Who still has faith in Nuclear?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Since that option wasn't available, though, I chose "the stone age".

I for one welcome our dinosaurian overlords.

[Warren Dew]

I don't think there's a place in Japan safe unough from earthquakes and tsunamis to be a good location for the types of plants that they have now. Somebody may someday design a type that responds better to such disasters, though. I think I read where Japan's power is 30% nuclear sourced. Maybe they'll make a push for development of alternatives now.

There appear to be 3 reactors that are in trouble. That leaves 51 that are fine. I think an excellent argument can be made that most of the rectors in Japan can withstand a worst case earthquake and tsunami - because they have.

Earthquake, 51 to 3
Tsunami ? to 3

How many reactors actually stood up to the earthquake? I doubt all of them had to.

Valid point. Here's a map of the nuclear sites in Japan:



Onagawa was actually considerably closer to the epicenter than Fukushima Daichi and doesn't seem to have had an accident, though I believe it did have to shut down. Fukushima Daini is at a similar distance to the Daichi plant, and Tokai isn't much further. Perhaps they should look at why the others of these plants managed to fare better than the Daichi plant.

Of course, again, even the Fukushima Daichi plant was fine after the earthquake - it was the tsunami that was the problem. I expect the appropriate fix is as simple as bigger and more extensive jetties to break up bigger tsunamis.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Or the distance from the water. Time to Google Earth?

[Atheist-Lite]

The fear factor should put a downward pressure on pricing within the nuclear construction industry for the next five years or so. Now is really the time for the UK to get into nuclear and make a saving on building the new reactors this country needs?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

The fear factor should put a downward pressure on pricing within the nuclear construction industry for the next five years or so. Now is really the time for the UK to get into nuclear and make a saving on building the new reactors this country needs?

Put them on high ground near a good water supply, please. Lake Country?

[FBM]

I don't think there's a place in Japan safe unough from earthquakes and tsunamis to be a good location for the types of plants that they have now. Somebody may someday design a type that responds better to such disasters, though. I think I read where Japan's power is 30% nuclear sourced. Maybe they'll make a push for development of alternatives now.

There appear to be 3 reactors that are in trouble. That leaves 51 that are fine. I think an excellent argument can be made that most of the rectors in Japan can withstand a worst case earthquake and tsunami - because they have.

Except that only a few actually experienced the worst of the earthquake/tsunami. If each of Japan's 55 reactors had been subjected to the same challenges and 51/55 had no significant damage, I'd agree with you, but you're counting places like Sendai, Genkai and Ikata in your numbers, which is misleading. The Fukushima facility has 6, 3 of which had been temporarily shut down for scheduled maintenance at the time. That means 3/3 in operation were fucked by the earthquake/tsunami forces that hit Fukushima. Reactors in other locations wouldn't have experienced exactly the same challenges to their integrity. You'd have to scrutinize data about ground movement and degree of inundation to have a fair comparison.

[Mysturji]

I don't think there's a place in Japan safe unough from earthquakes and tsunamis to be a good location for the types of plants that they have now. Somebody may someday design a type that responds better to such disasters, though. I think I read where Japan's power is 30% nuclear sourced. Maybe they'll make a push for development of alternatives now.

There appear to be 3 reactors that are in trouble. That leaves 51 that are fine. I think an excellent argument can be made that most of the rectors in Japan can withstand a worst case earthquake and tsunami - because they have.

Yeah! Only 3 4 reactors (plus the waste fuel dumps) are fucked.
That's OK then.
(Edit: After all, only 1 nuclear bomb hit Hiroshima, and only 1 nuclear bomb hit Nagasaki, so what are they moaning about?)

P.S. Is anyone else surprised/concerned about the apparent total ignorance of all things nuclear among the general Japanese population? The news is full of people talking about "nuclear explosions" at the plants.
I mean, you'd really think they would know (and teach) more than most countries about this stuff.

[Warren Dew]

Or the distance from the water. Time to Google Earth?

Onagawa is right next to the water, just like Fukushima.

Onagawa:


Fukushima:


It looks to me like the main difference is that Onagawa is elevated by 10m or so, which might have helped with the tidal wave. Hopefully they can learn from that difference - or other differences, if others are more relevant.

[JimC]

The fear factor should put a downward pressure on pricing within the nuclear construction industry for the next five years or so. Now is really the time for the UK to get into nuclear and make a saving on building the new reactors this country needs?

Put them on high ground near a good water supply, please. Lake Country?

Over Rum's dead body!

[Geoff]

The fear factor should put a downward pressure on pricing within the nuclear construction industry for the next five years or so. Now is really the time for the UK to get into nuclear and make a saving on building the new reactors this country needs?

Put them on high ground near a good water supply, please. Lake Country?

Over Rum's dead body!

Got one up there already. One of the oldest in the world, in fact...and it hasn't had a fire for ages...

[egbert]

In general, it's not wise to put all your eggs in one basket, anyway. I voted for the mix with mostly alternatives.

I don't think there's a place in Japan safe unough from earthquakes and tsunamis to be a good location for the types of plants that they have now. Somebody may someday design a type that responds better to such disasters, though. I think I read where Japan's power is 30% nuclear sourced. Maybe they'll make a push for development of alternatives now.

This whole thing could have been averted if only they'd used Holy Water in the cooling system.

[Pappa]

I would love to see hybrid reactors become a reality, if for no other reason than their ability to turn extremely dangerous and long-lasting nuclear waste into far less dangerous nuclear waste with a fraction of the half-life.

[Coito ergo sum]

The reality is, there is no alternative that will produce the significant amount of power that we need (not in the US, anyway).

It's nuclear, or fossil fuels. Wind and solar are not able to produce the amount of energy that we need, at present.

50 new nuclear power plants will do the following: reduce our dependence on foreign energy sources significantly, and provide a bump up for jobs and the economy. If wind and solar also increase, great. I'm all for it.

No government funding, though. Legalize it, regulate it and demand very high safety standards. The industry has lately been demanding public guarantees. Don't get suckered. If the government gets out of the way, they will build moneymaking plants.

[sandinista]

The answer IMO, is not; what can produce the same amount of power (or more) than nuclear or coal or wind or whatever. A starting point would be to reduce the amount of energy people use on a daily basis. This doesn't seem to be an angle anyone is looking at (in the mainstream media anyway).

[.Morticia.]

The answer IMO, is not; what can produce the same amount of power (or more) than nuclear or coal or wind or whatever. A starting point would be to reduce the amount of energy people use on a daily basis. This doesn't seem to be an angle anyone is looking at (in the mainstream media anyway).

hmmmm consume less

what a radical idea

but not the people

let's start with the M.I.C.

who the biggest wasters of resources on the planet