Educating the general public about pro nuclear energy?

[RogueOne]

We are not at risk of CO2 depletion, nor is human activity needed to maintain its natural levels, so what was this question even asked for? Was it an argument to the effect that CO2 is necessary for life, therefore we need more of it - in the same way as people affected by flooding need more life-giving water?.

That is a great analogy, almost. Thank you! Its important that the natural cycles are capable of subsorbing our contributions to them. However, too much CO₂ will not flood and kill a field of crops. It won't overwhelm a dam (causing it to break and/or allow flooding). It was not an argument to say that we need more CO₂. It was pointing out that we are closer to having CO₂ deficiency than we are to having any negative effects of CO₂ surplus that we know of with as much certainty as the negative effects of CO₂ deficiency.

Water vapour is a strong greenhouse gas, but it's irrelevant because, unlike CO2, it's also a condensing gas. If you put too much of it in the atmosphere, clouds form, followed by precipitation. Its concentration self-regulates.

Sounds like quite a life-giving event. More clouds and more rain water? I'm sure that could not possibly ever be anything other than benign, right? Should we go ahead and assume that the risk is negligible when we expand the scale of nuclear energy?

 

[russ_watters]

1.) Thats a whole different topic, but how predictive have those models been historically?

Dificult to say because the more critical predictions are without precedent.

2.) Its not arrogant to make decisions with regard to the possibility of human civilization existing 3,000 years from now. Assuming that human cilivization will not exist in 3,000 years is arrogant. Making decisions based on that assumption is absurd. We'll still technically be in this very same interglacial period at that time.

You're missing my point. Current standards require assuming the collapse of civilization and require protection of what's left of the world and maybe humanity for the next million years. But my opinion is that planning that long term is absurd regardless of which assumption is made because:
1. If our civilization still exists in its current or more advanced form, we'll be smart enough to avoid going into a cave if a sign says not to.
2. If our civilization doesn't exist in its current form, anyone who can't understand needing to stay out of a cave for their own safety does not deserve our help.

It has been my perception, though I cannot be sure, that the standards were written for the purpose of sabbotaging nuclear power.

 

[russ_watters]

That is a great analogy, almost. Thank you! Its important that the natural cycles are capable of subsorbing our contributions to them. However, too much CO₂ will not flood and kill a field of crops. It won't overwhelm a dam (causing it to break and/or allow flooding). It was not an argument to say that we need more CO₂. It was pointing out that we are closer to having CO₂ deficiency than we are to having any negative effects of CO₂ surplus that we know of with as much certainty as the negative effects of CO₂ deficiency.

That's total nonsense and I need to warn you here to stay within the bounds of known science moving forward. You say you are pro-nuclear, so I'm having a hard time telling if you are just playing devil's advocate, but if you are please be advised that while devil's advocate is fine, crackpot's advocate is not allowed.

Sounds like quite a life-giving event. More clouds and more rain water? I'm sure that could not possibly ever be anything other than benign, right? Should we go ahead and assume that the risk is negligible when we expand the scale of nuclear energy?

Can't tell if sarcastic, but the simple answer is no, we should not "assume the risk is negligible", we should understand that the risk is totally nonexistent.

 

[mfb]

However, too much CO2 will not flood and kill a field of crops. It won't overwhelm a dam (causing it to break and/or allow flooding).

It will increase precipitation in some regions, which can increase the risk of breaking dams.
In most regions in reduces precipitation, increasing the risk of droughts.

It was pointing out that we are closer to having CO2 deficiency than we are to having any negative effects of CO₂ surplus that we know of with as much certainty as the negative effects of CO₂ deficiency.

There is absolutely no risk of a lack of CO₂. We do have some negative effects of the increasing CO2 levels today, and it is predicted to get much worse.

No prediction is 100% accurate, but dismissing predictions altogether because they have some percent uncertainty how much warmer it will get is not the right approach.

 

[RogueOne]

That's total nonsense and I need to warn you here to stay within the bounds of known science moving forward. You say you are pro-nuclear, so I'm having a hard time telling if you are just playing devil's advocate, but if you are please be advised that while devil's advocate is fine, crackpot's advocate is not allowed.

Can't tell if sarcastic, but the simple answer is no, we should not "assume the risk is negligible", we should understand that the risk is totally nonexistent.

I was pointing out the fact that your analogy wasn't totally equivocable. I am filling the role of the devil's advocate right now. I understand that our likelihood of CO₂ deficiency is negligible. However, I am pointing out that should the change of CO₂ have happened an equal amount in the opposite direction from the mean, we would be dangerously close to 150ppm. The vast majority of plant life dies at around 150ppm. We are nearing 400ppm, which is up from approximately 270ppm.

And yes, I am pro nuclear. I don't like the idea of nuclear warfare, but nuclear energy has incredible constructive potential for civilization. I think that the caution by the uneducated people is actually the correct position for them to take. I think they should be more passive about it, but it is good that people are not blindly jumping on board with something as powerful and important as this. We're in an adjustment period right now. The economy needs to adjust and accommodate this without too much immediate frictional unemployment or newly-found issues etc etc. Nuclear is in its infancy, relative to what it will someday be.

People fear the unknown. From an evolutionary psychology perspective, that is natural and generally good in some sense. However, they will figure it out much like they figured out electricity. Imagine the horror of telling somebody that you wanted to string electrical wiring through their house that is made entirely of flammable materials??

 

[jim hardy]

I don't fear another doubling of CO2.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25600219

The inhalation toxicity of submarine contaminants is of concern to ensure the health of men and women aboard submarines during operational deployments. Due to a lack of adequate prior studies, potential general, neurobehavioral, reproductive and developmental toxicity was evaluated in male and female rats exposed to mixtures of three critical submarine atmospheric components: carbon monoxide (CO) and carbon dioxide (CO2; levels elevated above ambient), and oxygen (O2; levels decreased below ambient). In a 14-day, 23 h/day, whole-body inhalation study of exposure to clean air (0.4 ppm CO, 0.1% CO2 and 20.6% O2), low-dose, mid-dose and high-dose gas mixtures (high dose of 88.4 ppm CO, 2.5% CO2 and 15.0% O2), no adverse effects on survival, body weight or histopathology were observed

That's 25,000 PPM.

Are there any potential benefits of the water vapor release?

Willis Eschenbach's "Thermostat Hypothesis" makes a case that it's a significant stabilizer of climate.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/14/the-thermostat-hypothesis/

 

[RogueOne]

I don't fear another doubling of CO2.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25600219

That's 25,000 PPM.

Willis Eschenbach's "Thermostat Hypothesis" makes a case that it's a significant stabilizer of climate.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/14/the-thermostat-hypothesis/

Thank you for the objective reply. Those are useful peices of the picture!

 

[russ_watters]

It will increase precipitation in some regions, which can increase the risk of breaking dams.

I'll take that a step further to say that if we don't quibble about the difference between a dam and a levee, too much CO2 will flood and kill crops.

 

[Dr. Courtney]

One of the students we mentor was at a scholarship interview at a top 30 university when the subject of nuclear power was brought up in a large group discussion. All of the students were very well educated high school seniors with ACT scores of 35 or 36.

The student we mentor has a keen scientific mind, and was the only one to vocalize support for nuclear power. He supported his reasoning with a number of well researched and articulated facts. It went over like a turd in a punch bowl, along with every other view on a science or technology issue that can be framed as "conservative."

Top colleges claim to want diversity, but that's not the kind they want. Education is no longer about facts and knowledge and debate. It's about falling in line and agreeing with the consensus view. Some amount of disagreement is allowed, but only within acceptable parameters. Support for nuclear power is not within the acceptable parameters.

 

[HAYAO]

Which is baseless speculation, derivative of the fantasy that nuke plants are really just bombs trying to explode at the first blink. Unless the "other disaster" also happens at the same time as s 9.0 quake and 500 yr tsunami which prevents access to water and electrical utilities, and inhibits emergency crews for days, then there is no history of a disaster from these light water reactor designs, not that ever harmed anyone.

EDIT: I actually realized that the original post you are replying to had some bad wording that caused some misunderstanding. When I said "other disasters", I was talking about "other" possible power plant failures. See, this is what happens when English is not my mother tongue. Sorry about that.Just a note: Fukushima incident did kill a few people. One by possible acute radiation syndrome, and few others by heatstroke working in terrible conditions inside the hot reactors.

 

[russ_watters]

One of the students we mentor was at a scholarship interview at a top 30 university when the subject of nuclear power was brought up in a large group discussion. All of the students were very well educated high school seniors with ACT scores of 35 or 36.

The student we mentor has a keen scientific mind, and was the only one to vocalize support for nuclear power. He supported his reasoning with a number of well researched and articulated facts. It went over like a turd in a punch bowl, along with every other view on a science or technology issue that can be framed as "conservative."...

Interview? Hopefully that didn't affect his chances, but unfortunately in today's climate giving a good answer doesn't fly; you do need to know/give the "right" answer. Whether it be a for a scholarship interview or Miss America pagent.

 

[Dr. Courtney]

Interview? Hopefully that didn't affect his chances, but unfortunately in today's climate giving a good answer doesn't fly; you do need to know/give the "right" answer. Whether it be a for a scholarship interview or Miss America pagent.

All the students at the interview who gave "conservative" answers to ANY question received the lower of the two possible scholarship outcomes.

Towing the liberal party line seems necessary to receive the higher scholarship (a difference of about $5k per year). We appraise the students we mentor about these likely outcomes in our preparation work beforehand. But at some point, these "invincible" high school seniors have the confidence to be intellectually honest and express their fact-based, firmly held views even when they know it might cost them money. Hanging out with us for long enough gives them the confidence to that being scientifically correct is a better bet in the long run than being politically correct.

It is hard to convince invincible 18 year olds that it's not intellectually dishonest to just stay silent some times. We coach them that nuclear power is a third rail topic and that there is nothing to be gained by talking about it in high stakes interviews. Ever eager to show how smart they are, it is a hard temptation to resist.

 

[RogueOne]

All the students at the interview who gave "conservative" answers to ANY question received the lower of the two possible scholarship outcomes.

Towing the liberal party line seems necessary to receive the higher scholarship (a difference of about $5k per year). We appraise the students we mentor about these likely outcomes in our preparation work beforehand. But at some point, these "invincible" high school seniors have the confidence to be intellectually honest and express their fact-based, firmly held views even when they know it might cost them money. Hanging out with us for long enough gives them the confidence to that being scientifically correct is a better bet in the long run than being politically correct.

It is hard to convince invincible 18 year olds that it's not intellectually dishonest to just stay silent some times. We coach them that nuclear power is a third rail topic and that there is nothing to be gained by talking about it in high stakes interviews. Ever eager to show how smart they are, it is a hard temptation to resist.

It is a shame that our universities have become so intolerant of viewpoints other than liberal. There is a stubborn refusal to consider anything other than the narrative, or anybody who is good at speaking about the actual subject. That difference in scholarship is just the first different outcome that they will have in college if they don't hide their views. That theme repeats itself consistently. It seems as though being anything other than a doctrinaire democrat on a university campus will subject you to a journey of a thousand cuts. This syndrome has heightened in recent years. So one challenge in educating the general public about nuclear would be to figure out when/where your viewpoint will not be resisted with vitriol. As sad as it is, where are you allowed to even talk about a subject like this? Where is your information on _______ energy even allowed to be vocalized?

If you want to educate the public about nuclear, ironically, it might actually be easier than educating university students at a campus.

 

[russ_watters]

All the students at the interview who gave "conservative" answers to ANY question received the lower of the two possible scholarship outcomes.

Not shocked, but sorry to hear. You can tell him there is always a place for "his kind" in engineering!

But at some point, these "invincible" high school seniors have the confidence to be intellectually honest and express their fact-based, firmly held views even when they know it might cost them money. Hanging out with us for long enough gives them the confidence to that being scientifically correct is a better bet in the long run than being politically correct.

I wouldn't advocate intellectual dishonesty (well...maybe in the Miss America pagent), but rather to artfully dodge or spin the bad question into something better. It depends on the wording, but if they ask: "What technology we hang our energy future on, solar or nuclear?"

...you can always answer with splitting the difference and pointing out that it is a flawed question:
"It isn't an either-or; both have a role to play."

Or if you want to be safer:
"Solar definitely has more growth potential."

It's as true as it is meaningless, but if the audience just wants a sentence with the word "solar" in it, that should suffice.

Still, playing politics is a necessary evil in life that at some point they will have to get used to. You can't go into a job interview with company X and tell them you are only there because you were turned down for a job with company Y, which is a far better company, even if that's objectively true.

 

[mheslep]

Just a note: Fukushima incident did kill a few people. One by possible acute radiation syndrome,..

Not so, not from radiation.

UNSCEAR Report, released 2013

...
3. Health implications
38. No radiation-related deaths or acute diseases have been observed among the workers and general public exposed to radiation from the accident.

http://www.unscear.org/docs/reports/2013/14-06336_Report_2013_Annex_A_Ebook_website.pdf

I'm being pedantic here in following up on an erroneous single claim of radiation poisoning, because there was an avoidable jump in mortality among the old and ill caused by the reaction to the accident, i.e the transfer trauma via the mass evacuation. The mortality increase from those evacuated due to radiation concerns was similar to the increased mortality among "evacuees from tsunami- and earthquake-affected prefectures." Evacuation from, e.g., hospitals for which structures were seriously damaged by the quake/tsunami was likely unavoidable. Evacuation due to fear of radiation was avoidable. Every false claim about radiation deaths adds to the risk that poor choices will be repeated.

 

[HAYAO]

Not so, not from radiation.

UNSCEAR Report, released 2013

http://www.unscear.org/docs/reports/2013/14-06336_Report_2013_Annex_A_Ebook_website.pdf

I'm being pedantic here in following up on an erroneous single claim of radiation poisoning, because there was an avoidable jump in mortality among the old and ill caused by the reaction to the accident, i.e the transfer trauma via the mass evacuation. The mortality increase from those evacuated due to radiation concerns was similar to the increased mortality among "evacuees from tsunami- and earthquake-affected prefectures." Evacuation from, e.g., hospitals for which structures were seriously damaged by the quake/tsunami was likely unavoidable. Evacuation due to fear of radiation was avoidable. Every false claim about radiation deaths adds to the risk that poor choices will be repeated.

Hence the reason why I said precisely "possible" acute radiation syndrome. BTW, I made a mistake because it wasn't acute radiation syndrome but acute leukemia. Due to the sensitive matter at hand, they decided to pay compensation anyway although a this being related to the power plant is unlikely. I believe it's quite unlikely that it is related since radiation don't cause leukemia that fast. BTW, this happened in 2015 so your reference is a bit old.

 

[nikkkom]

Coal is not your main competition.
Solar power reports for 2016 are out.

Total installed generation worldwide: 302 GW
Installed in 2016: 75 GW (13 GW in US)
Fraction of total worldwide electricity production: 1.8% (in US: 1.3%)
Best performing modules are based on mono-crystalline silicon with ~23% efficiency

 

[RogueOne]

Coal is not your main competition.
Solar power reports for 2016 are out.

Total installed generation worldwide: 302 GW
Installed in 2016: 75 GW (13 GW in US)
Fraction of total worldwide electricity production: 1.8% (in US: 1.3%)
Best performing modules are based on mono-crystalline silicon with ~23% efficiency

Installs appear to be high in 2016. How were solar panel sales in 2016? Are these companies expanding and selling more? That market, historically, has been propped up by subsidies. I sense a potential for abrupt correction in that market.

 

[nikkkom]

Federal tax credit of 30%, expired December 31, 2016.
This caused a surge in installations to be finished (or "finished" as far as paperwork is concerned) by that date.

 

[russ_watters]

Coal is not your main competition.
Solar power reports for 2016 are out.

Total installed generation worldwide: 302 GW
Installed in 2016: 75 GW (13 GW in US)
Fraction of total worldwide electricity production: 1.8% (in US: 1.3%)
Best performing modules are based on mono-crystalline silicon with ~23% efficiency

Why do you think those facts support your thesis? They appear to me to be unconnected.

 

[nikkkom]

Most of the new generation in the US in 2016 is solar PV.
Close second is natural gas.
Next place is wind generation.
Nuclear added 1.1 GW (Watts Bar 2).
Coal seems to have added approximately nothing.

 

[mfb]

Most of the new generation in the US in 2016 is solar PV.

And it is still a tiny fraction of the overall electricity production. If we scale the 1.8% to what was installed in 2016, we get 0.45% (this is not exactly true as the generation per installed kW depends on the location where it is installed). If the solar cells last 30 years and the world keeps installing 75 GW per year and just replacing everything else, we would get a long-term contribution of 10-13% solar power, achieved by 2047.

The rate of new photovoltaic installations has to increase massively if they are supposed to replace coal or nuclear power. The storage problem will increase with more solar power.

 

[nikkkom]

And it is still a tiny fraction of the overall electricity production. If we scale the 1.8% to what was installed in 2016, we get 0.45% (this is not exactly true as the generation per installed kW depends on the location where it is installed). If the solar cells last 30 years and the world keeps installing 75 GW per year and just replacing everything else, we would get a long-term contribution of 10-13% solar power, achieved by 2047.

Would you try imagining that world would not keep installing 75 GW per year, but would install more? That is the trend in the past.

 

[russ_watters]

Most of the new generation in the US in 2016 is solar PV.
Close second is natural gas.
Next place is wind generation.
Nuclear added 1.1 GW (Watts Bar 2).
Coal seems to have added approximately nothing.

...ok, but your thesis was:

Coal is not your main competition.
Solar...

So, a couple of things:
1. Looking back a decade and further in the USA, it has been true since the dawn of nuclear power that coal and nuclear were the biggest baseload components of electrical generation, and they were essentially an either-or choice.
2. Looking back 10 years and forward for probably the next 10-20, the situation is different, with coal and natural gas fighting each other for production.

To the point, though: "competition" and "new generation capacity" don't appear to me to be synonomous (even if we set aside the disingenous nature of comparing something with a capacity factor of 20% to something else at 90%!). To me, competition is based on how much each produces because that's how each can actually impact the other (swinging prices by supply and demand). And as mfb said, at least for the US, solar power is still just a minor blip. If you look at graphs of production, you can see how the large sources trade generation back and forth -- but solar doesn't even appear on such graphs because it is too small to see at all.

The facts and claims you provided seem to switch back and forth between capacity and generation, USA and world. And they don't seem to have much to do with each other.

Would you try imagining that world would not keep installing 75 GW per year, but would install more? That is the trend in the past.

One of the signs of irrelevancy is having massive fractional increases in capacity resulting in still not having enough generation to show up on a graph comparing sources by output. It can have massive percentage increases because the actual capacity and output increases are still pretty small. As the actual capacity and output numbers get high enough for solar to become relevant, then the percentage increases will drop. It's already starting to happen, 2016 adds (maybe) notwithstanding.

Another measure of relevance: Solar presents problems for integration into the grid because of its limited availability that depends on mother nature's whims instead of an automatic throttle. Fortunately for solar, though, it is still such a small fraction of our power production that such issues are not relevant yet.

 

[mheslep]

Coal is not your main competition.

Politically, perhaps, as reflected by some of claims in this thread, including that post.

Globally in 2015 108 GW of new coal came online, and 77 GW in 2016 as China slowed. As of January 2017, the combination of all new coal plants either under construction or planned (i.e announced, permitted or pre-permitted) was 842 GW (1597 plants). The statistics indicate about third of these are under-construction, and its typical that many of the plants now in planning will be eventually cancelled. Unsurprisingly China still has the highest total though its slowed, but coal in the next highest half dozen countries (by new coal rank) is expanding rapidly: India, Turkey, Indonesia, Vietnam, Japan, Egypt, Bangladesh. Of course most of these countries don't have renewable portfolio mandates or tax subsidies for intermittent power. No new traditional coal plants are currently under construction in the United States. Multiple sources listedhttp://endcoal.org/global-coal-plant-tracker/methodology/, and aggregated http://endcoal.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Jan-2017-Proposed-by-country-MW.pdf, and http://endcoal.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Jan-2017-Proposed-by-country-units.pdf.

Solar power reports for 2016 are out.

Total installed generation worldwide: 302 GW
Installed in 2016: 75 GW (13 GW in US)
Fraction of total worldwide electricity production: 1.8% (in US: 1.3%)
Best performing modules are based on mono-crystalline silicon with ~23% efficiency

Assuming an annual average solar PV capacity factor of 16%, global solar generation from the cumulative installed solar base was 1.2 TWh/day when available, where as the new coal installed in the single year 2015 would have generated 1.3 TWh/day (assuming 50% capacity factor).

The evolution of solar power in some countries now has a history. Solar is rapidly installed for awhile up to high single digit share of power when subsidized, ~7% Germany 2016, and then slows to a trickle, as it becomes apparent that though some fossil fuel plants throttle back a bit, few of them close as a result, an expensive proposition (Germany 49 GW of coal in 2002, 49 GW of coal in 2017, and German natural gas capacity increased 47% over the same period). Germany even has a new large (1.1 GW) coal plant under construction at Datteln. German CO2 emissions are increasing the last few years.

 

[mheslep]

A look at the countries that have strongly invested in solar for many years indicates the solar trend is hot for awhile and then trickles out as the value of over supplied intermittent falls.

Germany installed solar as fast as 7 GW/yr in 2010, averaged 3 GW/yr for several years. Now they are down to 1.4 GW/yr, with 0.2 GW/yr required for replacement. Spain similarly slowed. California leads the US in new solar installation, but because of the growing daytime solar spike must now ramp up 13 GW of conventional power in three hours as solar fades in the evening, a scenario which is not practical to scale.

Germany still obtains over half generation from fossil fuel and 60% from all combustion. France by contrast pushed fossil fuels from 100% of non-hydro generation to single digit share in a dozen years via nuclear.

 

[Davy_Crockett]

Some discussion above about judgment and risk: “Somebody uncovered evidence of huge tidal waves within recorded history…”

Indeed. As ol' jim reminds us, stone tablets designed as permanent structures and labeling high water marks, detail the levels of previous floods in Japan. These markers, including the record of the similar June 15, 1896 tsunami which killed 26,975 and wounded 5,390 were ignored. Anecdotally, one of the stone markers was specifically where the most recent tsunami damage topped out.

I like the point that there is “group think” just as there is “group denial.” A number of sober minded people just blanked on proofing the construction against a repeat of the 1896 tsunami. I attribute this to a human inability to grasp intuitively, large numbers or large time scales.

As a society, we will need to leave similar markers for those centuries in the future, who may attempt to uncover deposits of spent nuclear fuel.

 

[Davy_Crockett]

But to answer your question as I see it: "Pardon my ignorance, but why would nuclear energy be a better option, I hear a lot of fears from the general public of why it is not safe?"

You mean a better option than the wood, coal, oil and natural gas burning...?

Primarily, there are scientists who intuit from their calculations that when all the kindergarteners of today fully mature and take the reins of society, life will be miserable and too hard for them because there will be no wild fish to eat and it will be hard to keep a crop from seed to harvest, and difficult to draw water from the ground in some places. Others places will have too much rain and the rivers will overflow and not go down and the waters will come near to the buildings and streets will flood and not empty.

In decades beyond that, the air will be turbulent and seas will be so stormy that trade and commerce will become intermittent. Fires will start over tens of thousands of hectares together and storms will converge over your country for weeks if not months on end. And it just keeps going like that, growing harder to prosper for generation after generation.

Compared with this, the risks of nuclear bomb proliferation, poisonous places that will exist until the end of time, and the massive costs to build all the power stations needed, is less and nuclear power they say is a better choice.

But better than a low-power lifestyle with a distributed "internet" model of non-combusting renewable power generation? No it would not be a better option.

 

[DrDu]

Pardon my ignorance, but why would nuclear energy be better option, I hear a lot of fears from the general public of why it is not safe?
How would someone convince someones fear about the safety of nuclear power, considering what happened in Japan?

cheers,

When Chernobyl happened, I was in German high school. I built my first Geiger counter and also tried to estimate the radiation dose a baby would get from radioactive iodine in contaminated milk powder.
Some people tried to convince us that with modern western reactors such an accident could never happen.
Now some 30 years after Chernobyl, two different reactors ran into desaster in one of the highest industrialized nations of the world.
So no excuse this time.
We saw the reactors spectacularly blowing up though some people here in the forum will hasten to point out that it wasn't a nuclear explosion but only hydrogen.

At that time, I was working in the field of radiation protection. What stuck me most, was how the accident was handled and the disinformation of the public. For example, Japan has a real-time network to control environmental gamma-dose rate which you normally can watch on-line on internet. However, for the relevant districts it was off-line for weeks and nobody is going to tell me that this was due to the Earth quake or tunami. Even years after the accident, treatment of the contaminated water is a big problem, most of it is handled with plastic gardening hoses and lot of it ended up in the sea. There seemed neither to exist a plan A nor a plan B for nuclear accidents.

When HAYAO mentions that the accident has caused only 2-3 deaths among workers, you should also mention that thousands of people were forced to leave their homes permanently and precious ground has been lost in one of the most densely populated areas on earth.
Furthermore, people from Fukushima are being stigmatized in Japanese society.

This is not mainly a question of technical safety, it is a question of how nuclear energy lost all credibility.

 

[russ_watters]

Some people tried to convince us that with modern western reactors such an accident could never happen.

It can't. But don't misunderstand that to mean people are saying no accident can happen.

Where the rubber meets the road for me is that I live 10 miles from a nuclear plant and when evaluating the likelihood that it could kill me (or leave me homeless), I can't use Fukushima and Chernobyl as examples of the type of accident I might see here. Unfortunately(?), there are no examples of a severity of Fukushima and Chernobyl accident of a type I might see here, so it is very difficult to judge the true risk --- and only possible to accept it is very, very - immeasurably - low.

We saw the reactors spectacularly blowing up though some people here in the forum will hasten to point out that it wasn't a nuclear explosion but only hydrogen.

You don't think the difference is important? I think it is important to point it out because some people appear to have the incorrect understanding that a nuclear explosion is possible.

At that time, I was working in the field of radiation protection. What stuck me most, was how the accident was handled and the disinformation of the public. For example, Japan has a real-time network to control environmental gamma-dose rate which you normally can watch on-line on internet. However, for the relevant districts it was off-line for weeks...

Could you post a link to this system please.

When HAYAO mentions that the accident has caused only 2-3 deaths among workers, you should also mention that thousands of people were forced to leave their homes permanently and precious ground has been lost in one of the most densely populated areas on earth.

That is unlikely to be true, and while a common complaint of nuclear power, it is something people choose to live with for other industrial issues (both accidents and normal operation). So my question would be: why is a higher standard demanded of nuclear power?

This is not mainly a question of technical safety, it is a question of how nuclear energy lost all credibility.

This appears to me to be a symptom of the expectations gap I mentioned earlier in the thread. You believe nuclear should be held to a very high standard (perfection?) and believe it has been promised, so when a failure happens, you decided "nuclear energy lost all credibility" instead of fairly evaluating the accident and the industry in general against other industries. If someone over-promised that is unfortunate, but that should not stop you from pointing a fair and critical eye at the issue.

 

[DrDu]

Could you post a link to this system please.

It was the SPEEDI network, however, the web address has changed and I don't know an actual address:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_monitoring_in_Japan#SPEEDI_Network

 

[DrDu]

It can't. But don't misunderstand that to mean people are saying no accident can happen.

You don't think the difference is important? I think it is important to point it out because some people appear to have the incorrect understanding that a nuclear explosion is possible.

Of course the difference is important, but I personally would have expected the outer containments to resist an explosion of hydrogen.

That is unlikely to be true, and while a common complaint of nuclear power, it is something people choose to live with for other industrial issues (both accidents and normal operation). So my question would be: why is a higher standard demanded of nuclear power?

I don't know of any other civil industry which would have made necessary emergency evacuations of the dimensions of Japan or Chernobyl.

If someone over-promised that is unfortunate, but that should not stop you from pointing a fair and critical eye at the issue.

From Dr. Strangelove:
Muffley:

anger rising General Turgidson, when you instituted the human reliability tests, you assured me there was no possibility of such a thing ever occurring.

Turgidson:

Well I don't think it's quite fair to condemn a whole program because of a single slip up sir.

 

[russ_watters]

Of course the difference is important, but I personally would have expected the outer containments to resist an explosion of hydrogen.

Fair enough, but those appear to be completely separate issues to me. Why did you mention nuclear explosions at all?

I don't know of any other civil industry which would have made necessary emergency evacuations of the dimensions of Japan or Chernobyl.

What? Emergency evacuations are a daily occurrence in all manner of civilian (residential) concerns, industry, government, etc. I can't tell if you are purposely trying to constrain the criteria to include only Fukushima and Chernobyl or just haven't put any thought into this, but please try to keep your eye on the ball.

From Dr. Strangelove:

Dr. Strangelove is an intentionally absurd fictional character. Again: it is not reasonable to respond to unreasonable with unreasonable. Two wrongs do not make a right. More pointedly: it is just as wrong for you to apply unreasonable criteria as it would be for someone else to make an unreasonable claim of safety. You cannot use someone else's unreasonablenees as an excuse for your own.

 

[anorlunda]

Indeed. As ol' jim reminds us, stone tablets designed as permanent structures and labeling high water marks, detail the levels of previous floods in Japan. These markers, including the record of the similar June 15, 1896 tsunami which killed 26,975 and wounded 5,390 were ignored. Anecdotally, one of the stone markers was specifically where the most recent tsunami damage topped out.

I have not followed this whole thread. But I think debating risk aversion strictly in terms of nuclear is misleading.

Reaction the the learned tsunami risk in Japan might have included much more than the nuclear risk, one could argue that the entire coastal regions of Japan should not be populated.

Similarly, it seems only a question of time that California will slide into the ocean. Shouldn't responsible authorities act to depopulate it now? (I say that only partially with tongue in cheek.)

My point is that nuclear risks are small compared to the general risks of natural disasters. If we want to argue for precautionary measures against natural disasters, it should include all possible measures up to and including depopulation.

 

[russ_watters]

I have not followed this whole thread. But I think debating risk aversion strictly in terms of nuclear is misleading.

Reaction the the learned tsunami risk in Japan might have included much more than the nuclear risk, one could argue that the entire coastal regions of Japan should not be populated.

Similarly, it seems only a question of time that California will slide into the ocean. Shouldn't responsible authorities act to depopulate it now? (I say that only partially with tongue in cheek.)

My point is that nuclear risks are small compared to the general risks of natural disasters. If we want to argue for precautionary measures against natural disasters, it should include all possible measures up to and including depopulation.

Agreed! We definitely need to keep our eye on the ball here. I was just thinking that in response to the disaster, shouldn't all buildings - existing and new - in Japan be constructed/upgraded to withstand a 9.0 earthquake and all in a tsunami zone be similarly upgraded if possible or abandoned if not? After all, that's the standard we hold the nuclear plant to and the nuclear plant didn't kill anyone (?) whereas normal buildings/homes/cars killed 15,000 people!

In response to the incident, all nuclear plants in Japan were shut off, presumably due to fear that they might also melt down. Why weren't the cities abandoned for fear the buildings might collapse?

[edit]
Minor quibble on that last part that should be evident from my post: if the concern is leaving a populace displaced, we shouldn't be de-populating but rather forcing *all* structures to be built to withstand the natural disasters. Not that that'll help California, though -- they're screwed.