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[WealthyRadish]

I agree with mainiac's stance on what we should do about nuclear power, but I think his arguments about statistical likelihood and risk are off.

Spoiler: Wall of text for a dead conversation arguing with someone I agree with (click to show/hide)

This earthquake analogy is taking on a life of its own, but I think we can agree that chernobyl's about as bad as we could expect a nuclear power plant failure to be, in terms of human impact. There isn't much else that could go wrong that didn't go wrong at chernobyl, not only in the operational procedure and safety systems, but in the plant engineering, soviet response, even the weather and place that it happened. So the idea that all the previous incidents including chernobyl point to the possibility of something worse seems very off, since chernobyl was very close to the worst possible outcome.

We did have another recent freak though, at fukushima, and it illustrates how an event of similar magnitude to chernobyl is so much better handled today. The reinforced structure resulted in the release of much less radioactive material, the japanese response was much better than that of the soviets (but not without its criticisms), and the overall exposure was very minimal.

But when I say that fukushima is of similar magnitude to chernobyl, I mean in terms of potential disaster, and it isn't a reflection of likelihood. If chernobyl didn't happen at chernobyl, it would've happened somewhere else at a similarly inadequate plant (that no longer exists anywhere in the world, save maybe North Korea), but fukushima wasn't inevitable. You could argue that a 9.0 earthquake and tsunami hitting it was inevitable in a geologic sense, but that's over a span of thousands of years and independent of the plant itself. I would argue that we still have no data points that could reasonably reflect how often these levels of disasters might occur, and if you're extremely generous, we would still only have two, which isn't enough to extrapolate anything.

Anyway, the main point is that the chances of nuclear catastrophes has been reduced, the resultant damage from similar levels of failure have been reduced, and the response in the case of them happening has been improved. So there is very little to fear from nuclear plants as they are now. If we had a fukushima happening somewhere every year, it'd be far less of an impact than what say, the emissions from all the coal fire plants do to people's lungs in a week.

[Starver]

a covert attack on a nuclear plant could rival Fukushima or Three Mile Island.

It is generally accepted that the 3MI incident caused radiation effects so insignificant as to be indistinguishable from statistical noise. Unlike the mental health issues arising from worry and stress ongoing at the time. If there was even the possibility of repeating that incident, by cyber-attack, an enemy would do better to target the news channels (or just let Fox News do its everyday thing, without any extra effort expended).

If a city has 10 magnitude 5.5 earthquakes over the course of a half century you dont say no big deal because magnitude 5.5 aren't very dangerous.  You freak out because you know that a magnitude 6.5 earthquake is about as likely as 10 magnitude 5.5 earthquakes and a magnitude 7.5 earthquake is a pretty significant possibility too.

Not sure how that relates. I was (closest I can get to your analogy) saying that something oft touted as a 6.5 quake wasn't even a 4.5 quake, maybe 3.5 at worst. But it's a snappy name and poster-child in the game of "name your favourite nuclear accident".

(In the actual INES scale,  Chernobyl and Fukushima are both maximum 7s (although I'd qualify Chernobyl as the greater, Fukushima assessed under a more risk-averse/threat-aware atmosphere) and Three Mile Island is at 5 along with the Windscale Fire (my personal 'favourite', and notably more dangerous) and the Goaiania Incident (Brazil) in which scavenged  medical isotopes caused four definite direct deaths and hundreds of other severe contaminations that are likely life-shortening, actually greater than Fukushima's realistic impact over the same timescales (with no direct deaths at all). But these are all Apples And Oranges, in comparison, on a scale not intended to rank by total effect, but by a more amorphous 'breadth' of impact that doesn't fit with such quantitative aspects as direct deaths.)

Addendum that I was on a long phone-call whilst trying to finish my post, so about eight or nine ninjas...

[Culise]

a covert attack on a nuclear plant could rival Fukushima or Three Mile Island.

It is generally accepted that the 3MI incident caused radiation effects so insignificant as to be indistinguishable from statistical noise. Unlike the mental health issues arising from worry and stress ongoing at the time. If there was even the possibility of repeating that incident, by cyber-attack, an enemy would do better to target the news channels (or just let Fox News do its everyday thing, without any extra effort expended).

Yes.  Sorry, but that's what I meant by a political attack.  Basically, it doesn't necessarily do all that much physically, but the media and public freak out, anti-nuclear sentiment surges, and everyone panics: it inspires terror all out of proportion to the actual physical effect.  Reviewing, Fukushima was probably the worse example for my point; like Chernobyl, that was a perfect storm that resulted in a rather unfortunate situation for the area, but it did result in a significant release of radioactive material.  Three Mile Island, on the other hand, as you say, and pursuant to my intended meaning, did not. 

[Sergarr]

Oh my god why does this exist.

If Donald Trump Wins US Election, Will Hillary Clinton Nullify Results Because Of Vladimir Putin?

[mainiac]

I think that if you think Fukoshima is the worst that can possibly happen you are replicating the exact fallacy that produces black swan events in the first place.  Of course a worse outcome then what happened is possible.  You could have more radioactive material leaked, you could have the radioactive materials spread before the evacuation go wrong.  These things might seem unlikely but people underestimate the likelihood of unlikely events enormously.

And I dont know why people keep saying that carbon does more damage.  Like I said, I favor keeping existing nuclear plans open.  My beef with nuclear energy is that new construction is not economically viable (outside of France) and kept alive with taxpayer subsidies that would be put to much better use on better technologies.  The true black swan we are waiting for is a nuclear plant being built in the US that actually meets the optimistic projections they use to secure funding.

[Sergarr]

It's only economically non-viable because of anti-nuclear lobby blocking research and construction of newer and better nuclear plants (any of the Generation IV ones, really). Of course it's economically non-viable if you don't allow them to improve to the level where it becomes viable, duh.

Also, even if it's truly non-viable now, it's inevitably going to become viable in the future, once we start running out of oil and gas. It's going to happen in this very century we live in, you know?

[mainiac]

Also, even if it's truly non-viable now, it's inevitably going to become viable in the future, once we start running out of oil and gas.

Except that the costs for solar energy and wind energy keep dropping.  We might not know exactly what the energy portfolio of the future will look like but it's pretty obvious what the working technology is.

It's only economically non-viable because of anti-nuclear lobby blocking research and construction of newer and better nuclear plants (any of the Generation IV ones, really). Of course it's economically non-viable if you don't allow them to improve to the level where it becomes viable, duh.

Not in France or pre-disaster Japan.  France makes nuclear technology work but it's not by embracing technologies everyone else shuns.  Japan's nuclear experimentation was a costly boondoggle.

Maybe next gen nuclear reactors will live up to the hype twenty years down the line.  I wouldn't even say it's particularly unlikely.  But solar and wind already have a proven that it can bring the cost down.  Maybe small nuclear reactors reactors will be handy as a niche power source supplementing solar and wind with an expensive alternative to meet gaps in the demand.

[PTTG??]

Oh my god why does this exist.

If Donald Trump Wins US Election, Will Hillary Clinton Nullify Results Because Of Vladimir Putin?

They are prepping to destroy the country when they lose.

[Flying Dice]

It's honesty hilarious how we seem to be aiming for the worst possible scenario, in which we maximize pollution by completely draining our fossil fuel reserves and only then start developing  alternate sources once we don't have a stable energy base.

[mainiac]

Isn't there like 200 years of proven coal reserves even if Trump is elected an puts the full might of the US military behind a full ban of wind and solar power worldwide?  It'd be a lot of global warming but we aren't going to be unable to turn on the lights.

[Culise]

I think that if you think Fukoshima is the worst that can possibly happen you are replicating the exact fallacy that produces black swan events in the first place.  Of course a worse outcome then what happened is possible.  You could have more radioactive material leaked, you could have the radioactive materials spread before the evacuation go wrong.  These things might seem unlikely but people underestimate the likelihood of unlikely events enormously.

I don't think anyone said Fukushima was the worst that could possibly happen.  I'm not even sure people said that Chernobyl was the worst that can possibly happen, and that was a darn sight worse than Fukushima.  The closest statement to that was that Chernobyl was the worst that has actually happened, which is accurate according to most criteria.  That said, I could drop dead tomorrow should half the atoms in my body spontaneously quantum-tunnel into my bedroom wall (along with making a rather unsightly mess, I should imagine).  I could have a meteor strike me from orbit (and that's actually something that has happened to a person EDIT: multiple people, actually).  I think that it's worth considering the worst-case, but it's not worth it to be ruled by it.  It doesn't seem to be far from the suggestion that we can't use oil because any movement of oil could result in a second Exxon Valdez, any coal since all coal mines run the risk of collapse or seam fires, or hydroelectric due to the risk of a second Banqiao dam/Shimantan Reservoir failure. 

Oh, by the bye, I forgot who stated that there were probably no more reactors of the type used at Chernobyl, but there are still 11 RBMK-1000s operating in Russia in Kursk, Smolensk, and St. Petersburg.  Outside of that, the last Chernobyl reactor shut down in 2000, and the last Lithuanian reactor (technically RBMK-1500s, but same family) shut down in 2009.  All of them have seen significant safety improvements, however, including shortening the SCRAM sequence, lowering the void coefficients, and additional absorbers and manual control rods.  I won't pretend they're the safest reactors in the world, but how many RBMK's have had catastrophic failures in the three decades since 1986?

[Flying Dice]

Isn't there like 200 years of proven coal reserves even if Trump is elected an puts the full might of the US military behind a full ban of wind and solar power worldwide?  It'd be a lot of global warming but we aren't going to be unable to turn on the lights.

So 200 more years before we begin to transition to solar/nuclear/tidal on a serious scale, gotcha.

More seriously, coal accounts for around 33% of power generation in the U.S. And you can't fuel vehicles with coal unless you want to go full steampunk, at which point you might as well go full North Korea and convert them to burn wood instead. Or into space for all those sweet, sweet hydrocarbons on Titan.

[Starver]

Also http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/1997/fs163-97/FS-163-97.html

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Isn't there like 200 years of proven coal reserves even if Trump is elected an puts the full might of the US military behind a full ban of wind and solar power worldwide?  It'd be a lot of global warming but we aren't going to be unable to turn on the lights.

200 years is what politicians say. What they don't say is that it's 200 years at current consumption. So if we decide to lean on our CLEAN COAL and destroy the world it'll be gone in probably about 50. I don't know as much about coal mining as I do about drilling, but I'd also suspect that some of these proven reserves are like oil sands and a net loss or otherwise impractical.

As for keeping the lights on, good luck. If we kick off collapse conditions we will drown in externalities and related factors no matter how many watts we allegedly have. You can't eat coal. Or maintain economic stability for the average person. Or deal with extreme droughts. Or hypercanes and polar vortexes. Or stop people from electing strongmen to fight the scary terrorists when the real problem is something we don't want to think about.

Grinds my fucking gears, I'll tell you what. If there's any good side to all of this, it's that if people don't listen I'll at least get to see all the entitled ignorant fatasses of the world turn around and moan about how "science was supposed to fix this" after they voted for people who denied climate change for 70 years or said God would protect us from ourselves before the real party starts.

We are not above consequences. One way or another, humanity will pay for the things we've done. Let's hope it's by being more responsible instead of killing our way out. Yeah, right.

[misko27]

Let's go full Steampunk and conquer Titan in the name of Hydrocarbons. I like this future.