I missed this before. You’ve mistaken the burden of proof here. It’s the consequences of a nuclear accident that are so horrendous, not the odds. But when someone cites those consequences, the pro-nuclear folks trot out “can’t happen,” “is safe,” “better-designed,” and similar mantras. You are effectively trying to imply that nucelar is failure-proof, or so close as not to matter.
Leaving aside coal mining itself, the negative consequences of a coal plant operational failure are not much bigger than a boiler explosion. A big nuke plant is a different scale of danger. It’s incumbent upon the people saying “oh this is safe” to make their case, not on me to say “no plant ever fails.”
According to Charles Perrow, in the long term, the likelihood of a major nuclear disaster somewhere is basically 100%. Accidents happen, in all systems. The difference is that previous systems didn’t have the potential to render an area the size of Ohio permanently uninhabitable.
You think the fact that a 6.8 earthquake resulted in a couple of tipped barrels and some radioactive effluent means that nuclear power is unsafe? Do you know how many thousands of people die because of air-pollution-related illness each year?
Coal power plants put out plenty of pollution, including radiation from all the radioactives in the coal, when they are working properly. And that’s ignoring little problems like global warming, a worldwide disaster that coal plants contribute to by nature, not just when something goes wrong.
And do you have evidence that a properly designed nuclear power plant is prone to produce some sort of super disaster ? If I had to choose between living next door to a nuke plant or miles downwind of a coal plant, I’d go with the nuke. And Chernobyl was not even close to properly designed, so don’t bother ranting about it.
As far as the risk due to nuclear weapons proliferation, I don’t see why that is a given. Plutonium can be used to generate electricity, so there is no reason for it to be hanging around to be “stolen by terrorists”. What I’m asking here is for someone to answer NaturalBlondChap’s comment. ie is there some reason why the risk of plutonium cannot be dealt with?
The bottom line: Someone cannot be both opposed to nuclear power and believe that global warming is so much as one one-thousandth the threat is is generally portrayed as being – the former would still be the lesser of the two evils even if a Chernobyl-level mishap occurred every decade or two (which it wouldn’t, as Chernobyl was the result of typical Soviet slapdashery in civil infrastructure).
When looking at the risk-to-return ratio on ramping up nuclear power generation compared to the damage of global warming, I think nuclear power would be an extremely obvious choice - even to the die-hard environmentalists.
It’s complete fantasy to expect the world’s population to start using LESS energy, and most of the other “green” options for power generation just can’t effectively replace current, dirtier methods. Nuclear is the only generation option at our fingertips that produces no greenhouse gases and can generate enough power to start eliminating CO2 producing plants.
The danger is that, in any country that has nuclear power, the government might take some of the fuel to make nuclear weapons. And those weapons then might end up in the hands of terrorists, if the government sells them to them, or gives them to them – or if the government collapses. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if the first nuke ever used in a terrorist plot is one made in the old Soviet Union, that somehow went missing in the subsequent disorders. John Kerry in 2004 spoke of the urgent need for the U.S. to account for and buy up all the loose nukes; nothing has been done about that since, AFAIK.
The amount of gut feeling, failure to appreciate risks, and bad information in this thread made me finally decide to post after lurking for years.
Sailbot
I have studied TMI, Chernobyl, as well as several minor accidental or run away reactions and I can say that some of the fail safes worked and the bottom line is that TMI was a financial disaster and not a environmental or safety one. The reactor was destroyed and the buildings were contaminated, but there was less radiation released than occurs during a bad thermal inversion in the mountains.
Comparing TMI and Chernobyl is a lesson in the why design is so important. Both are theoretically safe in that if they are run with the correct procedures, the materials are non defective, the maintenance are done correctly, and no external event damages them, they will work without fail to the end of their life. The problem is that those conditions are not possible. It is a given that at some point something will go wrong. In truth, both TMI and Chernobyl would not have failed if only one thing had gone wrong. Both read like a perfect storm of events converging to cause a failure. Bad maintenance, disabled safeties, under trained personnel, etc.
The big difference is in the physics of the design. The physics is complicated, but reactors need a certain number of neutrons in a certain amount of fuel. The Russian design was such that all else being equal as heat went up the neutron level, and therefor power went up. This means a power or temperature spike will cause more power, more heat, and higher temperature. This is bad. The pressurized water reactor used at TMI is the opposite. As temperature goes up, neutrons go down. If a power or heat excursion occurs the result is to shut down the reactor.
That safety feature cannot be disabled by human incompetence, bad act, or natural disaster.
First, I do not see how a reactor could render such a large area uninhabitable without grinding up the fuel and sowing into the ground, but even if it were true, I disagree with your conclusion. Yes, accidents can and will happen. That does need to be taken into account.
The problem is people are very bad at judging risks. Nuclear energy, even taking accidents into account, kills less people and does less environment damage per kilowatt produced than coal. But coal is old and familiar and nuclear is new and poorly understood, therefore people tend to weigh the risks differently.
For reference, I spent six years as nuclear reactor operator in the US Navy. I also recently did a report on nuclear power safety for school. Here are some cites from that that back up what I am saying:
Science News. Energy. Washington: Oct 1, 1994.Vol.146, Iss. 14; pg. 223, 1 pgs Retrieved from Proquest March 28, 2006
Energy Information Administration, Form EIA-860, “Annual Electric Generator Report.”
Ball, Roberts & Simpson, Research Report #20, Centre for Environmental & Risk Management, University of East Anglia, 1994;
Hirschberg et al, Paul Scherrer Institut, 1996; in: IAEA, Sustainable Development and Nuclear Power, 1997; Severe Accidents in the Energy Sector, Paul Scherrer Institut, 2001).
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Committee. Fact Sheet on the Accident at Three Mile Island. Last revised Monday, March 27, 2006. Retrieved from the World Wide Web Mach 30, 2006
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Committee. Backgrounder on Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant Accident. Last revised Monday, May 02, 2005. Retrieved from the World Wide Web Mach 30, 2006.
Exactly. Your whole post is spot on. I’ve said much the same thing in other threads on this subject…people are TERRIBLE at risk assessment. Especially where nuclear power is concerned. As with your example, even if you DELIBERATELY TRIED to cause a wide scale accident with a nuclear plant, what you’d end up with is a LOCAL disaster…that would, in the end, be a matter of basically containment and cleanup. Sure, on the local level it could be quite bad…but judged on a global level we are talking about small potatoes. And thats if you deliberately ground up the fuel and sowed it into the ground, as you said. Any kind of realistic accident (or even a perfect storm accident like TMI) would be orders of magnitude less invasive.