Get News & Views Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
Mother Nature and Nuclear Power
Our hearts go out to the people of Japan, who are suffering the horrendous effects of a massive earthquake and devastating tsunami. Watching the news clips of the natural disasters in Japan makes us realize yet again the enormous power of nature and the limits of our capacities to control such power. Large buildings, roadways and bridges buckled before the shockwaves of the earthquake. Cars and trucks, even houses, seemed like small toys when they were swept away by the tsunami wave hitting the Japanese coastline.
"Nuclear power plant failures in Japan are a final wake-up call to replace nuclear power with safe, sustainable and renewable forms of energy"
In Japan, electric power has been knocked out for millions of people. But the dangers are far greater than those associated with the temporary loss of power. Some of Japan’s 55 nuclear reactors lost primary and backup power, which in turn led to core cooling problems, partial meltdowns and radiation releases within the reactor control rooms and into the atmosphere, with possibly far worse radiation releases still ahead. Three of Japan’s 55 nuclear power reactors have reportedly experienced explosions. Over 200,000 people have been evacuated from around the damaged nuclear power plants.
So far, there has not been much reporting on problems with spent fuel storage pools, but these pools that hold used fuel rods could prove to be the most dangerous of all facets of the disaster. They contain vast amounts of radiation, several times the amount in a reactor core. If these spent fuel pools lose their cooling source, they could spew radiation into the atmosphere, creating a tragedy of even greater proportions than did the 1986 nuclear accident at Chernobyl in the Ukraine.
The major lessons to be drawn from the tragedy in Japan are: first, nature’s power is far beyond our ability to control; second, the nuclear industry, in Japan and elsewhere, has arrogantly pushed ahead with their dangerous technology, assuring the public there is no reason for concern; third, the reassurances of self-interested nuclear “experts” are not to be trusted; and fourth, the nuclear power plant failures in Japan are a final wake-up call to replace nuclear power with safe, sustainable and renewable forms of energy.
There are 440 commercial nuclear power plants in the world. Of these, the US has 104, nearly twice as many as Japan. Many of the US plants are of the same design as those that are failing in Japan. President Obama’s 2012 budget calls for $36 billion in loan guarantees to subsidize new nuclear power plants.
California, known for its propensity for earthquakes, has two nuclear power plants, one at Avila Beach, north of Santa Barbara, and one at San Onofre, between Los Angeles and San Diego. Both plants are located near major fault lines. The Diablo Canyon power plant at Avila Beach is situated near the San Andreas and Hosgri fault lines. The San Onofre plant is located less than a mile from the Cristianitos fault line. Diablo Canyon is designed to withstand a 7.5 magnitude earthquake and San Onofre to withstand a 7.0 magnitude earthquake, but as Japan has shown us earthquakes can come in larger sizes.
We know that we humans cannot control earthquakes. Nor can we control tsunamis or other natural disasters. What we can control is our own technologies and we can say “No” to technologies that are catastrophically dangerous. Natural disasters and nuclear power plants are a deadly mix. Disasters intentionally caused by terrorists could also result in the release of radiation from nuclear power plants.
Mother Nature has given us a deadly warning that it is past time to end our reliance on nuclear power and invest instead in solar power, the only safe nuclear reactor that exists – 93 million miles from Earth. The question is: Will the disaster in Japan open our eyes to the need for change, or will we be content to continue to tempt fate and simply hope that we do not become the next place on the planet where nuclear power fails catastrophically?
Comments
Note: Disqus 2012 is best viewed on an up to date browser. Click here for information. Instructions for how to sign up to comment can be viewed here. Our Comment Policy can be viewed here. Please follow the guidelines. Note to Readers: Spam Filter May Capture Legitimate Comments...
50 Comments so far
Show AllAll points on the globe suffers from this industrial disaster in Japan, same as the recent industrial disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Nature's systems are fluid.
Dr. Busby - google chris busby - said the reassurances being issued now by official sources and by apologists for the nuclear industry are exactly the same as those issued 25 years ago, at the time of Chernobyl. Risks were understated, as show by subsequent epidemiological studies.
Statements about allegedly low health risks are based on rates of gamma radiation measured at the site perimeter. These take no account of radiation from alpha-emitting radionuclides such as Uranium and Plutonium. It is of particular concern that the number 3 reactor at Fukushima which is now in a problematic condition is fuelled with Mixed-Oxide fuel containing Plutonium.
The health consequences of exposure to radioactive releases from nuclear plant cannot be accurately assessed by making radiation measurements based on absorbed dose. The authorities already downplay risks on the basis of the false radiation risk model advised by the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP). This is an exact replication of the responses to the similar Chernobyl explosion. The effects of the Chernobyl accident have been devastating and continue to affect the health of the exposed populations as far away from Chernobyl as Europe and the USA. 1A major volume published in 2010 by the New York Academy of Sciences reveals a death toll of approaching 1 million persons by 2005.
http://www.rense.com/general93/dis.htm
Uranium - when manifested as a radioactive metal - has profound and debilitating effects on human DNA. These radioactive effects have been well understood for decades, but there has been considerable debate and little agreement concerning the possible health risks associated with low-grade uranium ore (yellowcake) and depleted uranium.
Now however, Northern Arizona University biochemist Diane Stearns has established that when cells are exposed to uranium, the uranium binds to DNA and the cells acquire mutations, triggering a whole slew of protein replication errors, some of which can lead to various cancers. Stearns' research, published in the journals Mutagenesis and Molecular Carcinogenesis, confirms what many have suspected for some time - that uranium can damage DNA as a heavy metal, independently of its radioactive properties. "Essentially, if you get a heavy metal stuck on DNA, you can get a mutation," Stearns explained. While other heavy metals are known to bind to DNA, Stearns and her team were the first to identify this characteristic with uranium.
http://www.scienceagogo.com/news/20060307010324data_trunc_sys.shtml
"The reassurances being issued now by official sources and by apologists for the nuclear industry are exactly the same as those issued 25 years ago, at the time of Chernobyl. Risks were understated."
No surprise there. The risks of anything big and technological are always understated, if not actively denied, e.g., the president and "clean coal." If the risks were acknowledged, profit margins would be threatened, career advancement would be hindered, and an alarmed public might demand that the risks not be taken. Americans are afraid of risks when they perceive them -- even ridiculous risks -- and demand that laws be passed to keep the risks at bay (bike helmets, for example; I'm sure you can list more), Tell them apples or spinach have a chemical on them that might cause cancer in Canadian lab rats and the public goes all atwitter until assured that agencies are acting to get that chemical outa there.
But big risks such as nuclear energy, well . . .not so much. They don't hear about that till something blows up so there's no chance to get them all scared and "concerned" and demanding that they be kept "safe" (a mythological and nonexistent condition if there ever was one).
Risks are systematically underestimated in all such cases. Anyone near enough to be involved should always assume that circumstances are far worse than admitted by any official in charge. Look at TMI, Chernobyl, Exxon-Valdez, BP's Gulf leak, agricultural pollution in American water supplies, Shell on the Amazon, the spreading catastrophe around the Tar Sands in Alberta, and Bhopal.
From a public relations point of view, the dynamic is obvious:
-- There is no absolute way of determining exactly how much has leaked.
-- Owners and regulators will be blamed for killing people and damaging property, reasonably.
-- News coverage will endure for days or weeks, then fade.
-- Anything you announce could be used against you in court.
So, PR concludes, use the lowest conceivable figures that cannot certainly be proven wrong within a few days or weeks. When proof that is not immediately deniable arrives, revise estimates up to cover, and repeat assurances of concern and vague responsibility.
Go back and look at public announcements of anything of this sort. The pattern is always the same, and in the case of lethal contamination, the PR always kills more people in the act of saving face and saving money.
In all, all, all such cases, if you are downwind or downstream, get out of the way.
Will the disaster in Japan open our eyes to the need for change, or will we be content to continue to tempt fate and simply hope that we do not become the next place on the planet where nuclear power fails catastrophically?
Unfortunately, no. Don't believe me? Read this
http://www.alternet.org/environment/150247
As Ted Markow recently mentioned, our economy and life style is way too large and demanding to let go of coal and nuclear. It's kind of similar to our addiction on picking between the lesser of the two evils every time.
Maxpayne, I think it's a matter of will. Daylight savings time just started, which assures that malls and big box stores will do well to stay open as late as possible, with lights on and a/c running, because it will be light outside, and people will be driving around in gasoline fueled cars (or electric hybrids that rely on coal powered plants), in search of things to do and buy. In some countries, even throughout western Europe, shops close at 6pm, and are closed on Sundays. What about the jobs? I'm not sure at all. When it comes to social security, we're told we don't have the population to make up the work force to keep the gap closed. I do know that many of the workers at Big Lots are immigrants. You can tell because they don't speak English very well yet. I suspect that we can shut down our power and fuel usage by half without much suffering or sacrifice. I'm not speaking against immigrants. I'm only acknowledging that they come here to fill gaps in our work force, and jobs that perhaps don't need to exist in the first place. What about, what about, what about... I'm sure there are things I'm not thinking of, but in the end, I still feel it's possible.
When gas prices spiked last time, people stopped driving as much. When prices subsided during the 2008 election season, people resumed their usual habits of consumption. We have no will. We accept being told how to behave, what to consume, and we feel entitled. Even all the cooking shows on PBS show you how to use a disposable roasting pan for the Thanksgiving turkey. They show you how to drain french fries on piles of paper towels, how to cook multiple components of a recipe in one pan, wiping it out with paper towels between each item. Multiply that by millions of homes. We have so much more than we need to have good lives.
Politicians on soap boxes love to say that we must do anything it takes to end our dependence on foreign oil, and you and I know, we must end our dependence on energy of any kind, any source, or this planet is doomed.
At this point, I remember Beck always preaching that it's up to us. What if we stop letting ourselves be led? Stop going to stores after 7pm and on Sundays? What if we turn off lights in rooms we're not occupying, and multiply all that by millions of homes? Whatever we try, we can't feel the effects of that multiplication, don't feel that we're making any difference, and I think often we give up.
Speaking of Europe, I'm disappointed about the way dependence on nuclear power for electricity is far greater than that of the US. Today's article on France just mentioned that 79 percent of electricity comes from nuclear and the French government, rightwing I think, is now advising its citizens about iodine. It looks like another lecture on personal responsibility while covering up for the crooks behind the curtains.
In the meantime, I think it's good that we're picking up on good ideas and discovering how renewable energy actually enforces conservation. I noticed a big difference between hooking my computer to the usual outlets and hooking it to a solar backpack. I would sit at the computer for small durations when doing the latter than the former. Maybe after enough disasters from BP to nuclear meltdowns more people will be motivated to give these ideas a go and then ask themselves "now, why didn't we think of all that before" and we just won't know what to tell them. Tough times ahead and then that I guess. :-)
I read there is a way to store solar power so that it's more reliable. I read these things, save them for a while, then I clean out my email archive and delete them, and of course, then a discussion like this one starts, and I want them back.
Oy.
That's interesting and that could save even more resources. Still, I promise not to take it for granted. :-)
Bliss
It really is about looking at things differently. We think how can we possibly do without all the stuff we got and the things we can do today. The thought of no street lighting is quite frightening to some. The thought that manual labor would not be an immigrant but what you had to do daily to survive. I mean how in the world can we exist without oil, coal or nuclear energy that has a hand in everything we do.
But then on the other hand, I have friends that are very old and lived in the day when none of these things were available. How did they survive to bring us into existence. It must have been a nightmare, but it was not. It brought about the things that we treasure today but no longer have.
After cooking dinner on the wood stove everyone helped with the dishes because it was quicker and candles and lamp oil not in great abundance. After dinner they all sat around a large kitchen table. The kids did home work or played games. Dad read the paper or did finances. Mom could knit a pair of wool gloves or socks before the kids went to bed. My friends 17 year brother would walk 2 miles to the grange hall on friday nights in the dead of winter where the fire roared and the girls were ready to dance. There were no flashlights, street lights or plowed roads.
My friend at 11 would take the lunch to the boys in the wood yard. Her mom would help her harness the team and hook up an empty bunk for wood. She would drive the team through town and up the long hill to their wood lot. Her brother and father would have a fire going with a pot of tea and they would enjoy the day and lunch. After lunch she would change the team from the empty bunk to a full one and start down the hill atop the tons of wood. Her biggest fear was making the turn at the Lilac bush at the bottom of the hill. Once home she and her mother unhooked the team and unloaded the wood in the barn.
Her grand father and father were fish mongers. They bought the daily catch, cleaned it, dried it, salted it and packaged it. At three she carry flayed salmon and cod up a ladder to the roof where her father took it and placed it on a drying rack.
She loved her life and her family. She misses her old community that was always there to help. They ate good food they grew, worked hard and with mom's botanical knowledge were hardly sick. Life was good. She had no bike helmet for her buggy ride down the hill. They had no electricity nor running water but had a outhouse that was used as briefly as possible. In those days if you sold a product you made a profit.
She is still alive but is angry and sad that life is the way it is. She always voted and some she voted for turned out to be corrupt but not the liars and corporate tools of today. Community was lost in the fast pace. Her family lost the fish business as the fishermen took the catch to Boston when the trains opened a bigger market and they could pay more for the fish. Her brother was killed by a drunk driver. She had to sell herself the the shoe factory and than the chicken plant and except for the friends she had at work thought it slavery for the poor. She saved her money while raising her children by herself, as her husband the ironworker building America was always gone spending his money on women and drink, and bought a store that she ran until she retired.
We can not continue the life style we have nor will we return to the life that she had. We have the choice to decide what technology is best and most important to keep and shed the debris that is foolish and unnecessary. Yet we can improve our lives by being more active in it and growing and eating better food. We can build local community where the neighbors come around to rebuild the barn after it burns and there are no insurance fearmongers. No stress from the traffic ride home. If we throw off the corporations and bankers we can build a different world as we would like it to be. Do we today have much choice other than moving to a better model and who decides what that will be us or the rich?
Nuclear power plants generate 20 percent of the electricity in the USA.
As the plants come up for license renewal, they should be closed in favor of wind and solar plants. This could be an opportunity to transition to technologically advanced power sources.
You think this dream will be realized?
Neither do I.
I don't have to be Nostradamus to predict the continued stupidity of the American people.
I admit that we Americans are not too bright. Our eductional system is flawed and with the mass media controlled by corporations, we don't hear much truth. These are problems, but the worst of it all is the loss of our democracy. The people do not have any say in our government. The government has been purchased by the top 1% to work to increase their share of the wealth of this nation. Government has been doing a splendid job for their paymasters.
An even more serious problem is our hubris. We human beings have taken the role of gods in messing with mother nature. Some things, lots of things, we should leave alone. This nuclear mess is just one of many similar situations. All these decades of nuclear power we knew that the waste products were extremely dangerous to life on earth but we have been confident that 'science' would find the answer on how to take care of the waste. Well, 'science' has not done so. (I put 'science' in quotes because I think we have raised 'science' to a level of religion.)
We have been fooling with mother nature with genitically modified foods and creating new chemicals with unknown long term effects. The climate change going on now and threatening the very life of our planet is an example of our hubris.
We have to reevaluate just who we are. We are only one of many beings on earth. I think there is a serious fault in thinking that God (whoever or what ever that is) put us in charge of things here on earth. We are not in charge of anything. We are one part of the web of life and we need to be respectful of all life. We need to step down from our inflated self view and respect and care for all life on our mother earth.
If only those nuclear plants were windmills!
Most definitely
The tragedy in Japan is still unfolding and no one knows what will happen with the nuclear power plants.
It seems that the largest loss of life comes from living on the coast.
New Orleans. Indonesisa. Japan.
Hundreds of thousands of deaths because people refuse to acknowledge the folly of living on the coast.
The nuclear revival will be halted in its tracks.
Fossil fuel will fill in the gaps.
The shoreline will be rebuilt just like before until the next time.
Thousands of people washed away.
An unimaginable amount of trash and toxins as a whole city gets pulled into the ocean.
Yeah, let's just stay stupid and pick between the lesser of the two evils, coal and nuclear, just like we do in voting when we pick between the lesser of the two evils, Republican and Democrat. Pay no attention to the gdmf-ing liars in governments covering up for the nuclear and fossil fuel industries.
throughout human history, the ocean coasts have been home to the vast majority of the earth's peoples, as this has traditionally meant access to the sea's bounty...
Plus, it's a handy place to pee in although no one ever admits it.
"Mother Nature has given us a deadly warning" but, MN can not change human nature. Man is a greedy animal.
Obama - Illinois
Exelon - Illinois - Obama
Nuclear Power Industry - Nuclear Weapons Industry
Depleted Uranium Shells - Big Money
More Money Money Money Forever ..................
or until the rubber band breaks!
Imagine the dollar value of the insider information that the 30 year moratorium on building new nuclear power plants was going to be lifted. What stocks would you have bought in the summer of 2008?
Money, Money, Money, ................. Funny thing is that it is always OUR money! It is just about whose turn it is to steal OUR money. The (D)'s big complaint about W was that he was stealing too much and there would be nothing left when it was the (D)'s turn.
Five minutes of vocal music from women of the Baka forest people.
Utterly off topic and completely salient - organic symphonics, the collective genius of the creation under threat from 'development'
you need to remove the space after http
http ://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBBbSLQlKIE&playnext=1&list=PL58BBDF7273E7C1FA
The symphony of mother nature
The loss of life goes way, way beyond human life, as humans aren't the only creatures who are being affected by these natural and man-made events! What imploded, self-centered creatures humans are! I know of many, many accounts of non-human beings suffering the loss of loved ones, too, and here's a brief one from Hope Ryden’s book, “God’s Dog: A Celebration of the North American Coyote”:
"I could see evidence all about me that a rather large elk herd had recently pastured and bedded in the area. A freshly made trail ran directly across the feeding crater where the dead animal lay. Had it [sic] died before or after the herd had departed? And why had the live calf not followed when the others felt the urge to move on? Now, left alone, the audacious fellow stood slim chance of survival. Perhaps that, in part, explained why he so tenaciously defended his lone companion, who lay partially eaten at his side. There is no creature more pathetic than a herd animal who has lost his herd.
"Twice the calf walked over to its [sic] former companion(?), stretched out his head, and nudged the face of the carcass, as if trying to rouse it to life. How little we know what animals feel! How fatuous is man to assume that he alone among all creatures that walk the earth is capable of experiencing the pain of loss."
And as for the case AGAINST industrial technology, here's a smart thought from an interesting source:
CIVILIZATION HAS BEEN A BOON TO MANY MICROBES who feed off humans
(especially over-stressed humans in crowded quarters). I’ve heard of persuasive arguments that microbes, not humans, are responsible for cities, which are
in this perspective nothing more than microbe feedlots and factory farms.
As for sustainable alternative sources of energy in addition to solar power, may I recommend beans? Eating beans, I mean.
'Pushed ahead with dangerous technology'; NO KIDDING.
They are trying to do here, again; aided and abetted by our politically driven president.
How ironic-
Obama okays deep sea drilling licenses in the gulf and then the BP disaster.
Obama pushes through 56 mil for nuclear plants and then the Japan disaster.
Will he ever get it right.
Now they are restarting deep sea drilling.
When is enough enough.
Don't forget Obama has General Electric CEO, Jeffrey Immelt, (gotta love that name for a CEO from a prime pusher of nuclear things) right at his side. And, no doubt, from the record thus far, Obama will do whatever the corporados tell him to do and offer glib reassurances to the gullible who are still giving such a nonstop liar any credence whatever. Of course the corporate media will be avidly doing their endless job of manufacturing consent for whatever criminal and destructive agenda corporate fascist Amerikka wants to make some more profits from. Obama needs to get out on the golf courses more often amid all the multiple disasters at hand and just let the military and corporate folks who are already running things dispense with him as a mouthpiece and front man.
Call Senator Jeff Bingamen, NM, (202-224-5521) and tell him to continue to push for investigations into the "safety" of our nuclear power plants. Push for safe renewable energy.
He's retiring from the Senate so it's possible he might be getting a really lucrative contract by the nuclear industries.
Retirement age nuclear power plants routinely being granted an extended license by the NRC are also being allowed to boost output to 125%.
Maybe they'll now be able to fully develop the Eludeum 236 Explosive Space Modulator (for you old Warner Brothers cartoon fans).
No, no, next up is "solarinite" - you know, the explosive material that will ignite the sun's rays, and chain react to all all the stars in the galaxy?! (Plan 9 From Outer Space).
Hahahahaha, this is the best part of the movie:
Jeff Trent: So what if we *do* develop this Solanite bomb? We'd be even a stronger nation than now.
Eros: [with disgust] Stronger. You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Jeff Trent: That's all I'm taking from you!
[pistol-whips Eros upside the head]
Forget the Star Trek bullshit, this is how real human beings act. Point out clear and obvious stupidity and get knocked the fuck out :-DDDD "We'd be even a stronger nation than now!" Fantastic stuff.
In regard to "We know that we humans cannot control earthquakes. Nor can we control tsunamis or other natural disasters." -
One of the great casualties of the post -'60s societal movement was the exodus from the age-old spiritual path. The path teaches that there are laws governing not only of the physical plane but also the astral, mental and spiritual planes. It also teaches how the mind and emotions, when in disequilibrium, can cause problems on the physical plane. The principle that a spiritual impulse becomes a mental thought which gets clothed in desire and that desire manifests on the physical plane is hardly known today. Yet that principle is behind the statements of the Teachers of humanity - the Masters of Wisdom - when they say that most disasters are man made. The World Teacher Maitreya, the head of the Masters, put it this way in 1988:
"Natural disasters such as floods, earthquakes, droughts, etc are connected, as responses, to human activities. These connections are not perceived at present, but will be increasingly perceived and understood as such.
As an example, Maitreya cites the drought in the USA. The indifference on the part of many to famine elsewhere on the globe is itself a cause which generates effects. Because the land in the drought-stricken area has become so dry that the soil is losing its cohesiveness, there will be a major landslide there. This is not just an effect of the drought. The drought itself is the effect."
If we knew that natural disasters are largely the work of man, we would also have the wisdom to rid the world of nuclear power plants.
Solar power and wind power are not sufficient to replace the nuclear/coal/petroleum resources, and so people say: we have to cut back on our energy use, we have to begin a new era of austerity, conservation, and piety.
Nah! Nyet! What we need to do is to remove control of energy resources from the corporate oligarchy. All the energy we need and much more is available for the taking. For example, Daniel Nocera at MIT has developed an efficient and cheap method of removing hydrogen from water. The patent is held by MIT. It is the key to the hydrogen economy. Remember the hydrogen economy? H is the most abundant element. Cheap hydrogen and a fuel cell is the basis for an independent power source for every home, every industry, every municipality. No more centralized, metered power. 3 liters of water per day could meet the energy requirements of your average household. And this is one source of unlimited energy that could completely displace all these nasty legacy systems. One source. There are others.
Well, that's BS, somebody will say. If this were true, if the holy grail is there for the taking, you'd be the richest plutocrat in all of history if you just took your better mousetrap to the public. Right! The free market. Hahaha! GE pretty much controls the nuclear industry. And it also pretty much controls the fuel cell industry. There is no free market. The energy market in particular is rigidly controlled by the corporate energy cartel. Corporate power determines what kind of energy society will use, how much will be available, and at what cost.
The problem of energy is not physical scarcity, it is a political problem. Energy scarcity is a condition created and perpetuated by the corporate oligarchy that long ago seized control of society's energy resources. Innovation is strictly limited or suppressed entirely. No innovator will go into the marketplace with a cheap, reliable catalytic electrolysis device and a similarly dependable fuel cell, and displace the current energy regime. In a free market, in a more democratic system, it WOULD happen. GE controls key patents. GE and pals control finance. They control the market.
It is a sad, tragic, story, that not many people are aware of, most especially these "free market" Republicans, who are either abysmally stupid, or simply evil! These days, ignorance is evil!
This is called 'magical thinking'. GET OVER IT.
Actually "magical non-thinking"
"Daniel Nocera at MIT has developed an efficient and cheap method of removing hydrogen from water."
They have a company called Sun Catalytix.
http://www.suncatalytix.com
They say "We are commercializing new, active, versatile, and affordable catalysts that split water into oxygen and hydrogen fuel, mimicking photosynthesis." Sounds very cool, but you completely misunderstand how it works when you say "3 liters of water per day could meet the energy requirements of your average household". Water is not the energy source in this case. You need (at least) as much energy to turn H2O into H2 and O2 as you get from burning hydrogen. This technology is a new form of solar based power.
3 liters of water do NOT contain enough energy to power an average household for a day. You need the sun to turn water into hydrogen that can be burned, but this still sounds pretty awesome because it looks like it would integrate very well with a hydrogen economy. The problem with a lot of renewables (wind and photovoltaic definitely) is that they aren't "on demand" sources of energy and thus unfit for the current economy and energy storage is a huge issue, but maybe hydrogen cells could be a good solution for energy *storage* (water is NOT an energy source, unless you're talking about heavy water hehe) and this is where this technology might come in. In this case, I don't think we need a corporate conspiracy, the current economic system, the extreme short sightedness of monopoly capitalism is alone enough to discourage the development of a hydrogen economy (I have no idea about the technical issues either, and I'm pretty sure there are a lot of them).
But if this technology is clean and doesn't depend on difficult to access and rare resources, it could be pretty awesome.
It is possible to ban all nuclear, coal, oil, and other dirty technolgy, and then get run over by a stoned hippy on a bicycle. - Murphy's Law
Well, at least my head in its helmet will be OK.
Keepin' on pedaling---MD
I am simply stunned that you guys are so much lagging behind the rest of the world. Commondreams only started very recently to wake up to this worst-case-scenario, busying itself with The Great Topics of the Greatest Nation on the Face of The Earth instead, aka navel-gazing, and this article is very TAME. And the respose is WEAK. Sweet. Disneyland-like.
Hey, in the rest of the world this is THE topic of topics!!! Entire countries are revisiting their strategies re nuclear power right now. Nuclear power has been opposed by progressives around the world for decades - since if anything goes wrong, it goes wrong big, big time. QED.
But here the reaction is just a whimper.
Yes, yes, of course, Spanish news sites don't engage in nave gazing too. Never. And there are bunch of other articles on nuclear on this stie. And there always have been.
"Hey, in the rest of the world this is THE topic of topics!!! Entire countries are revisiting their strategies re nuclear power right now"
Sounds like navel gazing to me.
It's time to recognize scientists and technocrats who support nuclear technology as sociopaths. They promote growth and profit over safety. The potential risks of nuclear are way to high. No more hoodoo science. Nuclear power is inappropriate technology. It also represents privatized profits and socialized losses, just as the big banks do. Only a sociopath would continue to support nuclear power after the reality of Japanese meltdowns. Hard-nosed action is required now.
I'm no expert, but it seems to me if there were money to be made on alternative energies- wind, sun, etc., then some company or companies would have made these mainstream energy sources by now. The fact that its still not happening tells me the costs outweigh the profits. And the costs are likely for activities and products- sourcing raw materials, manufacturing, shipping, electronics, parts, infrastructure, batteries, etc. that all require oil. And, since we are at the point where the easy,cheap oil is gone and the rest is going to be more expensive, development of alternatives on any kind of scale is pretty much a lost cause.
So, wouldn't it just make more sense to restructure our lives and our communities to function with a whole lot less energy instead of hoping something will take the place of oil? It ain't gonna happen folks. Powerdown.
"And the costs are likely for activities and products- sourcing raw materials, manufacturing, shipping, electronics, parts, infrastructure, batteries, etc. that all require oil. "
Hempseed oil which requires no petroleum can be used to make all the plastics in the world. It may not be cheap but if it's more durable and reliable which is usually the case, then you're getting more for the buck.
"So, wouldn't it just make more sense to restructure our lives and our communities to function with a whole lot less energy instead of hoping something will take the place of oil?"
That's easier said than done. In reality, renewable sources of energy will enforce your idea while fossil fuels and nuclear sources only derails it. Most people don't realize it but we must both reduce our energy demands and give renewable resources a try. One without the other won't work. By the way, the costs of renewable energy are actually less once you remove government subsidies and coverups to allow for fair competition. The market isn't really free; it's rigged. Don't be fooled.
"By the way, the costs of renewable energy are actually less once you remove government subsidies and coverups to allow for fair competition."
This may as well be true, but the main, primary, number 1, most important issue is that the economy should finally reflect real resource use, efficiency, availability and cost, not some idiotic, manipulated market-dependent arbitrary crap. Current "market based prices" have almost no relevance to reality. They do not reflect pollution, risk, long term availavbility and other real costs. They reflect speculation, power games, political incompetence and "laziness", not (long term) reality. And from all these points of view, a lot of renewables are incomparably better, not all of them of course, but a lot.
Don't forget to factor in the environmental and health cost savings of renewable. I will acknowledge that Kate might be right that where there's no chance of going renewable on energy such as people renting apartments, the best one can do is conserve well. I still promise to keep up conservation efforts even if renewable sources prove convenient.
Yep, of course, should have mentioned those. Point is, if society wants to make good decisions, it needs to have access to information and systems that value and combine this information need to exist too. As you mentioned, these issues are incredibly complex and interconnected.
How much green energy could we have with the trillions conservatives have pissed away on Big Nuke.
Apart from the economic and military issues, the problem with nuclear reactors is the statistical danger and extreme environmental problems they can cause. They're usually very safe and don't pollute as much as other types of energy sources, but when there is a problem, it can be super large. The number of people dying (and amount of life-years lost) from illnesses induced by pollution coming from, eg. cars is still uncomparable. On the other hand, waste storage is very difficult and the dangers in extreme conditions can be huge, so I'm not really sure that nuclear energy is a good idea ultimately :-/
But as for renewables and "Green Energy", as things stand now, they can serve at best as supplementary power sources. Without a complete restructuring of the economy into a form that doesn't depend so much on large amounts of cheap power on demand, they're not a real alternative. Modern economies and lifestyles were all built around this (initially) super cheap, super abundant form of energy which was also storable and transportable, high energy density and easy to use, and a lot of technological development would be needed for energy obtained from renewable sources to support all these features. Even technically, this is not a simple task but what's worse, there aren't many high level political and economic processes that would aid this. This is why you get "biofuel" from corn, with its ridiculous 125% eroi, because even if it's clearly the most idiotic way to utilise the most important and ultimatly limited and non-extendable resource (farmland), it conforms to current energy use patterns.
I don't think "green energy" (or really, just generally not totally fucking up everything worthwhile just because it can make easy money quickly) can come without very deep social changes.
I'm with you AtomsK. They should be phased out. We can't throw the baby out with the bathwater, as they say, but we also shouldn't let the baby play so near the toxic waste! We need to convert to wind, water, and solar power completely. I am so sick of the greed to make the fast buck ~ and at others' expense! Please, God, give us all a conscience. There are too many conscienceless psychotics running the world!
and we can't control nuclear fission in any form.
Even as a weapons system it is a failure. The bombs are so enormously powerful that they end up targeting civilians instead of miitary targets.
Earthquakes and tsunamis aren't the only problems. Any number of things from human error, compromised water supply (a billion gallons a day on a good day) to sabotage make these expensive toys an environmental and human health disaster of unimaginable proportions.
Yep. The risk is just too big and long term while the gain is way too short term and imo not nearly big enough. Thousands or tens of thousands of years of risk for only years or maybe decades of not that cheap or abundant energy. I'm just not sure it's worth it.