why does the media do it?

[Kal-El]

More people die from lightening strikes than from nuclear power plants. It's ridiculous to even suggest they are dangerous especially weighing its benefits.

In fact, much, much more people die building wind turbines than working at nuclear power plants. And wind power is a joke.

[frownonfun]

Originally Posted by Kal-El

More people die from lightening strikes than from nuclear power plants. It's ridiculous to even suggest they are dangerous especially weighing its benefits.

In fact, much, much more people die building wind turbines than working at nuclear power plants. And wind power is a joke.

So because there hasn't been a major nuclear catastrophe yet we shouldn't worry about it? We should wait until something bad finally does happen? The potential threat is greater for nuclear power plants than wind energy. That's just the bottom line. You can't in anyway dispute that.

But I agree the media shouldn't be whipping up fear over nuclear power plants here in the states just because of what's going on in japan. They should be doing it all the time. Sorry but you don't fuck around with radiation. Nothing bad has happened here in the states yet. But why wait until it does?

Also when someone dies working at a wind farm it's most likely a worker. That is unfortunate and terrible, it really is, but that's the most it's ever going to affect. The only people put in any real danger are the people who are directly engaged in the maintenance of a wind farm. When we are talking nuclear it impacts everyone around the facility. Not just the workers at a plant. People who don't have shit to do with the plant can still become victim to it's malfunction.

The fact that people are so cavalier about NUCLEAR energy really blows my mind. These plants are just going to get older and older. So talk your crap now but our kids may not have the luxury of being so brazen about it. Time just isn't on our side in this case.

EDIT: also i'm really not trying to be a jerk about this. and though i quoted you Kal-El, i'm not directing all this entirely at you. just feel pretty strongly about the subject is all. so i apologize if i come off a little, uh, snippy.

[Kal-El]

Originally Posted by frownonfun

So because there hasn't been a major nuclear catastrophe yet we shouldn't worry about it? We should wait until something bad finally does happen? The potential threat is greater for nuclear power plants than wind energy. That's just the bottom line. You can't in anyway dispute that.

But I agree the media shouldn't be whipping up fear over nuclear power plants here in the states just because of what's going on in japan. They should be doing it all the time. Sorry but you don't fuck around with radiation. Nothing bad has happened here in the states yet. But why wait until it does?

Also when someone dies working at a wind farm it's most likely a worker. That is unfortunate and terrible, it really is, but that's the most it's ever going to affect. The only people put in any real danger are the people who are directly engaged in the maintenance of a wind farm. When we are talking nuclear it impacts everyone around the facility. Not just the workers at a plant. People who don't have shit to do with the plant can still become victim to it's malfunction.

The fact that people are so cavalier about NUCLEAR energy really blows my mind. These plants are just going to get older and older. So talk your crap now but our kids may not have the luxury of being so brazen about it. Time just isn't on our side in this case.

EDIT: also i'm really not trying to be a jerk about this. and though i quoted you Kal-El, i'm not directing all this entirely at you. just feel pretty strongly about the subject is all. so i apologize if i come off a little, uh, snippy.

Totally understand your argument. I didn't mean to suggest there is no danger in nuclear energy. It would be foolish to suggest that.

Still. the worst nuclear disaster in history, Chernobyl, killed 30 people. A shame, but not at all catastrophic.

"The initial explosion resulted in the death of two workers. 28 of the firemen and emergency clean-up workers died in the first three months after the explosion from Acute Radiation Sickness and one of cardiac arrest."

And Chernobyl didn't have nearly the safe guards that today's plants have. It didn't have a containment system and deaths were still minimal.

Of course, lingering radiation created some health issues and cancers but wasn't considered extreme.

In contrast, 115 people die each day in car accidents in the US alone (and we have the most stringent safety standards).


The thing is, is that creating energy will always have some type of drawback. No matter how clean or safe they are considered to be. If we are not prepared to take those small risks, we may as well revert back to being cave men. Forget even just flipping that light switch.

[Kal-El]

Originally Posted by PK198105

ok listen, I'm sorry but you are totally wrong, not sure where you got your figures but the intial deathtoll was above 50, with many more dying in weeks that followed. Add to that the million or so that died and/or became sick as of 2010, I hardly call this minimal. The figures that state just 28 people died are based on a Soviet government "study" read cover-up. So please don't be so naive and believe the hype that power companies are trying to push. To quote a famous Soviet:" One death is tragic, a thousand is a statistic."

Also the Chernobyl disaster was a result of sloppiness and not safety standards, their standards were actually very high, but again the soviet government and people with vested interests wanted results faster. The disaster struck while they were doing a safety check/drill.

Research a bit before you put figures that have no merit

Well here's a few legitimate sources below. One thing is for certain, 30 people died shortly after the accident (3-4 months). And this is mainly the rescue/cleanup crew who were unprepared and unprotected from the radiation.

The ongoing debate is the deaths that have occurred over the long term. Of course, many thousands, even 100's of thousands have eventually gotten cancer which may or may not be attributed to Chernobyl.

Then again, cancer is the number one killer of Americans never even exposed to dangerous amounts of radiation (it just passed heart disease).

I also referenced car accident deaths earlier for comparison purposes. 42,000 people die each year in car accidents in the US alone. Should we ban cars?

My point is that if you or anyone else has a better idea than nuclear to produce the power we need, your idea is welcome to change the world.

Wind and solar can only produce a minuscule percentage of what we need even if we drastically increase their use, so we'd end up burning a lot more coal if not for nuclear.


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

Health of plant workers and local people

In the aftermath of the accident, 237 people suffered from acute radiation sickness, of whom 31 died within the first three months. Most of these were fire and rescue workers trying to bring the accident under control, who were not fully aware of how dangerous exposure to the radiation in the smoke was. Whereas, the World Health Organization's report 2006 Report of the Chernobyl Forum Expert Group from the 237 emergency workers who were diagnosed with ARS, ARS was identified as the cause of death for 28 of these people within the first few months after the disaster. There were no further deaths identified, in the general population affected by the disaster, as being caused by ARS. Of the 72,000 Russian Emergency Workers being studied, 216 non-cancer deaths are attributed to the disaster, between 1991 and 1998. The latency period for solid cancers caused by excess radiation exposure is 10 or more years; thus at the time of the WHO report being undertaken, the rates of solid cancer deaths were no greater than the general population. Some 135,000 people were evacuated from the area, including 50,000 from Pripyat.

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/chernobyl/inf07.html

- The Chernobyl accident in 1986 was the result of a flawed reactor design that was operated with inadequately trained personnel.
- The resulting steam explosion and fires released at least 5% of the radioactive reactor core into the atmosphere and downwind.
- Two Chernobyl plant workers died on the night of the accident, and a further 28 people died within a few weeks as a result of acute radiation poisoning.
- UNSCEAR says that apart from increased thyroid cancers, "there is no evidence of a major public health impact attributable to radiation exposure 20 years after the accident."

http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-co...rnobyl-bg.html

Health Effects from the Accident

The Chernobyl accident caused many severe radiation effects almost immediately. Among the approximately 600 workers present on the site at the time of the accident, 2 died within hours of the reactor explosion and 134 received high radiation doses and suffered from acute radiation sickness. Of these, twenty eight workers died in the first four months after the accident. Another 200,000 recovery workers involved in the initial cleanup work of 1986-1987 received doses of between 0.01 and 0.50 Gy. The number of workers involved in cleanup activities at Chernobyl rose to 600,000, although only a small fraction of these workers were exposed to dangerous levels of radiation. Both groups of cleanup and recovery workers may become ill because of their radiation exposure, so their health is being monitored.

The Chernobyl accident also resulted in widespread contamination in areas of Belarus, the Russian Federation, and Ukraine inhabited by millions of residents. Radiation exposure to residents evacuated from areas heavily contaminated by radioactive material from the Chernobyl accident also has been a concern. Average doses to Ukrainian and Belarusian evacuees were 17 mSv and 31 mSv, respectively. Individual exposures ranged from a low of 0.1 to 380 mSv. However, the majority of the five million residents living in contaminated areas received very small radiation doses which are comparable to natural background levels (1 mSv per year).

The health of these residents also has been monitored since 1986, and to date there is no strong evidence for radiation-induced increases of leukemia or solid cancer (other than thyroid cancer). An exception is a large number of children and adolescents who in 1986 received substantial radiation doses in the thyroid after drinking milk contaminated with radioactive iodine. To date, about 4,000 thyroid cancer cases have been detected among these children. Although 99% of these children were successfully treated, nine children and adolescents in the three countries died from thyroid cancer. Fortunately, no evidence of any effect on the number of adverse pregnancy outcomes, delivery complications, stillbirths or overall health of children has been observed among the families living in the most contaminated areas.
Apart from the increase in thyroid cancer after childhood exposure, no increase in overall cancer or non-cancer diseases have been observed that can be attributed to the Chernobyl accident and exposure to radiation. However, it is estimated that approximately 4,000 radiation-related cancer deaths may eventually be attributed to the Chernobyl accident over the lifetime of the 200,000 emergency workers, 116,000 evacuees, and 270,000 residents living in the most contaminated areas. This estimate is far lower than initial speculations that radiation exposure would claim tens of thousands of lives, but it is not greatly different from estimates made in 1986 by Soviet scientists.

[john21031]

Originally Posted by Kal-El

Totally understand your argument. I didn't mean to suggest there is no danger in nuclear energy. It would be foolish to suggest that.

Still. the worst nuclear disaster in history, Chernobyl, killed 30 people. A shame, but not at all catastrophic.

"The initial explosion resulted in the death of two workers. 28 of the firemen and emergency clean-up workers died in the first three months after the explosion from Acute Radiation Sickness and one of cardiac arrest."

And Chernobyl didn't have nearly the safe guards that today's plants have. It didn't have a containment system and deaths were still minimal.

Of course, lingering radiation created some health issues and cancers but wasn't considered extreme.

In contrast, 115 people die each day in car accidents in the US alone (and we have the most stringent safety standards).


The thing is, is that creating energy will always have some type of drawback. No matter how clean or safe they are considered to be. If we are not prepared to take those small risks, we may as well revert back to being cave men. Forget even just flipping that light switch.

The tragedy of Chernobyl is not the people who died as a direct result of the explosion. It's the mutation and birth defects in the thousand and millions of people who were affected. It's the cancer rate... the child's leukemia, those things are the real consequences of radiation leaks.

You sound like you completely underestimate the dangers of nuclear incidents. Next time you hear of cancer - think of this thread. It's that serious.

[Kal-El]

Originally Posted by Shroomster

Hey kal-el you're a nice internet person so I'll be nice, please don't quote wikipedia when trying to make a valid argument about ANYTHING.

I know a lot of people like to put down Wikipedia but they are accurate most of the time. More so than general internet searches. Look up anything that you know a lot about (factually) and see if it is accurate, I'm certain it will be. Either way, I did confirm the numbers with other large sources. I do with any research.

Originally Posted by john21031

The tragedy of Chernobyl is not the people who died as a direct result of the explosion. It's the mutation and birth defects in the thousand and millions of people who were affected. It's the cancer rate... the child's leukemia, those things are the real consequences of radiation leaks.

You sound like you completely underestimate the dangers of nuclear incidents. Next time you hear of cancer - think of this thread. It's that serious.

I did site and talk about the lingering effects, which are horrible. I'm not naive enough to dismiss it.

I don't want to sound like I love nuclear at any cost. That's not the case.
I just think it's a relatively safe and very effective energy source. There's been a few accidents throughout history which have been horrible, but overall nuclear has a very good track record.

It just seems that people are against gas, against nuclear, against coal, against batteries, ect. I'm simply trying to figure out what people honestly think we are going to switch over to completely for our energy. We can't do it with just wind and solar. I do, however think we really need to ramp up natural gas use. It's hugely abundant in the US.

[frownonfun]

Originally Posted by PK198105

Natural gas is good but have you ever driven a gas operated vehicle?I did and it sucks (back couple of years a lot of courier trucks were propane operated).

Yeah I don't think anyone is suggesting we run vehicles off natural gas. Just for the production of electricity for energy grids. It really is an underused resource in that regard.

[Kal-El]

Originally Posted by frownonfun

Yeah I don't think anyone is suggesting we run vehicles off natural gas. Just for the production of electricity for energy grids. It really is an underused resource in that regard.

Why not?

The "greenest" car for 8 years straight is the Civic GX (100% CNG).

http://automobiles.honda.com/civic-gx/



Reviews suggest that the driver can't tell the difference from the natural gas Civic to how a regular gas Civic operates. It gets up to 240 miles on a tank and it costs a good amount less than regular gas. Refilling takes the same amount of time as a regular gas station. The current problem is the available refilling stations but that could and should be fixed.

Not quite sure why CNG cars haven't taken off more than just the Civic offering which started production way back in '98.