Chernobyl right now is an awesome nature preserve thanks to humans being gone. The entire area has been slowly moving back to its original state with even wolves moving back. That last bit is important as wolves have a huge influence on stability in natural habitats.
I know, silver linings, but still.
To the point: nuclear energy doesn’t need to be that bad. Well designed reactor are pretty much safe, and toxic end products are relatively little and manageable in comparison to gas and coal reactors. Chernobyl just was a shit reactor managed by idiots.
Ironically, because of their desig, nuclear power plants do not emit any radiation while coal and oill reactors do emit radiation coming from their fuels. That adds to all the other pollution classic power plants emit.
Then there are other fuels that could / should be used to avoid the “we don’t want people to have plutonium” issue.
Then the two big alternative energy generators wind and solar both have their own issues. No wind? No power. Night? No power. Clouds? No power. Wind farms kill birds. Solar panels require replacement every x amount of years because they degrade. The “no power” problem require huge batteries, or if you’re lucky, an entire lake to store that energy but now that late basically can’t be used for anything else and won’t be able to sustain any life.
Then finally: in comparison, nuclear energy generates enormous amounts of power where wind and solar generates very little. Humanity needs huge amounts of power to live.
Nuclear power plants take a long time to build but then give us huge amounts of power for as long as we need it to. If we really want to move away from CO2 emitting power generation, which we really really really do, I really think we can’t ignore nuclear energy
That’s fair, but you are assuming that the US, or any other nation with a nuclear plant will be run by competent people. I don’t have that faith. Perhaps because I’m pessamistic, but perhaps because I see people like Trump getting elected, or the rise of right wing, anti science, governments getting elected across the globe.
Ukraine likely wasn’t thinking they would be invaded by their neighbor and neighboring countries are now put at risk because of one rogue nation attacking their neighbor.
My problem with nuclear is that IF shit goes sideways, you can’t put that genie back in the bottle. I just watched a documentary on Fukishima, and despite the fact it was built on the ocean, it’s a nightmare of engineering to try to contain the shit show…
Look, I know I’m not going to convince this group that I’m right, but your also not going to convince me that I’m wrong… because you can’t engineer end users or nature out of the discussion. They are always wild cards.
Well…
Chernobyl right now is an awesome nature preserve thanks to humans being gone. The entire area has been slowly moving back to its original state with even wolves moving back. That last bit is important as wolves have a huge influence on stability in natural habitats.
I know, silver linings, but still.
To the point: nuclear energy doesn’t need to be that bad. Well designed reactor are pretty much safe, and toxic end products are relatively little and manageable in comparison to gas and coal reactors. Chernobyl just was a shit reactor managed by idiots.
Ironically, because of their desig, nuclear power plants do not emit any radiation while coal and oill reactors do emit radiation coming from their fuels. That adds to all the other pollution classic power plants emit.
Then there are other fuels that could / should be used to avoid the “we don’t want people to have plutonium” issue.
Then the two big alternative energy generators wind and solar both have their own issues. No wind? No power. Night? No power. Clouds? No power. Wind farms kill birds. Solar panels require replacement every x amount of years because they degrade. The “no power” problem require huge batteries, or if you’re lucky, an entire lake to store that energy but now that late basically can’t be used for anything else and won’t be able to sustain any life.
Then finally: in comparison, nuclear energy generates enormous amounts of power where wind and solar generates very little. Humanity needs huge amounts of power to live.
Nuclear power plants take a long time to build but then give us huge amounts of power for as long as we need it to. If we really want to move away from CO2 emitting power generation, which we really really really do, I really think we can’t ignore nuclear energy
That’s fair, but you are assuming that the US, or any other nation with a nuclear plant will be run by competent people. I don’t have that faith. Perhaps because I’m pessamistic, but perhaps because I see people like Trump getting elected, or the rise of right wing, anti science, governments getting elected across the globe.
Ukraine likely wasn’t thinking they would be invaded by their neighbor and neighboring countries are now put at risk because of one rogue nation attacking their neighbor.
My problem with nuclear is that IF shit goes sideways, you can’t put that genie back in the bottle. I just watched a documentary on Fukishima, and despite the fact it was built on the ocean, it’s a nightmare of engineering to try to contain the shit show…
Look, I know I’m not going to convince this group that I’m right, but your also not going to convince me that I’m wrong… because you can’t engineer end users or nature out of the discussion. They are always wild cards.
There is 54 nuclear powerplant in US my dude, how many of it exploded catastrophically?
I mean, time is on my side with this argument, no?
Time isn’t when you’re inhaling smog.