Radioactive tritium leaks found at 48 US nuke sites

[Icculus]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43475479...s-environment/

How many of you live near Nuclear Power plants?

I live within 20 miles of the Seabrook site in MA. I know that Nuclear power is a cheap and welcome alternative to more expensive power sources but is it worth the risk?

Germany has taken steps to shut down all their Nuclear Power plants by 2022. Maybe it's time for other countries to seriously consider alternative energy sources. Yes it would be a large initial investment but it would create far more jobs than it would eliminate in the long run and let's face it, nobody wants radiation in their drinking water.

-Icculus

[Bridget]

Nuclear energy is the boss. Good luck with your pussy "alternatives". They're inefficient. Don't be fooled by the hippy talk. It isn't the eighties anymore and we don't live under the shitty standards of the Soviet Union. It says nothing about nuclear energy's potential if it's improperly used. It says a lot about human irresponsibility, though.

[Innoc]

Every power source has pros and cons. I think the biggest problem with knee-jerk reactions is missing the steps needed for a change in course. Everything costs money and there needs to be a rational path described for reaching that goal that doesn't overwhelm the people who pay for it....us. The problem is that we keep electing speech makers who are incapable to formulating a sane energy policy. Simply declaring a direction is worthless...plan it out.

[Icculus]

Originally Posted by Bridget

Nuclear energy is the boss. Good luck with your pussy "alternatives". They're inefficient. Don't be fooled by the hippy talk. It isn't the eighties anymore and we don't live under the shitty standards of the Soviet Union. It says nothing about nuclear energy's potential if it's improperly used. It says a lot about human irresponsibility, though.

Very well thought out and tactful response. You always have had a way with words.

The flaw in your logic is that there is no "proper and responsible" way to harness nuclear energy (although what's accepted as resposible can be debated). The main issue of course is what to do with the spent fuel rods that are stacking up in "temporary" storage facilities all over the world.

The agreed upon long term solution seems to be to bury them in a mountain somewhere until their half-life expires and they no longer pose a threat. Anywhere from several thousand to 6 million years. That's a long time to wait and hope that nothing happens.

Your use of the term "inefficient" is not entirely accurate either. In the long run Solar power would be quite a bit cheaper than nuclear power. http://theenergycollective.com/oshad...heaper-nuclear

The reason Nuclear is so much cheaper to produce currently is that the infrastructure is already in place.

It would be a very large initial investment to start switching gears to a different energy solution and like Innoc pointed out, there is no clear plan to get there. Just more empty promises from our elected officials.

[Innoc]

Originally Posted by Icculus

It would be a very large initial investment to start switching gears to a different energy solution and like Innoc pointed out, there is no clear plan to get there. Just more empty promises from our elected officials.

Frankly I think it's going to take a couple of generations of Statesmen willing to be one term office holders to bring a sensible change of policy direction. There's very few people holding office presently that I believe would have the courage to stake their reelection prospects on trying to tackle this issue. Much like extravagant Social Spending completely decoupled from sustainable and rational funding mechanisms...

[BinaryLife]

Originally Posted by Icculus

Very well thought out and tactful response. You always have had a way with words.

The flaw in your logic is that there is no "proper and responsible" way to harness nuclear energy (although what's accepted as resposible can be debated). The main issue of course is what to do with the spent fuel rods that are stacking up in "temporary" storage facilities all over the world.

The agreed upon long term solution seems to be to bury them in a mountain somewhere until their half-life expires and they no longer pose a threat. Anywhere from several thousand to 6 million years. That's a long time to wait and hope that nothing happens.

Your use of the term "inefficient" is not entirely accurate either. In the long run Solar power would be quite a bit cheaper than nuclear power. http://theenergycollective.com/oshad...heaper-nuclear

The reason Nuclear is so much cheaper to produce currently is that the infrastructure is already in place.

It would be a very large initial investment to start switching gears to a different energy solution and like Innoc pointed out, there is no clear plan to get there. Just more empty promises from our elected officials.

I believe France has found a way to re-use those rods in a safe manner as continued energy if I'm not mistaken.

Compared to gas fuels nuclear energy is much more efficient, and less expensive. It would get us off of dependence from other countries and make the US more self sufficient. It would also be better for the environment, provided that a good plan (that one we've been talking about that doesn't exist yet) were put in place.

There are other alternatives of course, like natural gas. There's plenty of natural gas in the US that could be used to similar effects. However, it is still a finite energy source. Nuclear energy has the potential to power the country forever. We just need to find better handling solutions. I think that emotional reactions are bad when the plan is to give up.

What kind of thought is that? If there is a leak then we learn how to fix is. If there is a problem in another country then we take a look at our safety protocols and make sure that it wont happen here. We improve in the face of set-backs we don't drop a plan all together and choose a worse one.

[Lost]

Binary is right, there is a way to recycle spent fuel, and it has a very high rate of return.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear...e#Reprocessing

We don't use it here because of political sidestepping under the umbrella of terrorism. If we stopped doing anything that was even vaguely susceptible to terrorism or could be used for terror attacks, then we would sit at home without electricity, eating food from our own gardens and shooting the neighbors for sport.

So we need to pull our heads out of the sand and take a few steps forward, spend some money, and save our selves some headaches. Kick OPEC in the jimmy by driving smaller, more energy efficient cars and start more nuke plants. Yeah, we'll have some issues with spent fuel, and the coal industry would suffer, but the reactors in use today are actually refining the fuel as they use it, making it able to put off more energy after reprocessing. It's not that simple, but none of us are nuclear physicists. So then what do we do with the radioactive water?

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

That bitch will burn anything. It won't do anything but explode if you put heavy radioactive materials into it, but it does handle liquids the same was as solids; it separates them into their most basic molecules and sends the waste up to be burnt for energy.