IEA wants Germany to rethink nuclear phase-out

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

Also, the thread was never locked, Tribun, so I caught you in another lie over PM. You fail.

No it was locked albiet briefly Ein.

My mistake then.

[Colonel Olrik]

Yeah, I locked it briefly to do a split, but changed my mind since there were only two posts from Tribun

[rhoenix]

You guys with your nuclear fetisch start to make me sick. (By now I know that anything other than your "must have nuclear"-opinion is useless here, so I won't even try.)
And I can live without any anti-atom riots like we had in the 80's and 90's, so good riddance when we are rid of that shit.

God, I hate Nuclear-Hurrahist's.
So and now that I have said my opinon, flame me if you like.[/quote]

Howabout instead of starting a diatrabe that's completely unsupported by evidence, you back up your opinion with valid reasoning, instead of "damn kids and their nucular riots!"

It would be ignored anyway, so I don't even bother with writing down my reasons (and I do have them). It's only that it is a lost cause here anyway to try and explain it, wasting my time for nothing. You could as well try to explain race equality to a bunch of Ku-Klux Klans.

Aww, your reasoning would be ignored, so you don't bother backing up your assertions?

Your comments were most certainly not ignored, as the deluge of posts in reply to yours might suggest.

Last, but certainly not least, you throw out the dark assertion that we here are about nuclear energy the way the KKK is about hating people who don't have enough melanin in their skin. Once again, I note, without even the tiniest math-equation-on-toilet-paper form of evidence.

To anticipate your (unsubstantiated) response, here's my anticipatory response - invest the capital your countrymen would have put into coal research, and help out the ITER and other projects. If Germany, working with the other interested countries, managed to get proper nuclear fusion working as a power source, that would pretty much end the entire argument, wouldn't you say?

[rhoenix]

God, I hate Nuclear-Hurrahist's.
So and now that I have said my opinon, flame me if you like.

Somehow, during that whole diatrabe, I managed to screw up the quote tags. My apologies.

[Companion Cube]

This thread needs to be retitled "SDN Melts Down"

Further to the topic, what are the issues associated with extracting uranium from seawater? Wikipedia simply describes it as "feasible" given the work of Japanese scientists in the 80s, and the IAEA gives it the thumbs-upas well.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Doesn't Germany (and alot of Europe) buy power from France, which is the world's nuclear energy kingpin?

[Sea Skimmer]

This thread needs to be retitled "SDN Melts Down"

Further to the topic, what are the issues associated with extracting uranium from seawater? Wikipedia simply describes it as "feasible" given the work of Japanese scientists in the 80s, and the IAEA gives it the thumbs-upas well.

The way that technology works is they have a special cloth which will attract uranium atoms out of the water (and certain other heavy mental elements IIRC) as they float by. The plan for mass harvesting of the uranium would simply be to build huge cages of steel covered and filled with the fabric and let them sit anchored in the ocean in areas of strong currents for a while. After six months or so you pull them out, wash the uranium off and put the cages back into the ocean.

I don’t know how the costs work out, but the Japanese testing harvested several pounds of uranium in less then a year, while working on a very small scale. However right now existing mines are already supplying plenty of uranium, and no one is likely to invest in the new technology anytime soon because we simply don’t need the extra fuel.

Edit: apparently the Earth’s oceans contain 4.5 billion tons of uranium, uniformly dissolved at a density of 3 mg per cubic meter of water. That ought to last us a while.

[Ma Deuce]

Doesn't Germany (and alot of Europe) buy power from France, which is the world's nuclear energy kingpin?

Yes, France generates nearly 80% of their electricity from nuclear power and is the largest electricity exporter in Europe. One of their notable customers is Italy, who shut down all their nuclear plants years ago and are now the world's largest net importer of electricity, though I bet Germany would steal that dubious honor if they actually shut down all their plants.

And France does not have the huge problem with nuclear waste that American anti-nuclear activists whine about, because they reprocess their waste into more fuel. The US hasn't done this in 30 years, thanks to Jimmy Carter banning it (Reagan reversed Carter's ban on fuel reprocessing, but Congress hasn't been interested in allocating funds to restart it after the infrastructure had been dismantled).

[A-Wing_Slash]

And France does not have the huge problem with nuclear waste that American anti-nuclear activists whine about, because they reprocess their waste into more fuel. The US hasn't done this in 30 years, thanks to Jimmy Carter banning it (Reagan reversed Carter's ban on fuel reprocessing, but Congress hasn't been interested in allocating funds to restart it after the infrastructure had been dismantled).

What the fuck? We have a whole big controversy over the Nevada mountain thing, when we can actually just keep using the stuff? What am I missing here (or why is Congress fucking stupid)?

[Sea Skimmer]

What the fuck? We have a whole big controversy over the Nevada mountain thing, when we can actually just keep using the stuff? What am I missing here (or why is Congress fucking stupid)?

Reprocessing spent fuel reduces the weight of waste which actually must be buried by about 90% and results in lots of useful fuel. When the US nuclear power industry was established, it was agreed that the US government would run a reprocessing program. The power industry doesn’t do it because in the short term it is more economical to keep digging up more uranium and piling up the waste in temporary storage facilities.

It was also agreed that the power industry would pay a tax per unit of nuclear electricity to feed a fund that would pay for long term storage. The fund currently has something like 17 billion dollars in it, unspent because of political bullshit, and its still growing.

Carter killed off the reprocessing program but failed to phase out nuclear power, and Yucca Mountain may never open and can only store a fraction of existing waste to begin with. The result is a fucked situation with regards to waste storage, and we can quite reasonably blame it on the bullshit scaremongering politics of Americas equivalents of Tribun. Even for the Congressmen who know something about the issue, they can’t do anything because its too much a political hot potato, and any reprocessing plan would need firm congressional support for multiple decades, not just one senate term.

The anti nuclear morons love the situation of course, since they’ve managed to create a problem for the nuclear power industry that has no reason existing except for them, and can then use it as an argument against the industry. If hypocrisy caused death then everyone on earth would die, but they’d drop first.

[Starglider]

Yucca Mountain may never open and can only store a fraction of existing waste to begin with.

Really? I didn't know that. Do you have a source comparing the storage capacity to the actual amount of waste to be buried there? Where exactly does the limitation on how much can be stored come from; why can't they keep digging more tunnels to put it in?

[Starglider]

Do you have a source comparing the storage capacity to the actual amount of waste to be buried there?

Incidentally I tried to google this but after the first twenty or so pages of nonsensical and often illiterate enviro-moron screeds I gave up. However my best guess is that it comes from this seemingly insane EPA requirement;

EPA proposed a revised rule in August 2005 to address the issues raised by the appeals court. The new proposed rule limits radiation doses from Yucca Mountain for up to one million years after it closes. No other rules in the U.S. for any risks have ever attempted to regulate for such a long period of time. Within that regulatory timeframe, EPA has proposed two dose standards that would apply based on the number of years from the time the facility is closed. For the first 10,000 years, we would retain the 2001 final rule’s dose limit of 15 millirem per year. This is protection at the level of the most stringent radiation regulations in the U.S. today. From 10,000 to one million years, EPA proposes a dose limit of 350 millirem per year. This represents a total radiation exposure for people near Yucca Mountain that is no higher than natural levels people live with routinely in other parts of the country.

[aerius]

Where exactly does the limitation on how much can be stored come from; why can't they keep digging more tunnels to put it in?

I'll have to dig up my university geology notes to be sure, but as I remember it there's only so much suitable rock in the mountain for storing nuclear wastes. A lot of the rock has fractures which let water leak in or they're not strong & stable enough and may collapse.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Having done some graduate work on the Yucca Mountain situation (and getting failed from my program for bein pro-nuclear in environmental matters) the main problem is that Yucca Mountain is too small. There's such a backlog of waste (all of which is stored in or near urban centers in unsafe facilities) that as soon as Yucca Mountain opens, they'll have to close it.

The problem is that the facility's capacity to hold waste varies drastically depending on who decides how the waste is stored. Nevada state officials pitch a fit and say that 110k tons of leaky canisters will be stored unsafely, while more conservative estimates put it at 24k tons. Alot of the naysayers claim there are earthquake, flooding, or volcanic hazards associated with Yucca Mountain, but the fact is that its the best target for storage because;
1. The land is already a nuclear test site.
2. The waste would be stored several hundred feet above the water table.
3. The area has (on average) a magnitude 5 earthquake once every 10k years, and the facility is designed to withstand a magnitude 7.

Really, there's no reason why Yucca Mountain couldn't open tomorrow and start retrieving 3000 tons of waste annually, except that it sounds scary. The removal technology is secure, the waste transport vehicles can withstand anything up to and including a tomohawk missile strike, and the facility is open and ready. I say we start a crash program in reprocessing fuel to reduce our waste stockpile and put the byproducts in Yucca Mountain. In 15 years all the nuclear waste in the US would be secure, safe, and over 100 miles from any urban centers.

[dragon]

So you'll consign us to incredibly dirty coal which is MORE RADIOACTIVE than Nuclear? Oil which is running out and igniting warfare?

Fuck you; I hope Mike bans you without a Senate hearing for this total mockery of a debate!

Coal is more radioactive damn didn't know that. I know Germany has been going through a green period lately trying to increase things like solar, wind and hydroelectric power but I seriously doubt its enough to compensate for the lose of the nuclear power plants. Hell power here is pricy enough with out having a power shortage. But waht can you expect you have 80 plus million people living in an area the size of Montana.

I mean there are three nuclear power plants all within an hour drive of where my wife lives in Wurzburg. So if all three were to shut down thats a loss of a lot electricity for her state.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I already sent this to Einhander and now I will say it open:

I should have known that this topic is too hot for me...

I admit defeat. In the future I better stay away from anything concerning nuclear power (As I did before).

To make it short: I wrote mostly emotional, and I have NOT all the facts together. I made assumptions without facts. Now that I've thought about it I therefore admit that while I still don't like nuclear power, I have said nothing useful.

I want you to state right now that you acknowledge that nuclear power is safe and efficient and should be employed wherever possible to replace high-pollution, unsustainable coal and oil plants. If you do not do so, then I want to see some evidence to the contrary supporting your assertion, which you damn well better be prepared to defend.

Your "concession" above is a half-assed attempt to worm yourself out of some serious trouble, and since I'm up to a nuclear safety/efficiency debate, I'm not going to let you wriggle away so easily.

[Stuart Mackey]

snip I say we start a crash program in reprocessing fuel to reduce our waste stockpile and put the byproducts in Yucca Mountain. In 15 years all the nuclear waste in the US would be secure, safe, and over 100 miles from any urban centers.

No wonder you failed your course, your a bonifide heritic. I bet the greenies would have wanted to warm themselves by your burning carcass on a cold winter night if it wasnt for the potential for pollution.

[K. A. Pital]

"My anti-nuclear emotions caused me to flame and flood in the thread, but I haven't got a shred of facts behind me". Uber-fail.

I loved the "Nuclear Hurrahists" and Ku Klux Klan comparison though. Of course, rational people who support scientific advances in power generation are comparable to a bunch of racist shitheads, aren't they? I second the call for sanctions on that one.

[CaptainChewbacca]

snip I say we start a crash program in reprocessing fuel to reduce our waste stockpile and put the byproducts in Yucca Mountain. In 15 years all the nuclear waste in the US would be secure, safe, and over 100 miles from any urban centers.

No wonder you failed your course, your a bonifide heritic. I bet the greenies would have wanted to warm themselves by your burning carcass on a cold winter night if it wasnt for the potential for pollution.

One of my friends actually had to portray an 'evil geologist' in a presentation/skit, so he borrowed my hat and coat. Its ok, though, I managed to transfer into a parallel program, though I eventually had to leave for other problems.

[Mr. T]

I'm very much pro-nuclear but last year I took a "dumbed down" 100 level Physics course as part of a requirement and the Physics Professor on a few occassions railed against nuclear power as "wrong in principle". Here's his argument:

A vivarium is a sealed ecosystem. A large clear container has some soil, water, plants, perhaps some snails, etc. in carefully controlled proportions placed inside. The container is then totally sealed and placed in the sunlight. This ecosystem can survive for a long long time with no maintenance required. In fact, with care a vivarium can be constructed that initially increases the total amount of biomass inside until it reaches a steady state. What does the Second Law of Thermodynamics say about this? That there is no problem: although the system cannot exchange matter with the outside, energy from the sunlight is streaming through the ecosystem so it is not really closed. If you place the vivarium in a dark closet, the Second Law will take over and very soon you will have a high-entropy foul-smelling goo of decomposed biomass.

We can think of the Earth as being very similar to the vivarium. The exchange of matter between the Earth and space is fairly negligible, but energy from the sunlight is streaming through the system. In fact during the day about 1400 Joules per second (nearly 2 horsepower) reaches every square meter of the Earth's surface. A similar quantity of energy is radiated away into space from the Earth as thermal radiation.

Millions of years ago the Earth had no life and had a relatively high entropy. Now life has evolved, and the Earth contains about a trillion kilograms of ordered low-entropy biomass. And this all occurred because of the energy from the Sun that streams through the Earth's system. The rule set that governs this process is given by physics, chemistry, biology, and evolution.

Now let's consider some energy sources that we use.

<snipped out his discussion (and support) for renewable energy like wind, solar and hyrdoelectric and biomass >

These energy sources are all sustainable and renewable. In the language we have been using in this document, this means that they treat the Earth as an open system and thus allow our low-entropy ecosystem to survive and prosper.

Let us continue thinking about energy sources.

5. Petroleum, Coal, Natural Gas. These energy sources are also ultimately from the Sun: biomass from hundreds of thousands of years ago became trapped in the Earth as oil, coal and gas deposits. However, these energy sources are not renewable: they are no longer being produced. Thus they all treat the Earth as a closed system. The Second Law of Thermodynamics predicts, correctly, that these energy sources will necessarily produce problems with entropy: some common names for this entropy are pollution, greenhouse gases, and global warming.

6. Nuclear Power. This is the direct conversion of mass to energy in accordance with the most famous equation in the world: E= mc2. Note that because the speed of light c is such a huge number, a nearly unimaginable amount of energy is available to us from small quantities of mass. Thus when we hear experts quacking about an energy crisis they are wrong. However, we do have an entropy crisis, and the Second Law of Thermodynamics assures us that nuclear power generation on Earth in wrong in principle: it treats the Earth as a closed system and necessarily will lead to problems in sustaining our ecosystem.

Essentially his argument (I think) boils down to: Nuclear power treats the Earth as a "closed system" and the Second law of thermodynamics means that in the long term, reliance on nuclear power will lead us to the same fate as the vivarium put in a closet (we turn in to a high entropy goo of decomposing biomass).

I don't have the the scientific background to call bullshit, so did his argument have any merit at all or was it the reason that he was stuck with teaching my dumbed down physics course ?

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Essentially his argument (I think) boils down to: Nuclear power treats the Earth as a "closed system" and the Second law of thermodynamics means that in the long term, reliance on nuclear power will lead us to the same fate as the vivarium put in a closet (we turn in to a high entropy goo of decomposing biomass).

I don't have the the scientific background to call bullshit, so did his argument have any merit at all or was it the reason that he was stuck with teaching my dumbed down physics course ?

He's correct after a fashion, but he's completely ignoring the fact that the potential nuclear energy resources of the world are sufficient for thousands of years. Also, he explicitly assumes that the only source of nuclear material which is obtainable to humans is Earth, which is definitely utterly fallacious. Give us ten years at current technology levels and we could launch a mission which could reach the asteroid belt and mine several tons of uranium and bring it safely back to Earth.

However, we won't need to do that for quite some time, and by the year 2300 we should be engaged in mass resource extraction in orbit, even with such distractions as peak oil and coal and global warmining in the meantime to slow us down. We should have been getting close to being engaged in this stuff already, but, well, humans are very near-sighted, especially in our current governing mechanisms.

It's an utterly senseless objection, in short, even if it's "technically correct".

[Il Saggiatore]

Yes, France generates nearly 80% of their electricity from nuclear power and is the largest electricity exporter in Europe. One of their notable customers is Italy,...

And we get the gas from Russia.

... who shut down all their nuclear plants years ago and are now the world's largest net importer of electricity,...

The nuclear power plants were shut down after a referendum in 1987: they let the ignorant masses, scared by the Chernobyl accident, decide.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Chernobyl and 3-mile Island are all the scaremongers have to point to when they try to shut down nuclear construction. Unfortunately, 3-mile happened about 2 weeks after the movie 'China Syndrome' came out, which was about a runaway meltdown, and that's the main reason why no new nuclear plants have been opened in the US since then.

[sketerpot]

Chernobyl and 3-mile Island are all the scaremongers have to point to when they try to shut down nuclear construction. Unfortunately, 3-mile happened about 2 weeks after the movie 'China Syndrome' came out, which was about a runaway meltdown, and that's the main reason why no new nuclear plants have been opened in the US since then.

That's silly, though. China Syndrome was about a meltdown melting down to the groundwater. At TMI, the reactor vessel contained the meltdown. And if it hadn't, there would still be the containment structure, designed for exactly this sort of task. And then there's still some ground between the reactor and any groundwater.

Although if Tribun is any indication, anti-nuclear fearmongers tend to completely reject reality in favor of their emotions, so hassling them with facts won't do much.

[wilfulton]

You guys with your nuclear fetisch start to make me sick. (By now I know that anything other than your "must have nuclear"-opinion is useless here, so I won't even try.)
And I can live without any anti-atom riots like we had in the 80's and 90's, so good riddance when we are rid of that shit.

God, I hate Nuclear-Hurrahist's.
So and now that I have said my opinon, flame me if you like.

Certainly.

So what you're saying is that the (very) remote possibility (two incidents total) of releasing radioactive material from a nuclear reactor is far worse than the certainty (happens every freaking second of every minute of every day) of releasing radioactive material into the atmosphere (among other not-so-pleasant things, one of them being sulfur compounds) from the combustion of coal?
You know that bad shit is to be found in coal (we so casually refer to it as impurities) right?
And you know that just because you scrap your plans to build a nuclear plant isn't going to alleviate your energy needs, right? Solar power is expensive and not particularly reliable (the sun doesn't always shine, see) and neither is wind power. Guess what, you need some sort of exothermic reaction to produce the electricity you need to keep society going. The magical power of happy thoughts won't do a damned thing by itself.