The Green New Deal

[Belz...]

I doubt insurance companies do cost/benefit analysis based on bad press and movies. I'm pretty sure they have researchers find facts and studies to weigh the factors.

I'm sure you're right on the latter, but those companies are run by people, and they're not immune to public hysteria.

You make plenty of assumptions that are not in evidence. Solar, wind, geothermal are all good alternatives that could very well make up parts of an energy infrastructure along with batteries and a small contribution from fossil fuels.

How are they "good" alternatives? It's absolutely not "in evidence" that batteries can supply half the world in electricity during the night, especially during very hot or cold days, or during weeks where one barely sees the sun through the clouds. It's fantasy. You need a type of power generation that does _not_ rely on the weather.

Coal is dirty, dangerous, contributes to greenhouse effects, and actually puts out a lot of waste that is not only toxic forever, but also radioactive.

I'll take a gander.

In case you find that "harm" or "deaths" is not a proper way to compare these technologies, I'd like you to tell me what standard you'd use for the comparison. If the point of not wanting nuclear because it's risky, then harm absolutely is the only yardstick I can think of.

ETA:

I notice none of these studies include data about solar, wind or geothermal sources

What? Look again. Wiki has the same numbers, and they absolutely include solar and wind.

 

[thaiboxerken]

How are they "good" alternatives? It's absolutely not "in evidence" that batteries can supply half the world in electricity during the night, especially during very hot or cold days, or during weeks where one barely sees the sun through the clouds. It's fantasy. You need a type of power generation that does _not_ rely on the weather.

It is getting better all the time, but as I said, these would all be parts of an infrastructure.

Coal is dirty, dangerous, contributes to greenhouse effects, and actually puts out a lot of waste that is not only toxic forever, but also radioactive.

In case you find that "harm" or "deaths" is not a proper way to compare these technologies, I'd like you to tell me what standard you'd use for the comparison. If the point of not wanting nuclear because it's risky, then harm absolutely is the only yardstick I can think of.

Environmental risks and economic risks are major factors as well. Nuclear is very costly and accidents are always paid for by the public.

I could be on board with nuclear power but only if it was owned and operated by the public. The Navy has the safest and most reliable nuclear program out there and if nuclear power plants were run in the same way, I think it would be fine.

 

[Belz...]

It is getting better all the time, but as I said, these would all be parts of an infrastructure.

But you can't assume that it'll keep improving until we hit the point where they're coincidentally just as good as you would want them to be.

Environmental risks and economic risks are major factors as well. Nuclear is very costly and accidents are always paid for by the public.

Yes but that's taken into consideration.

As for environmental impact, consider this: wind and solar require a LOT of rare earth mining, which is very destructive to local environments. I'm not sure there is enough of this stuff accessible on Earth to fill all our power needs, to say nothing about the waste of iron and copper, transportation, repair and replacement, waste, etc.

Nuclear still has a smaller footprint. Think of it as planes vs cars: more people die in car accidents and planes are much safer, but a single crashed 747 makes the news. It's shocking, just like a single nuke going up. But it doesn't change the fact that the damned things are safer than the alternatives.

I could be on board with nuclear power but only if it was owned and operated by the public. The Navy has the safest and most reliable nuclear program out there and if nuclear power plants were run in the same way, I think it would be fine.

I can agree to that. And in addition, we could invest in _other_ nuclear technologies that were not developed but that could result in safer and cheaper plants. But I don't think dismissing fission is a good idea. We need the electricity, and at this point there is no clean alternative that will do the job fully.

 

[Eddie Dane]

I could be on board with nuclear power but only if it was owned and operated by the public. The Navy has the safest and most reliable nuclear program out there and if nuclear power plants were run in the same way, I think it would be fine.

I strongly agree with this.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

In my natural resources department, maybe. But even with our own students, those from ranching backgrounds have a real tough time convincing their dads, uncles, and grandpas to try anything new that's suggested by their liberal*, environmentalist*, college graduate* kid.

*these terms all pejoratives

Meanwhile, there are entire departments in our college force-feeding even bigger classes of students to buy/sell pesticides/fertilizers out the ying-yang, 'cause that's how you raise cows. Getting these folks even acknowledge climate science out loud is a tough sell, because they equate it with being a libtard* and that's the worst thing a person can be.

Well I do agree being a libtard* is the worst thing a human being can be, but I haven't seen anywhere near the push back as you describe. And I am out there talking to other farmers and ranchers all the time.

But then around here is a sort of cultural memory of the dust bowl. I try to use that cultural memory to my advantage and when I talk about atmospheric carbon that belongs in the soil being put back where it belongs, it immediately strikes a chord and gets them listening.

*Dictionary result for libtard
/ˈlibˌtärd/
noun INFORMAL•OFFENSIVE

1. a contemptuous term for the worst thing a person with left-wing political views can be.

 

[JoeMorgue]

I could be on board with nuclear power but only if it was owned and operated by the public. The Navy has the safest and most reliable nuclear program out there and if nuclear power plants were run in the same way, I think it would be fine.

*Laughs* I don't know if the world can survive another Rickover.

But seriously I agree with you. If the Navy can get 18 year olds to run reactors on an E-4's pay with a safety record like they have on a time frame like they've had in an environment like they run it in, we shouldn't have to keep pandering to the lamb bleating "But is it safe?" crowd.

By every possible metric nuclear power is our best bet.

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

Nobody said that nuclear power plants are harmless or risk-free. You're both responding to an argument I didn't make.

Excuse me, I wasn't correcting your argument. I was correcting your big fat lie about a very important fact.

The same is true from Fukushima, which is stated in Yuppy's own links.

And absolute everything you've said is responding to an argument I didn't make. Jesus, way to double down.

 

[Belz...]

Excuse me, I wasn't correcting your argument. I was correcting your big fat lie about a very important fact.

I didn't lie, so clearly you're mistaken. Maybe you should've read your link before posting it.

And absolute everything you've said is responding to an argument I didn't make.

What are you talking about? I pointed out that your link indicated that the number of deaths is an extrapolation in the future; and one based on ignorance. No one actually died.

Can you address any of that?

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

I didn't lie, so clearly you're mistaken. Maybe you should've read your link before posting it.

What are you talking about? I pointed out that your link indicated that the number of deaths is an extrapolation in the future; and one based on ignorance. No one actually died.

Can you address any of that?

It's already freaking addressed. I cited two articles from both ends of the spectrum of accepted opinion. Even the lower one cites a thousand deaths.

And I see no possible way to interpret my figure as an "extrapolation in to the future". And what the hell would that mean anyway? Since 8 years of "future" have happened certainly some of those extrapolated deaths would have happened by now. And it doesn't freaking matter since the figures cited weren't an extrapolation anyway.

 

[Belz...]

It's already freaking addressed. I cited two articles from both ends of the spectrum of accepted opinion. Even the lower one cites a thousand deaths.

And I see no possible way to interpret my figure as an "extrapolation in to the future". And what the hell would that mean anyway?

I've already explained it.

We have very little data on the effect of low-levels of radiation on human health. We know that strong exposure kills at a certain rate of additional cancer, but below a certain point, we don't know much. For Chernobyl, for instance, the estimate of several thousands simply assumed that the 'curve' could be extrapolated down to those levels and made an estimate. That's silly, if you ask me, but that's what happened. From your own links I suspect that this is what they did for Fukushima as well.

Now we know _for sure_ that a good 50 people died from the effects of Chernobyl, and it's no laughing matter, especially given that the area is uninhabitable even 30+ years later. However, keep in mind that this reactor was possibly the worst functional design you could ever imagine, and I've said in the past that if the Soviets wanted Chernobyl to blow up and kill people, they couldn't have done a better job of it.

So is it possible that thousands will die because of that incident? Yes. Is it known with any sort of certainty? No. If one wants to argue from ignorance then they are free to use the extrapolation, but I'd rather work with more certain facts, and those facts don't support those numbers, because we simply don't know what the impact will be. That doesn't mean that I can categorically state that only 50 people will have died as a result, but it does mean that I can categorically state that only 50 people are KNOWN to have died as a result.

Fukushima's story's even milder, since the release of radioactive materials into the environment was, comparatively, minimal.

 

[varwoche]

Although I agree with you that we are way overusing fertilizers* there are plenty of idiot neo-Luddites out there blithely spending big $$$ to degrade their land that way. ...

Well I do agree being a libtard* is the worst thing a human being can be, but I haven't seen anywhere near the push back as you describe. And I am out there talking to other farmers and ranchers all the time...

*Dictionary result for libtard
/ˈlibˌtärd/
noun INFORMAL•OFFENSIVE

1. a contemptuous term for the worst thing a person with left-wing political views can be.

@Red Baron Farms Let's see, insofar as citations, we have the fertilizer industry. And we have your anecdotes about farmers.

Neither of which are poster children for a liberal demographic. Can we agree on that?

♫ At farmers only dot com! ♫

And yet the gratuitous insult. Did you get that from Dale Carnagie?

 

[Ziggurat]

I'm sure you're right on the latter, but those companies are run by people, and they're not immune to public hysteria.

Probably even more importantly from an insurance perspective, juries are not immune to public hysteria.

 

[Ziggurat]

However, keep in mind that this reactor was possibly the worst functional design you could ever imagine, and I've said in the past that if the Soviets wanted Chernobyl to blow up and kill people, they couldn't have done a better job of it.

And not just in the design, let it be said. The operators couldn't have done any better if they had intentionally wanted to blow it up either. It's really stunning how badly they fumbled things.

Even assuming some American operators similarly did every possible thing wrong, a US reactor is not physically capable of blowing up like Chernobyl did.

 

[Belz...]

And not just in the design, let it be said. The operators couldn't have done any better if they had intentionally wanted to blow it up either. It's really stunning how badly they fumbled things.

It's also worth mentioning that it was the night crew. They weren't even supposed to be doing that test.

 

[Wayward son]

Nuclear power is too risky on several levels, so risky that it is not insurable.That is a very big reason to phase out that technology.

The insurance issue is mostly because of perception which, as I said, is mainly based on a single high-profile accident, and lots of propaganda in the form of bad movies and bad reporting.

I doubt insurance companies do cost/benefit analysis based on bad press and movies. I'm pretty sure they have researchers find facts and studies to weigh the factors.

I'm sure you're right on the latter, but those companies are run by people, and they're not immune to public hysteria.

This is a lot of debate over an initial claim that is a complete lie. A complete lie that is spread by every anti-nuclear activist. Of course if anti-nuclear activists stopped spreading lies they would have nothing left. Lying anti-nuclear activists should ask themselves why they need to tell lies, but they won't. They will just continue lying and lying and lying.

If there is a major oil spill - like say Deep Water Horizon, their liability tops out at 75 million. The public was on the hook for the additional 1.5+ billion (This happens all the time - still they don't require coverage to properly cover catastrophic events). A hydro dam fails and causes billions in damages and the public is on the hook for most of it (This has happened in the US - still they don't need proper coverage). Chemical company explosion? Good luck on that one. The nuclear industry carries 10 billion in insurance - through private commercial insurance companies despite the lie that is always spread - 50 times more than it has paid out total. Activists claim that essentially the only major industry that is actually covered for catastrophic events - not only isn't covered, but can't be covered. And they claim that insurance companies refuse to cover the nuclear industry, when in reality they love to cover it because it is easy money. And they do all this lying with complete confidence.

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

So is it possible that thousands will die because of that incident? Yes. Is it known with any sort of certainty? No.

A thousand people DID die.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Probably even more importantly from an insurance perspective, juries are not immune to public hysteria.

Case in point; the number of things that cause cancer... but only in California.

"Legal Precedents" are not facts.

 

[JoeMorgue]

More than a thousand dead and more than 100K evacuated.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/inform...rity/safety-of-plants/fukushima-accident.aspx

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


It's difficult to distinguish an exact list of deaths cause by the earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear accident but I can't find any source that attributes less then a thousand deaths to the nuclear accident.

Oh what kind of fear mongering nonsense is this?

By that logic if I trip and break my neck running away from a ghost that doesn't exist, the ghost killed me.

You can't count people who died evacuating against the things "death total."

1 person, tragically, died. But that person was an absolute worst case scenario inside another absolute worst case scenario. Perspective has to be kept.

 

[JoeMorgue]

A thousand people DID die.

In the same sense that people who drive to their destination instead of fly because they think flying is more dangerous than driving and wind up killed in traffic accidents count toward "Air travel deaths" sure.

 

[Belz...]

A thousand people DID die.

From Chernobyl? No. You cannot say that with any degree of certainty. I've already explained to you how that number was derived.

It would be nice if, rather than insist that you're correct, you addressed the points I've made. You know, discussing the issue.