Good Nuke News - Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy

Yipee, San Onofre Nuclear Plant (Southern California) is going to close.

www.alternet.org...

Victory for Grassroots Activism and Public Safety: San Onofre Nuclear Plant Closure Announced
This victory at San Onofre is a falling domino. Had the public not fought back, those reactors would have been “fixed” at public expense.

In the thick of the 1970s Arab oil embargo, Nixon said there’d be 1000 such reactors in the US by the year 2000. As of today, there are 100. Four have shut here this year. Citizen activism has put the “nuclear renaissance” into full retreat.

Just two of 54 reactors now operate in Japan, where Fukushima has joined Chernobyl and Three Mile Island in permanently scarring us all.

One more to go here in Cali.

It is good to be alive.

reply to post by FyreByrd


To be truthful, I would rather have a coal plant providing me power rather than a Nuke plant.

Even after a nuke plant is shutdown, it takes years to dismantle.

Please forgive my ignorance, but isn't cold fusion the way to go? And if so, why are we not throwing more money in that direction?

reply to post by TDawgRex

Please forgive my ignorance, but isn't cold fusion the way to go? And if so, why are we not throwing more money in that direction?

The term Cold Fusion is a misnomer. Fusion of nuclei can only occur under the most extreme pressures. A reactor would be like lighting a small H bomb and somehow keeping it contained. You thought the dragon that escaped from Fukushima was nasty...

EtA: All atomic reactions involve liberation of great amounts of heat. Which is just a fancy way to boil water.The upside is steam, the down side is cancer.

Shut them down. Shut them all down.

reply to post by TDawgRex

Please forgive my ignorance, but isn't cold fusion the way to go? And if so, why are we not throwing more money in that direction?

My opinion would be that until the effectiveness of cold fusion reactors has been extensively proven, thorium reactors are the way to go. Much safer and much cheaper than uranium reactors.



EDIT: here's a good Google Tech Talk on the subject:

The Thorium Molten-Salt Reactor: Why Didn't This Happen (and why is now the right time?)

reply to post by ChaoticOrder


Thanks, you've jogged my memory. I really have to clean that place out sometime.

I knew that I had seen “clean” nuclear energy somewhere before.

But let’s be truthful, rarely is anything ever clean, nor green. Solar and wind tech produces large amounts of toxins just making the pieces parts.

I just reread a book called “SuperFreakenomics” which provided a few theories on actual clean energy. They even made sense and were cheap to produce.

Which of course, means they will never see the light of day.

reply to post by TDawgRex

But let’s be truthful, rarely is anything ever clean, nor green.

Well of course it wouldn't be truly 100% clean energy, but the waste generated by thorium reactors is less hazardous than the waste generated by uranium reactors and the chances of something going critically wrong with a thorium reactor are much lower. I haven't looked into thorium reactors for quite some time myself, so I'm not sure of the exact numbers but I know it's a great improvement over uranium reactors.

The problem with fusion reactors is they require many money dollars and 30 years to build they also need a lot of international co-operation due to the nature of such a specialized technology, sadly something very much lacking these days.

Ah well its sad to see another closure of a nuclear facility anyway.

reply to post by FyreByrd


Best news all spring, FyreByrd!! The waste containments in their present
disrepair are bad enough, but I'm so relieved to see the pile not being added to.
I'll get on a bike and pedal on a PacSci DC motor for an hour to get online here:
rather than breathe the American flavor of Fukishima Frappe' !

EDIT: I'll have to join in to the general consensus and agree that every financially
feasible (dubious) nuke is dangerous, and however redundantly safeguarded
STILL unpredictable when you lose coolant. And the Earth's crust in California in
general doesn't need toys on it that don't shake well.

reply to post by Tuttle

The problem with fusion reactors is they require many money dollars and 30 years to build they also need a lot of international co-operation due to the nature of such a specialized technology, sadly something very much lacking these days. Ah well its sad to see another closure of a nuclear facility anyway.

The problem with fusion reactors is that they have been '30 years' away for something like 60 years now.

Originally posted by ChaoticOrder
reply to post by TDawgRex

 

But let’s be truthful, rarely is anything ever clean, nor green.

Well of course it wouldn't be truly 100% clean energy, but the waste generated by thorium reactors is less hazardous than the waste generated by uranium reactors and the chances of something going critically wrong with a thorium reactor are much lower. I haven't looked into thorium reactors for quite some time myself, so I'm not sure of the exact numbers but I know it's a great improvement over uranium reactors.

edit on 8/6/2013 by ChaoticOrder because: lol fixed stupid mistake

Additional advantages of Thorium reactors: they cannot be used to manufacture weapons grade materials and they actually eat the waste generated by uranium reactors and medical procedures.

Nice !

To bad we might caused to much mess trying first. Since radioactivity can cause mutations way after expose to it and we will probably not get super powers.

Maybe nothing happens. We do have a rather extreme radioactive spuwing sun, only we got a magnetic field to block that...

Originally posted by rnaa

Originally posted by ChaoticOrder
reply to post by TDawgRex

 

But let’s be truthful, rarely is anything ever clean, nor green.

Well of course it wouldn't be truly 100% clean energy, but the waste generated by thorium reactors is less hazardous than the waste generated by uranium reactors and the chances of something going critically wrong with a thorium reactor are much lower. I haven't looked into thorium reactors for quite some time myself, so I'm not sure of the exact numbers but I know it's a great improvement over uranium reactors.

edit on 8/6/2013 by ChaoticOrder because: lol fixed stupid mistake

Additional advantages of Thorium reactors: they cannot be used to manufacture weapons grade materials and they actually eat the waste generated by uranium reactors and medical procedures.

I have an aversion to sodium reactors because of the accident (s) at Santa Suzanna Field Labs (not only the sodium reactor but other way toxic stuff as well). Southern California too - and no way to clean it up.

Nope not a fan. Don't kown that much about sodium reactors in truth - terminally biased.

I live in Southern California and a good friend of mine works for the company that owns the San Onofre Nuclear Plant and this is what he told me.

Before I begin, I am fairly liberal in my views and support cleaning up our environment. With that said, the news of this closure came out a few days ago and my friend told me that about 700 or so jobs at the plant will be terminated.

Due to deregulation during the early 2000's the company that owns the Plant, Southern California Edison (SCE), had to sell off a very large part of its generating capacity to meet state mandates. For power companies, being able to generate power = making money. Just like people, the more money a company can make, the more it spends as well. This Plant brought in a lot of money to SCE as it was one of the few generating plants that was still owned by SCE. That income is now gone and part of preparing for this moment, the company had laid off about 25% of its work force.

This company serves electricity to essentially half of California. Losing the ability to generate the power (especially over the summer) will mean that the company will have to buy power from other power companies. The power is sold at a higher price and unfortunately, your average customer will have to pay for this difference. For those that are reading this and live in SoCal, you know that electricity from SCE is already extremely expensive. It's going to be more expensive now with this Plant down.

To add more fuel to the fire, this company has emission mandates that it must meet with CA. There may be a possibility that new wind power or natural gas power plants will have to be built to balance the loss of this Plant's production capacity. If that is the case, building "green" power generation is EXTREMELY expensive and will take about 10 years complete due to red tape. Guess who is going to have to pay for this? That's right, your average customer.

In all, yes, a nuke plant will now be shut down and we will not have to fear another Japan situation occurring in SoCal. But, this decision does have heavy consequences as well and for the most part, it will mean that your average customer in SoCal will see a significant increase in their monthly bill over the next 1-2 years.

Originally posted by SeekingAlpha
I live in Southern California and a good friend of mine works for the company that owns the San Onofre Nuclear Plant and this is what he told me.

Before I begin, I am fairly liberal in my views and support cleaning up our environment. With that said, the news of this closure came out a few days ago and my friend told me that about 700 or so jobs at the plant will be terminated.

Due to deregulation during the early 2000's the company that owns the Plant, Southern California Edison (SCE), had to sell off a very large part of its generating capacity to meet state mandates. For power companies, being able to generate power = making money. Just like people, the more money a company can make, the more it spends as well. This Plant brought in a lot of money to SCE as it was one of the few generating plants that was still owned by SCE. That income is now gone and part of preparing for this moment, the company had laid off about 25% of its work force.

This company serves electricity to essentially half of California. Losing the ability to generate the power (especially over the summer) will mean that the company will have to buy power from other power companies. The power is sold at a higher price and unfortunately, your average customer will have to pay for this difference. For those that are reading this and live in SoCal, you know that electricity from SCE is already extremely expensive. It's going to be more expensive now with this Plant down.

To add more fuel to the fire, this company has emission mandates that it must meet with CA. There may be a possibility that new wind power or natural gas power plants will have to be built to balance the loss of this Plant's production capacity. If that is the case, building "green" power generation is EXTREMELY expensive and will take about 10 years complete due to red tape. Guess who is going to have to pay for this? That's right, your average customer.

In all, yes, a nuke plant will now be shut down and we will not have to fear another Japan situation occurring in SoCal. But, this decision does have heavy consequences as well and for the most part, it will mean that your average customer in SoCal will see a significant increase in their monthly bill over the next 1-2 years.

Yes - there will be consequences. However, these are short term consequences that can (not necessarily will but can) be moderated. One - it will take years to fully decommission the plant which will require a workforce. Two - a good portion of these workers are highly skilled and can find work in other fields and/or locations.

About the ecomonic impact - I think you are overstating it. The company will have to buy power - but it already is as the plant has been inoperative for a while. It will be use as an excuse by BIG BUSINESS to raise prices (making the case for Public Utilities stronger).

But outweighting any of these concerns is the fact that it is the wiser choice. We have ample evidence that:

The potential devastation from an accident at this site (ecologically, economically and personally) vastly outweights the short term difficulties.

These plants have never been economically sound WE THE PEOPLE have always had to pay a premium for these temples of doom - not always directly - but though hidden taxes, clean up costs, etc. WE THE PEOPLE have become the insurance policy for any liability incurred by these plants.

I'm sorry that people will lose jobs in this tough economy, I'm sorry that prices will go up (BIG BUSINESS never misses the chance).

It's still a win for sanity.