leftists that diss nuclear really grind my gears. nuclear has the best outlook in terms of resource consumption. its mostly concrete. shit like solar, wind, etc. require a fuckton of rare earth materials, battery storage, and land use (and thusly: habitat destruction). they also produce a lot of carbon emissions to create, and require more labor. look at france and sweden. they are the most carbon friendly, fully industrialized nations and they use nuclear extensively. china has been very wise to invest heavily in nuclear too. look at their roadmaps. theyre hoping to quadruple their already solid nuclear production.
lets also talk about imperialism. rare earth materials are commonly found in the global south. bolivia had a regime change over lithium. choosing nuclear is very important to the global south's independent development.
It's been years since I've learned this, so I don't know how valid it is in the proper context, but from what I remember mining uranium is incredibly destructive and poisonous for the immediate environment, and for those working those mines.
If someone who knows more about the actual mining can shed more light on this, I'd appreciate it, since this is basically the only holdout I have for not embracing nuclear fully.
I do know that the energy density is off the charts, but is it enough to make the mining impact less than, say, solar?
Also someone please finally confirm whether or not thorium is viable or just a meme.
Uranium mining, like all mining is harmful and destructive. That said most uranium comes from relatively first world nations and is regulated to the teeth ( because of the potential for weapons- grade material to be made). Advanced in ventilation, and the switch to mining ore robotically has rendered extraction relatively safe. Importantly, uranium ore is not smelted ( I'll come back to this later). Old uranium mines, like a lot of old mines, are environmental disaster areas that need to be cleaned up.
By contrast, precious metals, especially cobalt, come from third world countries (mostly africa) that don't have functioning governments. Mines are run by thugs among populations so desperately poor that families send their kids to work in mines. This is just the form of modern slavery . The materials to make your phone or device came from these mines. These are the same materials whose production needs to be increased to increase production of wind, solar, electric cars, etc.
Precious metals, copper, lead/zinc and many other metals, in existing mining districts are smelted. (Hydrometallurgy is an improvement and is being practiced extensively in some mining areas). Smelting is responsible for most of the world's most polluted places, and it's responsible (at least it used to be) the largest share of greenhouse emissions. These places are sometimes in regions among some of the world's poorest populations.
As far as I can find, what a mine is mining has very little to do with its environmental/safety impact. The literature focuses on style of mine (pit, shaft, whatever) and almost never mentions the actual product. I guess intuitively, any random chunk of rock is going to have a whole bunch of different stuff in it, some of it poisonous, and what you intend to keep doesn't affect what's down there.
Thorium is conceptually viable and should be researched, but is not even close to being ready for the kind of mass deployment needed to be relevant for dealing with climate change. Basically anyone who's trying to pitch a reactor idea that isn't "copy a recent safe reactor ad nauseum" has accidentally fell for someone or another's marketing pitch.
i literally date a nuclear physicist. you are wrong. only wind beats out nuclear, and that isnt a global, reliable solution. solar also produces 50% more carbon. you must also consider the cost of transferring energy from region to region: there is a reason why solar isn't powering everything right now and the optimal spots are rare to find. the lack of nuclear power is mostly due to social pressure.
Okay. Maybe your nuclear physicist boyfriend is slightly biased in the nuclear vs renewables argument.
Because it's widely agreed upon and demonstrated throughout the past few decades how prohibitively expensive building and maintaining nuclear plants is. That's why we don't do it.
It's both. There is valid fear about producing nuclear waste given human propensity to using it for war and tendency to fuck up and kill a lot of people on accident.
continue with your capitalist arguments of 'cost'. the human cost of replacing an entire infrastructure worth of solar panels will be more than nuclear.
We are not arguing among each other on how to use our money. I would not argue cost with you if that was what we were discussing, obviously.
This isn't an idealistic argument though, it's one of reality and current policies.
People, as in the government and the people who support certain policies, do not justify the insane expense and long term effort of nuclear for a system that in the minds of many can fail and harm millions. Versus actual renewable energy and investing into developing renewable technology.
You can be right in theory that a full dedication to development of nuclear power over 30 years would be better, but there are many arguments like that to be made that are detached from reality. China could do that, Russia is doing that. The US cannot with our constant trade between parties in power and lack of political will to continue the projects of past administrations that combat climate disaster.
Which has an enormous carbon footprint. Mining nuclear fuel is also pretty bad in terms off land use and habitat destruction. The bulk of uranium mining is done in Kazakhstan, mostly through hydraulic fracturing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_situ_leach). I'm not necessarily against nuclear as part of an energy mixture that gets away from fossil fuels, but it's still just one shitty option among many.
Solar is 50% worse than nuclear for lifetime CO2 emissions per kilowatt-hour. Nuclear and wind tie for the best.
Obviously, not all countries can use wind. You can find the academic sources by googling their images. Hydroelectric is also good but that comes with its own problems. You're severely underestimating the amount of solar panels needed and the amount of mining that will require in comparison to even just uranium. You don't need a huge supply of uranium to accomplish a decade's worth of energy production. Thorium and other reactants are better because we accidentally dig that stuff up all the time, so it requires less concerted mining.
for reference on wind: https://globalwindatlas.info/
The United States is a good candidate for wind generation but there are still industrial hurdles there. You need an average wind speed greater than 7.5 m/s in order to export energy, lets also not forget that it takes significant amounts of energy to transfer electricity from one region to another. When you take this into account, the only sensible options are Wind, Hydroelectric, and Nuclear, with Hydroelectric and Nuclear being the top choices by a long shot. However, due to the fact that hydro is very environment damaging, you are confined to Wind and Nuclear, with nuclear being the bulk. Wind typically only works in currently well developed nations, unfortunately, so many of developing nations are going to be shoehorned into relying on the west for solar panel imports or learning nuclear tech from China for green alternatives. With the first option, you might as well laugh it off. It means nuclear is the only way forward and it would be wise to focus all our efforts on it in order to make development easier for the global south.
France has soldiers in Niger to protect their uranium mines, and they invaded Mali because the rebels were a threat to that.
I dont know if nuclear is ultimately better than the rest, but it's not clear cut like people make it out to be. It uses resources you have to dig out of the ground, it has high startup costs, it produces waste, and you have to be absolutely diligent about maintenance throughout the entirety of its lifespan.
Again maybe it edges out the alternatives, but only by a bit. I still think wind, solar, and hydroelectric should be the main focus of investment
no, nuclear is significantly better. uranium isnt the best fuel for anti-imperialism obviously, its used to create bombs and is rarer. i dont have my sources on me rn but if i remember to get back to you i will lmao
leftists that diss nuclear really grind my gears. nuclear has the best outlook in terms of resource consumption. its mostly concrete. shit like solar, wind, etc. require a fuckton of rare earth materials, battery storage, and land use (and thusly: habitat destruction). they also produce a lot of carbon emissions to create, and require more labor. look at france and sweden. they are the most carbon friendly, fully industrialized nations and they use nuclear extensively. china has been very wise to invest heavily in nuclear too. look at their roadmaps. theyre hoping to quadruple their already solid nuclear production.
lets also talk about imperialism. rare earth materials are commonly found in the global south. bolivia had a regime change over lithium. choosing nuclear is very important to the global south's independent development.
It's been years since I've learned this, so I don't know how valid it is in the proper context, but from what I remember mining uranium is incredibly destructive and poisonous for the immediate environment, and for those working those mines.
If someone who knows more about the actual mining can shed more light on this, I'd appreciate it, since this is basically the only holdout I have for not embracing nuclear fully. I do know that the energy density is off the charts, but is it enough to make the mining impact less than, say, solar?
Also someone please finally confirm whether or not thorium is viable or just a meme.
Uranium mining, like all mining is harmful and destructive. That said most uranium comes from relatively first world nations and is regulated to the teeth ( because of the potential for weapons- grade material to be made). Advanced in ventilation, and the switch to mining ore robotically has rendered extraction relatively safe. Importantly, uranium ore is not smelted ( I'll come back to this later). Old uranium mines, like a lot of old mines, are environmental disaster areas that need to be cleaned up.
By contrast, precious metals, especially cobalt, come from third world countries (mostly africa) that don't have functioning governments. Mines are run by thugs among populations so desperately poor that families send their kids to work in mines. This is just the form of modern slavery . The materials to make your phone or device came from these mines. These are the same materials whose production needs to be increased to increase production of wind, solar, electric cars, etc.
Precious metals, copper, lead/zinc and many other metals, in existing mining districts are smelted. (Hydrometallurgy is an improvement and is being practiced extensively in some mining areas). Smelting is responsible for most of the world's most polluted places, and it's responsible (at least it used to be) the largest share of greenhouse emissions. These places are sometimes in regions among some of the world's poorest populations.
As far as I can find, what a mine is mining has very little to do with its environmental/safety impact. The literature focuses on style of mine (pit, shaft, whatever) and almost never mentions the actual product. I guess intuitively, any random chunk of rock is going to have a whole bunch of different stuff in it, some of it poisonous, and what you intend to keep doesn't affect what's down there.
Thorium is conceptually viable and should be researched, but is not even close to being ready for the kind of mass deployment needed to be relevant for dealing with climate change. Basically anyone who's trying to pitch a reactor idea that isn't "copy a recent safe reactor ad nauseum" has accidentally fell for someone or another's marketing pitch.
thorium is viable and far more common its just not a ton of research on it because the field is focusing more on fusion for its new research
Except building nuclear plants is extremely expensive and far too long term for the US to stick through for several administrations.
and other green facilities arent? lmao
No, moron. Comparatively they cost less.
i literally date a nuclear physicist. you are wrong. only wind beats out nuclear, and that isnt a global, reliable solution. solar also produces 50% more carbon. you must also consider the cost of transferring energy from region to region: there is a reason why solar isn't powering everything right now and the optimal spots are rare to find. the lack of nuclear power is mostly due to social pressure.
Okay. Maybe your nuclear physicist boyfriend is slightly biased in the nuclear vs renewables argument.
Because it's widely agreed upon and demonstrated throughout the past few decades how prohibitively expensive building and maintaining nuclear plants is. That's why we don't do it.
It's not cost, it's political will (essentially, overcoming fear).
It's both. There is valid fear about producing nuclear waste given human propensity to using it for war and tendency to fuck up and kill a lot of people on accident.
continue with your capitalist arguments of 'cost'. the human cost of replacing an entire infrastructure worth of solar panels will be more than nuclear.
We are not arguing among each other on how to use our money. I would not argue cost with you if that was what we were discussing, obviously.
This isn't an idealistic argument though, it's one of reality and current policies.
People, as in the government and the people who support certain policies, do not justify the insane expense and long term effort of nuclear for a system that in the minds of many can fail and harm millions. Versus actual renewable energy and investing into developing renewable technology.
You can be right in theory that a full dedication to development of nuclear power over 30 years would be better, but there are many arguments like that to be made that are detached from reality. China could do that, Russia is doing that. The US cannot with our constant trade between parties in power and lack of political will to continue the projects of past administrations that combat climate disaster.
Which has an enormous carbon footprint. Mining nuclear fuel is also pretty bad in terms off land use and habitat destruction. The bulk of uranium mining is done in Kazakhstan, mostly through hydraulic fracturing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_situ_leach). I'm not necessarily against nuclear as part of an energy mixture that gets away from fossil fuels, but it's still just one shitty option among many.
Obviously, not all countries can use wind. You can find the academic sources by googling their images. Hydroelectric is also good but that comes with its own problems. You're severely underestimating the amount of solar panels needed and the amount of mining that will require in comparison to even just uranium. You don't need a huge supply of uranium to accomplish a decade's worth of energy production. Thorium and other reactants are better because we accidentally dig that stuff up all the time, so it requires less concerted mining.
https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2019/04/nuclear-energy-is-50-better-than-solar-for-lifetime-co2-emissions.html
http://www.world-nuclear.org/uploadedFiles/org/WNA/Publications/Working_Group_Reports/comparison_of_lifecycle.pdf
for reference on wind: https://globalwindatlas.info/
The United States is a good candidate for wind generation but there are still industrial hurdles there. You need an average wind speed greater than 7.5 m/s in order to export energy, lets also not forget that it takes significant amounts of energy to transfer electricity from one region to another. When you take this into account, the only sensible options are Wind, Hydroelectric, and Nuclear, with Hydroelectric and Nuclear being the top choices by a long shot. However, due to the fact that hydro is very environment damaging, you are confined to Wind and Nuclear, with nuclear being the bulk. Wind typically only works in currently well developed nations, unfortunately, so many of developing nations are going to be shoehorned into relying on the west for solar panel imports or learning nuclear tech from China for green alternatives. With the first option, you might as well laugh it off. It means nuclear is the only way forward and it would be wise to focus all our efforts on it in order to make development easier for the global south.
France has soldiers in Niger to protect their uranium mines, and they invaded Mali because the rebels were a threat to that.
I dont know if nuclear is ultimately better than the rest, but it's not clear cut like people make it out to be. It uses resources you have to dig out of the ground, it has high startup costs, it produces waste, and you have to be absolutely diligent about maintenance throughout the entirety of its lifespan.
Again maybe it edges out the alternatives, but only by a bit. I still think wind, solar, and hydroelectric should be the main focus of investment
no, nuclear is significantly better. uranium isnt the best fuel for anti-imperialism obviously, its used to create bombs and is rarer. i dont have my sources on me rn but if i remember to get back to you i will lmao