# Why is the Left so afraid of nuclear power? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 19, 2010, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708 "2010-02-19T22:59:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/81 "2010-02-21T07:28:04Z")
> [@CutterJohn](#): > > I spent 6 years working not more than a dozen yards from 2 operational reactors, and my biggest fears were fires, steam ruptures, and having liberty canceled. Radiation was waaaaaaay down on the list. believe me, the canceled liberty was a hell of a lot more common than any other accident … going by 20 years of Navy spousal experience … 😃 ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/82 "2010-02-21T07:57:03Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > It is private enterprise that builds solar, windmills and other forms of clean energy. But if there was money in nukes, they would be all over it. The government has to finance and insure nuke plants. If you want to put solar panels on your garage to power your electric car, you wont need government assistance. Oh really? Solar companies that are making new solar plants in Arizona were hit by the recession and they are getting government assistance to complete the work. And many solar panels offered to homes still need government intensives or discounts to make attractive to the home owners. This is not said to be against solar power, the point is that you still have to get government assistance even for solar. (Lockheed Martin is making a big solar plant close to Phoenix, Mongolia and China are making even larger solar power plants, but guess who is helping with a lot of the financing?) > [@gonzomax](#): > > In the Detroit River they are building wave plants that will generate electricity by using the wave power of the river. The energy sources of the future are going to have to compete for resources with the nukes who eat up tons of money. Again, this is if we follow the current irrational American way of doing Nuclear: From the PBS documentary Nuclear Reaction: > **[Tapes & Transcripts | Nuclear Reaction | FRONTLINE | PBS](https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/reaction/etc/script.html)** > [@](#): > > NARRATOR: If fear is less in France, so is cost. **France’s centralized political system allows standardization and control unimaginable in the U.S. The French selected just one American reactor model and charged one agency, EDF, to run the system for the nation. But America’s decentralized system meant that from the start it was a messy and expensive free-for-all, many different designs managed by many different utilities.** Ironically, in American hands, the energythat some dreamed would be too cheap to meter has ended up one of the most expensive ways to generate electric power. > > BILL MAGAVERN, Public Citizen’s Critical Mass Energy Project: And what we have coming in this country is more competition in the electricity market and a lot of these nuclear reactors cannot compete. Some of the existing ones will be able to compete and will keep running for a while, but they’ll reach the end of their lifespans. Some of them will not be able to compete and will shut down well before the end of their projected lifespans. And building a new reactor is just a complete fantasy in this country. > > RALPH NADER: What do you say about a technology that wants to persist on the public dole because it can’t meet a market test? I don’t know anybody in Wall Street and I don’t know anybody in the electric utility industry who wants to build any more nuclear plants. > > NARRATOR: Nuclear physicists like Charles Till argue that’s short-term thinking. > > Dr. CHARLES TILL, Argonne National Laboratory West: The exciting thing about nuclear power is its ability to handle mankind’s needs in the future. It’s not whether today in the 20% of electricity that it produces in this nation, whether it can produce it for two and a half cents a kilowatt hour or four cents a kilowatt hour where, you know, coal may be three and a half cents or whatever. That isn’t the argument at all. > > NARRATOR: Fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas, says Till, may be cheaper now, but as supplies decline that will change. Fossil fuels also produce pollution and greenhouse gases, so that many environmental groups oppose their use as well. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 8:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/83 "2010-02-21T08:02:24Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > Um, Look at the _size_ of France, and notice the disparity in gross number of schools in the US compared to France. Of course most of the techies graduated from EP, they don’t HAVE that many schools to choose from in country as the US does. There is also a ‘mad scientist/evil corporation’ paradigm in the US with big business, industrialists and scientists being portrayed in media as insane, greedy, self-serving or corrupt. That is a good argument \*\*for \*\*ignorance, but only in the sense that we are allowing it to drive the discussion. I would have to agree with PBS on this one, the popular media is doing more harm than good in this subject. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/84 "2010-02-21T17:00:44Z")
Good grief, I don’t even know where to start in this thread. One of the Wiki-citing posts on page 1 is so ludicrous I’m not even going to waste my time addressing it. So I’ll try to speak to some of the more intelligent posts. > [@Cosmic Relief](#): > > Last year I watched in morbid fascination while our state senate voted to allow Georgia Power to surcharge residents for new nuclear plants beginning in 2011 for a plant that will come online in 2017. The break-even point for consumers is expected to be around 2030. Some Georgians will pay for power that they’ll never get to use. > > Yep, that’s right, nuclear power is such a cost-effective capital investment that the power companies have to soak the rate-payers 6 years in advance to finance it. That same thing happens with coal power plants too - KCPL customers have been pre-paying for Iatan 2, which is still not generating power. That’s pretty much the way that the system works, and has worked, for most large capital power projects. Check out the impact that the crash in interest rates for municipal bonds has had on this subject for further information. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/85 "2010-02-21T17:10:18Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > Coal produces tens of millions of tons of fly ash that needs to be disposed of each year. Quite a lot of it is sold for concrete use, aggregate, cement kiln use, and soil stabilization. It is almost certain that every day you drive over coal fly ash-containing concrete, or work in a building containing such (unless you’re a basement-dwelling shut in…or have no arms or legs…or are a disembodied entity from another world). > [@](#): > > It also throws tons of Mercury into the air, and subsequently into our lakes and waterways. > > "On March 15, 2005, EPA issued a rule to permanently cap and reduce mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants. > > The Clean Air Mercury Rule was built on EPA’s Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR) to significantly reduce emissions from coal-fired power plants – the largest remaining sources of mercury emissions in the country. The goal of these rules regarding mercury was to reduce utility emissions of mercury from 48 tons a year to 15 tons, a reduction of nearly 70 percent." > > ([http://www.epa.gov/mercuryrule/basic.htm](http://www.epa.gov/mercuryrule/basic.htm)) Coal does contain mercury, and puts a decent amount of it into the air (and about 30-70% of it ends up in the ash, but I digress as no one on this Board gives a shit about the science of coal except for me). However, Chinese industrial pollution may be responsible for much more mercury than coal (there is a lot of Hg transport from China to the US and Canada). But coal can clean up it act on this front - 90+% mercury capture is happening right now at plants where ACI+FF is installed - I spoke to a gentleman just a few weeks ago in charge of a project which has been getting 95%+ removal, and I’ve inspected a site which got 97.2% removal for a 6-month test period (they disabled the system, however, since without it they discovered they were still getting 91% removal, but I digress again…) > [@](#): > > Oil…well, look who we get most it from, and consider how the flow of that much money out of our country harms us in the long run. Besides the other issues. Not a factor for electricity in the US. The remainder of your post I have no comment on; you repeat good points. ---
**Author:** ![Stoneburg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@Stoneburg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoneburg)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/86 "2010-02-21T17:41:17Z")
The two main issues: 1. It is a very expensive way of producing electricity. Only Gvt subsidies makes it viable. 2. It is not renewable. That means it isn’t a long term solution, and that you are held hostage to whoever controls the uranium Several minor issues: 3. It produces incredibly dangerous waste that we can’t handle (this might be solved, but hasn’t been yet) 4. The potential for disaster. A new Chernobyl is extremely unlikely, but not impossible. 5. The mining of uranium is detrimental to the environment 6. It takes funding away from developing better renewable sources of energy ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/87 "2010-02-21T17:47:37Z")
Nobody argues that coal plants are dirty. Those who run them do every thing they can to resist cleaning them up. It costs money after all. From smoke stack scrubbers to getting legislation written so they can escape cleaning them up, they play the system. I guess you nuke lovers believe that the nuke plant operators and builders are not motivated by profit but by the public good. We can trust them to not cut corners and save money by not training operators sufficiently. At least in nukeland all is well. In the real world ,it does not work that way. Yet the nuke lovers say law suits that are aimed at making the nuke manufacturers and operators keep the land safe are the problem. How dumb is that? Of course it takes almost a decade to build a nuke plant. So decisions on nukes, ignore the potential for new energy forms that the next decade could produce. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/88 "2010-02-21T17:53:49Z")
> [@Stoneburg](#): > > 1. The potential for disaster. A new Chernobyl is extremely unlikely, but not impossible. A Chernobyl is impossible if you don’t build one like that. It was a stupid design when it was made. After the fact doubly so. You might as well use the Hiendenburg as an arguement as to why air travel is dangerous. And to repeat, even after all that Chernobyl doesnt rank very high at all in terms of man made disasters, and doesnt even register when it comes to natural disasters. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/89 "2010-02-21T18:05:47Z")
First we eliminate the [42,000 plus Americans killed in car collisions every year,](http://www.car-accidents.com/pages/stats.html) then I’ll start worrying about nuclear plant meltdowns. Car collision death=real, valid concern. Nuclear accident death=unrealistic concern. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/90 "2010-02-21T18:26:00Z")
One thing not yet mentioned is that we may see an enormous increase in demand for electricity as our fleet of electric cars increases. Same thing if we go with hydrogen fuel cells. We will need electricity to separate hydrogen. So we are not just talking about producing electricity at current levels (which wind and solar and hydro can’t do by themselves anyway) we are talking about meeting a much **greater** future demand. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/91 "2010-02-21T19:18:58Z")
> [@spoke-](#): > > One thing not yet mentioned is that we may see an enormous increase in demand for electricity as our fleet of electric cars increases. Same thing if we go with hydrogen fuel cells. We will need electricity to separate hydrogen The vast majority of commercially produced hydrogen is not made from the electrolysis of water; it is too expensive. It is much cheaper to make hydrogen from natural gas. Until that changes, nobody will be will be running cars (or anything else) on hydrogen from water. For the foreseeable future, hydrogen is a fossil fuel. ---
**Author:** ![Stoneburg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@Stoneburg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoneburg)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/92 "2010-02-21T20:25:18Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > A Chernobyl is impossible if you don’t build one like that. It was a stupid design when it was made. After the fact doubly so. > > You might as well use the Hiendenburg as an arguement as to why air travel is dangerous. > > And to repeat, even after all that Chernobyl doesnt rank very high at all in terms of man made disasters, and doesnt even register when it comes to natural disasters. Yes an identical accident to Chernobyl is obviously impossible but I think you know that was not what I meant. Either way, I agree that a massive nuclear accident is extremely unlikely, but not impossible. I do not agree with you trivializing the Chernobyl accident though. Not only was it a massive disaster at the time, but the plethora of leukemia victims and other victims to cancers caused by the accident shows the huge long term damage of it. There are orphanages and orphanages filled with children still dying of the after effects. And you’ve not seen sadness until you’ve seen hundreds of sick children slowly dying in run down and over crowded orphanages. A wind power, solar power or bio fuel plant accident simply won’t have that effect. Even so, as I stated, the threat of accidents is only a minor concern (at least to me). I’m guessing it’s the dramatic quality of it that keeps it at the forefront. My main objections are of a completely different nature, ie: price and dependence. ---
**Author:** ![appleciders](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85f322/32.png) [@appleciders](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/appleciders)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/93 "2010-02-21T20:47:37Z")
> [@Stoneburg](#): > > The two main issues: > > 1. It is a very expensive way of producing electricity. Only Gvt subsidies makes it viable. Government subsidies wouldn’t be necessary if the anti-nuke lobbies didn’t sue the pants off the people trying to build them. Yes, it is more expensive than coal. Nothing will ever be quite as cheap as coal. But nuclear’s the only easily-scalable source we’ve got. > [@](#): > > 1. It is not renewable. That means it isn’t a long term solution, and that you are held hostage to whoever controls the uranium Yeah, that’s right. Now we’ll be held in thrall to those rogue states Canada (#1 in the world) and Australia (#3). Not to mention that we have our own reserves, and that much of the fuel for reactors now comes from decommissioned Russian and American nuclear missiles. > [@](#): > > Several minor issues: > > 1. It produces incredibly dangerous waste that we can’t handle (this might be solved, but hasn’t been yet) > > 2. The potential for disaster. A new Chernobyl is extremely unlikely, but not impossible. > > 3. The mining of uranium is detrimental to the environment > > 4. It takes funding away from developing better renewable sources of energy 1. The waste isn’t that dangerous and we can bury it in Yucca Mountain. Those geologists actually have done their homework and do know what they’re talking about. This is really a pretty safe way to do it. 2. Chernobyl killed fewer people than the Banquo dam failure, as noted above. Nuclear isn’t perfect; neither is anything else. 3. But you need a hell of a lot less of it than you do coal, or steel for windmills and solar panels, and you don’t need to inundate vast tracts of land like dams. 4. First, if nuclear is the solution, we might not need the other renewable sources as much. You’re arguing from your conclusion, which is a fallacy. Second, no one here is saying that wind, solar, and hydro won’t be part of the solution. But they likewise won’t be the entirety of the solution. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/94 "2010-02-21T21:18:30Z")
> [@Stoneburg](#): > > I do not agree with you trivializing the Chernobyl accident though. Not only was it a massive disaster at the time, but the plethora of leukemia victims and other victims to cancers caused by the accident shows the huge long term damage of it. There are orphanages and orphanages filled with children still dying of the after effects. And you’ve not seen sadness until you’ve seen hundreds of sick children slowly dying in run down and over crowded orphanages. A wind power, solar power or bio fuel plant accident simply won’t have that effect. > > . THIS is why “the left” doesnt like nuclear. Emotion driven decision making combined with a lack of understanding of numbers or science or risk. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/95 "2010-02-21T22:16:35Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > Quite a lot of it is sold for concrete use, aggregate, cement kiln use, and soil stabilization. True enough, but the figures I saw said only 25-30% was being re-cycled into other uses. The rest has to be stored and landfilled. 30+ million tons per year being buried or piled up. > [@](#): > > Coal does contain mercury, and puts a decent amount of it into the air Good points about the Chinese and others, because we’re not alone and all our great efforts to limit our pollution come to naught if we still get tons of toxic crap rolling over from other nations. I’m reminded of the Mercury every time I look at a lake survey from my state DNR. Such as [this one](http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/lakefind/showreport.html?downum=48000200) (that big round lake in the middle of my state), which isn’t bad, or [this one](http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/lakefind/showreport.html?downum=01007000). > [@](#): > > Not a factor for electricity in the US. Had to go check that out. Guess it is an almost insignificant amount. [http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/epm\_sum.html](http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/epm_sum.html) (year to date through October 2009) Coal: 44.4% Natural Gas 23.7% Nuclear 20.2% Hydro 6.8% Oil 1.0% All Other 3.6% ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/96 "2010-02-21T23:05:28Z")
Burning coal releases far more radioactive material into the environment, than nuclear power plants. But the left doesn’t want logic, they want propaganda…and to them, nuclear power is evil. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/97 "2010-02-21T23:16:55Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > Burning coal releases far more radioactive material into the environment, than nuclear power plants. > But the left doesn’t want logic, they want propaganda..and to them, nuclear power is evil. Oh really? I guess you are using now WIBIYBY (Wide brushes in your back yard.) ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/98 "2010-02-21T23:41:32Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > Burning coal releases far more radioactive material into the environment, than nuclear power plants. > But the left doesn’t want logic, they want propaganda..and to them, nuclear power is evil. I am a liberal. I don’t think nuclear power is evil. I think storing spent fuel in a hundred pools around the country is stupid and dangerous. What is illogical about that? ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/99 "2010-02-21T23:56:36Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > I am a liberal. I don’t think nuclear power is evil. I think storing spent fuel in a hundred pools around the country is stupid and dangerous. What is illogical about that? Do you see anybody here argueing FOR that? ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2010, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708/100 "2010-02-22T00:40:13Z")
[http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/02/18/60minutes/main6221135.shtml](http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/02/18/60minutes/main6221135.shtml) 60 Minutes just did a show on Bloomboxes. I maintain the energy of the future is not nuclear. Perhaps it is on a drawing board somewhere right now. I just don’t like big ,old time technology like nuclear. You Luddites have to grasp the future . [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-the-left-so-afraid-of-nuclear-power/529708.md?page=6)