Beginners guide to nuclear power stations ?

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071202120153AAdsh5W

http://www.americanenergyindependence.com/uranium.aspx

Whatever the merit of these groups’ goals, these arguments are based on a false premise. Long-term uranium supplies are simply not a real problem. Even if (in the distant future) uranium ore does get really expensive, market forces, and nuclear technology, are equipped to handle it.

They dont worry as the scale of a nuclear plant going terriblly wrong is quite massive and we know we make the worlds most powerful weapons from it.

Like I said before,

Having a nuclear power plant and a nuclear bomb factory are two very different things, don’t get confused between the two.

It is not neccasirly ignorance as nuclear is dangerous by its very nature. we are trying to comtrol that reaction and if we fail it gets very messy very quickly. Anything we do we mess up eventually.

Do you believe anything that has bad consequences if a human operator messes up is bad? Do you drive a car?

85 years worth here

currently known resources, at current prices, with current technology… increase price and you increase the viability of massive resources, indeed the estimate is a doubling in price would lead to ten times the amount of viable uranium resources, a doubling in price of the raw fuel is an insignificant rise in the final price of produced electricity.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf75.html

So, once again, the sky isn’t falling!

Do you believe anything that has bad consequences if a human operator messes up is bad? Do you drive a car?

I can think of nothing else that has the potential to be as catastrophic as a nuclear power station.

Zulu-Eleven +1

How about a space station crashing into earth? I think that could be worse actually.

Ok, so if we remove all nuclear power stations just because it has the worst consequences. So then what would have the worst consequences? Do we get rid of that too?

What are the possible consequences of you going outside? Could get hit by lightning, or by a car or a bus. Could get mugged, shot, raped, stabbed. Could get bitten by a rabid animal. Yet you don’t really consider those things when you walk out the door.

I can think of nothing else that has the potential to be as catastrophic as a nuclear power station.

See, this proves categorically your complete inability to assess risk!

You’ve clearly never heard of bacteria and viruses then! Roughly one million people every year die from malaria, and we’ve done very little to combat it!

The 1918 flu pandemic killed upwards of fifty million people!

Plague killed about fifty percent of the entire European population

One single random mutation in the genetic formulation of the common cold has the potential to kill 6 billion people – and we can do nothing about it, the potential catastrophe of one single mutation would be far more catastrophic than all nuclear power stations going up at once.

Yes there are things outwith our control…..but isn’t the choice of what we use to generate our power from entirely within our control ?

The place we live is entirely within our control too – but millions of people choose to live close to the sea despite the potential risk of tsunami’s killing them – the tsunami in 2006 killed about half a million, it was entirely avoidable, since they could have lived further inshore! Every death in Japan was avoidable, there was no need to live near the sea in an earthquake zone – these things were not outwith their control.

Oh my oh my, quick, relocate the populations, run for the hills, the sky is falling!

Come on guys – post more, The bivvy thread is still 400 posts ahead

The place we live is entirely within our control too – but millions of people choose to live close to the sea

Did they..?

I disagree with your cold example as well, its nearly completely out of our control, so it can’t be compared.

With nuclear power, I believe the rewards are worth the risk. But perhaps this is a personal thing. Really it lies down to the man in charge, whether or not he believes the rewards are worth the risks. I guess that’s why we get to vote..

Aha, the Elfin defence – trash the thread with pictures and close down debate when you’ve been proved to be talking out of your sphincter.

Is that just another form of flounce TJ?

Realman – how is where you live out of your control? if I offered you this exciting new villa, part of a new housing development in my newly built holiday resort of New Pompeii, would you have just a slight trepidation about the risk of pyroclastic flow entering your bedroom?

The fact that governments in the pacific rim have gone to the extent of creating a tsunami warning system, and hold tsunami drills, shows that the chance of it happening is entirely feasible, yet people choose to live there for a whole variety of reasons – but its fantasy to say that the risk is entirely out of their control!

TJ is hardly alone on this forum in being opinionated and not changing his mind – Socialist are we molgrips?- yet he seems to get the most grief for it from people

He’s by far the most intractable person on here AND he throws in nasty insults all over the place right from the start, which is really out of order and pisses people off.

I can think of nothing else that has the potential to be as catastrophic as a nuclear power station

Lol! The biggest potential catastrophe facing the earth is the one caused by fossil fuels!

Re question 7 – energy savings are essential, however, that requires persuading 65m people in the UK alone to do the right thing. You’ve seen how people react when I’ve talked about fuel efficient cars (not specifically Prius) – they bring out the China defence i.e. why should I save a bit of fuel when China is 100 times worse? etc etc etc. People just don’t care.

Nuclear power is probably the easiest carbon saving technology to roll out. You can make a few phone calls, maybe get some subsidy money out (maybe not) and viola, carbon emissions cut.

Just to make it clear, I personally favour a diverse mix of renewables and huge energy savings – I just don’t know how on earth we’d make it work. Nuclear would be easy to make work imo.

Like I keep saying, the bottom line is always education – in this case education about saving energy and I don’t just mean a few BBC news items and a sliding VED scale.

I offered you this exciting new villa, part of a new housing development in my newly built holiday resort of New Pompeii, would you have just a slight trepidation about the risk of pyroclastic flow entering your bedroom?

Evidence from California suggests that people are easily capable of putting that out of their minds. That TV programme ages ago about geology where the guy interviewed people living in a housing development under a big unstable mountainside covered in cracks and evidence of previous landslides, in a massive active earthquake zones. People bringing up their kids there and all 😯

Like I said before,

Having a nuclear power plant and a nuclear bomb factory are two very different things, don’t get confused between the two.
I was explaining aview not articulating my own. However the fact we dont build them near the big centre of use suggest othere think it is a risk.

Do you believe anything that has bad consequences if a human operator messes up is bad? Do you drive a car?

Are you asking me if humans are infallible or are you asking me if messing up with a clothes peg is as bad as crashing a car? Do you really need an answer?
ps if i thas bad consequences it probably is bad 😉 I know what you mean though.

What are the possible consequences of you going outside? Could get hit by lightning, or by a car or a bus. Could get mugged, shot, raped, stabbed. Could get bitten by a rabid animal. Yet you don’t really consider those things when you walk out the door.

Nothing is risk free , that is a given, but the fact other things have risks is irrelevant – unless you are weighing up interealted risks like say global warming v energy shortage v storage risks.

The place we live is entirely within our control too

oh yes global freemarket of movement without border controls is a worldwide reality unaffected by the availability of resources in any geographical area.

Exactly Molgrips – and I’d be willing to bet that the same bloke, living in a house under a mountainside which is inevitably going to collapse at some point – spends all his time worrying about the infinitesimally small chance he has of being killed by a nuclear reactor accident or muslamic terrorists.

He’s by far the most intractable person on here AND he throws in nasty insults all over the place right from the start, which is really out of order and pisses people off.

Molgrips – really – I think you will find on this thread I have been sinned against more than sinned – and you are one of the big perpetrators

find a nasty insult I have dished out?

I’ve seen signs of all the contributors to this thread except Z-11 learning from others including Zokes who seems more open minded on the effects of low level radiation now.

In my case I’ve learned that 3W bulbs are considered too expensive by some and there is little enthusiasm among thread contributors for investing in energy saving/producing measures with a financial returns of five to twenty years. That contrasts with my real-life French and German friends.

On energy saving attitudes can be changed and do change. Look at the difference in attitudes towards smoking over the last 25 years. People used to smoke on hospital wards FFS.

attitudes can be changed and do change. Look at the difference in attitudes towards smoking over the last 25 years. People used to smoke on hospital wards FFS.

Yes TJ – I mean, twenty odd years ago nobody would even dream of wearing a cycle helmet…

find a nasty insult I have dished out?

Oh this old chestnut.

Being insulting is not limited to the use of an epithet. I’ve tried explaining this to you before*

* this is an insulting comment btw.

Edukator – your real life French and German friends are proably intending to stay in the same house for 25 years, aren’t they? Plus I think they get better feed-in tariffs etc don’t they? They certainly did until recently since we had no FIT at all.

For me it’s not a case of not wanting to invest in solar/pv, I simply don’t have the spare cash right now. It’s in the queue of things in my life that need £10k spending on them.

On energy saving attitudes can be changed and do change. Look at the difference in attitudes towards smoking over the last 25 years. People used to smoke on hospital wards FFS

Absolutely. But this will be a lot more difficult. People and their loved ones were dying in the most heartbreakingly slow and painful ways right in front of people’s eyes, and it still took generations to make a change. This will be way harder.

So please tell me where I have been insulting? I might need to apologise.

he throws in nasty insults all over the place right from the start,

Please show this or is it hyperbole ?

molgrips even if he was [ lets be honest we all have at some point and i have no idea re this thread ] two wrongs dont make a right.

I’ve tried explaining this to you before

well has he? Seems factual tbh and you are being senistive he did not say or even hint at the reason being your gross stupidty did he 😉
Joke please take in the spirit it was inteneded no offence etc.

Ahh, helmets. What”s your view then Z-11 and whom do you believe? I believe:

1/ The Bath university study that found drrivers tooks less care around helmetted cyclists potentially resulting in more injured cyclists.

2/ The doctor that wrote the article in the Irish Medical Times who said that the reduction in cycling due to enforced helmet wearing (as demonstrated in Australia) would lead to an increase in the death rate due to heart disease. This more than outweiged any potential benefits from helmet wearing

3/ That a cycle helmet can only absorb a very small amount of energy in falls when it is not displaced. It may help but only in a small number of low speed, low energy accidents.

I wear a helmet most of the time but sometimes enjoy wind in my hair rides. The increased risk is on a similar level to driving a soft top car.

And you Z-11? Just out of idle interest.

molgrips – Member

“and argument that does not fit in with your own prejudices”

Don’t call me prejudiced you arrogant fkwit!

Now that is an insult

The increased risk is on a similar level to driving a soft top car.

So, Edukator – significanly higher by several orders of magnitude than the actual proven risk posed to anybody in the entire western world from all the nuclear disasters, leaks and atmospheric atom bomb tests that have taken place globally in the last seventy years… yet still TJ is passionately against nuclear power, but not convinced by the need to wear a helmet… 😆

Now that is an insult

Yeah, but he’s right though – you are an arrogant fkwit!

House values here reflect their energy performance Molgrips. You have to get a house energy assessed befora you can sell it. The category the house is in must appear in adverts. If you sell you can be pretty much certain to recoup much of what you’ve invested. People keep bills for everything and bring them out when negociating price. It’s like buying a second-hand car when the seller brings out the bills of a new engine and suspension parts.

The French a German housing markets are very different to the British one. With the exception of a few cities such as Paris, Grenoble and Munich price reflects supply and demand. Supply can be increased to meet demand as land is available. The green belt policy and the buying up of land by a cartel of house builders has resulted in severe distortions of the British market and a boom-bust cycle.

If you take the number of bicycle deaths in Europe and then consider the small number of deaths or serious injury that would have been prevented by wearing a helmet you end up with a very small number per year. I’ll be generous a give you a 100. Now take the numbers for Tchernobyl which most of the posters on the thread seem happy with, of the order of thousands to tens of thousands. It strikes me that just one nuclear accident has resulted in more death and suffering than the lack of helmets on cyclists heads over the last thirty years and will do for a good many more.

Can you back up your claim that most posters on this thread are happy with the claim of thousands killed by Chernobyl?

The IAEA and WHO say its bullshit!

I think there is a LOT of conjecture on the death toll.

IAEA has a vested interest in the industry so there may be bias in their figures. And IIRC the WHO cannot publish any stats on Nukes etc without sign off from IAEA so I would expect the WHO’s stats to tie in with IAEA(I could be wrong though).

From what I’ve read a total of 1000+ deaths from Chernobyl is at the more conservative end of the spectrum.

You have to get a house energy assessed befora you can sell it. The category the house is in must appear in adverts.

Same here, it’s an EU thing.

I dunno if someone would pay 10k extra for a house with PV or not – maybe. There are so few people who’ve done it, presumably because of the lack of FIT and uncertainty as to whether or not they’ll get their money back at sale.

It’s like buying a second-hand car when the seller brings out the bills of a new engine and suspension parts

It’s widely recognised that you don’t get your money back in this situation. Nor do you get your money back if you install a new bathroom etc.

Remember most houses are cripplingly expensive here so that limits the spare cash people have to invest.

The problem is that If 50,000 people a year were dying of cancer ar the time of chenobyl and 52000 died last year were the extra cancer deaths caused by radiation or is the rise down to better diagnostics and intensive monitoring of those who were exposed?

There is no statistical proof that the death rate from cancer has gone up – though of course everyone with any form cancer 1000miles from the plant will blame the accident!

Read the thread again Z-11, you appear to have missed quite a lot.

There is no statistical proof

Correct, there are only probabilities.

Edukator – I’ve missed nothing, there is no evidence at all of increased death rates, only TJ’s unreferenced assertion that over 10k people have died as a result.

J_me – and so far, the probability that someone (outside of a small, identified group of people) will die from a cause which is in any way attributable to radiation exposure from Chernobyl is infinitesimally small, (and inside that group the risk is only fractionally higher!)

J_me – and so far, the probability that someone (outside of a small, identified group of people) will die from a cause which is in any way attributable to radiation exposure from Chernobyl is infinitesimally small

Eh ? I thought it was yourself that quoted the WHO report which estimated a total of up to 4000 deaths could eventually be attributed to the accident?

You don’t have to look any further than Wikipedia to find 10 000 deaths. Look further and you sometimes find more but rarely less. Those that do quote less are those that you would expect to due to vested interests. Anyone with a minimum of independance talks in thousands.

J_me: Yes, read it again – that includes the likely deaths amongst the liquidators!

Edumakator:

don’t have to look any further than Wikipedia to find 10 000 deaths

hahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahh, wikipedia? you’re joking, right? you are joking aren’t you?

I’m not joking. The references in Wikipedia check out fine.

I’m not joking. The references in Wikipedia check out fine.

Seriously Educkator – you’ve really just taken this debate to a whole other level 😆

Whats next? – “a bloke down the pub told me”

250,000 is not “a small, identified group of people”. But yes they account for the majority (2,200) of the estimated deaths.

There are still 1,800 deaths outside this group. Still a figure that confirms “the claim thousands killed by Chernobyl”.

For reasons given above these estimates are likely to be conservative.