• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Merged nuclear power safe?

This was a terrible evening of tv watching.

My wife eats that crap up, and she is really emotional about it too becuase she is from Bavaria which experienced a major nuke scare during Chernobyl.

The whole evening was jam packed with deformed children, Chernobyl, failing reactors, lists of security failures etc etc
And not one counter voice.

I am not surprised people are scared witless.

If it wasn't for this forum I'd think that a massive radioactive cloud was on its way to Tokyo.

We can scold the general public for being uninformed, but what can they do?
State tv is misinforming them on their own tax money.

If yxou had watched the program, you'd think that the only pro nuclear people are greedy , lying politicians.

They even had a medical segment with a radiation dermatologist explaining the devestating effects of radiation on the skin.
He analised photos of - you guessed it- victims of the Chernobyl disaster.
 
Buckaroo said:
I'm usually a champion of NPR as a news source but their reporting on this story (at least on Morning Edition and All Things Considered) has been appallingly bad, spreading all kinds of misinformation, though I don't necessarily think its deliberate. It's just sloppy. I'm considering sending a nastygram to Richard Harris in particular, for his sky-is-falling reporting on M.E.

I think you can safely ignore what they say on the subject.
Click to expand...

Their constant reference to it as a "nuclear disaster" was fairly grating as well.
 
Buckaroo said:
I'm usually a champion of NPR as a news source but their reporting on this story (at least on Morning Edition and All Things Considered) has been appallingly bad, spreading all kinds of misinformation, though I don't necessarily think its deliberate. It's just sloppy. I'm considering sending a nastygram to Richard Harris in particular, for his sky-is-falling reporting on M.E.

I think you can safely ignore what they say on the subject.
Click to expand...

I've been sick and working from home, so I haven't been listening to NPR during my commute. What does the story to which I linked get wrong? What does it get right? What are the best and worst case scenarios? What is the most likely scenario?

From my non-expert perspective, things seem to have gotten worse in the last 24 hours or so. Prior to this, some obviously knowledgeable folk were often commenting here and elsewhere. With their input, my overall assessment was that most damage would be financial and brand related. From my non-expert perspective, things now appear different, so I should update my assessment.

What do the fires mean? About what should we be reasonably worried? About what should we not worry? I'd do more research on my own, but this is well beyond my field, I'm sick, and I'm trying to stay productive working from home so I don't have to burn my precious PTO.
 
bobdroege7 said:
Check out the chart

http://bravenewclimate.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/tepco_status_4.jpg
Click to expand...
It says 400 mS beside Unit 3. Without additional information, this data is nearly useless. Given only this information and your training (I was class 8401 in Orlando) how would you make a decision whether or not to work in the vicinity of Unit 3 and what precautions you would take?

While these levels are high, the precautions that most people would take to reduce exposure are simple. Stay away from it, far away, like outside of the fence. :)

Ranb
 
Last edited:
Christian Klippel said:
Wow, it seems that we, and especially MattusMaximus, stepped massively onto Greg Laden's toes.

He's doing quite a bit of complaining here.

Greetings,

Chris
Click to expand...

Dunning--Kruger....Greg didn't even attempt to correct any errors and just launched the typical--holier than the FSM--ad hom. There is a big difference between opinion and facts on this issue. He is just sooooooooo predictable.
 
pipelineaudio said:
whats greg laden's handle on here? Or where was it they stepped on his toes?
Click to expand...

Well, that's what he fails to explain, of course. However, JREF is mentioned twice in his blog posting:

The funny thing is, as these comments have come in on my blog (and at JREF and other fora) specifically explaining how Greg Laden Haz It Rong!!!
Click to expand...

Once again, the JREF forum has produced something other than thoughtful deliberation. Once again I and others are being told to shut up or worse, to say specific things and not say other things, or risk being labeled as pariah in the skeptical community.
Click to expand...

So, there clearly must have been something that we did that upsets him. But he won't tell, just complain about it.

On the bright side, comments #13 and #16 bring some perspective into the overall situation regarding risks and pollution from nuclear vs. coal plants.

Greetings,

Chris
 
Skwinty said:
Nonsense, once the fuel has spent sufficient time in the spent fuel pool, it can be boxed up and kept in dry storage with very little radiation emanating from the box.

It can then be loaded onto trucks, trains or planes and shipped anywhere.
Click to expand...

You are apparently unaware of the huge protest movement against moving nuclear stuff that erupted in the USA back in the 90's. They wanted to move spent fuel in special reinforced train cars which the activists dubbed "Death Trains" and then proceeded to march on the tracks preventing them from moving. Eventually they agreed to just keep the stuff in storage on site.
 
Ranb said:
It says 400 mS beside Unit 3. Without additional information, this data is nearly useless. Given only this information and your training (I was class 8401 in Orlando) how would you make a decision whether or not to work in the vicinity of Unit 3 and what precautions you would take?

While these levels are high, the precautions that most people would take to reduce exposure are simple. Stay away from it, far away, like outside of the fence. :)

Ranb
Click to expand...


It would be worth working for an hour there if it would result in restoring MW levels of electrical power.

It seems to me that using fire pump to pump borated water into the reactor vessel is only doing something to be doing something. They need thousands of gallons per minute flowing into the reactor, not the measly output of the pumps they are using.
 
Travis said:
You are apparently unaware of the huge protest movement against moving nuclear stuff that erupted in the USA back in the 90's. They wanted to move spent fuel in special reinforced train cars which the activists dubbed "Death Trains" and then proceeded to march on the tracks preventing them from moving. Eventually they agreed to just keep the stuff in storage on site.
Click to expand...

In spite of;


 
Travis said:
You are apparently unaware of the huge protest movement against moving nuclear stuff that erupted in the USA back in the 90's. They wanted to move spent fuel in special reinforced train cars which the activists dubbed "Death Trains" and then proceeded to march on the tracks preventing them from moving. Eventually they agreed to just keep the stuff in storage on site.
Click to expand...

What? They marched on the tracks? How cute!

Look what they do over here. These and these images are from February this year. And we have that every time the Castor trains roll.

Klick through the image galleries there.

Yes, they tied themselves to the tracks in a way that they actually had to cut the tracks to get these people away.

Marching on the tracks ... Pff ... What a bunch of beginners :D

Greetings,

Chris

Edit: And yeah, thanks to such people the spent fuel has to be stored on-site, usually on or above ground level, instead of being burried in a mountain or somewhere. Makes it sooooo much safer. Not.
 
Last edited:
bobdroege7 said:
Those hydrogen explosions that have been on the news and TEPCO admitting that the core water level in the three reactors are half full, recovering from dried and half full, indicate to me that this is a full on complete meltdown in all three reactors.

In two of those they are admitting that there is fuel damage and they are venting the containment, which means that we have a continuing uncontrolled release of fission products to the atmosphere.
Click to expand...
There are very brief moments in my life when I wish that the internet was just turned off - reading your post was one of them.
 
Christian Klippel said:
Edit: And yeah, thanks to such people the spent fuel has to be stored on-site, usually on or above ground level, instead of being burried in a mountain or somewhere. Makes it sooooo much safer. Not.
Click to expand...

Who's spinning rubbish now? "Such people" have got absolutely nothing to do with why the Japanese keep spent fuel on-site.

Correct me if I'm wrong.
 
Last edited:
armageddonman said:
I'm ashamed of being German these days.

German politians are claiming that this will bring the end of nuclear power worldwide.

.
Click to expand...

.
Yeah, it is pretty scary to see so many German buying into hysteric woo. Bad historicall precedent. Very Bad.
 
Buckaroo said:
I'm usually a champion of NPR as a news source but their reporting on this story (at least on Morning Edition and All Things Considered) has been appallingly bad, spreading all kinds of misinformation, though I don't necessarily think its deliberate. It's just sloppy. I'm considering sending a nastygram to Richard Harris in particular, for his sky-is-falling reporting on M.E.

I think you can safely ignore what they say on the subject.
Click to expand...

Anderson Cooper on CNN tonight was just as bad.
 
Christian Klippel said:
Also, this is how anti-nuclear people work here in Germany:

1) Complain about nuke power being somewhat subsidized, but never mention that renewable energy is highly subsidized

2) Complain that the operation of nukes costs so much money, but then go ahead making massive protests & demonstrations at, and tie themselves to, the train tracks of the Castor transports. This causes extreme delays in the transport, requires way more police personnel then normally required for that longer time. And last time, the managed to tie them to the tracks in such a way that workers had to actually cut these tracks apart and repair them afterwards.

3) Complain about the fact that there is no suitable terminal storage facility, but actively work against getting one built.

4) Complain about old, unsafe reactors, but force the government to ban companies from building new and safer ones. At the same time this also causes the companies to keep the old ones running even longer, prolonging the risk.


For example,here in Germany, if you have a photo-voltaic system running (solar cells), the energy companies are forced to buy that electricity, and the PV owner gets about 43 Euro-Cent per kilowatt-hour. Regular electricity costs "only" about 13 or 14 Euro-Cent per kW/h. And in that price there is the added premium of 3 or 4 Cents per kW/h included that results from the "Erneuerbare Energien Gesetz (EEG)", which means "renewable energies law".

This means that _everyone_ has to pay a premium to keep that system alive. I'm absolutely sure that if those people who have contracts for getting only renewable energy instead of the regular energy mix, would have to pay the _full_ price, they surely would be the first ones to scream "we want nukes!". After all, that price would be at least 50 to 60 Cent per kW/h, if the PV owners already get 43 Cent....

And they have the balls to complain that nuclear energy is partially subsidized. Hypocrisy at it's finest, i tell you.

Let's not forget that they also want to have electric cars everywhere instead of combustion engines. But somehow they don't spend a minute thinking about where that amount of electricity should come from. Let alone the problems of manufacturing and disposing suitable batteries.

I simply fail to see how all that is supposed to work, and to be achieved, in the long run. Without exception they all completely ignore the energy, material, production, build and space needed to switch to renewable energy completely. For them, wind-parks and solar-panels seem to grow on trees, install themselves, hook themselves up to the grid, and need no space at all. And of course these technologies are obviously able to produce electricity 24/7, regardless of the fact that most of the day there isn't enough sun or wind.

But hey, i'm happy to switch to renewable energy. Bring me a bunch of anti-nuke people and a bunch of stationary bicycles with fat dynamos, and i'm sure i can manage to hook them to my distribution box. Presto, renewable energy!

Greetings,

Chris
Click to expand...

Why is the Anti Nuke movement so much more powerful in Germany then it is in other European countries? Just curious.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom