Opinion of Nuclear Energy

[Associate Justice PiT]

Terrible energy. Hiroshima, Nagazaki, Tchernobyl,...

One of these things is not like the others.

What do you mean?

     Nuclear bombs and nuclear energy are really not the same thing.

[Velasco]

If tomorrow every coal plant was shut down and replace with nuclear, total greenhouse gas emissions would go down 25%, most environmental toxin emissions (mercury,etc) could go down 50% or more, particulate emissions would go down a lot.  It would be great for the environment.

It'd be great if you ignore the issue of nuclear waste, as well as security issues. Anyway, it's possible that fission is a necessary evil until nuclear fusion and renewable sources are fully developed, but the governments should better invest in the latter instead of wasting billions in funding power plants based on nuclear fission, which common sense indicates that is condemned to disappear in the future.

[windjammer]

Terrible energy. Hiroshima, Nagazaki, Tchernobyl,...

One of these things is not like the others.

What do you mean?

     Nuclear bombs and nuclear energy are really not the same thing.

Now I understand .

Well, they are not really the same thing, but all of thesr things are dangerous. That's why I don't support developing nuclear energy.

[Oakvale]

I'm a big fan. It carries the upside possibility of wiping out all life on earth, which would be great since there would be less awful, awful people.

[Redalgo]

FF of course, though to less of an extent than it could have been if the government had not encouraged research to proceed on a course that would allow fissile byproducts to be produced for the manufacturing of nuclear weapons. Had thorium-focused tech pressed ahead since the beginning we wouldn't have nearly so severe of a waste or security problem to contend with. As things stand, however, the only two sources of baseload electricity (i.e. sources providing a continuous, reliable, vast amount of energy with very little down-time for maintenance) available are coal and nuclear fission. Between the two of them I'd say fission is less environmentally hazardous provided the plants are operated carefully and wastes stored with great foresight. The lack of secure repositories for waste owing to the NIMBY factor is a major hassle, granted.

[Simfan34]

A necessary evil in the current climate crisis, but far from unproblematic. Nuclear waste management being the biggest problem.

Put it in the ground, like we were supposed to until they cancelled it.

One of those times where a single word answer is no good.

Nobody died at Three Mile Island. Security measures even in 1970s standard worked. It's like pointing to a BMW accident where everyone survived as proof that BMWs are unsafe.

Fossil fuels have significant direct mortality rates associated to them where as nuclear is 0. A lot of the fear of nuclear power comes from the misconception that it has anything to do with a nuclear bomb. Nuclear power plant reactors and nuclear bombs are like comparing apples with apple-flavored Jolly Ranchers.  Blowing up a nuclear power plant cannot cause a mushroom cloud.

Even if we want to go into indirect deaths (estimations of how many people will die of cancer from radiation leaked at Fukishama), it still pales in comparison to the indirect deaths in the mining of precious metals in Africa that compose solar panels.  Or environmental displacement by hydroelectric dam construction.

The only energy that is truly environmentally safe is wind and it's wholly inadequate.  In all other scenarios, you are playing a game of risk and the sheer amount of energy nuclear can produce means per accident it's a good deal as a opposed to per accident at an oil rig, a dam, a platinum mine, a coal mine, or a wind turbine manufacturing plant.

In other words, "No."

If tomorrow every coal plant was shut down and replace with nuclear, total greenhouse gas emissions would go down 25%, most environmental toxin emissions (mercury,etc) could go down 50% or more, particulate emissions would go down a lot.  It would be great for the environment.

It'd be great if you ignore the issue of nuclear waste, as well as security issues. Anyway, it's possible that fission is a necessary evil until nuclear fusion and renewable sources are fully developed, but the governments should better invest in the latter instead of wasting billions in funding power plants based on nuclear fission, which common sense indicates that is condemned to disappear in the future.

What security issues? That it will blow up like a nuclear bomb? Nuclear power plants can't do that.

[Donerail]

Terrible energy. Hiroshima, Nagazaki, Tchernobyl,...

One of these things is not like the others.

What do you mean?

     Nuclear bombs and nuclear energy are really not the same thing.

Now I understand .

Well, they are not really the same thing, but all of thesr things are dangerous. That's why I don't support developing nuclear energy.

That's like arguing that we shouldn't allow low-potency fireworks in backyards because machine guns are dangerous. It's the way the gunpowder is used that makes it dangerous, not the thing itself.

[Velasco]

What security issues? That it will blow up like a nuclear bomb? Nuclear power plants can't do that.

Did I equate a fission plant with the Enola Gay? Are you implying that nobody died at Chernobyl and nothing happened at Fukushima? Can you assure that nothing will happen in the future? Is there any feasible way to deal with nuclear waste? Why advocates of nuclear fission have the tendency to overlook the inconveniences? Also, can you explain why wind power is inappropriate? For sure it would be if you want to base all energy production in the wind, but the issue is that we should go to a diversification of energy sources. There are many places where wind blows constantly and it's a valuable resource that can be better developed. It has been used since time immemorial, because it's effective. 

[Maxwell]

For me, I don't think it would be the all purpose solution to our energy problems, because I think it would only be a great contributor to a vast energy market.

[Associate Justice PiT]

Terrible energy. Hiroshima, Nagazaki, Tchernobyl,...

One of these things is not like the others.

What do you mean?

     Nuclear bombs and nuclear energy are really not the same thing.

Now I understand .

Well, they are not really the same thing, but all of thesr things are dangerous. That's why I don't support developing nuclear energy.

     SJoyce has a point here, in that the scales involved are very different. Nuclear reactors are dangerous, but historically they have proven far less destructive than other things that we rely on in our everyday lives, like cars. Comparing that to the danger level of nuclear weapons is simply inaccurate.

[Redalgo]

. . . can you explain why wind power is inappropriate? For sure it would be if you want to base all energy production in the wind, but the issue is that we should go to a diversification of energy sources. There are many places where wind blows constantly and it's a valuable resource that can be better developed. It has been used since time immemorial, because it's effective.

Wind energy suffers from the ebb and flow of output. It means we need much better battery tech and/or the construction of far more turbines than would be needed if they were always at full capacity, making their use material-intensive, inefficient, and liable to require greater use of fossil fuels to ready for service than fission stations relative to their energy output. They are also a serious hazard to birds, from what I've heard, and a lot of the best sites for building them are in scenic areas where their presence would be an eyesore and perhaps even end up discouraging tourism.

That is not to suggest wind turbines are a flatly bad idea, of course. Rather, a diversified collection of energy sources including wind ought to have an underlying foundation of electrical output that ceases to be coal. There are options out there better than nuclear fission using uranium or plutonium but I am not aware of any of them being ready to press into service quite yet.

[Simfan34]

What security issues? That it will blow up like a nuclear bomb? Nuclear power plants can't do that.

Did I equate a fission plant with the Enola Gay? Are you implying that nobody died at Chernobyl and nothing happened at Fukushima? Can you assure that nothing will happen in the future? Is there any feasible way to deal with nuclear waste? Why advocates of nuclear fission have the tendency to overlook the inconveniences? Also, can you explain why wind power is inappropriate? For sure it would be if you want to base all energy production in the wind, but the issue is that we should go to a diversification of energy sources. There are many places where wind blows constantly and it's a valuable resource that can be better developed. It has been used since time immemorial, because it's effective. 

As for the rest of your post, no, you did not say that, but the fear over "security" is really a derivative of misconceptions over what harm can be done with a nuclear power plant; it is far, far less than what most people imagine. It could in the right circumstances, yes, particularly as a result of a deliberate plot, but the effort (and risk) one would have to put into such a plot would be far higher than that necessary, I imagine, for an attack of the same scale using some other means. One could could hack into a nuclear power plant, sure, but, again, you're not going to get it to blow up or anything. Hence my quip.

As for Chernobyl, I did not say that. I did say, however, and will say again- media-driven public hysteria over the Chernobyl accident has caused (and will continue to cause) more deaths than the direct effects of the accident. This isn't some wishful factoid drawn from some contortion of the nuclear energy lobby, it's the conclusion of the WHO's definitive report on the incident. Nor did I say that nothing happened at Fukushima, but then again no one actually died as a result of that, for that matter (aside from the 15,000 people in the earthquake and tsunami, but people seem to have almost forgotten about that...).

As for nuclear waste, it is a problem, but it's the same problem one will have to face, in different forms, with almost any other means of power generation. Sure, wind power, for example, may not produce any kind of immediate byproduct, but it entails erecting dozens or even hundreds of turbines just to produce perhaps one-tenth of the electricity a nuclear power plant would.* One could call this a very tangible form of visual pollution, and something I imagine that as time goes on "environmentalists" of the affluent sort (i.e. the bulk of them) will find themselves opposing if some were proposed near their houses or, God forbid, their places on the shore.

This is to say nothing of oddly neo-colonial ideas of covering the Sahara with solar panels (i.e., Desertec), Tuaregs be damned, apparently. (Hopefully a silver lining of the crisis in Mali would be understanding folly of such schemes.) I am not opposed to the "usual" renewable power sources, you see. I am a big fan of hydropower, for example, but people (here, at least) don't seem to like dams. I just understand that in terms of actual electric generation, they compare poorly to most other sources in terms of cost, as well as in the number of physical installations.

*I am assuming that a wind turbine produces 1-5 MW of energy, based off what I know of their usual capacities. This is compared to the 2,000 MW (if I remember correctly) capacity of the local Indian Point nuclear plant.

[Simfan34]

Also, Redalgo (who posted sometime after I started writing) brings up several other problematic issues with wind power. I too favor a shift in our electricity generation such that the "underlying foundation... ceases to be coal", and within the limits of plausibility, the best mix would, for me, be one of nuclear, hydropower, and natural gas. There are other sources, yes- geothermal, as far as I am concerned, seems to be the least intrusive and the most reliable- but in terms of generation potential, cleanliness, and cost-effectiveness nuclear leads all others by far.

Indeed, what I'd consider the greatest actual challenge to nuclear power would be the usually staggering up-front cost it requires; it's often so high, especially (but I honestly doubt solely) when compounded with the regulatory hoops building a new nuclear power plant requires jumping through, that the break-even time is unattractively long for most private utilities.

I'll go out on a limb, however, and say that if we were to scrap all the subsidies given to other "renewable energies" and instead spend the money on subsidising the constructing and insuring of new nuclear power plants, we'd not just get more electricity for the money, but we'd see a greater reduction in emissions as well. This is to say nothing of the returns to scale, and inevitable resultant reduction of costs, that would result from a nuclear power plant building spree. I haven't done the math on this, though, so don't hold me to it. (Now I'm tempted to...)

Either way, the current insistence on trying to mitigate climate change by insisting on the adoption of the incredibly poor mix of energy sources that has been promoted, which are ineffective for the reasons stated above and elsewhere, is so counter-productive that I sometimes wonder if the real forces behind this push are those who want to see higher utility prices, reduced economic growth, and greater expenditures than are necessary to achieve the same environmental results. One might say the oil producers but the losers are their markets; perhaps the Chinese but they seem to be pursuing these themselves to absurd levels...

But again, I am talking too much. Now you see why I preferred to stick to the one-word answer. For all my bloviating I have not revealed anything "no" did not. 

[Goldwater]

Either way Freedom Energy, obviously.

[CountyTy90]

I actually just started working at a nuclear power plant recently and I think it's definitely better than coal, but I really think we should be moving in the renewable energy direction... a lot worse things can happen in a nuclear meltdown than with wind energy.

I actually train for that soon!

[King]

Guys, we'll never have an interesting future if we don't master nuclear energy. We're not going to open those wormholes and what not if we're too afraid to play around with atoms.

[muon2]

I actually just started working at a nuclear power plant recently and I think it's definitely better than coal, but I really think we should be moving in the renewable energy direction... a lot worse things can happen in a nuclear meltdown than with wind energy.

I actually train for that soon!

Which plant? I've toured Dresden station.

[TJ in Oregon]

For better or worse, the only serious alternative we have today to fossil fuels for producing a base power load on the scale of the US.

[Redalgo]

. . . Indeed, what I'd consider the greatest actual challenge to nuclear power would be the usually staggering up-front cost it requires; it's often so high, especially (but I honestly doubt solely) when compounded with the regulatory hoops building a new nuclear power plant requires jumping through, that the break-even time is unattractively long for most private utilities.

I'll go out on a limb, however, and say that if we were to scrap all the subsidies given to other "renewable energies" and instead spend the money on subsidising the constructing and insuring of new nuclear power plants, we'd not just get more electricity for the money, but we'd see a greater reduction in emissions as well. This is to say nothing of the returns to scale, and inevitable resultant reduction of costs, that would result from a nuclear power plant building spree. I haven't done the math on this, though, so don't hold me to it. (Now I'm tempted to...) . . .

The state could build the plants and then either operate them or sell 'em off to other providers in smaller installments over the courses of their operating lives. Having the capital-intensive starting costs (it tends to be $2-5 billion, I think?) and delayed gratification involved strongly discourages investment and may make nuclear fission an example of market failure. The French offer an intriguing idea in settling on one reactor design to have built over and over again, which could greatly streamline authorization for future stations applying that layout... whereas the U.S. stations historically used a new design for every plant.

[Simfan34]

And even better, I think you know, considering who's posting.

[bedstuy]

If tomorrow every coal plant was shut down and replace with nuclear, total greenhouse gas emissions would go down 25%, most environmental toxin emissions (mercury,etc) could go down 50% or more, particulate emissions would go down a lot.  It would be great for the environment.

It'd be great if you ignore the issue of nuclear waste, as well as security issues. Anyway, it's possible that fission is a necessary evil until nuclear fusion and renewable sources are fully developed, but the governments should better invest in the latter instead of wasting billions in funding power plants based on nuclear fission, which common sense indicates that is condemned to disappear in the future.

There's no reason to expect nuclear fission plants will be obsolete in 50 years.  Nobody has come close to creating a workable model of a nuclear fusion power station.   

With renewables, sure, you should also invest there.  But, you can't have an electricity grid powered exclusively by wind and solar.

And, sure, nuclear waste is a problem.  But, I'd rather worry about where to dispose of nuclear waste safely than know I was spewing pollution into the air.

[BaconBacon96]

Obvious Freedom Energy.

[traininthedistance]

So we don't derail other threads about this.

This is one issue I've changed my mind on since about a year ago. Ask me then, and I would have said that nuclear was overhated, reliable and necessary in the battle against climate change. Increasingly however I'm cynical of the whole shebang, so I'm voting Horrible (and misguided) Energy.

(And in this poll I mean current nuclear fission technologies, not any other varient that is two hundred years from commercialisation like breeders)

I'm still generally at where you were a year ago... but this is also an issue I haven't followed much lately.  So I'm wondering if there was anything in particular (news or research or whatever) that I should know about, that might change my mind?

[CountyTy90]

I actually just started working at a nuclear power plant recently and I think it's definitely better than coal, but I really think we should be moving in the renewable energy direction... a lot worse things can happen in a nuclear meltdown than with wind energy.

I actually train for that soon!

Which plant? I've toured Dresden station.

Right down the road at LaSalle station.

[Attorney General, Senator-Elect, & Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

FF.
much better than fossil fuels.