Has the Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster changed your mind?

[DarrinS]

It has totally changed my outlook. I'm moving the family to rural Pennsylvania, where we will live off the land, use horses for transportation, and raise barns.

[RandomGuy]

Cool, thx. What about Nat Gas?

We have gotten some new technologies and have gotten at a lot of natural gas deposits that were previously unaccessable.

Short-term boon and it will bring costs down.

Long-term it still faces similar depletion problems as coal/oil.

I think we will lean on gas as coal/oil gets more expensive, and gas becomes a bit more compe ive in terms of $/energy.

We will do to natural gas deposits what we did to oil. We will use up the stuff under us at a fast clip, then be forced to import more and more of it from the same people we buy a lot of oil from today.

Compared to renewables, it is, if I remember correctly, about on par for cost.

Remember that is isn't absolute costs that matter, but relative costs that determine the energy mix. As one cost increases, that shifts demand to other forms of energy.

With new technological advances, energy sources are going to become more and more interchangeable.

[ChumpDumper]

Seems to me the there is no subsidies for oil

[RandomGuy]

How do you expect a serious answer to a exaggerated question?

I stopped expecting honest reasonable answers from you a long time ago.

20,000 years is the length of time that the Chernobyl manager expects the area to be unfarmable.

It is not an exaggeration of a worst case scenario.

[LnGrrrR]

Safer?

How many people have died from nuclear incident from any reactor built in the 90's or later? Now consider these:

Yes, but when nuclear reactors blow up, the long-term effects are much more devastating. Kinda like the whole "terrorist" thing. After all, terrorist deaths are much less than other, more mundane causes, and yet a disproportionate amount of money is spend towards stopping those attacks.

"Boom or bust" philosophies apply.

[LnGrrrR]

It has totally changed my outlook. I'm moving the family to rural Pennsylvania, where we will live off the land, use horses for transportation, and raise barns.

You mean, you won't be living under that bridge anymore? I'm shocked.

[ChumpDumper]

It has totally changed my outlook. I'm moving the family to rural Pennsylvania, where we will live off the land, use horses for transportation, and raise barns.

There are nuclear power plants in rural Pennsylvania.

[RandomGuy]

You guys are determined to undermine capitalism. Let capital venturists decide when the time is right, instead of using it as another political football.

That's where good leadership rather than partisanship comes in. Teach the truth instead of lies in political discourse.

Puh-lease.

No nuclear plant has ever been built without often heavy, direct assistance from governments. None. You can't claim that is "capitalism".

The truth is that I am just no longer comfortable with the risk, and I know the truth.

The only thing I want is an "incubator" period, of some hefty direct subsidies for renewables. Let the competing technologies and companies hash it out, and then slowly phase them out.

At that time, the most economical, free-market favored companies and tech will have given us the answer.

It doesn't get more capitalistic than that.

[DarrinS]

You mean, you won't be living under that bridge anymore? I'm shocked.

I live in a van, down by the river.

[Wild Cobra]

I stopped expecting honest reasonable answers from you a long time ago.

20,000 years is the length of time that the Chernobyl manager expects the area to be unfarmable.

It is not an exaggeration of a worst case scenario.

I specified newer reactor designs?

Thanks for proving you lie about taking the high road when you always manipulate the intent of what others say.

[ChumpDumper]

So 2000 years?

[Wild Cobra]

Yes, but when nuclear reactors blow up, the long-term effects are much more devastating. Kinda like the whole "terrorist" thing. After all, terrorist deaths are much less than other, more mundane causes, and yet a disproportionate amount of money is spend towards stopping those attacks.

"Boom or bust" philosophies apply.

New designs will not blow up.

[Wild Cobra]

Puh-lease.

No nuclear plant has ever been built without often heavy, direct assistance from governments. None. You can't claim that is "capitalism".

The truth is that I am just no longer comfortable with the risk, and I know the truth.

The only thing I want is an "incubator" period, of some hefty direct subsidies for renewables. Let the competing technologies and companies hash it out, and then slowly phase them out.

At that time, the most economical, free-market favored companies and tech will have given us the answer.

It doesn't get more capitalistic than that.

Need for large scale power is different than need for unproductive power. To what extent nuclear plants were subsidized, if any, I don't know. They are at least productive compared to there political football renewables.

Have numbers for subsidies that do not include tax breaks? Link please.

[ChumpDumper]

To what extent nuclear plants were subsidized, if any

Have numbers for subsidies that do not include tax breaks? Link please.

[coyotes_geek]

Have numbers for subsidies that do not include tax breaks? Link please.

Follow link, scroll down to exhibit 28-16. $1.2 billion of subsidies to the nuclear industry in 2006, only 0.4% of that in the form of tax breaks.

http://www.window.state.tx.us/specia...index.php#nuke

[Agloco]

If a wind turbine falls over, will it irradiate an area for 20,000+ years?

I'm not certain where this 20k figure came from, are you talking about an area being inhabitable, or viable for food growth, or ?

[Wild Cobra]

Follow link, scroll down to exhibit 28-16. $1.2 billion of subsidies to the nuclear industry in 2006, only 0.4% of that in the form of tax breaks.

http://www.window.state.tx.us/specia...index.php#nuke

Most of that is research and development costs not needed, but are political bearing items.

How about numbers that apply to nuclear plants. Can they be built without subsidies? Don't you think the energy giants would if they could get past the legal impasses?

[RandomGuy]

I specified newer reactor designs?

Thanks for proving you lie about taking the high road when you always manipulate the intent of what others say.

I know you deliniated that, but the "worst case scenario" has not ever changed for nuclear power.

We have improved newer designs and Chernobyl was a bad design to begin with, but as CosmicCowboy pointed out, even the newer designs are not invincible. There is a possibility that the earthquake may have cracked those casings, and we are left with a possibility of a release similar in scale to Chernobyl if there is a serious meltdown that breaches it.

I do not intentionally mis-represent what others say, ever, but I sure as don't have to accept the underlying assumptions in what is said, as I don't here.

The newer designs, as seems evident in the list of nuclear accidents, still have not eliminated the human element, have they?

The best design in the world is still subject to human error, bad management, and corner-cutting. Imagined slights on my part will not change that.

[LnGrrrR]

I live in a van, down by the river.

Nice retort.

[LnGrrrR]

New designs will not blow up.

We hope. I don't think anyone sells their designs as "Almost totally guaranteed not to fail, we think". But that's probably more the truth.

[RandomGuy]

Most of that is research and development costs not needed, but are political bearing items.

How about numbers that apply to nuclear plants. Can they be built without subsidies? Don't you think the energy giants would if they could get past the legal impasses?

I honestly don't know how much cost those legal challenges add. Do you?

Are you trying to imply that if we just cleared the legal barriers, a magical nirvana of cheap nuclear power would ensue?

I think you vastly underestimate the engineering challenges and up-front costs.

Give me a decent starting figure in $$ for an installed Mwh in nuclear and we can get a good starting handle on the true compe iveness of nuclear, and try to isolate the legal costs.

And about those legal obstacles:

I don't see any way around them anyways. They are simply the cost of doing business for nuclear.

This is all why I was convinced it was simply uneconomical before.

Now, as I pointed out, it seems there is just more risk to nuclear plants than proponents are admitting to.

Please keep arguing. If Fukushima gets worse, your arguments about safety will hang around your neck, like all the other albatrosses you carry.

[MannyIsGod]

No. The Power Plant situation has fully confirmed my opinion that Wild Cobra is one of the dumbest mother ers around. There must have been a nuclear meltdown within his dome because I'm positive there is not a single living cell within it.

[RandomGuy]

New designs will not blow up.

Bull .

Link to any nuclear engineer saying that?

I seriously don't think you can find one, cool-aid boy.

I double-dog dare you.

TRIPLE-DOG dare you.

[RandomGuy]

[ChumpDumper]

How about numbers that apply to nuclear plants. Can they be built without subsidies? Don't you think the energy giants would if they could get past the legal impasses?

Why would they turn down free money?