Draco_Aster Posted June 8, 2006 Posted June 8, 2006 Nuclear power is now being considered as an alternative primary power source in Australia. We have extremely large deposits of uranium ore whick is currently being sold off to countries like China. Many countries such as America, France and China are depending on nuclear power and I would like to know what you guys think of it. There are obvious drawbacks such as what happed in Chernobyl and Three Mile Island but I have been informaed that these risks have been eliminated. Is there any increased radioactivity in areas surrounding an nuclear powder plant? I have searched but but couldn't find a clear answer. So what do you guys think? I will be voting Yes from information I have gathered.
dragonman586 Posted June 8, 2006 Posted June 8, 2006 Well there definately are drawbacks. There is one near here known ans Indian Point. It sprung a leak and started releasing bits of strontium 90. If i'm not mistaken the body can mistake strontium 90 for calcium and deposit it into your bones where it will radiate for a while. And with the whole terrorist hollabaloo, It's definately a target. And the power companies here don't pass on the savings from using nuclear power so screw them.
Dr Boom Posted June 8, 2006 Posted June 8, 2006 Nuclear power is rather misleading the way the media plays it off and how the general public knows how nuclear power works. Ask someone and the answer you might get is- "Yeah, the people throw in the Uranium and burn it making electricity..." While this is somewhat true in a round-about way; it is an incorrect perception on nuclear power itself. Nothing "radioactive" used on a large scale yet, provides direct electrical usable energy. Uranium is self heating (to the point of critical mass) when you get enough of it in one place and throw in enough water and *poof*- you get a whole lotta steam for turbines that drive electrical generators. That's it in a nut shell! Massive problems such as Chernobyl and Three Mile Island were caused by inefficent designs and human error. With technology making leaps and bounds like it is and learning from mistakes of course- nuclear energy use is very safe. As far as making the area unsafe- direct nuclear byproducts would have to contact the environment for that to happen and international and local laws are extremely tight on waste removal and disposal. I've had the wonderful opportunity to work with my own homebuilt particle accelerator and I must say- someone, somewhere is getting rediculously rich off the "turn and burn" design currently used in nuclear power plants. I remember a few years back that I got to talk to a fella in Australia who was working with radioactive "batteries". These batteries worked off the radiation from anything nuclear and would run for the better part of an isotope half life! Jeez, if you could use Iodine 129, the battery would last for almost 17 Million years... Who's in line for one of those?!? Well, they ain't on the market yet due to the fact you can't just go down to the corner pharmacy and pick up a pound of energized Americium 243 to tinker in your garage with- or can you?? I used several/several dead smoke detectors which have a small chip of Americium 243 in them (about 1/4 gram) was removed and placed in a lead container due to the heavy Alpha and Gamma radiation. And yes I still have all my hair from this experiment. When I had enough (about 4 grams worth) I constructed the second part of my idea which was a helical device to capture the alpha particles. I used sheets of Tin and lead of about 1/4 inch thickness for protection and a couple of megnetron tubes from two donor microwave ovens-- may they R.I.Pieces.. On energising the Am 243 I got massive particle outputs that I directed at a target of Carbon 14 in a wire filled aluminum container- the electron spike from the Carbon 14 piece (which was about 2 grams) "blinked" a small LED light attached to the wire loom. Huh, I remember thinking that I could spend about 100,000$ in material today and never have electrical concerns for the rest of my life since the half life of C14 is 5700 years! Good grief why aren't the energy companies just pushing each other into moving traffic for this gold mine?? Well, people aren't thinking long term here and they want money the "now" way. Same with the oil industry but I'll not get into that, that's a whole nuther post... In short- sorry for the rambling- nulcear is "the way" to go, but we have to use it differently in the furture.
teknix Posted June 9, 2006 Posted June 9, 2006 "Is there any increased radioactivity in areas surrounding an nuclear power plant? " No. You will get more radiation from standing outside in the sun than you will standing in the room with the reactor.
lacrima97 Posted June 13, 2006 Posted June 13, 2006 If I am thinking right, weren't the chernobyl and 3-mile island accidents due to a purposeful overheating of the system, to see if they could recover from it if a problem occured? Maybe it was only one of them, or maybe none. I can't remember.
PyroJoe Posted June 13, 2006 Posted June 13, 2006 I just got done talking to my uncle about both of these subjects last week. He has been a nuclear reactor operator for a long time, but if I screw something up its my fault for not remembering, but this is a summary of what he told me about those accidents. Yes, the chernobyl accident happened because of an intended low power "test" that went horribly wrong. In that particular reactor they used big graphite blocks to slow down the speed of the nuclear raection, instead of water. Once the reactor exploded the graphite blocks caught fire, spewing radioactive particles all over the place and in the air through the smoke of the fire. That is what caused the most damage was because of the huge fires that started and helped spread the radioactivity into the air. 3 mile island wasn't much of an accident compared to chernobyl. A valve on their coolant system blew off and let water out as it should have because it began to heat up, but didnt close back up to keep the rest of the coolant water in. The system failed to tell the operators that the valve wasn't closed. Water began to leak from the cooling system and the emergency water injection pumps turned on to fill the coolant system back up as they should have. The operators let the pumps run and water levels showed that they were full, when in reality the levels were dropping. The pumps began to shake violently beacause the water levels were so low that the water turned to steam, so the pumps were shut off. The water continued to leak from the coolant system until the reactor core was exposed, causing the reactor to over heat and part of it melt. Radioactive fuel leaked directly into the water system which was shooting out the side of the nuclear plant. Although when water would blow off from the system it just landed in a holding tank next to the plant. So the radioactive fuel only got into that holding tank and no further. Therefore it didn't really cause any damage. Of course officials evacuated everyone from that area just in case, so it seemed like it was a lot worse than it really was. 3 mile island was just a huge mess of mis-communication between reactor operators and the system malfunctioning. In my opinion nuclear power is far more superior to fossil fuels. It uses MUCH less fuel, and really is safer and cleaner than burning fossil fuels. So many people die in coal mines. Much more than have ever died running a nuclear power plant. Technology has also come a long ways, so nuke plants are much safer and easier to run than they used to be.
justanotherpyro Posted June 13, 2006 Posted June 13, 2006 The design of the Chernobyl reactor was ridiculous. It didn't have a containment vessel for the reactor to leak into in case of an emergency, and in order to shut down the reactor, the control rods had to be fully opened first. Whoever the hell designed that piece of shit should be shot. 3 Mile Island as previously stated was a mix of human and mechanical error and was hyped up so much by the fucking media as a disaster, when in reality the safety measures performed flawlessly and didn't kill a single person. I don't remember the exact statistics, but the fossil fuel power plant kill hundreds of people every year, and the existing nuclear powerplants have yet to kill anywhere near that number. That, and the fact that waste differences are astounding. I swear that if I hear one more person tell me that they are against nuclear power because they don't want it to go A-bomb, I'm going to loosen a few of their teeth. Dumbshit soccer moms, and dumbshit politicians are why we aren't more heavily dependent on nuclear power, and are still having are balls squeezed by oil companies abroad. As you can tell, I am very much so for it, and I hate misinformed people who actually get to vote on this shit.
Rooster Posted June 13, 2006 Posted June 13, 2006 One thing not talked too much about here is what to do with the nuclear waste. Flying it to space is out of the question, since the rocket might explode. Any views?
lacrima97 Posted June 13, 2006 Posted June 13, 2006 I will say this. About 50 miles away, there is this underground storage facility for nuclear waste, and it isn't the nicest thought in my mind.
PyroJoe Posted June 13, 2006 Posted June 13, 2006 Yes, but think of all that nasty black smoke spewing into the air you are breathing right now from huge coal plants. What about those garbage land fills next you as well? Those cause much more damage leaking stuff into water systems than nuclear waste storage. Also, 90% of that nuclear waste everyone talks about is random crap that got contaminated and had to be thrown out. Such as old boots, hard hats, shirts, coveralls, and old respirators. It's not like those barrels are full of green radioactive goo that is leaking everywhere!
Mumbles Posted June 13, 2006 Posted June 13, 2006 The amount of waste is actually quite small. We have a small nuclear reactor on campus. They go through a 10g pellet of UO2 every two years I think it is. Well, it's a pellet containing 10g of UO2. That pellet is sent back out, re-refined and more pellets are created from it. Honestly, I would be more scared of the cadmium from the control rods than the uranium itself.
lacrima97 Posted June 13, 2006 Posted June 13, 2006 True, I will admit, it is alot better than burning fossil fuels. And true, one uranium pellet smaller than a penny, produces as much energy as 900,000 lbs of gasoline. I guess it is better for the environment. They store the waste far underground anyway. Unlike the batteries stored above ground at the land fill. The sulfuric acid can't be near as safe as waste underground.
justanotherpyro Posted June 13, 2006 Posted June 13, 2006 The US built a nuclear waste storage facility in the Nevada mountains. We spent billions on the project in research for the best location and then the actual building of it. The fucking hippies won't let us use it. Why the hell we don't do something about it is beyond me, when the alternative ( fossil fuels ) produces far more waste. A random story I remember is about a kid named David Hahn who built a nuclear breeder reactor out of common items like smoke detectors and lithium batteries etc. Its and intersting article, I have a notepad if anyone wants me to upload it. The concept of nuclear breeder reactors is downright astounding. Same thing as filling your car with gasoline, driving around and the whole time the fuel is making more fuel and filling your tank again and again and again. Damn hippies.
Frozentech Posted June 14, 2006 Posted June 14, 2006 The US built a nuclear waste storage facility in the Nevada mountains. We spent billions on the project in research for the best location and then the actual building of it. The fucking hippies won't let us use it. Why the hell we don't do something about it is beyond me, when the alternative ( fossil fuels ) produces far more waste. A random story I remember is about a kid named David Hahn who built a nuclear breeder reactor out of common items like smoke detectors and lithium batteries etc. Its and intersting article, I have a notepad if anyone wants me to upload it. The concept of nuclear breeder reactors is downright astounding. Same thing as filling your car with gasoline, driving around and the whole time the fuel is making more fuel and filling your tank again and again and again. Damn hippies. That's the name of the kid. I forgot the name, but my son ( who is a reactor operator in the US Navy ) was talking about him. Hahn is sort of a joke in the nuke community. He joined the Navy but couldn't get in the nuclear field, 1) because of his arrest record, and 2) because he took an unknown rad dose, and any nuke worker is closely monitored for that. He'll never get a job near a nuke plant for that reason I suppose.
ActionTekJackson Posted June 18, 2006 Posted June 18, 2006 WTF? I'd consider the car out in my drivfeway to be more dangerous, driving it around, a rock or nail, theoretically, big enough could fling off a tire or bounce up and puncture the gas tank causing a spark blowing the little tin can to crap. The idea that the material in a nuclear power plant might A-bomb is ridiculous! The material used is not that refined, and even if it were you'd have to have a primary explosive charge to compact the material to critical mass, where then, a reaction would start causing the material to heat extremely fast and thus explode....(in simple terms anyway) This is practically impossible in a power plant environment... Not to mention there has been talk of a method ( can't remember what its called) that can be used to de-radiate items in as little as two years, where normally it would take hundreds or thousands, but apparently this method costs too much, and the hippies are still crappin their pants everytime they here about nuclear power/waste. *shakes head* ahh, this world is retarded sometimes...
lacrima97 Posted June 18, 2006 Posted June 18, 2006 WTF? I'd consider the car out in my drivfeway to be more dangerous, driving it around, a rock or nail, theoretically, big enough could fling off a tire or bounce up and puncture the gas tank causing a spark blowing the little tin can to crap. "primary explosive charge to compact the material to critical mass, where then, a reaction would start causing the material to heat extremely fast and thus explode...." Spark blowing up a gas tank? Primary explosive setting off a nulcear fission reaction? You ok bud?
Swany Posted June 18, 2006 Posted June 18, 2006 Well, if the nail that punctured your gas tank was zinc coated iron, and we presume that it spontaniously underwent compelete nuclear decomposition turning the immediate area into a plasma ball of death doom and destruction complete with subatomic particles of angryness.... yes? Otherwise, you watch too many movies. Even the kewl Mythbusters proved gas tanks are fairly safe from projectiles, let alone nails. I would rank the probability of that about the 7th least probable event in the universe, the top few are probably just coincidences or something.... And if one had enough primary, and knew how it worked. There are several parts to a fission/fusion device. Not just a slab of acceptably fissable/fuseable material and some explosives. Well, at the most crude level, but I digress. Stupid anti-chemistry facishsts who do not understand it. People are afraid of decaf coffee due to the DCM used to extract the caffine. Hello fellows! Its all gone! Hello fellows! The politically correct salad you had for lunch is more likely to cause you to die from asphyxiation (whatever the spelling is) rather than die from radiation. Silly fools. If only they knew what was really bad for them. I hold no illusions, or delusions, about how safe I am. I know I am exposed to loads of badness, but... no point to living if you cannot feel alive. We all die sometime, some sooner than others. Perhaps my life span will be longer due to no stress and such. Such that is will be until someone changes it.
ActionTekJackson Posted June 18, 2006 Posted June 18, 2006 LMAO.... I was using as a relation to how ridiculous the chances are of nuclear power related death. Truth is, you do have a better chance of dyin in ur car than from a nuclear power plant. And if one had enough primary, and knew how it worked. There are several parts to a fission/fusion device. Not just a slab of acceptably fissable/fuseable material and some explosives. Well, at the most crude level, but I digress. This is partially my point, very few of the requirements to bring about a nuclear explosion CANNOT occur within a reactor. The most that really can happen is the coolant, for some reason or another doesn't work, and the core melts through its containment, hence the phrase "meltdown" it really has nothing to do with an explosion.
Boomer Posted June 19, 2006 Posted June 19, 2006 "The most that really can happen is ... the core melts through its containment" And even that can be avoided by construction, by pressing the fuel into graphite balls. Overheat --> moderator sublimes away --> reaction stops (simplified). These also breed their own fuel. But the idiots shut them down worldwide, keeping the old-style reactors running... "...has nothing to do with an explosion" in Chernobyl it had, but that was because there was no sturdy dome to contain the *water vapour* explosion which spread the radioactive waste. No *nuclear' explosion took place, you are right of course.
teknix Posted June 20, 2006 Posted June 20, 2006 I hate it when people associate a nuclear reactor with a nuclear weapon... "I'm afraid of a nuclear power plant because it's a ticking time bomb that sooner or later it's going to go up in a mushroom cloud." That sort of mentality that the general public seems to have. It is basically impossible to have it go into a nuclear explosion because that is very hard to achive. You have to has the critical mass of the nuclear material and it has to be in a certain shape so it can be compressed evenly and has to be covered in explosive material to compress it and the explosive material has to be detonated evemly with slapper detornators or whatever those new ones are that have harly any reaction time for them to go off. But anyhow yeah You have to have the conditions like super right for anything like that to happen and there is no way with the materials at the plant that could happen. Yeah the worst thing that could possibly happen is the core over heating and melting down and having some steam explosions. But plants now have so many safeguards in that is nearly impossible to happen as well. A coal firing plant is probably more dangerous to run and operate than a nuclear plant. It's kind of like how people are afraid to fly but they will drive in a car. Just because 1 or so planes a year wreak and the news plasters it all over the place. Even though millions of cars wreak a year and much more lives are lost to that for some reason people think it is safer.
BPinthemorning Posted August 4, 2008 Posted August 4, 2008 (edited) Just want to throw in a little about nuclear waist. A catalyst was discovered only a year ago with a packman like molecular shape that bonds with the nuclear waist and returns it to a stable isotope. With this ability, almost all arguments against nuclear energy are eliminated, and potentially, all other deposits of nuclear waist can be disposed of. Edited August 4, 2008 by BPinthemorning
Richtee Posted August 4, 2008 Posted August 4, 2008 Just want to throw in a little about nuclear waist. A catalyst was discovered only a year ago with a packman like molecular shape t Got a link? Seems this would have been rather big news? I mean destroying nuclear waste?
Richtee Posted August 4, 2008 Posted August 4, 2008 It's kind of like how people are afraid to fly but they will drive in a car. Just because 1 or so planes a year wreak and the news plasters it all over the place. Even though millions of cars wreak a year and much more lives are lost to that for some reason people think it is safer. Well, just to play Devil's advocate here... there ain't no fender-benders with airplanes ;{)
LGM Posted August 4, 2008 Posted August 4, 2008 I think I read something about a browns gas flame being able to reduce or remove the radioactivity of spent nuclear fuel. I might have been on the canadian nuclear association website.
flying fish Posted August 4, 2008 Posted August 4, 2008 (edited) @ BPinthemorning: It would be nice if you could back that up with the corresponding article... Also, keep in mind that nuclear waste is not the only concern when dealing with nuclear power. You also have to take into consideration that the mining and refining of uranium is NOT an environmentally friendly process ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power...nmental_effects )... And Uranium...like oil...is a non-renewable resource that we can't float forever on (apparently the known uranium deposits are only enough to float us for 100 years at the current rate, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium_mining ). I don't have anything against nuclear power in the context of its use today...but I do not believe it is the "end-all be-all" energy solution. Now of course I'm talking about fission. Fusion is perhaps an even more interesting area for future energy, in my opinion. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power#Fusion . That will give us at least 3000 years from solid lithium deposits, 60 million from aqueous Li, and 150 Billion years from pure D2O fusion. Hell yeah! Of course, there is a ton of research that has to be done before it becomes a feasible energy source... Edited August 4, 2008 by flying fish
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