190
Germany phased out nuclear instead of coal and now still relies on fossil fuels for electricity (lemmy.world)
submitted 2 days ago by to c/dataisbeautiful@lemmy.world
51 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] 5 points 1 day ago (4 children)

It’s ironic, how quickly three mile island, Chernobyl and Fukushima are struck from collective memory. I’m pretty relaxed about nuclear energy though: I will probably be dead and buried by the time these reactors would go life. And young men now have the right to repeat their grandfathers’ mistakes, it’s their world, and their taxmoney. That doesn’t mean I won’t join the protests, should a reactor be planned within 300 miles from my home, but I would protest in a relaxed sort of way, can of beer, chitchat, veggie hotdogs, catching a bit of sun.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • hideshow 4 child comments
    •
  • [–] 5 points 1 day ago (3 children)

    3 Mile Island was an overblown media sensation. Chernobyl was a poorly designed and poorly maintained facility doing a live stress controlled by complete morons that literally could not have happened in the next generation reactor design. Fukushima took a literal force of nature to cause an issue and even then it was originally designed to handle it but cost cutting during construction moved the backup power source too close to the water.

    Meanwhile the current generation reactors, even discounting SMR, are designed to make those failure modes physically impossible. The ultra-modern SMR designs are already producing commercial power in China with North America following suit in the next 36 months or so.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
    •
  • [–] 4 points 1 day ago (2 children)

    but cost cutting during construction

    Welcome to the best reason to avoid nuclear. People will always cut costs.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
    •
  • [–] 2 points 23 hours ago (1 child)

    Yeah, this is the factor that has me more negative on nuclear power than positive, even though I believe it can be one of the safest ways to generate a lot of power, that depends on people not cutting corners.

    They are also a pretty big liability during military conflicts, especially if it's with a far away enemy that isn't worried about the local fallout from a strike.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
    •
  • [–] 5 points 23 hours ago

    Mining and concentration are a big problem too. In situ mining with acid threatens ground water, and everywhere material is mined and stored they are under the threat of either bad actors, or foreign government/corporate intervention.

  • permalink
  • fedilink
  • source
  • parent
    • load more comments (-1 replies)