I've been pondering the question of nuclear power, about which there is, as Gristmill readers well know, impassioned debate. Here are some random, rambling thoughts:
Too much of the discussion is conducted on a rather simplistic "yes nuke" or "no nuke" axis. This is unsatisfying. Seems to me the better questions are: How much nuke, and where, and belonging to whom? What's the licensing and approval process going to look like? Who's going to insure against loss or accident? Where's the waste gonna go? What technology will be used in the facilities? Etc. As commenter scooter says, "one should be wary of good versus bad generalizations on any energy source. The Devil is always in the details."
On that note, I found this letter to the editor from reader Vince Daliessio quite convincing:
There would be everything to like about nuclear power, and little to hate, if all the regulatory accretion around the nuclear industry were removed, and replaced with a simple rule: Thou shalt be 100% financially responsible for anything that goes wrong with the plant. The current system, in exchange for an unmanageable welter of regulations, socializes most of the liability of nuke plants. This is bad, because the owners will never have their incentive, profit, fully aligned with those of their neighbors, clean air and property, and cheap energy.
Current advanced reactor technology can produce reactors that are not only virtually fail-safe and inexpensive right now, but in the future could be built to nearly any size load. So-called "pebble-bed" reactors virtually eliminate the meltdown potential, while "non-contact" water designs reduce the amount of radiation that would be released in a worst-case accident. And there are a number of exciting technologies for disposing of spent fuel, which in the absence of socialized disposal would rise to meet the challenge in a much more environmentally sound manner than the federal holedoggle at Yucca Mountain.
But as long as the industry substitutes taxpayer subsidies and stifling regulation for strict indemnity and property rights, then no, we shouldn't let them build even one new plant.
Right. There are awful things about nuclear, but if we made nuke companies financially responsible for those awful things, they either a) will go out of business, or b) change the awful things. Such is the magic of markets, despite their low cachet in lefty circles.
Perhaps instead of (or in addition to) standing on the sidelines and waving "no nuke" signs -- rather futilely, I suspect -- we should be inside the process, pushing for a real open energy market, speaking the language of free enterprise that those in power so love. That might be a more strategic approach.
Speaking of strategery, I was mildly intrigued by the idea floated recently by John Laumer on Treehugger: To the extent that the Bush administration and the nuclear industry hype nuclear as an answer to the dangers of global warming, take them up on it. Call their bluff. Hype nuclear along with them. Drag the debate into the open and say, "yes, climate change is a huge threat, so let's talk about solutions." If I read him right -- the post is a bit obscure -- he thinks that, if we really, as a society, set ourselves toward seeking solutions to climate change, nuclear will lose out naturally. The important thing is to instill the public with a sense of the gravity of the problem.
It's a gamble, but who knows. Perhaps it could work. But it's Friday, so my judgment cannot be entirely trusted.
Comments
View as Flat
chris@organicmatter Posted 12:16 pm
29 Apr 2005
Of course, this means that any company that can't pay for a disaster (and I expect that few would be able to) would end up bankrupt - something that no money-making organization wants. This being the case, your suggestion would still create a substantial incentive for companies to practice "responsible" nuclear power generation (to the extent that is possible). the problem is that many of the social costs would still be hefted onto the public.
Finally, please take all of my opinions with a grain of salt; nuclear isn't my area of expertise, and (possibly as a consequence) I tend to be willing to listen to those who talk about it as a not entirely horrific way of dealing with our carbon problem.
Organic Matter: Blogging the environment
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Thomas Palm Posted 10:44 pm
29 Apr 2005
The success story for these kind of market solutions is steam engines. Early on they had a tendency to explode as the boilers contained high pressure and sometimes were of low quality. Then one company started to offer insurance against explosions on one condition: they sent their own experts to qualify the engine first. As companies caught on the number of accident plummeted.
A market solution would have to include that each reactor owner guarantees that a fixed, very large, amount of money is available to cover any accident. This can either be managed through an insurance company, or by owners of nuclear plants joining to create a mutual fund. The latter option has the advantage that one reactor owner is likely to know a lot about what kind of flaws another reactor may have.
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MikeCapone Posted 5:59 am
30 Apr 2005
--
SUVs are squared-out minivans.
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amazingdrx Posted 4:56 am
01 May 2005
http://www.freep.com/news/nw/nukes7e_20050407.htm
Another huge drawback to nuclear power!
Just removing the water from one of these pools will create a huge nuclear conflagration! With up to 8 times the radiation released at Chernobyl!
This problem must be addressed before any new nuclear plants are built. The cost of dealing with that waste, for 50,000 years is a hidden cost of nukes that make wind, solar, and biofuel more than cost competitive.
There are 68 of these sites around the US, and 100s more where nuclear waste is spreading at exponential rates into rivers, groundwater, and air.
Only mass delusion created by neo-conservative lobbyists and nuclear power industry advocates through mass media repitition can faciliate the national insanity of continuing with nuclear power in it's present form.
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amazingdrx Posted 5:49 am
01 May 2005
I have used this before. It can be quite effective.
In effect it involves rethinking nuclear power, using the "pebble bed" example. Then locating nuclear plants in mine shafts in underground regions already radioactive from mining. And transporting the electric power to regions where it is needed, instead of hauling the fuel and waste all over creation incurring uninsurable risks everywhere along the way.
And siting plants in everyone's backyard. That won't happen without imperial government legal action over ruling the decades of lawsuits over it.
The already radioactives mines will make it feasible. But what about construction cost, and rising nuclear fuel cost?
Then it is helpfull to add this fact to the argument!
50 huge 1000 foot tower wind machines equal one 1000 megwatt nuclear plant in power output.
With No fuel or waste costs.
It's a good strategy in this ongoing debate.
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Thomas Palm Posted 2:07 am
02 May 2005
And where do you find a wind tower with an average output of 20 MW? As far as I know 5 MW top power is still considered big (ie. ~1 MW average power).
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amazingdrx Posted 3:02 pm
02 May 2005
Earthquake, terrorism...who knows? Look at Chernobyl.
And with the lawsuits still continuing there is no real choice. Either government steps in negating any suits with imperial power, like congress did in releasing nuclear operators from any libality, or one sites the plants in those already radioactive mines. The waste and mess stays there were no other areas will be contaminated. the power is transported where needed.
Heat pumps are as efficient as cogeneration,for heating purposes. Heat pump conversion from combustion is necessary anyway to save oil. A loss of efficiency, from line loss or loss of cogeneration, in order to solve the seemingly insourmountable problems of moving and storing fuel and waste ...storing waste for 50,000 years.
I envision a conversion to wind and solar on a 10 year path, with the same commitment on the part of government and industry involved in WW 2 war production.
Think of the millions of jeeps, trucks, tanks, planes, ships, guns....can american workers produce the 10's of thousands of hug wind, solar, and biofuel instalations needed.
Given the chance ....I would bet on them anytime!
(This is the tactic in action...the opposition falls for the weak statement, pouncing with overwhelming rhetoric on the phrase implying 20mw wind machines.
Then it's easy to deflect what he thinks is his strongest argument. And then get all over his other contentions about nukes. wind and solar come out smelling like roses.... He comes out like one who does not believe in the american workforce.)
This is how Rove is beating us, but he uses lies. Do you agree or disagree with this strategy? Anyone?
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Thomas Palm Posted 7:51 pm
03 May 2005
Chernobyl isn't relevant for any Western reactor. It was a lousy design combined with incompetent staff. Three Mile Island is a better example on what might happen, and that wasn't exactly an environmental disaster. I find it interesting how people can drag up Chernobyl to claim that nuclear power is too dangerous, yet forget all about the much worse accident in Bhopal. Shouldn't Bhopal prove that we have to close down chemical industry?
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amazingdrx Posted 11:13 pm
03 May 2005
How many of US would locate our homes near enough to a nuclear plant to get cogeneration heat? Or be in favor of a nuclear plant built near enough to our homes to do this? .000000001% of the population? Do you realize that being that close to a nuclear plant would completely destroy any resale value of any home?
So how much home heating would practically occur from nuclear cogeneration?
Present reactors maybe safer than that of the Chernobyl reactor...with the secrecy and lack of oversight of the nuclear industry, and the complete release from liability for any nuclear accidents...who would one trust to vouch for the risks involved?
Would anyone in america trust their family's health to this corporate/government mess that is the titanic corruption of the nuclear power and weapons industries? Would you buy a home near Rocky Flats, Hanford, or Oak Ridge?
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Environmentman Posted 11:45 pm
03 May 2005
Theoretical energy activists propose unworkable solutions because they do not have to provide electricity to the public. They see the utilities, particularly nuclear power providers as evil doers determined to kill us. Ridiculous. American utilities are providing us with electricity 24/7 in the best way(s) they know how to. They do not have the luxury of pursuing technologies they know will not provide dependable electricity 24/7. Armchair critics can insist on unworkable solutions though. At a certain point, it is a disservice to public policy formulation and needed infrastructure investments.
So Dave. America runs on cheap energy subsidized by taxpayers in the service of a very high living standard. A candle and a cave simply will not cut it here.
Environment Man
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amazingdrx Posted 12:08 am
04 May 2005
Radioactive waste is seeping through groundwater from Hanford right this very moment.
As Helen Caldicott stated in the Grist interview, 20 to 30 tons of nuclear waste are created each year by each nuclear plant. That waste must be stored for over 50,000 years. How can the cost of that even be comprehended?
Much less the risk involved. Will the waste be handled like it is at Rocky Flats, Hanford, Oak Ridge...or the hundreds of other leaking nuclear sites?
Will it be handled as well as the used nuclear fuel rods in those 68 storage pools around the country? A recent government study found that 8 times the radiation of Chernobyl could be released in an incident where the water was simply removed from ONE of these pools!
The fact is that wind power is already 3.5 cents per kwh in the larger machines installed in high wind speed areas like the northern great plains. It is a practical solution that can restore the US manufacturing base.
No waste, no fuel! The cost of nuclear fuel is being touted by wall street "investment" weasels right now...to triple in the next few years.
You are the one who is proposing "unworkable solutions"...that have been proven to be catastrophically unworkable for decades, by incidents like Three Mile Island, Chernobyl...and the leaking nuclear facilities all over the world.
And now we have terrorism added into the mix? Wake up and smell the toxic radioactive metal. Like the smell reported by the victims of Chernobyl.
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Thomas Palm Posted 1:48 am
04 May 2005
It is no accidents that people worry about substances with short halflifes. Radioactivity means that nuclei decay. If they do so quickly you get high radiactivity for a short time, if they do it slowly the substance will be correspondingly less radioactive. You can't have a substance that is both highly radioactive and has a long lifetime. (The dangers of plutonium are highly overrated. It's nasty, but not that nasty).
You do not have to wait any 50,000 years for the area around Chernobyl to be harmless. In fact, people living around the evacuated zone complain that they are invaded by wolves since the area has become a wildlife refuge.
I don't know how long the toxins from Bhopal will persist, chemicals can be very stable and cause long time damage too. I am convinced, however, that Bhopal has already caused more deaths and suffering than Chernobyl will ever do no matter how far into the future you look.
Over to cogeneration. In Sweden we have discussed for a long time building a tunnel transporting hot water from the reactors in Forsmark to Stockholm, a distance of roughly 80 km. This hasn't happened (yet) because supposedly we are going to close down our nuclear reactors some time in the future. We have built a half as long tunnel elsewhere, so we are not talking about any need for having the reactor as a neighbor. Not that I would worry much about having one nearby, and neither do people who do live close to reactors in Sweden. The resistance to nuclear power is concentrated to areas that have none. But then I think the Swedish nuclear industry has been more open and managed to convince people that they know what they are doing.
In Sweden too reactor owners are excluded from paying more than a fairly insignificant amount in case of an accident, but if you speak to them they have concluded that in case of a large accident they would most likely be forced into bancrupcy anyway. Laws or not, they wouldn't be able to get away with not paying everything they own, someone would find a loophole.
I don't know enough about your US sites, but I wouldn't like to live near a miliatry facility. The military operate under different (no) rules, and can get away with a lot you can't in the civilian sector. You shouldn't compare facilities for production of nuclear weapons with civilian nuclear reactors.
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amazingdrx Posted 2:19 am
04 May 2005
So does the US nuclear industry Dave, maybe Swedish companies are more resposible. Here nuclear companies are exempt from liability by act of congress. Former and future execuitives in the nuclear industry run the regulatory agencies. A revolving door of boardroom to bureacracy corruption.
Insurance companies recognized that these facilities pose an uninsurable risk, and lendors realized they were vulnerable without insurance.
The billions lent out for each facility would never be paid back to the bank and other bondholders, were an accident to occur shutting the plant and contaminating whole regions of the US.
As I stated, 50 huge 1000 foot tower wind machines located in the very high wind regions like the northern US and Canadian great plains are equal in output to one 1000 megawatt nuclear reactor.
Compare the cost of these machines to the uninsurable risk, legal costs, rising nuclear fuel costs, and astronomical costs of storing 20 to 30 tons of radioactive waste for 10s of thousands of years.
Maybe you would feel safe with an iodine pill and assurances by government and industry that is now presiding over 1000s of leaking radioactive sites for which they charge taxpayers 10s of billions per year to "manage", but how may of us would.
I would suspect it would be far less than 1% of the population. Moving hot water 80km? Why not move clean stabley priced wind electricioty instead, and power heat pumps. that would yield three times the heat value of the wind electricity consumed!
With no fuel or waste costs...ever! Only 3.5 cents per kwh or less as fasr as the eye can see.
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amazingdrx Posted 2:30 am
04 May 2005
Check it Tom, a fascinating look at Chernobyl like no other. A wonderful angel of chaos...too bad her story isn't on Sundance channel already..
...any independent filmakers with the courage to do this story out there? I bet Helen Caldicott would do a forward.
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amazingdrx Posted 2:32 am
04 May 2005
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Thomas Palm Posted 5:27 am
04 May 2005
I wouldn't mind taking a trip to see the area surrounding the reactor. I have actually been on a visit inside Ignalina in a trip to Lithuania where we one day tried to find wolves and the next looked at their most polluting industries. I've also seen Famagusta, although only from a distance. (It's a city in Cyprus that was evacuated when the Turks invaded)
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jdhlax Posted 7:15 am
04 May 2005
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Thomas Palm Posted 3:08 pm
04 May 2005
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amazingdrx Posted 12:28 am
05 May 2005
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amazingdrx Posted 2:03 am
05 May 2005
My sauna is electric and thus at least partially nuclear powered. Hehey.
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da silva Posted 9:06 am
05 May 2005
I posted this elsewhere, but it bears repeating if for no other reason than to correct jdhlax's misinformed assertion. Again, plutonium is dangerous stuff, to be sure. It's not even close to being "the most toxic substance known."
Even without the following encyclopedia entry, I think most of us could guess at the inaccuracy of that. Curare, botulinum, strychnine, ... c'mon.
(Jdhlax: you might want to read The Plutonium Files, the disturbing true story about the government's secret and sinister experiments injecting people with plutonium. Some bad things happened to those folks, but if I recall correctly, they lived.)
Exaggerations and untruths just aren't helpful.
All isotopes and compounds of plutonium are toxic and radioactive. While plutonium is sometimes described in media reports as "the most toxic substance known to man", there is general agreement among experts in the field that this is incorrect. As of 2003, there has yet to be a single human death officially attributed to plutonium exposure. Naturally-occurring radium is about 200 times more radiotoxic than plutonium, and some organic toxins like botulism toxin are still more toxic. Botulism toxin, in particular, has a lethal dose in the hundreds of pg per kg, far less than the quantity of plutonium that poses a significant cancer risk. In addition, beta and gamma emitters (including the C-14 and K-40 in nearly all food) can cause cancer on casual contact, which alpha emitters cannot.
Orally, plutonium is less toxic than several common substances, including caffeine, acetaminophen, some vitamins, pseudoephedrine, and any number of plants and fungi. It is perhaps somewhat more toxic than pure ethanol, but less so than tobacco and many illegal drugs (some such as LSD and marijuana are negligibly toxic). Considering the pure chemical toxicity it probably ranks with lead and other heavy metals.
That said, there is no doubt that plutonium may be extremely dangerous when handled incorrectly.
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amazingdrx Posted 11:59 am
05 May 2005
Nice try though. You may want to have several others come in and get some heat going behind your diversion now! Hehey.
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jdhlax Posted 1:09 pm
05 May 2005
Second, there's a huge difference between naturally occurring plants, animals, and substances, and artificially created substances like plutonium. The former are part of life on this planet, the latter bring death because the Earth and its life didn''t evolve with them and has no way of dealing with their toxic effects.
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da silva Posted 1:45 pm
05 May 2005
Yes, there's a big difference between the natural and the artificial, but that doesn't change the fact that your statement is still dead wrong: Plutonium, as awful as it is, is simply NOT the most toxic substance on the planet.
Undersand, I'm not advocating nukes or downplaying the dangers involved, (and, furthermore, I didn't change the subject). I simply urge you to stick to the facts. Talk about the real dangers of plutonium rather than propagating this ridiculous myth.
Don't believe the 'so-called' encyclopedia entry? Fine, here's another perspective: this one, a paper from the Lawrence Livermore National Labaratory dealing with common misconceptions about health risks and plutonium. But I'm sure you'll dismiss it too as nuclear sophistry.
I tell you what, though, rather than dismiss it, give us some sources to refute it. That would be interesting.
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da silva Posted 1:59 pm
05 May 2005
http://www.llnl.gov/csts/publications/sutcliffe/
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amazingdrx Posted 10:03 pm
05 May 2005
Who's running the all-hat, no cattle duuhbyaist ranch?
Why the neoconmen are...and their interests are alligned with the intersts of the nuclear industry, just one more branch of bushco inc.
Nuclear waste? Not hardly, that plutonium is a valuable food supplement. Growing better, bigger tumors..for more profits for the medical industry.
Another important bushco inc. corporate monopoly!
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amazingdrx Posted 10:23 pm
05 May 2005
http://www.najaco.com/literature/quotes/statistics.htm
Hehehey. But go ahead on. Maybe the sheop will agree that iodine pills and these studies make nuclear power the really safe alternative to global climate disaster.
The happy residents of Chernobyl will back you up all the way.
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amazingdrx Posted 12:16 am
06 May 2005
http://www.inesap.org/bulletin22/bul22art30.htm
"Assuming a 50-100% Cs137 release during a spent fuel fire, [8] the consequence of the Cs-137 exceed those of the Chernobyl accident 8-17 times (2MCi release from Chernobyl)."
Hate to say I told you so. Especially in this case! Yikes.
"8-17 times..." is extremely alarming.
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da silva Posted 2:03 am
06 May 2005
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amazingdrx Posted 3:21 am
06 May 2005
That's very different then, never mind..(Gilda RIP).
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Ana Unruh Cohen Posted 5:20 am
06 May 2005
"The book of nature is always open." - Louis Agassiz
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amazingdrx Posted 7:02 am
06 May 2005
Helen Caldicott pointed out the CFCs released in processing it too. Plus wall street weasels are predicting nuclear fuel to triple in price in the next few years.
With wind and solar there is no waste or fuel, no hidden costs or huge cost increases at the whim of monopoly corporations or OPEC.
Think of what only one catastrophe transporting the waste or fuel could do. The resulting destruction would make any further transportation all but impossible from a legal and financial aspect.
I have also heard that many tribal members worked in uranium mining and have become ill from it. As well as the dust blowing.
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amazingdrx Posted 7:12 am
06 May 2005
Clean renewable energy is also the number one topic on the moveon.org forum. This comprehensive energy, economic,environmental, and foreign policy is coming together with a real grass roots consensus forming up.
By replacing foreign oil the oil wars end, and the manufacturing base is restored by building 10s of thousands of wind and solar installation, and nillions of hybrid plugin vehicles.
These products would quickly gain an international market, making our economy what it was before...and more.
This time the prosperity is based on real productivity gains, and lower costs due to energy. This is a real investment in our economy and workforce and families.
Marx claimed capitalism needs war in order to usew up extra capacity, lets show it can be done with a peaceful effort this time. and instead of used up tanks, planes, ships... and dead soldiers..
We will have solar and wind power plants that will last for decades, and lives will be saved by ending oil wars.
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Nucbuddy Posted 8:09 pm
15 Jan 2008
Why would spent nuclear-fuel need to be stored for over 50,000 years?
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