Nuclear power is necessary to provide "bridge" energy until we can go fully green. We don't have the resources yet to meet all our needs using green energy sources, and nuclear is far better than fossil fuels. Also, modern nuclear plant designs don't have any of the dangers that reactors like TMI and Fukushima had. Those relied on active safety-- that is, there is something that must be done to stop the reaction, and if the safety devices fail or if some input, such as electric power, becomes unavailable, it becomes difficult to stop. Modern designs (pebble bed, thorium) have passive safety (i.e. the reaction stops if not continually supported).
No, that isn't correct. Fukushima (along with every reactor on the eastern half of Honshu) failed into quench, within seconds, exactly as designed, as a consequence of the earthquake rattling a system around the control rods which is intentionally designed to only keep them out of the reactor by continued effort.
All the problems were caused by waste heat, rather than ongoing criticality (which would have produced 20 times the heat and been a much, much scarier proposition for the teams on site).
Let's be more precise here: some of the pebble bed designs offer passive decay heat removal. The PB-AHTR, for example, gets this handy property from its choice of coolant and geometry.
I might be using the term "passive safety" incorrectly, but I wouldn't call a design "safe" if, even after criticality ended, there was still enough heat/pressure to cause explosions that subject nearby people to high levels of radiation.
There's no doubt in my mind that Fukushima is far better designed and in much better operating order than Chernobyl (a terrible comparison for a number of reasons) was.
Nuclear power is necessary to provide "bridge" energy until we can go fully green.
Not exactly so.
Wind or solar are dependent on it being windy or daytime, therefore will never provide base load power and can only provide incremental power on top of base load power sources such as coal, oil, gas, nuclear, or... geothermal. Geothermal is one of the best green energy sources that can provide baseload power.
After 100 years a geothermal power plant will still produce 35% of it's original first year production, so it's a pretty long lived asset.
I don't understand why geothermal is always overlooked.
Geothermal increases earthquake risk/frequency, so it's not all roses either.
There are plenty of problems for large scale power plants, like limited locations, custom fit for each spot, etc.. But there are some pretty large ones, I wouldn't say it's overlooked by the industry, maybe by the media.
But is that really bad? If man can induce earthquakes, then it's possible that these man made earthquakes releases the tension building up to the big ones, saving both lives and money.
> I don't understand why geothermal is always overlooked.
Because it's hard to come by. Either you're in a geothermally active area, in which case it's a no-brainer, or you aren't. If you're in a normal area you need to drill extremely deep for the heat and then, somehow, keep the drill hole open. Tectonic drift is actually a serious show-stopper at the depths we're talking about.
Read Revelation. Nuclear power is the mistake that caused Revelation to be written. Faster Than Light Data Transfer Results in earthquakes from Time Travel that allows man to write the Bible.
Comments
Nuclear power is necessary to provide "bridge" energy until we can go fully green. We don't have the resources yet to meet all our needs using green energy sources, and nuclear is far better than fossil fuels. Also, modern nuclear plant designs don't have any of the dangers that reactors like TMI and Fukushima had. Those relied on active safety-- that is, there is something that must be done to stop the reaction, and if the safety devices fail or if some input, such as electric power, becomes unavailable, it becomes difficult to stop. Modern designs (pebble bed, thorium) have passive safety (i.e. the reaction stops if not continually supported).
No, that isn't correct. Fukushima (along with every reactor on the eastern half of Honshu) failed into quench, within seconds, exactly as designed, as a consequence of the earthquake rattling a system around the control rods which is intentionally designed to only keep them out of the reactor by continued effort.
All the problems were caused by waste heat, rather than ongoing criticality (which would have produced 20 times the heat and been a much, much scarier proposition for the teams on site).
Pebble bed in particular, if I recall, is passively safe precisely because it resists waste heat.
Let's be more precise here: some of the pebble bed designs offer passive decay heat removal. The PB-AHTR, for example, gets this handy property from its choice of coolant and geometry.
I might be using the term "passive safety" incorrectly, but I wouldn't call a design "safe" if, even after criticality ended, there was still enough heat/pressure to cause explosions that subject nearby people to high levels of radiation.
There's no doubt in my mind that Fukushima is far better designed and in much better operating order than Chernobyl (a terrible comparison for a number of reasons) was.
Nuclear power is necessary to provide "bridge" energy until we can go fully green.
Not exactly so.
Wind or solar are dependent on it being windy or daytime, therefore will never provide base load power and can only provide incremental power on top of base load power sources such as coal, oil, gas, nuclear, or... geothermal. Geothermal is one of the best green energy sources that can provide baseload power.
After 100 years a geothermal power plant will still produce 35% of it's original first year production, so it's a pretty long lived asset.
I don't understand why geothermal is always overlooked.
Geothermal increases earthquake risk/frequency, so it's not all roses either.
There are plenty of problems for large scale power plants, like limited locations, custom fit for each spot, etc.. But there are some pretty large ones, I wouldn't say it's overlooked by the industry, maybe by the media.
But is that really bad? If man can induce earthquakes, then it's possible that these man made earthquakes releases the tension building up to the big ones, saving both lives and money.
> Geothermal increases earthquake risk/frequency, so it's not all roses either.
What do you mean?
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-03/does-geotherma...
Just google "geothermal" and "earthquakes"
> I don't understand why geothermal is always overlooked.
Because it's hard to come by. Either you're in a geothermally active area, in which case it's a no-brainer, or you aren't. If you're in a normal area you need to drill extremely deep for the heat and then, somehow, keep the drill hole open. Tectonic drift is actually a serious show-stopper at the depths we're talking about.
Read Revelation. Nuclear power is the mistake that caused Revelation to be written. Faster Than Light Data Transfer Results in earthquakes from Time Travel that allows man to write the Bible.
http://tinyurl.com/teslamadeearthquakes