why do people suddenly fear nuclear power plants?
- Thread starter Wintermoot
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Yeah and when they don't work, the damage to the environment can be horrifying. Don't act like nuclear technology is flawless. It's far from it. I'm sure we are all familiar with murphy's law at this point. I guarantee that if we increase our dependency on nuclear power, a disaster will occur. I don't see the point in taking such a risk when nuclear energy is nonrenewable energy source that produces incredibly hazardous wastes, the storage of which continues to be a major problem.RAKtheUndead said:
Hopefully nothing will happen with the nuclear reactors in Japan. However to pretend they're not an issue is just silly. You can just say it's all media-fear mongering but their is a very real danger behind it.
Also just because America and other developed countries build "safe" nuclear power plants doesn't mean the rest of the world would. If we increase our dependency on nuclear power other countries will no doubt follow, and I highly doubt they would be nearly as concerned about safety. But the environmental disasters that would occur due to their negligence would still be catastrophic.
Caution certainly is merited, but given our experiences with environmental radiation releases it's getting harder to claim that it does "massive damage". The cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are both thriving communities today.* (Both contain trees still showing the scars from the attack, said trees still showing blooms every spring.) Wildlife populations in the Chernobyl Zone of Exclusion is actually more robust now than it was before the accident; it would seem that human presence was a greater threat to their survival than the fallout. I don't have any figures for the after-effects of Windhover, but I don't think there are vast uninhabitable swathes of English countryside.Internet Kraken said:
I'm not saying it isn't a concern; I don't want spills either, for the human costs if nothing else. I am saying that public fears of the consequences are vastly overblown.
Because the containment held**, and would've held even had the preventative measures not worked as well as they did. Also, those quick and efficient preventative measures are today's Standard Operating Procedures for reactors world-wide.
-- Steve
*One area I'm not certain about is long-term cancer risk... are there any reliable studies of cancer rates among those born after the War from the affected areas?
** Indeed, the containment held so well that the additional radiation exposure was the equivalent of eating less than half a banana. (Search "banana equivalent dose" on Wikipedia.)
I think you mean bombs, modern Nuclear Power plants are safe (unless put to the extreme,s like the Japan plant or are very old,crude and manned by newbies and interned). Also Nuclear plants don,t turn into nukes when they go into a meltdownjackpipsam said:
in a normal quake the Plant would work fine but NOBODY saw a quake like this coming (in hind sight they should have)bluepilot said:
Exceedingly unlikely to happen, but that doesn't mean it can't.
(My Uncle is a Nuclear Safety Inspector)
No, it really isn't. I don't get why people say this. Nuclear is a nonrenewable energy source that produces highly hazardous wastes. The storage of these wastes is a major issue that has yet to be resolved despite over 30 years of bickering over it. Our current infrastructure is designed mainly around the use of coal and oil. To switch over to nuclear would require huge amounts of money, all for at most 100 years of power before we run into this same problem again only we'll have a lot more nuclear waste to go along with it.Haakong said:
You know it's strange that you call people who oppose nuclear power "sheeple" (dumb term that should never be used) when, last time I heard, the majority of US citizens were in favor of expanding nuclear power. Though depending on what happens in Japan this might change.Haakong said:
I'd say that the plants handled the earthquake just fine... it was the tsunami that did the real damage, and that area of Japan hasn't seen a tsunami that big for centuries. (Or perhaps even in recorded history, though I'd have to research that more to be certain.)henritje said:
-- Steve
No, you don't understand, they have a facility to store all of the rods in the desert specifically designed to avoid any water leaking in, and it's a facility not a dumping ground. All the rods are stored in their own special containers and what not.Steven True said:
This is all already in action
Suddenly? In Germany at least there's been a huge debate for decades now. It's not so much because of accidents while they're running though and more because of what to do with the waste. The depots have proven to be very unsafe and there's a very real danger of contamination of drinking water.henritje said:
What's your point? I never claimed coal was a nice, clean energy source. Indeed it creates a large amount of environmental problems as well. Oil can also cause a lot of damage, as shown by the BP oil spill. However that doesn't mean nuclear is any better, if anything it's worse since the waste produced by nuclear plants continues to be a hazard for an unknown period of time, though it's estimated to be thousands of years. We have to somehow design a way to safely store this dangerous waste so that it never causes a problem, and that future generations will also know how to do so.Haakong said:
Basically I don't see the point in doing this when nuclear leads to a dead end anyways on account of it being nonrenewable. You're swapping out one really bad problem for another really bad problem.
