we have a lot of confirming evidence that the LNT holds to very small doses.
No, actually we don't. The one common thread between studies of very low dose exposures is that they all have results which pretty much fall within the uncertainty band of the study itself.
Citation please. Specifically which statistics and which science are you referring to?
I can say it too. Sounds scary. Do you really think you are on to some big thing that these doctors don't fully understand?
No, just something you don't understand. You CLEARLY have no understanding of the differences between radiation and radionuclides and no understanding of external and internal exposure.
Repeat after me R.A.D.I.O.N.U.C.L.I.D.E..A.B.S.O.R.P.T.I.O.N
Contamination & internal exposure is easily monitored. It is fully considered, I assure you. You can find plenty of reference in the IAEA reports.
Produce the evidence, the exact pages in the IAEA report.
According to established radiation science and statistics,
Citation please. Specifically which statistics and which science are you referring to?
hahahahahaha - he effortlessly made you look like the shill you are, almost but not quite a professional yet are you.
You CLEARLY have no understanding of the differences between radiation and radionuclides and no understanding of external and internal exposure. You cannot and will not support your claims.
Repeat after me R.A.D.I.O.N.U.C.L.I.D.E..A.B.S.O.R.P.T.I.O.N
Here is something to help you better gauge the risks. The exposure received by this worker is closer to the zero mark than the next mark above it (250).
http://jmsc.hku.hk/sites/healt...
You CLEARLY have no understanding of the differences between radiation and radionuclides and no understanding of external and internal exposure.
Repeat after me R.A.D.I.O.N.U.C.L.I.D.E..A.B.S.O.R.P.T.I.O.N
According to established radiation science and statistics,
Citation please. Specifically which statistics and which science are you referring to?
Ok, I see where the confusion is, I've led you to believe it's all about aircraft impacts however that is not the main issue. Aircraft resistance is a consequence of what the real issue is.
Thermal Containment ratio which is the amount of concrete compared to the energy in the reactor at anyone time. So it doesn't matter if a reactor dome can tank an aircraft, what matters is if it can tank the reactor that it contains. I was referring to TMI because it has the *highest* Thermal Containment ratio of reactors as a consequence of it being in a flight path.
This means that TMI has the highest possibility for containing a reactor explosion such as what occurred in Fukushima. Reduce the amount of concrete below the amount of thermal energy in the reactor and you may as well not have a concrete dome at all. It just makes people feel better. AP1000's thermal containment ratio is below that of the reactor (IIRC) and certainly much less than TMI.
Dude, the wiki, westinghouse's site [westinghousenuclear.com], etc... All mention extensive safety systems, including how they've changed some things up to improve safety
I'm critical of information from the manufacturers of reactors. I've never heard a company say bad things about their products and I don't expect reactor manufacturers to be any different. Independent studies and law are generally more reliable. Westinghouse want to sell nuclear reactors.
I think the problem I'm having with your assertion that the AP1000 includes 'none' of the recommended safety measures is that by all research I've done, it includes them quite extensively. So I think you need to be more specific about what safety measures you think it doesn't have, that it should.
That new reactors should be underground is the first and there are about 30 other recommendations like control room design and implementation of EPR like features. If you want the watered down version, and no, AP-1000 has none of them.
Searching the web, I primarily get that the EPR is not as good or economical as the AP1000. But like I've said earlier, I'm actually neutral on the two designs.... AP1000 has a core damage frequency of 5.09e-7 per plant years, EPR is rated at 6.1e-7 per plant year...
AP1000 has a lot of problems because new features introduce new failure modes. Of the math regarding CDF that you quoted the NRC had this to say in SECY-05-0227 FINAL RULE — AP1000 DESIGN CERTIFICATION:
The applicant’s estimates of risk do not account for uncertainties either in the CDF or in the offsite radiation exposures resulting from a core damage event. The uncertainties in both of these key elements are fairly large because key safety features of the AP1000 design are unique and their reliability has been evaluated through analysis and testing programs rather than operating experience. In addition, the estimates of CDF and offsite exposures do not account for the added risk from earthquakes. - however they approved it anyway.
Challenge your assumptions here Firethorn, AP-1000 is not a good design.
Whilst you say these containment buildings sneer at plane impacts, well, EPR builds *another* concrete building around that one, has four separate buildings to control radio-isotopes in the event of an accident and, a core catcher, which isn't present in the AP-1000 at all. EPR is also resistant to impacts from *Military* aircraft. Powerful and good, but not cheap.
Do I talk about why AP-1000 is crap? Corrosion is the biggest issue from my understanding and the reduced accessibility to inspect key parts of the reactor. CDF has little to do with what volu
I've shown you mine. You have got nothing - as usual.
Bottom line is, we have very good and very detailed exposure and contamination information.
Produce it. The exact pages in the report I should read. Show me the data, show me the evidence.
You can take the moral superiority tact, but you undermine it with an inability to produce evidence that highlights you are bullshitting. I just call it like I see it.
No you don't. You're still struggling to tell the difference between internal and external radiation exposure. You fail to understand bio-accumulation and bio-concentration, how it propagate through the environment and the food chain, what micro nutrients the radio nuclides you've mentioned below analogue, what cancers they cause, what level of transgenic disease and failed pregnancies and a host of other things are caused.
Most of fallout from these mishaps is in form of short lived isotopes, and the stuff that actually remains is Cesium (for Fukushima) and some Strontium (in case of Chernobyl, which is not the same as Fukushima). Both of these have half lives measured in about ONE human generation. This means that in a few generations (about 100 years),
Whose radioactive versions are neatly absorbed into the food chain and whose daughter products will easily exceed our time here. You left out plutonium, it's chloride and oxide produced when the sea water was used to cool fukushima reactor and just spewed out by Chernobyl. Will that die down in one generation too? I don't think so.
So yes, I support nuclear power because,
1. it demands that we deal with its waste
Except that in the entire 50 years of the nuclear industry we haven't
2. local population that benefits from the plants is impacted by any mishaps -- it's in local interest to push for safety
Except that they can't because government regulations stop them from doing so even if they knew what to push for
3. it's abundant
Completely false. Soft ores are expended and only hard ores remain so nuclear power is close to not being viable anyway because of the amount of energy the front end processes consume just getting the fuel ready. So you are talking about a completely different technology with different design basis issues.
4. it's always on, base-load power technology
Which is a function of the grid and not of any individual power source.
It's time environmentalists wake up and start opposing carbon as primary danger to our future. Primary danger to our environment is our agricultural practices and carbon pollution, not nuclear power.
And it's time for nuclear supporters to start acknowledging the problems the nuclear industry has and fixing them. Except they won't even acknowledge them so we can't even discuss how to fix them. So that leaves us with ditching coal AND nuclear because all the nuclear supporters create the mindset where nuclear accidents happen. You don't know anything about nuclear power, it's net energy return and how to fix it's problems because you transmute you 'idealized' imagination of how you *think* it *should* work onto reality.
History has proven with Windscale, TMI, Chernobyl and Fukushima that we simply do not have the systemic discipline to control nuclear power safely. Even if we could Coal and Oil maintains a legislative advantage over Nuclear that keeps you blaming environmental groups for the nuclear industries woes. Nuclear is the Oil industries bitch, if you'd bother to understand the laws that regulate it you would understand why.
I think the OX part of MOX pretty much guarantees it doesn't have an ignition temperature at all unless you're a fan of fluorine atmospheres:)
I'm curious about how you think this would behave. We already know that the fuel in that configuration was producing hydrogen as the water levels reduced in the reactor even with the control rods in place. With 30-40 years of spent fuel in the spent fuel pools, that's roughly 5-6 times as much fuel mass than the core. So in absence of anything to moderate such a fuel mass how are you suggesting it would behave?
And MOX has a relatively low proportion of plutonium coupled with a very high ignition temperature. It probably wouldn't catch fire.
Well it's probably not worth risking the extinction of humanity finding out then is it. Luckily, the people who make the decisions about such things agree with me and we won't have to find out.
Thanks for the link, I didn't see anything there that disproves LNT, care to provide one that supports your statement?
But you just keep believing your reds-under-the-bed propoganda view of radiation.. because science stopped in the 50s, really it did.
There is no need to get emotional, I'd prefer to stick with the science myself. You are *still* missing the difference between radiation and radionuclides, the difference between internal and external exposure to radionuclides.
For bonus points I suggest you keep working hard to stop development/deployment of new generation nuclear power, to maximise the length
of time we keep running old gen reactors, and block any attempts to minimise waste through reprocessing/breeding! yeah, thats the ticket!
breeding eh? I see you have a long way to go before you understand the issues. Right now you think I am anti nuclear, yet you don't even know what a burner reactor is.
Before you start ad-homing the shit out of me, why don't you check out some of my other posts and see if I've supported my opinion with fact. It's a complex industry and you may have some good points to share which will mean we both learn something. I'm not being an asshole to you, I'm just asking you to support your claim if you can.
What a fucking little coward you are. Go crawl under your blanket and live in your world of soot and shit you cock sucking useless cum stain.
Says the Anonymous Coward illustrating the intellectual level at which you discuss things. Why don't you mod my copy of your insults up so people can see how useless and inane your ad hom attacks are.
I hope your studies are progressing well Firethorn !
I'd argue that Coal is worse, and worse in ways that we still don't fully comprehend. Remember, most of the dangerous byproducts from a coal plant don't break down, and aren't all that well contained.
You're not going to get an argument from me that coal is bad. It is a shit industry, they don't want to change and you already know my opinions, based in knowledge of the appropriate bills, how and why the nuclear industry is still, like all of us, beholden to coal and oil.
You also know that I think Nuclear *could* be better if we could get past all of the people who think they are supporting it, but in reality are preventing it from evolving a safety culture. It needs to be divorced from private industry's profit motivation and moved into the domain of government where it can be managed with the same type of safety culture that exists in military installations.
Based on the available evidence from the official report, I doubt Japan could make the appropriate regulatory changes that would support a safe restart of the industry. Same situation, it's not the technology so much as the entities running it.
We understand the problems with nuclear power pretty well, including that it kills fewer people per MWh than solar.
Well, I think you need to read my comments about IAEA and WHO however I see that it has already been modded down, perhaps the facts are a little too confrontational. It doesn't matter - the real conversation about Nuclear power is always at -1 here at/.
As for killing less than solar, I think it is clear that that is a contrived situation.
Incidentally, I will post the last part of our previous discussion on EPR vs AP1000 for you later as you asked me to answer some specific things which I was too tired to answer. I could be related to what we are discussing here.
I'm from Sweden, almost half of our electricity has come from hydro power and the other half from nuclear power.
Well, you guys and Finland and the world leaders in this technology. I commend your countries pragmatic approach to spent fuel containment, of which Japan has none.
Just to give other people here some context, one of the most major criticisms of Yucca Mountain was that the DOE's original policy using the 'Defense in Depth' approach to the specification for building a spent fuel containment facility could not be applied to Yucca's geology. The reason to choose a specific geology (in addition to being seisemically stable) was also to have the geologic chemistry of the rock able to control the the amount of time ground water took to travel through the facility carrying radioactive isotopes, eventually, into the water table. If the amount of time it takes exceeds the decay rate of the longest lived radio-isotopes then the facility was providing defense in depth.
In addition, as a site like that would be containing pu-239, whose half life is around 25000 years, after considering the daughter products you need a geology capable of containing it for 500,000 years, which is what the original specification called for.
Studies of the Yucca mountain hydrology (pdf) revealed that the passage cl-36 from atmospheric nuclear testing took less that 50 years in ground water through Yucca mountain so the reality of Yucca is it is inappropriate to contain *any* kind of radioactive products. The reason is Yucca is pumice and volcanic ash.
Curiously, getting this right should be the one thing pro and anti nuclear folk should be able to agree on, if only for their own reasons. For Nuclear power to continue operating such a storage facility is essential so that new reactors can be deployed and materials removed from reactor sites. For people against Nuclear power such a facility would improve the safety of the industry as a whole by providing a place to store the materials permanently where there ingress into the environment can be controlled.
We don't see any improvements to governance, containment or anything else in Japans Nuclear industry thus very little logic in restarting it.
First of all, I'll reiterate bloodhawk's point above, that coal has worse long-term impact than nuclear disasters too.
Well DU is analogous to coal ash, so is it worse than this? Which was also inflicted on American soldiers.
This is what happens when you start spreading DU around regardless of the source (in this case as munitions). Warning: those pictures are disturbing and illustrates the consequence of internal radiation exposure from one type of radionuclide.
So coal bad, nuclear worse.
Second, the main long-term impact of Chernobyl and Fukushima (beyond the lifetimes of the humans involved)
Unfortunately it is a contrived position that has been constructed by the political agreements in place to deceive us into thinking that something positive came out of Chernobyl, I doubt Ukrainians would agree. I will provide you with some context.
According to the IAEA's founding papers "The agency shall seek to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic energy to peace, health and prosperity through the world." I'll draw your attention to the interdiction clause (12.40) the IAEA has over the WHO drawn up on 28 May 1959, at the 12th World Health Assembly:
"Whenever either organisation [the WHO or the IAEA] proposes to initiate a programme or activity on a subject in which the other organisation has or may have a substantial interest, the first party shall consult the other with a view to adjusting the matter by mutual agreement"
In other words, the WHO grants the right of prior approval over any research it might undertake or report on to the IAEA , widely known in the scientific community as the instrument that gags their work. Unless of course you beleive the IAEA has an interest in malaria or Aids research it has effectively gagged the WHO from reporting on health matters Nuclear.
Ask yourself how likely it is for us to get reliable health science if the world's peak health organisation has it's science related to Nuclear matter vetted by the orgainsation responsible for promoting nuclear power.
Look, Chernobyl and Fukushima sucked for their victims.
Indeed it did. As opposed to WHO reports, reports in the Slavic languages from Ukrainian scientists on the ground performing research into the after effects of Chernobyl estimate deaths as a consequence of the Chernobyl accident to be around 980,000.
Why is their science less valid?
It's an emotional, irrational overreaction that just doesn't make any damn (statistical) sense.
No, it's a logical one based on a dispassionate examination of the evidence. Current governance of Nuclear reactor technology (especially in Japan) needs a complete overhaul as so far, it has produced accidents and is in no way comparable to the airline industry who has an embedded safety culture. You need look no further than
the Japanese governments own inquiry for that opinion:
The TEPCO Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant accident was the result of collusion between the government, the regulators and TEPCO, and the lack of governance by said parties. They effectively betrayed the nationâ(TM)s right to be safe from nuclear accidents. Therefore, we conclude that the accident was clearly manmade.
So far, we have no evidence that there is any improvement in the regulatory structures of NIAC or TEPCO and thus how can we expect anything different a restart of their nuclear industry. Not the technology, per se, but the flawed humans running it.
Despite your apparent ignorance on the subject, it is the situation that we *all* faced at Unit 4 Fukushima spent fuel pools for the last four years. Why do you think that TEPCO worked so hard to remove the fuel rods from the structure that is failing. What do you think would happen to plutonium fuel rods in a spent fuel pool without water surrounding them to moderate neutron activity had the structure collapsed?
The answer is Plutonium Fire. The 1300 fuel rods in unit 4 (now removed - thankfully) in storage with another 4000 in a storage unit near by presented the risk of a plutonium fire so large that it would be, IN FACT, an extinction level event that would spread hundreds of tons of fissile ash (mainly plutonium oxide and plutonium chloride) across the entire northern hemisphere via the jet stream.
You can't put a Plutonium fire out with water because it splits the water into hydrogen and oxygen. This is the physics that make a reactor operate in the first place and were the ones at play as a result of the basis design issue of the reactor that lead to the explosions in the first place.
Whilst the structural issues that damaged unit 4's spent fuel pool made the removal of the fuel rods a priority there, whether or not we face the same issue in unit's 1-3 depend on if the radiation levels in those units will allow works to continue to remove the remaining spent fuel. Fortunately the largest risk from unit 4 has been abated.
These are the realities of accidents like this and these are the risks we take on by using Nuclear power. If you want to remove such a risk, go start lobbying your politicians for a geologically sound spent fuel repository because such a risk exists in every plant until we do.
You seem to forget that the US dropped NUCLEAR FUCKING BOMBS on two Japanese cities only 70 odd years ago, and both are thriving cities these days.
A nuclear bomb has a mass of plutonium in the kilogram range. A nuclear reactor's fuel mass is in the 100-150 ton range. You are missing the difference between radiation and radionuclides.
What goes on for so long is the bs paranoia that is so deeply ingrained that people refuse to look at the scientific facts that low levels of radiation are not lethal
Citation please. LNT has NOT been disproved - so where is your evidence that it is?
But dont let actual facts get in the way of your cold war radiation terror..
Well I'm sure you won't have any trouble producing the facts you claim to have.
The TEPCO Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant accident was the result of collusion between the government, the regulators and TEPCO, and the lack of governance by said parties. They effectively betrayed the nation’s right to be safe from nuclear accidents. Therefore, we conclude that the accident was clearly “manmade.”
See it's not me saying the word "collusion", it's the *official* investigation.
If you read that report you'll find sentences like "were aware of the risk of core damage from tsunami" and "nor did TEPCO take any protective steps against such an occurrence. "
And here is another one "In order to get evidence of this collusion, the Commission was forced to exercise our legislative right to demand such information from NISA, after NISA failed to respond to several requests"
So before you go waving your fatty finger at me, I suggest you get a better understanding of the facts. We already have positive proof that TEPCO do not disclose information and official evidence that they engage in cover ups.
Thanks for the link, I'll make a point of reading it so I can excoriate you with it later. More than likely you've done a 30 second google search, you haven't read it and, you just want to look like you are in some possesion of facts. So care to point me to where in that 1200 odd pages of a report, by an agency who promotes nuclear power, should look to find support of your claims? It should be easy, but I doubt you can.
Exposures are tightly monitored.
So is information and I will provide you with some context. According to the IAEA's founding papers "The agency shall seek to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic energy to peace, health and prosperity through the world." Since you are so intent on claims of a cover up I'll draw your attention to the interdiction clause (12.40) the IAEA has over the WHO drawn up on 28 May 1959, at the 12th World Health Assembly:
"Whenever either organisation [the WHO or the IAEA] proposes to initiate a programme or activity on a subject in which the other organisation has or may have a substantial interest, the first party shall consult the other with a view to adjusting the matter by mutual agreement"
In other words, the WHO grants the right of prior approval over any research it might undertake or report on to the IAEA , widely known in the scientific community as the instrument that gags their work. Unless of course you beleive the IAEA has an interest in malaria or Aids research it has effectively gagged the WHO from reporting on health matters Nuclear.
Consequently the facts reveal your ignorance with very little effort on my part. Since you have very little manners, it is a service that is my pleasure to provide.
every coal fire plant is a disaster that is occurring every single day and are continuing to affect the human race in ways we still don't fully comprehend long after everyone here is dead.
You are arguing that having two problems is the solution, instead of getting rid of both problems. Nuclear and Coal are as bad as each other and Nuclear is worse in ways we still don't fully comprehend.
We only get worked up about nuclear disasters because they're so unusual.
No we don't. We get worked up about them because they go on for so long. Chernobyl, Fukushima are all disasters that are still occurring and will continue to affect the human race in ways we still don't fully comprehend long after everyone here is dead.
However, now we have some because I was, for once, not lazy. You're welcome. I don't know if they're the correct facts or even the information needed but, damn it, we've got data!
First of all, they aren't your claims to support, but thanks for trying. MrDfrom63 has to be able to prove the statements he made aren't "bullshit", the onus of proof is on him.
You however are missing the difference between radiation and radionuclides, in particular which ones and their quantity. I suspect plutonium chloride so, they are the incorrect "facts" to support the OP's "bullshitting".
Now back to your regularly scheduled poop flinging and screeching.
An ad hom attack before engaging in any dialogue is the typical response of someone who has no argument to offer. Perhaps if you educated yourself about how soluble plutonium chloride is and where in the body you would expect it to accumulate considering it is an iron analogue we may have been able to have a polite conversation.
Instead I'll let you get back to your kool-aid as it is unlikely you have anything constructive to add.
If the anti-nuclear folk can prevent safe storage, then it makes nuclear power more dangerous. In the same way they push low capacity factor "green" power which makes high capacity factor nuclear power more expensive.
I think you will find it has more to do with budgetary and political wrangling more than anti-nuclear people. In many countries there are laws to stop any entity lower than a state government interfering with the placement of nuclear facilities.
Slashdot Mirror
we have a lot of confirming evidence that the LNT holds to very small doses.
No, actually we don't. The one common thread between studies of very low dose exposures is that they all have results which pretty much fall within the uncertainty band of the study itself.
Citation please. Specifically which statistics and which science are you referring to?
OK. "Radionuclide Absorption"
I can say it too. Sounds scary. Do you really think you are on to some big thing that these doctors don't fully understand?
No, just something you don't understand. You CLEARLY have no understanding of the differences between radiation and radionuclides and no understanding of external and internal exposure.
Repeat after me R.A.D.I.O.N.U.C.L.I.D.E..A.B.S.O.R.P.T.I.O.N
Contamination & internal exposure is easily monitored. It is fully considered, I assure you. You can find plenty of reference in the IAEA reports.
Produce the evidence, the exact pages in the IAEA report.
Citation please. Specifically which statistics and which science are you referring to?
hahahahahaha - he effortlessly made you look like the shill you are, almost but not quite a professional yet are you.
You CLEARLY have no understanding of the differences between radiation and radionuclides and no understanding of external and internal exposure. You cannot and will not support your claims.
Repeat after me R.A.D.I.O.N.U.C.L.I.D.E..A.B.S.O.R.P.T.I.O.N
Try this one - p.l.u.t.o.n.i.u.m.c.h.l.o.r.i.d.e
Here is something to help you better gauge the risks. The exposure received by this worker is closer to the zero mark than the next mark above it (250). http://jmsc.hku.hk/sites/healt...
You CLEARLY have no understanding of the differences between radiation and radionuclides and no understanding of external and internal exposure.
Repeat after me R.A.D.I.O.N.U.C.L.I.D.E..A.B.S.O.R.P.T.I.O.N
Citation please. Specifically which statistics and which science are you referring to?
Citation please. Specifically which statistics and which science are you referring to?
Ok, I see where the confusion is, I've led you to believe it's all about aircraft impacts however that is not the main issue. Aircraft resistance is a consequence of what the real issue is.
Thermal Containment ratio which is the amount of concrete compared to the energy in the reactor at anyone time. So it doesn't matter if a reactor dome can tank an aircraft, what matters is if it can tank the reactor that it contains. I was referring to TMI because it has the *highest* Thermal Containment ratio of reactors as a consequence of it being in a flight path.
This means that TMI has the highest possibility for containing a reactor explosion such as what occurred in Fukushima. Reduce the amount of concrete below the amount of thermal energy in the reactor and you may as well not have a concrete dome at all. It just makes people feel better. AP1000's thermal containment ratio is below that of the reactor (IIRC) and certainly much less than TMI.
I'm critical of information from the manufacturers of reactors. I've never heard a company say bad things about their products and I don't expect reactor manufacturers to be any different. Independent studies and law are generally more reliable. Westinghouse want to sell nuclear reactors.
That new reactors should be underground is the first and there are about 30 other recommendations like control room design and implementation of EPR like features. If you want the watered down version, and no, AP-1000 has none of them.
AP1000 has a lot of problems because new features introduce new failure modes. Of the math regarding CDF that you quoted the NRC had this to say in SECY-05-0227 FINAL RULE — AP1000 DESIGN CERTIFICATION: The applicant’s estimates of risk do not account for uncertainties either in the CDF or in the offsite radiation exposures resulting from a core damage event. The uncertainties in both of these key elements are fairly large because key safety features of the AP1000 design are unique and their reliability has been evaluated through analysis and testing programs rather than operating experience. In addition, the estimates of CDF and offsite exposures do not account for the added risk from earthquakes. - however they approved it anyway.
Challenge your assumptions here Firethorn, AP-1000 is not a good design.
Whilst you say these containment buildings sneer at plane impacts, well, EPR builds *another* concrete building around that one, has four separate buildings to control radio-isotopes in the event of an accident and, a core catcher, which isn't present in the AP-1000 at all. EPR is also resistant to impacts from *Military* aircraft. Powerful and good, but not cheap.
Do I talk about why AP-1000 is crap? Corrosion is the biggest issue from my understanding and the reduced accessibility to inspect key parts of the reactor. CDF has little to do with what volu
Citation please. Specifically which statistics and which science are you referring to?
Citation please. Specifically which statistics and which science are you referring to?
Bottom line is, we have very good and very detailed exposure and contamination information.
Produce it. The exact pages in the report I should read. Show me the data, show me the evidence.
You can take the moral superiority tact, but you undermine it with an inability to produce evidence that highlights you are bullshitting. I just call it like I see it.
YES, *we* do (though, maybe you don't).
No you don't. You're still struggling to tell the difference between internal and external radiation exposure. You fail to understand bio-accumulation and bio-concentration, how it propagate through the environment and the food chain, what micro nutrients the radio nuclides you've mentioned below analogue, what cancers they cause, what level of transgenic disease and failed pregnancies and a host of other things are caused.
Most of fallout from these mishaps is in form of short lived isotopes, and the stuff that actually remains is Cesium (for Fukushima) and some Strontium (in case of Chernobyl, which is not the same as Fukushima). Both of these have half lives measured in about ONE human generation. This means that in a few generations (about 100 years),
Whose radioactive versions are neatly absorbed into the food chain and whose daughter products will easily exceed our time here. You left out plutonium, it's chloride and oxide produced when the sea water was used to cool fukushima reactor and just spewed out by Chernobyl. Will that die down in one generation too? I don't think so.
So yes, I support nuclear power because,
1. it demands that we deal with its waste
Except that in the entire 50 years of the nuclear industry we haven't
2. local population that benefits from the plants is impacted by any mishaps -- it's in local interest to push for safety
Except that they can't because government regulations stop them from doing so even if they knew what to push for
3. it's abundant
Completely false. Soft ores are expended and only hard ores remain so nuclear power is close to not being viable anyway because of the amount of energy the front end processes consume just getting the fuel ready. So you are talking about a completely different technology with different design basis issues.
4. it's always on, base-load power technology
Which is a function of the grid and not of any individual power source.
It's time environmentalists wake up and start opposing carbon as primary danger to our future. Primary danger to our environment is our agricultural practices and carbon pollution, not nuclear power.
And it's time for nuclear supporters to start acknowledging the problems the nuclear industry has and fixing them. Except they won't even acknowledge them so we can't even discuss how to fix them. So that leaves us with ditching coal AND nuclear because all the nuclear supporters create the mindset where nuclear accidents happen. You don't know anything about nuclear power, it's net energy return and how to fix it's problems because you transmute you 'idealized' imagination of how you *think* it *should* work onto reality.
History has proven with Windscale, TMI, Chernobyl and Fukushima that we simply do not have the systemic discipline to control nuclear power safely. Even if we could Coal and Oil maintains a legislative advantage over Nuclear that keeps you blaming environmental groups for the nuclear industries woes. Nuclear is the Oil industries bitch, if you'd bother to understand the laws that regulate it you would understand why.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Indeed, thanks for reminding me.
I think the OX part of MOX pretty much guarantees it doesn't have an ignition temperature at all unless you're a fan of fluorine atmospheres :)
I'm curious about how you think this would behave. We already know that the fuel in that configuration was producing hydrogen as the water levels reduced in the reactor even with the control rods in place. With 30-40 years of spent fuel in the spent fuel pools, that's roughly 5-6 times as much fuel mass than the core. So in absence of anything to moderate such a fuel mass how are you suggesting it would behave?
And MOX has a relatively low proportion of plutonium coupled with a very high ignition temperature. It probably wouldn't catch fire.
Well it's probably not worth risking the extinction of humanity finding out then is it. Luckily, the people who make the decisions about such things agree with me and we won't have to find out.
Thanks for the link, I didn't see anything there that disproves LNT, care to provide one that supports your statement?
But you just keep believing your reds-under-the-bed propoganda view of radiation.. because science stopped in the 50s, really it did.
There is no need to get emotional, I'd prefer to stick with the science myself. You are *still* missing the difference between radiation and radionuclides, the difference between internal and external exposure to radionuclides.
For bonus points I suggest you keep working hard to stop development/deployment of new generation nuclear power, to maximise the length of time we keep running old gen reactors, and block any attempts to minimise waste through reprocessing/breeding! yeah, thats the ticket!
breeding eh? I see you have a long way to go before you understand the issues. Right now you think I am anti nuclear, yet you don't even know what a burner reactor is.
Before you start ad-homing the shit out of me, why don't you check out some of my other posts and see if I've supported my opinion with fact. It's a complex industry and you may have some good points to share which will mean we both learn something. I'm not being an asshole to you, I'm just asking you to support your claim if you can.
What a fucking little coward you are. Go crawl under your blanket and live in your world of soot and shit you cock sucking useless cum stain.
Says the Anonymous Coward illustrating the intellectual level at which you discuss things. Why don't you mod my copy of your insults up so people can see how useless and inane your ad hom attacks are.
I'd argue that Coal is worse, and worse in ways that we still don't fully comprehend. Remember, most of the dangerous byproducts from a coal plant don't break down, and aren't all that well contained.
You're not going to get an argument from me that coal is bad. It is a shit industry, they don't want to change and you already know my opinions, based in knowledge of the appropriate bills, how and why the nuclear industry is still, like all of us, beholden to coal and oil.
You also know that I think Nuclear *could* be better if we could get past all of the people who think they are supporting it, but in reality are preventing it from evolving a safety culture. It needs to be divorced from private industry's profit motivation and moved into the domain of government where it can be managed with the same type of safety culture that exists in military installations.
Based on the available evidence from the official report, I doubt Japan could make the appropriate regulatory changes that would support a safe restart of the industry. Same situation, it's not the technology so much as the entities running it.
We understand the problems with nuclear power pretty well, including that it kills fewer people per MWh than solar.
Well, I think you need to read my comments about IAEA and WHO however I see that it has already been modded down, perhaps the facts are a little too confrontational. It doesn't matter - the real conversation about Nuclear power is always at -1 here at /.
As for killing less than solar, I think it is clear that that is a contrived situation.
Nuclear power waste is at least contained.
It's a core problem of the nuclear industry around the world that needs to be solved of which I have already commented on.
Incidentally, I will post the last part of our previous discussion on EPR vs AP1000 for you later as you asked me to answer some specific things which I was too tired to answer. I could be related to what we are discussing here.
I'm from Sweden, almost half of our electricity has come from hydro power and the other half from nuclear power.
Well, you guys and Finland and the world leaders in this technology. I commend your countries pragmatic approach to spent fuel containment, of which Japan has none.
Just to give other people here some context, one of the most major criticisms of Yucca Mountain was that the DOE's original policy using the 'Defense in Depth' approach to the specification for building a spent fuel containment facility could not be applied to Yucca's geology. The reason to choose a specific geology (in addition to being seisemically stable) was also to have the geologic chemistry of the rock able to control the the amount of time ground water took to travel through the facility carrying radioactive isotopes, eventually, into the water table. If the amount of time it takes exceeds the decay rate of the longest lived radio-isotopes then the facility was providing defense in depth.
In addition, as a site like that would be containing pu-239, whose half life is around 25000 years, after considering the daughter products you need a geology capable of containing it for 500,000 years, which is what the original specification called for.
Studies of the Yucca mountain hydrology (pdf) revealed that the passage cl-36 from atmospheric nuclear testing took less that 50 years in ground water through Yucca mountain so the reality of Yucca is it is inappropriate to contain *any* kind of radioactive products. The reason is Yucca is pumice and volcanic ash.
Feild studies have established that crystaline rocks like granite and bentonite clays can acheive this control. So far Finland is on track to be the first with an active facility with a Swedish facility also in the works.
Curiously, getting this right should be the one thing pro and anti nuclear folk should be able to agree on, if only for their own reasons. For Nuclear power to continue operating such a storage facility is essential so that new reactors can be deployed and materials removed from reactor sites. For people against Nuclear power such a facility would improve the safety of the industry as a whole by providing a place to store the materials permanently where there ingress into the environment can be controlled.
We don't see any improvements to governance, containment or anything else in Japans Nuclear industry thus very little logic in restarting it.
Units 1-4 used LEU fuel. Why are you concerned about plutonium?
Unit 4 used MOX.
First of all, I'll reiterate bloodhawk's point above, that coal has worse long-term impact than nuclear disasters too.
Well DU is analogous to coal ash, so is it worse than this? Which was also inflicted on American soldiers.
This is what happens when you start spreading DU around regardless of the source (in this case as munitions). Warning: those pictures are disturbing and illustrates the consequence of internal radiation exposure from one type of radionuclide.
So coal bad, nuclear worse.
Second, the main long-term impact of Chernobyl and Fukushima (beyond the lifetimes of the humans involved)
Unfortunately it is a contrived position that has been constructed by the political agreements in place to deceive us into thinking that something positive came out of Chernobyl, I doubt Ukrainians would agree. I will provide you with some context.
According to the IAEA's founding papers "The agency shall seek to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic energy to peace, health and prosperity through the world." I'll draw your attention to the interdiction clause (12.40) the IAEA has over the WHO drawn up on 28 May 1959, at the 12th World Health Assembly:
"Whenever either organisation [the WHO or the IAEA] proposes to initiate a programme or activity on a subject in which the other organisation has or may have a substantial interest, the first party shall consult the other with a view to adjusting the matter by mutual agreement"
In other words, the WHO grants the right of prior approval over any research it might undertake or report on to the IAEA , widely known in the scientific community as the instrument that gags their work. Unless of course you beleive the IAEA has an interest in malaria or Aids research it has effectively gagged the WHO from reporting on health matters Nuclear.
Ask yourself how likely it is for us to get reliable health science if the world's peak health organisation has it's science related to Nuclear matter vetted by the orgainsation responsible for promoting nuclear power.
Look, Chernobyl and Fukushima sucked for their victims.
Indeed it did. As opposed to WHO reports, reports in the Slavic languages from Ukrainian scientists on the ground performing research into the after effects of Chernobyl estimate deaths as a consequence of the Chernobyl accident to be around 980,000.
Why is their science less valid?
It's an emotional, irrational overreaction that just doesn't make any damn (statistical) sense.
No, it's a logical one based on a dispassionate examination of the evidence. Current governance of Nuclear reactor technology (especially in Japan) needs a complete overhaul as so far, it has produced accidents and is in no way comparable to the airline industry who has an embedded safety culture. You need look no further than the Japanese governments own inquiry for that opinion:
The TEPCO Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant accident was the result of collusion between the government, the regulators and TEPCO, and the lack of governance by said parties. They effectively betrayed the nationâ(TM)s right to be safe from nuclear accidents. Therefore, we conclude that the accident was clearly manmade.
So far, we have no evidence that there is any improvement in the regulatory structures of NIAC or TEPCO and thus how can we expect anything different a restart of their nuclear industry. Not the technology, per se, but the flawed humans running it.
I beg to differ, no it cannot.
I beg to differ, yes it can.
Despite your apparent ignorance on the subject, it is the situation that we *all* faced at Unit 4 Fukushima spent fuel pools for the last four years. Why do you think that TEPCO worked so hard to remove the fuel rods from the structure that is failing. What do you think would happen to plutonium fuel rods in a spent fuel pool without water surrounding them to moderate neutron activity had the structure collapsed?
The answer is Plutonium Fire. The 1300 fuel rods in unit 4 (now removed - thankfully) in storage with another 4000 in a storage unit near by presented the risk of a plutonium fire so large that it would be, IN FACT, an extinction level event that would spread hundreds of tons of fissile ash (mainly plutonium oxide and plutonium chloride) across the entire northern hemisphere via the jet stream.
You can't put a Plutonium fire out with water because it splits the water into hydrogen and oxygen. This is the physics that make a reactor operate in the first place and were the ones at play as a result of the basis design issue of the reactor that lead to the explosions in the first place.
Whilst the structural issues that damaged unit 4's spent fuel pool made the removal of the fuel rods a priority there, whether or not we face the same issue in unit's 1-3 depend on if the radiation levels in those units will allow works to continue to remove the remaining spent fuel. Fortunately the largest risk from unit 4 has been abated.
These are the realities of accidents like this and these are the risks we take on by using Nuclear power. If you want to remove such a risk, go start lobbying your politicians for a geologically sound spent fuel repository because such a risk exists in every plant until we do.
You seem to forget that the US dropped NUCLEAR FUCKING BOMBS on two Japanese cities only 70 odd years ago, and both are thriving cities these days.
A nuclear bomb has a mass of plutonium in the kilogram range. A nuclear reactor's fuel mass is in the 100-150 ton range. You are missing the difference between radiation and radionuclides.
What goes on for so long is the bs paranoia that is so deeply ingrained that people refuse to look at the scientific facts that low levels of radiation are not lethal
Citation please. LNT has NOT been disproved - so where is your evidence that it is?
But dont let actual facts get in the way of your cold war radiation terror..
Well I'm sure you won't have any trouble producing the facts you claim to have.
You need look no further than the Japanese governments own inquiry for that opinion:
The TEPCO Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant accident was the result of collusion between the government, the regulators and TEPCO, and the lack of governance by said parties. They effectively betrayed the nation’s right to be safe from nuclear accidents. Therefore, we conclude that the accident was clearly “manmade.”
See it's not me saying the word "collusion", it's the *official* investigation.
If you read that report you'll find sentences like "were aware of the risk of core damage from tsunami" and "nor did TEPCO take any protective steps against such an occurrence. "
And here is another one "In order to get evidence of this collusion, the Commission was forced to exercise our legislative right to demand such information from NISA, after NISA failed to respond to several requests"
So before you go waving your fatty finger at me, I suggest you get a better understanding of the facts. We already have positive proof that TEPCO do not disclose information and official evidence that they engage in cover ups.
Thanks for the link, I'll make a point of reading it so I can excoriate you with it later. More than likely you've done a 30 second google search, you haven't read it and, you just want to look like you are in some possesion of facts. So care to point me to where in that 1200 odd pages of a report, by an agency who promotes nuclear power, should look to find support of your claims? It should be easy, but I doubt you can.
So is information and I will provide you with some context. According to the IAEA's founding papers "The agency shall seek to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic energy to peace, health and prosperity through the world." Since you are so intent on claims of a cover up I'll draw your attention to the interdiction clause (12.40) the IAEA has over the WHO drawn up on 28 May 1959, at the 12th World Health Assembly:
"Whenever either organisation [the WHO or the IAEA] proposes to initiate a programme or activity on a subject in which the other organisation has or may have a substantial interest, the first party shall consult the other with a view to adjusting the matter by mutual agreement"
In other words, the WHO grants the right of prior approval over any research it might undertake or report on to the IAEA , widely known in the scientific community as the instrument that gags their work. Unless of course you beleive the IAEA has an interest in malaria or Aids research it has effectively gagged the WHO from reporting on health matters Nuclear.
Consequently the facts reveal your ignorance with very little effort on my part. Since you have very little manners, it is a service that is my pleasure to provide.
every coal fire plant is a disaster that is occurring every single day and are continuing to affect the human race in ways we still don't fully comprehend long after everyone here is dead.
You are arguing that having two problems is the solution, instead of getting rid of both problems. Nuclear and Coal are as bad as each other and Nuclear is worse in ways we still don't fully comprehend.
We only get worked up about nuclear disasters because they're so unusual.
No we don't. We get worked up about them because they go on for so long. Chernobyl, Fukushima are all disasters that are still occurring and will continue to affect the human race in ways we still don't fully comprehend long after everyone here is dead.
First of all, they aren't your claims to support, but thanks for trying. MrDfrom63 has to be able to prove the statements he made aren't "bullshit", the onus of proof is on him.
You however are missing the difference between radiation and radionuclides, in particular which ones and their quantity. I suspect plutonium chloride so, they are the incorrect "facts" to support the OP's "bullshitting".
An ad hom attack before engaging in any dialogue is the typical response of someone who has no argument to offer. Perhaps if you educated yourself about how soluble plutonium chloride is and where in the body you would expect it to accumulate considering it is an iron analogue we may have been able to have a polite conversation.
Instead I'll let you get back to your kool-aid as it is unlikely you have anything constructive to add.
I think you will find it has more to do with budgetary and political wrangling more than anti-nuclear people. In many countries there are laws to stop any entity lower than a state government interfering with the placement of nuclear facilities.