Science Friction - the nuclear debate

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pinkyBear

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Its good to see that RTE are having a debate on Neuclear power. I for one are pro Neuclear Power, its cleaner that fossil feuls - technology is far more advanced now, so the building standards of Neuclear plants far exceeds what would have been the "Chernobyl building standard"..
What do you think?
 
Re: Science Friction - the neuclear debate

Out of interest, what are your suggestions for dealing with the by-products of nuclear energy production? What do you think the energy suppliers should do with the radioactive waste, and who should pay for the disposal? Whom do you think should pay for its storage and disposal - should it be subsidised by the taxpayer, or should the nuclear energy companies pay for it and therefore put the true cost of nuclear energy generation into the per-unit charge and pass that on to customers?
 
Re: Science Friction - the neuclear debate

Its a long term project - how are other countries like sweeden dealing with by products - and sweedne are an eco friendly country - as the development of Neuclear Power research is 40-50 years old, cant we look at best of breed...
 
Re: Science Friction - the neuclear debate

Ehh pinkyBear do you not think you should find out the answers to those important questions before you take a stance on whether or not you think it is a good alternative?
 
Re: Science Friction - the neuclear debate

Well, as far as I can see (reading up to date developments in New Scientist) the best waste strategies involve putting it into big canisters and burying it for thousands of years in areas believed to be geologically stable. No one can agree on this at the moment, so much of the waste is currently being housed in the facilities where it was produced, or has been taken for reprocessing into material for nuclear weapons.

Seeing as no one can predict if civilisation will continue for thousands of years it will take to become safe, much research has gone into creating signs that universally mean "Nasty stuff! Don't touch!" (eg using faces expressing disgust etc). Much like universal smilies stuck on metal plates - . Personally I wonder if future generation won't just think of them in much the same way as we think of warnings and curses in Egyptian tombs and carry on regardless, but hey, thats for my great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great grandson Professor Sylvester Jones to worry about.

Personally, I am waiting for them to perfect Nuclear fusion reactors which are predicted to be much cleaner. Hopefully the technical problems will be sorted out in 20 years or so.
 
not think you should find out the answers to those important questions before you take a stance on whether or not you think it is a good alternative?
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Without a proper debate it is difficult to access all the information on both sides. But from what I can see Neuclear power has worked over all around Europe without much incident - I know there have been issues with Sellafield - but that is not the only reactor in Europe.
 
You will find that Nuclear power in Europe (eg France) is heavily susidised by government, which is why it seems to be cost effective for the consumer. If they built in the true cost, including the removal, disposal and maintenance of waste, into the unit charge it would seem very expensive.

Its a shame that renewable energy sources haven't attracted the same subsidies so far for research and development. But it is great to see things improving. For instance, in Germany consumers are guaranteed the facility to sell their surplus electricity (eg from solar panels, turbines etc) back to the grid. I think ideas like that will ultimately prove their worth.
 
But from what I can see Neuclear power has worked over all around Europe without much incident - I know there have been issues with Sellafield - but that is not the only reactor in Europe.
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When it does goes wrong, it can be very very bad.
[broken link removed]

Is it worth the risk? - what's wrong with wind power?
 
a shame that renewable energy sources haven't attracted the same subsidies so far for research and development
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I completely agree - and the idea that if you have surlus electricity that you could sell back to the government is brilliant - it can be done in NI as a friend of mine is doing up a house and has it in place that he can sell extra unit back.
It is a shame that it cant be done here.
 
what's wrong with wind power?
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I have nothing against wind power or renewables - and developing these.
At the present time we are entering a new phase where fossil feuls will become more expensive. And we are not really addressing the issue. There is no debate going on that is looking at the future our energy requirements.

I would love to see more debate on the issue of NP - it is time that we seriously address our power needs for the future..
 
If you want to ask questions - use the normal forums.

if you want to debate issues such as this, use Letting Off Steam.

Brendan
 
Is it worth the risk? - what's wrong with wind power?
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Wind and solar power will never be able to power a national grid. Solar power is currently horribly inefficient.

Hydro-electric is out because it releases massive amounts of CO2 locked in vegetation into the atmosphere

Nuclear power alone cannot power a national grid, its not possible to ramp up supply of electricity at short notice to handle spikes in demand.
 
A mooted prospect is to change the current system of a few large power stations supplying the majority of power for a system where electricity is generated at smaller local stations through a variety of means (wind/tidal turbines, solar, geothermal, hydro etc etc). If everyone both drew and supplied energy to the network then this would reduce the requirement for central power stations to generate so much.

It would also reduce the loss of energy attributed to transmitting it long distances and stepping it up and down for local/national use.

The current sell back in Germany and the UK are baby steps in this direction.

By the way, Solar energy research and technology has taken some large strides recently and I wouldn't be surprised to see it becoming far more cost effective soon. Especially when compared against the cost of traditional fossil fuels.
 

Can you back up that claim?

From what I've read that's not accurate.

A UK Royal Academy of Engineering report in 2004 looked at electricity generation costs from new plants in the UK. In particular it aimed to develop "a robust approach to compare directly the costs of intermittent generation with more dependable sources of generation". This meant adding the cost of standby capacity for wind, as well as carbon values up to £30 (€45.44) per tonne CO2 for coal and gas. Wind power was calculated to be more than twice as expensive as nuclear power. Without a carbon tax, the cost of production through coal, nuclear and gas ranged £0.022-0.026/kWh and coal gasification was £0.032/kWh. When carbon tax was added (up to £0.025) coal came close to onshore wind (including back-up power) at £0.054/kWh — offshore wind is £0.072/kWh -- nuclear power remained at £0.023/kWh either way, as it produces negligible amounts of CO2. (Nuclear figures included decommissioning costs.)[30][31][1]
 
It doesn't take much of a search on to back up my claim that nuclear power is heavily subsidised by the government in France - loads of news articles publicise and discuss the fact. In fact its pretty much general knowledge. States love nuclear power (look at Iran) as it is a legitimate use of a technology that is also a necessary step towards becoming a nuclear power.

You are right that alternative sources of energy require heavy subsidies as well, especially to get them started. However my argument to that is that alternative approaches to energy generation should be explored as the legacy of nuclear power generation so far is a stockpile of highly toxic radioactive waste that will remain so for many, many generations. Wind/solar/tidal power , heck even fossil fuels, do not leave this problem. We can reclaim CO2 and other emissions from power stations if we really have to, and find uses for them, but the only solution for nuclear waste is incredibly expensive storage that no one can guarantee will remain secure for the thousands of years it will take to become safe. (hence my mention of the research into universally understood signage for future generation)
 
There is also a very good article in [broken link removed] from 26 April 2006 thats goes into some of these arguments in detail, including the following quote (mods please tell me if I infringe copyright here):

Nuclear power is also being squeezed on the cost of the electricity it produces. According to a report last year by the New Economics Foundation, a London-based think tank, a kilowatt-hour of electricity from a nuclear generator will cost as much as 8.3 pence once realistic construction and running costs are factored in, compared with about 3 pence claimed by the nuclear industry - and that's without including the cost of managing pollution, insuring the power stations or protecting them from terrorists. This compares with about 3.4 pence for gas, 5 pence for coal and up to 7.2 pence for wind power, according to a report in 2004 by the UK's Royal Academy of Engineering.

The article is only available on subscription (which I have) but I remember reading this when it came out and it has influenced my views somewhat. I can try to condense more of this for you if you want, but it argues in favour of small scale distributed power generation - the point I brought up before. The quote above mentions the figure you raise, but it shows that if you factor in the real cost of generation, the cost is much higher.
 
leghorn said:
When it does goes wrong, it can be very very bad.
[broken link removed]

Is it worth the risk?
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How do you distill "very very bad" from this illustrative? composite image? Major nuclear accidents are very rare. Chernobyl is old technology, they managed to blow it up by abandoning pretty much all safety procedures. Albeit the most serious nuclear fubar in history it only killed around 20 people and it continued in operation with the last reactor being shut down a year or so ago. I don't think Chernobyl is a credible argument against Nuclear.
 
Sylvester3 said:
It doesn't take much of a search on to back up my claim that nuclear power is heavily subsidised by the government in France
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the French government subsidies everything here. I should have been clearer. I was referring to your claim that nuclear was more expensive.



The amount of waste from repossessed nuclear fuel is tiny! A typical 1GW plant produces about 25-30 tons of high level waste each year which of reprocessed would result in 3m2 of waste . Storing this in stable regions underground for very long time is not a huge issue.

Fossil fuels produce huge amounts of hazardous waste. The fact that it's all push up the chimney and inhaled by humans doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
 
Did you miss my extract from New Scientist that backed up my other claim? You may just have read my first reply.

The [broken link removed] that the UK is currently managing and says that 10 new power stations will increase that quantity by 8%. This may be a mixture of high level and low level waste, but it must all be stored and managed.
 
Sylvester3 said:
This may be a mixture of high level and low level waste, but it must all be stored and managed.
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But there is a world of difference between them (and their disposal). LLW is produced also by hospitals, universities, research labs etc... and can be managed easily (most of it can be handled by humans!) HLW is this waste that needs to be managed. Lumping them together is done only to confuse the issue.

Oh and here is the second link on Google for the New Economics Foundation report
 
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