Why Not Nuclear Reactors if So Much Concern about Environment?

Question

In California, we have one nuclear reactor, on half the time. We still have coal burning power plants. How many tens of thousands of kids and adults have to get asthma before CLEAN nuclear power is established? Florida has 5, their rates are 1/4 of California. Even tiny Switzerland has 5.

There have never been any nuclear 'accident's in the United States. No one was ever injured, no plant or animal of any kind was injured. We had a scare only with Three Mile Island. Russia had catastrophes with poorly designed reactors.

Nuclear reactors have zero emissions unlike even 'clean' natural gas or so called 'clean' coal plants.

Answer 1

Because the world is full of really uninformed, and sadly stupid, people. If they pulled their head out of the sand and really found out how safe and clean and cost effective nuclear is we would have lots.
By the way, it is possible to have clean coal plants. We need them also.
We need a diversity of nuke, coal, wind, water, solar. Each has it's place. We need to educate people that 3-mile island was a success! The operators did every stupid thing possible and the controls still shut down without anyone geting hurt, miniscule radiation leakage and only damage to one reactor. Modern ones are even safer, cheaper and more efficient. Media "hyped" Chernobal. It was a cheap plant put up by stupid government. Had no "containment" building (such as the one at 3-mile island). No wonder it was a disaster.
Simple answer. Media has talked "sheep" in this country into believeing nuke is unsafe. Blame Jane Fonda for one more thing "meltdown". It was only a MOVIE folks, not real life!

Answer 2

I'm not a great fan of nuclear power but at the moment it seems to be the best option available to us.

Conventional fuels (coal, oil, gas) are finite in supply, cause health problems, pollution etc and alternative renewable energy sources aren't developed enough to be implemented on a large enough scale. The only remaining option is the nuclear one.

I think the thing that concerns me the most is that it never came anywhere close to being what it was promised to be and the costs have proven to be astronomical. Every person in the UK is having to pay £500 ($1000) to decomission EACH redundant nuclear power station (we've got about 15 of them so it's like an extra $15,000 we'll each have to pay during the decomissioning process).

Answer 3

- A nuclear plant produces 1/3 of the greenhouse gases when compared to the conventional plant, however, this is barely worth dealing with significant amounts of dangerous radioactive waste that will be around for hundreds of thousands of years. For example, Iodine-129, which is one of the nuclear waste products, has a half-life of 15.7 million years.

- As long as there is a potential for a nuclear accident – the lives and health of hundreds of thousands of people are at stake. In addition, we risk facing radioactive contamination of our soil, food and water supplies, which would cost billions of dollars.

- Accidents with nuclear reactors are STILL happening (last one in Canada in 1994). In the last few years, a number of previously unanticipated safety problems have occurred at Gentilly-2 (a CANDU reactor), all of them requiring expensive corrective action costing millions of dollars each.

- Some argue that Chernobyl’s accident is attributed to an outdated technology of the time, however, modern nuclear reactors are not fundamentally different from the Chernobyl’s nuclear reactor. In principal, a similarly catastrophic accident can happen at any nuclear reactor.

The following are some of the few reasons why an accident CAN happen at a modern nuclear plant:
• Inability to generate emergency electrical power to remove heat from the core of a reactor
• Steam line accidents
• Pressure tube ruptures that cause Loss of Coolant Accident (LOCA)
• Pressure relief valves malfunctioning

- A used nuclear fuel bundle is the most lethal object on earth. A one-hour exposure (within a radius of 1 meter) to a used fuel bundle is fatal. 85,000 fuel bundles are present at all times in a nuclear reactor.

Answer 4

From an engineering standpoint nuclear power is not a real problem. We know enough now to build a containment system tha twould hold even with a Chernobyl-type meltdown.

IF THE JOB IS DONE RIGHT. Right now, I would oppose a resumption of constructing nuclear plants--becaus e of the current corruption and incompetence of the oversight agencies and many corporations.

Think about it. Would you want Haliburton--oversight by FEMA--building a nuclear reactor? The thought alone is enough to make you glow in the dark!

Answer 5

Because the word "nuclear" scares people. I aked my dad that question when I was little and he totally freaked out! He went off for about an hour telling me WHY they don't and why they probably will never catch on. The thing is, when they first started the idea, (YEARS AGO) they had some fatal accidents. So even now that it's a million times safer and better for the environment, I think it still scares some people.

Answer 6

That's exactly what I have been saying. Nuclear Reactors are very clean and only give out toxic waste that deteriorates eventually. I think in the future we could get enough power from Nuclear being our main source then solar, wind, water, volcano, and lightning.

Answer 7

The democratic party is against nuclear energy and has been fighting the production of new ones.

Its only a matter of time before we start making more again. The benefits of nuclear energy are so great, someones going to cave in. Our demand for energy is constantly increasing. Even with all this attempt to be "green".

Answer 8

Million Dollar question. Nuclear energy is a renewable source. Its waste can be burried deeply under water table (absolutly no harm).
Coal can be used to prepare other compounds of daily use.
Water energy projects are prone to large earthquakes.
Accidents can happen to anyone, best way is to make these accident free, and taht can easily be achieved.

Answer 9

This because the norm is not to do anything for global warming Bush made this point I think. Because doing anything to stop global warming cost money and the government does not want to put a penny into this. In fact they did away with a lot of things in place they alredy had and where using to slow down global warming.
And now we have global warming.

Answer 10

First, they would have to admit to being wrong. Second, they would have to admit that it isn't really about CO2.