Nuclear power, yey or ney?

[Bon]

I doubt anyone on here doesn't know of the tragedy in Japan, and the resulting problems going on in the nuclear plants they have.

Nuclear power has long been a hot topic of debate, people for or against for a whole host of reasons. Chernobyl and 3 mile island being 2 disasters that help to back up the anti-nuclear protestors, but how do you think that the disaster in Japan will swing that debate?

Further to that, how will the result of this ongoing disaster effect them? With oil gas and coal reserves running out, and renewable sources being too limited to provide all the power we will need in the future, should we embrace nuclear power here in the UK as the answer?

 

[cowface]

destroy the earth by mining it, or possibly destroy the earth by nuclear meltdown.

either way, we are still f*cked in the long run.

 

[WihGlah]

As long as you are not a couple hundred miles from the confluence of three major fault lines - I say Yey.


also -according to wikipedia, a 9.0 on the richter scale is equivalent to a 474 Megaton blast. It's gonna mess your **** up.

 

[Liam92]

since all our finite resources go up in price the less of it there is, i dont see companies willing to pretty much disband and miss out on the biggest slice of the cake just because we're about to blow the planet up no idea what the stats are but i'd imagine compared to the money being made from the oil/coal/gas industries there is very little of that being relatively invested into renewable energy sources. from that it looks like the next best thing has to be nuclear power only because we can get a huge amount of energy from a very small amount of materials.

too bad we need to worry about getting rid of nuclear waste which takes 100's of years to stabilize and that distinct possibility of ruining thousands of lives and further generations to come in the event of 1 meltdown.

in a perfect world we would be running every lightbulb from a wind turbine somewhere but between greed and the 'easy way out' going hand in hand, using nuclear and coal for power is going to be the way things go until its too late to do anything in my opinion.

 

[Return of the Silver Fox]

Nuclear will remain a viable option based on gas and oil prices and the inability of wind and wave to meet base load.

The reactors currently suffering problems in Japan are almost 40 years old and rely on the coolent to protect the rods. This has little resemblance to modern reactor design which are passively safe.

Problem we currently face is that the UKs reactors are mostly due to be decommisioned and the option to extend their life is limited as the fuel is no longer being made. Lengthy discussions about whether to build will inevitably lead to power shortages within the next decade.

 

[DJForbes]

ill tell you what i want.
cheeper energy. all these safe and renewable energy is more expensive than nuclear. all those farmers with wind turbins in there feilds are driving prices up not to mention looks stupid.

id much rather have nuclear which as i understand it is cheeper and greener than all other forms of power plants and risk that tiny chance of a melt down.

 

[Cook$]

You know, I've never seen the point of wind farms. We've got enough wind as it is.

 

[Bon]

Nuclear will remain a viable option based on gas and oil prices and the inability of wind and wave to meet base load.

The reactors currently suffering problems in Japan are almost 40 years old and rely on the coolent to protect the rods. This has little resemblance to modern reactor design which are passively safe.

Problem we currently face is that the UKs reactors are mostly due to be decommisioned and the option to extend their life is limited as the fuel is no longer being made. Lengthy discussions about whether to build will inevitably lead to power shortages within the next decade.

Current fuel rods only use around 10% of their energy before being replaced. Thats 90% of the energy being wasted because current reactors become un-economical to run after this point.

If we were to invest in integral fast reactors opposed to conventional reactors we have enough current "waste" fuel already to last us 2000 years worth of production. The integral reactors use nearly everything from almost any radioactive source and what they put out that can't be used has around a 300 year decay (much less than the current 1000's of years).

 

[sundance1968]

i'm sure ive heard that there is now the technology to catch the emissions from burning coal and prevent those emissions going into the o zone and then be safely disposed of ?

why not get that industry going and create jobs we sure as hell need some industry in the uk

 

[Rat]

You know, I've never seen the point of wind farms. We've got enough wind as it is.

I assumed it was for harvesting peoples farts? Quite a few people out there seem to be able to let one off with enough energy to power a small city!!