So How Do You Regard Nuclear Power Now?

[Sydde]

Originally Posted by iJohnHenry

Nice try, but it's "Methinks he doth protest to much."

Well, if you must be pedantic, get your meter right. The original line was "The lady doth protest too much methinks".

[citizenzen]

Originally Posted by Heilage

They do. I never claimed any support of it though.

Never claimed you did.

Never thought such a bland statement such as "wise decisions are better than ones made in haste" would be so controversial.

I learn something new every day.

[torbjoern]

Originally Posted by citizenzen

Never claimed you did.

Never thought such a bland statement such as "wise decisions are better than ones made in haste" would be so controversial.

I learn something new every day.

Yes, it's a crazy world, isn't it. Sometimes a bland statement can be labeled anything from "naive and simplistic" to "evil and misanthropic" (especially here on PRSI!)... or sometimes just "trolling". Implying that a decision more likely than not will be "wiser" after having gone through a democratic process, sounds totally absurd to me and hopefully to others as well. So yes, that part of your statement is certainly controversial.

[johnnyturbouk]

Originally Posted by zioxide

I'd be willing to bet that our crusades for oil have costs thousands of more lives than nuclear power accidents ever have.

+1 - also the cost to the environment, both direct and indirect!

[Huntn]

Originally Posted by SandboxGeneral

There are inherent risks with nuclear power and there is the waste issue yet to be solved. But likewise, there are risks for other types of power, whether it's gas, oil, coal or even hydroelectric. Choose your poison.

No other power source poses the risks of nuclear energy with consequences that could last hundreds of years when considering worst case scenarios.

[rasmasyean]

Originally Posted by johnnyturbouk

+1 - also the cost to the environment, both direct and indirect!

Well the "crusades for oil" also fuels (pun! ) the transportation sector a lot. Nuclear doesn't really involve transportation apart from large military sea vessels mostly only within the US fleet. Perhaps when all cars "go electric"? But that will be ages from now anyway.

But that does bring up a valid point that nuclear fuel is almost unlimited, since it takes a lot less mineral mined to produce the same amount of electricity. But it's much more of a "hazardous material" nevertheless.

I still think underground nuclear facilities would be a good bet in certain geographically favorable areas. But I think in order for this to be widespead, we need to implement the superconductor grid. This way you can just have some large plants in the "safe locations" supply a wide population.

Originally Posted by Huntn

No other power source poses the risks of nuclear energy with consequences that could last hundreds of years when considering worst case scenarios.

The technology isn't ready yet, but there has been work on engineering "radiation resistant" bacteria to uptake nuclear waste. I think the idea is that it will absorb stuff that it uses as it's biology (like iodine) and in clusters you can see it. Perhaps they migrate to the surface or something. Then when you scoop the bateria, you would scoop the radioactive iodine or whatever and dispose of it. I don't think there are any other methods today that can "scoop radioactive atoms", so this is one way that looks real promising for the near future.

[Huntn]

Fukushima Reactor now rated by the Japanese Government as a 7 out of 7, same as Chernobyl.

[R.Perez]

Originally Posted by Huntn

Fukushima Reactor now rated by the Japanese Government as a 7 out of 7, same as Chernobyl.

Yup. Maybe all the nuclear apologists here that this couldn't happen will start to rethink their positions.

[firestarter]

Originally Posted by R.Perez

Yup. Maybe all the nuclear apologists here that this couldn't happen will start to rethink their positions.

No.

Following an earthquake and tsunami which caused 15000 confirmed deaths and 12000 still unaccounted for, zero people have been killed as a result of any radiation leakages at Fukushima.

In the same month since the earthquake, 200 people will have been killed mining coal in China alone. US coal mining deaths stand at an average of 32 per year.

[takao]

i have to say it comes surprising to me .. i perhaps thought that it might get rated up a single level because of the water leakages but 2 ? .. that is quite a massive step up


side note:
an austrian Greenpeace consultant called it a level 7 more than 2 weeks ago and i remember how many people on german language message boards called Greenpeace "clueless about the incident" "they have no idea about nuclear power in general" etc.

[rasmasyean]

Originally Posted by takao

i have to say it comes surprising to me .. i perhaps thought that it might get rated up a single level because of the water leakages but 2 ? .. that is quite a massive step up


side note:
an austrian Greenpeace consultant called it a level 7 more than 2 weeks ago and i remember how many people on german language message boards called Greenpeace "clueless about the incident" "they have no idea about nuclear power in general" etc.

Tell you the truth, I thought it would have reached that level a while ago. I would have thought they should have just burried the whole place to begin with because it would eventually Chernoble. I'm actually kind of surprised they were actually able to keep it under the control they were claiming. But I guess as new things get "revealed" later on...we would get a more factualy idea of what actually happened and investigations would show some timelines.

[Huntn]

Originally Posted by firestarter

No.

Following an earthquake and tsunami which caused 15000 confirmed deaths and 12000 still unaccounted for, zero people have been killed as a result of any radiation leakages at Fukushima.

In the same month since the earthquake, 200 people will have been killed mining coal in China alone. US coal mining deaths stand at an average of 32 per year.

Obviously you think the risk, the contamination, and the overall outcome is worth the benefit. I disagree. I'm still rooting for Thorium Reactors!

[mcrain]

Originally Posted by firestarter

No.

Following an earthquake and tsunami which caused 15000 confirmed deaths and 12000 still unaccounted for, zero people have been killed as a result of any radiation leakages at Fukushima.

So, does that mean everything is ok since there haven't been any/many deaths so far?

… One expert predicted that the death toll in the years ahead could top the 500,000 attributed to the Chernobyl accident of 1986 and warned that panicked repair attempts could lead to an even greater disaster. John Large, a British nuc*lear engineer, said: “The Japanese don’t know how to deal with it. They’re ad-libbing. Link

A new Greenpeace report has revealed that the full consequences of the Chernobyl disaster could top a quarter of a million cancer cases and nearly 100,000 fatal cancers. Link

Science Insider noted yesterday:

And see this.

That means that Fukushima has nearly 10 times more nuclear fuel than Chernobyl.

It also means that a single spent fuel pool – at reactor 4, which has lost all of its water and thus faces a release of its radioactive material - has 75% as much nuclear fuel as at all of Chernobyl.

However, the real numbers are even worse.

Specifically, Tepco very recently transferred many more radioactive spent fuel rods into the storage pools. According to Associated Press, there were – at the time of the earthquake and tsunami – 3,400 tons of fuel in seven spent fuel pools plus 877 tons of active fuel in the cores of the reactors.

That totals 4,277 tons of nuclear fuel at Fukushima.

Which means that there is almost 24 times more nuclear fuel at Fukushima than Chernobyl. Link

Obviously, Chernobyl's accident involved a core explosion, where Fukushima has only had a few hydrogen explosions and a partial (70%+) meltdown, but the sheer amount of radioactive material...

[ender land]

Originally Posted by R.Perez

Yup. Maybe all the nuclear apologists here that this couldn't happen will start to rethink their positions.

I am not sure if I am one of the "apologists" since I was defending nuclear power, but I stand by what I said.

Let me know when the people who make that rating actually think this is close to as bad as Chernobyl.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011...el1?intcmp=239

I'm not concerned with some arbitrary rating on some arbitrary scale. Hell, even the spokesperson for the agency which raised the level said it wasn't on the level of Chernobyl (which leads me to wonder what the point of the scale is in the first place?).

[Huntn]

If you want a reason to quake in your boots check out the second link and quote.

To know more about Thorium Reactors check out this online Popular Science Article July 2011. The description of the thorium reactor starts on the second page. The first page of the article describes a 3rd generation+ reactor, but it can only be left unattended for 3 days without power. That is unsat in light of the possibility of a CATASTROPHIC Solar Storm.

Popular Science: Are We Prepared For a Catastrophic Solar Storm:

One of the biggest disasters we face would begin about 18 hours after the sun spit out a 10-billion-ton ball of plasma--something it has done before and is sure to do again. When the ball, a charged cloud of particles called a coronal mass ejection (CME), struck the Earth, electrical currents would spike through the power grid. Transformers would be destroyed. Lights would go out. Food would spoil and--since the entire transportation system would also be shut down--go unrestocked.

Within weeks, backup generators at nuclear power plants would have run down, and the electric pumps that supply water to cooling ponds, where radioactive spent fuel rods are stored, would shut off. Multiple meltdowns would ensue. “Imagine 30 Chernobyls across the U.S.,” says electrical engineer John Kappenman, an expert on the grid’s vulnerability to space weather. A CME big enough to take out a chunk of the grid is what scientists and insurers call a high-consequence, low-frequency event. Many space-weather scientists say the Earth is due for one soon. Although CMEs can strike anytime, they are closely correlated to highs in the 11-year sunspot cycle. The current cycle will peak in July 2013.

[Liquorpuki]

Originally Posted by Huntn

If you want a reason to quake in your boots check out the second link and quote.

From the comments under that link

Surge Arrestors are installed all over the power grid, and will short the high DC spikes to ground, so transformers won't "melt", unless someone messed up in the design and decided not to install these. Every EHV substation should have them installed. If these fail, they will either fail closed, which will cause protective equipment to operate, or fail open, which will cause overvoltages. Overvoltage protective devices are often installed (but not always), so these would likely isolate the lines, also preventing transformers from melting.

This is super hyped beyond reality. What would most likely happen is breakers on the bulk electric system would operate in mass, causing wide scale blackouts (but relatively little system damage), and would take a day to several weeks to bring the whole system back on line. Your ice cream might melt. But the Nukes would continue to be operated safely - they would likely get offsite power back within 8 hours to a day, depending on how wide spread the blackout was. The good thing to know is this sort of thing is practiced on a regular basis by grid operators, by law.

This guy is right.

Also a 1921 level storm knocking out 350 transformers across the nation means nothing. 350 transformers is not a lot. That little fenced off substation you drive by on the way to work that feeds your block probably has at least 2 or 3 of them. And yeah, it takes 1-2 years to build a transformer, which is why utilities stock spares.

I could go on, but basically it's a lot of speculative BS.

[SactoGuy18]

Also, I think power utilities learned a lot from that March 1989 solar storm that caused major damage to the power grid in Quebec. As such, current power grids could probably withstand that extreme CME mentioned in the article, and I think there are preemptive plans for power grids to manually shut down in case of a incoming major solar flare or CME to prevent damage to the whole power grid.

[Huntn]

Originally Posted by Liquorpuki

From the comments under that link



This guy is right.

Also a 1921 level storm knocking out 350 transformers across the nation means nothing. 350 transformers is not a lot. That little fenced off substation you drive by on the way to work that feeds your block probably has at least 2 or 3 of them. And yeah, it takes 1-2 years to build a transformer, which is why utilities stock spares.

I could go on, but basically it's a lot of speculative BS.

I don't know who "littlewatts" is. Just some guy commenting on the article.

[Liquorpuki]

Originally Posted by Huntn

I don't know who "littlewatts" is. Just some guy commenting on the article.

I don't know who littlewatts is either. But I can vouch for what he's saying.

[jnpy!$4g3cwk]

Originally Posted by Huntn

Unless there is some negative aspect of thorium they are not talking about, I'm sold.

This reactor type does look much more promising than current nuclear reactors for three reasons. First, it appears that the waste problem is much smaller. Second, these reactors apparently have much lower proliferation potential, although I would be cautious about that without very careful analysis. Third, they turn off instantly.

Based on what I know, I would much rather own property next to one of these Thorium reactors than a BWR like the Fukushima and Diablo Canyon design.

I think we need some real-world operating experience before getting too excited, though. For one thing, Uranium-based LWR's turned out to cost a lot more to construct than was originally thought. It is impossible to know for sure what the real cost will be until some real utilities actually build and operate for years.

[Huntn]

For those of you who don't read Popular Science, the Nov 2012 issue included a very interesting story on Cold Fusion, the politically correct name now being called LENR, called Andrea Rossi's Black Box. The man Andrea Rossi comes across as a huckster, but it appears according to this article that other well regarded scientists, he and they might be on to something. If this is real, this is the kind of nuclear power we could really use...

He pointed to a narrow glass cylinder that resembled an oversize hypodermic needle resting on its side. It had been running for six weeks straight, Celani said. He called it his “special reactor.” Kneeling down for a closer look, I could feel the heat coming off it. It was difficult to fathom that nuclear reactions thousands of times more energetic than any known chemical reaction were occurring on the hair-thin wire coiled inside the gas-filled cylinder. Celani had been experimenting with constantan wire, a nickel-copper alloy, for almost a year. He kept detailed records of various preparations, which involved roughing up the wire’s smooth surface so that it had a spongelike quality that absorbed hydrogen atoms more efficiently. It took two days for hydrogen to “load” into the wire’s atomic lattice and begin producing excess heat. Around 5 to 10 watts, nothing like the numbers Rossi was getting, Celani said, but he could switch the cell on and off and get excess heat every time. Most important, Celani wasn’t working in secrecy. Any scientist could replicate his experiment, no belief required. He opened his logbook to show me a “very nice correlation” between a decrease in resistivity of the wire and an increase in heat production.

Opednews.com-It is Here, It is Real

Besides the above, NASA and other agencies of the U.S. government have expressed great interest in LENR. In late 2011, a presentation about it was given at a major NASA meeting, verifying it is a valid and highly important technology that will be pursued in the future. Dr. Dennis Bushnell, highly respected Chief Scientist at NASA Langley, has recently made several positive public statements about LENR and its validity. And back in 2008, the CBS "Sixty Minutes" TV show did a segment on it ("Cold Fusion is Hot Again"), where the amazing statement that the U.S. Naval Research Lab had positively verified significant excess energy production was first publicly made.

Other Articles:
*Cold Fusion Gets A Little More Real
*LENR Resources

[citizenzen]

Originally Posted by Huntn

For those of you who don't read Popular Science ...

My immediate reaction is that it's a scam.

But I am very willing to wait for testing and corroboration to prove me wrong.

[Huntn]

Originally Posted by citizenzen

My immediate reaction is that it's a scam.

But I am very willing to wait for testing and corroboration to prove me wrong.

I'm hoping you did not purposefully ignore the statement coming from the Naval Research Lab.

[citizenzen]

Originally Posted by Huntn

I'm hoping you did not purposefully ignore the statement coming from the Naval Research Lab...

I'm a sucker for corroboration.

Give it another few years at least.

See who can replicate the results.