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Skeptics and nuclear power

Skeptic and Suport nuclear power

  • Skeptic and support nuclear power

    Votes: 94 90.4%

  • Skeptic and against nuclear power

    Votes: 6 5.8%

  • Not a skeptic and support nuclear power

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Not a skeptic and against nuclear power

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • I don't want to answer

    Votes: 4 3.8%
  • Total voters
    104

Desert Fox

Philosopher
Desert Fox
Joined
Feb 4, 2014
Messages
6,147
I know any poll here will be unscientific but might be a place to start

Simple questions
1. Do you consider yourself a skeptic?
2. Do you support nuclear power?

Of course anybody want to explain why your positions would be best as well.

My position is that I do consider myself a skeptic.

I support nuclear power because it does not produce greenhouse gas itself although I realize that there are green house gasses produced during the building of the plant and during operations (Still far less than most other power generation methods), it seems to be the only near term solution to energy production, waste can be managed far better today, and modern reactor designs are far safer than those in the past.
 
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Nuclear power plants need to be redesigned from the ground up. With modern computers and controls, it should be safe and effective.

Also a big believer in nuclear power or at least radioactive decay for space probes.
 
Current nuclear power systems are not economically competitive.
There is great potential in generation 4 systems, and nuclear power obviously has its niches; and of course we might actually get somewhere with fusion technology.

Thinking ahead, nuclear power might be needed for interstellar flight, which makes using the fuel up now inadvisable when we have so many alternatives.
 
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The Great Zaganza said:
Thinking ahead, nuclear power might be needed for interstellar flight, which makes using the fuel up now inadvisable when we have so many alternatives.
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There should be enough fuel to power our entire civilization for a few centuries, we aren't running out of nuclear fuel anytime soon. Nuclear reactors don't provide the energy density needed for interstellar flights.

McHrozni
 
McHrozni said:
There should be enough fuel to power our entire civilization for a few centuries, we aren't running out of nuclear fuel anytime soon. Nuclear reactors don't provide the energy density needed for interstellar flights.

McHrozni
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Probably.

Still, I feel better with nuclear waste in space (or the bottom of the ocean) than in any man-made structure: we have a bad track record of keeping stuff safe for a few decades - keeping something secure for a few tens of thousands of years through multiple changes in society and government is just a too uncertain prospect to feel good about.
 
From what I have read, you can reprocess waste and reuse a large portion of it in CANDU type reactors.
 
Nuclear is probably our best bet for the future right now, even though the tight regulations make prices high. That said, there should be better alternatives for that than what we currently have.
 
Not quite sure how to answer. I generally support Nuclear power but question whether capacity can be scaled up sufficiently to replace fossil fuels. I also worry about safety, not so much form a frequency or death rate perspective, but even rare accidents add up when areas can be rendered unusable for many thousands of years.


I’m not concerned about it at current generation rates and could see doubling or even tripling nuclear generating capacity. I think we should build new reactors to replace old ones, and am very much opposed to shutting down reactors and replacing them with fossil fuel based generating capacity.


MikeG said:
Are we using the wrong fuel? Would thorium be a better alternative?
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It’s a better option in theory, but technology wise we may be a long way from commercially viable reactors that could be built on the scale required to replace fossil fuels.
 
Desert Fox said:
From what I have read, you can reprocess waste and reuse a large portion of it in CANDU type reactors.
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CANDU it a great technology. It can burn Thorium as well. The problem is that it uses a lot of heavy water so we probably can't built the 50 000+ reactors needed to replace fossil fuels.
 
Generally what iomiller said. I'm a big supporter and nuclear is safe but not economically competitive and dispersed renewables with battery storage will do a better job in the long run.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-07-07/what-is-tesla-big-sa-battery-and-how-will-it-work/8688992

We might see fusion but given we have a big one in the sky already ...best we exploit that.

I'm also very encouraged by the closed cycle no carbon release gas plants that have been developed recently.

The method had already been applied successfully in a test facility with 100 kW fuel power. An international research project has now managed to increase the scale of the technology significantly, thus creating all the necessary conditions to enable a fully functional demonstration facility to be built in the 10 MW range.

Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-05-natural-gas-facilities-co2-emissions.html#jCp
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https://phys.org/news/2017-05-natural-gas-facilities-co2-emissions.html

That potentially opens clathrates to power generation and replace the methane in the lattice with CO2.

I'm also intrigued with small nukes ( nuclear batteries ).

https://phys.org/news/2016-11-diamond-age-power-nuclear-batteries.html
 
Argumemnon said:
Nuclear is probably our best bet for the future right now, even though the tight regulations make prices high. That said, there should be better alternatives for that than what we currently have.
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By the same token, you could say that tight regulations make flying expensive.

Nuclear power has so many safety layers because, in the past, all of them have broken down, one time or another. And each time, all plants susceptible to that flaw had to be upgraded. Of course this adds costs, but the alternative is to risk a catastrophe that would discredit nuclear power forever.
Nuclear power plants need to be re-designed from the ground up, with meltdown-proof designs before they will become competitive again.
And, of course, we still need proof that the a permanent storage can be run safely and effectively: in 60 years of commercial nuclear power, none has been built yet, which isn't just an oversight.
 
Well for sure nuclear needs more research and development. Pity Germany stepped away, they were doing lot of it.
Molten salts and thorium sure sounds nice. But we don't have cold war to fuel the research anymore.
 
I have two uncertainties: i believe nuclear reactors can be designed and run to be very, very safe, but then are they economically competitive? Perhaps others here can tell me. But more importantly: what are we going to do with the radioactive waste?
 
Giordano said:
I have two uncertainties: i believe nuclear reactors can be designed and run to be very, very safe, but then are they economically competitive? Perhaps others here can tell me. But more importantly: what are we going to do with the radioactive waste?
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Currently, most reactors only burn a fraction of the nuclear fuel - the rest is very hot and needs very careful handling.
By using more of these fuels (like in the aforementioned CANDU reactors), a lot less highly radioactive waste is generated.

The biggest flaw in current permanent storage design is to find a place that is expected to the geologically stable for 20,000 years and doesn't leak; then you dump it to the lid with waste and seal it for eternity.
But that's very irresponsible: we need to be able to monitor and intervene if necessary. Many places previously considered "safe" have turned out to be unsuitable during use.
 
Giordano said:
I have two uncertainties: i believe nuclear reactors can be designed and run to be very, very safe, but then are they economically competitive?
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Really hard to say.... there are so many subsidies and tax issues involves with all types of power generation (nuclear, solar, wind, fossil fuels). Plus you have things like externalities, different time frames to recoup investments, etc.

Perhaps others here can tell me. But more importantly: what are we going to do with the radioactive waste?
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2 possibilities...
- Process/recycle the waste, extracting material that can then be used again
- Long term storage. (The U.S. was going to use Yucca Mountain for long term waste storage, but that was ended a few years ago by the Obama administration.). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_repository

The major problem with either of these options is not technical (both options are pretty safe), but political... nobody wants to have nuclear waste transported through their town (even if the risk is low), nobody wants to live in the same areas as a nuclear disposal site.
 
I voted with the vast majority (and I'm an engineer as well, so there's that) but would offer the caveat that it's been badly implemented in the USA and has become politically and economically non-viable. That's a shame.
 
MikeG said:
Are we using the wrong fuel? Would thorium be a better alternative?
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That's what I was hinting at. Assuming the technology was as well-developed as the one we're currently using it could conceivably be a much better alternative. Then there's fusion, of course.

The Great Zaganza said:
By the same token, you could say that tight regulations make flying expensive.
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Absolutely, and I see your point. But I think that nuclear power is over-regulated because of hysteria mostly stoked by the mass media and the unfortunate incident at Chernobyl. There are good reasons to be very careful about nuclear, but there is a point at which it's excessive. Imagine buying a 18,000$ plane ticket to go from NYC to London.
 
A large factor in costs are the timescales involved: from planning to decomissioning, 80 years might pass, requiring constant upgrades in safety.
Since there will never be many players capable of binding tens of billions for such long times, nuclear power can never really exist in a truly free market without government backing.
 
And, of course, we still need proof that the a permanent storage can be run safely and effectively: in 60 years of commercial nuclear power,
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a) low level nuclear storage long term is well developed.

b) high level nuclear storage is pointless as 90% of the energy remains and can be accessed by existing technologies.

and even some newer technologies.
https://www.extremetech.com/extreme...t-nuclear-reactor-that-eats-radioactive-waste

c) there is vanishing little high level waste.

The entire high level waste of 60 years of nuclear power in the US would fill a football field 3 meters deep.....

The biggest headache is there is no standarization on nuclear reactors...imagine if each plane had to be designed and custom built ( sort of like the space industry is just moving out of ).

Industry can buy reliable gas turbines that are proven over the years .....Westinghouse and GE came close to cookie cutter plants but regulations are stifling.

Nuclear is here for a while, we can built more reactors next to those we have but I suspect not cost effectively.
 
Skeptic here - and quite surprised at the handy majority of nuclear fans.

I am not fundamentally opposed to nuclear power as in "shut down all plants now and never start again" - the risks of modern plants are non-zero, but not on a doomsday scale. I remember having seen an early draft of someone calculating roughly the number of deaths per TWh of produced energy, and it turned out that nuclear power after Chernobyl and Fukushima compared very favorably to coal (mining accidents, health issues related to pollution, long-term effects of AGW...), and still nicely with solar power (where, for example, people falling off roofs while installing or servicing panels are surprisingly many - per TWh). But I would not want to see a marked increase of nuclear power, as each big accident affects just too much of continent - and the waste just multiplies, with no solution in sight.

I see it as a necessary evil for a short time, until the many ways to harness (and intermediately store) the sun's and the earth core's heat combine for enough to end the waste of both fossil and nuclear resources.
 
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I seem to be the only one declining to answer, and it's for this reason: I don't think either question is best answered in a black-and-white manner.

Yes, my worldview is "skeptical" and I have at times identified myself as "a skeptic", especially to other people who also identify as "skeptics" but I don't like labels, especially ones that the population at large has such a negative opinion of. So I generally don't pigeonhole myself as "a skeptic".

I also believe that nuclear power is probably going to be a necessary part of the world's energy future, but I do not believe that it will or should be the only or even the best option, so I hesitate to wholeheartedly put myself onto one side of the binary.
 
Oystein said:
But I would not want to see a marked increase of nuclear power, as each big accident affects just too much of continent - and the waste just multiplies, with no solution in sight.
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Too much of continent? How much damage do you think the incidents so far have done?

I see it as a necessary evil for a short time
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I really dislike this sort of thinking. Generating energy on a large scale is inherently dangerous. Hydro and coal and nuclear are not exceptions. They all carry risks and we have to accept them if we want to have electrical power for millions. Nuclear isn't an evil, nor is it temporary. It's part of a long line of electricity technologies and will possibly stick around for centuries or more.
 
Argumemnon said:
Absolutely, and I see your point. But I think that nuclear power is over-regulated because of hysteria mostly stoked by the mass media and the unfortunate incident at Chernobyl.
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The hysteria predates Chernobyl, and TMI, by a lot. Largely a left wing (and I'm in that category) Nuclear = BOMB!!! mindset. Sometimes I'm kind of sad to be a lib, then the Trumptard opens his mouth/twitter.
 
Trebuchet said:
The hysteria predates Chernobyl, and TMI, by a lot. Largely a left wing (and I'm in that category) Nuclear = BOMB!!! mindset. Sometimes I'm kind of sad to be a lib, then the Trumptard opens his mouth/twitter.
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I dunno. Trump will only be with us for a few years at most. The liberal opposition to nuclear power has been doing its damage for decades, and shows no signs of letting up.
 
The Great Zaganza said:
And, of course, we still need proof that the a permanent storage can be run safely and effectively: in 60 years of commercial nuclear power, none has been built yet, which isn't just an oversight.
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The only fission technologies truly capable of replacing fossil fuels are breeder type reactors that don’t produce the same volume of waste, and in fact can burn waste as fuel.
The lifespan of the problems that could potentially be created is really the issue with nuclear power. I saw the Nova special last year on the new containment facility at Chernobyl and was suppressed at how much of an ongoing, in progress disaster that really is. There still is no known way to stop the nuclear reaction and up until now all they have done is build ever larger containment faculties around it, and these are destined to fail LONG before it stops releasing high levels of radiation.

Even if it’s safe and low risk nuclear plants are effectively un-insurable. Even governments can’t truly underwrite the risk because any problem cold outlive even the most stable of systems.
The Great Zaganza said:
Nuclear power plants need to be re-designed from the ground up, with meltdown-proof designs before
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CANDU, mentioned above is already about as meltdown proof as you can ask, at least in theory. It’s sub-critical in air or normal water so as soon as the heavy water drains of evaporates the reaction stops. This doesn’t mean you can’t run into issues with the waste as happened in Fukushima, but It’s possible even the waste from CANDU is safer.
 
Voted against present system but not (if we ever get it) fusion.

I use to be a strong supporter of nuclear but as the systems cannot be ensured against failure. I've cooled my jets about their wide spread use.
 
lomiller said:
The only fission technologies truly capable of replacing fossil fuels are breeder type reactors that don’t produce the same volume of waste, and in fact can burn waste as fuel.
The lifespan of the problems that could potentially be created is really the issue with nuclear power.
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Is it? Nuclear waste is dangerous for a number of millennia. That's pebbles for the planet. On the other hand, coal waste, which is also radioactive, incidently, is toxic forever, and in much greater quantities for the same MWh.

I saw the Nova special last year on the new containment facility at Chernobyl and was suppressed at how much of an ongoing, in progress disaster that really is. There still is no known way to stop the nuclear reaction and up until now all they have done is build ever larger containment faculties around it, and these are destined to fail LONG before it stops releasing high levels of radiation.
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Wait a minute. That the remains of the reactor are radioactive doesn't mean the nuclear reaction is still ongoing. There's nothing to sustain it.
 
Fusion is energy of the future .. and will always be ..
No srsly, we are at least 20 years away, but more likely more. Do not bet on fusion just yet. Even after we manage to hold plasma, the problems of energy harvesting, durability, operation costs, safety, it's all unsolved .. mainly because it all depends on the system for managing the reaction in the first place.
Pressurized water reactors are kinda matured technology .. but we need more .. it's time to experiment with other systems .. especially molten salt. That could bring costs down drastically and improve safety.
But even with old technology .. nukes are the only way how to go carbon neutral. Sun and wind are just not enough to replace coal and gas.
 
Argumemnon said:
Wait a minute. That the remains of the reactor are radioactive doesn't mean the nuclear reaction is still ongoing. There's nothing to sustain it.
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It’s still emitting dangerous amounts of radiation and will continue to do so at a level that requires containment for 10 000+ year, and the original containment facility barely lasted 30.
 
lomiller said:
It’s still emitting dangerous amounts of radiation and will continue to do so at a level that requires containment for 10 000+ year, and the original containment facility barely lasted 30.
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So you misspoke when you said "There still is no known way to stop the nuclear reaction"? Because there is no such thing onging at Chernobyl.

Chernobyl is the worst possible incident that can happen at a plant, and happened in the worst possible design you could think of for such a facility. I think it's so outside the norm that constantly seeing it used as an example of the evils of nuclear power smacks of ideological agenda.
 
Argumemnon said:
Is it? Nuclear waste is dangerous for a number of millennia. That's pebbles for the planet. On the other hand, coal waste, which is also radioactive, incidently, is toxic forever, and in much greater quantities for the same MWh.



Wait a minute. That the remains of the reactor are radioactive doesn't mean the nuclear reaction is still ongoing. There's nothing to sustain it.
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Technically it does mean a nuclear reaction is still going on but its very misleading to but it in those terms. Like saying a fire is still burning because there's some embers still there.

On the other hand, I agree with almost everything you've said in this thread. Nuclear is safer and produces less waste and pollution than the majority of our power supply, which is fossil fuel based.

Nuclear should be part of a package that includes solar, wind, hydro, geothermal and even natural gas. We should phase out coal and petroleum.
 
Oystein said:
I remember having seen an early draft of someone calculating roughly the number of deaths per TWh of produced energy, and it turned out that nuclear power after Chernobyl and Fukushima compared very favorably to coal (mining accidents, health issues related to pollution, long-term effects of AGW...), and still nicely with solar power (where, for example, people falling off roofs while installing or servicing panels are surprisingly many - per TWh).
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Actually, I think you might be underestimating the safetly of nuclear power. I've seen similar analysis that measure deaths per KwH, and in those cases Nuclear comes out much better.

And its not only people falling off roofs when installing solar panels that have to be considered... Nuclear is a fairly 'dense' energy technology... you don't need many raw materials to generate a whole lot of power. By comparison, Solar and Wind require a lot more raw materials to generate the same amount of power. That means more mining deaths, more manufacturing deaths, etc.

For example: https://www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/publications/magazines/bulletin/bull21-1/21104091117.pdf
Electricity produced from natural gas has the lowest risk of the 11 technologies (five conventional, six non-conventional) It is a factor of about two lower than the next highest, nuclear power....The main reason why non-conventional systems (eg. Solar and wind) have relatively high risk is the large amount of materials and labour they require per unit energy output.

Or: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesc...-deathprint-a-price-always-paid/#113320e0709b
Mortality Rate (deaths/trillionkWhr)Solar (rooftop) 440 (< 1% global electricity)
Wind 150 (2% global electricity)
Nuclear – global average 90 (11% global electricity w/Chern&Fukush) Nuclear – U.S. 0.1 (19% U.S. electricity)[/i]


Now, some may be skeptical of the sources (one is from a government atomic energy agency after all), but it still points to Nuclear being less deadly than Solar or wind.
 
Solar power is still increasing in efficiency, whereas even new Generation III+ and IV reactors have serious cost and construction time overrun issues.
Most importantly, solar farms have comparatively tiny investment costs and can easily take advantage of future innovations.
But a reactor once build will mostly be confined to its original design, which by the half-time of operation will 50 years behind the edge of progress.
 
Argumemnon said:
So you misspoke when you said "There still is no known way to stop the nuclear reaction"? Because there is no such thing onging at Chernobyl.
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The reaction is still occurring at a sub-critical rate. I just see no need to debate the degree to which the reaction is still occurring when the real issue is the span on which it requires containment.
 
lomiller said:
The reaction is still occurring at a sub-critical rate. I just see no need to debate the degree to which the reaction is still occurring when the real issue is the span on which it requires containment.
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The point is that it's not a sustained chain reaction. It's very important to distinguish these, especially given the hysteria relating to nuclear technologies.
 
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