# Are we making meaningful progress on climate change **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 10, 2025, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146 "2025-02-10T19:56:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Ancient\_Nerd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ed655f/32.png) [@Ancient\_Nerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ancient_Nerd)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/41 "2025-12-22T22:11:25Z")
Many people have trouble seeing the difference between human and geologic time scales. Many other people take advantage of that shortcoming. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/42 "2025-12-22T22:12:47Z")
Closed on December 22, 2025, 10:12pm UTC ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/43 "2025-12-22T22:13:46Z")
Trolls gotta troll. Sat on this fake account for a while. Goodbye. Reminder to all, Climate Change Denialism is not allowed according to the Tired Subjects rule and poorly written climate changed denials will be mocked. **Moderating:** ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/44 "2025-12-22T22:22:30Z")
Opened on December 22, 2025, 10:22pm UTC ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2025, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/45 "2025-12-22T22:24:25Z")
> [@Ancient\_Nerd](#): > > Sorry, but the need to permanently evacuate an extremely large area does not sound like a success to me. Yes, if there were such a need, that would be a sign of a major safety failure. But there wasn’t. A large area was evacuated, but because people irrationally fear nuclear power, not because it was actually necessary. “People should fear nuclear power because people fear nuclear power” is not a cogent argument. ---
**Author:** ![Ancient\_Nerd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ed655f/32.png) [@Ancient\_Nerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ancient_Nerd)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2025, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/46 "2025-12-23T18:42:18Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > A large area was evacuated, but because people irrationally fear nuclear power, not because it was actually necessary. If someone wanted to raise his family in Fukushima, say a mile from the old power plant, and feed them vegetables grown in the back yard would there be a need for any kind of precautions? ---
**Author:** ![doomtastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8c91f0/32.png) [@doomtastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doomtastic)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2025, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/47 "2025-12-23T18:44:13Z")
My biggest worry about reactors is what happens to them in the event of major societal disruptions. Civilization is already under pressure with the warming we’ve already incurred. Every tenth of a degree increase from here amplifies that pressure. (And that’s with our current best estimates of earth system sensitivity to emissions. Emerging evidence hints at the possibility of those estimates being too conservative. We could still get unlucky here) That means more disasters from extreme weather, more disruptions to supply chains, more mass movement of people, more conflict. What happens to all the reactors out there at that point? Lot of room for things to go wrong, and I worry that the ability to respond will be compromised. Hell, we just saw an errant drone blow a hole in the shielding over Chernobyl reactor 4. Now imagine that everyone was too busy with other conflicts/catastrophes to go patch it… ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2025, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/48 "2025-12-23T19:36:43Z")
> [@Ancient\_Nerd](#): > > If someone wanted to raise his family in Fukushima, say a mile from the old power plant, and feed them vegetables grown in the back yard would there be a need for any kind of precautions? Probably not, no. I mean, Hiroshima and Nagasaki are both populous cities again. ---
**Author:** ![Ancient\_Nerd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ed655f/32.png) [@Ancient\_Nerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ancient_Nerd)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2025, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/49 "2025-12-23T19:55:40Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Probably not, no. I mean, Hiroshima and Nagasaki are both populous cities again. > **[Bikini Atoll](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bikini_Atoll)** > > Bikini Atoll (/ˈbɪkɪni/ BIK-in-ee or /bɪˈkiːni/ bih-KEE-nee; Marshallese: Pikinni \[pʲiɡinnʲi\], lit. 'coconut place'), known as Eschscholtz Atoll between the 19th century and 1946, is a coral reef in the Marshall Islands consisting of 23 islands surrounding a 229.4-square-mile (594.1 km2) central lagoon. The atoll is at the northern end of the Ralik Chain, approximately 530 miles (850 km) northwest of the capital Majuro. > After the Second World War, the atoll was chosen by the United States as ... > In 1972, about 100 residents were voluntarily returned to their home island.[[6]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bikini_Atoll#cite_note-6) But scientists found dangerously high levels of [strontium-90](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strontium-90 "Strontium-90") in well water in May 1978, and the residents’ bodies were carrying abnormally high concentrations of [caesium-137](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caesium-137 "Caesium-137"). They were evacuated again in September 1978. The atoll is occasionally visited today by divers and a few scientists, and it is occupied by a handful of caretakers. The people of the atoll, which now number in the thousands, have spread out to other Marshallese islands and the United States. A multi-million dollar trust fund, which had been supporting services for many Bikini inhabitants since the 1980s, was drained in the late 2010s. Granted Hiroshima and Nagasaki suffered just one explosion each while Bikini had dozens. But strontium-90 and caesium-137 would not be expected from fusion explosions. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2025, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/50 "2025-12-24T14:58:18Z")
> [@Ancient\_Nerd](#): > > If someone wanted to raise his family in Fukushima, say a mile from the old power plant, and feed them vegetables grown in the back yard would there be a need for any kind of precautions? They’d probably want to wash it very carefully to remove the pollution caused by the fossil fuel plants after the nukes went offline. The radiation wasn’t really an issue… there wasn’t much exposure to begin with: [Basic Survey｜The Fukushima Health Management Survey｜Radiation Medical Science Center for the Fukushima Health Management Survey](https://fhms.jp/en/fhms/basic/) Years later, no radiation-linked health impacts: [Offsite Consequences of the Fukushima Nuclear Accident: Recovery and Return to Hometown After Evacuation | Disaster Medicine and Public Health Preparedness | Cambridge Core](https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/disaster-medicine-and-public-health-preparedness/article/offsite-consequences-of-the-fukushima-nuclear-accident-recovery-and-return-to-hometown-after-evacuation/7A05115366A39FEF0D59C022B83165E4) In that study, at least, residents who did _not_ return to Fukushima are actually doing worse, in terms of their mental health (homesickness?). It’s not like nukes are risk-free, but they do displace the _guaranteed_ pollution and health impacts of coal and other fossil fuels. But that’s a tired argument now (and a false dilemma), with cheap renewables and the increasing availability of energy storage. ---
**Author:** ![Ancient\_Nerd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ed655f/32.png) [@Ancient\_Nerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ancient_Nerd)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2025, 8:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/51 "2025-12-26T08:20:22Z")
> [@Reply](#): > > Years later, no radiation-linked health impacts The accident must have released a lot of fission products. There should be some isotopes left with multi-year half lives somewhere. Where did they go? Maybe the wind was blowing the direction that carried them out to sea. Maybe they went into the ocean. Will we be that lucky next time? ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2025, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/52 "2025-12-26T13:31:55Z")
Is nuclear power completely safe? No. But you were asking about Fukushima, and in that case, yes, we got lucky. The risk will always be there, whether it’s natural disasters or human error or sabotage or some combination of the three. Modern designs can increase the safety but not altogether guarantee it. None of these technologies are without cost. Coal kills in pollution at a slow and steady pace. Nuclear has tiny but potentially catastrophic risks. Renewables are situational and dependent on storage. Storage is in its infancy and often requires materials mined in inhumane ways. In the context of climate change mitigation, I think we need all the tools in the bag… and then some. If we’re lucky, maybe one day we can phase out nukes _and_ fossil fuels. Chances are we won’t be that lucky, and we’ll kill ourselves long before the next Chernobyl does. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [December 26, 2025, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/53 "2025-12-26T22:45:46Z")
We should absolutely keep using what nuclear power we have as long as it is safe. Japan and Germany should re-commission their nukes if they safely can. But we should absolutely not build any more; they are expensive to build and decommission, and take far too long to build to reduce emissions when we need to - right NOW. But even if every watt of power generated today was from nukes, we’d still have a problem. Power generation is IIRC about 1/3 of world GHG emissions; even removing that would only slow down the accumulation of GHGs, not reverse it which is what we need to do. Transport, fossil fuel extraction for other reasons, farming, production and use of concrete, production of steel and aluminium … even the Amazon is now a nett emitter of GHG. We are cooked, folks! ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [April 24, 2026, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/54 "2026-04-24T06:14:50Z")
Slightly better than bad news: > **[Clean energy pushes fossil-fuel power into reverse for ‘first time ever’ -...](https://www.carbonbrief.org/clean-energy-pushes-fossil-fuel-power-into-reverse-for-first-time-ever/)** > > Renewable energy has overtaken coal to become the world's largest source of electricity in 2025, according to thinktank Ember. ---
**Author:** ![doomtastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8c91f0/32.png) [@doomtastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doomtastic)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2026, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146/55 "2026-04-26T03:25:42Z")
Statistically indistinguishable from bad news, but at least directionally pointed towards good news? At this point, I guess we should take what we can get. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-making-meaningful-progress-on-climate-change/1014146.md?page=2)