i’m not sure what you’re talking about… The nuclear energy industry has a track record of safety and extensively regulated engineering that surpasses virtually any other industry
Fukashima happened because they skimped on the wall height and generator placement.
Enerhodar is currently under siege in Ukraine, future unknown
Those are two within the last 15 years. I’m glad when things are happy happy joy joy nuke plants are safe, but don’t think for a second that it’s a steady state. Ready to see what happens when a spent fuel pool gets hit with a bunker buster?
Solar power, as great as it is, is only available during the day and wind is also not a constant source of electricity either. Solar panels are also made through slave labor in China. The cobalt needed for a lot of our batteries to store renewables also comes from slave labor, though we’re working on that part. And almost all of the renewable sources don’t have parts recycled and instead put their heavy metals into landfills.
They’re still a lot better than fossil fuels but they’re by no means perfect. That’s why we need at least some nuclear to help with those issues
producing enough energy consistently is the key figure of merit for electric generation infrastructure. Not a hand wavy optional nice to have fru fru thing.
Nuclear disasters are becoming incredibly rare and plus a nation like the US for instance has plenty of wide open and otherwise unused land. Ask the military. So even if there were a disaster, they could be pushed far away from cities.
The only disaster in recent memory required a tsunami to cause it and its effects are very minimal. Mostly it just cost a lot to clean up which again, is miles better than the radiation from coal and spills of oil and release of natural gas. The standard for which nuclear must meet is way higher than any other energy source when it comes to contamination.
I also didn’t say that mining of other types didn’t matter. Coal has always abused its workers. Oil is bought from nations with large human rights abuses procuring it. Meanwhile Uranium is often easily accessible to nations and doesn’t even need to be traded for.
Using nuclear energy is such a brain dead easy decision. Only barriers are upfront costs and public perception.
While I am inclined to agree: those upfront costs translate directly into time. Time that we don’t necessarily have. Solar and wind are deployable and much less complex of a facility to run overall. For me it isn’t about the best energy producer as it is whichever method gets us of fossil fuels the fastest.
Nuclear has long term capabilities and should be used, don’t get me wrong, but solar and wind are bridges, if you will, to when it can have all the time and money it needs.
So, Fukushima was a story of incompetence and bribery, not under-engineering. It was perfectly safe when built. In the 30 years after that, the owners bribed investigators again and again to cover up deficiencies that were known.
I’m not sure what the nuclear plant being occupied by Russians who forced the entire safety team out at gunpoint has to do with the plant not being safe. The team was willing, by their own words, to keep working even with the Russians occupying the plant, even just keeping a minimum skeleton crew there to safely shut down the plant if necessary. That was shot down, almost literally - and Ukraine has been VERY careful about shelling that plant for political and infrastructure reasons even though enemy combatants are using it as a shelter to launch their own artillery strikes from.
sure, and you think this isn’t also happening in every single other industry right now?
That’s a regulatory problem and not a fundamental mechanics problem. the logic of “well it’s good but humans will cut corners” means we should never do anything at all.
The problem is that humans cut corners for power and profit, and the nuclear industry is no exception.
i’m not sure what you’re talking about… The nuclear energy industry has a track record of safety and extensively regulated engineering that surpasses virtually any other industry
Those are two within the last 15 years. I’m glad when things are happy happy joy joy nuke plants are safe, but don’t think for a second that it’s a steady state. Ready to see what happens when a spent fuel pool gets hit with a bunker buster?
That’s ONE in 15 years. In fact 18 years, because the previous one was in 2006.
But look at this list of oil spills https://response.restoration.noaa.gov/oil-and-chemical-spills/oil-spills/largest-oil-spills-affecting-us-waters-1969.html and list of most contaminated coal ash disposal sites https://earthjustice.org/feature/coal-ash-contaminated-sites-map#top10
We have seen what happens to oil infrastructure in a war: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/04/08/sunday-review/exposures-kuwait-salgado.html
Cool, now do solar and wind.
Solar power, as great as it is, is only available during the day and wind is also not a constant source of electricity either. Solar panels are also made through slave labor in China. The cobalt needed for a lot of our batteries to store renewables also comes from slave labor, though we’re working on that part. And almost all of the renewable sources don’t have parts recycled and instead put their heavy metals into landfills.
They’re still a lot better than fossil fuels but they’re by no means perfect. That’s why we need at least some nuclear to help with those issues
Nuclear disasters vs not producing consistently due to nighttime.
I do find it interesting the method of resource extraction matters for solar components, but rarely any other minerals mined inhumanely for energy.
Like human rights policies are inherent to a solar panel.
producing enough energy consistently is the key figure of merit for electric generation infrastructure. Not a hand wavy optional nice to have fru fru thing.
Nuclear disasters are becoming incredibly rare and plus a nation like the US for instance has plenty of wide open and otherwise unused land. Ask the military. So even if there were a disaster, they could be pushed far away from cities.
The only disaster in recent memory required a tsunami to cause it and its effects are very minimal. Mostly it just cost a lot to clean up which again, is miles better than the radiation from coal and spills of oil and release of natural gas. The standard for which nuclear must meet is way higher than any other energy source when it comes to contamination.
I also didn’t say that mining of other types didn’t matter. Coal has always abused its workers. Oil is bought from nations with large human rights abuses procuring it. Meanwhile Uranium is often easily accessible to nations and doesn’t even need to be traded for.
Using nuclear energy is such a brain dead easy decision. Only barriers are upfront costs and public perception.
While I am inclined to agree: those upfront costs translate directly into time. Time that we don’t necessarily have. Solar and wind are deployable and much less complex of a facility to run overall. For me it isn’t about the best energy producer as it is whichever method gets us of fossil fuels the fastest.
Nuclear has long term capabilities and should be used, don’t get me wrong, but solar and wind are bridges, if you will, to when it can have all the time and money it needs.
So, Fukushima was a story of incompetence and bribery, not under-engineering. It was perfectly safe when built. In the 30 years after that, the owners bribed investigators again and again to cover up deficiencies that were known.
I’m not sure what the nuclear plant being occupied by Russians who forced the entire safety team out at gunpoint has to do with the plant not being safe. The team was willing, by their own words, to keep working even with the Russians occupying the plant, even just keeping a minimum skeleton crew there to safely shut down the plant if necessary. That was shot down, almost literally - and Ukraine has been VERY careful about shelling that plant for political and infrastructure reasons even though enemy combatants are using it as a shelter to launch their own artillery strikes from.
sure, and you think this isn’t also happening in every single other industry right now?
That’s a regulatory problem and not a fundamental mechanics problem. the logic of “well it’s good but humans will cut corners” means we should never do anything at all.