News from Japan

Dear Beverly, I've been watching the news as well and it seems that The West Coast of the continental US is also in danger of the tsunami. I hope you are far enough away to be safe. This has been just terrible for the people of Japan, Hawaii and now possibly the West Coast of the continental US. I hope all are safe. NJ on the East Coast has also been hit by heavy flooding. It has been a terrible weather winter for so many people. Juno

I am also watching CNN about the tsunami. How terrible! I'll be watching it all day.

Emily

I'm 90 miles from the coast, and even though for a while they were predicting that the tsunami surge would flow up the Columbia River, and issued an alert for the county I live in, my home is at 130' elevation so I was in no danger.

Terrible indeed. I watched all night long, I am just in awe of the forces of nature.

Beverly

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Glad you're safe J

This is a really bad thing, especially the nuclear power plants that are about to blow up or have already. As bad as the flooding and the quake damage is, they will heal in a couple of years. The loss of lives is sad, too, but what really worries me to death is the atomic pollution. I know it's not fair to say it at this moment, but why don't people see that atomic energy is not safe - under no circumstances in this world? And it's always the same: those who profit financially from it are wealthy enough to move somewhere else when the thing blows, and the everyday people have to stay there and suffer from the 'side effects' of so-called cheap energy. I remember Chernobyl only too well. A trauma of my youth, and I can't understand that our government here in Germany wants to continue the nuclear plants. But that's another story.

I hope that the series of quakes won't continue. I heard that California is overdue. I really dread that one. I'm not one for praying, but my thoughts go out to those people in Japan.

U.

The population of the world is 6,905,600,986 and climbing:

How about being pramatic? Unless everyone in the "first world" is willing to go *off* the electric power grid, the energy needs of world's human populations will continue to require nuclear energy for the foreseeable future. Some of the alternatives:

Coal? filthy dirty Dams? fatal for wildlife Solar? Not ready on a large scale yet Wind? Sure build a windmill for *everyone*, that has no downside. Wave? Might work for those near oceans Cold Fusion? apparently just a dream Some new magic source? Great, as soon as it is developed and built.

The Japanese built their nuclear plants to a very high standard, meant to withstand 7.0 earthquake, and so far the reports indicate no disastrous release of radiation, in spite of the fact that this was a mega-disaster. The combination of an earthquake 2 points of magnitude greater than their standard, *plus* the tsunami, and yet it has not resulted in a nuclear disaster.

Where I live, most of our power is generated by several large dams. Now some folks want them all to come down because of the negative impact on fish and other wildlife. The same bunch managed to force the closure of our only nuclear plant several years ago. A few "wind farms" are built, with more in the planning stage, but it will be years, if ever (and take up lots of real estate), before windmills will supply the energy needs of the world.

Each power source has costs and benefits. I'm willing to trust the true experts to continue to do R&D, and in the meantime build and run nuclear as part of the mix. JMHO,

Beverly

If you have wind generation you need the equivalent available in "conventional" generation too, for when the wind ISN'T blowing. We have a large wind farm near us, but when we had our coldest weather in the winter, leading to more electricity consumption, it generated diddly squat because the weather was cold, clear and still.

Exactly my view. Just as in education there is no one true way that suits everyone, there is no one single generating technology that suits all countries and situations.

Lizzy

Dear Beverly,

I feel that you are perhaps a bit angry with me; please d> Ursula Schrader wrote:

Of course all the things you said are correct; all these alternative energies have their downsides. But what upsets me is: a) Research in alternative energy sources has been neglected for many years. The reasons are various; for once there are massive interests of the atomic industry involved. Then there is 'us', the masses that are to idle and perhaps also scared to look at the dangers and downsides of cheap electricity.

b) The concept of unlimited growth. For years or rather decades we have been told that growth is good since that is what keeps the world turning, so to speak. But personally, I feel that there are limits; limits in resources as well as manpower. Many people on this planet are far from being ready for the digital age, for example; that is, in my opinion, a reason why fundamentalists of all religions are having a field day. And the way natural resources are squandered upsets me greatly, too.

I am well aware that we in the 'first world' have far more than we need and I try to limit myself in what I buy and use; but I also have to admit that I'm a 'Wirtschaftswunderkind' and thus fully in the habit of living a lush life. Old habits are hard to kill and I'm trying to start with myself before preaching to others.

At this point we might discuss the definition of 'nuclear disaster'. Probably it is a matter of generations; I remember watching old TV-spots from 1950s, issued by the US Gov. in which people are advised to 'duck and cover' in case of an atomic explosion. Personally, I don't consider a briefcase or a school desk a proper protective device against radiation.

But then, I was raised in the 1970s and '80s and there was no greater evil than 'The Bomb'; I remember that as a kid of perhaps 14 I spent nights crying inconsolably for fear of 'The Bomb' being dropped by some idiot and then what would become of our, or rather my future? My parents had a hard time to convince me that the superpowers were far too sensible to do more than threaten; I was too young to have remember the Cuba crisis.

Chernobyl didn't do much to relieve those fears; the fallout cloud blew straight over to Europe, and gathering mushrooms on holidays in Sweden was a thing of the past. I still avoid mushrooms such as chanterelles since they come from Poland, are not cultivated, and contain a up to this day a very high level of radiation.

So, did it come to the Worst Case Scenario? Probably not (yet). Good thing, and I have to admit that it might have if it would have been a Russian nuke plant. Does that mean everything is fine and dandy (and we're not talking the effects of the quake and the tsunami as such)? No, since a lot of radiation escaped. The effects of this will hit the Japanese population in the years to come, just as did Hiroshima. I have to admit here that I never fully understood why the Japanese are still so fond of atomic energy; but of course there are, as you correctly stated, practical constraints. A large population, an industrial nation, a small island with very little natural resources; if you don't look too closely, atomic energy seems the ideal solution for many problems. Many other reasons are very likely found in the structure of Japanese society, their cultural traditions and national character.

Now, this seems like I gloat on their misery, but I don't. I try hard not to judge them. They have their reasons, like we all do. But - and I think that I mentioned it in my original post - I live in a country that uses atomic energy, too, and I feel that, as a citizen of this country, it is my duty to promote the shut-down of those power plants as much as I can. If I knew the solution, or had the ultimate idea for environmentally friendly, never ending energy, I'd be a) very rich and - more important - b) very happy.

As said before - all these forms of energy production have their down sides. And yes, nuclear power is part of the mix. But few of the down sides are so lasting and serious as those of nuclear power, and that is what scares me. Also, I find it sometimes hard to trust experts blindly; many are no experts, or they are blinded by overconfidence in their expertise; and there's always the bad-day factor. But, and this I have to repeat again, we are talking a personal fear, and perhaps the group is not the right place to talk about it since it might not be shared in the same amount by everybody else. I'm sorry if I offended. Perhaps I'm just a little more sensitive these days, not in the best of shapes, if you want to.

Wow, that was a long one, and the best part of the morning went into it. I hope I could make myself a little clearer. I'm sure I didn't cover every aspect of the topic but the entire thing is so huge that I'd have to write volumes. Again, I didn't mean to offend you and perhaps I could make a little clearer why I reacted so strongly.

U.

The table below shows the human cost of mainstream and alternative energy supply sources.

Coal is by far the worst.

Nuclear is the safest, many times safer than even hydro.

Nuclear power has been demonised for far too long. As prices for the older fuels, coal and oil, continue to rise, nuclear power is the best way to provide the extra power we all need to survive: to power our transport and factories, to get goods out and food into our cities.

Thanks Alan, for providing such a rational exposition.

And power the internet and our computers! ;-)

Exactly! And the scare tactics used by those who demonize nuclear power generation, might more properly be called "propaganda".

That site is interesting. I have rooftop solar, and have had in this house for the past 25 years. We've had no accidents, no fatalities, no injuries, no illness as a result. My system doesn't generate electricity, but does heat water via an exchange with anti-freeze. This is not the first place I've lived in with solar hot water. It used to be very common in South Florida, where there is abundant sunshine.

There is plenty of sunshine in Nevada, and miles and miles of land that can't be used for anything productive. We do have practice bombing ranges and a large nuclear test facility. Also "Area 51." Nevada could produce enough electricity through solar means to supply the western United States. We're already producing a huge amount at Hoover Dam, in the southern end of the state.

It's not more widespread because of the economics. I looked into photovoltaic film for my new steel standing-seam roof, but at present there is a 50 year R.O.I. I heat with oil. Oil, gasoline and natural gas are heavily subsidized by government. Statistics on fossil fuels and nuclear fuels strike me as slanted because they don't factor in the costs of cleaning up, only the production costs. We had a hard, but successful, fight against a large coal plant just a year or two ago.

The amount of money that has been made and can be made by generating and selling electricity, and by supplying the fuels to make it have skewed the entire industry. It's very difficult to get any information that doesn't reflect the interests of one or more of the parties who benefit from government aid and profit.

As Ursula mentioned, we in the "developed" countries use a disproportionate share of energy to sustain our lifestyles. I wonder sometimes if the increase in cancers could be linked to the amount of microwaves, radar, radio waves, and electro-magnetic fields that exist today, but which did not exist only a short time ago.

We have a finite supply of fossil fuels. Our great-grandchildren may be mining the landfills for petrochemicals and minerals. Mining is big business out here, but mining companies have not cleaned up their sites when they abandon them, and we have had quite a few deaths from people falling into old mine shafts. The government seals up some -- at no cost to the companies that created the problem. Usually the company dissolves when they abandon the mine.

We need to be very careful what we do, and we need to look at real costs, not fancy power-point presentations that wrap everything up to look pretty.