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The irrational fear of nuclear power (Page 2)
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turtle777  (op)
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Mar 16, 2011, 01:20 PM
 
Well, yeah, that's hardly surprising.

-t
     
Athens
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Mar 16, 2011, 01:46 PM
 
What should be learned in this event is that one set of backup generators need to be houses in a quake/plane/bomb and Tsunami proof building.

Additional quick hookups installed at all power plants with a landing pad. Every country that operates Nuclear Power plants must have a standby team 24/7 that can fly out generators to problem plants which is what the landing pad and quick hookups are for.

Thats about it really. Overall im still impressed that the reactors are still intact. I mean the absolute worst was thrown at these plants and they survived. Goes to prove the design was pretty good 40 years ago. New plants have passive cooling systems which negate the need for generators.
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The Final Dakar
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Mar 16, 2011, 01:47 PM
 
Originally Posted by Athens View Post
What should be learned in this event is that one set of backup generators need to be houses in a quake/plane/bomb and Tsunami proof building.
Preferably made of adamantium.
     
Athens
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Mar 16, 2011, 01:48 PM
 
Is that the Material they use now for the Core?
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subego
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Mar 16, 2011, 02:32 PM
 
Originally Posted by Athens View Post
What should be learned in this event is that one set of backup generators need to be houses in a quake/plane/bomb and Tsunami proof building.
Combined generator arms.

One on stilts for a tsunami, one in a bunker for bombs, one that floats in the air for earthquakes...
     
ghporter
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Mar 16, 2011, 09:29 PM
 
Originally Posted by ShortcutToMoncton View Post
Uhh, what? Might want to read up on uranium mining....
In the US, Canada and Australia, just to name a few countries, is conducted with high levels of scrutiny for all types of safety. Radiation exposure is an extremely highly overseen issue, and since the value of the ores extracted (often including gold and silver, especially in Australia) are so high, it's in the operators' best interest to not let cave-ins happen. Contrast that to coal mines; they experience cave-ins regularly, oversight into exposure to toxic dust and gasses is dodged or poorly policed, and of course they explode and burn. While some countries may use less highly supervised methods to extract uranium, those countries also don't monitor other mines very well. So "apples to apples," uranium mining in the US, Canada and Australia is safer by a couple orders of magnitude than coal mining. I am, however, open to learning about poor safety in uranium mining elsewhere. Obviously many nations don't focus as much on individual safety as the three I mentioned... By the way, Australia is the third largest exporter of uranium ore, behind Canada and Khazakhstan (which only overtook Canada in 2009).

Originally Posted by turtle777 View Post
Not in the US, because there are no Uranium mines
(I just made that up)
-t
Oh really? Mining of uranium pretty much stopped in the US in 1992, but it's been restarted in 3 states since 2003. There had been mines in at least a dozen states in 1992, when economics, not safety, led to their closure.

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subego
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Mar 16, 2011, 11:02 PM
 
It looks like you can get about 10 pounds of Yellowcake for the same price as an ounce of good pot.

     
ebuddy
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Mar 17, 2011, 06:33 AM
 
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
Preferably made of adamantium.
Adamantium - Friend or Foe
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olePigeon
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Mar 17, 2011, 12:35 PM
 
Some larger telescopes are mounted on a ball bearing foundation that minimizes seismic vibrations, the same concept is being applied to buildings. There are a few companies exploring ball bearing foundations for commercial buildings. Seems like that would be a good idea for a nuclear power plant.
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subego
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Mar 17, 2011, 12:49 PM
 
Originally Posted by olePigeon View Post
Some larger telescopes are mounted on a ball bearing foundation that minimizes seismic vibrations, the same concept is being applied to buildings. There are a few companies exploring ball bearing foundations for commercial buildings. Seems like that would be a good idea for a nuclear power plant.
As an aside, just yesterday I read about someone developing car mountable versions of this.
     
turtle777  (op)
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Mar 17, 2011, 12:52 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
As an aside, just yesterday I read about someone developing car mountable versions of this.
Car-mountable nuclear power plant ? My likey

-t
     
subego
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Mar 17, 2011, 01:56 PM
 
http://forums.macnn.com/95/political...ve-fuels-rant/

An oldie but goodie. The nuclear car was apparently "very far along" back in 2007.
     
turtle777  (op)
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Mar 17, 2011, 02:08 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
http://forums.macnn.com/95/political...ve-fuels-rant/

An oldie but goodie. The nuclear car was apparently "very far along" back in 2007.
I LOVE Doofy's post on Sep 14, 2007, 11:12 AM :

If oil were going to go away within the next 50 years, right now the price would be doubling at least once a year.
We are actually NOT that far away from that.
Oil was in the range of $ $20 / barrel between 1984 and 2002.
A significant upturn happened in the last 8 years.

It's not quite doubling, but definitely a sign of tighter supply.

-t
     
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Mar 19, 2011, 02:28 PM
 
Being in debt and celebrating a lower deficit is like being on a diet and celebrating the fact you gained two pounds this week instead of five.
     
Athens
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Mar 20, 2011, 05:10 PM
 
If the numbers are correct and I dont have any reason to suspect otherwise this really puts things in perspective

Japan Reluctant To Disclose Drone Footage of Fukushima Plant - Slashdot
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andi*pandi
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Mar 20, 2011, 06:55 PM
 
Yes but candles don't cause cancer and three-eyed fish children. I'd say more people are scared of mutation and cancer than immediate death.

I'm also a little leary of data that says not one single person in the US has died due to nuclear plants... How do you prove what gave you cancer?
     
smacintush
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Mar 21, 2011, 12:53 AM
 
Originally Posted by andi*pandi View Post
Yes but candles don't cause cancer and three-eyed fish children. I'd say more people are scared of mutation and cancer than immediate death.

I'm also a little leary of data that says not one single person in the US has died due to nuclear plants... How do you prove what gave you cancer?
I'm certainly not an expert, but off the top of my head I would say that a correlation between a person's or many people's cancer and a level of dangerous radiation would have to be made. These things are monitored, studied and controlled heavily.
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subego
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Mar 21, 2011, 01:26 AM
 
Originally Posted by smacintush View Post
I'm certainly not an expert, but off the top of my head I would say that a correlation between a person's or many people's cancer and a level of dangerous radiation would have to be made. These things are monitored, studied and controlled heavily.
I think you are correct, but there's some semantic bullshit going on in the article. They're talking about injuries. I don't see getting cancer after you retire being counted as an "injury".
     
Athens
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Mar 21, 2011, 04:24 AM
 
http://xkcd.com/radiation/

This should put things in perspective. ITs always easier when its a graphical representation.
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subego
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Mar 21, 2011, 05:39 AM
 
     
ghporter
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Mar 21, 2011, 06:39 AM
 
I finally looked up what a "sievert" is, and how it relates to the units I've grown up with, "rems".

1 rem = 0.01 Sv = 10 mSv

Having worked with non-ionizing radiation all my life, and with a variety of devices that can produce ionizing radiation (high power vacuum tubes, for example), I have gotten accustomed to "exposure limits" in daily life. The XKCD chart is quite illuminating-especially the tiny little empty blue square about "cell phone exposure."

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olePigeon
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Mar 21, 2011, 11:17 AM
 
Originally Posted by andi*pandi View Post
I'm also a little leary of data that says not one single person in the US has died due to nuclear plants... How do you prove what gave you cancer?
Very extensive studies are done over several generations of families to test for cancer levels. It has been determined to a reasonable degree of certainty that no one has developed cancer or died as the result of a nuclear power plant.

Over 300 people have died in the last 10 years in the U.S. alone in coal mining accidents. Unfortunately, over 50,000 workers died in China in coal mining accidents over the past 10 years. The U.S. seems to have relatively safe mining conditions compared to many other countries.
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Mar 21, 2011, 12:28 PM
 
Originally Posted by ghporter View Post
Fail-safe design is typically expected to be "five nines" effective (99.999%). What are the chances of a 9.0 earthquake with multiple 7 and 6 magnitude aftershocks AND a ten meter tsunami surge at the same plant? Much lower than that 0.001% the designers missed.
They are actually much higher than you think: your estimate is a little too simple since these events are not unrelated. Put into mathematical terms, they are highly correlated, i. e. it is to be expected that there are strong after `shocks' after an earth quake. And since tsunamis are caused by earth quakes, there is also a strong correlation between the two. Hence, you cannot just multiply probabilities of each event happening, you can only do that if these events are independent.

The second mistake you make in your analysis is that you think in terms of probabilities when what matters is the expectation value: here, you take into account how often you actually sample. Think of accidents per driven kilometer: assuming two drivers have the same probability to be involved in an accident, but one of them drives twice as much, he'll have an accident with twice the probability.

A very strong earth quake in Japan happens once every 100 years or so (that's the number I have memorized; as a matter of fact, the Japanese were waiting for it already). So even if the probability of such a strong earth quake is low, experiencing one during a life time is very probable.
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finboy
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Mar 21, 2011, 05:18 PM
 
Originally Posted by olePigeon View Post
It took an 8.9 earthquake (with successive 7+ and 6+ quakes and aftershocks) and a tsunami to only turn off the power on a nuclear plant built with 50-year-old technology. Imagine if a plant was built using modern techniques and safety protocols?

It is still one of the safest and cleanest sources of energy that we currently utilize. Modern plants are even 100% recyclable. If the U.S. would actually support nuclear energy and update our power plants, we could recycle our spent fuel rods instead of burying them.
Yup.

The main problem with the Japanese plant is that the folks running it LACKED IMAGINATION.

Just like the people who built the levies in New Orleans.

Without more nuclear plants, this country is screwed. But it will certainly make for good media fodder.

OreoCookie: Your point about correlation is right on, and you're also right that the Japanese designers should have anticipated this, ESPECIALLY given the (largely irrational) fear of radiation that they have over there. (I understand why they have it, but they seem to place a special significance on it vis a vis so many other things that are more likely, such as tsunamis.)
( Last edited by finboy; Mar 21, 2011 at 05:52 PM. )
     
ghporter
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Mar 21, 2011, 07:56 PM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
They are actually much higher than you think: your estimate is a little too simple since these events are not unrelated. Put into mathematical terms, they are highly correlated, i. e. it is to be expected that there are strong after `shocks' after an earth quake. And since tsunamis are caused by earth quakes, there is also a strong correlation between the two. Hence, you cannot just multiply probabilities of each event happening, you can only do that if these events are independent.

The second mistake you make in your analysis is that you think in terms of probabilities when what matters is the expectation value: here, you take into account how often you actually sample. Think of accidents per driven kilometer: assuming two drivers have the same probability to be involved in an accident, but one of them drives twice as much, he'll have an accident with twice the probability.

A very strong earth quake in Japan happens once every 100 years or so (that's the number I have memorized; as a matter of fact, the Japanese were waiting for it already). So even if the probability of such a strong earth quake is low, experiencing one during a life time is very probable.
In my "brief" post, I was focusing not just on a huge quake with a massive tsunami, but one centered immediately off the coast aligned with the particular spot where the plant is located. Surely the expectation value for that event at that particular spot is particularly low.

Overall, for even a northern island, the expectation of a strong earthquake and even one that drives a large tsunami would be pretty high, but for one located so that the tsunami could do maximum damage to the backup power system as it was installed would have to be very, very low.

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Mar 22, 2011, 04:39 AM
 
I think the only mistake made with current designs is the fact the cooling systems are not as well protected as the reactor itself. The dome and reactors can take a direct plane hit and so forth but not the generators. If anything was learned from this a cooling system and its generator must be protected like the core itself.
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