Is nuclear power safe??

In light of whats happening in Japan and the heated discussions about nuclear power in the Japan topic I feel nuclear power may deserve its own discussion.I feel nuclear power is a option that cant be discounted. It already provides 20% of our domestic power in USA. With oil supplies shrinking and environmental concerns over greenhouse gas's, I feel it is a good source of energy. Newer deigns of reactors are more efficient and built with safety in mind.http://www.ga.com./energy/em2/I feel alot of peoples fears are based on an irrational fear of radiation. This fear may be a product of cold war?? Although this would be another topic maybe.I would like to hear what anti-nuke people have to say, and why they feel the way they do. My only goal is for both sides to maybe gain a little insight and knowledge.

Of course not, nuclear power is not safe, but then no form of energy production is really safe, there are advantages and risks to every scenario.But we need to be having a discussion about energy provision that I simply don't seem happening. IMHO the first step that is needed is to re-regulate energy production and generation as a Limited Regulated Monopoly and limit the capitalistic aspects while emphasizing the socialistic aspects.

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

A top-down command economy, eh? Get rid of all competition?Have a five-year plan too?(We all know how well all those things work.)

I imagine you can point to where I advocated any of those things or do you just enjoy misrepresenting folk?

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

Fearing radiation is irrational? Certainly you jest! The long-term effects of non-nuclear forms of energy are well known and manageable; the downsides are even reversible over time. The same cannot be said of nuclear energy: we do not know what the future will bring us with all that crap stored in the ground. If we stopped using fossil-fueled electricity today, the greenhouse gasses associated with its production would slowly clear up. If we stopped using nuclear energy today, all that shit stored in the ground will still be with us for thousands of years.Nuclear energy is a stupid idea; no rational society would prefer it over the currently-available alternatives (which are, admittedly, all somewhat stupid ideas in their own right).Jon

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Check out No webpage found at provided URL: Apollo's Temple!
Ignorance is temporary; you should be able to overcome it. - nwr

fear of radiation is not irrational when placed in proper prospective.The run on potassium iodine pills being bought by people nowhere near the event in japan only supports my statement about irrational fear....Fear or radiation on the us west coast is irrational....need I say more??By the way that crap stored in the ground is in itself a source of energy.....see my link in the first post....support what you say with ???I guess all the nations currently using nuclear power are irrational?? Edited by fearandloathing, : No reason given.Edited by fearandloathing, : No reason given.

Radioactive isotopes? The ground is where they are before we mine them.I think maybe you guys aren't thinking the materials chain through, here. And apparently you don't know about waste vitrification - no risk of isotope leaching, even over thousands of years. Nuclear energy is and continues to be an excellent idea, particularly forms such as fusion that don't produce radioactive wastes. But much of the issue here is that you've heard about radioactive waste, but you've never heard about things like hydrofracking waste or fly ash waste, because nobody's ever made a movie where fly ash turns four turtles into ninjas.

Of course, and in the same concentration as well... of course. I'm well aware of the risks and side-effects of coal power and such. But like I said, those effects can be better regulated: fly ash disappears almost immediately after the plant is shut down. Nuclear waste doesn't; as you yourself said, it's around for thousands of years.Jon

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Check out No webpage found at provided URL: Apollo's Temple!
Ignorance is temporary; you should be able to overcome it. - nwr

As I asked you before ...Look at link in first post...what we now consider waste is actually a source of energy for future.

Um, no, it doesn't. It sits there in holding levees, hundreds of millions of metric tons of it, until the levee gives way and it poisons an entire river. Or they try to bury it and it leeches a million tons of arsenic, mercury, and lead into local aquifers.I think maybe you don't know what "fly ash" is. If you did there is no way you would think it simply evaporates into thin air as soon as you turn off the plant. But again - nobody's ever made a movie about fly ash turning ants into leviathans, so you're not concerned about it, even though it's responsible for far more death, far more toxic exposure, far more cancer, far more destruction of natural environments than nuclear waste. Everything is around for thousands of years. There are coal seam fires that have burned for all of recorded human history.

Okay, step two.Once we have re-regulated energy production and distribution and re-instituted the Regulated Limited Monopoly Utility system, the next step is to look at the current US inventory of Nuclear Power Stations and prioritize the risk and threat from each.Then we decide which should be closed down, which need to be upgraded and which are as safe as we can make them.

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

And which designs are best for the new ones that we need to build post haste?Edited by Coyote, : Grammar

I don't think I have said that we need to build any "post haste".No single design is "safe" or "best". That will depend on the needs of the population to be served and the site itself.One "nuclear" course to consider might be decentralization, returning to the concept of small modular units.But first we need to make our current inventory of ALL, not just nuclear, power generating sources as safe as possible while we transition the whole field from the current relatively unregulated capitalistic mess back to the Highly Regulated Limited Monopoly.

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Anyone so limited that they can only spell a word one way is severely handicapped!

I proffered the excellent idea of mini nuclear power plants (and micro hydro-power plants) in the Japan thread. Sadly, no one remarked about that particular post:Small Town Nukes 
National Geographic Magazine

Here is a link with lots of good info, also visit the NRC website for details on how the licensing and certification process works. Build New Reactors NRC Nuclear Regulatory Commission Edited by fearandloathing, : No reason given.