A community discussing nuclear power, including fission and fusion. The goal is to talk about generated nuclear power, so avoid simply talking about stars or something unless it is relevant.
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The hate nuclear power gets is so incredibly irrational. We’re in a middle of a climate catastrophe, and nuclear is the one practical option for replacing fossil fuels at scale that’s actually available to us.
My concern with nuclear power is that it seems to me that it is fundamentally incompatible with capitalism. You cannot cut corners when generating nuclear energy, the maintenance of facilities and proper storage of waste outweight the profit motive. The consequences of negligence seem significant. Though thats not to say oil is any different… but i fear the damage caused wont be so apparent to the layman.
Agree, the danger of cutting corners for profit gets is as high as it gets when it comes to something like nuclear power.
This is true, unfettered capitalism is likely to lead to safety standards being compromised and further accidents. I do not think that is reason to stop pursuing it as a solution. Capitalism is also a tool to improve nuclear power, making it vastly cheaper, safer and more efficient.
Indeed. Imagine the for-profit non-regulated texas nuckular authoratah
I couldn’t agree more, it pains me to see this kind of thinking run rampant even among ‘environmentalists’, ‘greens’ and such. We’re not going to cover the entire Sahara in solar panels or turbines anytime soon, so I think nuclear is a far better solution. (and let’s not even talk about all the ‘gravity batteries’ and other bullshit all the Musk fanboys and imitators are pushing now)
People also forget the environmental impact of producing things like solar panels and wind turbines. There are now whole landfills full of wind turbine blades for example.
Wind power can be done in an environmentally friendly way wrt the equipment, it just currently isn’t. Just like nuclear could be but currently isn’t. Another problem with wind that no one ever talks about is that sucking that much energy out drastically alters weather patterns (in most but not all cases). Wind is crucial to how weather works. But even bring up the topic and you’d be called a tinfoil hatter.
More importantly than finding ways to generate more energy, we need to be using less. Grid energy itself encourages wastefulness. Homes need to be insulated. Unnecessary travel (such as office work, and yes even ‘shopping’) are practices that must be ended. Those 2 things alone would reduce energy usage by 80%+.
But anyways… Like I said, even mentioning such things gets people very hateful. They don’t want to even consider change.
How so?
Using common metals for the blades and rare-earthless turbines for the generation, doing only small-scale installations such as on homes and distributing true excess through neighborhood microgrids (no supergrids). Also storing minor excess using flywheel or gravity batter rather than chemical battery. Most of these are systemic improvements and not specific to wind but I want to make sure you’re not picturing giant wind farms. Because as I said in my other post the biggest problem is supergrid thinking.
To put a point on it, an efficient home can be powered by a single wind turbine and possibly a solar panel for heavy usage appliances such as laundry machines, which is another problem that can be mitigated with further simple engineering solutions.
Thanks. The reason for big turbines is because they are more efficient. You use less materials for more power. So you’ll never convince an engineer of all this.
I wonder if there is a maximum size of turbine that can be built with steel, given how heavy it is. Wind might become a lot more expensive.
Which would not be a bad thing because the world needs to start converting to sea-swell power asap.
That’s a misleading statement because the efficiency calculations are done with assumptions based on current load, usage patterns, and supergrid as prerequisites.
To do a proper efficiency calculation we need a page 1 rewrite of how we handle energy entirety, as I described. I can prove I’m right with maths.
Also, aluminum not steel. Because you only need 1 meter bladespan when only generating one household of energy.
As for industrial needs, they can be handled by nuclear. Trying to scale up wind or solar is just too environmentally destructive.
But again, the key here is not to keep generating more and more energy, or using existing base loads as a starting point, we need to reduce energy usage drastically. It’s so wasteful right now.
Could be. At least for rural areas, small scale could be more efficent.
IIRC aluminium is never used for rotating parts because of the way it fatigues. After a certain number of strain cycles it will snap.
Yes but now this is a political issue. How are you going to stand between big business’s and its thirst for AI? The usage is growing exponentially and IMO will soon be dominant and the rest of the economy becomes more efficient.
Those have environmental impacts?
I wonder what’s the sources for this.
a few examples
https://honuaolabioenergy.com/environmental-impact-of-solar-panel-manufacturing/
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/141111-solar-panel-manufacturing-sustainability-ranking
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2020-02-05/wind-turbine-blades-can-t-be-recycled-so-they-re-piling-up-in-landfills
I agree by and large, but pumped hydro storage is a tried and true technology which has already proven its worth.
Pumped hydro storage is an energy storage method, not energy generation. Its also the most common form of power grid energy storage, so I have no doubt that the countries that are still using nuclear are storing the excess there.
I’m simply responding to the comment which called “gravity batteries” bullshit.
Though the Energy Vault is very much an unproven technology with a lot of problems.
I hope in time to create a wiki giving a high level overview of why nuclear power is viable w/ sources.
Sweet!
That would be fantastic!
Removed by mod