(08-04-2011 12:14 PM)I45owl Wrote:  

(08-04-2011 11:53 AM)Hambone10 Wrote:  I guess the nuclear "scare" was put out by them as well.... since there really hasn't been one. Even Japan's chatter has died down.

Not really (depending on what you mean) ... NISA seems to have acted pretty irresponsibly and may have doomed nuclear power in Japan as a result. They seem to have the opposite problem of US Regulators.

Turmoil at nuclear regulatory agencies in Japan and U.S. | ANS Nuclear Cafe

http://ansnuclearcafe.org/2011/08/03/tur...n-and-u-s/ Wrote:In Japan, the Nuclear Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) is in hot water over revelations that it stacked the deck at public meetings with employees of the nuclear utilities it is supposed to regulate.
...
Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan has questioned whether NISA should continue to exist in its present form. He also called for a phaseout of dependence on nuclear power for the Japanese economy.

Sorry I wasn't clear.

Yes... by far the worst disaster since Chernobyl, and perhaps even much worse... merely that it took an incredible chain of disastrous events and even more failures in the response to create the problem to begin with, and at least as far as continued GLOBAL media coverage is concerned, the problem is primarily localized. I think what you're seeing now is CYA by politicians. I'm not reading a lot about tainted food and water etc etc etc

But, you see, this regulation punishes the evil energy corporations, not the consumers. . . Taxes on corporations only hurt the evil corporations.

Quote:“Georgia Power said it can’t meet a five-month deadline imposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to cap and regulate two major pollutants from its coal-fired power plants. … The default could mean customers end up paying more money.

Focusing on the extreme consequences of nuclear power elides the fact that fossil fuels often produce the same, or similar, consequences (cancers, chronic disease, permanent environmental damage).

Coal, oil, and even natural gas just happen to produces these effects gradually and as part of the daily routine of the power plants. Nuclear, on the other hand, tends to only produce these effects when something goes horribly wrong (like failing to make recommended safety upgrades in the event of a tsunami).

Remember, one German organic farm recently killed twice as many people through E.Coli as the Fukushima nuclear disaster and the Gulf Oil spill combined.

(08-04-2011 02:38 PM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  Focusing on the extreme consequences of nuclear power elides the fact that fossil fuels often produce the same, or similar, consequences (cancers, chronic disease, permanent environmental damage).

Coal, oil, and even natural gas just happen to produces these effects gradually and as part of the daily routine of the power plants. Nuclear, on the other hand, tends to only produce these effects when something goes horribly wrong (like failing to make recommended safety upgrades in the event of a tsunami).

Remember, one German organic farm recently killed twice as many people through E.Coli as the Fukushima nuclear disaster and the Gulf Oil spill combined.

Pretty sure most people, even anti-nuclear ones, don't think about nuclear plants as killing people outright. Or oil spills. It's the environmental damage.

The other thing is, whoever's responsible for action when one of these occurs seems to always downplay the seriousness of the incident - happened with Fukushima and with the oil spill. Then later you find out how serious it was. Not sure if that resulted in more damage, but it does make one wonder. Is one utilizing all damage-control facilities when one is also saying the event is no big deal? Are they convincing themselves as well as others?

(08-04-2011 03:45 PM)NIU007 Wrote:  Is one utilizing all damage-control facilities when one is also saying the event is no big deal? Are they convincing themselves as well as others?

In the cases of both Fukushima and the Gulf oil spill--clearly no. You make an excellent point.

We need nuclear power--we can't make the numbers work without it, for at least the foreseeable future.
We need offshore drilling, including deep water--we can't make the numbers work without it, for at least the foreseeable future.

But we need to be doing both with our eyes open to the obvious risks, and a firm resolve to do everything possible to respond to any potentially catastrophic event, intentionally erring on the side of overkill at every point. And the full cost of being ready to respond needs to be factored into product prices. We're nowhere close to any of that now.

The simple fact that we can all reference individual nuclear disasters is indicative of how rare and spectacular they are in comparison to the pervasive negative effects of other sources of electric power. Deaths directly related to Chernobyl -- the only nuclear incident which has so far required a permanent large-scale evacuation, assuming Fukushima doesn't end up like this -- have been estimated by the IAEA to be about 9000.

You might say that number is biased high or low, and you would not be alone, but let's compare those nuclear disaster deaths to another probably biased source on coal mining deaths in China. According to PRC numbers, China alone has averaged more than 5000 coal mining deaths per year.

I agree. Lesson learned. You don't build a nuclear power plant on a faultline in a tsunami-prone area just as you don't grow a pulpwood farm at the base of a volcano. Nuclear is safe.

(08-05-2011 02:51 PM)Rebel Wrote:  Nuclear is safe.

Agree. It's as safe as we allow/want it to be. Gotta factor in the moron quotient.

(08-04-2011 11:26 AM)RobertN Wrote:  Crock of **** put out there by the coal industry to try and scare granny.

Spoken by our own in house crock of **** expert.

(08-04-2011 12:13 PM)RobertN Wrote:  If we get rid of planes, you guys can finally get rid of those pesky FAA guys once and for all. Not to mention most of the TSA. That will cut down on spending!

Now I know why the doctor slapped you when you were born. Even then you were an @ss.