Nuclear power stations

[bunn]

Have I missed something? Has there been some change in the technology that means that putting new nuclear power stations on a small crowded island that is a target for suicide bombers is a good idea?

Why is it better to make radioactive waste than carbon dioxide?

I thought the whole idea had been more or less written off after Chernobyl.

Comments

[chainmailmaiden]

I don't think that it's particularly a question of whether it's better to make radioactive waste rather than carbon dioxide. It's more to do with the fact we simply won't be able to meet the demands for power in the future unless we build more nuclear power stations. The North Sea oil fields are running out quicker than expected and we are very soon going to be relying on fuel piped from Europe or even further afield. Which is all very well, but it gives us less control over the supply and the price we'll pay for it.

The type of nuclear power station they would be building would be a new generation of reactor, I don't know the details, but I would presume they would be incorporating more safety features given the events of the last few years. They do produce far less waste and though it is high toxic it is possible to store it safely.

Personally I'd like to see the Government invest more in making it affordable for ordinary households to install solar panels and mini wind turbines, but that's unlikely to happen as no one profits from it directly, apart from the consumer, whose power bills go down, displeasing the power companies. I'd also like to see it mandatory for solar panels to be installed on all new builds, and companies also made to install them as well as making their buildings more energy efficient. Bacchus and I will be getting solar panels as soon we can afford them. Unfortunately that will probably not be for several more years.

Even if all that did happen though, the demand for power increases every year. Nuclear power may not be a popular option, but unless people start to use less electricity I don't really see any other choice.

[bunn.livejournal.com]

I wondered about burning stuff - rubbish, particularly, as we have so much! - and I understood that there is now a move to make powerstations that are powered with a kind of mega-maize. That seemed nicely circular : carbon dioxide absorbed by maize-> powerstation-> carbon dioxide free -> maize again.

But I haven't heard anything at all about that since I stumbled over the report on some obscure radio station. It does sound cheaper and safer than nuclear though. All you seem to hear about is wind, which isn't reliable enough.

Our old family house in Shirwell had solar panels (well, it still does). They are pretty good for heating water, even in the winter - but we don't really get enough sun in the UK to generate electricity from it, I believe. I'm thinking we might get them here one day, though being on the north side of a hill, they might not work so well.

[bunn.livejournal.com]

Also, I think they should rot dog-poo and make methane. Did you know all the dog poo is wrapped in plastic, then taken away from poo bins and burnt in incinerators? What a huge waste of energy for a completely biodegradable substance!

[chainmailmaiden]

I agree bio-fuel should be exploited too and not just dog poo, cows famously produce lots of methane, I believe there is an island of monks that produce all their power needs from their cow shed. Then again I don't suppose their power needs are that great.

I've not heard of the maize fuel idea, I'd be interested to read more on that. My main worry would be what if the crop failed for some reason - what would they burn instead? It reminded me of the cars that can run on vegetable oil, apparently they smell like a chippy while they're running. I'd quite like one of them, but I think it might make me want to eat chips too often.

I have read about people who do manage to produce enough electricity from their solar panels that their meter runs backwards as they feed power back into the national grid. I think they had an awful lot of panels though.

[bunn.livejournal.com]

Wow - maybe solar panels have got more effective. will have to look into it again. The ones we had would be about 20 years old now so it wouldn't surprise me.

[jane-somebody.livejournal.com]

In Holland, apparantly, they have a system for recycling disposable nappies to create energy/fertilizer/paper; I wish they'd introduce that here, since I have reluctantly abandoned the idea of washable nappies as impractical for me at this time, and am feeling bad about the land-fill volume.