£20bn To Fix Problems With 143 EU Nuclear Power Plants

 

"Hundreds of problems have been found at European nuclear plants that would cost 25bn euros (£20bn) to fix, says a leaked draft report."

 

"The report, commissioned after Japan's Fukushima nuclear disaster, aimed to see how Europe's nuclear power stations would cope during extreme emergencies."

 

"The final report is to be published on Thursday. The draft says nearly all the EU's 143 nuclear plants need improving."

 

"Anti-nuclear groups say the report's warnings do not go far enough."

 

"For its part, the regulatory body for European nuclear safety has urged the Commission not to use language that could undermine public confidence, says the BBC's Chris Morris in Brussels."

 

 

read http://www.bbc.co.uk...europe-19804817

for its part, watmm has urged troon not to use reactionary language, thread titles, or bolding to undermine public confidence.

 

nuclear power remains the safest source of power that mankind has ever discovered. the reason people are freaked out about it is because when the rare accidents occur, they tend to be big. compare deaths from driving cars (i do acknowledge that troon would much prefer that we all drove vehicles powered by either farts or our own sense of smugness) to deaths from air crashes. whilst plane crashes tend to be far, far fewer, they tend to kill a lot more people.

 

thorium reactors are the future.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium_fuel_cycle

fusion is still so far away it's not really worth talking about.

 

  On 10/3/2012 at 5:24 AM, Redruth said:

"For its part, the regulatory body for European nuclear safety has urged the Commission not to use language that could undermine public confidence, says the BBC's Chris Morris in Brussels."

 

also this is pretty hilarious considering the name.

Edited October 3, 2012 by kaini

the waste and toxicity issues throughout the world. the hundreds of thousands (millions) of deaths that have been attributed to nuclear energy and its byproducts. the hundreds of thousands of employees who have been or are being subtly and not so subtly effected. the inhabitancy in surrounding areas where power stations exist and the proven, toxic (disease) impact on these innocent people. the thousands of stations around the world that sit, in waiting, as potential ticking time bombs for human error, mechanical error as well as the potential war-time attack or terrorist attack, or natural disasters like fukushima etc etc etc etc etc..

 

"nuclear power remains the safest source of power that mankind has ever discovered"

citations needed. as the person who started the thread the burden of proof is on you.

 

let me demonstrate.

 

leading experts have shown that watching spongebob squarepants gives you cancer.

 

i've just said something fucking ridiculous and clearly untrue there. if i want to back that up, it's my responsibility to show where and how these 'leading experts' demonstrate that watching spongebob squarepants gives you cancer. otherwise my claim is laughable and any right-minded person would ignore it.

Edited October 3, 2012 by kaini

pfft

unless you are able to argue your point in a logical way without resorting to 'pffft' or your standard hippy bullshit, don't expect people to take you seriously.

It's not hippy to dislike nuclear power plants. It's perfectly logical.

low-probability, high risk.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf06.html

 

modern nuclear plants are so unlikely to fail that you'd probably have to live on top of a stack to garner the same risks to health as you do by living within 20km of a coal power station during your lifetime. the reactors that have failed were all old, poorly designed, or overwhelmed by circumstances the designers never saw (which they should have, i agree) or a combination thereof.

 

like i said, it's the difference between flying and driving. and even more than that, it's the difference between flying in something designed by the wright brothers and an airbus, if you're talking purely about nuclear power plants themselves.

Edited October 3, 2012 by kaini

  On 10/3/2012 at 6:38 AM, kaini said:

i've just said something fucking ridiculous and clearly untrue there. if i want to back that up, it's my responsibility to show where and how these 'leading experts' demonstrate that watching spongebob squarepants gives you cancer. otherwise my claim is laughable and any right-minded person would ignore it.

 

if you were an elected official, kardashian, or megachurch pastor who tweeted that 'spongebodsquarepants gives you cancer' would be the talk of network morning shows, The View, cable news discussions, and - if there's a highbrow spin to make of it - a NPR all things considered blurb

I essentially with kaini on this one - beyond coal there's the dangers of offshore drilling and yet the rate and frequency of that method in context makes one how catastrophes like the BP spill don't occur more often. In the US, fracking has become a major source of energy seemingly overnight and yet it poses an array of potential pollutants - greenhouse gases, radioactive byproducts, natural gas itself, and chemicals used in extraction - all of which could easily contaminate communities, water supplies, air quality in populated areas, etc. And yet the US hasn't completed and opened a new nuclear plant since 1974 and many political and industrial leaders continue to lobby against public funds from any form of green energy or cleaner energy methods. Currently the GOP has fired up a movement that demonizes anyone who raises issues with drilling oil and extracting natural gas from ANYWHERE in the country.

 

So I guess what I'm saying is the title "£20bn To Fix Problems With 143 EU Nuclear Power Plants" neither shocks nor alarms me in and of itself. With the economic meltdown in context it's a concern, but that amount of money is a drop in the bucket compared to other government and corporate spending (needless corrupt military contracts, subsidized sports stadiums, major entertainment events, etc) especially when in this case it will be used to protect the public and environment with preventive maintenance.

  On 10/3/2012 at 6:55 AM, delet... said:

It's not hippy to dislike nuclear power plants. It's perfectly logical.

 

If it's logical, it should be easy to explain the disadvantages of nuclear compared with coal, natural gas, and other common forms of power generating sources.

 

also, can you get cancer from spongebob squarepants toys? I'm really worried now.

  On 10/3/2012 at 5:43 AM, kaini said:

nuclear power remains the safest source of power that mankind has ever discovered.

 

+1000000

 

  On 10/3/2012 at 6:35 AM, Redruth said:

the waste and toxicity issues throughout the world. the hundreds of thousands (millions) of deaths that have been attributed to nuclear energy and its byproducts. the hundreds of thousands of employees who have been or are being subtly and not so subtly effected. the inhabitancy in surrounding areas where power stations exist and the proven, toxic (disease) impact on these innocent people. the thousands of stations around the world that sit, in waiting, as potential ticking time bombs for human error, mechanical error as well as the potential war-time attack or terrorist attack, or natural disasters like fukushima etc etc etc etc etc..

 

This is a very naive view. For starters, here's an interesting article on the reality of Fukushima by a renowned Berkeley physicist: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444772404577589270444059332.html

nuclear power using fission is inherently dangerous, and produces toxic waste that nobody knows what to do with except bury it underground and hope nobody digs it up for ten thousand years - this much is fact. unfortunately we have very few other viable options that can deliver the energy we need for the price and timescale we need. so basically, we're fucked. but there's nothing new about that - we've been fucked for years.

The hysteria surrounding nuclear power is ridiculous. Considering that Fukushima was hit by the worst earthquake and tsunami in a century it did remarkably well, for being over 40 years old. And the reason why most plants are old is because no real progress has been done to improve them since Chernobyl, because nuclear power is bad and dangerous. And it's very easy to scaremonger the public about nuclear power when very few know anything about how it works and what radioactivity is. All they know is that radioactivity is invisible, tasteless and gives you cancer and babies with two heads and four arms and that it comes from nuclear plants. Nevermind the fact that coal plants spew it out far more than a nuclear plant.

  On 10/3/2012 at 7:25 AM, joshuatx said:

So I guess what I'm saying is the title "£20bn To Fix Problems With 143 EU Nuclear Power Plants" neither shocks nor alarms me in and of itself.

 

Yeah, I work for one Oil Major (Boo, Hiss) we spend close to that on normal wear and tear / planned maintenance annually. Looks great in a headline but its f-all spread accross 143 major installations like a power plant. I'm glad they've looked at it after the disaster, but its hardly a shock you need to invest in the upkeep of assets...

Edited October 3, 2012 by Malkmus

Yep, another nuclear fan here. I'm not even worried about the radiation leakage issue. Fact is, only humans are scared of radiation, animals just keep going about their business. Hence why Chernobyl has basically become a nature preserve. I like the fact that worst case scenario, we create an unintentional future nature preserve.

Edited October 3, 2012 by lumpenprol

  On 10/3/2012 at 2:37 PM, lumpenprol said:

Yep, another nuclear fan here. I'm not even worried about the radiation leakage issue. Fact is, only humans are scared of radiation, animals just keep going about their business. Hence why Chernobyl has basically become a nature preserve. I like the fact that worst case scenario, we create an unintentional future nature preserve.

 

not entirely true. research has shown that there are less mammals in highly contaminated areas.

Professor Tim Mousseau

 

"In the highly contaminated areas, we see fewer than half as many species as there are in the cleaner parts of the zone."

 

  On 10/3/2012 at 3:46 PM, keltoi said:

  On 10/3/2012 at 2:37 PM, lumpenprol said:

Yep, another nuclear fan here. I'm not even worried about the radiation leakage issue. Fact is, only humans are scared of radiation, animals just keep going about their business. Hence why Chernobyl has basically become a nature preserve. I like the fact that worst case scenario, we create an unintentional future nature preserve.

 

not entirely true. research has shown that there are less mammals in highly contaminated areas.

 

It's highly debated what the overall effect of contamination has been on animals in the area and conflicting studies have already become politicized and controversial - WIRED ran a good article about it

that part where they lie down in the swamp is one of the weirdest parts of that movie

  On 10/3/2012 at 4:40 PM, joshuatx said:

  On 10/3/2012 at 3:46 PM, keltoi said:

  On 10/3/2012 at 2:37 PM, lumpenprol said:

Yep, another nuclear fan here. I'm not even worried about the radiation leakage issue. Fact is, only humans are scared of radiation, animals just keep going about their business. Hence why Chernobyl has basically become a nature preserve. I like the fact that worst case scenario, we create an unintentional future nature preserve.

 

not entirely true. research has shown that there are less mammals in highly contaminated areas.

 

It's highly debated what the overall effect of contamination has been on animals in the area and conflicting studies have already become politicized and controversial - WIRED ran a good article about it

 

yeah i've read that before but i was sceptical due to the conflict between the 2 parties of scientists. there's obviously bad blood between them... near the end of the article the russian scientist is asked why he doesn't debunk the findings of the americans by submitting his own evidence and he kind of pussies out of it... whether this is down to simple clash of personalities, conflict of interest, territorialism on the russian's part or even russian government propoganda... i don't know.

 

one things for sure.. "animals just keep going about their business" has to be a joke... they're too stupid to run for safety. the fact the numbers of animals are increasing is because no humans hunt/chase them out like they did previously, not because they're thriving in some kind of paradise... apparently the population has mostly migrated into the area rather than bred there.

 

and i read something about the area getting more dangerously radio-active over time, rather than less, due to certain contaminants mutating into other compounds with huuuuuge half-lifes as they decay in water.

 

some good reading here (page 255 for specific impact on fauna)...

 

http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf

 

  On 10/3/2012 at 4:40 PM, Salvatorin said:

that part where they lie down in the swamp is one of the weirdest parts of that movie

 

and there's a LOT to choose from!

lol @ lumpy's animal comment.

  On 10/3/2012 at 5:26 PM, keltoi said:

  On 10/3/2012 at 4:40 PM, joshuatx said:

  On 10/3/2012 at 3:46 PM, keltoi said:

  On 10/3/2012 at 2:37 PM, lumpenprol said:

Yep, another nuclear fan here. I'm not even worried about the radiation leakage issue. Fact is, only humans are scared of radiation, animals just keep going about their business. Hence why Chernobyl has basically become a nature preserve. I like the fact that worst case scenario, we create an unintentional future nature preserve.

 

not entirely true. research has shown that there are less mammals in highly contaminated areas.

 

It's highly debated what the overall effect of contamination has been on animals in the area and conflicting studies have already become politicized and controversial - WIRED ran a good article about it

and i read something about the area getting more dangerously radio-active over time, rather than less, due to certain contaminants mutating into other compounds with huuuuuge half-lifes as they decay in water.

 

 

actually i don't think thats true. i saw a documetery that went into chernoble. aside from the broken down buildings, the plant life has thrived increadibly. and the animal life while not large is doing just fine. they breed with no problems. honestly, it looks like fucking Eden in there. its just full of radiation. in fact i believe they say that the tress are actually feeding off of the radiation. reducing its levels Edited October 3, 2012 by Frankie5fingers

anyways, Nuclear power IS the safest form of energy that can pump out as much as it does. honestly, people love to hate it cause the media only talks about it when something goes wrong.