Forget Covid, Fukushima is what you should be really worried about

[UFO]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Concerning the economics of nuclear power -- if these costs are so huge, then why do those countries with the most nuclear power, have the cheapest electrical power rates? France gets 70% of its power from nuclear, and the French pay €0.19/kWH. Finland gets almost 40% of its power from nuclear, and the Finns pay €0.18. In Denmark and Germany, by contrast, with no nuclear, electrical power costs €0.29.

Errrr... Because the Taxpayer is covering all the ugly costs. Nuclear power is beyond just the running costs, but the commissioning and decommission costs need to be accounted for in the overall cost along with the cost of the long term storage of nuclear waste - Plenty of accounting fudging going on there and the taxpayer gets reamed as normal.



The great thing about Nuclear is that if you screw up you just change the name and spin it all away - Windscale to Sellafield - all though that did not stop the Balls Ups.

[UFO]

"if these costs are so huge, then why do those countries with the most nuclear power, have the cheapest electrical power rates? France gets 70% of its power from nuclear, and the French pay €0.19/kWH. Finland gets almost 40% of its power from nuclear, and the Finns pay €0.18. In Denmark and Germany, by contrast, with no nuclear, electrical power costs €0.29."

Forgot to say - That is not cheap -I live in the coal burning center of the world and pay Au$ 0.26/kWH which is less than the government subsidized French amount and personally I think its still too much. Utilities should never have been privatized, but our old mate Margaret started that one.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by UFO

"if these costs are so huge, then why do those countries with the most nuclear power, have the cheapest electrical power rates? France gets 70% of its power from nuclear, and the French pay €0.19/kWH. Finland gets almost 40% of its power from nuclear, and the Finns pay €0.18. In Denmark and Germany, by contrast, with no nuclear, electrical power costs €0.29."

Forgot to say - That is not cheap -I live in the coal burning center of the world and pay Au$ 0.26/kWH which is less than the government subsidized French amount and personally I think its still too much. Utilities should never have been privatized, but our old mate Margaret started that one.

The French do not subsidize nuclear power. They do provide €8 billion in subsidies a year to renewable power, which is taken out of profits from nuclear power. French nuclear power is immensely profitable even at the low prices charged for electrical power in France because their 58 nuclear power plants have all paid back their capital costs already.

Coal burning only seems cheap if you ignore the externalized costs. The cost of the health effects alone dwarf the tariff:

"Coal is only considered cheap because coal plants do not have to pay for the full social and environmental costs of coal burning on people’s health, the natural environment, and our climate. These costs, known as 'externalities', would double or triple the price of electricity from coal according to a Harvard University study, making renewables much cheaper. In China, mortality from air pollution is now valued at 10% of GDP. A 2015 IMF assessment put global fossil fuel subsidies at $5.3 trillion annually, which includes the costs of managing the environmental and health impacts of coal."

https://endcoal.org/coal-myths/

https://www.kftc.org/resources/full-...ife-cycle-coal

That's not even getting to the question of climate change.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by UFO

Errrr... Because the Taxpayer is covering all the ugly costs. Nuclear power is beyond just the running costs, but the commissioning and decommission costs need to be accounted for in the overall cost along with the cost of the long term storage of nuclear waste - Plenty of accounting fudging going on there and the taxpayer gets reamed as normal.

The great thing about Nuclear is that if you screw up you just change the name and spin it all away - Windscale to Sellafield - all though that did not stop the Balls Ups.

What "ugly costs"? All power generation capacity has capital costs, including initial construction and commissioning, and decommissioning at end of life. You think this is not accounted for? You would be incorrect.


The big risk with nuclear power is delays and cost overruns. Costs snowball because interest accrues during delays. But running and fuel costs of nuclear power are so low that eventually all nuclear power plants will pay for themselves -- PROVIDED only that the interest rate environment is reasonable. And even more so than meets the eye -- since economics of fossil fuel power don't include the cost of the externalities.

In an inflationary, high interest rate environment, very capital intensive projects like nuclear power start to lose their rationality.

[barnakiel]

On natural energies, only few countries can get as much as they consume. I believe Norway is one such case - and the only one on this continent!


We cannon NOT have nuclear energy - given the amt of energy we consume.


b.

[GordMay]

[Brewgyver]

Originally Posted by roverhi

You can buy tritium gun sites at any gun store and probably Walmart.

Not to mention there are probably a hundred million wrist watches with Tritium on the hands and dial.

[Brewgyver]

Originally Posted by Boatyarddog

"There was virtually no radioactive material released from 3 Mile Island."

They were not so lucky in other instances such as Chernobyl.
It's still No way to Clean Power‼️
SV Cloud Duster

Luck had nothing to do with it. Design and sound engineering procedures did.
As for "other instances," what other instances are you talking about?

The fact is that Nuclear power generation is historically SAFER than hydroelectric and fossil fuel generation, by a very large margin.

[GordMay]

[Brewgyver]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

...
One important reason not to freak out and have irrational fear of nuclear power, is that it causes you to do really stupid things like what Germany did, shutting down all their reactors and making up the difference by burning coal , which is devastating to human health and the environment, not to mention global warming. Really dumb.
[/URL]

Oh, yes, but they (No Nuke Germany) are also buying power from...

French nuclear reactors. So what exactly does that say about their "No Nukes" stance?

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Brewgyver

Oh, yes, but they (No Nuke Germany) are also buying power from...

French nuclear reactors. So what exactly does that say about their "No Nukes" stance?

Even in France, where everyone should know better, some crazy things are being done:


https://www.sustainability-times.com...in-france-why/

[CassidyNZ]

Originally Posted by UFO

Really most of you guys & gals have busted blood vessels over this whole covid thing, which is hardly a blip in the road for humanity as far as these things go

I read somewhere that five major conflicts in which the United States was involved throughout the 20th century: World War I, Korea, Vietnam and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq resulted in the deaths of something like 140,000 Americans.

CV19 has now been attributed with (in round numbers) 220,000 deaths in the US alone and you believe this to be “hardly a blip”? Holy cow!!

And one wonders what the cost of those conflicts was to America compared to the cost of lockdowns. I’m not going to bother researching that but I reckon that by comparison, given the US defence budget for 2021 alone is $740b, the cost of CV19 is the real blip. 30m people in poverty (of which 15m were probably already in poverty before CV19) beats the heck out of 1/4 million people dead.

[CassidyNZ]

Originally Posted by UFO

Errrr... Because the Taxpayer is covering all the ugly costs.

I’m not sure of the US tax structures but surely the cost of electricity (which would include the cost of nukes) is borne by the consumer of the electricity? Is it subsidised by federal or state government (tax payer)? I never thought it was but I’ve been wrong once or twice before now.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by CassidyNZ

I’m not sure of the US tax structures but surely the cost of electricity (which would include the cost of nukes) is borne by the consumer of the electricity? Is it subsidised by federal or state government (tax payer)? I never thought it was but I’ve been wrong once or twice before now.

No, you are correct in this.


We subsidize the cost of burning fossil fuels because the external costs are transferred to the public at large. Especially coal -- which has immense external costs.



We subsidize renewables -- and probably that's a good thing.


Nuclear? Pays its own way.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by CassidyNZ

I read somewhere that five major conflicts in which the United States was involved throughout the 20th century: World War I, Korea, Vietnam and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq resulted in the deaths of something like 140,000 Americans.

CV19 has now been attributed with (in round numbers) 220,000 deaths in the US alone and you believe this to be “hardly a blip”? Holy cow!!

And one wonders what the cost of those conflicts was to America compared to the cost of lockdowns. I’m not going to bother researching that but I reckon that by comparison, given the US defence budget for 2021 alone is $740b, the cost of CV19 is the real blip. 30m people in poverty (of which 15m were probably already in poverty before CV19) beats the heck out of 1/4 million people dead.

And here you're not right.


You can't compare x number of healthy young me killed in battle, to the same number of 84 year olds (average age of the COVID deaths in Northern Europe) dying a couple of months earlier than they otherwise would have. In science, it's more customary to measure life-years lost, not lives, as if they were all equivalent.



30 million people thrown into poverty who were not in poverty before, is God knows how many life-years lost. Certainly equivalent to 3 million dead. And the quality of life of the remaining 27 million. NOT indeed worth 250k 84 year olds dead. And if I were 84 years old, I would agree.


This attitude seems to be a peculiar one belonging to privileged white retired people. Terrified of the virus, terrified of death, willing to throw the whole rest of the population under the bus, in order to control the pandemic. People unable to relate to the 30 year old (say) black (say) man who has minimal risk from the virus, but for whom lockdown means the end of a job, poverty, despair, God knows whatever consequences. This is selfish and evil.


The risk from COVID to the population under 60 is similar to the flu -- as the head of the Finnish health services said a few weeks ago, and as the science supports. This whole thing is about privileged retired people, at the expense of everyone else. We should be ashamed.


I've been keeping an open mind about this, but in the last week or so I've started to feel like I actually understand what this is all about.