Methane into the atmosphere in Arctic shelf:

Originally posted by googlefudge
More radioactive materiel has been emitted into the atmosphere (along with
other carcinogens) by all the nuclear disasters (of not nuclear bombs) combined.


Nuclear energy kills fewer people (by far) per Twhr generated than almost any
other energy generation method.

The forecast number of excess cancers caused by fukashima is currently so smal ...[text shortened]... At least not one that
ends up being achieved faster or cheaper than one that includes nuclear.

Too bad the whole fusion thing never took off.

Originally posted by joe beyser
Too bad the whole fusion thing never took off.

It is taking off. Just much slower than initially hoped.

It's a very hard problem to solve.

However it should be noted that having a 5 year plus delay while the countries
working on the problem argued about which country to build the next experimental
reactor in doesn't help.

However there are other designs for fission reactors that eliminate most of the
problems faced by the reactors we have, or had in the past.

Reactors that eat high level waste, reactors that use ALL the fissionable fuel and
not just a fraction of it, reactors that can't melt down or explode... ect.

It's all doable, if you have the political will, and back that up with cash.

Reactors are a very LONG term investment with a big upfront outlay, and long term
commitments.

That's exactly the kind of thing private companies tend not to like, and governments,
(when properly run) excel at.

Originally posted by joe beyser
Too bad the whole fusion thing never took off.

But practical fusion power will probably eventually be made possible to develop -but not before solar power pans out and pans out permanently rendering such fusion power on Earth obsolete even before it has a chance to be developed! -but not in outer-space to power fusion spaceships where fusion power will one day rule supreme.

Originally posted by humy
But practical fusion power will probably eventually be made possible to develop -but not before solar power pans out and pans out permanently rendering such fusion power on Earth obsolete even before it has a chance to be developed! -but not in outer-space to power fusion spaceships where fusion power will one day rule supreme.

I suggest that you are being over optimistic about the abilities of solar power.

The fact that it's Possible to build solar power plants to meet all our current
energy needs, doesn't mean that it's economically practical or sensible to do so.
Or even environmentally sound, that's a large area you are covering with solar
power plants. Plus big long distance power distribution grids, and energy storage...

Also if you have localised, or mobile, large energy needs, then it might make
more sense to generate that power locally, and nuclear power gives you a very
high density of energy generation, and does so reliably.

Originally posted by googlefudge
I suggest that you are being over optimistic about the abilities of solar power.

The fact that it's Possible to build solar power plants to meet all our current
energy needs, doesn't mean that it's economically practical or sensible to do so.
Or even environmentally sound, that's a large area you are covering with solar
power plants. Plus big lon ...[text shortened]... y, and nuclear power gives you a very
high density of energy generation, and does so reliably.

Solar power should rapidly become more economic in the next few years with solar panels becoming cheaper and more energy efficient and so should off-the-grid electric storage facilities which would counter the problem of solar power being fickle. With sufficiently economical off-the-grid electric storage, the solar energy can be produced locally from such places as rooftops and the energy then stored locally so in most places there should not be a special need to transmit the electricity over thousands of kilometers distances.

Nuclear energy, in comparison, would not make such rapid progress and will become ever less economic compared to solar energy within the coming decades until it will not and could not compete and that would mean no more nuclear power stations will be built and the old ones will eventually be rundown to exhaustion -there is no future for nuclear.

Originally posted by humy
Solar power should rapidly become more economic in the next few years and so should off-the-grid electric storage facilities which would counter the problem of solar power being fickle. With sufficiently economical off-the-grid electric storage, the solar energy can be produced locally from such places as rooftops and the energy then stored locally so there sho ...[text shortened]... thin the coming decades until it will not and could not compete -there is no future for nuclear.

Um, how do you know that solar power will rapidly become more economic
in the next few years?

Or for that matter that electric storage will rapidly become cheaper and more
efficient/ect.?

People have been working on these technologies for decades, and had huge sums
of money spent on them, and progress has been almost exclusively incremental and
not revolutionary.


Also what makes you think that nuclear is as good as it's ever going to get, and
can't also get cheaper and more efficient?


The molten salt reactors I talk about are both safer and cheaper than current reactors,
once in mass production (and mass production brings it's own efficiencies that you can't
take advantage of if each reactor is built individually and bespoke.) And while they would
research to be done to get them to the same level we have with present designs, your
magic increases in solar power don't come for free either.

I remind you that in the real world Germany just spent billions investing in solar for an
overall increase in their CO2 emissions.

I am not knocking solar, or saying we shouldn't invest [more] into solar power technology.

But I don't think you can just write off nuclear power, and don't think solar is anywhere
close to being the magic solution you appear to be claiming.

Oh, and the topic of radiation from reactors...

This gives a sense of scale...

http://xkcd.com/radiation/

Originally posted by googlefudge
Oh, and the topic of radiation from reactors...

This gives a sense of scale...

http://xkcd.com/radiation/

Interesting about the Chernobyl chart. This explains why they ran a bunch of workers through there for only a short period. The charts do not explain much about ingesting particles downwind though.

Originally posted by googlefudge
Um, how do you know that solar power will rapidly become more economic
in the next few years?

Or for that matter that electric storage will rapidly become cheaper and more
efficient/ect.?

People have been working on these technologies for decades, and had huge sums
of money spent on them, and progress has been almost exclusively incremental a ...[text shortened]... and don't think solar is anywhere
close to being the magic solution you appear to be claiming.

Um, how do you know that solar power will rapidly become more economic
in the next few years?

Or for that matter that electric storage will rapidly become cheaper and more
efficient/ect.?

because I been observing the news in research into solar cells etc in just the last few years and observed that the rate at which real progress is being made in these areas is far greater than any previous years -then, using the simplifying assumption that fast rate will continue for the next few years, extrapolate; simple.

Also what makes you think that nuclear is as good as it's ever going to get, and
can't also get cheaper and more efficient?

Of course it will get cheaper and more efficient with time! Technology is improving all the time! -but how much 'time' in this case? I don't know if you have noticed but I would judge from the research I read the rate of progress in research to make it cheaper and more efficient is at least one order of magnitude less than that progress being made with solar power.

I remind you that in the real world Germany just spent billions investing in solar for an
overall increase in their CO2 emissions.

But that should change in the next few years as solar cells become cheaper, more efficient AND leave a lower carbon footprint from their manufacture.

But I don't think you can just write off nuclear power, and don't think solar is anywhere
close to being the magic solution you appear to be claiming.

we shall see in the next few years. I still bet solar power (with some other renewable as well but I bet not quite as much as solar ) will become by far the main source of electric power of choice with the next, say, 30 years? And, while I have no doubt there will still exist working nuclear power stations in 30 years time, I further bet the general policy would be to never build any new ones -not because of anything to do with safety but rather purely because it would cease to make any economic sense to build any more of them when it would become more cost effective in every way to build and use more solar panels and electric storage instead.

I also bet that the general policy in just a few years time would probably generally be to produce electricity from solar and energy storage would be mainly for local use so to avoid having to transmit the electricity over many thousands of kilometres. However, I also bet that, in the much longer run, once the technology for making a supergrid improves enough to make it practical and cost-effective to make a global supergrid, that is what will be built and then local energy storage would be much less relied on -but I think that would be many years later and after my time.

Originally posted by googlefudge
Germany has just spent decades and vast sums of money on renewables, mainly solar,
and yet they still only produce a tiny fraction of their energy from solar and other renewables.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy_in_Germany

...about 25 percent in the first half of 2012

And it has gone up since then. If I recall correctly it went over 50% on a particularly sunny day in 2013.

Originally posted by twhitehead
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy_in_Germany

...about 25 percent in the first half of 2012

And it has gone up since then. If I recall correctly it went over 50% on a particularly sunny day in 2013.

Yeah, but claiming that you get 50% of your energy from solar because 50% of the
energy used during non-peak hours on a hot sunny day in the middle of summer
reached 50% is disingenuous to say the least.

The number that matters is average production over the year.
Which according to that article is currently 5.3%...

The same article says they are hoping to get to 25% electricity generation by 2050.

Which is fantastic, I have no issues with that whatsoever.

But that leaves you with the remaining 75% of the electricity to get from...

And 2050 is far enough away that you could build not 1 but 2 generations of nuclear
power plants.


At the moment the combined totals of all renewables in Germany equals the total from nuclear,
at a little under 25% each.

Which leaves the remaining 50+% as coming from fossil fuels.

France gets appx 80% of its energy from nuclear, and has renewables, which leaves less
than 20% coming from fossil fuels.

And it doesn't have to rely on fragile and expensive, international power distribution
networks to deliver its energy. networks which are vulnerable to terrorist attacks,
and to countries seeking to hold others to ransom by shutting off their power.
Like Russia does with it's gas pipelines to eastern Europe.

If you build large and efficient solar thermal power plants in the sahara to power
Europe, then you have to worry about the north African countries deciding whether
to provide us with power, and tectonic activity, solar flares, and errant trawler-men
taking out the long distance power lines. (and that's before adding in terrorists, or
any other national power around the Med, who might like to turn the lights off in
Europe.



Solar is great, renewables are great... I'm completely sold on having them.

I am not seeing anything remotely like a workable solution from them that doesn't include
a solid base load generation from nuclear.