Skeptics and nuclear power

[wobs]

That’s only immediate deaths due to acute radiation poisoning. The WHO has estimated the final number will be ~4000 once you factor in higher cancer death rates among people who lived near the reactor.

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2005/pr38/en/

Current estimates disagree, owing to a better understanding of low level radiation. In fact, the greatest risks for the population was for the first responders and kids in the local area. These have been closely monitored.

The best estimate puts it nearer 100 deaths in the long term, at worst.

 

[bobdroege7]

I also declined to answer, because it's too complicated.

There is a lot of oversimplification on this topic.

For one, anywhere there is a measureable amount of uranium, or any other element with a higher atomic number, there is spontaneous fission going on. So to say there is no fission occurring in the Chernobyl ruin is not correct.

All radiation is not the same, different isotopes have vastly different hazards.

The biggest hazard with a modern nuke plant is financial, the costs with Fukushima are mostly cleanup and loss of use of land use. You tie up a lot of money in building a plant before you get a return on the money. Nuclear wasn't competitive with natural gas when it would have been prudent to build a large fleet.

Now solar and wind are price competitive.

 

[Belz...]

That’s only immediate deaths due to acute radiation poisoning. The WHO has estimated the final number will be ~4000 once you factor in higher cancer death rates among people who lived near the reactor.

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2005/pr38/en/

We've already addressed that estimate in this thread. They extrapolated from higher exposures to lower ones and assumed a linear progression. Data doesn't support that extrapolation.

 

[Belz...]

The biggest hazard with a modern nuke plant is financial, the costs with Fukushima are mostly cleanup and loss of use of land use. You tie up a lot of money in building a plant before you get a return on the money. Nuclear wasn't competitive with natural gas when it would have been prudent to build a large fleet.

Part of the cost problem is due to regulation, which in the case of nuclear might be a little over the top.

Now solar and wind are price competitive.

But is it because of subsidies?

 

[bobdroege7]

Part of the cost problem is due to regulation, which in the case of nuclear might be a little over the top.

But if the operators of Fukushima had installed the safety related systems required in the US post Three Mile Island and properly housed their diesel generators there would not have been core meltdowns and explosions due to hydrogen build up from the zircaloy water reaction.

Sorry but the case that Nuclear is over-regulated is hard to make.

 

[bobdroege7]

But is it because of subsidies?

Against fossil fuels, one is measured in trillions and the other in billions.

 

[Crossbow]

I voted "Skeptic and against nuclear power" because there is no good solution for dealing with the nuclear waste.

While all forms of power production have waste disposal problems, the problems of nuclear waster disposal are quite difficult (to put it mildly) to deal with.

 

[Dr.Sid]

But if the operators of Fukushima had installed the safety related systems required in the US post Three Mile Island and properly housed their diesel generators there would not have been core meltdowns and explosions due to hydrogen build up from the zircaloy water reaction.

Sorry but the case that Nuclear is over-regulated is hard to make.

It's not over-regulated .. but most of the price of the nuclear power plant is due to safety concerns. If there was technology, which were inherently more safe in the beginning, it would be lot cheaper. Like molten salts reactor, or other experimental designs. There is still lot room for development in nuclear power.
But without government support it wont happen. Look what government support did to solar and wind, and it actually allowed nuclear to be developed in the first place. But solar and wind cannot replace coal.
It's not enough, it's not constant enough, it' not dependable enough. It's welcomed addition, and especially with local use it's priceless .. but it can't completely replace coal .. and in Germany new gas plants are built with the renewable sources, to back them up. Yes, it's 2017 and we are building new CO2 producing power plants.
Also electric cars will mostly need power over night .. solar won't help. And the power demands will be huge.

 

[Belz...]

Against fossil fuels, one is measured in trillions and the other in billions.

Is that a "yes"?

But if the operators of Fukushima had installed the safety related systems required in the US post Three Mile Island and properly housed their diesel generators there would not have been core meltdowns and explosions due to hydrogen build up from the zircaloy water reaction.

Sorry but the case that Nuclear is over-regulated is hard to make.

I'm sorry, but how do you get from the first sentence to the second?

 

[lomiller]

We've already addressed that estimate in this thread. They extrapolated from higher exposures to lower ones and assumed a linear progression. Data doesn't support that extrapolation.

The WHO estimate isn’t based on radiation dose it’s based off observed increase in cancer rates among people who lived near Chernobyl.

 

[ahhell]

Against fossil fuels, one is measured in trillions and the other in billions.

How much of that difference is that just a matter of the size of the industry. I've seen a lot of big numbers for how much fossil fuels are subsidized but a lot of it seems to be the sort of subsidizes all businesses get. Tax right offs and what not.

 

[lomiller]

It's not over-regulated .. but most of the price of the nuclear power plant is due to safety concerns. If there was technology, which were inherently more safe in the beginning, it would be lot cheaper. Like molten salts reactor, or other experimental designs. There is still lot room for development in nuclear power.

Most of the cost is actually related to the length of time it takes to get a plant up and running. You are spending a lot of money for up to a decade before you see any return which results in large financing costs that can more than double the cost of the project.

 

[macdoc]

and in Germany new gas plants are built with the renewable sources, to back them up.

You have that entirely backwards. The gas plants because of their rapid spin up time are backups for renewables.
Soon they will be replaced by battery as in South Australia.

Nuclear is not cost competitive currently on new builds.

 

[Belz...]

The WHO estimate isn’t based on radiation dose it’s based off observed increase in cancer rates among people who lived near Chernobyl.

Then what am I thinking about? There's an oft-cited estimate of thousands of deaths which is definitely based on that calculation.

 

[The Great Zaganza]

Currently, nuclear power is subsidized in the US under the guise of"carbon offset" - otherwise most plants would have to shut down.
There are incentive programs for installing solar panels, but that's for the private market, not big solar parks.

 

[wobs]

- and the waste just multiplies, with no solution in sight.

Why do you and others keep saying this, when there is already a facility in existence to deal with this waste?

In fact there are many such facilities in various states of development, but the one in Finland is the most developed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onkalo_spent_nuclear_fuel_repository

In fact, it would be better if they didn't use this yet, and reprocess the spent fuel, as this would render the final waste less harmful, and its radioactivity would drop below that of uranium ore in under 1000 years. In some instances, it would be 300 years.

Basically, the spent fuel is a non-issue when it comes to disposal.

 

[Belz...]

Basically, the spent fuel is a non-issue when it comes to disposal.

It's an issue. It's just mostly a political one.

 

[lomiller]

Then what am I thinking about? There's an oft-cited estimate of thousands of deaths which is definitely based on that calculation.

There are some really big numbers (100 000+) generated using the tiny increase in radiation dose over the population of Europe.

Further to cancer rates. It does look like some cancer rate increases are disputed (no necessarily refuted). As of 2006 there were ~6000 cases of Thyroid Cancer, mostly among people who were children at the time, directly attributed to Chernobyl. This seems to be generally agreed on.

 

[Dr.Sid]

There are some really big numbers (100 000+) generated using the tiny increase in radiation dose over the population of Europe.

Further to cancer rates. It does look like some cancer rate increases are disputed (no necessarily refuted). As of 2006 there were ~6000 cases of Thyroid Cancer, mostly among people who were children at the time, directly attributed to Chernobyl. This seems to be generally agreed on.

That is agreed on. What's not agreed on is if this is increase or not. Such detailed screening upon such large population was not made anywhere else (to this day). So there is nothing to compare the data to. Thyroid cancer does not lead to death, and most of the time it's not diagnosed at all.
Long term effect are really hard to prove .. we are talking about several percent of change of getting a disease decades later.

Even survivor of median lethal dose has only 10-25% chance of developing cancer during his lifetime. But then cancer is tight more to what specific isotope you were exposed to, or if and how it did deposit in your body, what kind of radiation it is .. it's not just about the dose of ionizing radiation.

To prove effects on cancer for small dose exposure you need tens of thousands of affected people. In other words, it cannot be done artificially. These data must be based on disasters .. and unfortunately there were only few so far. I mean unfortunately from a scientific point

 

[Belz...]

There are some really big numbers (100 000+) generated using the tiny increase in radiation dose over the population of Europe.

Further to cancer rates. It does look like some cancer rate increases are disputed (no necessarily refuted). As of 2006 there were ~6000 cases of Thyroid Cancer, mostly among people who were children at the time, directly attributed to Chernobyl. This seems to be generally agreed on.

How many cases would be otherwise expected?