Some – no, many – years ago, a local radio talk host (Roy Norris?) invited two guests to his program for yet another installment of the provincial nuclear “debate”. One was a nuclear physicist, the other an anti-nuke activist.
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The debate centered on expansion from mining into actually using (!) the stuff for electrical generation. The argument went back and forth over the feasibility of the technology before moving, as it always does, to safety.
The physicist cited the testing that had been conducted to prove the integrity of nuclear containment vessels during transport. I recall there being something about a canister surviving being slammed into a concrete barrier on the front of a speeding locomotive.
Well, I was pretty close.
The rest of the exchange went something like this….
Activist (knowing full well the answer): “Well, if you say so … but can you give this audience your 100% guarantee that there’s zero risk of a nuclear spill taking place – ever?”
Physicist: “Well, of course not. Reputable scientists never claim such things.”
Activist: “Aha!”
Physicist: “But, we can say with complete confidence that the odds of such a accident occurring, given the technology and track record of nuclear safety, are extremely remote.”
Activist: “That’s what the airlines say, too – that the chance of a plane going down are so remote that I’m in more far danger driving to the airport.”
Physicist: “Of course.”
Activist: “…. but there was still a parachute under my seat when I flew in from Toronto.”
Sigh.
http://nextbigfuture.com/2008/03/deaths-per-twh-for-all-energy-sources.html
One of the comments got me thinking, so I went and googled deaths per TWh for nuclear and wind.
Turns out rooftop solar is the most dangerous, and nuclear the safest of all power generation methods.
If building a nuclear reactor to produce electricity was the best idea going then Alberta would have already done that.
Though, they’d be happy politically if Saskatchewan would become the nuclear waste dump for the electricity generated for their industrial benefit.
Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick need a nuclear waste disposal site. It’s the most politically puny place that will get that privilege in Canada… sounds like Saskatchewan. Why did Yucca mountain in Nevada get to be the U.S. nuclear dump? Because they like to gamble? Or at the time no one else would accept it?
The massive amount of federal government taxpayer subsidy is the only thing that keeps the nuclear industry going in Canada.
Use cheap Coal, Natural Gas and Manitoba Hydro for base load capacity. Then use the billions in capital saved to invest in those viable companies here who can accelerate the economic recovery.
If you were an Investment Banker and had a few billions $ to invest in Saskatchewan how would you do it and why?
We in the West are long overdue for cheap electricity for ourselves & businesses. Better to sell our oil at a profit. Frankly not having nuclear energy like ALL of Europe, has retarded us as a Nation. In fact I think it was deliberate on their part. Kind of like the Phoenicians putting on maps” There be Dragons there” to stop others from trading on Ocean ports out side the Mediterranean Sea .
JMO
‘The massive amount of federal govt subsidy is the only thing that keeps the nuclear industry in Canada going.’ – larry
Right larry.
And that is exactly why I proposed a long time ago that Alberta/Sask/BC go and get the real pros to do our nukes – the Japanese.
I wouldn’t let anyone from the Ontario nuke industry past the Manitoba border.
They have proven to be absolute incompetents for years.
All plutonium stores will be eventually be shipped off earth to fuel the human conquest of the solar system anyway.
Yucca is a massive precious metal vault, in my opinion…
See also: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-o8haMIVcL8
“All plutonium stores will be eventually be shipped off earth…”
I hope not to the Moon. As that documentary Space:1999 informs us, eventually there’s an explosion and the Moon flies out of orbit. Causing all kinds of alien problems and such.
Back during the presidential election campaign, I said to my wife, “I almost hope Obama wins, because it will be quite the train wreck to witness.” And, that video describes in stunning visual fashion these first two months of the Obama administration.
I wonder what visual representation will accurately describe Obama after the next 46 months………..
I hope not to the Moon.
The lunar poles will be the plutonium warehouses of the future. Even Bush knew this.
Leftists are right about one simple thing though, plutonium is pure man-made concentrated evil. It’s kryptonite to all known life…
Well personally I would like to witness said activist employ that handy under seat parachute from about 40,000 feet.
I’m getting to the point where I’m ready to strangle the next patient that demands 100% safety for a prescription drug when they’ll use “natural” remedies of unknown composition or potency without a second thought. This is an identical form of thought to so-called environmentalists who demand 100% safey for nuclear power whereas the risks of wind power and solar power (in the form of falls from roofs) are orders of magnitude higher.
The response I’ve used to people demanding 100% certainty is to point out to them that there is a small, but non-zero probability, that the molecules of O2 in their corner of the room will all decide to head off to the other side of the room leaving them in a pure N2/Ar atmosphere which won’t sustain life. The chances of this happening somewhere in the universe during the next 10 billion years are quite small but non-zero hence one cannot give 100% assurance that this won’t happen. I don’t think I’ve changed any minds with this example but hopefully I’ve gotten some people to think about the unreasonable concept of 100% safety.
Every so-called debate on nuclear energy that I have listened to featured an expert in the field on one side and an uninformed, fear-mongering whackadoodle on the other. The expert was armed with facts which were put forth professionally and politely while his/her opponent babbled semi-coherently, interrupted frequently and presented numerous highly unlikely or completely impossible apocalyptic scenarios with, of course, numerous references to Chernobyl.
To enter into a debate with activists whose knowledge of the subject consists of nothing more than what they have read in a newspaper is an absolute waste of time and serves only to offer a platform to spread misinformation and fear.
Loki, I had the same trouble with patients and their “natural” remedies. My approach was to ask them exactly what was in their natural remedies and what sort of quality control was done on them. The next step was to tell them that I knew a guy, Frank, who was making his own brand of gasoline in his backyard/basement. I didn’t know exactly what was in it and it came with no guarantees or quality control, but would they be prepared to put “Frank’s Gas” in their new car?
It didn’t always work of course, but it did cause some of them to stop and think.
Uranium-235 will always be the most valuable matter known….
Your map of Saskatchewan resources is missing Oil Sands in the North West.
This quote is too good to resist: “Patrick Henry did not say, ‘Give me absolute safety or give me death.’ ” — John Stossel, “20/20”, ABC-TV, Aug. 3, 2001
How is it that a nuclear physicist didn’t know that there are no parachutes under airline seats? Oh, wait . . .