German Nuclear Power Phaseout

[Alex K]

As a child I grew up with NPPs Philippsburg Block 1+2 permanently in view just 10 miles down in the valley. I was in Kindergarten when Chernobyl blew up and was terrified living next to a NPP for a while.
3 days ago, the last operating Block, Philippsburg 2, was taken offline as part of the Nuclear power phaseout which was decided after the Fukushima meltdowns.
There was a switch off party by the Greens, but, remarkably, there also was a small international protest by people fighting for the preservation and expansion of the German nuclear fleet as a means to fight climate change.



Philippsburg 2 was basically substituted simultaneously by a brand new coal fired plant, further worsening our bad CO2 footprint. The "Energiewende" , the official policy which purports to achieve decarbonization purely with renewables, is not it good shape at all, with newly built wind power dwindling and the local solar industry basically dying from neglect, and no visible effort to develop the necessary gigantic power storage capability which has to go with a grid of 100% intermittent power sources, so we're basically risking becoming a bad example for the rest of the world.


So what do you think? Should we keep the nukes, even build new ones as these protesters demand in order to save the climate, or throw them out and go for 100% Wind+Solar?

[Mr Greene]

Ideally we'll figure out the cold fusion thing if it ever gets properly funded but we're still decades away from that.

100% renewables, nice ambition but obviously there's problems in funding (as always).

We're already seeing the effects of climate change so anything to reduce that is welcome.

As such I'd have said keep the nuclear stations active temporarily until they're ready to fund a decent alternative.

[Alex K]

Ideally we'll figure out the cold fusion thing if it ever gets properly funded but we're still decades away from that.

100% renewables, nice ambition but obviously there's problems in funding (as always).

We're already seeing the effects of climate change so anything to reduce that is welcome.

As such I'd have said keep the nuclear stations active temporarily until they're ready to fund a decent alternative.

Forget cold fusion, it's not a real thing. Ordinary fusion, sure, but as you say that's indeed going to take too long to wait for it unless there's a completely unforseen breakthrough... (ITER and DEMO are scheduled for 2035 and 45 or so)

We'd have to build 130 reactor blocks to completely decarbonize all energy sectors in the country using only uranium, that's also not cheap. Anti nuclear activists won't tire telling you that they would be impossibly expensive,but looking at the numbers (investments in renewables so far+cost of storage) that criticism doesn't seem to hold up to scrutiny.

[Fireball]

Lots of people panning Thorium, but it has a lot of advantages. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium-ba...lear_power

[Rev. Rye]

Looking into nuclear power, I legitimately think it’s extremely underrated as a form of energy. I understand that it’s got a bad rap, especially post-Chernobyl, but even in that case, that was down to a poorly designed reactor, building, and a poorly-thought-out experiment that probably wouldn’t have even yielded useful information. I swear, if HBO didn’t make Chernobyl, and On the off-chance Fox was ever inclined to make a series finale for The Simpsons where Homer fucks up at the nuclear plant and renders Springfield uninhabitable, it could probably be taken verbatim from the actual disaster.

And like it or not, for all its flaws, nuclear power is actually one of the greenest energy sources out there (emitting fewer greenhouse gases than even Solar power); is far less Likely to depend on specific climate factors than, say, wind, solar, or hydroelectric energy; is actually pretty cheap once you actually get the (admittedly considerable) startup costs taken care of; and is otherwise pretty safe... as long as you don’t have an accident. And even then, Fukushima is easily the biggest nuclear accident to happen since I was born. You probably heard a lot about it, but something you probably haven’t heard: the disaster happened when the plant was hit with a 15-meter tsunami and an Earthquake that was a 9.0 on the Richter scale (of which there have been exactly FIVE since the scale was first presented). And yet, the building remains intact, the radiation leak was limited and local, and exactly one person has died as a direct result of the radiation in the disaster. A handful of others died after the accident, but none seem to be due to radiation. And the plant at Fukushima was actuAlly older than the one in Chernobyl. Granted, it still shows you shouldn’t build nuclear plants in a geologically unstable part of the world without making damn sure it can withstand any conditions it may encounter, but still. Looking into the Fukushima disaster and finding out how far removed it really was from Chernobyl was like listening to that infamous Christian Bale rant and realizing that “Holy Shit, he’s railing at that lighting tech WHILE STILL IN CHARACTER.”

[Peebothuhlu]

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So what do you think? Should we keep the nukes, even build new ones as these protesters demand in order to save the climate, or throw them out and go for 100% Wind+Solar?

Build more Nuke plants.

Systems, material science, our understanding of their workings... Have all increased over the half century since the first 'Pile' was put together on a basket-ball court.

'Renewables'... Technically aren't.

The materials from which turbines etc are made generally consume more energy than they mechanically (Wind, water) or 'Electronically' (Not actually sure on eht sub term of 'Photvoltaic'? Is is sub atomic, since photons are smacking electrons about? *Shrug*) generate within the service life time of the equipment.

Atomic energy is a hundred fold more 'power' dense than chemical or mechanical energy.

For your capital investement you litterally get 'More bang per buck'.

*Plants flag on hill... Prepares for incomming...*



Not at work.

[Fake Messiah]

So what does it mean when, recently, Angela Merkel said that she will be fighting climate change with all her strength:
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germa...SKBN1YY1IF

So what is my opinion on closing nukes? I think it is paranoid that they will go the way of Fukushima, especially since the main reason Fukushima was so bad was because it was by the sea and it got flooded.

But that said, NPPs aren’t so much green since they are hard to build and produce lots of nuclear waste.

When it comes to solution take Bill Gates and how he has (had?) this promising company that was developing Traveling Wave Reactor (nuclear power plant that uses and "eats" nuclear waste and is small and easy to build). And it was so promising that he even made a deal with president of China that, if he develops TWR, he will get to build them all over China which gave him additional enthusiasm to develop it. But then came in Trump and with his trade war with China the deal fell apart.

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

And Gates isn’t the only one, there are other companies trying to develop this kind of nuclear reactors which is covered in the documentary called “New Fire”.

But the BIG question is: why is such an important technology left for the private sector to develop? Why don’t governments of the world (or one government) make a plan and investment to develop it? Are they all in the pockets of oil industries or is something else going on?

I mean in the ecology topic I posted recently video by Vice about technologies to battle climate change and they're all funded by Bill Gates. Nobody else seems to give a shit and is buying yachts instead.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Godzilla Breath, it's the way of the future!

[The Grand Nudger]

Fukushima went pear shaped because they decided to cut costs on the building reinforcement necessary to put the backup gens at elevation. Opting to put them in the basement, instead, that they knew could be flooded.

In theory, nuclear power is our best bet...but in practice..well, they'll build em like they built fukushima.

[Mr Greene]

Accidents happen,
Germany;

Rheinsburg 1973 breach in coolant pipe Level 2 event

Greifswald 1975 Near Core Meltdown

Hamm-Uentrop 1986 Damaged Fuel elements in Thorium Reactor contaminated surrounding area.

Hessen 1987 Failed Stop Valve, contaminated reactor building

Greifswald 1989 Control of reactor lost, coolant pump failure, Close to meltdown

Looking over the saftey records I'd revise my previous statement to 'Make sure the reactors in East Germany are never used again...'