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Germany To End Nuclear Power By 2022
dcollins writes "Germany on Monday announced plans to become the first major industrialized power to shut down all its nuclear plants in the wake of the disaster in Japan, with a phase-out due to be wrapped up by 2022... Germany has 17 nuclear reactors on its territory, eight of which are currently off the electricity grid... Already Friday, the environment ministers from all 16 German regional states had called for the temporary order on the seven plants to be made permanent... Monday's decision is effectively a return to the timetable set by the previous Social Democrat-Green coalition government a decade ago. And it is a humbling U-turn for Merkel, who at the end of 2010 decided to extend the lifetime of Germany's 17 reactors by an average of 12 years, which would have kept them open until the mid-2030s."
France has stated that it will open several new nuclear reactors before 2022, and will increase the amount of power that it exports to Germany.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
"Well what the hell are we supposed to use? Harsh language?"
Where does the power come from then!?
The government must now determine how it can make up the difference with renewable energy sources, natural gas and coal-fired plants.
I mean, really? That'll end up being 90% coal at the very least. I love sentiment driven politics, It's crappy, but waaay more interesting.
Tsunamis and earthquakes has Germany had in lets say the last 1000 years :-)
They will actually be able to replace those 23% of the energy production in the meantime without increasing the energy costs too much... difficulty: the price for 2011 will already be about 50% higher than 2010 according to my energy supplier (announced a few weeks ago, before this decision).
The more countries follow their lead the cheaper it will be for us to double our nuclear capacity.
Airplanes kill more people a year than nuclear energy killed in total. However, airplanes are "safe" and nuclear energy is "terribly dangerous".
The headline should read:
Germany To End Nuclear Power By 2022 yet again
Politicians are good at two things: making large strategic decisions that do not require anything now but much in not-so-near future and apologizing stuff that their predecessors have made. This decision will be repealed; nothing to see here, move along.
The circumstances that contributed to the failings at Fukushima are not similar to the situation surrounding nuclear plants in Switzerland or Germany. This is nonsense.
They want to improve their use of renewables, awesome. They should keep the nuke plants while boosting efforts on wind, solar, and hydro. Ramping up reliance on fossil-fueled energy while waiting for those other technologies to get to where we need them to be is foolish.
Apparently, people make the right choice only after all other options were exhausted.
--
signed: rastos, citizen of EU.
Overreaction due to a disaster by a reactor that should have never been built in the first place. It should be common sense to never build a device that cannot be tuned off (or 3 months to turn off). There are other nuclear reactor designs that can be turn off quickly. Banning the entire industry without a proper review is stupid.
Oil is likely to run out or become very expensive during the next few decades, if plug in hybrids and electric cars is the most likely replacement for gasoline ( and it seems to be the case at the moment ) then much more electricity will be needed.
Environmental concerns mandate a large reduction in the use of coal for electricity.
EU-member states have committed to such reductions through several treaties and
directives, and it is unlikely that they will simply be dropped.
Wind cannot contribute a majority of electricity generation out of load levelling concerns.
Solar is prohibitively expensive and only does well in Germany due to strong economic
incentives that would be very costly to scale. It also doesn't work during the night, and large
scale energy storage is prohibitively expensive.
Scaling bio-mass to supply a nation the size of Germany would have a dramatic environmental
impact associated with its cultivation, growth and combustion. It is presently very expensive for
applications other than heating, and the more advanced bio-fuels (cellulosic ethanol ) that actually
seem feasible are still experimental. Brazil kinda makes etanol from sugar cane work, but it is
dubious if the practice would be sustainable outside of tropical climates.
So basically unless they overturn this decision it seems likely that Germany will end up importing
electricity or making themselves reliant on Russian natural gas. This is what happens when you make
policy based on populism and wishful thinking rather than reality.
How exactly do they intend to meet their power req after ?
So their plan is to shutdown domestic nuclear power production without, from what I see, a corresponding increase in production from coal, gas, or "green" power sources. This means they'll be importing from places like France who are increasing their power production. While this is less of a concern now that they're all part of the warm and fuzzy EU brotherhood but Germany is handing the French (and any other country that will be doing the same, such as say the Netherlands) leverage in future negotiations.
The only way I see this really working in the long term is if the EU becomes more of a Federalist system with the EU taking on the role of the Federal Government and the Member Nations taking on the role of the component states. Ultimately I think that may be a decent idea, obviously with more independence for the Member Nations than the states enjoy in the USA but with potential benefits. Keep in mind at this point it is purely idol speculation with no real knowledge on the issues this would generate or hurdles that would have to be jumped.
I'll meet you at the intersection of "Should be" and "Reality"
These idiots know that it's just politicians talking bullshit. It's not the first time a German government agreed on plans to end nuke power. One of the following governments simply ignored these plans and did whatever the nuke lobby wanted.
2022 is a long time away. By then the current concerns caused by Fukushima will be forgottten and corporations will have had enough time to bribe coming generations of politicians to delay/cancel the whole shebang once more.
It's just the usual "pandering to voters today, forgotten tomorrow" political fraud.
Natural gas and coal-fired power plants are not responsible alternatives to nuclear energy. Nuclear power does not belch out carbon monoxide and green house gases. By eschewing nuclear energy and blanketing as unsafe without looking into the technical problems and improving them, we may be headed down a entirely different wrong path. It seems like politicians the world around are excellent at making "large strategic decisions" without a clear, viable alternative. What about nuclear fusion? Where are we in that development?
Whether they end generating new nuclear power or not, the radioactive waste already generated will remain.
It's a victory for environmentalists worldwide. We all knew Fukushima could be successfully exploited to make positive changes elsewhere. You just wait, Fukushima will be the gift that just keeps on giving. In the future, any pro-nuclear arguments will be answered with "But...Fukushima!" Let's all pour a pint of naturally brewed reinheitsgebot beer and celebrate!
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I don't like nuclear power either.... but I base my opinion on some real science instead of your chiropractic quackery.
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
I propose an alternative to democracy: weighted democracy.
It would play out like this: Ministers, senators, presidents et al. gets the boot. The government is replaced by people who carry out the will of the people. The government is not allowed to propose changes, only the citizenry is. Changes to stuff are ALL voted upon by the people.
And last but not least: People will have to pass a fucking popquiz about the subject they're voting on before their vote counts!
Oh yes. Excellent news. Because nuclear power is the cleanest, most dependable, most regulated, and lowest impacting power source on the planet right now, lets shut it down for no realistic reason. "Spinal sublexations which cause ill health?" Ah, you're a chiropractor. Sooooo, your position is that mythical twisting of the vertebrae (Oh yes, sorry, chiropractors have co-opted the term 'subluxation' to mean whatever they think might be wrong, rather than an actual anatomical definition. Convenient) ... which you say causes ill health, is due to radioactivity, that no one has ever sensed? That's quite a reach my friend.
The short version is nuclear power is the safest power we have. (Xref: http://climatesight.org/2011/03/15/nuclear-power-in-context/ ) That chart shows direct-impact deaths, and does not show the number of mine workers who die yearly mining coal, or the oil rig operators who die, or the VAST environmental impact directly from burning fossil fuels. In 40 years of nuclear power, there have been THREE nuclear plant failures. TMI, Chernobyl, and fukujima. TMI resulted in negligible radiation release. Chernobyl resulted in 64 confirmed deaths (though there is ENORMOUS variation in forecasts for 'potential deaths'), and Fukujima has, we've noted so far, had ONE death. One.
I can already hear the raising of the "But, it's Radiation! Radiation is BAD!" - yes, of course it is, but it must be taken in context. The levels talked about around these plants varies wildly, and your random "because we have nuke plants, people are getting more colds because of mythical undefineable spinal shift" is a textbook "Correlation proves Causation - a logical fallacy.
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If I had to choose between burning coal and fission reactors, I'd keep the nuclear.
Yeah, I know people are scared because of what have happened in Japan, but I STILL rather have 100 nuclear plant in my backyard with a 0.0001% chance of killing or making me sick than one coal plant that are 100% sure to be bad (1) for my health.
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fossil_fuel_power_station: The combustion of coal contributes the most to acid rain and air pollution, and has been connected with global warming.
Meanwhile coalmining and coal is killing tens of thousands every year.
the catch is, that gift that keeps on giving has the possibility of giving way too much to make any such discussion pointless, if we have more serious problems.
Read radical news here
After a quick glance through history, it would appear that the French are more likely to have such thoughts, or even the Russians.. The Americans carried a fairly strong and friendly business relationship with the Germans throughout the war. Only the zombie public had any animosity..
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
invention of radioactivity
You should have taken an entry level science course instead of enrolling in Chiropractic Clown College.
i visited a nuclear power plant in northern germany last year. and i am glad, that this is been shut down. that 70ies tech does not shine anymore. and i talked to the control room employee what extra education he has. well there is a one year course and here is the funny part, nobody fails in this course.
You should move to the Fukushima area or to Pripyat and enjoy the clean and healthy environment there.
There's no "most populous city" in germany. It's all autobahns with exits to small villages.
Without these kind of far-sighted policies, Europe would eventually be thrust back into war. I mean, look at how Germany already dominates the EU's financial decisions. After a few more decades, German power would be so great that a coalition of other nations would have to form an alliance to restore the balance of power. Terrible wars would result.
Germany is doing us all a favor by learning from the positive example of the Hongxi Emperor. By burning the fleet of their power generating capability, Germany's future will be more like China: waning influence followed by foreign colonization. Kudos to them for taking the peaceful way out!
Firstly, nobody "invented" radioactivity. The Big Bang was a nuclear explosion. We are (a very small) part of the fallout.
You could say that someone invented nuclear power. This is not the same thing as radioactivity. Some might say it uses radioactivity but for better explanations you should read a textbook or even Wikipedia.
Spinal subluxations have been around a lot longer than human generated radioactivity. The fact that they have increased does not mean that they are caused by radioactive leaks/fallout. Correlation is not causation. They may be related but there are a lot more people around that there was in the time of the Curies and a lot of the things that people died of back then are far less prevalent.
Cancer is a bigger problem and some most definitely is related to radioactivity. We definitely need to deal with that. Closing down all nuclear activity will not do this. It will help the uninformed feel good. It will not make the world a better place. It will make life harder - unless you think that we can make up the deficit from renewables? I suggest you read up on that myth too,
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
No debate with your points. But here are some other insights...
Did you know to this day 20% of Belarus's farmland is unusable?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belarus
The problem is that nuclear has serious longterm issues like this. Sure there are less immediate deaths, but the longer term deaths related to nuclear are much higher. This is the fault of humanity that can't look beyond the next Apple announcement.
So tell me how do you plan on making all of the land usable again? Oh wait I forgot you are not near any of these disasters and as such could not shive a ghit. Until it happens in your backyard!
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
Just you wait, in less than a decade all of you will have to buy power from China, which is the only country presently building new generation of nuclear reactors.
EDF stock or german coal mines stock ? Stock price probably adjusted by now, so maybe I should buy stocks from companies proving tratment for asthma in Germany ?
Wow. I was going to respond to all Dr.Bob's detractors with a great big Whoosh! I interpreted his post as sarcasm. I'm glad I looked at his post history first.
I actually kind of like nuke power. it's pretty safe. its cheap. its easy to put just about anywhere.
However... The worst case failure mode for a nuclear power plant is much much MUCH worse than anything else save perhaps hydro. And even then if the hydro dam fails and wipes out everything downstream... well you can go back in and rebuild now. not in 10,100,1000,10000 years when the place isnt 'hot' anymore.
Arguments could be made for coal that it contaminates a much wider area over the entire time it's running.
But people don't work like that. They see that one day this land was fine. And the next day after a nuke disaster. It's now super fucked for a great many years.
Where coal is a gradual fuck of the entire area. Not quite as noticable. And you CAN put alot of work into cleaning coal stack output. We just never really have. Yet.
Anywhere the epic fuckups of humans and the epic fuckups of nature can wipe out an entire chunk of land for decades... Is most likely something we shouldnt allow to happen. And that means not using nuke power till we're much much more capable of preventing worst case failures. And we're a long time from that just due to plain human greed and shortsightedness.
Good for germany.
In the long term, we all die. How many people have lived longer, fuller lives because of nuclear power? That's the balance.
Out of curiosity, what makes you opposed to the modern iteration of nuclear reactors? The major accidents have all been Mark I reactors, which have been known to be unsafe since 1972 (warnings ignored, thank GE in the U.S.). For modern reactors, "real science" reveals mostly positives, with almost no chance of a critical meltdown.
While the reasoning of Merkel's government seems to be based on fear and emotions of the general public the background behind this is the nuclear waste.
Fukushima is just an example that a complex technology like nuclear power can fail, even with a lot of safeguards in place and in a high-tech country like Japan. It is now obvious that Tepco did not do their homework correctly and that it is just a bad idea in general to build a power plant where a tsunami can hit the shore but this is only the catalyst for the debate in Germany. The main problem is and will be in the future the massive amounts of nuclear waste, with high and medium radiation levels. The situation in Germany for waste disposal is abysmal. In the 1960s due to political issues only two underground mines were seriously examined if they can keep the waste safe for eternity until the radiation levels are low enough to be harmless. These two mines are Asse and Gorleben.
It is now very clear that during the last decades a lot of negative security reports for both mines were downplayed or never published. Asse is currently more or less flooded from groundwater penetrating the salt and while Gorleben seems safe today serious cracks have been discovered. So there is no place in Germany were we could safely store nuclear waste at all. The consensus was for a while to search for better places and it was obvious that any politician will fight tooth and nail against a mine in his district.
At the same time Germany tries to increase the amount of renewable energy and is quite successful. Merkel's current move is certainly not completely ruled by reason but it fits into the bigger picture and the last thing she wants is large demonstrations and her being seen as a cold technocrat which almost brought her a defeat in the last election.
While I personally like nuclear power much more than polluting the air with coal power plants, were the emissions also contain a lot of radioactivity and of course CO2 it feels irresponsible to use a technology as long as the waste problem is completely unsolved, at least in Germany.
This is a groundbreaking turn from the country already leading the world in renewable energy.
The question is now, what combination of sources will replace the nuclear piece of the energy pie.
Currently nuclear stands at 22% and renewables at 17% in Germany. I reccomend the literature here for anyone who doubts renewables (solar, wind, geothermal, small hydro, biomass) are up to the task of displacing fossil and nuclear. Especially check out Hermann Scheer's "Energy Autonomy".
As a bonus, this will be a chance to dispel illusions regarding the technical viability of thorium, fast breeder reactors, fusion and other nuclear chymeras.
https://dalgamotor.wordpress.com/ - Elektronik beyinlere ozgurluk asisi (Turkish)
Major accidents have all been Mark 1 reactors JUST BECAUSE Mark 1 reactors are OLDER. and It's pretty clear that there is a correlation between AGE and accidents. When the mark 2 reactors begin to be old, major accidents will happen as well.
Much higher than what? Deaths from burning dirty brown coal? I doubt it.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
1. If we were to choose the nuclear option, it would not be 'delivered' to their most populous city. Instead, it would be delivered to a secondary city ... we didn't drop Little Boy or Fat Man on Tokyo, after all. The goal is not to kill people, but just to prompt surrender.
2. We are not at war with Germany any longer - such an attack would be an act of aggression, and not tolerated by the rest of the world.
3. Obama is the Commander in Chief, and would not sign off on such a plan - this is the territory you need to worry about if Palin were to inherit the White House.
Maybe so, but when they close down their nuclear plants, Germany will have trouble meeting its CO2 emissions targets. The problem is not so much about generation capacity (anyone can build coal-fired stations), but doing so within agreed targets
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Successful troll is successful.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Given that effectively all of our energy (aside from a comparatively small amount of geothermal) is produced in a very, very large nuclear reactor, to which we have been exposed on a daily basis since life began, I guess you've just explained all disease! Good thing too-we had it long before we were "out of the trees", or "in the trees"-even single-celled organisms die.
What they don't die of is "subluxations", because there's no such thing. Honestly, I hope you're a troll. The alternative is far worse-that you're really one of the people who's out there selling this shit to people, and keeping them from getting real treatment in some cases. But whether you're personally a troll or not, there really are people who do that. It's not funny-they kill people and in the meantime make a fortune selling snake oil to the gullible and the desperate.
Of course, if you had any real interest in science, you'd know that coal power causes thousands upon thousands of deaths a year-not from "subluxations", but from the harmful chemicals it releases into the atmosphere. And we may see its death toll rise precipitously once the full effects of climate change begin to be felt, though I certainly hope that will not be the case. And right now, if you're not doing nuclear as your baseline, you're doing coal or natural gas. There isn't enough stable energy potential in solar or wind yet, and they're not cost-effective on a massive scale.
Right now, nuclear is our best option. It should be carefully regulated, and perhaps some older plants do need to be given the choice between mandatory upgrade and shutdown. What we shouldn't do is throw a technology out that can work properly because someone misused and failed to maintain it.
But, of course, you're a quack (or you're a troll playing one). So what do you care about reality, anyway, in either case?
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
The funny thing is, that they will need a replacement for the loss of nuclear power. Since there are also laws that energy must be "green" for a certain percentage, coal plants will be off limits. Which will lead to .. Germany importing energy from France. Which is generated by ... dumtiedum .. nuclear reactors!
Hypocrisy at its finest.
So i wonder, how are they going to light their bulbs, or maybe they will move to candles???
Um, no. In fact, there is not enough data to make that correlation.
It is kind of like claiming that truck drivers are worse driver because truck drivers are involved in more wrecks per capita and the wrecks are worse. But, the truth is that truck drivers are some of the safest drivers. They are in more wrecks per capita because they travel many times more miles per year than the average driver. It is not that the reactors are older. It is that the data covers a long period of time. Compare nuclear power incidents and the rate of incidents per year to other industrial complexes and/or power generation facilities and you will find that nuclear power has a much better safety record.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Yes, because that has worked ever so well with 3-Mile Island and Chernobyl.... As it fades from the news, it will become more of a distant memory, and will no longer have the weight it has now when arguing the dangers of nuclear energy. Ultimately, it'll come down to one thing: cost. As long as nuclear energy is the cheapest out there, it will continue to be widely used. As soon as safer and cheaper technologies are easily available, a gradual transition will begin. It is not going to be an overnight change, no matter how much you want it to be: just look at how much coal energy is still being used in the states.
Technology is promising. There are new types of solar cells available in the last couple of years that weren't possible 5 years ago, and that are significantly cheaper to manufacture while also being significantly more efficient. There's other uses of solar energy that are coming into use (like the plant outside Seville, Spain). There's large scale wind operations coming into use, and even some very interesting buildings being built that produce their own wind (there's a twin tower in Dubai with 3 wind turbines between the pillars, using the Bernoulli effect on the breeze passing between the buildings to increase the flow through the turbines, for example). There's buildings being built that are much more efficient with how they use energy. All of it will add up to an eventual shift to completely renewable energy in time, but right now, we're still developing technologies that we'll need to do it properly, and we still need to use transition technologies like ethanol fuel and biodiesel. (and yes, I do believe that a traditional diesel generator plant fuelled by biodiesel will be a step between nuclear power and large scale solar/wind power, because the infrastructure is already there and old plants can be converted really easily).
Uh, no. Mark 1 reactors are fundamentally flawed, in that they can easily build up hydrogen and explode if the cooling system is compromised (leaving out the detail here). Even Mark 2 designs are built strong enough to withstand a failed cooling system.
Even if you were correct, that age is the most important factor, then why is that the fault of nuclear power in general, and not the governments for a fire-and-forget attitude?
Or, he can stay where he is and experience the effects of burning coal and gas directly.
As someone recently said "Nuclear power damages the environment and causes health issues when there is an accident. Coal and gas damages the environment and causes health issues as a consequence of normal operation."
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Now I don't have to go to demonstrations anymore, this is what I was hoping for. And for all you pro-nuclear haters out there, eat lederhosen!
In the long term, most energy generation techniques have long term issues, especially the most popular. The long term deaths from normal operation of coal plants is much higher than those from nuclear power accidents. You are focusing so much on that tree in front of you that you are not seeing the forest.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
> Because nuclear power is the cleanest, most dependable, most regulated,
> and lowest impacting power source on the planet right now
That would be hydro, not nuclear. Much cheaper too. People who believe nuclear is the way to go generally live in areas that are tapped out on the hydro side and the local power companies stop talking about it.
A good example is right here in Toronto. They're still trying to build another set of four reactors east of the city, but there's 9 reactors worth in norther Quebec already installed and underused, another 11 unbuilt, another 10 in Newfoundland and Manitoba, and at least 25 in northern Alberta and Saskatchewan. There's more untapped hydro in Canada than tapped, and more hydro in total than all the other forms of power put together. If we did a full build-out, we would supply all of our electricity, power all our cars, and still export more power to the US than we do now.
So no, I don't support building new reactors.
If a nuclear reactor is underground (let's say, 100 m below surface), then in case of radiation leak, a simple covering of the reactor with dirt will solve the problem.
Is this realistic?
I find this all very upsetting.. I thought radiation was supposed to give us super powers... What's up with that?
Not really true, they (the industry) say there is a chance of 1 in 2000 years that one will meltdown. With the current number + the soon to be build new plants, you come to 1 meltdown/serious accident in 14 years. This seems to be spot on with history. You can get a free report btw from the atom agency that has all the accidents that are known with radiation in them. Many thousand cases already and a scary read.
The greenies now go laughing to the next polls, and 5 years later someone else will go laughing to the polls when personal electricity bills get too expensive and nuclear is sold as "cheaper".
Modern democratic politics is pathetic. Politicians are not interested in change, improvements or ideals - they do whatever wins them polls and votes and gives them airtime - so they can retire out of politics, famous and into a lucrative private sector career.
Actually, a Brit, you tard.
I guess the accident that killed people at the fuel processing facility and exposed residents nearby to radiation in 1999 doesn't count.
And although no one died, the accident, and the cover-up of the severity of it, at the Japanese sodium breeder reactor apparently isn't worth mentioning.
That was no Mark I design.
The fuel pond issues certainly aren't unique to Mark I designs. Unit 4 in Japan, which had fuel only in the fuel pond, exploded, apparently from hydrogen that came from unit 3. Neither unit 3 nor unit 4 were Mark I designs. There aren't supposed to be any common-cause failures, yet clearly that explosion pathway and the backup power had causes in common.
One of the reactors shut down in central Japan over earthquake fears was found to have salt water in the closed-loop part of the cooling system. That wasn't even known before the plant was shut down for another reason. Coupling between the ocean water and internal cooling water loops was supposed to be impossible.
In one sense the older systems may have an advantage. They didn't originally use frail and vulnerable computer systems. What modern computer systems can be trusted to work for 40 years plus?
Germany is pushing hard on the green front, entire towns are off the grid now. A full 17% of their energy is provided by renewable sources, well on track to meeting their 18% goal by 2020.
Nuclear comprises only 11% of Germany's energy generation as of 2009.
One of the challenges with modern democracy is that government mandates usually last only 4 or 5 years at most. Any commitments made beyond the current term are essentially meaningless. If peak oil predictions turn out to be true, it might be very difficult for Germany to avoid nuclear power in the 2020s, unless the entire population dramatically reduces power consumption.
So to the Japanese people who had to abandon their ancestral home, their lands and forests, their animals to die you're saying:
You're alive and you got 8000$, so STFU! Come back in 100,000 years.
You mean the "positive" change of replacing existing nuclear power stations with coal, gas and oil fired plants? That'll sure help the environment!
:-) Eh, figures, bunch of hooligans, all of 'em... somebody should tell them the war is over... And that tasty food isn't being rationed anymore.
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
Hydro-electric dam failures have killed hundreds of thousands of people over the years. Indeed, a small (non-power-generating) dam in Fukushima prefecture broke during the recent big earthquake in Japan, killing at least four people at the dam itself and washing away a couple of villages downstream with some inhabitants reported as missing presumed drowned. That's a lot more people than were killed by the tsunami and earthquake at the two Fukushima plants and (obviously) a lot more than have died from radioactivity releases caused by the reactor failures.
Hydro power is a proven killer with a long history of mass deaths due to structural failures and operating problems. It's not in the same class as coal and oil due to the amount of pollution and CO2 it produces for the amount of energy it outputs but in terms of ill-effects it's way ahead of nuclear in any scale you care to compare it with.
What the last year or so of arguments about discontinuing nuclear power plants, carbon dioxide "pollution", outlawing of agricultural chemicals, the continued drive to less and less power consumption, more and more use of natural materials, the slowing of technical progress (except as relates to lotus land type entertainment products) combined with the debt crisis is many western states just says to me that western civilization has already past its peak and we're just riding the downhill slope into obscurity.
You'll notice that the other competing states aren't calling for ends to power generation, ends to population replacement. China, India or the burgeoning Islamic religion that wants to create a new world state aren't going to be as liberal and caring to make themselves go extinct to save the planet. They'll keep generating power by whatever means possible whether it's building a new coal fired power plant a week or building newer technology nuclear reactors and they'll make sure their population controls don't drop below replacement rates. China has been easing up on their one child per family rules for a while now.
If you want a place in the future you might as well do as I've seen many do now. Get your higher education and jobs in China or India. They'll be leading humanity into the future not the West.
As for me, I'm just old enough to see this on it's way but will be cozily dead before the end really comes. (unless the US falters and doesn't raise it debt ceiling in time. Now that might be something to see. The cascade of state failures would be impressive.)
Magic fairy dust? Oil will be out of the question by then. Too expensive. Natural gas will work - for a while, until everyone starts doing it and the remaining gas fields, which deplete *much* more quickly than oil fields start running out. Coal? That too, will work, for a while, but the situation there is analogous to peak oil. It's not that there isn't a lot of it; it's that what's left is expensive to get, with a much lower energy return than the cheap, close-to-the-surface, low sulfur coal we used to be able to get.
2022 seems like a goodish date. IBGYBG as the saying goes and the public, shivering in their homes during the first cold winter, will start voting sensibly again.
Oh, and before you start in with an innumerate response about how we'll replace it all with wind, solar and faith, I suggest you review some numbers at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubic_mile_of_oil so you sound like less of an idiot.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
Germans have long been known for their general intellect and logical reasoning. Here they are, reacting out of fear instead of surveying the situation and determining where safety can be improved. I'm dumbfounded.
Nuclear power is just about the best there is. Zero emissions and fairly low maintenance. The only problems that seem to exist are those that could have been prevented with monitoring and maintenance.
As energy-related disasters go, we have seen far more tragic things come from oil spills and coal mines than we have seen from nuclear plants and yet people aren't falling all over themselves demanding the shutdown of every coal and oil burning power plant. And the crap that comes from burning those do far more harm to humanity and wildlife -- noticed the problems with mercury in the fish? Fish used to be a healthy food and now it can give you cancer.
Nuclear power is "scary." I get that. Guns are scary. Fear and reaction, fear and reaction. Stop running around like herds of animals and pause to think for a moment. Even Chernobyl hasn't caused a huge global impact on the planet and that one was pretty bad. People didn't start shutting down power plants then... why? Oh that's right, because it was the Russians who built that and we all know Russians don't built for safety or reliability so we can dismiss this case. But Japan? The Japanese are perfect and never put profits before safety so the problem must be the technology! Ban it!
There is a big picture. People would do themselves a world of good to look at it once in a while.
Dr. Bob. Dude, you're a nutbag. Take some time out and look at your world from an objective cause-and-effect perspective. My father's a freak like you -- thought he could cure muscular dystrophy with prayer and the anointing of oils. Now I have two dead half-brothers who suffered 'til the very last... oh if only we knew what chiropractic care could have done to heal their misery. Get with real life.
Did you know to this day 20% of Belarus's farmland is unusable?
No, and you didn't know either because it isn't true. The original BBC story states that 20% of Belarus was contaminated by Chernobyl fallout. Much of that land (probably everything aside from a bit that lies within the Chernobyl exclusion zone) is being used.
So tell me how do you plan on making all of the land usable again?
You can always reuse such land for industrial purposes. Or plant a crop that aggressively absorbs cesium or other problem isotopes.
Even more dangerous is that they import natural gas from Russia.
Then the Germans wonder how they have to please their new masters when Russia decides it isn't pleased with things and shuts off the gas. Especially in winter.
Fleeing nuclear blindly has been a VERY large coup for the Russians. Now, Germany is their bitch because German citizens will die because they can't get heat in the winter if Russia decides it doesn't want to continue providing gas.
Real stupid -- Germany has completely compromised its national security for to please the Greens, and the long term result, has not pleased them (you cannot appease a dictator... Europe should have learned this because appeasement cost millions of lives.)
Your first impression, before you read his history, was the correct one...The very last thing you should do is take him seriously.. And to him, we should only say, jolly good show..
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
It's interesting to see so many comments here which express a huge amount of narrow thinking (non-competitive sissy couch syndrome).
The move is really ambitious, and the road to the end of nuclear fuel usage will be hard, but we (germans) want to take the chance, and end this status quo of dependence from nuclear energy and fossil fuels. The nuclear and coal plants won't be replaced by a single source of energy, they will be replaced by a combination, and yes russian natural gas is one step because the plants will are more efficient. But some people here say russian natural gas is bad, and well it's even as bad as to use gasoline made from crude oil coming from arabia, or owing China huge amounts of money.
Actually we have a selection of technologies today at our hands and with such a vision and drive many german engineers will devellop these technologies further, it's not like that we are starting just now .. we will just speed it up a bit.
- saving energy
- better insulation
- Wind Power
- Solar Power
- Water
- Bio mass
- Fuel Cells
- Energy Storage ( synthesis gas, pressure containment, electrolysis, pump storage)
Perhaps we (germans) will fail, but then we can proudly say that we tried !
And if we are going to succeed paint the picture for yourself - I still say I smell fear !
Some idiot said once: "We choose to go to the moon, not because it's easy but because it's hard. ..."
so STILL going on about the same bullshit attitude ? 'nuclear power will never end' ? what's with this nuclear power morondom ?
Nuclear power will never end. It will be used by the countries that succeed, versus the ones that'll be ever more irrelevant. Interesting that France will start selling nuclear generated power to Germany, eh?
Then there's China, which has the foresight and will to invest heavily in thorium reactor technology. Good move, I hope the US wises up under the next (sane this time) administration!
Watch and see what happens. ;-)
Galileo: "The Earth revolves around the Sun!"
Score: -1 100% Flamebait
Since nuclear energy is the only viable alternative to energy sources that are high in green house gas emissions, I can only conclude from this news that the German government has decided that either global warming is not caused by man-made greenhouse gases, or that global warming isn't all that bad.
The unwillingness of global warming alarmists to embrace nuclear energy seems to me, as someone who is not a full-time atmospheric scientist and who doesn't have 10 years to get a graduate degree in the field, to be strong evidence against the threat of man-made global warming.
I often don't like the choices people make, but I like the fact that people make choices. That's why I'm a conservative.
he is a meta-troll.
Germany is scared of getting hit by a tsunami or something?
this is the territory you need to worry about if Palin were to inherit the White House.
LOL! Palin's grasp on the liberal mind is astonishing.
I'd say brace yourself, Palin may just pull a Reagan and get herself elected. The Republican field is looking weak, and she will do well in the primaries. It's looking all but certain that she's going to run.
Galileo: "The Earth revolves around the Sun!"
Score: -1 100% Flamebait
"Nuclear power is just about the best" Until it goes wrong. Which it always will because people cut corners, get complacent, don't plan for statistically inevitable events or are just plain stupid. And when it does the costs are astronomical - have you any idea of how much land in an area with a radius of twenty kilometres is worth in Germany?. If nuclear power plants had to ensure themselves fully, none would ever be built. Renewables are our future. They are clever enough to want to get a jump start on the rest of the world. Good luck to them. It is just a shame that my native Australia, with all it's natural advantages in that regard, is still wedded to coal.
So are the Germans expecting to be hit by earthquakes and tsunamis then? After all the Japanese plants were fine before the disaster.
I guess the rest of the world has come to the conclusion that since the US and China aren't going to do anything to reduce CO2 emissions, YTF should they
Great news! The human species has suffered with health problems since we left the trees. However since the invention of radioactivity, there has been a direct link between the amount of radiation used in the world and spinal subluxations which cause ill health. Hopefully Germany is just the first in a long long of countries dumping radioactivity!
Less nuclear power means more power from burning coal.
You should read about the health effects associated with the uptake of the heavy metals released from burning coal. Spinal sublaxations will be the least of your problems if the world continues to increase their coal consumption.
Du sprecken das kraut superduperlich !
Nuclear power is already relatively insignificant in Germany:
just 20 out of 160 thousand megawatts
Tuck them into underground concrete tubes and they are impregnable to nearly any disaster that wouldn't already kill everyone.
http://www.thorium.tv/en/thorium_reactor/thorium_reactor_1.php
Just drop the reactor they show in the drawing down into a 3.25 meter wide tube and cap it off with a 3 meter thick top cap of reinforced concrete.
As long as I can pump up my fake ego by burning up the next generations energy.... whatever.
Yes, but I think the "1 in 2000 years" statistic includes Mark 1 reactors, which should have been phased out years ago.
And I don't mean to sound pedantic, but "1 in 2000 years" does not mean "1 every 14 years" (and actually, "1 in 2000 years" was an improper way for the industry to state this to begin with). In this case, the industry was trying to refer to the core integrity, which is designed to last a very long time; its expected lifetime is several hundred years. Additionally, "end of life" does not refer to "catastrophic failure", and modern reactors have an absurdly low chance that even an accident would produce a meltdown, or even a large radiation leak.
The only reason the "1 in 14 years" condition works, historically, is because the chance of failure for the Mark 1 containment reactors is much higher than the designed failure chance.
The markets react.
Shares of E.ON and RWE are getting hammered, Renewable Energy Corp, Vestas Wind, etc are up sharply today.
I am very sucseptible to "let's have another drink"
What modern computer systems can be trusted to work for 40 years plus?
Any ones that are left powered on. Transistors last apparently indefinitely if you leave them powered on, it's only when cycling the power that you have a chance for them to blow (after the "infant mortality" period of a few weeks/months anyway). If you used network storage then you wouldn't need the main system to have any moving parts at all, and it would last ages.
Why are you calling modern industrial computer setups "frail and vulnerable" anyway? It's not like anyone is going to be designing their nuclear power plant with a Windows box running all the essential control logic. Windows boxes might be used to monitor outputs and even to control some things, but they will be used in a situation where a BSOD/reboot is not going to cause everything to ASPLODE.
which is totally what she said
Compared to conventional burnt (chemical) fuel, like fossil fuel, wood fired stoves, etc.?
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/07/070709-china-pollution.html
You're kidding yourself if you think chemical fuels are risk-free. Nuclear isn't without risks, and in an ideal world we'd have something better (like unlimited, ultra-efficient, cheap solar power). But for the time being, it's one of the best options we have (and far better than the only other serious competitors- coal and gas), and certainly not deserving of the ridiculous stigmatising heaped on it over the last few decades.
Why the hell are some many uninformed comments marked insightful or informative?
1) Germany has capacities to produce a hell lot more electricity than it actually needs.
2) Estimates say Germany could easily switch off all nuclear power plants by 2017, and it would not need to import (nuclear) power.
3) Solar and wind power are sky-rocketing in Germany.
4) The short term gap will not be filled with coal, but with gas. Sure, that's not exactly great, but it will do until renewables can take that share as well.
The actual issue at the moment and in 2022 is not the amount of power, but WHERE it is produced.
The network isn't too well-prepared for decentralized energy production, and Germany is just starting to do something about that.
Using nuclear power might be desirable with a small greedy look-ahead, but I suspect there will be many events in the future where Germany can easily take a "Told you." stance.
....and while large earthquakes are not frequent in Germany, they are bound to happen eventually, and the plants are not prepared.
Translation: I didn't effect me, so what do I care. Nice way of pissing on the victims graves.
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
That hydro which needs huge dams that deeply affect the local ecosystem and which can (and DID) kill hundreds of thousands of people if they happen to fail?
You gotta be kidding me.
Real life is overrated.
There are 17 available nuclear power plants in Germany. While some were down for maintenance in 2010, the remaining ones produced 22.6% of Germany's electricity.
Also in 2010, "green power" (electricity from regenerative sources) was at 16.5% in Germany.
8 nuclear power plants have been shut down in the wake of the Fukushima disaster and will remain so. With 5 down for maintenance, this leaves Germany with currently only 4 running nuclear power plants. I didn't notice any recent shortage of electricity. And obviously green power has outpaced nuclear power already.
And regarding the alleged expensiveness of green power, here's a Bloomberg article which claims it's keeping the power price down: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-21/solar-doubling-gas-glut-drive-down-german-power-prices-energy-markets.html
There are plans to have Germany completely on green power by 2050. Should be possible.
Merkel's spokesman Steffen Seibert said the plan would uphold four priorities: Germany's standing as a top global economy, an affordable and sufficient energy supply, climate protection and independence from energy imports.
Think you could pick a more partisan source next time? I like to get my information from the most biased websites I can find, and that one doesn't quite make the cut. Maybe if they had a big hammer and sickle on the front page, and talked about the overthrowing of the proletariat through free energy for all ....
Anyway, Germany already has some of the highest energy prices in Europe, and that's even with the government already subsidizing "renewable" energy. Unfortunately, they've recently decided to cut some of those subsidies, so the average price of electricity is expected to shoot up nicely over the next year. I can't WAIT to see the prices when they reach the kind of "renewable energy" levels you're talking about. I admit I'll be experiencing more than a little schadenfreude while watching Germans chose between keeping the lights on or keeping the fridge running.
I guess you would say anything to freak people out and get them to think anything is better than deal with the insanity of Obama who has spent more in 2 years than any other President in history, causing the national debt to reach levels that are guaranteed to bankrupt the US. Obama who wants to tell doctors how much they can charge and how much they make but at the same time sue them out of existence because patients don't follow what the doctor's say. Yea Obama loves the fact the lawyers are shopping their venues so they get a jury that doesn't care about the facts, but is just pissed at doctors and want to see them punished with insane judgements. After all Obama is a lawyer and he has to be good to his fellow lawyers because he won't be President forever. Never mind most doctors come out of school with $400,000+ in debt and end up having to work for someone else because setting up your own practice with that level of debt is impossible, so they take whatever scraps of a job they are offered. Yep the insanity of Obama to spend 4 times what the government earns. Yea that is way better than the balanced budgets that Alaska has or the fact that all of Alaska got a check from the Alaska government. Yep let's all follow Obama in a hard core economic crash direct run to socialism rather than actually talk about the facts. Just brilliant. Let's just ignore the facts and react on blind emotion that has no basis at all. That's a perfect way to run a country on pure emotion and blind hate.
A Federal Environment Agency (UBA) report revealed that a rapid phase-out of nuclear energy would have only a modest impact on Germany’s economy.
Daily Frankfurter Rundschau reported on Friday that an assessment by the agency found that if all nuclear power plants were shut down by 2017, electricity prices would increase by just 0.6 to 0.8 cents per kilowatt hour and there would be “no significant loss” in economic growth.
A shut-down would “have substantial benefits and outweigh the modest increases in electricity prices,” the report said.
The report also said the withdrawal could be achieved without the risk of electricity blackouts because “sufficient surplus reserve capacity” exists.
It added that new power plants would need to be built to support the withdrawal but that Germany could rely on the rapid development of renewable energy sources as well as ultra-efficient natural gas-fired power plants.
http://www.thelocal.de/national/20110527-35293.html
I feel like it does need mentioning, though: hydro can be pretty nasty when it goes wrong, too. Nuclear meltdowns may not be a barrel of laughs, but a burst damn would ruin your day too.
http://disasterhistorian.blogspot.com/2010/03/bursting-dams.html
I know you didn't actually argue on that point, but I though it needed mentioning all the same.
Generating 17% from renewables is "leading the world"?
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Germany has made a decision which will look like a very wise move 50 years
from now.
And all your whining will not change the course of Germany.
So quit your bitching, you sorry bunch of knowitall fuck sticks.
so whats the alteritive? Nukes have there downside but there A LOT better then Fossil fuel. I am all for solar or wind or tide power but it has to be practical.
With Social Democrat schemes in Germany, grid powers you! .....?
Less-geeky computer repair alternative for Lansing, MI
The ironic thing about Germany, is that other European nations with less regulations (and some with equal or more) will be building more nuclear power plants.
For example, take Ukraine. Currently, about 50% of all electricity in Ukraine is nuclear power. Ukraine is the site of Chernobyl. Yet, Ukraine is planning on renewing and expanding their nuclear fleet in the next decades.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Ukraine
The largest nuclear power plant in Europe, the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, is located in Ukraine. In 2006, the government planned to build 11 new reactors by the year 2030, in effect, almost doubling the current amount of nuclear power capacity.[3] Ukraine's power sector is the twelfth-largest in the world in terms of installed capacity, with 54 gigawatts (GW).[2] Renewable energy still plays a very modest role in electrical output; in 2005 energy production was met by the following sources: nuclear (47 percent), thermal (45 percent), hydroelectric and other (8 percent).[3]
So why is Ukraine going to build more nuclear plants? Energy security. Once the gas pipeline from Russia is built under the Baltic sea, Ukraine will get cut off unless they pay same rates as rest of Europe.
So, Germany may just kill its nuclear plants. But lots of the neighbors will not be killing theirs. Keep in mind, that Germany also had plans to kill their nuclear plants after Chernobyl, then they flip flopped and now they flip flopped again.
Does this mean Germans trust Ukrainians or French more than they do themselves to run these plants safely??
Statisticly they are indeed relatively safe, however if something happens it happens on a big scale.
That is just one part....
(albeit not an un-important one)
I have some wories about peak-uranium for one thing. Not all studies give the same answer (basicly anything from 1980 to never) but it is something to take into account.
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
Why is this tagged with "idiocracy"? Getting rid of a megadeath technology is idiotic? Wait until you'll have your own nuclear power accident with millions of dead people, you asked for it!
Nuclear has the lowest fatality rates of any power source, and is the only true green technology with no emissions whatsoever. No it's not perfect but it is the best source of power we have today.
Tesla was a genius. Edison however was a overrated hack who liked to torture puppies.
The pro-nucular bias of the Slashdot audience is always amazing - technocratic and enomically ignorant.
Germany's government effectively reinstalled the former agreement which hasalready been set up with the German nuclear industry years ago, today. There is nothing new here so stop standing and looking. Germany is researching ways of substituting the meager 22% (before the most recent de-plugs of the older plants) of its Atomkraftanteil. There is a chance that other economies will ask for what Germany has to offer someday - not just on the field of renewables but also how to get rid of defunct plants and other still unsolved problems of nuclear power generation.
What the country is doing now has a grounding, or do you really think the Germans with their fetish realationship to their industry production would do such a thing head-over-heels?
http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Datei:Strommix-D-2010.svg&filetimestamp=20110323124037
No emission whatsoever? Oh, you've solved the permanent storage of nuclear waste problem? Let's hear it. You'll get a nobel price for that one. Current temporary storage facilities have "emissions" in the form of radioactive water due to leaks.
While personally I would prefer a nuclear over a fossil fuel plant, I read that nuclear reactors are too slow to react to the highly variable energy production by wind turbines and photo-voltaic installations which make up an increasingly large percentage of the energy production in Germany.
If this is true, keeping the existing reactors running for an extended period would not be beneficial towards the goal of migrating to renewable energy sources.
The only source I can find for this at the moment is http://www.taz.de/1/zukunft/umwelt/artikel/1/so-bleiben-sie-atomkraftgegner/ (in german) - I would love to hear someone with a better understanding of the subject matter than me address this (and maybe to the other claims in the article).
The excess cancer deaths from Chernobyl alone are expected to be between 30,000 and 60,000 http://www.chernobylreport.org/?p=summary
Looks like nuclear power is doing its durndest to catch up with coal, which has been around longer and so has quite a head start.
pussies
This means that Germany will concentrate on Libya and not on technology to solve energy problems.
Right now we know that mark 1 reactors are flawed. At the time they built until the first major accident, no. There is a excessive hubris that makes people to believe in all new technologies and marking as '-1' comments that try to point it out.
A full 17% of their energy is provided by renewable sources, well on track to meeting their 18% goal by 2020.
Nuclear comprises only 11% of Germany's energy generation as of 2009.
For a value of 11% that is supprisingly close to 27%
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Current temporary storage facilities don't all 'leak'. That's just nonsense.
Tesla was a genius. Edison however was a overrated hack who liked to torture puppies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1356_Basel_earthquake
I think I'm investing in Finnish nuclear plants. I bet they are useful in the future europe.
tlax says: "Lol".
Does Germany have some secret plan to replace all their their nuclear power plants with a huge pile of Bloom fuel cells stashed all around the country taking a load off the main power grid? I would love to see mass production of these fuel cells so that everyone or at least every apartment complex would have one and reduce the load on the power grid and reduce the miles of power lines needed to provide power. The amount of power lost due to power lines over a large distance isn't insignificant. Not to mention in the US so many power lines are not buried, so weather and other disasters cause problems with the power lines.
http://www.fastcompany.com/1557348/bloombox-bloom-box-fuel-cell-60-minutes-kleiner-perkins-kr-sridhar-green-energy-google
They are not pie-in-the-sky. E-bay, Google and a few other silicon valley companies are already using them to help reduce their load on the power grid. Not to mention I would assume reduce electrical costs as well.
Idiots, thorium nuclear is bay far the best solution. Solar and wind simply cannot convert the amount of energy we need for the future.
The German government is obviously a bunch of complete idiots. I feel sorry for the German people.
This is a groundbreaking turn from the country already leading the world in renewable energy.
not a groundbreaking turn at all - the current government is merely backing out of its own plans to steer away from a process that had been running since 2000.
There's plenty of untapped hydro power potential in the far north of Canada, it's true. However, it means *enormous* capital investment, huge transmission losses to get it to markets far away (even within Canada), flooding and rearrangement of entire drainage systems, et cetera. On top of that, people DO live in the far north, and would be profoundly affected by these sorts of changes. One of the negative aspects of the James Bay projects, for example, has been contamination of downstream fisheries by mercury due to its release from drowned vegetation in the upstream reservoirs.
Finally, we'd really be screwed if we invest all that money and precipitation patterns change due to global climate change, and there is a long-term drought. For that matter, rearranging drainages on this scale could have other climatic effects (e.g., changing freshwater supply to the Arctic Ocean). It's useful having multiple energy options, and I'm generally for more hydro power investment, but it isn't without its negative impacts. Throwing all our eggs into hydro power would be risky.
(it's not worth filling in the blank as I expect it to change the next time there's an election or when the higher power bills start arriving - whichever is the sooner.)
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
We have to remember that Germany is able to have interminent source of electricity through renewables due to the fact that it has many interconnects with neighbouring countries like france etc and is able to import electricity when required and export electricity when wind is at it's max... So in a sense it is made possible by the fact that France has nuclear power at base load and has capacity to export electrcity..
No debate with your points. But here are some other insights...
Did you know to this day 20% of Belarus's farmland is unusable?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belarus
The problem is that nuclear has serious longterm issues like this. Sure there are less immediate deaths, but the longer term deaths related to nuclear are much higher. This is the fault of humanity that can't look beyond the next Apple announcement.
So tell me how do you plan on making all of the land usable again? Oh wait I forgot you are not near any of these disasters and as such could not shive a ghit. Until it happens in your backyard!
Compared to the alternatives, coal or even hydro, that's still pretty good. Especially when you consider Chernobyl was a freak accident that absolutely can never happen again because nobody uses graphite control rods anymore. There was an actual meltdown at Fukushima, care to tell me just how much farmland was lost there? You'd be surprised to find out that the impact is minimal, and that's pretty much as bad as it can get with a nuclear reactor these days. More modern designs with passive cooling can't even get THAT bad.
Yeah. Right. Total non-sense. German overreaction and wimpyness.
The last time I heard that it was as german funds, banks and privateers were hesitant to invest in the US housing market.
Listen:
This is the nation that had a significant influence in the invention of nuclear power. THEY INVENTED THE F*CKING STUFF! Nuclear plants all over the planet are run with german hightech. And yet, in this nation of Über-technologist, the effing government party, the CDU, well know to lube up and bend over for the industrial complex in general (and the gridpower giants in particular) whenever the occasion arises
has concluded that
a) The risk is to high.
b) The long-term costs hugely outweigh the benefits of nuclear power.
c) Nobody, and I mean *NOBODY* can take on responsibility for their deadly toxic garbage for a time period of 50 000 years.
d) There are no eternally safe storages for nulear waste.
e) The existing safe storages for nuclear waste are leaking as we speak and the Atomaufsichtsbehörden have a huge f*cking problem on their hands. Which taxpayers will have to pay up for.
d) It's easier than we thought to cover all power needs with renewable sources, *excluding* the burning of coal and/or oil.
They've shut down Kalkar, before it even was finished.
There wasn't even a particularly huge protest wave about that one, compared to AKW Brokdorf. And yet they shut it down *after* it had already become the most expensive building in the history of mankind. (More expensive than the Pyramids in Egypt measured in GDP equivalent!)
They shut down the reprocessing plant WAA Wackersdorf. Not the protesters, which were quite vocal I might add. Some beancounter in the fricking ultra conservative techno-romantic Bavarian state-government figured the numbers just didn't add up and canceled the damn thing with the stroke of a pencil. .... And on and on and on ...
Believe me, I too wish it were different. Harnessing the power of the sun and universe here on earth to do great powerful things, Foo Foo Wah Wah. And all that 70ies technocratic romanticism. I'm all for it, really. Heck, my Grandpa worked with Grumman on the lunar lander, as did my dad. I'd love to have a working technocracy, I'm a nerd-kid of the 70ies, for crisakes!
BUT:
The current state of net-positive nuclear power is to risky, to expensive to build, to expensive to maintain, the waste can't be stored safely for the required amount of time, etc. pp.
And nuclear power thus IS NOT FEASIBLE!.
Those are the facts. End of story.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Nuclear waste of long half life is very weak radioactively (U235 is much more likely to kill you by good old fashionned heavy emtal poisonning). On the covnerse very short half live means evry radioactive. The reason is simply, if you have 1 mole with an activity of 10000 years , using the reverse exponential law, you get only a few beckerel, whereas with a half life of a few minutes you will get enormous quantity of beckerel. Naturally it also then depends if your radioactivity is beta, gamma or alpha. Unless ingested alpha is relatively easily stopped and in comparison much less dangerous than gamma or beta.
The bottom line is that a 10000 year radioactive waste is much much less dangerous than the 100 year half life one. So the problem is not, and has NEVER been the waste which will be there in 20000 years. The problem is the short lived one , and the eventual secondary decays. And frankly, all things considered, we have much greater problem with toxic waste, than with radioactive waste.
Your valid points are obscured by your citing of 64 confirmed Chernobyl deaths. Even though you clarify yout point, why cite that number?
Did you also know that a second explosion there might have rendered half of Europe uninhabitable? Care to address that?
Twelve-and-three-quarter inches. Unyielding. This wand belonged to Bellatrix Lestrange.
But there's a smaaaaaal issue.
The nominal power output is about 4 times the average output. Yep, inland wind farms typically work at 25% of their nominal power. Offshore wind powerplants can reliably produce about 50% of their nominal power.
That's a dirty little secret of wind power.
Most of these so called 'studies' assume that:
1) There won't be growth in electric power consumption.
2) There'll be significant improvements to the whole grid.
3) There'll be significant improvements to the generating technology.
4) Capital is unlimited.
5) Optimal circumstances for their particular brand of renewable power are universal.
I haven't yet seen _any_ report which doesn't make at least two of these assumptions.
Realistically, it's either fossil fuels or nuclear power for the next 50 years or so.
Yeah, but what happens when you pummel transistors with ionized radiation? Oh....
Quebec is a net importer of electricity from Ontario in the winter, when demand is higher (electric heating) and capacity is lower (low reservoir levels - it doesn't rain in the winter - unless you count ice storms).
Also, the history of the James Bay project is instructive - it was supposed to cost under $4 billion, not $16.7 billion. If it hadn't been for the energy crisis, James Bay would have been a white elephant.
So now Charest (Quebec premier) wants to propose an $80 billion northern development? Quebec's economy lags almost every province and state in North America already (hint: it ranks 53rd out of 60 - even Newfies make more money per capita). Tax rates to support this are already the highest in North America (hint #2 - a quebecer making minimum wage pays as much tax to Quebec as an ontarioan making $50k a year pays to Ontario).
The money simply isn't there. The solution is simple: Kick Quebec out of confederation and revert the borders of Quebec to what they were at confederation, well before the Feds gave control of northern Quebec to the province. This ends the $8 billion a year equalization payments fiasco as well. It also ends the problem of politicians sucking up to separatists (like Layton in the last election).
Let's call it what it is, Anti-Social Media.
Why nuclear power will never supply the world's energy needs May 11, 2011 by Lisa Zyga http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-05-nuclear-power-world-energy.html/ As Abbott notes in his study, global power consumption today is about 15 terawatts (TW). Currently, the global nuclear power supply capacity is only 375 gigawatts (GW). In order to examine the large-scale limits of nuclear power, Abbott estimates that to supply 15 TW with nuclear only, we would need about 15,000 nuclear reactors. In his analysis, Abbott explores the consequences of building, operating, and decommissioning 15,000 reactors on the Earth, looking at factors such as the amount of land required, radioactive waste, accident rate, risk of proliferation into weapons, uranium abundance and extraction, and the exotic metals used to build the reactors themselves. âoeA nuclear power station is resource-hungry and, apart from the fuel, uses many rare metals in its construction,â Abbott told PhysOrg.com. âoeThe dream of a utopia where the world is powered off fission or fusion reactors is simply unattainable. Even a supply of as little as 1 TW stretches resources considerably.â His findings, some of which are based on the results of previous studies, are summarized below. Land and location: One nuclear reactor plant requires about 20.5 km2 (7.9 mi2) of land to accommodate the nuclear power station itself, its exclusion zone, its enrichment plant, ore processing, and supporting infrastructure. Secondly, nuclear reactors need to be located near a massive body of coolant water, but away from dense population zones and natural disaster zones. Simply finding 15,000 locations on Earth that fulfill these requirements is extremely challenging. Lifetime: Every nuclear power station needs to be decommissioned after 40-60 years of operation due to neutron embrittlement - cracks that develop on the metal surfaces due to radiation. If nuclear stations need to be replaced every 50 years on average, then with 15,000 nuclear power stations, one station would need to be built and another decommissioned somewhere in the world every day. Currently, it takes 6-12 years to build a nuclear station, and up to 20 years to decommission one, making this rate of replacement unrealistic. Nuclear waste: Although nuclear technology has been around for 60 years, there is still no universally agreed mode of disposal. Itâ(TM)s uncertain whether burying the spent fuel and the spent reactor vessels (which are also highly radioactive) may cause radioactive leakage into groundwater or the environment via geological movement. Accident rate: To date, there have been 11 nuclear accidents at the level of a full or partial core-melt. These accidents are not the minor accidents that can be avoided with improved safety technology; they are rare events that are not even possible to model in a system as complex as a nuclear station, and arise from unforeseen pathways and unpredictable circumstances (such as the Fukushima accident). Considering that these 11 accidents occurred during a cumulated total of 14,000 reactor-years of nuclear operations, scaling up to 15,000 reactors would mean we would have a major accident somewhere in the world every month. Proliferation: The more nuclear power stations, the greater the likelihood that materials and expertise for making nuclear weapons may proliferate. Although reactors have proliferation resistance measures, maintaining accountability for 15,000 reactor sites worldwide would be nearly impossible. Uranium abundance: At the current rate of uranium consumption with conventional reactors, the world supply of viable uranium, which is the most common nuclear fuel, will last for 80 years. Scaling consumption up to 15 TW, the viable uranium supply will last for less than 5 years. (Viable uranium is the uranium that exists in a high enough ore concentration so that extracting the ore is economically justified.) Uranium extraction from seawater: Uranium is mos
15TW = 15,000 Nuclear Reactors. (Approx. one accident a month.)
If you discount the very first accident (at a testing center, and having nothing to do with the core), then the first "real" (read: injury, death, or radiation leakage) accident was in 1975. The warnings about Mark I reactors began in 1972.
It also ends the problem of politicians sucking up to separatists (like Layton in the last election).
Eh? Don't you think it's more likely that a separatist would vote BQ rather than NDP?
Who exactly should the Quebecois have voted for to keep your highness ungrumpy?
Yes, of course, no one in their right mind would ever consider allowing critical systems to trust any data that matters from potentially creaky, cranky, or otherwise afflicted PCs regardless of the OS.
More detail would be redundant.
Hardware failures are something that I'm sure is planned on, not something to be denied. Things like metal migration in semiconductors and dried out electrolytic capacitors are examples of long-term failure that don't show up in burn-in or as infant mortality. Good luck in finding a PC power supply that would be trustworthy after 40 years without maintenance. Redundant or stored identical spare supplies would tend to suffer from the same ailments. I'm sure they'd be freshness dated. Transistors do well but some fail. (of historical interest, some older germanium transistors would short out from tin whiskers growing inside even when not in use, see NASA analysis http://www.vintage-radio.info/whiskers/ )
It's easier to trust someone that has designed a system and expects, accommodates, and acknowledges failures than someone who claims they've built something that won't fail in 40 years.
Partisan? Ofcourse, it's a politicised issue! Do you cry "partisan!" if i link to Dawkins in a creationism vs. evolution debate? No? Obviously what matters is if the arguments are valid not that some people are "partisan" to the arguments.
Hammer and sickle and the proletariat? please grow up beyond the mind of a cold war victim. ("overthrowing of the proletariat" made me laugh though, next time try "the proletariat overthrowing capitalism" or similar to avoid embarassment)
If you had spent half the time writing this drivel to actually research this issue, you would know that fossil and nuclear have been subsidized through the roof for half a decade now, right from R&D to purchasing guarantees to insurance. Subsidized renewables? On an absolute scale sure (and we should have more of that), on a scale relative to non-renewable energy, renewable subsidies are a joke.
https://dalgamotor.wordpress.com/ - Elektronik beyinlere ozgurluk asisi (Turkish)
Partisan? Ofcourse, it's a politicised issue! Do you cry "partisan!" if i link to Dawkins in a creationism vs. evolution debate? No? Obviously what matters is if the arguments are valid not that some people are "partisan" to the arguments.
It's nice of you to assume that my answer would be "no", but you happen to be wrong. Debates are pointless. Trotting out the newest poster boy for either side isn't particularly convincing. I want to see hard data from a non-partisan source, not talking points repeated ad-nauseum.
Hammer and sickle and the proletariat? please grow up beyond the mind of a cold war victim. ("overthrowing of the proletariat" made me laugh though, next time try "the proletariat overthrowing capitalism" or similar to avoid embarassment)
It's true, I'm not up on my double-speak. Never needed it much. Thanks for the lesson!
If you had spent half the time writing this drivel to actually research this issue, you would know that fossil and nuclear have been subsidized through the roof for half a decade now, right from R&D to purchasing guarantees to insurance. Subsidized renewables? On an absolute scale sure (and we should have more of that), on a scale relative to non-renewable energy, renewable subsidies are a joke.
Now that's funny, right there :)
I would have thought Germany, with it's technological leanings and expertise, would have been more resistant to knee-jerk reactions about nuclear power. But I guess politicians are the same no matter where you are - a bunch of pussies.
Nuclear is a great power source. Sometimes stuff blows up but it is almost always because of human error.
Even if you were correct, that age is the most important factor, then why is that the fault of nuclear power in general, and not the governments for a fire-and-forget attitude?
It's easier to dump nuclear power than get rid of corrupt and lazy regulators, arrogant and secretive companies and a huge cloud of deluded online denialists.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
'ASPLODE' - scat reference?
Jonathanjk.com
You do realise designs and operating procedures like Chernobyl's would never be adopted for either regulatory or financial reasons. You are showing your ignorance of nuclear power if you bring up crap like Chernobyl. By your logic skyscrapers shouldn't be built because thousands of people died in some on 9/11. You are merely skimming the surface of what happened at Chernobyl, conflating several incredibly-different concepts and technologies, and vomiting up your ignorance for everyone to see.
The media is so sensationalist that it managed to make people seriously believe that nuclear plants were very dangerous, to the point of forcing Germany, the main power behind the EU, to throw its economy and society down the gutter, depend more on other countries, and pollute more?
Nice.
Please keep in mind that Germany's CO2 emission per capita is half of US and Germany has committed to CO2 reduction targets. The way forward will be not more coal but saving of energy.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita
It's easier to dump nuclear power than get rid of corrupt and lazy regulators, arrogant and secretive companies and a huge cloud of deluded online denialists.
Well that's a pretty generic argument. Seems you could substitute just about anything for "nuclear power": "coal power", "privatized health insurance", "the military-industrial complex", "Soylent Green", etc.
Joking aside, the only "deluded online denialists" are the ones screaming to keep all current nuclear power plans operational (this, sadly, makes up most of the "huge cloud"...people just as uninformed as most nuclear opponents). But the fact remains that the modern nuclear reactor designs cannot produce the types of runaway reactions that led to the major meltdowns of old. No delusion, just physics.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_Germany
* Oil 34.6%
* Bituminous coal 11.1%
* Lignite 11.4%
* Natural gas 21.7%
* Nuclear power 11.0%
* Hydro- and wind power 1.5%
* Others 9.0%
Yeah, now you really have shown yourself to be a troll (as if there was any doubt). Can't you find a more constructive use for your time? Why not jerk off more like the rest of us?
simple fact is that modern civilization in it's present form is unsustainable. am i saying modern civilization will collapse? no. worst-case scenario, life becomes very wretched and expensive as the Earth becomes less able to sustain modern civilization. how bad will it get and how soon? i don't know, but i'm glad i won't be alive 100 years from now.
what can be done to make modern civilization sustainable?
1. Population control
2. lots of directions to go here...
a.
- move power generation and manufacturing to the moon or other lifeless bodies in space.
- find cheap methods of transporting energy and goods from those extra-terrestrial locations.
- find cheap methods of reusing waste on Earth or transporting it off Earth
b.
- practical fusion
- find cheap methods of reusing waste on Earth
c.
- improve and rely solely on solar, wind, hydro, and other forms of clean, natural energy generation here on Earth
- improve energy efficiency of all devices
- find cheap methods of reusing waste on Earth
Please note that while there are many options for #2, Population Control is a required part of the solution. The more successful #2 is, the less population control you need.
If this goes off, Germany won't have much trouble shutting down their nuclear plants.
Solar has the potential to power the entire world, even with current efficiencies. Direct conversion of solar to eletricity is good for small devices only, if you want to generate MWs with low cost and environmental impact you want to boil water and use the good ol turbines.
What we need is good transmission lines (those guys want to do it with DC lines, but a hot superconductor would be ideal), political stability, and people willing to work in desertic areas.
As for the night time, there are ways of storing the thermal energy generated during the day.
Renewables are more expensive and pesky than oil, and it is not the magic bullet of fusion power, but yes, we can stop burning oil and coal and live just fine.
Excellent news. News . Watch the pro nuke shills go ballistic with their ususal lies now. (:
And also back in reality (instead of nuclear reactors run on magic beans land) nobody has yet seen any of those "radioactive particles" coming out of the stack despite the technology to do so being available since the 19th century (spectroscopy). They haven't put up since the wild claims of 1978 so it's time to shut up.
Coal kills a lot of real people in real ways without making shit like this up. This radioactive coal bullshit was part of a stupid 1970s PR campaign to attempt to make the general public worry less about nuclear waste from civilian nuclear power plants. It should be buried and forgotten like all other old lies in advertising. There's almost a weekly death toll of coal miners in accidents let alone the other problems with coal - it's a pity idiots like the GP poster don't focus on real things like that instead of a failed PR fantasy.
It's worse than that - it wasn't a study but a newsletter article by a guy better known for his books about cars and moonshining. Near the end of the article it goes on about how OMG terrorists! can make an OMG nuclear bomb! from the ash heaps at power stations. Getting an idea of the bullshit level yet? Meanwhile using the data from his references you can show that it would take more than 220,000 tons of the most radioactive coal he could find to equal enough material to give you the famous banana dose! Work it out for yourself from his numbers and googling banana dose in equivalent units if you like. The article citing the bullshit in the newsletter article was very much a low point for Scientific American.
Coal kills real people in real ways without this PR driven fantasy of "coal is nuclear too".
E=MC2 if you understand it even to a small degree you understand windmills and solar panels are in large part foolishness.... we can run the entire city of San Francisco on just 6 oz. of matter and do so for 5 full years..... Nuclear... renewable energy is what airheads dream of. It will never replace Nuclear or come even close... it's folly. Nuclear is by far superior to anything we have, including gas, oil, coal..... don't build on faults or any other unstable platforms and Nuclear is extremely safe and the waste is easily housed and managed.... it's politics and ignorance ( suppose I'm being redundant) that has the uneducated frightened of Nuclear.
That's energy, not electricity. It includes oil for transport and coal for heating,
Everyone else is talking about electricity.
(It's also out of date - Germany currently generates about 17% of it's electricity from renewables, not the ~3% wikipedia shows).
Watch this Heartland Institute video
International Atomic Energy Agency
Another good example of Mass Hysteria by the idiotic crowd. People are afraid of nuclear power because of what happened in Japan. Well, there was a 9.1 earthquake in Japan (which didn't even damage the powerplants) followed by a massive tsunami. What Germany got do do with it? Italy is going to a referendum and it's said that close to 90% will vote against nuclear power. People are stupid, but here on /. we already knew that.
I did not see any numbers about the amount of radioactive substances in that footnote, just "among which". Care to provide a link to actual numbers that support the claim in the GP's link?
You bet... and I'm sure he appreciates your contribution.. You got some catching up to do, my friend... He gets heavier response from a single comment than you do from a whole page of 24.. You should have your subluxations checked.. you might need a refill...
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
I did some very basic calculations a while ago.
If all nuclear plants in Germany would all be replaced by coal plants, the average annual carbon footprint per german citizen would raise 1.5 tons from 9.5 tons to 11 tons of CO2. The average carbon footprint of a US citizen is about 20 tons.
This is the math (data from http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromerzeugung):
g CO2/kWh nuclear energy: 66
g CO2/kWh coal: 900
kWh/year produced by nuclear plants: 135 *10^9
#germans: 80 * 10^6
(135 * 10^9 kWh *(900 g CO2/kWh -66 g CO2/kWh))/(80*10^6 germans) = 1407375 g CO2/german
This would set back the german CO2 emmision to the status in 1998 http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&met=en_atm_co2e_pc&idim=country%3ADEU&dl=de&hl=de&q=co2+pro+kopf .
Germany wasn't going to be spending a lot of money maintaining those nuclear plants and building new ones unless there was going to be a similtaneous Greek, Spanish, Irish and Icelandic economic miracle.
Civilian nuclear power is finished unless viable reactors of a small size (for safety) and small cost are produced which will reduce the huge upfront capital expediture pain that has been preventing construction just about everywhere. There are some options but they need a bit of R&D.
You see, real safety, not mickey-mouse make believe duck-and-cover safety is much too expensive to the folks in the executive class that get to become rich with this type of projects. So they prefer to allow for the occasional meltdown.
This my friend is where you show a complete lack of understanding behind the principles of process safety. Safety is NOT expensive. Please repeat that after me, Safety is NOT expensive. Safety comes in good design.
So Fukushima nuclear plant melted down because the cooling water systems failed after getting hit by a tsunami. How about simply not building them in an area where they can be struck by tsunamis or hit by earthquakes. Your German reactor had issues with the cold? Why not locate buildings indoors and heat the room through waste heat of the reactor.
You see fundamentally designs have changed a lot to go for inherent process safety. There exist reactors that can't possibly melt down, reactors that can dissipate to a safe state on a complete loss of power to all parts simultaneously, reactors that can run on the waste of other reactors without requiring re-processing. These designs have 40 years of process safety experience in them and cost not a cent more than the reactors of 40 years ago.
Retrofitting safety into an outdated reactor limping on its last legs is expensive these should be shut down. But the fundamental problem with nuclear is people like YOU, people who think because the dinosaurs are unsafe and economical that we should not invest in future technologies. Did you also cry from the hills that cars didn't have seatbelts, airbags, or ABS and that the only logical solution is to shut down the entire card industry? If not, why? After all more people die in car accidents in a single year than the nuclear industry has ever killed even if you take into account the bombs.
> Germany is pushing hard on the green front, entire towns are off the grid now.
Now, now, let's not spread such bullshit. Not a single town allegedly powered by "renewables" is capable of doing so without grid connection. If they go offline, they will go dark.
Out of curiosity, what makes you opposed to the modern iteration of nuclear reactors? The major accidents have all been Mark I reactors, which have been known to be unsafe since 1972 (warnings ignored, thank GE in the U.S.). For modern reactors, "real science" reveals mostly positives, with almost no chance of a critical meltdown.
Well, as you wrote: "almost no chance...". The thing is, the probability estimates in this regard have a habit of turning out wrong; somehow something comes up that was not included in the estimate. In Chernobyl, well, it was a Russian plant, well, of course communists can't build proper plants. In Fukushima, it was either (a) the reactor design is outdated, or (b) the scale of the natural disaster was so unexpectedly large.
What will it be next time? How about maybe, "My bad, the reactor design was absolutely safe, but of course we didn't anticipate a terrorist attack / software glitch in the controls / human error."
I think it is not too convincing to keep hearing, "of course, in the past we were too stupid to prevent such disasters, but now we got the hang of it, honest"
Nuclear power is releasing uninimaginable quantities of waste, which contains all the elements you named, and much more, in a radioactive isotope version. This is also stored in unsafe places, and has to be stored for millions of years. Who will care of that in 20 years, when nuclear power will disappear ? Nobody. And it will contaminate large territories, it already started at places like Mayak, Tchernoby, Fukushima, TMI, Windscale, La Hague, etc.
Any ones that are left powered on. Transistors last apparently indefinitely if you leave them powered on, it's only when cycling the power that you have a chance for them to blow (after the "infant mortality" period of a few weeks/months anyway).
I think you're getting confused with valves or something, though even those don't last indefinitely. Transistor-based designs are a bit different - the longer you run them for (and the higher the voltage and temperature you run them at), the more likely the transistors are to die.
The Fukujima plant saved lives. Did you see the area around it? Not too many people survived that tsunami. But those working in the plant at that time did.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
Good for France, they will buy even more of our nuclear energy !
You're so fucking stupid it makes me laugh. You have no clue and you don't even have anything backing your bullcrap up. Why don't you go away you clueless trolling douchebag?
And here I thought I was done with this discussion...
In Chernobyl, well, it was a Russian plant, well, of course communists can't build proper plants. In Fukushima, it was either (a) the reactor design is outdated, or (b) the scale of the natural disaster was so unexpectedly large.
Couple of things: first, Chernobyl was built without any sort of containment, and was operated with all controls disabled. It was like driving a truck through rough mountains with a nuclear bomb in the back on a hair trigger. And they were running experiments to test the limits of the thing!
In the case of Fukushima, yes, the reactors were outdated. Very outdated. Criminally outdated, considering that nuclear advocates have been screaming about that particular design flaw since 1972.
but of course we didn't anticipate a terrorist attack / software glitch in the controls / human error
As I pointed out earlier, the new reactor designs (the ones that we should be building, while demolishing Mark I (and some II) reactors) are invulnerable to those three. Why? Because modern reactors are designed to only keep and accept a small amount of fissionable material critical. In this sense, the controls are not required to prevent a disaster, because the reaction would simply fizzle, with all potential radiation leakage coming from the core being stopped at the containment. In fact, the controls are only required to keep the reaction going (and you can always shut everything down with control rods, but again, you can just let it fizzle in an emergency).
What this means is that human error and control failure would only cause a power failure, not a dangerous overload.
As for terrorism: the only way to possibly make an inherently-safe reactor design experience a far-reaching accident would be to detonate a nuclear bomb inside of it (this is the only thing the new containments cannot necessarily withstand). To do so would be a waste of a nuclear bomb, since the resulting disaster (if containment was even breached, and all fissionable material went critical) would be less devastating than, say, detonating the device at a sports stadium, or even a city street.
I think it is not too convincing to keep hearing, "of course, in the past we were too stupid to prevent such disasters, but now we got the hang of it, honest"
Since reactors have been built, we have had 50 years to pick apart every design aspect. We now know the physics in great detail, and can rationally design reactors. That we still have designs from the 70s in operation and causing disasters boggles the mind, but the new ones are safe. There's no delusions about it, just the physics behind it.
sad new for you, California now gets 60% of its energy from natural gas, up from 40% in just 3 short years. Fossil fuels are one viable alternative to nuclear, California chose that. Enjoy your fossil fuel future.
No tsunamis that I know about, but there have been quite a few earthquakes which I have personally experienced. None on the scale that are common in Japan, for sure, but there were some. And nobody can really be sure that there won't be even more severe quakes or even volcano eruptions in Germany in the near future. There are quite a few sleeping but far from inactive volcanoes.
http://www.off-grid.net/2009/10/17/german-village-goes-off-grid-ready/
As an example.
You might want to check the last election results. The BQ got wiped out by the NDP.
Me, obviously!!! :-)
Let's call it what it is, Anti-Social Media.
How many species would be killed due to environmental disruption and alteration?
I find being offended by me offensive.
Merkel's spokesman says whatever it takes to get votes. By the time the shit hits the fan, Merkel is out of office and doesn't have to worry about it anymore. Remember, this is the same woman who said that it didn't matter that here defense minister lied and had copied almost his entire Ph.D. thesis from other sources.
Germany's CO2 emissions and energy consumption are currently no better than many other European countries on a per capita basis, despite its claims of being so environmentally conscious and successful at managing its energy usage.
Getting rid of nuclear power means one thing for Germany: a large increase in gas imports from Russia. Now, what could possibly go wrong with Russia being able to shut down the German economy at the touch of a button? Heck, Russia doesn't even need an army anymore to pressure Germany (not that Germany would fight back), they just need to hint at "slight technical problems with the pipeline".