Greenpeace: Arctic 30

[wobs]

One big fearmongering fest. Lets take a look:

Jan Willem Storm van Leeuwen wrote
(Independent consultant)

1 The physical origin of nuclear health risks is the mobilization of natural radioactivity and the anthropogenic generation and mobilization of a billionfold of the natural radioactivity.

So? And this poses a risk because?

2 Routine releases of radioactivity by nominally operating nuclear power plants, which are classified as harmless by the nuclear industry, proved to be harmful. Within a radius of some 30 km an increasing occurrence of childhood cancer with decreasing living distance from a nominally operating nuclear power plant is proved to exist.

Utter nonesense (note lack of evidence). There are no cancer clusters. In fact A friend of mine has seen actual monitoring data for the area around Sellafield, and they are just normal background readings. Also, see previous posts on low level radiation.

3 Computer models from the nuclear industry fail to explain empirical observations of health effects of nuclear power. These models do not include health effects of radionuclides within living cells, nor non-targeted and delayed effects.

False. While computer models general fail to predict with pin point accuracy, they are useful for predictions for managing risks.

The same could be said for climate modelling, or flight simulation training. All are useful tools.

4 A number hazardous radionuclides are hard to detect with common detectors, enhancing health risks.

There's a thing called mass balance, and general management of nuclear materials. Where is the evidence that there is a serious risk to human health by using these materials. By "risk" I'm talking about likelyhood that something nasty will happen to people.

These materials have been used for decades. If the risk was so great, we would have had many deaths by now, but nuclear energy continues to have the lowest death rate of any energy system.

5 In nuclear technology only engineered safety exists, which is subject to economic pressure, to human behavior and to the basic laws of nature, particularly the Second Law of thermodynamics.

False. Management systems also exist. Safety is not just an engineering issue.

I refer to the previous point on safety, but also, it is subject to regulatory pressures, to ensure a safe running plant. Far more than any other industry, hence its safety record.

6 Inherently safe nuclear power is inherently impossible.

And when things go wrong, they kill less people than any other comparable industry (eg. coal, hydro, gas, chemcial industry).

7 Severe accidents are possible, involving a radioactive inventory of thousands of nuclear bomb equivalents.

Nuclear plants cannot explode like a nulcear bomb.

The extent and consequences of such accidents could pale the Chernobyl
disaster.

Not a scrap of evidence to make such a ridiculous claim. Chernobyl was about as bad as it could get, and had no containment dome. Modern plants are not even remotely comparable, as has been said here many times.
Edit: A better assessment here:
http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles_2010/Summer_2010/Observations_Chernobyl.pdf
By Zbigniew Jaworowski, M.D., Ph.D., D.Sc. was Professor Emeritus of the Central Laboratory for Radiological Protection, Warsaw Poland

The risks of such large-scale accidents originate from the reactors as well as from the interim storage of spent fuel and from reprocessing plants.

So is that why neither storage or reprocessing have ever seen any major accident? The risks of storage are incredibly small, and reprocessing poses little risk.

8 The only way to prevent disastrous exposure of the public to human-made radioactivity on unprecedented scale is to immobilize the radioactive waste physically and to isolate it from the biosphere in deep geologic repositories, lasting at least a million of years.

Well, its not the only way. There are many options.
Disposal of the fuel is:
a. A non-issue that has been very thoroughly researched.
b. Immitates the natural process of fission found in the Earth interior.
c. Need to be engineered to last a few hundred years if we reprocess the fuel, as it will return the radioactivity of the ore within that time. Not millions of years.

To deal with the global radioactive waste at the current rate of generation about every year a new large deep geological repository has to be opened, at an estimated cost of at least €10bn each. To dispose of the existing radioactive wastes from the past dozens of deep geologic repositories would be required.

False. A single repository can take the waste of an entire fleet of nuclear plants, that each run for 60 years and the cost is small considering the amount of energy it represents.

http://www.mng.org.uk/gh/private/jackson_nuclear_waste_disposal.pdf
Disposal is still a non-issue, and the quantities are tiny considering the scale of energy production.

9 The health risks of nuclear power are growing with time as a result of:
• Increasing amounts of mobile radioactive material piling up in temporary storage.
• Unavoidable deterioration of materials and structures of the temporary storage
facilities, as a consequence of the basic laws of nature.
• Increasing economic pressure.

Again, zero evidence.
What are these health risks? Fuels are managed in containers that are tested prior to use, and have a known lifespan. And the problem is what?

10 Ever since the beginning of the nuclear era the activities necessary to effectively immobilize and isolate the human-made radioactivity from the biosphere have been postponed to the future. This behavior has generated, and is still generating, an immense debt in terms of
energy, materials, human resources and economic effort. A habit of living on credit and ‘après nous le déluge’ seems to dominate the present attitude of politicians and the nuclear
world.

False. There is no debt, as payments are being made. When disposal is needed (and it isn't needed yet, as we reprocess the fuel to get more energy from it), the money will be available to take care of it, and we have the technical know how of what to do already. What is the issue?

11 Nuclear power delivers energy on credit.

No, it produces predictable, manageable, low carbon energy.

12 Information on nuclear matters to the public and politicians originates almost exclusively from institutions with vested interests in nuclear power, for instance the International Atomic Energy Agency IAEA.
The institutions United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR), International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) and World Health Organization (WHO) cannot operate independently of the IAEA on nuclear matters.

Information derives from experts. Who'd of thought.
Although there are plenty of other sources on nuclear power in general online.

13 Health risks of nuclear power are greatly enhanced by economic pressure, as a result of:
• decrease of safety-related investments and staff at the utilities
• relaxation of official exposure standards
• decrease of the efficiency and independency of inspectors and regulators.

The author has never encountered a regulator.

14 Health risks posed by nuclear power are an economic notion.

Wrong. The fact that it poses the least risk of any energy source points to this.

15 The basic questions the public and politicians are confronted with are:
• What are we willing to pay for the safety and health of ourselves, our childern and grandchildern and of future generations?

Already been asked ad nauseam. We now have over 5 decades of research into safety standards, which has resultsed in models which has resulted in the models currently being built.

Are you a consultant wobs? What qualifies you to post so much tosh?

A degree in environental engineering, and years in studying energy resource management, and environmental management.
Your source (without a link I should add) has a reputation for inaccuracy:
http://neinuclearnotes.blogspot.co.uk/2008/01/van-leeuwen-and-smiths-egregious.html
And is sponsered by Greenpeace:
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Jan_Willem_Storm_van_Leeuwen#cite_note-1
So not exactly a reliable source.

 

[trickyh]

Busted!

So anyways On Topic, about the Greenpeace 30...

Got what they deserved if you ask me... If you f*** about with the Russians then expect some Russian justice and accept the consequences of YOUR actions.... Ask any member of Pussy Riot...

 

[JBR]

I agree. I think Greenpeace has lost all credibility, except for other like-minded naive individuals.

 

[Norcon]

wobs wrote

No, it produces predictable, manageable, low carbon energy.

At what cost?
Britians nuclear power industry is being handed over to the Chinese and French which will eventually see electricity prices doubled for consumers.

You people make me laugh. You make the demands that these monstrosities be built and you don't have a bean to pay for them.

Information derives from experts. Who'd of thought.

Nope. It derives from people with vested interests!

False. There is no debt, as payments are being made.

Wrong. If there was no debt then no payments would have to be made.

False. A single repository can take the waste of an entire fleet of nuclear plants, that each run for 60 years and the cost is small considering the amount of energy it represents.

12 billion according to your link and excludes spent fuel from new reactors.
That's a lot bigger than "small".

Again, zero evidence.
What are these health risks? Fuels are managed in containers that are tested prior to use, and have a known lifespan. And the problem is what?

Like you say, they have a short lifespan and will eventually leak into the environment.
Everything man made fails at some time or another.

It is widely accepted that spent nuclear fuel and high-level reprocessing and plutonium wastes require well-designed storage for periods ranging from tens of thousands to a million years, to minimize releases of the contained radioactivity into the environment. Safeguards are also required to ensure that neither plutonium nor highly enriched uranium is diverted to weapon use. There is general agreement that placing spent nuclear fuel in repositories hundreds of meters below the surface would be safer than indefinite storage of spent fuel on the surface

False. Management systems also exist. Safety is not just an engineering issue.

No its true. "Technology" has engineered safety. Nothing more. Therefore fallible.

 

[mehran]

been keeping tabs of this slow simmering topic.

would like to point out that the so called "waste" still contains 95% of the useful energy, we have designs and know ways to reuse this fuel. the final waste would be safe in 300 years(by using up and preventing the forming of transuranics)

would also like to point that nuclear industry take vastly more responsibility for its waste then fossil fuel industry. it is estimated 2 million people die each year from just air pollution.

its is the fundamental facts about nuclear power that keeps us coming back to nuclear power. we have 1000s of years worth of energy just lying about our feet in fissionable materials. that clean reliable energy

we are 25 years behind were we should be. we have climate change coming our way and our best solution has been stitched up, wrapped up in red tape and lied about.

btw I grow up anti but looked at the real facts and not FUD and changed my mind.

build new reactors, invest in R&D in new gen deigns and keep fossil fuels in the ground.

 

[wobs]

False. A single repository can take the waste of an entire fleet of nuclear plants, that each run for 60 years and the cost is small considering the amount of energy it represents.

12 billion according to your link and excludes spent fuel from new reactors.
That's a lot bigger than "small".

No, the nation's nuclear reactors will collectively cost that much after up to 60years of operation each Try to imagine how many MWh that equates to.

Let's compare that with wind turbine disposal (admittedly a futile exercise, as they cannot replace nuclear power).

Assume HinkleyC will last 60years
Average on shore turbine is 125m tall and 3MW (average output 0.9MW), and last 25years.

Blades are 8t each and none-recycleable as they are fibre glass and wood composites, so in 25 years time will landfilling, as the rates in 25 years time (possibly £352/t LF tax). We'll be generaous and ignore the concrete base that will need digging up eventually (about 1000t per WT).

HinkleyC = 3200MW

So you effectively need 8533 turbines per new HinkelyC. (3200/0.9*(60/25))

8533 turbines equate to 204800t of waste for landfill, which would cost at least £72billion in landfill tax. If you include the inert waste of concrete bases, and the oils in the housings, these are other large financial variables. Then multiply that for multiple nuclear power plants equivilants.

Or you could burn said blades in a cement kiln, if that's your thing, but you'd need to account for the impact of those emissions and cost of disposal which would be a big unknown.

In effect it would cost more as that is based on projected landfill cost after 25 years. You would also need to account for landfill cost after 50 years and beyond. Landfill tax currently increases £8 per year.

I also have not taken into account that we reprocess the nuclear fuel, thus reducing the quantity by at least 25%, and that the quoted £12billion is for ALL UK nuclear fuel waste, so that can effectively be divided multiple times to account for each nuclear plant.

The Energy Act 2008 stipulates that plant operators are required to submit a Funded Decommissioning Programme (FDP) before construction on a new nuclear power station is allowed to commence, so the idea that nuclear power accumulates a debt is absurd. The exact opposite is true.

Bascially, nuclear power is a bargain.

 

[wobs]

Information derives from experts. Who'd of thought.

Nope. It derives from people with vested interests!

They are regulators. Its like saying the EA has a vested interest in the waste industry, or water industry.

Here is an example of an international team of investigators looking at a Swiss disposal site:
"This report presents the consensus view of the International Review Team (IRT). The IRT was made up of nine internationally recognised specialists, including two members of the NEA Secretariat. The experts were chosen to bring complementary expertise to the review. The main objective of the review was to provide an independent evaluation, from an international standpoint, of the quality of the post-closure radiological safety assessment presented by Nagra."
http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rc...tYDIBQ&usg=AFQjCNFjisJHEnV21REYoWiAUPpovqHHQQ
Not exactly a closed shop, but a team of experts.

False. There is no debt, as payments are being made.

Wrong. If there was no debt then no payments would have to be made.

Its not a debt as it will have already been paid for. That's the point.
See previous post on wind turbine disposal costs.

False. A single repository can take the waste of an entire fleet of nuclear plants, that each run for 60 years and the cost is small considering the amount of energy it represents.

12 billion according to your link and excludes spent fuel from new reactors.
That's a lot bigger than "small".

Wrong when you consider the huge amount of GWh it represents. Also, you need to factor in that new plants use much less fuel than older designs, and so will generate far less waste.

Again, zero evidence.
What are these health risks? Fuels are managed in containers that are tested prior to use, and have a known lifespan. And the problem is what?

Like you say, they have a short lifespan and will eventually leak into the environment.
Everything man made fails at some time or another.

I can't wait to find out how they will fail and where I said they had a short life span.
The temporary storage is not a problem, as it is engineered to far outlast its usefulness. When they come to final disposal, it will be encapsulated in glass or ceramics, which in turn are placed in multi lined containers. How will this fail? How can such an inert and stable material fail?

And even if it did, how will it escape from a geological deposit site to affect anyone, when groundwater modelling has been done, and the whole process has been thoroughly researched? Don't believe me? See link above for report on geological disposal.

It is widely accepted that spent nuclear fuel and high-level reprocessing and plutonium wastes require well-designed storage for periods ranging from tens of thousands to a million years, to minimize releases of the contained radioactivity into the environment. Safeguards are also required to ensure that neither plutonium nor highly enriched uranium is diverted to weapon use. There is general agreement that placing spent nuclear fuel in repositories hundreds of meters below the surface would be safer than indefinite storage of spent fuel on the surface

Where is this quote from?

False. Management systems also exist. Safety is not just an engineering issue.

No its true. "Technology" has engineered safety. Nothing more. Therefore fallible.

You clearly have never been involved in SHE issues.
Also, engineering solutions are studied, and risks factored in.
The Swiss study I referenced was a very thorough look at one geological pilot scheme. This is one part of a very big collection of knowledge in disposal of this material. Also remember that reprocessed fuel (like we do in teh UK) returns to the ore level of radioactivity within a few hundred years, and so are far easier to engineer.

It effectively immitates nature, as the same radioactive decay occurs naturally deep underground. But we are required to isolate the process in extremely stable conditions.

I'm open to ideas as to how they can escape into our groundwater in ways that said experts haven't thought of..

I also note that you haven't come up with a single alternative. Given that its nuclear, coal or darkness, and nuclear power is the safest of ALL options, I fail to see your problem.

And given that renewables are more expensive, get more subsidies per kW, and kill more people per kWh, and cannot provide the same type of supply, again, I don't see the problem.

Oh, and coal gets a free lunch when it comes to impact:
http://web.ornl.gov/info/ornlreview/rev26-34/text/colmain.html
-Especially given how much uranium it pumps out. If it was held to account to the standards of nuclear power, it would be uneconomic.

 

[JBR]

No, the nation's nuclear reactors will collectively cost that much after up to 60years of operation each Try to imagine how many MWh that equates to.

Let's compare that with wind turbine disposal (admittedly a futile exercise, as they cannot replace nuclear power).

Assume HinkleyC will last 60years
Average on shore turbine is 125m tall and 3MW (average output 0.9MW), and last 25years.

Blades are 8t each and none-recycleable as they are fibre glass and wood composites, so in 25 years time will landfilling, as the rates in 25 years time (possibly £352/t LF tax). We'll be generaous and ignore the concrete base that will need digging up eventually (about 1000t per WT).

HinkleyC = 3200MW

So you effectively need 8533 turbines per new HinkelyC. (3200/0.9*(60/25))

8533 turbines equate to 204800t of waste for landfill, which would cost at least £72billion in landfill tax. If you include the inert waste of concrete bases, and the oils in the housings, these are other large financial variables. Then multiply that for multiple nuclear power plants equivilants.

Or you could burn said blades in a cement kiln, if that's your thing, but you'd need to account for the impact of those emissions and cost of disposal which would be a big unknown.

In effect it would cost more as that is based on projected landfill cost after 25 years. You would also need to account for landfill cost after 50 years and beyond. Landfill tax currently increases £8 per year.

I also have not taken into account that we reprocess the nuclear fuel, thus reducing the quantity by at least 25%, and that the quoted £12billion is for ALL UK nuclear fuel waste, so that can effectively be divided multiple times to account for each nuclear plant.

The Energy Act 2008 stipulates that plant operators are required to submit a Funded Decommissioning Programme (FDP) before construction on a new nuclear power station is allowed to commence, so the idea that nuclear power accumulates a debt is absurd. The exact opposite is true.

Bascially, nuclear power is a bargain.

Well said. This wind power cr@p makes me laugh.

I just wish I could be around in a hundred years to see what historians say about all of this.

 

[Norcon]

Scotland will soon be powered by wind.

 

[JBR]

Scotland will soon be powered by wind.

Good point. Westminster is already powered by wind, but of a different kind what with all those politicians talking out of their ar$es.

 

[wobs]

Scotland will soon be powered by wind.

No they aren't.

They're hoping to have lots of wind turbines, but:

Policy Aims

Scottish Government Policy is to generate the equivalent of 100% of Scotland's gross annual electricity consumption , the equivalent of 11% of Scotland's heat demand met from renewable sources and 500 MW of community and locally-owned renewable energy, all by 2020.

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/B...ng/National-Planning-Policy/themes/renewables

And:

Our new target is to generate the equivalent of 100% of Scotland's own electricity demand from renewable resources by 2020.

By then we intend to be generating twice as much electricity as Scotland needs - just over half of it from renewables, and just under half from other conventional sources. We will be exporting as much electricity as we consume.

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2011/08/04110353/3#renewableenergytargets

So they're going down the Denmark route of over capacity on renewables, which will result in large amounts of extra grid connections with its neighbours to cope with the fluctuations. This will mean selling excess energy at a reduced rate, and buying it back when they need it (no wind or sun) at elevated rates.

Denmark has some of most expensive energy rates in the EU.

 

[Norcon]

wobs wrote

8533 turbines equate to 204800t of waste for landfill, which would cost at least £72billion in landfill tax. If you include the inert waste of concrete bases, and the oils in the housings,

This is compete tosh.
Turbines don't end up in landfill after 25 years.

Lets see you link something that will prove it. (he won't)

In effect it would cost more as that is based on projected landfill cost after 25 years.

Nonsense.

We'll be generaous and ignore the concrete base that will need digging up eventually (about 1000t per WT).

Why would the concrete base need digging up? You could always build one of your nuclear power stations on top of it!

And even if it did need digging up its 100% recyclable.

 

[roberta1000]

I daresay it would take quite a bit of energy to recycle 1000t of concrete. Maybe we could allocate a whole nuclear reactor to the job of recycling these ghastly wind turbines (and the sooner the better IMHO).

 

[jockscott]

Here's the real risk of nuclear power generation in context .

Untitled

• jockscott
• 17 Nov 2013
• 1

 

[wobs]

wobs wrote

8533 turbines equate to 204800t of waste for landfill, which would cost at least £72billion in landfill tax. If you include the inert waste of concrete bases, and the oils in the housings,

This is compete tosh.
Turbines don't end up in landfill after 25 years.

Lets see you link something that will prove it. (he won't)

I was been generous. This link gives 20years lifespan:
http://www.windmeasurementinternational.com/wind-turbines/om-turbines.php
Its the blades at 8t each that could be landfilled.

The bit you quoted perhaps wasn't that clear. The landfilling of the blades could cost £72billion in landfill tax alone. The oils and and inerts would cost extra.

Landfill tax has been going up £8 per year, so one just has to project a trend to estimate future costs:
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/rates/landfill-tax.htm

In effect it would cost more as that is based on projected landfill cost after 25 years.

Nonsense.

See above
I have records of every landfill tax rate going back to the early 90s.

We'll be generaous and ignore the concrete base that will need digging up eventually (about 1000t per WT).

Why would the concrete base need digging up? You could always build one of your nuclear power stations on top of it!

And even if it did need digging up its 100% recyclable.

[/quote]
To ensure they minimise the impact on the environment (typical modern environmental legislation these days). And that concrete is reinforced. There's often at least 70t of steel in that base, so its very difficult to break up.

But the steel in the tower etc, would be easily recycled of course. Its just the cost of disposal and decommissioning the rest would make it expensive.