Nuclear Power. What are your views?

Minto said:
Actually he is right, a fission reactor can be used to generate fuel for fusion, though the major route is by cladding the reactor with lithium-6 and letting escaping neutrons fuse with this to form lithium-7 which is one of the nuclei required for the latest generation of fusion prototypes. (7Li can also be made from the material waste, though obviously not all of the waste is expended or converted to 7Li)
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I stand corrected :p
 
The idea that Nuclear is dangerous is a complete nonsense IMO. I live reasonably close to Sizewell and have been there a few times, as well as to a couple of other nuclear plants. When you can happily stand on top of the core and see round the premises I don't think we have anything to worry about in terms of operational safety with modern reactors. There is room there for a third plant and I see no reason not to build one there.

I agree that we have almost left it too late though. We should have started construction at least 5 if not 10 years ago of a new round of plants so they are coming on stream soon. It's a typical problem of gov't to wait till we are at a crisis before doing anything about it. I'm not bashing Labour here either, I don't think the Conservatives would have been any better and I know the Liberals would have been worse as there is a large anti-nuclear contingent there.

As far as the quantities of Uranium go if we put our minds to it we could quite happilly at least double the use we got from it. By using two different types of reactor we can use the fuel once, reprocess and then use it again. IMO the idea that we are going to run out of uranium any time soon is a red herring.

What we really do need to focus on is safe disposal of the waste and ensuring that with what we now know safe disposal is built in to the initial build of a new station.
 
I hate it when people pose questions like "would you be happy living next to a nuclear power station?" . Everyone will say "no", it's a classic "not in my back yard" response. A better question would be:

"Rank these in order of preference
a) Live next to a nuclear power station
b) Live next to a coal fired power station
c) Live next to gas fired power station
d) Have no electricity."

My personal opinion is that in the short to mid term there is only one solution, construct more gas fired power stations and except the fact that the UK will become dependant on imports. Nuclear stations cannot be built in time to replace the current aging coal and nuclear generators. Renewable technologies today have a very important place, but today they are not mature enough to power an industrial, modern nation.

The long term future (15-20+ years) is what we would be addressing today and the key factor will be diversity of supply. This includes nuclear, renewables (including micro generation), better energy efficiency and conventional fossil fuels.
 
I'm in favour of it, and wish the environmentalists who are so concerned about carbon emissions would stop being so bloody two faced and stop protesting about nuclear power as well. Nuclear waste can be stored deep underground, and hey, if we generated half and half from Nuclear/Renewable sources, we'd have 0% carbon emissions from power generation!

If we're worried about the safety, whilst I think we've probably come a long way from Sellafield..as much as it galls me, we could consult the French! As they generate most of their power from Nuclear.
 
what of people in the future dig it up? what we need is fusion not fission. no waste and energy is given out. (but it needs to be at about 3000000 degrees)
 
Inquisitor said:
While nuclear power is pretty awesome (safe, clean, reliable, etc.), it won't last forever; there is currently about 50 or 70 years of easily accessible uranium left in the crust. Of course, if a viable method of recycling used fuel or truly sustainable fusion reactions can be thought up in that time then we're fine :)
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http://www.americanenergyindependence.com/uranium.html

There is no real risk of us running out of nuclear material in our civilisation. There is so much readilly available uranium we havn't even bothered thinking about where more reserves might be or extraction methods from lower grade sites. The article says it far better than I can if you fancy a read.
 
i'm well up for nuclear but i think all households should be fitted with a solar panel or 2 also.

kinda mad that all the stuff we talked about as a kid in geography nearly 20 years ago is finally becoming reality :(

anyway scrap Trident and invest that into This issue, if any government do that they have my respect for life.
 
The only problem I see with nuclear is the long term storage of waste which IIRC is on roughly a 10,000 year timescale. This is a far too large timescale to be able to guarantee safety IMO. The political landscape is likely to change beyond all recognition over that period of time and countries and governments now investing in nuclear technology may well cease to exist so who is going to take on the responsibility?
 
I'm all for it, as long as they have a good way of getting rid of the waste. There is no way we can just rely on renewable fuels, on BBC News they said there was a huge wind farm being built in the north sea, which would only produce 75mW, a Nuclear power plant can output 1600mW! To get that sort of power from wind you'd probably have to surround the whole of Britain with bloody wind turbines, I'd much rather have just one nuclear power plant in a remote location.

So basically Nuclear is the only option we have. Obviously use renewale fuels as well whilst the technology develops but relying on it solely would be a huge mistake.
 
I'm totally in favour of nuclear power, and would happily support one being built close to my home for the benefits it brings. The vast, vast majority of issues with it are political, rather than technological in nature, and a modern nuclear plant is incredibly safe.

There are also technologies that can deal efficiently with waste, dramatically reducing both the amount and the danger from it, as well as allowing more efficient use of fuel through reprocessing.

Some links on various reactor types and their benefits.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pressurized_water_reactor (like sizewell B)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_breeder_reactor (killed by the UK government for political, rather than technological reasons, capable of breeding fuel, hence the name, and dramatically reducing the amount of nuclear waste that needs disposal)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_IV_reactor This is where our research should be going if the whingers ever stop and allow it.
 
Agree with you completely Dolph (as usual :p). It's just a shame that nuclear power has such a negative stigma attached to it really. Little do people realise that it's actually incredibly safe and clean. :(

Usher said:
It amazing that even with nuclear power it still needs steam to run the generators
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It's pretty much the standard way of converting thermal energy (which is what fission and fusion reactors produce lots of) into electrical energy on a large scale :)
 
Usher said:
It amazing that even with nuclear power it still needs steam to run the generators
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As my old thermodynamics lecturer used to say after nearly 200 years the world still all runs on steam they just dont see it now.
 
Jaffa_Cake said:
An exam I had last week had this very question in. Well, it was about the future of power in the UK.

Came to the conclusion that wind power was the best solution.

No damage to environment.
Safe
Cheap
Quick to built.
Who gives a crap about peoples views and how it 'pollutes' the view. Whining tbh.
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If you want wind stick a little turbine in your back yard - don't rip up the wilderness with your access roads and giant turbines.
 
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