The nuclear energy argument is even more surreal when things like Chernobyl are brought up - Especially if, as you suggest, we consider that to be a best case scenario - Especially given what's been coming through some of the younger Pripyat survivers, and of course, the current polution of the surrounding area. It's entirely possible that another, slightly less potent, cloud of (for lack of a better phrase) nuclear **** is going to make an appearance, if the dome collapses (Given that it is hardly stable, and the sarcophagus is weak (through no fault of the people maintaining it, might I add)). Might bring some of the 'pro nuclear power' group into touch with reality. What worries me is the fields of vehicles that were so irradiated they were dumped, including the helicopters, which have been scavenged for parts (Engine blocks, rotor blades etc). I've no idea as to whether they're 'clean' now, in comparison to what they were, but that is still pretty creepy. The fact that it was only one reactor, too. What if there were three or four to experience a similar disaster?
I'm suprised at the amount of ******** there, Nexxo. Chernobyl was and still is a worst case scenario. Consider the fact that is was a shoddy Russian design, that ALL the safeguards were turned off, that the plant was undermanned because of night hours, that people were blatently disregarding safety rules and that the reactor design itself is decades old by now. The consider a new reactor design - such as a pebblebed reactor - in combination with breeder reactors and you have very safe almost limitless energy. There is no reason to not go nuclear apart from the high cost of getting one built, which given this energy crisis and the credit crunch I think is worth it.
I'm all pro renewable energy, but not at this moment. The technology isn't quite there yet. Offshore turbine fields are good in theory, but there is a reason that Norway is retracting them. In my studies I made a lot of projects about renewable energy, only to find out it wasn't up to it. IMHO there should be an investment in Nuclear power, the station at Chernobyl was an old graphite reactor, current reactors are a lot cleaner, and safer. They also produce a lot less waste. And I wouldn't mind having one in my backjard (BTW, I live very close to a nuclear test facility with 4 reactors, lots of nuclear storage,... 8.2km to be precise). However nuclear fission is just step one in the path to the true power, nuclear fusion.
Not really, the cost of commisioning a unclear power plant is HUGE! The government would sooner wait until the absolute last minute to change from oil/gas/coal.
forget last minute mate, we're past that. Consider the ammount of time it takes to plan, build and test a nuclear site. by the time it gets done we'll be out of power. oh, and unclear power plant
The disaster was, as I said, a freak accident rather than one waiting to happen, but the consequences may well be a best-case scenario. Truth is, we don't know. All things are infallible until they fail. And then there is the problem of what to do with the nuclear waste. It hangs around for a very long time and current storage facilities are already running into difficulties.
Tbh the best power is manpower... don't want to pay for petrol? get a bike don't want to ride a bike around town because making the rubber in the tyres causes too much pollution? get a kid's scooter, like I have
The Thing about modern economies and the way we use matter to move things about is, its a finite resource. People rely on that conversion between matter and energy to plop things on their doorstep, its an undisputed fact that this supply of energy will run out, and the sooner people realize that they have to create their own, the better off the impact will be when this finite resource runs out. Buying habits will change, as imported fruit and veg will no longer be a viable means to support your family, local producers will benefit enormously, and we wil all be selling electricity back to the national grid. Just think it may cost £1200 for solar panels, but when your out at work, your selling your electricity back to the grid, effectively paying off your bills. if you had storage for this, you can use whatever you generated at night, and the surplus sold off when the batteries are topped off. did i mention, if you apply this (for example) to the 60 million + homes in the uk, we wouldn't need to generate energy?
No they don't. Our town has had them for a year now and they are nowhere near covering their costs. The amount of maintenance alone keeps that from happening. Most of the time, out of the 5 that we have, only 3 are running. For how much they cost, and how much space they take over, they are just not viable at the moment. I live in a relatively small place and we would need another 15 to "light" up the main town area, and once again, that's just lights, not everything else and considering the main population lives on the outskirts, it's really not helping at all.
wind turbines are a good way of demonstrating that you are for alternative energy, however not that serious, but have a big budget to blow on it anyway. government schemes for solar panels, even in our shitty rainy country would be a great success.
Nuclear in the UK? Why not? Oh how quickly people forget. In Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, as well as at Windscale, the main problem was gaseous. TMI and Windscale had the major concern of the emittance of the radioisotope Iodine-131 which has a half-life of 8 days. In Chernobyl, the many worse isotopes that were spread as a result of the fire from the melted core were mainly displaced by a prevailing wind. Windscale fire
We also shouldn't drive cars, because I know some steam boilers blew up due to the high pressure steam used.
Solar electric is of little or no use in Northern Britain, it might be fine south of the lakes but there is nothing like enough light in the winter never mind sun light. I don't know where you live but in between Nov and March there is about 6 hours of day light (light about 9 and dark about 3) thats hours when there should be day light if its raining it sometimes doesn't get light at all. Solar will not work in the dark. These guys live off grid in the Rocky Mountains and make wind generators they also discuss alternative power. Have a read.... http://www.otherpower.com/otherpowerfront.shtml Another useful chart on why solar in the uk is a bigger waste than petrol... http://www.sunwize.com/info_center/insolmap.htm From that you can see the south east gets 1-1.9 useable sun hours the rest gets less than one. So with a fairly large 1kw array i'd get 1Kw a day... wouldn't run much.
Hold on there. So, if each house was kitted out with say a £1000 solar panel, it would cost £60billion (£60,000,000,000), which could be, er, borrowed. Obviously, some enterprising souls are going to sell them for a quick hit, but say the majority stayed where they were put.. hmm, quite cheap considering we could then be selling electricity to other countries as long as the sun's in the sky (and then pay back the money borrowed to buy the solar panels!) Obviously, you'd have several 'stores' of electricity dotted round the country, too. Damn good idea, that.
I like nuclear, it has a definite future, albeit only for as long as we can get hold of fissionable materials, but I don't delude myself with the belief that it is environmentally friendly - aside from what you have left afterwards, you also have the massive amounts of concrete required to build the reinforced structures [for those unaware, this is a major source of CO2 emissions worldwide], all the energy required to process the uranium, and so on. Operationally it's clean but before an after you've done everything... meh, it seems hardly better than oil in that regard. Opencast mining certainly isn't any better. -x- On a lighter note, does anyone drive an LPG car? I'm in the market for a small car for the daily commute and am wondering if it's worth the fuss. LPG pumps seem quite ubiquitous these days but does it really work out much cheaper? You seem to be able to get all sorts of cars from small stuff (old Rovers) up to saloons and estates, so I'm wondering if it might be worth the extra couple of hundred quid initially. Ta. PS: Chernobyl is/was the only ever 'worst case' nuclear accident to have happened (i.e. only one to be awarded 7 on the international scale thingy of 0-7), so I think it's unrealistic to say "oh noes we don't want another Chernobyl" and not do any nuclear power - that's not to say it couldn't happen, but do you not think the people designing reactors aren't aware of the risks should their design be bad? I think it's fairly safe to assume lessons were learned. Notice how all new reactors have a containment structure already in place, for example. Notice how Chernobyl is open to the world. PPS: Windscale was a totally different type of appliance - it was basically an air cooled pile of bricks with radioactive fuel. It caught fire. Particles went up the *chimney* used to create the cooling draught, overwhelmed the filters, and escaped - it was rated 5 (Accident with off-site risk) on the scale. Though I agree Sellafield as a whole was rather a shower.
TMI was not caused by a fire. Yet, it posed a serious risk to the surrounding area for many days, in which, people had to take shelter in their homes and hope for the best. I can't imagine a city having to take refuge from exposure in what can be the result of a safety-lock designed to expel excess gases to control a more catastrophic event from happening. The point that I'm making is that an airborne event can be much more widespread then what is typically regarded as an "off-site" occurrence. As somebody who has worked in facilities that deal with the presence of nuclear materials, I can attest to the fact that even rodents living in the quarantined area and egressing out of it are considered a source of off site contamination. It may be small, but it puts a perspective of how little it takes to be classified as such.
IMAO the only nuclear-type energy I approve would be Fusion Power. However, we're far from getting it working.
Scientists can control it, however they can't scale it up, in order to get good production yields (I think).
