Why are the apocalyptic hippies ignoring this power source?

Question

Nuclear power! Abundant material, safe, efficient, not renewable but reliable. They all say "Babies will be mutated." or "It'll blow up the town!" But it's more reliable and productive than solar or wind and it doesn't further humanity's extreme power (cough...cough). Why not use that?

It's called "...the Sun creates more energy than all the nuclear bombs and the electricity ever made on Earth in 1 second."

Answer 1

I'm a tree hugging hippie, but I think nuclear power is a good idea too.  The first guy is right, most people are conserned about storing the nuclear waste.  It can be done effectively, but a lot of times is not because of the cost.  If you could force utilities to pay for secure storage sites and they actually followed through with it, nuclear is a good option.

Answer 2

The sun is the best nuclear power we have.

Yes Nuclear power plants can produce energy cheaply once that initial $5 to $10 billion dollar bill from building the plant and getting it on line is paid for. So if a plant can run at full capacity and deliver energy to a million people per plant for 100 years the energy is indeed cheap. Considering no plant currently comes close to that, not so cheap when you run the numbers

Than there is the cost of storing the spent fuel which is very expensive and potential a huge threat to the rest of the world except likely a few trillion species of microbes who will happily take the earth back from us animals and plants. oh yes we have Yucca Mountain but the problem with that location is it is on several fault lines and in a very active seismic area so the potential for the storage area to rupture is pretty high. so we cannot consider this safe.

Remember Chernobyl? yes I know it is not in the USA and therefore not on the brains of most the pro nuke/climate change deniers but Chernobyl did happen and the area is still very much off limits to people. Why? Because of radiation from a nuclear plant melting down. So never ever think with nuclear power huge disasters killing and maiming thousands of innocents cannot happen. Especially if the plants are old and out dated.

Most the plants in the USA need replacing-they are at or beyond their lifespans. This could leave us open to several disasters that will make 9/11 look like fiction.

There are worse power sources-oil, coal, natural gas are all dirtier and dangerous in their own ways, but not as dangerous as nuclear.

We should be working on nuclear fission which is safe and far cheaper to do (once we figure out the physics). We should be doing a lot more R&D on wind solar which are far cheaper than nuclear as the infrastructure is not so costly and the energy itself is 100% free and non polluting (though I realize the items to capture this energy can be rather polluting and can kill wildlife). Most of all we need to curtail our incredibly wasteful and sustainable ways so we use far less energy.

Answer 3

First, let's remember that the Sun is made safer to us by it's considerable distance from the eath.  However it is not totally safe by any means.  I worked for a Dermatologist for 8 years.  Would you like me to relate some of the incredibly sad stories of our patients who died of melonoma?  

Nuclear energy is sold at about an average of 14 cents per kwh.  Not the cheapest, but not the most expensive, either.  

Now however let's talke about "lifespan."  Everything built has a "lifespan."  For wind towers the current lifespan is 20 years.  After that they can be torn down, and people will come bid on them since they are made of valuable metals.  Almost every singe bit of a wind turbine will and can be recycled in a very earth friendly way.

Nuclear power plants have a lifespan of 50 years.  Then they are dismantled.  Did you know that once you do the REAL math, the construction of, running of, and dismantling of a nuclear power plant, the ACTUALY cost of the power they produce is over 60 DOLLARS a kwh?

Why on earth do I want to pay those kind of taxes to the Government to pay the hidden subsidy costs of nuclear power plants?

People always talk about what a small area all the spent rods could be stored in.  Yup, that's true.  However every single bit of a nuclear power plant (think about all that cement) and every tool that is used to decomission a nuclear power plant, from a small s***w driver, to a bulldozer must be stored...forever.  

This is where the real hidden cost of nuclear power plants lays...the decomissioning of them.  The cost is mind boggling.

How do I know so much about it?  My husbands best friend does the decomissioning for a living.  He's done two of them so far.  He's now getting job offers from one in England.  Pay is $120 an hour (tax free!).  No, he's not some high payed CEO....he's just one of the master carpenter grunts they higher.

Based on TRUE cost alone, and total lack of recyclablity I vote NO on nuclear power plants.

~Garnet

Homesteading/Farming over 20 years

P.S.  Ever thought about what the cost is going to be to dismantle the nuclear plants in another 50-60 years if they start building them again?

Answer 4

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Answer 5

because it is costly, it is comparable to some low cost renewable power souses such as Solar thermal energy. it also raises the issue of what to do with the waste.

Answer 6

do you live next to a nuke plant i didnt think so its a giant rain maker and as far as the energy it produces they dont let us use any of it but we get free cable so we can be notified if the d**n thing starts to melt and they give us pills to take but they have turned our high school into a country club and try to go near it and they will shoot you i guess it has its pros and cons but who really cares anyway if it blows none of us locals have a chance i think they should do away with our taxes what do you think how do we get them to bribe us somemore werenot to concerned about it blowin up from an airplane crashing into it because of the S.A.M. s they have on site but if they shoot one down where are the pieces gonna land in my pool

Answer 7

"Apocalyptic hippies"?  Overstate much?

Actually, the founder of Greenpeace came out in support of nuclear energy.  Not every "hippy" is against nuclear, but those that are, are worried mostly about storing the waste.  If you have a solution to that little problem, I'd be interested in hearing it.

Answer 8

What it really come down to is elitism. Most people that whine about the environment feel guilty. Their guilt brings them to extremes of wanting to save the planet, wildlife, spotted owls, polar bears etc. The problem with these people is not what their guilt trip is about but they think they are elite or better than everybody else. Being on a guilt trip is one thing, but when you have to push your guilt on somebody else is totally wrong. If you think the polar bears need to be saved fine, but don't preach to me about it. Just because you feel guilty of something don't try to make me feel guilty. This has gotten so bad that the guilty condemn the non-guilty for not pushing their agenda of feeling guilty.

Environmentalist's are the real Killers.

Answer 9

People have TOTALLY forgotten that Yucca Mountain was selected as the storage site for nuclear wastes, so other than settling any last minute lawsuits, everything is in place to begin aggressive construction of more nuke plants.  An entire generation of hippie children have grown up since Three Mile Island totally oblivious to the fact that existing nuke plants have sat quietly and churned on countless gigwatts of power without releasing radiation.

Answer 10

Because they are so biased against nuclear power they don't realize it's the safest power in existence. And, if you happen to believe in Global Warming (which I don't at all), then you should be rushing for it. It's safe and cheap, and doesn't pollute.

Answer 11

Nuclear was attacked by the greenie idiots who did not know anything about the emissions of fossil fuel plants or the environmental damage they cause, and did not know nuclear produces NO emissions. But the fossil fuel producers certainly jumped on the bandwagon to help actually fund the protests and studies disclaiming the safety of nuclear.  It is called economics-- I want to make money my way, so your way is wrong.

Answer 12

I know they are researching "recycling" the waste, up to 90% of a "spent" fuel rod used in commercial reactors can be used again.

But mostly you get a star for "apocalytic hippies"