The Green New Deal

#256
#256
Stew Cook said:
I'm not too keen on nuclear power, considering the potential for rendering vast areas of the nation uninhabitable, following some unforseen but inevitable natural disaster.

Maybe these potential problems have been solved?
Click to expand...

I was at Three Mile Island for a couple of weeks after the accident. Twelve to fourteen hours a day in a building level below the control room and as I recall the same level as one of the containment building main hatches. This was the "Cable Spreading Room" - where cables from containment instrumentation were routed to processing equipment. I was back several times over the summer. I'm 72 now with no effects from the accident. The most amazing part of the whole episode was hearing the news while I was trying to wake up and get ready to go back to the plant. The news had almost no basis in fact. It isn't just a matter of "journalists" not reporting accurately; most are just too damn stupid to understand what they are told and are too much attention seekers.

I've had more radiation exposure in normally operating BWRs (always below acceptable limits) than in that broken PWR. Fukushima was a BWR ... not one of GE's better ideas. Problems were discovered and addressed; a whole series of mods based on lessons learned came from TMI. One had to do with hydrogen ignitors to burn off hydrogen generated under accident conditions before the hydrogen reaches disastrous levels. Fukushima could have benefited from that, but BWR manufacturers (particularly GE) have almost always resisted mods related to PWR incidents. I think it's part stubbornness and part an attempt to portray BWRs as better than PWRs. But even with that in mind, nuclear power is far cleaner than most other power generation. Like in so many other businesses, the biggest problem is one of getting management to listen to engineers or doctors or nurses or any other number of professionals who are closer to and far more understanding of what goes on and what needs to be addressed.
 
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#260
#260
My surviving little brother graduated with a nuke eng. Degree from ncstate. There was a bidding war between duke power and pnc to hire him when he graduated at 22...ended up at close to 100k a year when the free up front relocation money was counted. He worked for them a couple years then went to work for a company in Seattle that sends engineers like him all over the globe to natural gas facilities, nuke, coal, all kinds. He travels the world going to things like carnivale in brazil and makes double overtime after 8hrs. Hes close to 30 now, starting to think about settling down i think. I always told him to see the world and sow his oats in his 20s, then look to settle down. He has done just that, and made a ton of money, too...my other little brother that killed himself last year was his best friend, and really hit him hard. Life will either toughen you up, or kill you.
 
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#261
#261
AM64 said:
I was at Three Mile Island for a couple of weeks after the accident. Twelve to fourteen hours a day in a building level below the control room and as I recall the same level as one of the containment building main hatches. This was the "Cable Spreading Room" - where cables from containment instrumentation were routed to processing equipment. I was back several times over the summer. I'm 72 now with no effects from the accident. The most amazing part of the whole episode was hearing the news while I was trying to wake up and get ready to go back to the plant. The news had almost no basis in fact. It isn't just a matter of "journalists" not reporting accurately; most are just too damn stupid to understand what they are told and are too much attention seekers.

I've had more radiation exposure in normally operating BWRs (always below acceptable limits) than in that broken PWR. Fukushima was a BWR ... not one of GE's better ideas. Problems were discovered and addressed; a whole series of mods based on lessons learned came from TMI. One had to do with hydrogen ignitors to burn off hydrogen generated under accident conditions before the hydrogen reaches disastrous levels. Fukushima could have benefited from that, but BWR manufacturers (particularly GE) have almost always resisted mods related to PWR incidents. I think it's part stubbornness and part an attempt to portray BWRs as better than PWRs. But even with that in mind, nuclear power is far cleaner than most other power generation. Like in so many other businesses, the biggest problem is one of getting management to listen to engineers or doctors or nurses or any other number of professionals who are closer to and far more understanding of what goes on and what needs to be addressed.
Click to expand...

I have to imagine that the lessons learned from previous accidents/disasters have resulted in a safer industry. It's still gonna be a NIMBY type thing, which is where I'm at on the subject.

Of course there is always a worse case scenario where the experts might say, in hindsight, you just couldn't plan for. I'm talking about catastrophic level earthquakes, storms, sabatoge etc.. Maybe it would never happen, but I sincerely hope the 0.01% likely event actually has an effective contingency.

Clean energy, I suppose it's clean, in a really dirty clean kind of way. Surely advances in the science will get us to where need to be with nuclear energy. I really hope so.
 
#264
#264
Stew Cook said:
I have to imagine that the lessons learned from previous accidents/disasters have resulted in a safer industry. It's still gonna be a NIMBY type thing, which is where I'm at on the subject.

Of course there is always a worse case scenario where the experts might say, in hindsight, you just couldn't plan for. I'm talking about catastrophic level earthquakes, storms, sabatoge etc.. Maybe it would never happen, but I sincerely hope the 0.01% likely event actually has an effective contingency.
Click to expand...

What makes you think we don't plan for these things?

It's funny you say the 0.01% likely event--we have to provide preventative or mitigative measures for postulated accidents with high dose consequences unless they are expected to occur less frequently than one in a million years.
 
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#265
#265
Stew Cook said:
I have to imagine that the lessons learned from previous accidents/disasters have resulted in a safer industry. It's still gonna be a NIMBY type thing, which is where I'm at on the subject.

Of course there is always a worse case scenario where the experts might say, in hindsight, you just couldn't plan for. I'm talking about catastrophic level earthquakes, storms, sabatoge etc.. Maybe it would never happen, but I sincerely hope the 0.01% likely event actually has an effective contingency.

Clean energy, I suppose it's clean, in a really dirty clean kind of way. Surely advances in the science will get us to where need to be with nuclear energy. I really hope so.
Click to expand...
Put a wind farm on or near a fault and see how quickly a wind turbine will destroy itself with only a minor shake.
 
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#266
#266
Wafflestomper said:
What makes you think we don't plan for these things?

It's funny you say the 0.01% likely event--we have to provide preventative or mitigative measures for postulated accidents with high dose consequences unless they are expected to occur less frequently than one in a million years.
Click to expand...

If the standard is once in a million years, I feel pretty good about it.
 
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#267
#267
82_VOL_83 said:
Put a wind farm on or near a fault and see how quickly a wind turbine will destroy itself with only a minor shake.
Click to expand...
I don't doubt that. The blades might even destroy all kinds of stuff, but wouldn't do anything close to the potential nuclear plant damage.
 
#268
#268
Vol8188 said:
Do you have anything from a less biased source (the opening lines literally call politicians science deniers and talked about environment protections) that isn’t behind a pay wall?
Click to expand...
NRC: Spent Fuel Pools

What can happen with something that has a half life of over 159,000 years? More reactors=more spent fuel=more storage concerns.
 
#269
#269
Stew Cook said:
I'm not too keen on nuclear power, considering the potential for rendering vast areas of the nation uninhabitable, following some unforseen but inevitable natural disaster.

Maybe these potential problems have been solved?
Click to expand...

We've had it for over 60 years. Hasn't happened yet.
 
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#274
#274
Stew Cook said:
So, we are overdue? And to think I just put my Geiger counter away..
Click to expand...

One of the worst consequences of TMI was that nuclear plant construction virtually stopped. I haven't kept up with new developments since I retired several years ago, but even then the thing with nuclear power was PLEX - plant life extension; nuclear plants were licensed for thirty years of operation, and many of ours are well past that now. Tests and analysis showed continued operation to be safe, and the plants have been maintained, updated, and allowed to continue operation. However, you have to realize that we have much better monitoring and control technology, and newer plants would probably be a better way to go, but public perception (misguided by the press and anti-nuclear groups) has pretty well halted what could be a better path. The media I hold in complete contempt, some naysayers are just as guilty, but many are simply mislead.

We could certainly do better with spent fuel. Jimmy Carter ended hopes of reprocessing, and long term permanent storage sites have been stymied. The spent fuel storage at Fukushima was a travesty. Storage in those buildings should never have been allowed - simply not enough protection, and completely unable to deal with the hydrogen gas buildup and explosion once the stored fuel was damaged.
 
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