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Comment by xrange | Hacker News Reader

Deaths from nuclear power: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nuclear_and_radiation_...

Deaths from coal mining: http://www.msha.gov/stats/centurystats/coalstats.asp

First: I'm not necessarily opposed to nuclear, at least in the near term. However it has numerous issues (see link below, Thoughts...). Addressing risks:

Coal mining is a strawman. The comparison you want to be making is to solar, wind, hydro, and biomass.

All of which compare well with, if not better than nuclear. And which don't suddenly consecrate 300-1,000 year human-exclusion wildlife parks, and threaten continent-wide areas with toxic poison which cannot be sensed directly.

http://i.imgur.com/KqOOYai.png

From: "Renewable Energy Sources and Climate Change Mitigation: Special Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change" http://srren.ipcc-wg3.de/report/

The problem with nuclear power is that, with little warning, things can go very, very wrong. From good neighbor to continent-contaminating, centuries-long nature-preserve (no humans allowed) creation. The uncertainty and disputes over nuclear accident consequences (Chernobyl deaths: a few dozen, hundreds, thousands, millions? Over what time? When do you close the books? What happens if containment around the sarcophogus fails some time into the future?).

The worst power plant accident of time, not a nuclear power plant failure, but a hydro station in China, Banqiao Dam. It's instructive several ways:

Any number of fairly simple methods would have hugely alleviated the impact of the disaster. Much as with major nuclear disasters, it was a cascade of failures, starting with poor management and a dysfunctional culture, amplified through poor design, adverse conditions, poor communications, delayed or absent warnings, and little or no disaster response (many of the deaths were attributed to starvation and disease, not drowning or other physical impacts).

A useful thing to keep in mind, though, is that after a dam break is done being a a massive disaster area, which typically resolves in a few hours to a few weeks, the land is no longer a glowing radioactive mess. It can be re-settled and populated as structures and infrasctructure are rebuilt. Zhumadian City, the region surrounding Banqiao, has a present population of over 7 million.

Or look up the story of the Johnstown Flood, worst dam break in US history (by deaths), which saw the emergence of the Red Cross, of national response to disasters, and changes in liability laws.

(Excepting Johnstown and Banqiao, dam failure mortality falls off rapidly, with another 8 disasters of 1,000+ lives. Wikipedia gives some 908 notable dams, and 137 hydroelectric facilities of 1GW+ net capcity.)

There are other questions, notably whether or not "deaths per GWh generation" is the most appropriate measure of risk. Particularly for a technology whose risk tail spans not years, decades, or even centuries, but millennia. Or longer.

Last I checked, there were few human institutions with lifespans of similar scale. Technical or otherwise.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zhumadian

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnstown_Flood

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dam_failure

https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/2awjj2/thought...

https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/283sz1/key_fac...?

Deer kill more people than sharks, but one is more fearsome. Jaws and The China Syndrome have served the same purpose. It wouldn't hurt for some folks to start making some pro-nuclear movies.

This is not a problem of absence of marketing (pro nuclear marketing was baroque in fact, but did not live up to their promises). The main problem with Fukushima probably is that everybody in charge where high on flippant pro-nuclear happy movies, and their emergency plan was "none, this will never happen ha-haa".

So please stop reducing this to the old: "people is just hysterical and nuclear is perfectly safe". It isn't and is getting tiresome. We have solid reasons to be upset of the blatant incompetence of the nuclear sector. No amount of propaganda will cover the reality that Prypiat is a ghost town.

Maybe its only the export movies, but I am having a tough time remembering any pro-nuclear Japanese movies. Fukushima was a systemic and human disaster, but the reactor type is an old model. We have a lot of old models, and not a lot of in-the-field innovation because of the anti-nucleaur media. If we would have had decent evolution, some of those plants would have been closed and replaced by safer plants. Since its all political, we have not deployed new technology in a timely manner.

Not, is not all political. Nuclear companies employ thousands of clever people, and of course have easy access to nuclear products and nuclear plants, pools, buildings, machines... Those companies are doing big money also.

Despite being very gifted people with almost unlimited resources unreachable for the common guy, nobody had find a realistic solution for the nuclear waste in 50 years and nobody knows still how to decontaminate a nuclear wasteland in a safe and fast way. Finding those holy grail will make them multibillonaries in two months so is not a problem of lack of motivation.

If you prove, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that you can convert plutonium in a purring harmless kitten all politicians in the world will be at your feet droling and thinking about how to associate his/her name with the big success and what to do with the extra money now that expensive nuclear cemeteries payed with taxes are not needed anymore.

As a rule, I try not to blame other people for my own incompetence.

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