@kravietz Nuclear power is guaranteed destruction as well… Creating nuclear waste lasting for centuries and other than CO2, we don't even have a remote idea on how to get rid of it.

And no, hiding it in the ground is not a great answer as all temporary depots have shown.

I think we have to come up with better solutions there.

@sheogorath @kravietz What nonsense. Long-living nuclear waste is only created in the countries that don't have the full cycle nuclear energy. Spent fuel can be reprocessed and the remainder is a bunch of short-lived isotopes. This cycle also uses fuel many times more efficiently. It's only a choice made by the governments.

@pro @kravietz Do you have an example for a country which runs a "full cycle" for nuclear power?

@sheogorath @kravietz France does full cycle. USSR had the technology and utilized it, but they were notoriously environmentally irresponsible in general, so they still produced long-lived waste.

@pro @kravietz So, I just spend some time reading about full cycle nuclear power strategy and the first thing that sticks out is: Even for the "little" amount of nuclear waste that France produces, it has no final destination.

And another point I came across, due to the "statistics being an asshole the risk of an incident increases drastically with every new power plant, The incidents of Fukushima and Chernobyl were no exceptions, they were statically "expectable".

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/00963402.2016.1145910

@sheogorath @kravietz Oh puleeeeze. Coal, wind, and solar kill way more people than nuclear. It's laughable.

@pro @kravietz I don't know of any coal, wind or solar energy incident, that made it impossible for humans to live in an area as big as Chernobyl.

I mean if you want to live with the risk, fine, go ahead. But please somewhere not even remotely close to me? like further away than Chernobyl, because we still had their nuclear cloud over here and are still recommended to not collect mushrooms in the forest, due to this nonsense.

@sheogorath @pro Here are some case studies of fatal accidents in solar industry https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CCDPHP/DEODC/OHB/FACE/Pages/Solar.aspx

And obviously, we should not panic around that because *every* human activity can potentially result in harm and death. Keeping them safe is a task for healt & safety. The problem is that accidents in nuclear industry are singled out and presented as something immensely dangerous and deadly, when they are not.

@kravietz @pro I think the major difference is 1st party impact vs 3rd party impact.

The number of people that are at least subject of a nuclear incident is by a magnitude of hundred thousands when not millions higher than the number of even hundreds of solar or wind industry incidents.

https://www.who.int/ionizing_radiation/chernobyl/backgrounder/en/
https://www.who.int/ionizing_radiation/a_e/fukushima/faqs-fukushima/en/

And we can safely expect another incident within the next 15-20 years.

@sheogorath @pro

> than the number of even hundreds of solar or wind industry incidents

But not hydro incidents, right?

In a few recent years there were further dam failures in Brazil and in Russia.

They killed ~200 people.

Have you ever heard about them?

@kravietz @pro True, those can happen, and they do happen, but considering the environmental impact and the regulations that those project have regarding cleanness of water in Europe mean even the worst incident won't cause a wasteland. Like with a Tsunami people will die, people will flee but as soon as it's over they will come back and start living there. That not so much the case directly around Chernobyl or Fukushima even after decontamination.

@sheogorath @pro

This is precisely engineers do comparisons such as this one to objectively compare mortality of various energy sources against a normalised units.

@kravietz @pro What they don't calculate: Area destroyed by incidents, which is the major problem I'm pointing out.

The problem with nuclear power are not direct death numbers, but the long term environmental impact. From deformities, to reduced life expectations to no longer usable land areas. I'm not sure which study you are quoting, but I don't expect them to calculate those impacts in there.

@sheogorath @pro

This is all covered by medical research after nuclear accidents. In case of Fukushima there was 1 fatality, in case of Chernobyl - 200 (over 20 years). All that included cancer, early death, birth defects etc.

In many cases suspicious diseases are blamed on nuclear without conclusive evidence, as it was with a spike of leukemia near Sellafield nuclear processing plant in UK back in 80's. Media were quick to jump to conclusion that the plant is KILLING OUR CHILDREN!!! etc

@kravietz @pro The WHO talks about slightly different number around a few thousand that are impacted in form of cancer but with no clear diagnose whenever this is caused directly due to radiation of due to bad lifestyle. (That's the ugly thing about radiation)

And a lot of cancer cases were solvable by surgery but people have to take meds for their entire life. The mortality itself is not really the full picture of the problem with nuclear power, as I mentioned before.

https://www.who.int/ionizing_radiation/chernobyl/backgrounder/en/

@sheogorath

And is it a full picture with coal? This is why it's important to compare objectively rather than single out one industry.

@pro

@kravietz @pro Keep in mind, I'm not advocating for more coal. I'm talking about reducing coal as well. Renewable energy is what I'm advocating for.

When it comes to coal, we also have the whole mining process, which has a huge and negative impact on the environment. But even there I consider the impact of those things lower than the impact of a nuclear power plant incident in Germany. Be it due to natural disaster or human error.

What we need to do is getting this Bureaucracy sorted out.

@kravietz @pro Anyway, it was definitely an interesting discussion we had. I really enjoyed it. Even when it just made me even less certain about the world wide usage of nuclear power. The MIT even suggests that there are 4 major incidents in the timespan from 2004 to 2053 (and at least 1 with Fukushima was there).

It's a weird piece of technology. As someone who hates gambling, not really my world. Still hope we can all figure this energy/environment problem out together quite soon :)

@sheogorath @kravietz The real issue is that solar is junk from EROEI standpoint, while wind is a plain hoax (no matter what lies the German media posts about it). Wind cannot even produce enough energy to re-create itself twice, and solar can do 5 at the most. So neither of them can support a civilization that has computers and dentistry. In short, there is no alternative to nuclear, even if we had to store nuclear waste -- which you now know only needs to happen for a small fraction of the used fuel. Even if we had a Chernobyl every 10 years, there's NO ALTERNATIVE. What's so damned hard to understand about it?

People are too used to magical thinking about the forces of market and science and they expect improvements in solar to narrow the gap to oil's EROEI of 30 (as I mentioned, wind is a hoax and we don't even need to consider it). I'm just going to tell you right here that it cannot happen.

Remember that making solar practical for supplying the grid by buffering it with energy storage actually tanks its EROEI.

@pro

Can you provide references for wind & solar power consumption at - I guess - manufacturing phase and EROEI? Obviously, in discussions about German energy policy these are rarely raised...

@sheogorath

@kravietz @pro at least this study doesn't seem to support the indicated statement: https://festkoerper-kernphysik.de/Weissbach_EROI_preprint.pdf

And similar studies I got through a quick scan using google scholar, don't suggest anything else either. There is a positive EOREI in wind energy, it's just not as big as other renewable energy sources and way below fossil fuels. But that's no surprise.

@sheogorath @pro

Looking at real world examples: Rampion off-shore wind farm in UK has 116 towers that occupy 70 km2 (!) and has nominal output of 700MW. In case of off-shore wind, that can be utilised up to 40% due to intermittency.

Nearby Dungeness nuclear power plant has just one block of 600MW that can be utilised up to 95% and occupies maybe 1 km2.

This, in my opinion, is a huge difference...