>implying uranium isn't a limited resource.

IIRC we release mor radioactive shit every year through the burning of fossil fuels than we create through all the worlds nuke plants combined.

>>9844314
Salt water uranium is estimated to last us a few million years. We should have time to come up with something else.

>>9844278
Yes, some years before all the fossil fuel runs out all the oil companies and governments are going to be going "Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck...". At this point many will turn to nuclear power and wind 'n' solar ect. And then we'l all go "yaaaay establishment" and they'll be all like "I know right".

Nuclear Power is the primary source of power for France. They have had a total of 0 accidents over the few decades that they have used them and when countries that rely on gas and coal for the electricity run out/cannot afford to keep going, France will be one of the last bastion's of electrical power in the western world (which is a shame as it will soon be in the control of the sand niggers).

If those pussy, butt-licking French fags can handle it then so can the likes of the USA and UK. I believe now that we have a con/lib coalition in the UK, switching to Nuclear Power is somewhere on the agenda.

>intents and purposes instead of intensive purposes.

>>9844352
In this case, 'all intents and purposes' is correct, you faggot.

Okay so what the hell do we do with all the radioactive waste produced?

People need to be educated about the facts. Three Mile Island only caused the stir it did because of The China Syndrome being in theaters. The danger from it was minimal. Modern reactors would be much safer but we're stuck with 70's technology. Chernobyl was a typical example of Soviet fail, though I'd rather risk another Chernobyl than another Deepwater Horizon.

>>9844352
OP here.
What I said is correct. You should answer my question about nuclear energy instead of correcting my grammar.

>>9844352
intents and purposes is the correct one, chucklewagon

>>9844378
What everyone else does. Dig a huge hole. Dump waste. Layer with concrete and lead. Cover with landfill.

What the fuck kind of point is that anyway? Do you know how much waste burning coal makes? Only difference is that its in the air and doing harm rather than being radioactive and doing harm. Nuclear Power is the way forward.

Nuclear is the shit, and it's the only realistic future source of power, unless we manage to make super-efficient solar panels.

>>9844437

Except that over half of the nuclear waste dumps are confirmed to be leaking.

Actually, nuclear power stations wouldn't necessarily result in large masses of radioactive waste. It depends on what element you use as fuel or whatever. Uranium isn't the only element that's possible to use. Thorium is radioactive, and there would be no radioactive waste after the process, if I recall correctly. No one has really focused on thorium yet, though.

I SUGGEST WE DROP THE FISSION AND GO FOR THE FUUUUSION

>>9844473
I can confirm that your mother is leaking my manly fluids after the nuking I gave her last night.

>>9844437
Actually, it's both in the air and radioactive, though most of the damage isn't caused by radiation. IIRC there was one study that estimated the annual damage from coal plants was somewhere around 30 000 man-lives.

>>9844473
I'd rather have that than coal plants. I don't think you realize how dangerous those things are to humans. Reactor technology is increasingly making waste less and less of a problem, but the United States is stuck with 1970's technology.It's like complaining about smog but not allowing anyone to buy a Prius, they all have to drive Gremlins and Pintos.

I'm not knowledgeable, but my parents and their friends are.

Both my parents are engineers, working for one of the top nuclear facilities in the states. They're both extremely smart, my dad being borderline genius. He's worked in all aspects concerning nuclear power and most recently has been working with nuclear waste.

He has several patents and has worked for this same nuclear facility since he was fresh out of college. He's made some of the smartest and most knowledgeable friends in the field and I listen to them talk about their jobs all the time.

I asked my Dad recently what he thought of bringing nuclear power to a large scale. He said that basically, the whole thing is so mismanaged that nothing gets done anymore. People are scared of taking responsibility for it.

He says that it's turned from good science to politics.

For example, If one were to implement nuclear power, you would need a way to refine and store the waste safely.

Anyone technical would give you ideas as to how to manage said waste, the most prominent being incineration.

When suggested to the D.O.E, they were too put off by the word, thinking the hippies would cause a scene simply because it doesn't "sound green". In reality, it's probably the cleanest way to go about it.

Instead they are spending billions on a new "Super Compaction" facility.

Apparently all they're going to be doing with the waste is squeezing it a bit before they ship it off to be buried. Using this method on a large scale would be extremely dangerous because of the potential for radiation poisoning.

How does it feel that the States of Georgia and South Carolina are more progressive in energy production than your state?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vogtle_Electric_Generating_Plant

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savannah_River_Site

Oh, I love this topic. Chernobyl CANNOT happen in the US. Why?

1) The reactor at Chernobyl suffered from inherent design flaws. In the event of a nuclear meltdown the control rods would descend into the core, speeding up the reaction. We never built any reactors like this because we knew it was a bad idea. Western reactors's control rods shut down the reaction as they descend into the core.

This is important, because a meltdown is just what it sounds like. The core literally melts. Gravity will pull in the control rods and limit the reaction. Not so at Chernobyl.

2) The scientists at Chernobyl broke the rules. They were preforming tests to see how far they could push the reactor. They violated several safety procedures in the process. When they reactor was pushed too far it broke- SURPRISE!

Three Mile Island is another story. The reactor partially melted and no radiation escaped. None.

>>9844384
There's also the fact that much of it was down to retards doing retarded shit, like building the control station with the warning lights on the back, or ignoring the sound of a series of explosions and chalking it up to a malfuncitoning fan.

Nuclear waste can be refined. A reactor only uses a small percentage of its fuel before being spent. The problem is people dont want trucks driving all over the country with radioactive materials to and from processing stations. The small amount of waste that cannot be processed can be buried in a seismically stable area or we could find new ways to utilize it.

The ONLY people who oppose nuclear power are the ones too stupid to know how it works.

>> Chernobyl

Chernobyl occurred because jackasses off of the street were performing poorly thought out experiments on a horribly designed reactor.

This could have only happened in the Soviet Union. Anywhere else in the developed world, the assholes in charge of the hole thing would have flunked out of their physics class and the reactor wouldn't even have existed.

>> Three Mile Island

Does not even deserve to be mentioned. The radiation released into the environment subjected the people there to levels of radiation you would experience on a trans-Atlantic flight.

Oh, and Nuclear Waste? We put it in the ground in the middle of deserts and wait for it to decay, unlike the burning of fossil fuels which dumps all sorts of pollutants into the atmosphere that stay in the atmosphere.

Would rather have the US burning fossil fuels so sophisticated societies won't get herp derp derp nuclear power fad time! prices for uranium.

Anyway,
Nuclear waste:
Deep hole, several miles deep. Insert waste in a radiation container, wall with concrete, fill hole. Something directly above the place is mildly affected, nothing is actually anywhere near it though, since they made the hole in the middle of nowhere.
Maybe fence it and turn it into a dump site so no idiot moves in.

Explain to me why anyone would be in any way hurt by this?
>inb4 Would somebody please think of the rats and seagulls?!

subcritical thorium circle.
Google it!

Nuclear power may be clean, efficient and cheap, but what the hell do you do with all of the waste created by it?

You cant just keep storing it. Soon enough were going to run out of space, and the possibility of leakage into water ways despite safety precautions is still existant.

It's not worth it.

>>9844588
Yeah, there are plenty of ways to refine it. The problem is, no one wants to do it.

My Pops says people have gotten irresponsible and lazy. Rather than get shit done, the diplomats who make the decisions are basically laundering tax money and doing shit all with it. google "INL Super Compaction"

The whole thing's crooked. The D.O.E. is supposed to have an IG (Inspector General) that keeps the D.O.E. in check. All government depts have an IG. But guess who pays the IG's paycheck? DOE does.

Pop's says all the engineers are stuck doing the same tests over and over and cataloging the results in a file, never to be heard from again.

There's nothing progressive going on in the states anymore.

SEND NUCLEAR WASTE INTO SPAAAACE:D

>>9844720
>challengerdisaster.jpg

It takes a lot of oil to make a nuclear reactor. A metric fuck ton of oil.

We will run out of oil before we can create enough nuclear reactors to make a difference.

Convert your house to wind and solar or be prepared to die when the oil runs out.

>>9844720

As fun as that would be, it would be absurdly expensive.

>>9844720
Not sure if troll or not, but to be honest, this could actually be a good idea.

Not the HERP DERP LETS LAUNCH THIS SHIT because that would be an absolutely terrible idea. Sending it to Jupiter or the sun would effectively destroy it with almost no negative consequences.

'It has become appaulingly clear that our technology has surpassed our humanity' - Einstein.

For fuck's sake. There are obvious alternatives to nuclear energy, which is both inefficient on small scales and dangerous. Wind and solar power are both readily available and cheap. Why is more research not being done into these?

>>9844704
This is because we're exporting all our smart scientists and engineers and importing landscapers.

>>9844798
Not enough money to be made by converting everything to solar and wind.

99% of all questions can be answered with "money".

Nuclear power is awesome, it's just getting plants up and running is the problem.


>theoretical solution a: just cut the regulations so people can do what they want with them.
Then why isn't China switching from coal to nuclear?

>theoretical solution b: utilize new technologies to work around old problems.
Easier said than done. Old technologies are the tried and proven ones, new technologies need to run their own hurdles before they can be put to work.

>theoretical solution c: just invest whatever it takes to get things off the ground.
Who's money would this be? Government can't afford it, the private sector isn't motivated to because they're already selling their product based on existing power plants.

>>9844798
Because they suck compared to nuclear power. Also, they're unreliable and solar power takes a shitload of different resources.

>>9844798
>>9844798
>Nuclear power
>Dangerous
Inbred, uneducated faggot detected

There's not nearly enough space for wind farms and solar plants to power the whole planet. Until we get cold fusion working nuclear power is BEST power.

>>9844750
This. I'm surprised no one gets this.

It isn't feasible to build nuclear reactors. I agree if we had the oil to make them, it is the best and safest idea, but we simply don't have the oil.

We need to learn to scale back an enormous amount on our energy consumption so solar, hydo, and wind power can work. If we don't, we're going to be completely fucked in the next 50 years.

>>9844859
Harnessing available wind resources could power all humanity right now. Harnessing available solar resources could power us thousands of times over.

It isn't about availability, it's about investment. Solar and wind are already economically viable, but what we really need is for fossil fuels to *stop* being economically viable before people abandon them.

>>9844278
Nuclear power just provides tons of waste that is terrible to anything/place you put it in.
Only true options are solar power, geothermal, and of course hydro-power

The only solution is.. DYSON SPHERE!

>>9844859
We have cold fusion. The US navy confirmed the existence of it a couple of years ago, but don't expect to see it used in practice. The reason it took so long for anyone to reproduce the results was appearently that people were using equipment that wasn't accurate enough to detect the output.

>>9844917
Bullshit. Oil isn't running out any time soon. It's getting more expensive as the good sources dry up, but it's there.

Here's a crazy idea: why not tap ALL energy resources? Yes coal, yes oil, yes nuclear, yes solar, yes geo, yes wind, yes hydro, yes tidal, yes biofuel. Did I miss any? Tap those too.

Resources are resources. Use them. Coal is dirty, but we make it cleaner already. An American/European coal plant would not be the same as a Chinese coal plant. All of these things are sources of what makes our modern technology work.

>>9844936
We got the radioactive shit from the ground in the first place. No reason we can't just plop it back where we found it, or even recycle it in other reactors.

Nuclear power would work great if people just acted in good faith and followed the safety rules 100% of the time. Right?

How did that work with Deepwater Horizon? The people on that rig KNEW they couldn't just walk away if they fucked up and they still cheated the rules and died for it

>>9845001
You're a fucking idiot. If oil wasn't running out we wouldn't be trying to get it from five miles beneath the ocean surface. At some point you use more energy to drill for oil than you harvest. We're approaching that point with new rigs.

>>9845001
That's what "running out" means.

Oil contains a limited amount of energy. The deeper you drill, the less net gain you achieve. Once this net starts approaching a certain level, oil will no longer be the free lunch we've become accustomed to and then it will be time to move on.

The sooner and more diligently we prepare for this, the softer the blow will be. We don't have to abandon oil, we merely need to be prepared for it to abandon us.

>>9845001
Saudi Arabia had over half of the world's oil.

They are now drilling off shore. All the mainland oil is gone. How do you explain this? It is fucking expensive to drill off shore. It is a complete waste unless it's necessary to keep your company going.

The Saudi government won't let on that they're out because there will be mass riots if they do. A totalitarian government will inevitably collapse if they can't fool the people into thinking that everything is going just fine.

>>9845002
>implying we have the resources to fully tap everything
>implying we aren't already tapping everything


Holy SHIT GUYZ WE HAVE A BREAKTHROUGH.

::::FUCKING TAP EVERYTHING:::::

>>9845042
... if you're saying it's about energy, just use the energy from existing nuke plants....

I personally find it hilarious how by bitching about nuclear power, the environmentalists are helping the fossil fuel companies and shit.

STAY CLASSY LEFTIES.

>>9845002
Do you even know what "clean coal" is?

>>9845048
Precisely. You know where oil came from before the Middle East? From the United States, and on land.

>>9844437

You know, we have the tech to recycle nuclear waste already, producing even more energy. It's still not very cost-effective, but more discoveries in this field and upgrading the tech will eventually make this proccess very efficient.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traveling_wave_reactor

sounds like a pretty cool idea.

>>9845064
There are technologies that predate the industrial revolution which could make it cleaner than how China handles it.

Emissions can also be captured instead of released. As long as this method can achieve a net gain, it is worth pursuing.

>>9845048
Shit dries up, and we move on to the less lucrative sources. Not rocket science. So far we've gotten more energy out of the oil than it took to get it from the ground. As oil gets more expensive to extract, we'll shift away from using it, in the mean time using stopgap shit like tar sand extraction because our infrastructure is still very much oil-based.
At some point, oil will become some shit we only extract because we need it for something, as opposed to being a convenient free lunch.

>>9845100
Do you realize that in about 150 years we've burned OVER half of the worlds oil. We've probably come closer to burning about 75%.

We're only burning it faster. We aren't slowing down. We aren't stopping. We are going to run out. Fast.

I'm all for nuclear power provided the waste is disposed of properly, and that they don't hire negligent fucktards.

>>9845138
OHMUHGERRRRD

WE DIDNT LISTEN

Ignore the green party and everyone spouting their slogans.

You won't get a real picture before that.

>>9845136
What are we going to shift away to? Not nuclear because at that point it won't be feasible to build the reactors.

We won't have enough resources to make enough solar panels either.

We need to start now. Not when it becomes economically unfeasible.

I can't stand this attitude that everything will be okay. It won't. Not if we don't start preparing. We don't need to run around like chickens with our heads cut off, but we do need to be realistic.

>>9844378
>>9844703

Idiots.

Nuclear power has several governmental hurdles that keep new plants from being built. Among the top ones is, its actually illegal to refine nuclear waste in the US due to some idiot named carter. The other side of it is, the DOE technically owns the fuel, not the power stations, they just lease it. Since the government is responsible for providing new fuel and storing spent fuel, and they aren't doing didly shit to store the fuel, the storage problem needs to be resolved before new plants are built.

>>9844331
Assuming that is economically viable to extract.

A key problem is that the private sector has no responsibility to ensure any of the following:

a: that the general population is provided for
b: that the production is safe from BP-style disasters
c: that long-term hazards will be avoided

A private company has one responsibility and one alone: to make a profit. Any of the above things will be pursued only if they are profitable, which generally means the use of fines and tariffs to change what profitable means.

Starting with supply; who needs a nuclear power plant when we already have coal? Nuclear will be pursued more someday, but not today and not tomorrow. A business only needs enough power to sell to its customers, no sense in building anything new.

Second, safety. As long as a corporation can limit its liability (which is pretty much what a corporation is) there will always be motivation to take risks. If you win you profit, if you lose other people eat the fallout.

Finally, long-term hazards. Industries pump poison into the air then kids get birth defects, so on and so forth. The only way to prevent this is with aggressive regulations, which causes business to flee to places that don't regulate.

>>9845192
OHMUHGERRRRD NO MORE THINGS WILL BE INVENTED

WE DIDN'T LISTEN

>>9845197

Guy with nuclear parents here. Mom works for DOE, dad works for one of the contractors at the site. One of the major problems with the contractors is that their goal shifted from progression to playing bidding wars with eachother over nothing. DOE will blame a contractor, the contractor blames another contractor, that one may blame DOE, etc.

There's never a case where "The buck stops here".


We're surrounded by idiots.

One of the huge problems with nuclear is that it needs a perfectly reliable large body of water for effective cooling. In most parts of the country, this is no problem, but in arid or inconsistent climates, nuclear power becomes somewhat difficult.

Other than that, it has a lot of potential. If we could only see breeder reactors become prevalent, we could power human society for a few hundred years, no sweat, until we think up a better energy source.

>>9845272
There is a point where we won't have enough time to invent something feasible.

I guess this is too far beyond your comprehension.

>>9845233
Never has so much bullshit been pumped into one post.

>>9845298
OHMUHGERRRD

WE DONT HAVE TIME TO INVENT STUFF

THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW IS TODAY!!!!

Why nuclear power hasn't been utilized more is beyond comprehension. Chernobyl was a piece of shit plant ran by an inept scientist. Nuclear power is utilized throughout the world safely and has proven safety records in comparison to coal burning, fossil fuels, etc.

>>9844936

I have a solution to both the nuclear waste issue and immigration control. Instead of burying the waste, we build a giant culvert along the border with mexico. we lay the spent fuel rods in the culvert with no shielding. Fuel is in a safe location and nobody gets across the border, at least not without dying a horrible death from radiation poisoning. (:

>>9845310
I'm glad you're replying with well thought out posts.

>>9844495

i laughed out loud, for real bro. good one.

>>9845344
HERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRP


DERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRP

ALSO, OHMUGERRRRD MANBEARPIG

>>9845310
Even if we had 20 years left, it might not be enough time to convert everything and avoid mass starvation/riots/etc.

Holy jesus fuck, keep living in your 4chan dream world.

>>9845303
American detected.

>>9845310
As resources undergo supply-and-demand problems, which is occurring in the present, it becomes more difficult to make the technological strides necessary to adapt. If the supply becomes even more of an issue, which is the foreseeable future, then adaptation can be a difficult challenge.

Not to worry, the sane and competent are already working on solar/wind/geo/hydro/bio advancement. Maybe in another few decades they'll have enough pity and generosity to bail out those who clung to their oil.

>>9844917
>Nuclear reactors require oil
Because anything requiring power requires oil. No shit, sherlock - that's the problem. But saying that "Oh no, shipping a few metric tons of cement takes GASOLINE so nukes can't be built" is dumber than /b/.

Nuclear engineer, here. I specialize in thermonuclear fusion research, but I've studied the current fission systems we currently have.

The main problem with FISSION reactors is cost. It's typically obscenely expensive to construct and maintain a uranium fission reactor, which is usually deconstructed after a decade or so.

Most nuclear waste doesn't come from spent fuel, but rather from the mining and refinement process of Uranium. Most Uranium isn't actually radioactive, and the specific isotope we use (235) doesn't occur in large numbers in nature. It's considered lucky if you can pull 2% of usable fuel from Uranium ore.
This is also the basis for research and implementation into Thorium reactors, as said element occurs in greater usable quantities in nature, among other things.
Also, fission reactors have had a negative environmental impact on rivers, as the water used to generate electricity is often too hot even when cooled, and damages freshwater wildlife.

FUSION, on the other hand, could potentially be the energy break we've been looking for. The main issue is creating a fusion reactor that would output more energy than what is required to get the damn thing to start in the first place.
For some perspective, look at the hydrogen bomb. In order for a hydrogen weapon to detonate, a smaller fission warhead is detonated, causing the fusion warhead to implode and allow the hydrogen to fuse into Helium. The bomb is so powerful that is requires a nuclear fucking bomb to detonate it.

>>9845366
>>9845368
HERRRRRRRRRRRRP

DERRRRRRPPPPPPPPPP


HERP DERP DERP DERP DERP


HERP DERP

HERPPPPPPPP

DERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPPPPPPP


WE DODN LOSTIN

Canadafag here, Living in British columbia where most of our power is hydroelectric. Only stupid environmentalists think dams are a bad idea. Hydro for areas with rivers, Solar for areas where there are rarely clouds and/or, tidal for areas with strong predictable tides to ahrness. Nuclear for everywhere else. The only real argument against nuclear is that in some places it would be more expensive than other kinds of clean power, such as tidal, hydro and solar, in aforementioned areas as examples.

>>9845368
meanwhile coal still has another 400 or so years in just the US supply, and that's what powers over half the grid anyway. The real problem facing US electricity is the age of all the existing plants. a large number of them are 50 plus years old.

>>9845400
> For some perspective, look at the hydrogen bomb. In order for a hydrogen weapon to detonate, a smaller fission warhead is detonated, causing the fusion warhead to implode and allow the hydrogen to fuse into Helium. The bomb is so powerful that is requires a nuclear fucking bomb to detonate it.

I'm not familiar with power generation, but I've studied weapons a bit and I'd just like to chime in to say that this is indeed the case and an interesting thing to consider on the matter.

>>9845389
It's not just shipping the cement. It's building the steel infrastructure. That alone takes a tremendous amount of fuel.

It's a lot more than you would realize. It's also absurdly expensive which makes it a not very attractive option for energy companies.

>>9845406
Get the fuck out of this thread, faggot. The rest of the brobots are trying to have a conversation here.

>>9845406
that's some serious herp-derping.

>>9845406
>HERRRRRRRRRRRRP
>DERRRRRRPPPPPPPPPP
>HERP DERP DERP DERP DERP
>HERP DERP
>HERPPPPPPPP
>DERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPPPPPPP


I'm sorry, I don't understand palin-american.

>"It's not economically viable"
>lrn 2 resources.
Just because it's expensive now doesn't mean it will never be cheaper than sucking more oil out.
>>9845233
If the Private Sector is irresponsible, then ALL private sector is irresponsible. How many deaths have happened in the US from nuclear power? And how many from coal power? You have to count the fuel cycle too!

Nuclear power companies already have to have shit-tons of money just sitting around just in case something goes wrong. Not that it really can, when you consider that a genIV reactor is as likely to go critical as wet paper is to suddenly burst into flame. Now, how responsible are oil companies? let's go with the power infrastructure that doesn't cause horrible lung diseases, widespread radioactive contamination, and environmental destruction.
>trollface.jpg

>>9845441
>>9845453
HUBBBA BUBBA DUBBA FLUBBA

HUBBBA BUBBA DUBBA FLUBBA

DUBBA FLUBBA HUBBBA BUBBA

HIUBBITY DIBBITY DLOOP BOOP DOOP HOOP BOOP BEEEP BLOOP BLEEP
PIVIOP

INTELLIGENCE ABOARD

>>9845455
One big disaster could kill millions. I think this is what he's getting at. Not that there will be melt downs every week.

>>9845400

You're retarded. a decade lifespan on commercial reactors? No, it takes a decade before they become cost effective, and the reason that is so is because of the environmentalist imposed bureaucratic hurdles they have to jump through. All of the nuclear plants in the US are 30+ years old.

>>9845455
A publicly traded company has two responsibilities:

1: make a profit
2: obey the laws wherever it does business

>>9845496
reactor != plant

organ != body

>>9845437
>It's also absurdly expensive
You've heard of Clean Coal and carbon sequestration. Wanna know how much such plants cost, per kWh, compared to nuclear? 80-120%. In order to make coal power plants NOT have immediate external costs, you have to spend shit-tons of money, as high as $5000 per kWh of production - just like nuclear. This doesn't clean up the fuel cycle.

Currently, coal power prices would have to double to cover their hidden costs of human illnesses, death, and direct environmental damage. This estimate doesn't count global warming damages, which are not actualized.

Just dropping by to tell you guys that nuclear power isn't cheap unless you are unresponsible with the wastes.

>>9845527
Energy companies don't care about the environment or their customers.

>>9845529
NukeDad chiming in, the containers can reach 7 digits each.

>>9845527
>This estimate doesn't count global warming damages, which are not real.


fixd bro

>>9845507

The reactor is almost as large as the plant itself retard. If you're talking about the fuel rods, retard, those get cycled and replaced every 10 to 20 years. you obviously know nothing about real world nuclear apllications.

>>9845553
Trolls will be ignored, stay on subject.

>>9845562
You didn't ignore it....so you got trolled. Faggot.

>>9845544
>I love t-shirts, especially ones with Argentines on them

>>9845400
>>9845429
I think it's fucking awesome that fusion is literally the sun in a goddamn box. It's so fucking cool.

>>9845597
WTF does this have to do with anything??

The amount of hostility, arrogance, and just plain childishness surrounding the issue makes it clear just Why We Can't Have Nice Things.

I'm not worried though; in another few decades these people will be bankrupt and powerless, the ones moving upward today will be the ones on top tomorrow.

>>9845616
>>9845616
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Che_Guevara

aka, guy sounds like a giant faggot hippie leftist piece of shit

The future is perpetual motion machines like the one those two guys made but I never heard anything about it since then. They probably got assassinated.

>>9844314
>implying we can't use breeder reactors which run on thorium, which is as common as lead.

>
Anyone technical would give you ideas as to how to manage said waste, the most prominent being incineration.

Go back to school and learn some chemistry. You cannot incinerate radioactive waste.

>>9845641
You honestly think BP gives two shits about the oil spill other than the fact that they are losing money? LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

>>9845691
Nice lols. This thread is going places.

>>9845691
Considering that the oil spill directly affects their company negatively in numerous ways, yes, I would say they do care.

>>9845652
lrn2entropy

wait 4 fusion

You >>9845708
must be this guy
>>9845562
why are you taking this thread so seriously? it's a bunch of jerkoffs who just graduated highschool pretending to understand the insanely complicated energy issue.

>>9845660

You realize waste isn't JUST depleted uranium right? There's plenty to be incinerated, thus making it more manageable. At least this is what my Pops says, who's not a smart ass fresh out of uni.

It's besides the point anyway, my point is, no one wants to refine the waste, there's a huge political sinkhole in the industry. Nothing gets done, everything's outdated. Money is being wasted on Super Compaction plants and there's no progression.

>>9844278

>>I know there has been a certain apprehension towards the prospect of mass numbers of Nuclear power plants

Don't worry, most of that owes to the fact that the generation before you lived through the cold war. Your generation has no such irrational fear of nuclear power.

The first wave of "nuclear renaissance" reactors were uranium based, but they were quickly overtaken by liquid fluoride thorium reactors. The reason nuclear dominated was not so much environmental concern as ease of automation. We also get quite a bit of power from the South American solar collector, endless rows of heliostats in the South American desert. We pipe water down to the heliostats, they send electricity back. The only maintinence required is mirror cleaning/replacement on account of sandstorms, they send out a cloud of small disposable drones to do that every three years or so.

>>9845544
>Energy companies don't care about the environment or their customers.
So make it worth their dime.

And you!
>>9845529
>nuclear power isn't cheap unless you are unresponsible with the wastes.
What do you think coal power companies do with THEIR waste? A town in Tennessee disappeared under a tidal wave of toxic sludge when an ash pond dam broke.

well op it really depends, nuclear energy right now is pretty inefficient so

All I know is that the current perception of Nuclear Power is completely wrong. It's actually probably the best energy source we can rely on other than fossil fuels. There's no danger of it exploding Chernobyl-style, that was due to crappy safety protocols, and the amount of nuclear waste produced is like a single truck load, per power station, per year.

And until we can fully rely on solar, wind, tidal, etc. or we can develop fusion (which is a working progress btw), it's a perfect substitute for fossil fuels.

>>9845845
>So make it worth their dime.

The ONLY way you're going to achieve that is through government regulations. Then business stagnates because of excessive regulations.

Personally I'd like to see a universal "you break it you buy it" rule making businesses 100% liable for any property damage or loss of income caused by their mistakes, but a republic can't make that happen thanks to the magic of lobbying.

>>9845881

We've got about a dozen polywell fusor plants. It's a boondoggle. They produce a healthy net positive of energy but require a complete rebuild every few years.

>>9845881

Sane people aren't worried about "another Chernobyl." There are plenty of other concerns, and long story short we're not going to see another batch of nuclear plants until these concerns are addressed in full. You'll know it has happened once you see the plants going up.

>>9845931

They're going up now.

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/feb/16/nation/la-na-obama-nuclear17-2010feb17

Since this legislation, twelve new reactors have broken ground.

>>9845931
And what are those concerns?

>>9845982
Just imagine if these little cunt hippy faggot leftist queers hadn't fucked over nuclear power back in the 60s and 70s. All the incentives to innovate, the advances in tech and processes. FUCK I HATE ENVIRONMENTALISM.

>>9845881
Here's the high-level view. Any large infrastructure project is expensive as hell. Coal power plants can be made cheaply, yay. But the cheaply built ones release huge amounts of various toxic things, and any coal plant anywhere will ship out trainloads of toxic ash, which is usually radioactive due to impurities common in coal worldwide. In order to make coal plants reduce this waste, you have to build them more expensively. Once you get to removal of most carbon dioxide, and filtering of most toxic chemicals at the stacks, coal power plant construction costs are comparable to nuclear power plant construction costs, per kWh. This means that a fairly-compared Coal vs. Nuclear plant has no cost difference.

Nuclear power plants are cheaper to run. We already discussed how making coal plants that aren't absolutely awful for everyone nearby (check health statistics lol) makes the initial investment equal. Due to fuel, repair, and maintenance costs, nuclear power is still cheaper that coal power. Most of the cost of coal is in the rock itself - as supplies dwindle, costs rise. Uranium is reasonably plentiful, especially as proven technologies become used in the US to recover fuel in waste - this also makes nuclear waste less harmful.

Coal power plants shit their waste across the countryside, and the ash requires bulk disposal. Now, we could chemically clean it, but that drives costs way the hell up. So don't say "Nuclear power is the only one that leaves harmful wastes that are tricky to deal with." That's ignorant.

ITT: people don't know about nuclear power. There's all this screaming about the waste, when we have things like breeder reactors and traveling wave reactors that make that completely irrelevant. The TWRs turn natural and depleted uranium into fissile fuel to be used wherever it's needed (thereby removing the problem of existing nuclear waste), and the breeder reactors don't have a significant fuel problem to begin with, so we're good once we migrate to them.

>>9846013
This. Good use for time traveling.
>>9845982
Hell yes. Power independent from Middle-East dictators, less environmental harm, and sweet-as-shit technology. Also, it'll hold us over until fusion works.

>>9846064
I dunno man...France has like 30% of all their power provided by nuclear tech, and they have all sorts of middle-east problems. fucking muslims ruining their 2000 year old culture and wtf, oh well.

>>9846098
France has other socioeconomic shit going on. They're a textbook post-industrial country with a dropping population. The rich established septuagenarians leave the young-uns up a tree, so they turn to extremism.

>>9845998
I'd call this just another boondoggle like the previous plants, but still I'm happy. We just plain need electricity, even if it means spending federal money on it. That said, the private sector still can't get it off the ground on its own strength because the minimum requirements (which are there for very good reason) are too big an obstacle to overcome. It's just a matter of time though; technology makes it easier as new developments come into the market.

>>9845982
Basically, cost. Building them is expensive, maintaining them is expensive, handling the waste is expensive, so on and so forth. The problem is this: if you expect it to be cost-effective, you're expecting it to be shoddily built and poorly managed. THAT is what everyone is afraid of, and it's a perfectly rational fear. The other solution is to just use taxes to pay for it, which is pretty much the solution we've chosen up to this point.

>>9846013
Environmentalism has nothing to do with it. If you screw up a coal plant it's an environmental concern, if you screw up a nuclear plant it's a world-class disaster that will be immortalized in history.

>>9846013

At the time, they were right. The technology wasn't ready.

Also, cool homophobia bro. What's it like being a terrible human being?

>>9846111
Well that's gotta suck. Fucking stability, how does it work?

>>9846046
>ITT: people don't know about nuclear power.

Namely, you.

> There's all this screaming about the waste

You can dismiss it once it stops happening. It is still happening, therefore you cannot dismiss it.

>>9846121
Ya know what, cunt-pickle? fuck you and your little red wagon.

The technology was fine, properly monitored and maintained--OH SHIT just like every other bit of technology not involving the word "nuclear".. You don't know what the fuck you're talking about.

>>9846046

I'm down with most of what you said, but breeder reactors are disastrous. Every one tried so far has been shut down. They are inherently unsafe as they're required to operate at a temperature many times what the containment materials can withstand in order to sustain the reaction. I read a really good paper on it a while back. Pebble Bed reactors have the same problems, too. Whatever we use, it won't be either of those.

>>9846146
> Ya know what, cunt-pickle? fuck you and your little red wagon.

You're such a philosopher.

>>9846146

I'm trying to reason with you, and you've immediately turned to insults.

Laying all the blame on environmentalists is ignorant when they're the primary force advancing nuclear power today. The leader of greenpeace actually quit because he was pro-nuclear and there was resistance to that view within greenpeace, but they've come around since his resignation. If all you can think of to complain about is that they didn't see things your way from the start, well, who put you in charge?

>>9846182
Wow, way to rationalize ignorance and fear-mongering.

environmentalists = Pat Robertson

>>9846120
>The other solution is to just use taxes to pay for it [Nuclear Power]
Coal subsidies. lol.

>>9846152
Well then, couldn't we just cycle fuel between regular reactors and TWRs, and produce it with the TWRs to prevent the waste from enriching it by normal methods?

ITT: seething angry little kids who claim to understand hard sciences.

Here's something to think about that hasn't really been discussed ITT: Fusion-based nuclear energy.

Current nuclear reactors run off of a process called nuclear fission: a nuclear reaction in which a single nucleus is broken into two different nuclei, creating two, smaller atoms/ions from one and releasing energy.

Fusion-based reactors, however, will run off of a process called nuclear fusion, in which two, smaller atoms/ions fuse together to form a new, singular atom/ion. This also produces tremendous amounts of energy.

Ultimately, fusion energy is significantly cleaner, more efficient, and produces FAR less radioactive waste. The technology isn't really economically feasible as of now, but should be coming online within the next ten years.

I personally think that fusion energy needs to be much more heavily invested in, with more time and money dedicated to research in this area, as well as educating people about the way it works.

Seriously, look it up. Fusion energy should be the definitive method of energy production in the future, at least, as long as some bureaucrat doesn't come along and fuck everything up.

tl;dr fusion energy is the way of the future, and needs to be invested in now.

>>9846230
>seething angry

Cool useless adjective, bro.

>>9846249
>tl;dr fusion energy is the way of the future, and needs to be invested in now.
No shit. But it's 25 years out, and our power infrastructure needs help.

>>9846249
> tl;dr fusion energy is the way of the future, and needs to be invested in now.

And that's pretty much why we don't have it, while pretty much the past 30 years have been promising it within a decade and fusion bombs have already been tested far earlier than that.

It's simple, money. Everyone wants someone to spend money, but nobody wants to spend their own.

>>9846256

Yeah, well that's the catch. Until then, I still support the use of modern nuclear energy. Putting up more nuclear reactors would create a helluva lot of jobs, reduce US dependency on foreign oil, and vastly improve the energy situation we currently find ourselves in.

Nuclear fusion by 2030 = frees up a huge chunk of the labor pool due to super efficient means of energy production to a level where it won't be a concern anymore.

Utopia isn't too far off.

>>9846249

I hate to tell you this, but you have about an 80 year wait before nuclear fusion matures to the point where it's used for grid power. And there are only a handful of polywell fusor plants in existence, because they're notoriously labor intensive to keep running. There's plentiful thorium and the massive solar collector arrays in the Sourth American and African deserts meet the world's needs many times over, research into fusion is really geared more towards the development of a propulsion system better than the nuclear lightbulb and pulse drives used on most ferries.

>>9846305
There is merit in building fission plants, but what you've said isn't really the case. Maintaining nuclear plants requires very large amounts of energy consumption; it is perfectly feasible on small scales but if you try to extend it outward then the needs scale along with it. Storing nuclear waste is very expensive business, and if demand were multiplied then it would become far more expensive.

Common sense: if any feasible solution were made of rainbows and unicorn farts, we'd already be exploiting it.

>>9846347
>making predictions 80 years out
>knowing the rapidly changing world we live in today, could be proven wrong tomorrow
>still being a pompous asshole

>>9846357

The new reactors that're planned store all of their own waste internally. As in, all of the waste they'll ever produce over their 60 year operational lifespan. When they're decomissioned they just fill up the lower levels with leaded concrete and demolish everything aboveground.

>>9846357

Perhaps I wasn't completely thorough in what I meant by my post. I certainly agree that reactors have their problems, I just think the benefits outweigh the costs.

>>9846376

I don't mean to come off as pompous. I apologize if I have. And they're not 'predictions', fusion was commercialized when I was still in formative ed.

ANON DELIVERS!!

<<-- 601301

>>9846432
There's a problem with that; there is a big difference between merely selling something and being able to conduct full-circle production and distribution on a net profit.

For a private entity to be fully capable on its own, a lot of things would need to happen.

1: in the next 10-20 years (who knows, it should have happened already) there will be some sort of publicly hyped breakthrough in which the 3/4 century of global cooperation bears fruit.

2: for another few decades after this point, fusion power will be going through its trials in a manner similar to new drugs seeking approval. It'll be a slow and frustrating process, but a necessary one.

3: once the trials will be completed, there will be a market race to build these plants. This will involve raising the money necessary to build (likely to be a very large amount) as well as taking measures to ensure profit from the investment.


This is what the journey will be; going from "it exists" to "we have it."

>>9846347

I disagree with the 80 year figure. In regards to the handful of reactors you mention, its all because the technology is still in its developmental phase. Vast improvements have been made in this area in recent years, however, and the technology is becoming more feasible every day.

And fusion energy is very well suited to powering the grid. It works independently of environmental conditions, and produces massive amounts of energy.

I'm not sure whether you're aware of the difference between energy and electricity.

sure

<<--- 7304304

>>9846555

Wait, are you posting via ETP? Those fusor plants weren't built until the early 2080s. Judging by the fact that you 'disagree' with the 80 year figure I'm going to guess you're posting from the 60s-70s. Am I warm?

>>9846614

lol ok i see what you did there

>>9846661

newfags don't know 'bout futurebro

>>9846555
The similarities are more important than the differences.

The reason for powering the electricity grid is to provide energy. If it can't be done at a sustainable long-term profit, a point it hasn't yet reached, then it is functionally useless as a primary power source. That's why we still burn coal over a hundred years later.

The proper baseline for this is whether it can be done without using government as a crutch. Here's why:

In order to truly be a source of energy, it has to "pay back" all of the energy that was invested into production. This means it needs to feed the workers, pay back the construction loans, sustain the maintenance costs, set itself up for decomissioning in however many years, AND sell energy to the public at a net profit after all these expenses are accounted for.

If it can't do all of this, then it's an energy sink rather than an energy source.

OP here.
I fucking swear, future guy must be myself from the future. Every time I make a thread, he is there. I'm starting not to buy the Alex Beyman bit.

Anyways, Beyman, are you still on Iron Hill? Are you being held captive? Is Adonis Okay?

I don't have time to stay and post in this thread sadly, as I work in the energy industry and have much knowledge about this topic. For thoes of you who don't know about the energy markets (at least the Northeast) here is a little bit of information as to why we will never know if the economics of nuclear work. The price that everybody in an area gets for the electricity they generate is the cost to generate the next MW of electricity. The units that set the price of electricity are natural gas (this is another whole discussion if you really want to have it,) When commodity prices are low, see today, nuclear does not make sense as the units that set the price do not set it at a high price. When commodity prices are high (see $12 natural gas) nuclear makes the most sense as near the lowest cost generation they get paid the same as expensive generation. The problem is we don't know where commodity prices will be over the next 40-60 years (life of the operating license.) When doing financial modeling you have to do it at today's prices and curves, but thoes really don't mean anything as they can be totally wrong (see 2008-2009 actuals vs projections from 2006.) The moral of the story is, we should probably invest in nuclear to diversify our fuel source to smooth out costs over the long run, but if we allow for non fixed price contracts from the general contractors then it isn't worth it.

>>9847080
Of course, that's just the thing.

Nuclear and everything else will become a better prospect over time for two reasons.

1: cost goes down
2: price goes up

When cost is greater than price, you lose money. The only reason to generate energy while losing money is to ensure the technology exists for tomorrow's sake; todays pioneers are a necessity to tomorrow's settlers.

this makes me rage so hard. my dad is a nuclear engineer, worked at TMI about a year before the meltdown. NOTHING FUCKING HAPPENED. it should have been a success story on how safe plants are, but idiot deushe bags fucked everything up.

>>9847189
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_mile_island

>The plant is best known for having been the site of the worst civilian nuclear accident in United States history

>BAWWWWW MY DAD FAILED HARD AND ENVIRONMENTALISTS FUCK MY ASS OVER IT

>>9846880
Coal subsidies. Why so ignorant?

I didn't read the entire thread, only because there are so many posts, so I apologize ahead of time if there was already a post made similar to this one.

Essentially, the main reason that America has not developed it's nuclear capabilities for energy purposes is due to poor reception from the media, which reflects back on the general public. You ask any one on the street what they would think if a nuclear power planet was implemented in their state, and more than likely you'll ge an answer of "No, I wouldn't want that", when cited for reasons as to why, they would reel off bullshit, such as "mutations", "cancer", "melt down", etc, etc.

This is due to as I had previously stated, poor reception within the media. Not just the news, but movies and tv shows. How many of those have we had where there is some type of nuclear force involved, normally related to a reactor, and mutations come into place that end up causing some horrible shit to go down?

Look at France how ever, who is almost entirely all nuclear power plant based (They have solar panels and wind turbines as well). They do not have this reception. Why? Because any one can go to a nuclear power plant there, take a guided tour, and get the ins and outs of how safe it is.

When our fossil fuels burn up, and we are left with nothing else America is going to be absolutely fucked. Other countries who have adopted using nuclear reactors as their main source of power will be doing balls-amazing at that point.

So then I am bumping in order to raise this thread for future reading and things. You could call it an age.

>>9846969

Yeah Adonis is fine, but cranky because he has ugly plastic loaner legs for the time being.

I'm still stationed in Iron Hill, and slowly getting used to the constant smell of BO. Two hundred guys, crammed into the same few decks, for weeks at a time... D:

Sorry I haven't been on as much lately, they keep me very very busy, and ETP is pretty popular with the other guys since we're not allowed to get out much while stopped except to help recover drones and stuff. As a consequence it's more heavily monitored here than I'm used to, so I'm sorta walking on eggshells.

We are bumpinh yhis apone mrore time

Does it not strike you guys that doing something with a potential for catastrophic failure is not necessarily a good idea? Chernobyl might be an outlier, but you still can't live there.

>>9844917
>>9844750

>people who think we'll just up and run out of oil.

Not these fucking retards again. Peak oil implies a decrease until oil is no longer economically viable and other sources become cheaper. It doesn't imply that oil will just fucking run out and we'll all be fucked and killing each other.