what we can't. Safe and Effective.
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Interesting)
Better than the french we can use next generation feeder breeder reactors to eliminate the already minimal transportation and mechanical processing risks.
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It's too bad that the only new reactors currently under construction in the US aren't using such a design.
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Interesting)
How about like the french. We reprocess what we can, and bury what we can't. Safe and Effective.
Why like the French? We do this in Canada, Japan does it and so does South Korea. It's not exactly "new and exciting" technology, the US is the odd-man-out like usual because of nimbys and environmentalists.
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why must we always blame "the environmentalists"? Fuck, the US has less restrictive environmental regulation compared to Canada and Japan, and those countries have "the environmentalists" as well.
Maybe it's because our rotten fucking system can't build anything in a cost efficient manner, without pork? Maybe some other reason?
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Why must we always blame "the environmentalists"?
When they stop being a big part of the problems, we'll stop blaming them. Ever hear of the phrase "exporting the pollution"? That's environmentalists admitting that they chased off industry.
Maybe it's because our rotten fucking system can't build anything in a cost efficient manner, without pork?
That's what you get when you make industry too expensive to operate unsubsidized. Subsidies and rent seeking long predate the environmentalist movement, but it destroyed a bunch of otherwise competitive industries.
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Insightful)
This one can't be laid at the environmentalist's feet. The ban on re-processing is purely political and appears to be specifically to make nuclear power look much less attractive than it actually is. Follow the money.
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean, like the French, who were TRYING to reprocess spent fuel, and abandoned the project? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superph%C3%A9nix [wikipedia.org] That was the closest that anyone came in making a commercial breeder reactor. All other programs are research programs, who are not scheduled to put out enough electricity to function as an actual commercial plant.
Breeder reactors are a bitch to work. As far as I know, there is no successful commercial program on the horizon.
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Breeder reactors are a bitch to work. As far as I know, there is no successful commercial program on the horizon.
The Russians have had some luck - the BN-600 reactor has a load factor comparable to their conventional reactors. How *safe* it is I'm not sure, but the reliability's not bad for such an old design.
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Insightful)
The French reprocessing plant is this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COGEMA_La_Hague_site [wikipedia.org]
There's a list of all of them: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_fuel_reprocessing_plant#List_of_sites [wikipedia.org]
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Sorry - that was bad wording. I should have said "to build a reactor that reprocesses its own fuel", which is a breeder reactor. Reprocessing is definitely possible, but it means that you need other types of reactors to use the change in fuel. In general, reprocessing plants take spent uranium fuel rods, and then produce plutonium, MOX, or a variety of other fuels, based on the process used. In short, it doesn't solve the problem of nuclear waste, it just changes it.
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Breeder reactors are a bitch to work. As far as I know, there is no successful commercial program on the horizon.
Maybe if Clinton hadn't cancelled funding for the EBR2 [wikipedia.org] in the 90s, we would have viable reprocessing reactors today and be processing existing nuclear waste.
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Long term? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Long term? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure (Score:3, Insightful)
Give me one that can:
1) Generate base load, as in it doesn't vary with the time of day or weather.
2) Provide for power in all parts of the world, from northern latitudes to the equator.
3) Is cost effective.
You can't. That isn't to say other power generation methods aren't useful in some areas. Solar rules in the desert for peak load (when it is the hottest, you need the most energy for cooling and it is also outputting the most usually). However you are going to need something for base load. Nuclear is the
Re:Sure (Score:5, Insightful)
2) Provide for power in all parts of the world, from northern latitudes to the equator.
This how opponents of renewables make sure they always fail to meet their requirements. Obviously it is dumb trying to use the same type of energy everywhere.
Take Scotland as an example. Using wind they meet your base load requirement. Yes, locally wind speed varies, but over the entire country there is always enough energy being produced to supply a certain amount of base load. Furthermore wind speed is very predictable over the short term, and you can always keep some idling gas plants around to fill in those rare occasions when you need more energy.
Further south solar collectors are the way to go. 0.3% of the energy that falls on the Sahara could power all of Europe. They work 24/7 all year round and are ideal of base load.
Japan has massive geothermal resources, as does a lot of central and northern Africa.
Discard your ridiculous "must work everywhere equally" requirement and the other two are easily met with current technology.
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1) Generate base load, as in it doesn't vary with the time of day or weather.
2) Provide for power in all parts of the world, from northern latitudes to the equator.
3) Is cost effective.
Never heard of geothermal energy huh?
That said, your "must work everywhere, all the time" standard is arbitrary and counterproductive.
We should be trying as much as possible, wherever possible, whenever ever possible.
And nuclear/coal are only practical where there is enough water for them to cool the plant.
When the summer time rolls around, be prepared for your nuclear and coal plants to get idled because of high water temperatures or low water conditions.
/The low water conditions are almost always a produc
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Coal can do all of these (for various values of cost effective). The problem is it is very polluting.
If you add a "4) Is environmentally reasonable", then no, nothing in the world passes.
Coal fails on 4 very badly.
Nuclear fails on 3 (and on 2 for countries that lack the technology, and 4 depending on whom you ask)
Solar fails 1, 2, and 3.
Tidal fails on 1 and 2 (I do not know about 3)
Dams fail on 2 and 4. (and that isn't even including failures, and they fail on 1 if it doesn't rain enough)
Wind fails on 1 and
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You say "Also, the claim that waste from coal plants is as dangerous as that from nuclear plants is simply ridiculous."
Now, there are some client scientists who argue that pumping massive amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere could lead to environmental catastrophe (such as an anoxic event) which could lead to our extinction, along with pretty much every other oxygen breathing species.
I have no idea how realistic or likely that is, but I don't see any meaningful slowdown of CO2 emissions on a global scale,
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I call this argument ad-hippium.
Why is it ridiculous? Isn't pollution spewed up into the atmosphere worse than stuff collected in barrels on a power plant? This is the exact point the article was trying to make.
Re:Long term? (Score:4, Interesting)
Hydroelectric generation is tapped out. Hydroelectric storage is nowhere near tapped out -- there simply hasn't been enough demand for it. Keep that in mind.
It's not waste (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It's not waste (Score:4, Insightful)
It's like saying that there are lots of valuable mining opportunities out in the asteroid belt. It's technically true but the cost involved in taking advantage of it means no-one is really interested while there are better options.
The problem with waste consuming thorium reactors is that no-one has a proven design for a commercial scale one, and all the research ones have had major issues. When you are looking at spending billions of private and taxpayer money on a new nuclear plant it is rather hard to justify spending billions more to make it a thorium one that might run into expensive problems, especially when demand for other forms of clean energy make them a much more attractive proposition.
Re:It's not waste (Score:5, Insightful)
Reprocessing of nuclear waste doesn't have technical or economic hurdles, our reasons for not doing it are all political.
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Please point to a working commercial breeder/fast breeder reactor. The french project was abandoned because its costs had ballooned way beyond projections, with constant technical problems being the main reason. If it would have worked, the French would have accepted it. But it wasn't, and so the French closed it down.
Re:It's not waste (Score:5, Informative)
There are methods of reprocessing other than breeder reactors.
Long Term Waste EASY.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Long Term Waste EASY.. (Score:5, Informative)
Okay, let's go for some information from a non-cartoon propaganda source. First of all, India's experimental 500MWe reactor will definitely not be going online this year. It has exceeded the sales pitch for time and money by a factor of 2, and still counting:
The Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor (PFBR) is a 500MWe fast breeder nuclear reactor presently being constructed in Kalpakkam, India.[1] The Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR) is responsible for the design of this reactor. As of 2007 the reactor was expected to begin functioning in 2010.[2] As of April 2011, it was expected to be commissioned in 2012.[3]As of July 2012, it was expected to begin operations in 2013. As of February 2013, it was expected to begin operations in September 2014.[4] Total costs, originally estimated at 3500 crore (35 billion) Rupees are now estimated at 5,677 crore (56 billion) Rs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prototype_fast_breeder_reactor [wikipedia.org]
Secondly, this reactor does NOT use a thorium fuel cycle. "It will make use of MOX fuel, a mixture of PuO2 and UO2." (same link above). Rather, what it does is OUTPUT processed thorium that can be used to jump-start a later, hypothetical, thorium-based reactor. In other words: The current project is just "Stage II" in India's 3-stage nuclear program, which has taken since the 1950's to even get to this point. Stage III is now hoped to be a reality maybe around 2050:
According to replies given in Q&A in the Indian Parliament on two separate occasions, 19 August 2010 and 21 March 2012, large scale thorium deployment is only to be expected "3 – 4 decades after the commercial operation of fast breeder reactors with short doubling time".[66][31] Full exploitation of India’s domestic thorium reserves will likely not occur until after the year 2050.[67]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India%27s_three_stage_nuclear_power_programme#Stage_III_.E2.80.93_thorium_based_reactors [wikipedia.org]
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Insightful)
I have yet to see a nonviable solution to storing nuclear waste. The problem is that no one wants viable, they want perfect. The standards are being set by the fearful, with the design to not really make storage safe, but to make it impossible in order to kill the industry.
Re: (Score:3)
NASA scientists should not make politics.
Politicians should not make science.
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Insightful)
The long term waste is a known quantity, and needs to be addressed. But it is nowhere nearly as pressing a concern as the global CO2 levels are.
We have to bring down the CO2 emissions dramatically, and fast. Doing this through renewable energies would be nice, but it is a pipe dream at best. At least for now. We have to go nuclear, and do so on an far more aggressive scale than we are using it now, if we are to survive long enough, to be able to harness the still elusive fusion and renewable energy bonanza, the greens and the lawmakers are still clinging to.
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Solution to that is ban NIMBY environmental lawsuits from greenpeace et al that prevent the construction of a repository. Lawsuits have kept the construction or consideration of repositories from happening for literally decades. The result has been that we can't build new plants that are built to better standards and instead we built a generation of coal power plants that caused far more environmental harm.
Want to get real about helping the environment? Get greenpeace and similar anti-nuke fascists to back
Re:Long term? (Score:5, Informative)
(source [world-nuclear.org])
Moreover:
(source [reuters.com])
Japanese LNG prices went up from ~$13/MBTU just before the Fukushima event to ~$18/MBTU in July 2012 (source [ycharts.com]) just before the 2 reactors restarted, and is at $16.66 today
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Uhh, you are aware that France does have nuclear weapons, right?
Re: (Score:3)
Most people would recognize that my comment was in response to the suggestion of a trade embargo.
But not you!
You seem to think "Freedom Fries" were some sort of defense against weapons of mass destruction and my fear is that we'll come up with an even stupider defense.
What an interesting view of the world you must have.
It takes 20+ years to build a nuclear plant (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It takes 20+ years to build a nuclear plant (Score:4, Insightful)
It only takes 20 years because of all the governmental permits, lawsuits and protests that delay the project. Implement a strict but reasonable inspection scheme for every step of the way, and without all the other bullshit it wouldn't take more than 5 years to first criticality.
Re:It takes 20+ years to build a nuclear plant (Score:4, Informative)
So as nice as it would be to have more nuclear energy; the window of opportunity is gone.
China [world-nuclear.org] has 17 nuclear power reactors in operation, 28 under construction, and more about to start construction.
Chinese nuclear capacity will be 58 GWe by 2020, 200 GWe by 2030, and 400 GWe by 2050.
China has been able to close 71 GWe of small inefficient coal burning power plants since 2006, cutting annual coal consumption by about 82 million tonnes and annual carbon dioxide emissions by some 165 million tonnes.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_energy_storage [wikipedia.org] . So I'd say solar at
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Your reference is misleading. The article actually says "Molten salt is used to store heat collected by a solar power tower so that it can be used to generate electricity in bad weather or at night. Thermal efficiencies over one year of 99% have been predicted". I could only find one example of this molten salt storage actually being used in the real world, to store energy.
Regarding the actual efficiency of this method, in relation to the Andasol plant in Spain "It came on line March 2009. On July 4, 201 [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:3)
It's not about storage degradation during the winter months. It's about total solar production capacity during the winter months. In July, there are ~15 hours of daylight in Barcelona, Spain. In December, there are ~9.5 hours of daylight. That's a total decrease of 37% of daylight, or time solar arrays would have to produce electricity.
What about Anchorage, Alaska, which gets ~5 hours of daylight in the winter? That would be a 66% reduction in the potential power generation of solar panels. Or large s
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Could you expand a bit on these two things? Why are molten salt pits "short term"? And why do you see solar + batteries as having the same issues as coal?
Water you have to deal with the eco/economic problem of sucking up millions of gallons of water and putting it somewhere else.
Aren't you just going to put this water in
Old news (Score:5, Informative)
Nuclear power has the lowest deaths per TWh [nextbigfuture.com] of any form of energy -- and that includes things like Chernobyl and Fukushima, the latter of which had a curious focus given that far, far, far more people were injured, displaced, or killed by the actual tsunami as opposed to any radiation events, now or in the future.
Direct deaths from fossil fuel sources -- including even naturally occurring radiation from conventional fossil fuel energy sources -- far outstrip any deaths that have ever occurred, or even will occur with even the most extreme statistical projections, from any nuclear power source, including accidents. That's right: there are more deaths from "radiation" from the byproducts of fossil fuel sources than there are from nuclear power, including accidents and waste.
This [nytimes.com] is what we should be worried about:
"Outdoor air pollution contributed to 1.2 million premature deaths in China in 2010, nearly 40 percent of the global total, according to a new summary of data from a scientific study on leading causes of death worldwide. Figured another way, the researchers said, China's toll from pollution was the loss of 25 million healthy years of life from the population."
There is a reason China has 30 nuclear plants under construction, while the US just approved its first new plant in 30 years.
Vulcan logic (Score:3)
Nuclear is fodder for war mongers and scam artists (Score:3, Insightful)
The only way they can keep the price down is to nationalize it, and even then you have to have a very specific regulatory and business culture (like France) to make it work in abundance. Otherwise, the exclusive private club financing the construction of nuclear power plants will find ways to jack up the prices, essentially holding the ratepayers hostage once the community has made a commitment to having the new plant. IOW, nuclear literally puts too much power in too few hands to the extent that it gets abused immediately.
The war mongers (neoconservatives) love nuclear power the most because while they promote the scamming of consumers at home, they spread fear about its development in any country that has not put itself up for sale to Wall St. or become a client state to US military contractors.
good thing Hansen is leaving NASA (Score:3, Informative)
For example, there is no breakdown of the data or consideration of alternative strategies. What's the break down of the various sources of deaths from fossil fuel burning? In particular, I was curious how many deaths he would attribute to elevated levels of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere. As far as I can tell, it's not there in his research though I probably could figure it out eventually from a detailed analysis of his references.
Here's another big question. How effective would implementing other strategies, like pollution controls on coal power plants, be? If most of those lives can be saved merely by scrubbing coal power plant exhaust, then that's not a strong argument for nuclear power (and would become another propaganda element of the paper).
And once again, he exaggerates the risks of carbon dioxide emissions (in his "Implications" section).
I have no problem with Hansen putting out biased research. Just don't do it with public funds.
One small problem (Score:5, Interesting)
As an aside, the folks running SONGS for PG&E decided to redesign the tube bundles when they had to be replaced. They arrogantly redesigned them - without even telling the NRC, mind you - to get more [Jeremy Clarkson] Power! [/JC], but only managed to make them wear out in mere months due to so much vibration the tubes eroded each other.
So nuclear power does make sense, if it weren't the actual short-term greedy bastards that own and run them.
The case against coal... (Score:5, Interesting)
I've got quite a few friends who are anti-nuclear power and they constantly site Chernobyl, 3-mile Island and Fukushima...
The problem is that they refuse to travel to enjoy the fresh air [google.com]" in Beijing. I spent 3 weeks there in February, and let me tell you, after about 3 days there my nose was constantly congested. Within about 4 days of returning to the US, it cleared up. That air is not too fresh.
Also on the few days when it is clear there, the Japanese complain because all the smog has blown it's way into Japan.
Relevant xkcd (Score:5, Interesting)
Here [xkcd.com]. Refined nuclear fuel has roughly a million times as much energy per gram as any chemical source. Even counting the ore and refining, you just have to move much less stuff to get your energy - 1/100 to 1/1000 as much.
Done for Uranium... Now, do it again Thorium LFTRs (Score:3)
With increased safety levels, Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (a.k.a. LFTRs) would have even better results.
Then, take another step: Consider the Cost-Effectiveness of LFTRs, from construction to safe storage of waste, per Mega-KWH of electricity produced.
Now, what's the best choice, out of these 3 alternatives...?
the obvious (Score:4, Informative)
All of this has been obvious to anyone with more than two brain cells not sold to some lobby group.
The reasons that nuclear is so disliked is not polution, it is danger. When a coal or gas plant blows up, tough luck for anyone inside. When a nuclear plant blows up, tough luck for everyone within many miles.
That, and the fact that we still don't know what to do with the radioactive waste.
Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)
It isn't the deaths we are most worried about.
Then what are you worried about?
It's also contaminated less land. And takes up less space overall.
Certianly compared to coal, which produces vast quantities of ash waste (which sometimes has massive spills), churns our mercury and requires insanely huge mining operations due to the sheer volume of coal required.
So, basacilly nuclear provides solid, reliable baseline power with fewer deaths per kWh than any other scheme in existence.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Don't forget that every year the coal industry in the US pumps out more radioactive material than has ever been released from US nuclear power plants, even if you include the 3 mile island minor incident.
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Don't forget that every year the coal industry in the US pumps out more radioactive material than has ever been released from US nuclear power plants, even if you include the 3 mile island minor incident.
Authoritative numbers for radiation release of a coal plant are hard to find, but here's what I found:
Coal plants release 330mCi per billion KWh [google.com] Around 13MCi of radiation was released [wikipedia.org] from TMI (mostly in the form of "harmless" noble gases.
So to figure out how many KwH of coal production that release was equivalent to:
13 x 10e6 Ci / 330 x 10e-3 Ci * 1 x 10e9 KWh = 3.9 x 10e16 Kwh
Coal plants generate 1 .5 million GWh [sourcewatch.org] or 1.5 x 10e6 * 10e9 = 1.5 x 10e15 Wh or 1.5 x 10e12 KWh
So the Three Mile Island release was
Re:So? (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, and the AC was debunked by another commenter.
This is a very silly comparison. 1700 PBq of the Chernobyl release was in the form of I-131, which has a half-life of 8 days. Which means that 3 months after the disaster, it was effectively gone. Thousands more Pbq of Xenon-133 were released, but Xe133 has a half-life of 5 days. So after 2 months, that was effectively gone, 99.98% of it had decayed to stable cesium.
The only radioisotopes released from Chernobyl that are still exist in significant amounts, 26 years after the release, are Sr90 and Cs137, with half-lives of about 30 years. Total release of those isotopes was 100 Pbq. So about equal to the total radioactive release from burning coal for 100 years. But that stuff from burning coal? That's going to last for many thousands of years. (And that's just the radioactive release, the arsenic, mercury, etc? That stuff's forever.)
Meanwhile, 300,000 people a year die to air pollution. That beats Chernobyl's total by a factor of 75.
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Meanwhile, 300,000 people a year die to air pollution. That beats Chernobyl's total by a factor of 75.
Yeah but those slowly accumulate over the year and so are easier to ignore.
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Then what are you worried about?
Prosperity. Economic growth. Energy is the ultimate raw material necessary for these things.
Don't assume everyone shares the premise that we need cheap, abundant and clean energy. You could live out your life inside a three mile radius of your yurt nursing a solar panel. Putting you there is an ideal to which many aspire.
To be clear, I am not among them. I've just shed any illusions about whom I'm dealing with. They've either got theirs or they don't want it (the former being the vastly larger gro
Re:So? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
You can own a radio without a car; you cannot operate a hydro plant without a dam. Your analogy is flawed.
The inherent dangers and ecological drawbacks of dams are necessarily inherent to hydro-electric power stations.
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Hydroelectricity can certainly exist without dams, there's no doubt about that. The post above mentioning Niagara Falls is another good example of that. But could a waterfall turbine or buoy farm even hope to match the output of a hydroelectric dam or compete with nuclear energy?
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There has never been a failure of a dam built specifically for hydroelectric power
Counterexamples [wikipedia.org] abound [wikipedia.org] if [wikipedia.org] you [wikipedia.org] look [wikipedia.org].
Re:So? (Score:4, Informative)
PV solar definitely creates more pollution per MWHr, wind would be site dependant but it's not like mining ore, smelting, etc all the pieces is pollution free plus it's not baseline and we're decades away from it being able to fill that role. Hydro is probably 80-90% tapped and we're actually tearing down hydro dams to try to help fish. Geothermal causes earthquakes and there aren't that many sites where it's economical.
Re:So? (Score:5, Informative)
Hydro is abismal, it destroys millions of acres of land with flooding and disrupts the river ecosystem. Migratory freshwater fish all around the world are rapidly facing extinction because of hydro power.
Geothermal is not infinitely renewable, heat sources can be and are being depleted, and there is evidence that it can cause earthquakes.
Solar thermal is great if you have the right environment for it, but outside the southwest, nuclear is still the better option.
We need more nuclear and more solar power.
Re:So? (Score:4, Informative)
Not really a false dichotomy.
While there are numerous other sources of electrical power, the ONLY CURRENTLY AVAILABLE METHODS OF GETTING LARGE AMOUNTS OF BASELOAD POWER are fossil fuels and nuclear. Solar and wind MIGHT be able to scale up if we spend enough money improving the transmission infrastructure (which we are not). So, when talking about the big contributors, you have a limited number of options.
Now, I'm not so sanguine about TFA's answers. Having some researchers with an axe to grind (Climate Change) and having said researchers dig out some numbers of dubious quality, make a few entertaining assumptions and grind out some numbers doesn't exactly strike me as the most intellectual of ventures. In particular, the long term costs of nuclear waste storage have never been realistically modeled.
Big fission plants in the middle of nowhere might be answer - with the implicit assumption that if it starts glowing, you just put a big fence around it - but if you're going to go there, you need better transmission infrastructure and so you might as well do large scale wind / solar.....
Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)
You know what's a false dichotomy? Comparing nuclear to coal when talking about costs, and renewable when talking about environmental effect.
Re:So? (Score:4, Informative)
Since you asked:
Deaths per terawatt hour (from nextbigfuture.com )
Coal – world average: 161
Coal – China: 278
Coal – USA: 15
Oil: 36
Natural Gas: 4
Biofuel/Biomass: 12
Peat: 12
Solar: 0.44
Wind: 0.15
Hydro: 0.10
Nuclear: 0.04
"Lives ruined" is kinda hard to track... kinda ambiguous.
Cost: Nuclear is normally in the middle for costs (long term). Solar and wind are "cheaper" but take up more property... As for property damage, check out the documentary "Windfall" on Netflix. It is about some unhappy people who agreed to have a windfarm move into their neighborhoods. Biggest complaint is noise and "flicker" caused by turning blades.
Plus I question the environmental damage wind-farms can cause. We are pulling energy out of the wind. That energy is used to create currents and is part of the ecosystem... by altering this by large wind farms, could we potentially prevent moisture from moving from offshore in land? Cause a dustbowl?
As for Nuclear: I really see that as the future. New LFT reactors, for example has waste with a half-life of, 30 years I believe... and have low pressure (no explosions) and the reaction will destabilize itself (no melt down).
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Your what-if scenero is really full of crap because for nuclear to kill people faster then our breeding rate we'd have to pretty much attempt to poison everybody on earth with it on purpose.
Not to mention that I've always figured that even if we had been successful with Yucca mountain, within 200 years our descendents would be cursing us as they work, fully knowing the dangers, to dig up the useful fuel we buried.
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll try this a few ways:
First:
http://www.ted.com/talks/debate_does_the_world_need_nuclear_energy.html [ted.com]
Second:
http://xkcd.com/1162/ [xkcd.com]
Third:
I worked nuclear power for 10 years (ops/maint), coal for the last 5 years(maint), and and converting the plant to biomass from waste wood currently. As the TED talk suggests, the right answer is to build nuclear now to replace the aging plants that we currently have while we figure out how to fit the renewable sources in.
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As long as you subsidize it with government loan guarantees that no other power source needs, sure. But then you're not actually competing on an even level.
It would be cheaper than wars in the Middle East, wars on terror/drugs, bank bailouts, automotive bailouts, or any of that other stuff government does.
And... long-term, you'd have a chance of getting some of that money back, unlike wars in the Middle East, wars on terror/drugs, bank bailouts, automotive bailouts, or any of that other stuff government does.
Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you're worried about accidents, then you're worried about deaths and and sickness. But fossil fuels are worse.
If you're worried about weaponisation, then you're worried about deaths. The cat's out of the bag, and not using nuclear power stations won't stop people from making bombs.
If you're worried about waste, then you need not worry [larouchepac.com].
So what are you more worried about than deaths?
Re:So? (Score:4, Funny)
We're worried about the *important* stuff!
Re:So? (Score:5, Informative)
Because it's the only other technology that supplies any appreciable percentage of global base load.
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
Your half right – because nuclear and coal are close substitute and coal is the low hanging fruit.
Both are very good a providing base load power and not much else. Natural gas can do other things – peak electricity, heating, stock feed for plastic manufacturing, etc. Solar, Wind, etc. – while getting better – can’t offer reliable baseline load.
And, if we are talking about changing the energy supply mix, then yes, it does make logical sense to ask relative questions – is A better then B? If yes, more of A and less of B.
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
Nuclear proponents talk about coal because coal is the competition. If a new nuclear plant is built it will be build instead of a fossil fuel plant, it won't be replacing a wind farm. 40% of our electricity comes from coal and another 25% comes from gas. Solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal are way down on the list and have no chance of becoming the dominant source of power in the near future, if ever.
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
Because it doesn't make sense to compare it against technologies that can't scale up to meet demand.
No country has achieved more than 20% grid penetration of wind/solar without major compromises. In the case of Denmark, they did it by trading electricity with Norway. (Norway is fortunate to have LOTS of hydro resources, and hydro is great for energy storage and filling in holes left when you use a resource that typically has only 20-30% capacity factor.)
The problem is that our hydroelectric resources are pretty much tapped out - there aren't many more places we can build dams.
So once your wind/solar penetration goes above what our current hydro resources can fill in the gaps for - you've got a BIG scaling problem.
Nuclear, on the other hand, has a pretty consistent track record of delivering capacity factors of 90% or above. (The exception being France, who actually do have too much nuclear, so much that they actually have to do demand following with some of their plants.)
So what does that leave? Coal and gas. Coal can be proven to be FAR more dangerous and dirty than nuclear, and while gas burns cleanly, if you look at the environmental impacts of modern drilling techniques (such as hydrofracturing), you're approaching as much environmental damage in the past 5-10 years as the entire history of nuclear - it's just not as obvious because instead of bad things happening at a single obvious point source, the damage being done by gas drilling is distributed geographically.
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Did you search the news where Germany's government is currently panicking because there reelection chance is almost zero if they can't stop power costs from increasing year over year? Oh yea you forgot that people have to afford the power too.
Re:So? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes.
You got "Environmentalists" not the actually scientists per say but average guy who feels the need to stop all things that are bad, not really realizing that most things has some sort of trade-off, So they just say NO NO BAD BAD all the time. Oddly enough these people side with the left leaning parties, thus influence their policies.
You got other energy companies who won't cry to see nuclear go away. These guys tend to side with the right leaning parties, thus influence their policies.
As a counterpoint you have the supporters touting Clean, Safe, too cheap to meter. Who are just pushing the opposing side.
Nuclear Energy is dangerous, it produces a lot of hazardous wastes. However it is manageable when you have all the sides playing fairly and stop trying to discredit each other.
Nuclear Energy is part of a complete energy plan. Hydroelectric, Wind, Solar, Fossil Fuels, etc. are needed to. As of right now we are using too much Fossil Fuels, its side effects are outweighing its benefits. So we should start dialing it back a bit and replace it with other sources, yes they have their own side effects too, but they are different and if you get the right balance you are good.
Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nuclear Energy is part of a complete energy plan.
Well it's a stepping stone to a sustainable energy plan anyway. But yes, it will be necessary for probably 50-100 years before we can fully finish converting to entirely renewable sources.
The *only* way nuclear is 'good' is that its less bad than coal in terms of greenhouse gases. No more.
Re:So? (Score:5, Informative)
I believe you meant "fusion". Sunlight and wind don't have a ton of energy density per m^3. We will certainly still have a use for massive amounts of power in 50-100 years.
If we're playing this game, the only way solar and wind are "good" are that they have less of an environmental impact than coal, etc. They're not impact-free.
Re: (Score:3)
>
If we're playing this game, the only way solar and wind are "good" are that they have less of an environmental impact than coal, etc. They're not impact-free.
Mod Parent UP!!!!
You are indeed correct. Our energy needs are ever increasing as our population grows. Electrical demand is projected to keep going up, and I expect we will not stop that trend *anytime* soon. We will be building more and more generation capacity into the foreseeable future and, baring any major population adjustments (war, pestilence, mass starvation etc) for the next few hundred years as well. There isn't enough real estate out there for solar or enough wind blowing for wind... And "re
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
Just wait until we start driving electric cars, etc. That's going to double the demand for electricity.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
They're not impact-free.
Nothing is, but they don't have fuel costs nor fuel waste...NOTHING else can say that.
Renewables are multiple orders of magnitude less 'impacting' than fossil fuels or nuclear.
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
Nuclear Energy is dangerous, it produces a lot of hazardous wastes.
Yup. Totally agree. The thing is... so does Coal. And oil. And natural gas. Small scale solar actually has more deaths from installers falling off roofs than you'd think All power is somewhat dangerous - nuclear just happens to be the least dangerous we have.
FFS, coal mining and burning puts more radioactivity into the system than nuclear waste would if the plants just ground up their detritus and spewed it into the sky - while removing the natural landscape - but we're used to it so it doesn't count.
Re:So? (Score:5, Informative)
Nuclear power could be a lot cleaner and less dangerous if we stopped using those old-fashioned bomb-making reactors, too.
Re:So? (Score:4, Informative)
Oh, it is not like uranium does not have to be mined, mind you. It just magically appears there in the fuel pellet state in the close proximity of the reactor.
Re:So? (Score:5, Informative)
To clarify the above poster...
Things with a 'Short' half life...Decay away. They are not a long term issue (depending on decay products)
Things with half lives of a few years or decades are nasty - they last long enough and put out enough radiation to be a problem.
Things with a long half lives approach natural background radiation levels and don't really have a significant biological impact.
Treating something with a 250k year halflife as if it was a dangerous short-mid term radioactive is terribly expensive and has no benefit.
Re:So? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nuclear wins... Hands down.
At least until you factor in the cost of the bribes required to get enough politicians to tell the environmental lobby to take a hike long enough to get a plant approved and running... That has apparently killed the industry over the last decade or two here in the US. World wide though, it is pretty clear that nuclear power is the way to go for generating the base of an industrialized nation's electrical power.
They would not have built them, if they didn't make financial sense... With the possible exception of North Korea and Iran who are building them for other reasons...
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They would not have built them, if they didn't make financial sense...
That's not true. All prior nuclear plants were built with the cost overruns being guaranteed by either the government or consumers in a regulated monopoly. The recent proposed boom that was supposed to happen fizzled when the companies were told that they had to bear their own costs and risks of capital, market volatility and insurance rather than relying on governmental guarantees. Liberalized electricity markets make the return rates more uncertain, causing capital investors to prefer more flexible if
Re:As did (Score:4, Insightful)
Nuclear power != Nuclear bomb.
With your logic, I have decided to blame solar power on the death of anyone who got dehydrated while out in the sun. And I am going to blame wind power on the death of anyone caused by a hurricane or tornado. Under your flawed logic, more people have died from solar and wind power than have from nuclear power.
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Hansen a nuclear shill? No. (Score:4, Informative)
The authors are Kharecha and Hansen. James Hansen [wikipedia.org] is world famous for supplying warmists with NASA stamped ammo since the early 1980's
You can say a lot of things about Hansen but shilling for nukes is just not plausible. But hey, if you want to discredit one of the most credible AGW celebrities in the world go right ahead.
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Nuclear power does not prevent deaths. Not a single one. In fact, it causes quite a few deaths.
Keep in mind that electricity in general saves all kinds of lives. Refrigeration reduces food poisoning deaths, air conditioning reduces heat stroke deaths, electric light reduces deaths from candle burning accidents as well as inhaled particles, electric power runs many life-saving machines in hospitals, dialysis, etc.
I suspect the number of lives saved by any electrical power producing system far outweighs dea