Fukushima- Still Bad and Getting Worse

After nearly 15 years in the nuclear power industry, navy and civilian pwr and bwr plants I am confident that the single biggest issue with nuclear power is that the tree huggers stopped us from building more 30 years ago. I don't care how well you maintain your top of the line '84 anything, after 30+ years of running at 100% capacity for 90+% of the time anything would be worn out, especially when you have to use all 1984 parts because no one will certify anything newer and loosing your grandfathered status means shutting it down until the legal wrangling is over.

A brand new AP1000 pwr plant could be safely making power in a couple of years and withstand any environmental conditions any plant has ever experienced safely and without notice, but they have been trying to build them for almost 10 years and can't get past the paperwork.

Yeah, the rabid treehuggers have completely killed off the construction of new nuke and hydro plants. Then they wonder why everybody still burns coal.

I can see blocking Hydro.. those things kill wide swatches of environment and do untold damage from the weight of the water itself.

But the new nukes, like mentioned above, -are- safe, clean, and readily cleaned up.

Nukes are great as long as you don't live in Nevada.

6500 times increase in 2 days?

That was in Oct. What is the current status?

Is a Tyvek suit appropriate PPE for a liquid radioactive cleanup site?

mad_machine wrote: I can see blocking Hydro.. those things kill wide swatches of environment...

Wider impact than burning coal?

SVreX wrote: 6500 times increase in 2 days? That was in Oct. What is the current status? Is a Tyvek suit appropriate PPE for a liquid radioactive cleanup site?

It's not tyvek, it's orex, and it doesn't provide much radiation protection it's just for contamination. After use it gets bundled up and dissolved in hot water so any radioactive material gets caught in a filter and then disposed of with a lot less solid waste. The water gets reprocessed and reused.

For actual radiation the old standbys of minimizing time and maximizing distance and shielding are still the best protection.

I do kind of find it strange Japan has not modernized there nukes more. I believe a large percentage of their power is from them.

I think they do have a pretty strong enviro movement though.

In reply to aircooled:

The cost of it also plays a part I'm sure

JoeyM wrote:

Sky_Render wrote: WTF has happened to this thread?

We fixed it! (i.e. song lyrics make everything better.....even discussions about thorium reactors)

Pre-emptive anti-flounder.

Appleseed wrote: Nukes are great as long as you don't live in Nevada.

Actually, not true.

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304773104579270660999230736

http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2014/01/13/more-testing-this-week-at-bridgeton-landfill/

oldopelguy wrote: For actual radiation the old standbys of minimizing time and maximizing distance and shielding are still the best protection.

I always preferred the A.L.A.R.A. principle- always let another run ahead!

svex: yeah, that's right scary stuff, and getting worse daily. Unfortunately, Tepco still thinks dilution is the solution and is content to continue to dump into the ocean.

Don't forget about the rest of Nevada. The Nevada Test Site is bigger than Rhode Island.

SVreX wrote:

mad_machine wrote: I can see blocking Hydro.. those things kill wide swatches of environment...

Wider impact than burning coal?

Well, the really big one in China is supposedly going to/has begun/already did (not sure what stage its at, too lazy to google it ) change the angle of the earths axis of rotation, simply by putting so much mass in one spot. Then take into effect the way a hydro electric dam will change the shoreline/water flow along the entirety of the river its built on, and the impact is direct, and measurable (at least that data is more easily calculated and attributed than the way "analysts" measure climate change etc from the airborne pollutants put out by coal/oil plants).

I may or may not have any idea what Im talking about, as well

In reply to N Sperlo:

Your WSJ link requires a subscription to view......something I will not do for an e-version of backup toilet paper. Also, I thought Yucca Mountain was never actually filled.

SVreX wrote:

mad_machine wrote: I can see blocking Hydro.. those things kill wide swatches of environment...

Wider impact than burning coal?

Exactly. When you factor in the mining operations, transportation and then the acid rain etc from burning the coal suddenly a big lake behind a hydro dam looks a lot more palatable.

Strip mine in West Virginia:

That's a pretty big chunk of changed environment right there, I'd say.

Don't get me wrong, coal has cleaned up a lot (I live less than three miles from a coal burning plant and you'd never know it was there) but it's still not exactly the cleanest power source.

Once built, a hydro plant puts out no emissions and lasts every bit as long as a coal fired plant. Its big drawback is the limited areas it can be used.

An Uncle of mine has a brother who lives in Sweden(Vietnam draft dodger IIRC) apparently a lot of the deer herd there is considered inedible by the government due to being downwind from all the coal burning in the UK over the years.

Coal is actual dirty in a nuclear manner too, if it were regulated by the NRC, burning coal (especially on an industrial non zero emissions scale) would probably be illegal.

Curmudgeon wrote: Strip mine in West Virginia: That's a pretty big chunk of changed environment right there, I'd say.

Coal companies do more than strip mine. Now they're into Mountaintop removal mining

In reply to JoeyM:

There is an area near Jim Thorpe PA where that was done. The mines were abandoned decades ago (I think the Wiki dates are a bit off). There are trails through the area we ride on so the trails are called "The Strip Mines." While you can definitely tell something "artificial" happened, it's amazing how quickly nature reclaimed much of the area (the slag areas are still sporadic with vegetation).