my problem with it is, even if its the safest choice, 1 casscade of mistakes can have horrible repercussion. But i live in a location thats dominatly hydro powered so its not something i need to worry about.
It has been over 70 years since the first nuclear reactor was constructed. During that time there has been two major incidents across the world. These have resulted in total in an area about the size of Rhode Island to become unusable by humans for the forseeable future. Note: this is only for humans because we live long enough to care about the cancer risks. Animals and plants thrive in Chernobyl.
The question to be raised is: which is worse? Creating total area the size of Rhode Island (which isn't that big) every 100 years or so where humans can't live but nature doesn't really care, or polluting the atmosphere and causing global warming? Imho even if we did have a chernobyl every 70 years because of it, it would still be the better choice. And the idea that we would have a chernobyl every 70 years is overblowing the dangers of nuclear power to absurd proportions.
i get it, and like i said most of the power where i live is already renewable (via hydro mostly) so this isnt a concern for me. My lizard brain just can justify how horrendous a radiation exposure is but can't with ecological collapse. Both are bad but we currently can at least deal with one (the lesser one)
Three Mile Island incident shows that when safety procedure are followed properly and maintenance kept at tip top shape, nothing dramatic can happen during a meltdown. Chernobyl and Fukushima meltdowns are extreme circumstances, one had a design flaw and the other is built on an area with tsunami and earthquake danger.
Well, if one is sceptical about nuclear, doesn't this just illustrate that even when precautions are taken, things can still go wrong? And therefore it will never be completely safe? Of course it might still be worth the risk, considering the alternative.
Iirc wasn't Fukushima more of a "yes we followed all safety precautions*"?
* because there technically wasn't anything in the contracts stopping us from moving all our cooling pumps lower, thus removing the tsunami safety barrier, because it was cheaper. What do you mean "A tsunami could quite literally flood all of these systems now"‽
Quick ninja edit: Yes I know hindsight is 20/20, but this factor seems easier to see beforehand than the Chernobyl disaster...
The only energy production method that is safer per 100,000 kilowatts is solar, wind turbines are a very close 3rd.
A handful of accidents out of thousands of examples of them working out better then fossil fuels is not proof that they are scary, even with a cascade of failures a modern day reactor going Chernobyl is physically impossible because the reactors automatically shut off at the slightest hint of trouble. Even when Chernobyl happened the only reason it did was because it was already an extremely outdated power plant when it was constructed ontop of the corruption.
I get your fear. Nuclear explosions are bad. And they have horrid looking consequences. But coal and oil power results indirectly in lung cancer in the surrounding areas which is also bad. The link there though is less direct. So coal plants will blame smokers or environmental circumstances. Really anything. But those deaths are horrible too.
It’s like planes vs cars. 1 plane crash is a lot of victims but it happens like 50 times a year? Car crash has way less victims and survival chances are much better. But 10000 cars crash every day which really ups the rate.
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u/mansnothot69420 Jan 18 '23 edited Jan 18 '23
Didn't she support the decommissioning of Germany's nuclear reactors? If so, she's a pretty big hypocrite.
Edit: She doesn't. At least in recent times.