Hydroelectric power FTW
Electrical Engineering student. Life is pretty good, but boring.
Alex Lamb
@Al6200
Age 34, Male
Studying Engineering
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Comments
For a win perhaps, but certainly not the win.
I believe a lot in Hydroelectric power, but quite frankly there are too few spaces for it to fulfill all of our energy needs. And as of today, most of the world's rivers with hydroelectric potential are already dammed.
There's not the same situation where I live =D
Nearly all of the rivers that can be dammed have been dammed, and there are usually goods reasons why the left over rivers aren't being dammed, namely:
1. Might force people to leave their homes. Politically infeasible in a democratic nation
2. Harms fish populations
You make no mention of the waste material.
Yes, I do. Second part, entitled: "Doesn't nuclear fission produce radioactive waste?"
Then go to the first citation, and you can read all about how the waste threat is dramatically overrated:
http://gabe.web.psi.ch/research/r a/pics/ra_fn_OECD.jpg
I cite this graph at the end of my citations, and it's a little bit hard to read. But the probability of having any number of fatalities is lower than other energy sources.
Oooops, how did I miss that?
My apologies,
Good reading, btw. =)
It's cool, and thanks for reading.
Great article. Very informative.
You are right, Nuclear power does seem to make sense now, but what about 500 years into the future?
What if the nuclear waste does indeed become a problem. We simple do not know.
Also, moving to nuclear power will put us at a huge advantage over third world countries. This would make them even poorer and you don't want to have poor countries. Poor countries = terrorists that hate the USA.
Very few countries have access to Nuclear Power.
Thanks. From my calculations, Yucca mountain should be good for at least a few hundred years. It's all very hard to look beyond that time frame with any accuracy.
Needless to say, even the nuclear worst-case scenario is considerably better than the predicted fortunes of coal or oil. It's difficult to imagine a situation where nuclear waste is so problematic that it becomes worse than
The biggest problem with nuclear power (IMO) isn't the nuclear fuel or waste, but rather the steam. Nuclear power plants work by taking relatively cool water, and placing it in proximity to a nuclear reaction, such that the water is converted to steam which spins turbines.
Of course, spinning the turbines cools the steam, which makes it cool and condense back into water. This water is hot enough to kill fish on impact, and seriously impact the environment if dumped, but isn't hot enough to use continuously. Usually, the used steam is just vented into the air, via the large cooling towers that are synonymous with nuclear power plants.
Unfortunately, the water needs of nuclear power plants reduces the areas where they can be built. And where they are built near rivers, there is a risk of droughts forcing the plants to shut down.
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/TECH/
01/23/drought.nuclear.ap/index.ht ml#cnnSTCText
In the end, it might make sense to build our nuclear reactors very close to the sea, or even on the sea. This, of course, works quite well in the case of nuclear powered submarines and aircraft carriers.
On the note of income gap, I don't prescribe to the notion that progress for America = harm to the poor. Rather, I believe that cheaper and (more importantly) reliable energy for America will make us a more consistent and effective member of the world economy. Many poor nations rely on their trade with the United States, and an increase in American disposable income means more business for their struggling markets - and more opportunities.
More opportunities to raise a family and be successful -> Less terrorism, more happiness
I remember hearing of a space elevator idea long ago... Possibly, we could develop those to jettison radioactive wastes into deep space, never to be seen again.
That's certainly an interesting idea, but it'll take quite a while before we develop a space elevator.
Edit: The problem with the space elevator is that it would put the waste into orbit, which I don't think is going to be a big deal, but it's probably not a great idea either.
It'll also take quite a while to fully implement nuclear power and find ways to transport the waste without anything becoming irradiated.
Well, technically that's true. We'll never prevent ANYTHING from being irradiated. But the evidence shown in the original post clearly shows that even modern methods of dealing with nuclear waste don't cause a significant health risk.
Thank you for this information; it will probably help me at some point in my life.
Anyways do you know how Nuclear Fission got such a bad reputation in the first place?
Oh, by the way what about Hydrothermal and Geothermal?
Thanks.
It probably got it's bad reputation for two reasons:
1. Nuclear bombs predated peaceful nuclear power, and got a lot of attention for their sheer destructiveness. Of course, nuclear reactions are useful for peace the same reasons they're useful for war - they release an incredible amount of energy with a small amount of fuel.
2. The radiation from nuclear fission is pretty deadly, and in a clearly visible way. Modern reactors make this threat pretty small though, while coal and oil have more subtle (and honestly much deadlier) effects.
Hydrothermal and Geothermal:
Both are great ideas, and I'd love to see them implemented more, but unfortunately there are fairly large geographical and scaling constraints.
That was quite a mouthfull.
Indeed, and it took on the order of 5 or so hours to write it (yeah, I HAVE no life), but it was still fun.
I've always sort of thought intuitively that nuclear power was clean/efficient, and needed to be implemented, but I had never thoroughly investigated or studied those ideas.
Now that I have, I can annihilate hippies in flamewars.
Christopherr
This isn't the textbook thing I talked about, is it? Whatever, it is a very good summation. Kudos.
Al6200
Its actually different. The other one was about energy (mostly focused on physics). This is about nuclear fission, and mostly focuses on the practical economics of it.
Thanks, glad you liked it.