Is Nuclear Energy the solution?
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- Äas pĆidĂĄn 28. 05. 2024
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In this Our Changing Climate environmental video essay, I look at what role nuclear energy has to play in a renewable energy transition to combat climate change. Specifically, I figure out whether nuclear energy is emissions free or low carbon. I look at the problem of nuclear waste by weighing the differences between long term storage, on-site storage, and reprocessing of nuclear waste. I also look at the prohibitive cost and construction barriers to nuclear energy in order to understand whether it's actually a feasible solution to climate change. Finally, I look at the issue of safety in relation to nuclear energy by comparing the death tolls of other energy outputs to that of nuclear energy.
A huge thanks to Dr. Arjendu Pattanayak for helping me out with this video!!
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Resources:
1. How Deadly Is Your Kilowatt? We Rank The Killer Energy Sources (Forbes): www.forbes.com/sites/jamescon...
2. Is Nuclear Good or Bad? (PBS Studios): âą Is Nuclear Power Good ...
3. Nuclear Waste (Union of Concerned Scientists): www.ucsusa.org/nuclear-power/...
4. Prevented Mortality and Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Historical and Projected Nuclear Power (Kharecha and Hansen): pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/...
5. Nuclear Power Cost (Union of Concerned Scientists): www.ucsusa.org/nuclear-power/...
6. Renewable Energy in the Context of Sustainable Development, Emissions Graph on pg. 732 (IPCC): www.ipcc-wg3.de/report/IPCC_SR...
7. The simple argument for keeping nuclear power plants open (Vox): www.vox.com/energy-and-enviro...
8. Nuclear Power & Global Warming (Union of Concerned Scientists): www.ucsusa.org/nuclear-power/...
9. Itâs time to go nuclear in the fight against climate change (Grist): grist.org/article/its-time-to...
10. Levelized Cost of Energy Analysis (Lazard): www.lazard.com/media/450784/l...
Are you pro-nuclear energy or against it? I would love to hear your thoughts. Rebuttals and counter-arguments are welcome!
I am against it, Chernobyl is enough reason in my opinion. We had to get rid of some cows in Austria, my family as well. Not the best thing for mostly farmers....
You forgot thorium, and we'll need a power source to power peak periods at night, or during storms, so Thorium Nuclear reactors are a good choice for that role, and have very few downsides, and more environmentally friendly, then solar or wind.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thorium-based_nuclear_power
"There is much less nuclear waste-up to two orders of
magnitude less, state Moir and Teller,[4]
eliminating the need for large-scale or long-term storage;[14]:13
"Chinese scientists claim that hazardous waste will be a
thousand times less than with uranium."[19]
The radioactivity of the resulting waste also drops down to safe
levels after just a one or a few hundred years, compared to tens of
thousands of years needed for current nuclear waste to cool off.[23]"
"Mining thorium is safer and more efficient than mining
uranium. Thorium's ore monazite generally contains higher
concentrations of thorium than the percentage of uranium found in its
respective ore. This makes thorium a more cost efficient and less
environmentally damaging fuel source. Thorium mining is also easier
and less dangerous than uranium mining, as the mine is an open
pit-which requires no ventilation, unlike underground uranium
mines, where radon
levels can be potentially harmful.[27]"
"Thorium fuel cycle is a potential way to produce long term
nuclear energy with low radio-toxicity waste. In addition, the
transition to thorium could be done through the incineration of
weapons grade plutonium (WPu) or civilian plutonium.[24]"
"Comparing the amount of thorium needed with coal, Nobel
laureate CarloRubbia of CERN,(European Organization for Nuclear Research),
estimates that one tonof thorium can produce as much energy as 200 tons of uranium, or
3,500,000 tons of coal.[25]"
"Thorium is three times as abundant as uranium and nearly as
abundant as lead and gallium in the Earth's crust.[18]
The Thorium
Energy Alliance estimates "there is enough thorium in the
United States alone to power the country at its current energy level
for over 1,000 years."[17][18]"America has buried tons as a by-product of rare earth metals
mining," notes Evans-Pritchard.[19]Almost all thorium is fertile
Th-232, compared to uranium that is composed of 99.3% fertile U-238
and 0.7% more valuable fissile U-235."
As someone who just completed a chemistry Masters project to do with nuclear fuel reprocessing I am for nuclear energy. 95% of the uranium fuel put into the reactors is recyclable. There are also many researchers looking into ways of separating and treating the radioactive elements in the remaining waste so they can be converted into stable isotopes. Countries are planning to build deep geological disposal sites for high level nuclear waste but the current level of nuclear waste is much lower than most people think it is. We need a mix of nuclear and renewable energy sources in order to reduce our carbon emissions to the desired levels.
I think nuclear can be a supplement to areas where there isnât much sun light, roaring rivers or fast winds.
i used to be against it, then for it, and now i'm against it again. mostly because i started informing myself about what effects climate change has on nuclear power plants.
power plants (and spent fuel rods) need lots of water, so usually they're built near oceans, or rivers. oceans are rising, which means that storm surges are rising as well. oceans are getting warmer, that means storms are getting stronger, moving further north. it also means there is more precipitation, or less, which means rivers can have either not enough, or too much water. at the time nuclear power plants where built, none of these effects where included in planning.
there's an interesting study about nuclear power plants and climate change:
www.jstor.org/stable/41323396?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
"for example, during the 2003 summer heat wave in europe, more than 30 nuclear power plant units in europe were forced to shut down, or reduce their power production"
(which means that it actually happened during a time where more energy than usually was needed for air conditioning, probably leading to even more heat related mortality)
âonce weâve sorted out battery storageâ
ok...
Exactly, that's not as simple of a solution as is brief statement makes it out to be. That is also going to be an incredibly long and expensive process.
With as much of existential threat that climate change is, a WW2 style refocusing of the worlds economy and infrastructure needs to be implemented, which would include directing money to nuclear as well as renewables+batteries, not an either or framework
Yeah thatâs probably not going to happen within the next hundred years if it ever happens at all.
So in the meantime the clock is ticking and the temperature is rising.
Nuclear power really is our ONLY choice.
@@infidelheretic923 yep. But people will pull out chernobyl and fukushima when you suggest nuclear power
@@danielotero9038
That would be like banning airplanes because of 9/11. Besides, there are new reactor designs that solve a lot of the problems from the old versions.
@@infidelheretic923 try to tell that to the average fully-renewable-energy activist
I usually love your videos but I heavily disagree with you in this one. You talked about the heavy costs of building nuclear power plants but failed to compare them to the costs of building coal plants. In the end the two are comparable and France which only has 5% of its energy come from fossil fuels has electricity costs similar to the US. You made it sounds like nuclear power was not feasible because it takes a lot of work to put in place and US politicians are too lazy to do it. Furthermore you talked about nuclear waste but failed to mention that one person only produces the equivalent of a can of soda of waste if they only relied on nuclear for their entire life, not to mention solar panels, batteries and even wind turbines produce crazy amounts of waste at the end of their life cycle (about 20 years). Nuclear is without a doubt a solution to a carbon free future, at least for now while we figure out cleaner ways of producing energy
He states the heavy cost of building and maintaining nuclear plants, but doesn't show the data that really matters, which is cost per energy produced. This should tell you about the intellectual dishonesty in the video...
Also, never does he mention that most nuclear plants currently operating worldwide are made with reactor designs developed in the 60's. More recent generation reactors are far more efficient, and if we didn't live in clown world, nuclear plants wouldn't be decommissioned but upgraded with modern designs.
@@donarsoak6863 100x(+) more energy extracted from the same volume of fuel, with less than 1% of the waste. This is the case for a modern (gen iv) breeder reactor. In addition, we can burn UÂČÂłâž and PuÂČÂłâč in fast reactors.
Also he talks about nuclear power plants taking a long time to build but compared to building the amount of wind turbines to replace one nuclear power plant it isnât really that long.
@@JAGRAFX Thermal efficiency doesnt equate to rector/fission efficiency. At the end of the day, every nuclear reactor turns water into steam and runs a steam turbine. The difference is that in modern currently operating water reactors they are only burning
@@JAGRAFX Good response! I agree entirely. Though, I would argue that MSR's and Breeder's have suffered because of a substantial lack of funding (mostly cause by a public misconception on Nuclear as a whole). My point in responding earlier was more so directed at what the other commenter was referring too, which I believe is the discussion of energy produce per unit of waste; which breeder reactors cant even be compared to LWR's.
One thing that many dont take into account is how rapidly our energy needs are increasing. It's a major fault of Solar and Wind. People dont realize that your smartphone uses roughly the equivalent of a family refrigerator in energy. Not directly of course; however once you factor all the servers and data centers required to turn your smart phone into a sophisticated piece of equipment instead of a $1000 paper weight, its substantial. Then it is compounded when you realize half the earth's population is living on energy consumption levels pre-technology age (1920's level is American energy consumption per capita). These countries dont take a century to catch up like we did, it takes them a matter of a decade or less once energy is provided. This is a major reason we need to push for more Nuclear if we really want to reverse our carbon impact.
How is France not an example of what nuclear power can be? Instead, you list it as an outlier. You mention that it is Franceâs strong government stance on nuclear that allows them to use it effectively.
If the United States is going to make any significant difference with climate change, it is going to need to have a strong and willing government.
Additionally, you mention proliferation and radioactivity as negatives, when the data clearly states it is safer compared to other energy sources.
I think you could have just as easily said nuclear was a viable option using the same statistics that you showed. This was ultimately not convincing.
Also, I love your stuff and respect all the work you put in. This is just some criticism I have or your argument.
Completely agree. Stating that France's achievements can't be replicated because they have a "top down approach" doesn't make any sense to me. I wish that this could have been explained more since France seems like a great example of a clean energy grid.
Same with safety. âNuclear is the most safe energy source, but that might be due to a strong regulatory environment.â
OK. Then whatâs the problem? We in the US DO live in a country with a strong regulatory environment.
Completely agree with the points you brought up about the governments and safety but still, cost and time is a huge factor especially for countries that dont have existing nuclear power plants.
Totally agree. Being from France I can also say that we pay for our electricity about half of what green Germans pay. Sure a nuclear plant is expensive to build but it lasts for 60 years compared to wind and solar (20-30years?)
The nuclear plants in France already exist, the expertise and skilled workforce exists, the government support exists, the popular support exists. These are huge hurdles for America. The cost of building, running and decommissioning plants continues to increase as the cost of alternatives drops, so being tied to fixed cost energy for 50-60 years is a gamble that not a lot of countries want to take. Also don't forget there are a lot of small government, anti public ownership types in America who don't accept public healthcare, transit, or energy, so where is the government going to find the money? Several planned nuclear plants have been cancelled recently due to the costs and private industry is not able to carry the burden on its own.
*Those nuclear reactors shown in the video are like 50 years old.*
*_Theres newer, safer, and more productive nuclear powerplants._*
There is still a risk... If a solar panel fails it does not put an entire population at risk for cancer
@@goosty17 If a solar panel fails and is not disposed of correctly, it can put you at risk to adverse health affects. The panels contain toxic metals that can contaminate water. If you drink this contaminated water, you are at risk.
@@goosty17 The newer nuclear powerplants cannot have a meltdown.
Try googling "Pebble-bed reactor" before thinking you know everything.
Matt Doyle If a solar panel falls onto the floor, or whatever, it is not going to leech into the earth like it does with nuclear waste. not to mention how nuclear waste cannot be recycled atm while solar panels can be fixed and recycled.
Knowledge Is Key Watch your attitude little girl.
The more I learn about nuclear power, the more convinced I become that not only is it the best solution for climate change, it is the _only_ solution.
It's obvious if you know anything about anything
www.electricitymap.org/?page=map&solar=false&remote=true&wind=false
Look at this map and weep. Literally all of the places that are green use mostly nuclear and hydro. ;(
Completely agree
GLaDOnOS That looks like an awesome resource! Is it reliable though?
Actually, I'm coming to believe it WAS the only solution. In our Mad Max future, our descendants might continue to use fossil fuels as part of a global suicide pact.
i live in france and no one is scared about nuclear. once the technology to reuse nuclear waste is found and secure it is by far the best option. extremely strict regulations is the key to avoid any trouble.
research the Oklo Company, theyâre using it as fuel and it is much much safer than the plant that generated it to begin with
TH0R!UM MATER!AL IT'S THE BEST MATER!AL F0R NUCLEAR P0WER PLANTS!!!
Uhm it is already found. fourth generation MSR reactors exist.
Fusion when?
@@munkhazaya29 Last year, us Brits found it. LOL
We do have viable nuclear waste storage, and the current methods are not only sufficient, but massively excessive. The Oklo natural reactor shows that, in a reducing environment, the waste will hardly permeate the rock as it will react with the rock, becoming embedded. Even the bad conditions of massive thermal flux and water flow didn't lead to any leakage. Our current storage technique is digging a massive borehole into stable bedrock with no water flow, and putting the waste, which is in an alloy, into extremely durable and watertight containers into the hole, and sealing it. The chances of it leaking are tiny, and the chances of it being accidentally dug up again are equally tiny.
Imagine someone accidentally digging up 100 m hole into granite
Finland has viable nuclear storage, the entire rest of the world has yet to solve the problem. And this is not about whether or not our storage techniques are good enough, it's that literally every other country has no plans for long term storage whatsoever and are not on the path to solving it. Nuclear proponents seem to have absolutely no idea what the actual issues with nuclear are as you just demonstrated. Most of them are completely practical problems not technological but the nuclear sector has in general failed to solve these practical problems.
@@MuhammadAhmed-qh7ut Its not a matter of wether or not it is perfectly safe. Nothing humans make is perfectly safe. But the risk associated with nuclear is far lesser than the risk of other energy sources. Wastes can be reprocessed and reused in the form of MOX fuel. France is doing it quite successfully already. In the US, they use their uranium only once then discard the used fuel as waste. Like the rest of their backward, stupid way of doing everything, it is wasteful and damaging for the environment. Used uranium isn't waste, it has to be reprocessed so you can continue to use it. Much like recycling your trash can prevent a new cycle of extraction and waste. BTW most of the Chernobyl workers who worked to contain the damaged reactor are still alive today (30+ years later) and the only real effect this accident had was a mild increase in cancer statistics in the localised area of the disaster. The environment is naturally radioactive and people get cancer even when they aren't in contact with nuclear radiation. Still, including TMI, Chernobyl and Fukushima, nuclear remain safer than other energy sources. Also it emits very little amounts of greenhouse gas so it is essentially green in nature. Everything we do is risky, we have to choose the option that is the safest.
we can convert waste into nuclear battery's the fact is waste is the only issue. Humanity will die if we rely on antiquated tecnology's like solar ,and wind which are already reaching their limits.
@@azudallsolus9413 true
âOnce we have sorted out battery storageâ. Yeah, betting it all on technologies that do not exist and may never be scientifically possible is definately smarter than investing in the buildout of nuclear...
The reality is that there is not going to be a battery storage solution. The support for renewables comes from Oil companies. Why? Because there is never going to be an efficient way to store energy on a large scale, and in the meantime, when the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow (70 pc of the time) we'll have to burn "natural" gas to provide energy.
@@jeremy6398 there already is. Hydro storage compressed air, liquid air, gravity, and there's already flow batteries online that can power cities for hours. The tech exists its just that it hasn't been commercialized.
Gart Lonm I havenât seen any white papers about those things, but my intuition tells me that they would not be very efficient ways of storing energy for the long term, which means you would still need to have a base load energy provider in the form of natural gas or coal.
Meanwhile, nuclear power IS the safest form of power, and, technology on the horizon (LFTR/MSR) would provide even safer energy for the future.
@@nateward7120 hydro storage is the most common and has been used by dams for decades. It's very efficient. Since the working fluid is dense and all you need is gravity.
Apparently it also has great potential for expansion www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=www.sciencealert.com/scientists-spot-530-000-potential-pumped-hydro-sites-to-meet-all-our-renewable-energy-needs&ved=2ahUKEwj0wcf4uLriAhVMvFkKHWaeAQoQFjAgegQICBAB&usg=AOvVaw3xMPrNlel7upB_iklDmafF
Same goes solid gravity systems since your potential is gravity you never have to worry about degradation of the energy just general maintenance on the generators. Long term it's more efficient Since it's less complicated.
Newer tech like liquid air and grid scale batteries haven't shown themselves yet. LAES has a round trip efficiently of about 30-35 percent but can be utilized anywhere and the "fuel" can be used in anything that needs cooling
arstechnica.com/science/2018/06/liquid-air-energy-storage-the-latest-new-battery-on-the-uk-grid/
Grid scale batteries are as efficient as the batteries are so any where between 50-90% depending on the chemistry. Generally more places go for flow batteries since they generally come in a truck trailer, readily scaleable, easy to handle, generally non toxic, and can *possibly last a long time with little degradation.
www.windpowerengineering.com/business-news-projects/how-three-battery-types-work-in-grid-scale-energy-storage-systems/
Right now it's not a matter of whether it can work long term but expensive storage is the most expensive mostly cause we never thought of it.
@@Garhunt05 hydro requires mountains or hills, compressed air requires old mines, gravity requires hills or mountains, batteries require a LOT of money and they deteriorate quickly. What do we do in flat country? Nuclear can be built anywhere, anywhen, is cheap, environmentally clean, has basically no waste, can function for 100 years with basic maintanence.
Doesn't the graf at 2:25 show that nuclear emissions seem to be around half of solar, and just a fraction of wind? Sure, it's a big leap up to fossil fuels, but according to that very graf, nuclear is by far the best option regarding emissions. Or am I missing something?
actually the graph is misleading, wind and nuclear are about the Same in Terms of Greenhouse Emissions, so says IPCC 2014 and If the production used renewable Energy its even better.
The andvantage of nuclear is the continuity. But the big disadvantage is the high cost expspecially If you add the cost for storing the waste for 100k+ years
but isn't it true that while we transition towards renewable energy, nuclear should definitely be contemplated and not be demolished? It is completely counterproductive to get rid of an energy source that could easily provide us all with electricity that doesn't cause emissions or at least way less than other sources. Many nuclear power plants are demolished because they're "unsafe" or that there is no solution or the waste. The solution that we have now is to store it as long as we don't have a better option. Where it is now, it is safe. There isn't even that much of it. The only viable solution, in my opinion, is to work together with all power sources we have now. We shouldn't exclude nuclear because it's the most efficient way of providing electricity when looking at the area required. While solar and wind have great potential, I don't believe building solely wind and solar farms is a viable option, as they do require lots of space, which we steal from nature. Germany is a particulately active opponent of nuclear and is swiftly replacing its facilities with coal, oil and natural gas. The replacement simply isn't quick enough to prevent a devastating change in climate own its own. We have to work together and use all our tools we have.
@@tirobo i believe nuclear should be considered, but as far as i am concerned i do not think nuclear will have much of a chance. If we exclude subsidies nuclear is easily one of the most expensive ways to produce energy, exspecially if you add the cost of nuclear waste storage.
I think safety concerns towards imminent danger are unrational, but the concern of storing the waste are not. The cost of storing it for 100k+ years is very high and in the long term error-prone.
A very reliable and cost efficient solution is actually available: solar thermal energy.
Not only is it carbon neutral an as efficient as nuclear energy, but it is actually benificial for the environment if used correctly.
Yes nuclear energy is one of the best options im terms of low emissions however it is highly unsustainable. It is extremely costly to build and run nuclear power plants and it still involves mining of uranium which, like coal, will eventually be depleted. Also no one has thought of a way to properly dispose of the nuclear waste.
@@rachaelwang6155 the waste generated my nuclear plants is so small in quantity compared to the current alternatives,that it shouldn't be a concern -I don't think having a football court size designated to storing safely waste underground is comparable to inhaling pollution from fossil fuels. Renewables won't be able to cope with demand for energy and they also produce waste
France is said to be an outlier when it comes to nuclear energy but it's not really explained. I'd like to know why the US or other countries can't replicate or learn from France. It seems like France's success with nuclear energy was severely overlooked in this video. I don't see why other countries can't learn from France but I would really like to find out why if there is a good reason.
yep
Ridiculous regulations and license fees kill nuclear projects before breaking ground. If coal and gas plants had to abide by nuclear's standards then they would be expensive, too.
Also the price of electricity in France ,which mainly uses nuclear, is way cheaper than Germany which is trying to use wind and solar. And France's carbon footprint is way below Germany's.
@@Music5362 Funny how people say renewables are already cheaper than fossil fuels yet their electric bills say otherwise.
@@leerman22 solar. And wind has already achieved $.02 a kilowatt hour
www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=www.nextbigfuture.com/2018/09/wind-power-costs-at-2-cents-per-kilowatt-hour.html&ved=2ahUKEwjdlvKd-LbiAhUBTt8KHTgNA1cQFjAAegQIAxAB&usg=AOvVaw2IaF1HEXowYT3WbeYq4jP5
cleantechnica.com/2018/06/14/new-us-solar-record-2-155-cents-per-kwh-400-mwh-of-energy-storage/
What I can tell you is that I live in Ontario, where 90% of the electricity is carbon free. Thanks to hydro and nuclear.
Hydro could be carbon "free" but it's way more enviromentally destructive that even coal.
Darlington is life, Darlington is love
@@Exelius No it isn't. Not even close!
@@Jemalacane0 No, he is right. Hydro is literally what people think nuclear is: Destroying the nearby environment and when it fails it is like a nuclear weapon going off.
Still, it is the cheapest and best source of energy overall and is 100% emission free.
We need a combination of nuclear, wind, solar and hydro, why is it so hard to people to understand that?
Germany: Hey we need less CO2 and more clean energy
*precedes to get rid of only viable clean energy source and replace it with coal*
Decisions like this are what totally destroyed my faith in humanity.
Please stop your pro atomic-waste propaganda.
Germoney is perfectly fine without the risk and waste.
@@arnonuhm4022 LMAO do you know how bad the waste from the coal plants they replaced it with is?
@@cooperhawk988 No no, they are using "Clean Coal" it's basically as clear as producing energy from renewables. It's much better than nuclear... Nuclear is the past, it's the technology of the Unevolved world...
@@neilzukov2921 lol
What you forgot to mention is, that nuclear provides energy 24/7 and more or less constant but solar and wind are very unstable and at night solar does not generate any power. Therefore you have to compensate for the "down times" of wind and solar which is mostly made with natural gas, which creates more CO2.
And not to mention all the damage to the environment solar farms and wind parks create
"figure out batteries" ;)
For example California, need an average of 30,000 MW 24/7.
50MW battery being built in my state is on the frontier of large installations. It's only able to pump 200MWhrs of energy.
Just for California to run off 50% battery...is an astronomical amount of lithium and carbon emissions.
In contrast we can recycle the spent fuel that's in the US and run for another 80 years if not more...but the US can't recycle it due to laws sooooo...
Or how about we change the way we live so we don't need electricity every hour of the day?
@@goosty17 this is on the agenda, Increasing efficiency should be number one.
Unfortunately, some places need AC/heat at night. So reducing that electrical demand will be tough until there is a better way to store energy on a grid scale.
We have a better bet to produce better batteries besides lithium based ones with poor energy storage. I mean, lithium-ion is the best battery type storage we have but it doesn't compare to gasoline or body fat for storage.
Anyways, we should convert all dams to hydro storage then reduce our residential demand to something similar to cave man era and then we should be on our way to reducing CO2 emissions from the grid.
Molten salt reactors are the only viable solution today. You don't seem to be aware of this?
You also didn't mention the ridiculous amount land and resources solar and wind need and how that causes a serious enviornmental problem.
Nuclear waste storage is an even bigger problem.
â@@goosty17 No it's not. Dry casks are inert and nuclear waste is of very small volume. Solar waste is just as big a problem as you think nuclear waste is.
@@goosty17 The volume of nuclear waste for a country like France, which has had nuclear powers since the 1970s, would fit in an olympic sized swimming pool. This is for 75pc of all energy produced for nearly 50 years! Now tell me if that is a big problem compared to the amount of waste we would produce to create 75pc of all energy needs for 50 years with renewables?
@@goosty17 it requires one football field for all the waste in the world. One football field of solar panels will barely produce enough energy for 10 storey building
Plus solar doesnt work at night.
I like how people expressed such irrational fear over nuclear, that his mother will go to the extent and mapping out an evacuation plan, but the only 3 plants in 60 years of history that they can reference are chernobyl, fukushima, and TMI, despite the fact the the latter 2 had no radiation deaths, especially TMI. Nothing even came of it and it was completely controlled.
Let's ignore data that shows it is statistically the safest, claim that France is somehow an outlier of what nuclear can accomplish (????), and resort to fear-mongering. France is what happens what nuclear is EMBRACED and not feared. Outliers are chernobyl and fukushima. They are statistical anomalies.
Why does hydro not receive the same criticisms and fear when the Banqiao dam collapsed in China during the 70s, that resulted in 200,000 deaths and the displacement of millions of others? That event alone has more casualties than the entire history of nuclear's power plants, normal operations and accidents.
Fear. Mongering. Stop it.
Fun story, I'm french and the greatest risk for our nuclear power plant is a dam collapsing :)
This a million times.
Exactly! Chernobyl was caused by unbelievable levels of Soviet mismanagement, and Fukushima was built on the Pacific Ring of Fire for goodness sake
Im Australian, if you want to build nuclear plants here would be one of the best places - we have some of the worlds largest uranium deposits, and miles of desert to build plants safely out of the way. Much better than next to a crowded Japanese city on a fault line. Unfortunately, we have a very radical, fearmongering Greens Party that instantly stirs up mass protests at the slightest mention of nuclear.
RON JAGRAF/X you cant cover all of energy needs in green energy as you need energy during night time and when its not windy. now even in the most progressive of countries coal still makes a big chunk of energy. While nuclear power is expensive in short term it is extremely money efficient in the long run. also even if it was expensive i fail to see how its not a better alternative still. Rather than spending trillions of dollars on green new deal or whatever just transition to nuclear power for a fraction of the cost. When you finally have better energy sources in the future like fusion, the free market will take care of the costs.
RON JAGRAF/X you quote construction records while i argue for long term money efficiency. fuel is inexpensive and maintainance costs are too. your point for construction costs doesnt consider the long run be the short term. also california has 45% of its energy come trough natural gasses, wich are producing co2, so no california isnt a good example at all
Worth all the risks and downsides. If you're serious about AGW you need to be open to nuclear energy.
Are you willing to live nearby a nuclear plant, or dare I say, near a nuclear burial?
@@imiy yes because I do in florida I live like 35 minutes away from a nuclear power plant, and those nuclear "burials" are like .1 percent of what could go wrong. stop fear mongering
@@imiy yes because it is more safer than working in an office
@@imiy literally safer than coal and oil power plants
@@imiy yes because it's safer than pumping more Carbon and pollution in to the air that we breath.
Where did this guy grow up? I live quite close to Indian Point and Iâm actually upset itâs closing since itâs good for the environment.
"We just have to figure out battery storage". That "battery storage" part alone makes nuclear less expansive than solar and wind. Producing electricity is not the problem. The real problem is to deliver it when needed.
Solar and wind can easily be part of a decentralized electricity disturbution system. And they're installation in comparison to nuclear is much cheaper and much faster and much safer.
There are not even enough resources to manufacture sufficient batteries to go full wind and solar, nuclear is always necessary
"That storage part makes nuclear less expensive"
2 issues I have with this statement.
First:
It ignores the cost of storage nuclear needs.
Nuclear is great for base load but can't provide peak load without being unreasonable expensive. That's why France is relying on coal power from Germany in the winter and at peak hours to keep the lights on and has built up massive heat storage over the years.
Second:
It isn't true. Grid size solar plus battery is already cheaper than nuclear and the prices there are dropping fast.
@loki katzbalger
"Enjoy cadmium poisoning"
Currently there is more cadmium put into the air by coal power plants than by solar, so the likelihood of cadmium poisoning is actually dropping by the use of solar.
"Lithium"
Currently most lithium is used for consumer electronics, paint, glass, etc. and there noone cares how it is mined.
So I actually think it is a plus that we use lithium in cars and for electricity storage as thanks to the concern trolls we get more aware of the mining practices and start to change them (which is shown in the numbers).
Except you're not really telling the truth are you. The fact is that wind and solar compliment each other as it tends to be more windy when the sun isn't out. And offshore wind is especially reliable often massively exceeding expectations. Denmark has at times had 145% of it's energy produced by wind and even at peak times Denmark has reached 130% wind energy. Wind also matches our energy use fairly well, wind tends to peak in the evenings and in the winter which are the times where we use the most energy.
Actually, in France, our electricity prices soared up because of more renewables under Germany's insistence...And we've had to put up some gas electricity plants to make for the intermittent solar and wind power...One has to understand that it's not solar + wind, it's ALWAYS solar + wind + a carbon intensive backup support, be it gas, coal or oil.
In France Engie (Gas) and Total (Oil + Gas) are totally into renewables, he he, and try to sell you "clean" electricity at an outrageous price.
Is it a coincidence that the natural gas lobby promotes solar energy?
@@KarlTykke no itâs not. âNaturalâ gas is the perfect backup for intermittent energy sources, so lobbying for windmills and solar panels secures contracts for gas productors. They know that renewables will never be able to function on their own
Yep he who says wind and solar says natural gas.
Very interesting take about how renewables always come in tandem with more carbon sources as backup
Yes true. I always get ticked off by seeing these charts nuclear compared to wind and solar and not wind + natural gas backup charts like that are disruptive
There are a lot of very promising new nuclear power designs being developed which address most of the down sides you mentioned about nuclear, including waste.
I think your view of nuclear is based on old designs whilst ignoring the new designs.
I expect nuclear to be become among the cheapest energy while maintaining it as the safest form of energy production, even safer than wind and solar as you stated yourself.
Issue with this is that those "new designs" are basically 60 years old and the promise of being "to cheap to meter" is also 60 years old.
Nuclear is expensive but considering its huge power output, wouldnât it mean that it has a good power output to cost ratio?
No. It is way way more expensive per kWh than solar or onshore wind.
@@mAx-grassfed No it's not. Google is your friend
@@mAx-grassfed Not really since wind and solar are five times more expensive if you consider the costs that are subsidised and the costs that have to be made in order to make it viable such as hugely updating the powergrid.
@@mAx-grassfed you forgot solar and offshore wind farms need to be replaced every so often and the stuff you use to replace them are not as renewable
@@Cecilia-ky3uw yet
I think nuclear is 100% the solution. This video is still going based off old systems of nuclear. There is new nuclear technology which requires simpler construction, is more stable, and produces less waste. I recommend everyone watch the video Vox recently made about new nuclear technology and re-evaluate.
Side note: wind energy kills many (i dont know numbers) migratory birds and affects the lifestyles of many other animals. If we want to protect wildlife, I dont think wind energy is the solution at all.
I agree with your points on nuclear energy but skyscrapers effect many more birds than wind turbines. Although wind turbines kill many birds, tall buildings kill many more. All energy sources have their trade-offs including solar, and the lack of emissions from wind energy outweighs the harm done to the environment.
"scientists concluded that, nationwide, 365 million to 988 million birds die annually after crashing into buildings and houses"
www.nytimes.com/2014/05/14/nyregion/researchers-hope-bird-friendly-glass-can-help-reduce-migration-deaths.html
New nuclear plant designs have been around for a long time, but they aren't being built. Why? If the technology is truly functional and viable it would happen, instead it just stays on the drawing board and in test facilities. Meanwhile the alternatives continue to become cheaper. The window for nuclear to have a bigger impact is closing.
@Jan KubĂĄt fastbreeders already exist, but they are expensive and get a fraction of the returns that should be possible, they also produce a lot of waste. There are no magic bullets, if nuclear delivered on its promises and was economically viable they would be built. Public opinion barely enters the equation, just look at fracking and tar sands. Nuclear is not being built because it fails economically.
@@Jimmy4video In my country public opinion has everything to do with it, we actually banned nuclear power production in the country via a referendum in the wake of the Chernobyl meltdown
@@TheMrdeathlord I agree nuclear would have been bigger if Chernobyl hadn't happened, but it's a long time since then and new nuclear is failing to be built on economic grounds. www.theguardian.com/business/2019/jan/17/hitachi-set-to-scrap-16bn-nuclear-project-anglesey-wales www.nytimes.com/2017/07/31/climate/nuclear-power-project-canceled-in-south-carolina.html ahvalnews.com/turkey-investment/japan-cancels-22-billion-turkish-nuclear-power-project
French electricity price is about half of Germany's btw. So much for that "fucking expensive nuclear".
Basically his argument was "But France is the outlier", but failing to acknowledge uthat it's actually bad policy that makes nuclear expensive, not the technology being expensive inherently. And if France can do it, we can do it... oh I guess that only counts when Germany is doing wind and solar (and failing at it).
The point "It can't be done because there's no momentum" is a failure to see that the very purpose of this channel is creating positive momentum in society - EXACTLY what would make nuclear pursued and cheap.
If you want cheap, efficient, safe and clean energy, nuclear energy it's the only choice.
@Nicholas Negron I disagree residential grid tied solar
Autism. But no geothermal is the best option. Just run a government deficit and done. Sadly money never listens it only talks
Nah man, Nuclear energy is a secret fossil fuel.
â@@TheHiralis How? People talk about waste and fail to mention all of the waste we have produced since the 1950's can fit into a football stadium only a few feet high. He also failed to mention fast breeder reactors, which use spent uranium as fuel. Also no mention of thorium reactor of any kind. This dude definitely didn't do enough research.
Solar and Wind is far cheaper than nuclear, produce no wast, and with no storage technologies, there will be no reason to build any other type of power plant.
I usually love this channel but in my opinion this video is somewhat biased towards renewables and doesn't seem to give nuclear a fair chance. Despite the financial cost, we cannot afford the environmental cost anymore. France and Sweden have flipped their energy sources to mainly nuclear in recent years through lots of proactive initiatives, why can't the US or China? Renewables are a good source of energy, but like you said, they haven't reached their full potential yet until we "figure out batteries". Well how long will figuring out battery tech take? The current nuclear reactors we have now are the most safe form of energy production, and the cleanest. Renewables will not produce enough energy to offset our current carbon emissions before it's too late. The only option if we want to have a chance of reversing our carbon emissions is converting mainly to nuclear. Also the point you made about the big nuclear disasters that everyone fears, other than Chernobyl there were no casualties caused directly by the radiation. The deaths in Fukushima were caused by a botched evacuation. Three Mile island, there were no deaths. Chernobyl is the only meltdown that directly had adverse health effects on the nearby people, and that was an operator error that we've learned from and incorporated into power plant designs. I could go on longer but Nuclear is definitely the future, no matter the cost. If you're interested in learning more about this I'd recommend reading, A Bright Future by Joshua Goldstein.
i felt the same
Yeah I agree, this video was a bit biased imo
Your message is correct, but Sweden is actually shutting down nuclear power plants now. This means that we now import a lot of coal power, and are getting a less stable power grid. In the mean time we spend 30 million dollars on electric bikes people buy instead of normal bikes. The priorities are crazy and the co2 emissions are now increasing rapidly after a longer period of lower emissions.
...But... ...But... ...But, CHERNOBYL!!! THREE MILE ISLAND! FUKASHIMA! The whole world is doomed if these happen again. We should just burn more coal instead.
@@felixgustavsson2852
Even France is planning to phase out nuclear and the reason is cost.
Currently France can build nuclear with a price tag of 120âŹ/MWh. They claim they can lower that cost down to 70âŹ/MWh with their next gen reactors.
Wind is already below half of that and even if you include storage wind and solar will be cheaper.
Holy shit been awile since I've seen something filled with so much bias.
This is roughly par for the course for this joker's videos, lol.
Yeah this undermined a lot of my faith in their content.
@@comeradecoyote Go find the one where he says everyone with a lawn is a racist.
@@hughjass1044 That is a strawman, and if you watched the video, you know that. He never said anything remotely like "everyone with a lawn is racist"
@@michealhoffstater9810 This video leaves much to be desired, but i think his content over all is good. This one just wasnt researched as well as it could have been.
"We have to explore other energy options"
Thorium? Gen IV nuclear? or (somehow) Fusion? Those are options, at least, quite optimistic ones, that I hoped you mentioned.
I agree, there are a large number of next gen type nuclear reactors that are being designed. One could argue the lack of testing or no "historically viable commercialization", but that will be true for any new design for any new power production technology. The nearly 50 year old nuclear reactor designs of yesteryear require massive cooling towers (that only emit steam I might add) and reaction chambers that are under 200 PSI.
@@emersonharris142 THANKYOU!!!
I mean wow. This channel doesn't research their videos!
They didn't even mention pebble-bed reactors. their information is pretty outdated.
I've heard about Thorium reactors making a comeback, but how confirmed is it? Fusion is still a big theorethical and I'm not sure what Gen IV nuclear is.
I ask because if it isn't something we can rely on, then it's a disservice to the point made in the video. We can already replace carbon emissions with the tech we have. Making calculations of "what would happen if X comes to reality" will only serve as a deterrent for action. We need to do whatever we're certain we can do first, then consider better options as they arise.
@@ekki1993 Don't quote me on it, but at least for thorium there have been some tests in India, but those were with a solid reactor and more for radiation research not power production. I have heard that China was looking into it as well, but I haven't heard much beyond that. The US has some some companies trying to work on the design but the the Government (and activists that are pushing anti-nuclear in general) have been blocking any hope of a test reactor in the states. I think it was seeker that had a video on this and the take away is that they are having to make lab test to prove 10+ year viability, so they have to run lab tests for 10 years. For example with the liquid salt reactor, the pipes that move the salts from the reactor chamber to the heat transfer need to be ensured that they will not corrode with the heated salts for that long. I heard this stuff a year or two ago when I was looking into this stuff more so there might be more information out there that I don't know.
My PhD thesis will be on nuclear fusion. I'm here to say that we need to invest in advanced fission reactors if we ever want to curb climate change.
At 3:59 , France is actually building a long term storage solution , called Cigeo. But it is a very unpopular and controversial project.
"On par with Three Mile Island" Ah yes, the deadliest energy accident ever.
From archive.epa.gov/epa/aboutepa/epas-role-three-mile-island.html:
"An interagency analysis concluded that the accident did not raise radioactivity far enough above background levels to cause even one additional cancer death among the people in the area. They found no contamination in water, soil, sediment or plant samples."
I'm pretty sure that the general consensus is for an accident to be considered "deadly" at least one person has to die from it. You don't even have that.
Meanwhile in England, 14 people were killed in wind turbine accidents in 2011 alone.
www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2013/09/29/forget-eagle-deaths-wind-turbines-kill-humans/#16beca0a5467
That's 14 more that died during the Three Mile Island meltdown.
@@CrossoverManiac That's 13 more than from the radiation in Fukushima.
Omg, three mile. A catastrophe
Looking back at TMI I think getting scared of it is like getting scared of a bat
I am a nuclear engineering student so definitely Iâm pro-nuclear energy
I mean, yeah but you really have to specify if fusion or scission nuclear power
I'd say I'm really pro fusion, and I hope we'll find the way to make it work
Scission on the other hand is not so good to me, it's a literal bomb and the waste is rarely correctly disposed of (+ all of the genetic mutation horror that happens around those reactors is really scarry)
Poor logic surely.
"I work for Exxon so definitely I'm pro fossil fuels"
@lakshya varshney sadly, almost all methods of energy production except solar require fans.
@@simolx nuclear power plants canât even explode at this point. If something goes wrong, the worst that can happen is a leak. Leaking radioactive material is definitely better than straight-up releasing CO2 into the atmosphere. But i do agree, fusion is best.
@@Nico-dt5hu there are solar powerplant that basically use mirrors to concentrate light in a tower with water that it warms up , become steam and run a turbine, sorry
I'm sorry but I can't agree with some of your arguments, specially with the one regarding how slow nuclear is, it is true that recent nuclear proyects have taken too long and blown out of budget but that has to do with the fact that since the 70s and 80s we haven't built much and aren't used to it. For example, South Korea and China are constructing reactors in as little as 4 years and sticking to budget. Nuclear is the only technology we have nowadays that can decarbonize completely an energy grid. With a big enough investment 100% of the world energy could be carbon free in 10 years if we rellied solely on nuclear and renewables (I know it's impossible but I'm just trying to show that we already have the technology to do so). However, we can't say the same of a 100% renewables scenario, not only do we need to figure out batteries but we would need to completely reinvent our energy market and power grid. In the meantime we would still rely heavily on natural gas to backup our renewables (which can be more expensive by kWh than nuclear). So what is the better strategy to stop climate change as soon as we can? Use a technology we have available nowadays and invest in solving its issues in the future? Or invest in a technology we don't have yet and hope we solve its issues before it is too late for climate change?
I don't see the point of a slow building process. Sure, it needs some time to build a nuclear power plant, but when finished, you'll be able to provide a massive amount of electricity. To get that amount with something like offshore wind, you'll need much longer.
I mean no, like taking an actual example in the same time it has taken Finland to build 1 reactor which is expected to provide 1600 mw Denmark has installed over 1800 mw of offshore wind power. Now keep in mind that offshore wind park construction in Denmark only really started accelerating in the last decade and there were massive gaps in construction while Finland started their project in 2005. The Finish reactor is expected to go online in july next year if all things go according to plan, but in that same time Denmark has not only built more power, Denmark has also been using that power for longer. So actually you need less time to build the same amount of off shore wind power as you'd get from the most modern nuclear reactor. And the other big difference is that while Finland has no additional plans for building more reactors right now, Denmark has plans for over 4000 mw of off shore wind power. Building wind is simply faster and cheaper than nuclear.
Now the reason why wind ends up beating nuclear so easily is that wind turbines can be mass produced which hugely decreases the cost and means that you just have to put them down, you don't have to build a new building every time you just install them.
Wind also has some other less obvious benefits, when you're building off shore wind parks you need high voltage cables to connect them to be mainland, but a lot of cables connecting nations also run underwater so it's easy to just hook a wind park up to another nation. And that is the plan for a wind park currently under construction in Denmark, it's going to connect to Germany. Building up wind also helps you build up the grid in general, nuclear does not do that as nuclear power plants have to be built close to cities.
Nuclear power is VITAL to decarbonization. It is by every metric the safest and most powerful form of zero-emission energy known to mankind. It is also the only PROVEN way to meaningfully decarbonize a national electricity system - France is not an outlier but a MODEL to be emulated for how consistently low-carbon their energy system is, and how inexpensive that energy is overall.
There are LOTS of hidden costs with renewables that nuclear just does not have - additional grid buildouts, backup batteries (that take carbon to make, move, and connect), and 'spinning reserve' plants with natural gas peaker facilities and other such fossil-fuel infrastructure burning away 24x7 to make sure the lights stay on when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine.
By every available metric - energy density, useful energy, energy consistency, safety, scalability, proven decarbonization, small waste volume, small land footprint, small material input footprint, by EVERY metric Nuclear is clearly a powerhouse of zero-emissions energy.
It is only fear-mongering, hysteria, and a well-coordinated propaganda campaign by anti-nuclear groups and anti-nuclear regulators that have kneecapped this amazing technology. We should FULLY embrace it if we want to maintain a livable climate.
Don't forget the fossil fuel industry. www.forbes.com/sites/kensilverstein/2016/07/13/are-fossil-fuel-interests-bankrolling-the-anti-nuclear-energy-movement/#448850e57453
Except Denmark has managed to to reach 50% carbon neutral energy generation using mostly wind and has done that in the same time Finland has taken to build a single generator. Nuclear is a great option if you want to decarbonize in 50 years, solar and wind are the options if you want to decarbonize now.
Iâm disappointed this video didnât mention nuclear fusion as one of the more promising energy alternatives in the future. This form of energy creation is basically current nuclear without the risk of meltdown, and no harmful radioactive materials left over. If figured out, it would allow for easily the best way to create energy ever seen by man
ahah, he didn't mention nuclear fusion and he was right. As he say, France has many experience in the nuclear, we already think of this idea since decades, I even invite you to learn about the biggest project on the world for nuclear fusion : www.iter.org/proj/inafewlines. But the problem is that he will never end (and i'm pretty sur about it) because making this energy seems impossible (and it is).
Jay Park thatâs not the issue with fusion at the moment, we can create fusion reactors right now, the issue is getting the EROI (energy returned on investment) value to be positive. Where are you getting your info?
Solar panels are powered by nuclear fusion. *wink*
Progress is being made on fusion research. I do think we will one day make a break through but there is no telling how far away that it.
Muon catalyzed fusion in a polywell reactor may be the thing that works.
Dr Busard of EMC2 was developing the polywell before his death. The last time I looked, EMC2 was still working on it. I have not read up recently on the progress. What made his deign so attractive to me was the boron hydrogen fuel thet polywell used only produces 3 alpha particles as waste. These particles have a lot of KE and could in theory power a direct conversion system by making DC current.
I support the continued research in fusion power.
Matt Doyle yeah Iâm with you, it does seem like a far off technology but I think it should have been at least given a nod in this video as in the future so far it seems to be the most promising form of energy with massive technological and societal implications
Nic Diaz this video isnât necessarily on current times. A lot of the video discusses how nuclear isnât being implemented because of the cost and the future moving towards solar and wind
I definitely think nuclear power has a huge role to play in our transition to carbon neutral power sources. In addition to having virtually no carbon emissions, it is also able to produce large amounts of energy. This gives it an advantage over renewable when competing against fossil fuels, as renewables produce very little energy. In a perfect world, we would be able to rely solely on renewables. However, unless we drastically reduce our energy consumption, or greatly improve the efficiency of renewables, this will not be a reality in the near future. Knowing this, there are some things to still consider.
Firstly, solutions to waste storage definitely need to be explored as waste storage will remain an issue until this is addressed. One solution, if it can be done safely, would be waste reprocessing. I believe that France processes their nuclear waste, if I remember correctly. This would reduce the amount of waste that would need to be stored. Then, long term storage sites would need to be created.
Secondly, regardless of support or opposition, nuclear power plants are slowly closing down all over the country. This, in large part, has to do with the low cost of natural gas. Due to fracking, America has an abundance of natural gas. This has driven down the cost of energy production in America. As a result, nuclear is struggling to compete with the Natural gas power plants, while still making a profit. A solution to this issue could be power-purchase agreements. This would ensure that Nuclear plants are given guaranteed energy rates so they can continue to operate, regardless of Natural gas prices.
Whether or not we should be building more nuclear power plants is another discussion. However, at the very least, I think we should be supporting the ones that currently exist so that fossil fuel plants are not taking their places. Nuclear power, when done correctly, is able to produce energy more safely than fossil fuel plants, which can be observed with the low global mortality rate. Finally, it is important to remember that as a consumer, we have to power to reduce our consumption, regardless of where our electricity comes from. Everyone can reduce their footprint by improving the energy efficiency of their homes/businesses. This can be done with changes like improved insulation, LED lighting, energy star appliances, and mindful energy habits.
"Firstly, solutions to waste storage definitely need to be explored as waste storage will remain an issue until this is addressed."
nuclear.gepower.com/build-a-plant/products/nuclear-power-plants-overview/prism1
That's a reactor design that's been commercially available since at least 2010 that can convert spent nuclear fuel into usable fuel for other reactors or run off of it itself and only leaves the shorter lived waste left at the end that'd be safe within 200-300 years. It's also not the only reactor design that can do that.
@@coreymicallef365 Theres over 100x more toxic waste produced by solar that isn't able to be recycled. Thorium also produces less waste and more power then even new nuclear.
@@Gamerad360 Thorium is a type of new nuclear power being developed, it isn't seperate.
@@coreymicallef365 Never said it was separate.
@@Gamerad360 just the way you put it makes it seem like you were.
3:47 , rectification : we have a long term (eternal)storage facility being built in France, totally risk proof.
It's called CIGEO in the Bure region
What most solar and wind supporters don't understand is the amount of batteries needed to store electricity in power grids. Also when there will be basically no wind during winter for several days in a row, batteries can't help you anymore. You need basically 100 % backup.
Wind regularly goes a week without blowing hard enough for wind farms, not just in winter. The amount of power wind turbines produce is to the square of windspeed. I think Hydro One is forced to buy wind power at above-market rates just for these farms to survive.
@@leerman22 That's right, I just wanter to show that combined solar and wind electricity prosuction can be basically zero for days in a row. Power of a wind turbine dependa on the cube of wind speed, not square, which makes things even worse. Yes they do, this electricity is subeidized.
Solar and wind are great but the scaleability poses environmental concerns. The amount of solar and wind farms needed to power a country like the United States is rather high and as such we would have to disrupt large swaths of land to build these solar and wind farms. This defeats the entire purpose of switching to these renewables for the sake of saving the planet if in the end we just destroy ecosystems to build these energy generation plants.
That's sorta fundamentally misunderstanding those power types. Both wind and solar have the advantage of being incredibly modular, you can basically place them anywhere, this means that you can put them in cities and cities have a lot of space that we aren't using that you could put solar panels on. Roofs, parking lots etc. all massive swaths of land that you could easily install solar panels on and it doesn't have any effect on the environment. Wind power is similar in that you can install turbines on top of large buildings but also off shore wind is by far the best option and off shore wind takes up very little space and is shown to have a negligible impact on the environment. Even on land wind turbines barely do anything as they don't actually take up much space, each turbine is not that big so there's plenty of space for forests around them or other use, they only need the wind which isn't on the ground anyways.
hedgehog3180 Shut up, youâre like 14.
âRenewables like solar and wind have not reached their potentialâ I agree but neither has nuclear fission, I havenât heard of thorium rector development and implementation yet.
India
Yeah good idea lets bet on completely theoretical technologies.
Thorium reactors have been built but they were never developed because it was nixed by the Nixon Administration in favor of the fast breeder (which never got off the ground).
Thorium isn't even necessary. Nuclear is already the best solution, and our reactors are only 1% efficient. Imagine what a 10% efficient reactor could do.
Grouping Three Mile Island with Chernobyl and Fukushima is doing a disservice. Chernobyl was a full-on core exposure, the moderator graphite burned and that smoke spread. Fukushima was multiple core containment failures.
Three Mile Island was a partial meltdown. Core containment was never lost. A small amount of coolant was vented. Today TMI barely registers above natural background radiation.
And nobody died in Fukushima. Only 4000 people died because of chernobyl. 7-9 million die each year because of fossil fuel, at least 100000 die in us because of coal
@@tedarcher9120 Don't forget the Chinese dam that killed 230,000 people. Makes Chernobyl look like a picnic.
This channel is so dang underrated, these topics are so relevant and you cover them so informatively.
Cheers :)
Itâs growing fast tho
Agreed! I was so happy to see the shoutout by Hank Green of Vlogbrothers in his âWhite Walkers are Climate Changeâ-GoT-Video! Also â+â and âDFTBA!â.
*Can I just say; this channel doesn't research their videos.*
*Their information is wayyy out of date.*
_If you want to research nuclear search "Pebble-Bed Reactors", "Transatomic power" and "Nucscale"_
still pretty stupid that they didnt notice thorium reactors.
I love your videos dude but I really have disagree with you on this one and I kind of feel like you came to this video with a bias and your opinion already decided. Just because nuclear power stations are very expensive to build does not mean that we shouldn't be building them. I agree with the professor that you spoke to that there isn't public political momentum behind nuclear power but that means that people who believe in it need to get out and spread the word. I would have liked to see you interview some other scientists or people who work in the industry and see a different side to the argument. I would have liked to see more on new advances in nuclear energy and some more info about storage because it was a bit vague. The reality of the current situation we are in with energy is that solar and wind do not provide anywhere near enough energy to what we are consuming. I'm not against renewables and believe they will improve in efficiency and we should be implementing them where we can but I believe we can use nuclear alongside them.
US: Decommissions nuclear plant
US: CLEAN COAL!!!
Rip
@@johnperic6860 And the oil industry.
"It's in the mail. I sent the check yesterday"
How can you talk about nuclear power with out talking about Thorium. None of the drawbacks you mentioned would be relevant in in LFTR.
It's still a prototype
That's like saying he's wrong for forgetting about fusion, except fusion is actually way closer to being a practical source of power than thorium since thorium reactors literally don't exist yet. Yeah sure this completely theoretical technology sounds great but we shouldn't throw away wind and solar which are proven technologies because of some theory.
Thorium actually has all the same drawbacks as normal Uranium. Molten salt reactors can use the typical Uranium-235/238 mixture as well as Uranium-232/238, which is what you mean when taking about Thorium. If a reactor is efficient enough, it can "burn" both fuels. However using Uranium-232/238 as fuel would generate a hotter reaction, and it would last longer on the same amount of fuel. In terms of safety modern reactors technically could meltdown, so I can't say impossible, but it is so unbelievably unlikely it really shouldn't be considered. Future reactors, apart from being more efficient, could also make it physically impossible for a meltdown to occur. Back to Thorium, it has higher energy density so it creates less waste for the same amount of fuel, which is good, but disposing of waste isn't the problem it is made out to be. The waste from this is also more potent than Uranium-235/238. Uranium has different isotopes, the only ones you need to know about for this are Uranium-233, Uranium-235, and Uranium-238. A mixture of 95% Uranium-238 and 5% Uranium-235 is used in reactors now. The Uranium-235 acts as a catalyst, keeping the Neutrons flying and the reaction going. Uranium-235 is the more potent of the two, which is why Nuclear bombs require 95% Uranium-235 and only 5% maximum Uranium-238. Uranium-238 has to be refined into Uranium-235. The idea of Thorium reactors is to use the Thorium to produce Uranium-233, which would give us more Nuclear fuel, about 10 billion years worth (Uranium already offers 5 billion years), as well as a more powerful fuel, once it is refined. The biggest issue with Thorium is the required processing and refining to get the actual fuel. This is an energy hungry, time consuming process. Thorium offers few advantages over Uranium, and the advantages it does offer only solve problems we don't have. We aren't going to run out of Uranium anytime soon. We aren't going to need to mine for Uranium soon either because it is cheaper and easier to get it out of the Ocean. Uranium reactors are already safe and reliable. We already have a solution for the little waste Uranium fission produces. Also Uranium is ready to go right now, we don't have to develop it. I mean we really should because right now reactors are 1% efficient, so imagine a 10% efficient reactor. To sum up, Thorium is cool, and plenty capable, but it solves problems we don't really have, and its going to take time to develop and deploy, while we need a solution now so we can stop burning fossil fuels, and we already have that solution.
@@hedgehog3180 proven technologies that cause more harm than benefit. Yeah, sure, that's a great source we shall keep using! (Seriously, a direct low carbon footprint is the only advantage renewables have in comparison to other energy sources.)
@@tedarcher9120 Oakridge National Laboratory successfully ran the design back in the 60s, running 13,000 hours of full energy production in a span of four years operation. It has then been defunded in favor of fast breeder reactors.
The MSR is not an undemonstrated blueprint. The reason it's not being pursued in the US is that the NRC doesn't have any process in place for greenlighting liquid fuel reactors R&D, and is lethargic and not funded to establish and pursue a process.
I got my information mainly from Gordon McDowell videos. I can provide links if asked.
Look up molten salt reactors. They solve/lessen a lot of the problems you mentioned
Halfa-Sword smh đ€Šđ»ââïž
nuclear > fossil fuels
Nuclear >> conventional renewables > fossil fuels
Beck Addison for now and the next one-hundred years? Absolutely.
A-fuckin'-men!
@@beckaddison5827 Amen
@@beckaddison5827 For me it's more like Nuclear > Renewable's >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Fossil fuels.
What I learned from the 3 famous nuclear disasters
1) TMI didn't have enough sensors at the right places for the operators to make correct decisions
2) TMI operators had to make critical decisions within minutes
3) Fukushima was placed in a bad location
4) Chernobyl was a bad design when taken out of normal oerating mode to do tests, had no confinement building, and again, complexity requiring critical decisions to be made in a few minutes
If those problems can be solved in new designs, I'm for nuclear
I don't consider the waste storage to be anything more than a political problem.
Robert Brandywine Fukushima was caused by a fault in the coolant bay, which shut off as the reactor was still running. It only killed 1 person, so we are improving our ways of building power plants
those problems have been solved by current designs, future designs are finding ways to solve the waste storage problem and more. price isn't much of a factor when compared to investment potential. meanwhile, politicians are decommissioning the few nuclear reactors we do have and replacing them with inferror energy sources that will ultimately harm the environment more, yet will still get the environmentalists to reelect the politicians who are behind it.
7:27 uh... did you do your research on how cheap the "renewables" are? Because our family business is in renewable energy and They are not cheap.
In what country? Do you mind sharing?
@@TCt83067695 sure, Armenia
@@imicca thanks. Maybe there are more factors unique to Armenia
@@TCt83067695 could be :)
France: abolishes slavery
World: well thatâs an outlier, thereâs no way we can do that...
Did not go well for the Whites in Haiti
Please do one with Biofuel! My country indonesia is transitioning to use biofuel instead of fossil fuel and they use palm oil. Im still not sure what is tbe right solution as we cant just eliminate them.
Biofuel is renewable but not sustainable. Forest cover loss in Indonesia is already at an alarming rate.
evita dwipayana Biofuel is a waste of space as it requires huge monocultures and still causes carbon emissions.
Bio fueles are nice in theory, but they are only truely green if the crops for fuel are grown on barren land or at sea, which surprise surprise, they are not.
So which one is better? Fossil fuel or biofuel?
evita dwipayana It really depends. How is the biomass used as fuel grown? What did it do the land it was grown on? To which fossil fuels are we comparing biofuel? Everything is better than coal, but oil and gas are on the same level of most biofuels. In the case of palmoil, for which more often than not natural forests are burned down, I would rather stick to oil, or better, with gas.
Here in the Netherlands we do have long term storage. They've built a facility that can survive the crash of a Boeing 737, so not only Finland is working on it.
czcams.com/video/Bfa_DzKrYjo/video.html
@3:27 there is the talk about turning nuclear waste into bomb material. âone consequence of reprocessing spend fuel could be the proliferation of nuclear weapons. A by-product of the recycling process is more plutonium, which can easily be used to build a nuclear weapons.â
This is false. The answer lies in the word plutonium. This is the name of an element but plutonium has many isotopes. Not all these isotopes can be used as bomb material due to their half-lives and nuclear characteristics. To make a bomb out of plutonium, you would need Pu-239. The concentration in spend fuel of this isotope is too low to go directly to a bomb, it has to be enriched. This canât be done chemically because the isotopes are indistinguishable from one another on the chemical scale, youâd have to go atomic, which is to say enrichment by centrifuges. This is very hard to do, and frankly the hardest way to make a nuclear weapon.
The solution in nuclear waste does lie in reprocessing of spend fuel. Fast reactors like EBR I & II, BN-600 & 800, PhĂ©nix & Super PhĂ©nix have all proven that this technology works. When using this tech, itâs called closing the fuel cycle, so that all the atoms are fissioned and only fission products are left over. 17% of these products have to be stored for 300 years.
On the subject of cost, it is obviously not seriously discussed in this video. They only give one example of one new nuclear plant. And of course itâs the one that is in the US. For some context, this is the very first new reactor in the US in 30 years so yeah of course itâs going to be expensive. This design has been used in china with US supplied parts, it took 9 years to build. The Haiyang NPP has 2 AP1000 designs and are operational since 2018. The Sanmen NPP has 2 AP1000 designs and they are operational since 2018.
I haven't watched the hole video yet but I'm gonna make a bet that he doesn't mention thorium.
tell me if I'm wrong:)
You're not wrong. I thought I finally came across a platform that actually tells important stories without bias but I was wrong. A common theme I found in his videos is the fact that he always talks about the capitalist system being the culprit of all problem. A system is as good as the people running it. OCC IS ANOTHER ONE OF THOSE FAR LEFT CHANNELS WHO SERVES GENERAL PUBLIC WITHOUT ANY MUCH DONE RESEARCH JUST SO THAT IT COULD FIT THEIR PROPAGANDA.
@@dps3902 I wish you weren't right. I mean, saying that capitalism can't stay the way it is and needs strong policies to combat corporate misconduct is something I would add, but that goes along with your statement anyway.
Maybe not THE solution, but a pretty damn good one.
The problem with OLD nuclear energy plants was they had a focus on creating weapon grade plutonium, and use extremely outdated tech. The old reactors relied on pressurised water.
New reactor tech doesn't need high pressure as the control medium used slows the reaction once it reaches too high of a temperature causing reactors to automatically shut down. They also have liquid fuel which simply drains into storage/waste tanks in the case of a malfunction. Note the fuel drain system is caused by the heat of the fuel itself melting through a pre-designed "plug" so if the fuel does reach too high of a temp, or is in the state of a "meltdown" it melts through the plug and stores itself in the tanks.
Also you may not know this but modular reactors have been in use for over 50 years. NASA uses them for remote satellites and Mars Rovers. They reproduce their own fuel and output a buttload of energy, since 1KG of Uranium contains over 1,000,000x more energy than 1KG of Coal.
Nuclear energy is not alone either. Sharks and Planes get a bad rap too. Eventhough cars cause more deaths than both combined, and are way more damaging to the Earth aswell.
Don't take my word for it. I'm not a Nuclear scientist. But seriously RESEARCH. collect the data yourself and compare. Don't cherry pick information that suits your current beliefs. Actually strive for the truth behind nuclear power. Bottom-line. There is NO other alternative available right now. The world MUST move away from fossil fuels ASAP. Nuclear power isn't a permanent solution but its our only option, and its way safer than you think.
love the use of language in this video...not!
"nuclear 'could' be a low carbon emission option"?? as if there is a doubt?
it definitely and utterly IS a low carbon emission option...perhaps even the lowest!
bias over facts is THE major problem today especially in free media...
Per the IPCC, the total lifecycle emissions of nuclear are comparable to wind.
www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/ipcc_wg3_ar5_annex-iii.pdf
pp 1335, Table A.III.2 | Emissions of selected electricity supply technologies (gCO 2 eq / kWh)
wind ~11g CO2/kWh
nuclear ~12g CO2/kWh
hydro ~24g CO2/kWh
solar ~48g CO2/kWh
Gas-Combined 490g CO2/kWh
Coal-PC 820g CO2/kWh
One big thing you missed is that solar and wind aren't environmentally friendly, wind turbines are so massive and create such a huge negative pressure that they cause small bats and birds lungs to burst when they fly near them. Solar when concentrated in one area is like a giant mirror and reflects sunlight back, when in a large concentrated area they can catch birds on fire when birds fly above them. That really affects their migration patterns and solar has actually caused some birds to become endangered I believe. I personally see nuclear as the best option for us right now if we don't want to kill massive amounts of small animals. I know there are ways that we are actually working on to make nuclear power plants even safer than they are now, they also are working on renewable nuclear energy sources. If we can actually implement those ideas I can see nuclear becoming more prominent. That still doesn't solve the waste problem but we might be able to find a way to solve that problem too. This all being said no matter what energy option we choose, there will be pros and cons, we kind of have to pick our poison here.
hi do you happen to have any sources that support this theory? I would be interested in reading up in this topic
The physics are clear. The universe has spoken. Go nukes!
How long does it take for you to create a video? Iâm always amazed by your work and the way you display all the information
the element you mentionned about reprocessing is also applyed to Gen4 central?
Really nice to see that this channel is making a video about Nuclear energy. Still, I couldn't help to note some things I think are important:
1. On Emissions: The IPCC graph clearly shows that a total cycle of a nuclear power plant even produces less emissions than that of solar and wind. This includes construction, transportation and mining. Don't portray it like its just OK and 'less harmful than fossil fuels'. Seems a clear argument in favor of nuclear.
2. Waste: Good job. I'd add the number of cubic meters of overall nuclear waste produced in comparison to other energy sources like coal, gas and even renewables. (I'm sincerely curious for example what the waste footprint of battery cells and metals used in PV is? Or is it all getting recycled?) Also note that coal plants release radioactive C* atoms in the air - how does that compare in quantities?
3. Cost: This is where I get a bit triggered. Nuclear energy has a high UPFRONT cost, that does not necessarily mean a high total cost in comparison to renewables. Renewables also require a complete overhaul of an electricity network with huge costs tied to this.
In addition, people often look at maximum capacities of renewables as a comparison of costs while on average PV and wind work on 40% capacity not even accounting for energy loss in storage. A 5GW nuclear power plant is actually going to provide all round 5GW of power; a 5GW solar power park provides some 3GW of power on a good day and 1GW on a bad one. The rest of the network also has to be able to support the huge peaks and shortages to keep everything running smoothly which becomes increasingly hard and expensive when the percentage of renewables increases.
As you said, France managed to scale up nuclear quickly and successfully with huge upfront costs that are only possible when you have strong support and direction from the state. You failed to say that except the fact that 'it is an outlier' it was a really successful plan: they almost completely decarbonised their energy sector in a time span of 15 years (1), created a valuable high skilled industry that made a lot of money by exporting the industry and the electricity prices in france are amongst the lowest in western europe (2). So yes, with a concerted push it is possible and successful, and more importantly much quicker than a transition to renewables. Telling people it is not possible because we cannot make the required legislative push is the same as telling people switching to renewables won't work because we can't possibly organise all the new energy storage and changes to the grid that are necessary. You need the same kind of coordinated push except that with nuclear it has already been done on this scale.
If you aren't convinced, take this example: Germany spent $580 Billion on renewables and renewable infrastructure and has barely been able to reduce its total emissions. If they had invested it all in nuclear they would have had enough money to 100% run their country on nuclear power and have enough energy left to electrify all vehicles and trucks (3)(4).
Also keep in mind that renewables are still heavily subsidised in a lot of countries in contrast to nuclear.
4. Safety: Only thing I'd add is that the safety measures are only going to improve and that newer plants have all kinds of passive safety options without interference of human error making the plants safe even if they aren't properly operated.
To be clear, I think we should invest in all kind of alternative carbon-free sources and I am not at all against solar and wind energy. It just becomes problematic when public opinion against nuclear, fed by well meaning groups such as Greenpeace, is seriously harming the pace of a carbon free transition. It is unbelievable that so many green activists understand the urgency of global warming and the immediate changes that need to be made, but flat out refuse to even consider nuclear energy as a viable energy source.
(1. www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/reaction/readings/french.html)
(2. 1-stromvergleich.com/electricity-prices-europe/)
(3. www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/09/11/had-they-bet-on-nuclear-not-renewables-germany-california-would-already-have-100-clean-power/#6412d123e0d4)
(4. environmentalprogress.org/big-news/2018/9/11/california-and-germany-decarbonization-with-alternative-energy-investments)
(www.electricitymap.org/?page=country&solar=false&remote=true&wind=false&countryCode=FR)
Fear point, if I'm convinced yet though.
So true!
This man somehow brings up how itâs the cleanest, safest, least wasteful energy source, that has no battery issue unlike other renewables, and still somehow believes itâs bad.
"somehow"
I can spoil to you the reason why he thinks its bad: It doesn't involves overthrowing capitalism
It'd be great if people could judge nuclear power based on facts instead of movies like Mad Max. Nuclear waste that needs to be stored for 100s or 1000s of years ....is not that dangerous. Fast radioactive decay = danger. Slow nuclear decay = welcome to planet Earth which is already radioactive...Life has evolved despite (or maybe because of) this radioactivity.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki returned to background radiation levels in around 2015 (5 half lives x 14 years for one of last energetic radioisotopes...and it probably has only been slightly elevated for 14 to 28 years before that).... I've read that the worst radiation from a nuclear bomb is gone within 24 hours...after 2 weeks it is relatively safe to go outside for short periods as long as you don't inhale / ingest radioactive dust. Coal has caused massively more deaths than even Chernobyl.
That said, I think we should build a small number of nuclear reactors, ideally with newer, safer designs, to cover background / base power generation 24 hours per day...This is a valid use case for the high construction cost of nuclear...Advances in batteries, solar, wind, tidal and geothermal can cover the rest
Hey, how did you learn to do motion graphics like this?
"The debate surrounding nuclear power is complicated" I'm studying engineering, with a focus on energy technologies, and, yeah, that's probably the most important take away. depending on how you want to classify them, right now we have at least 8 "alternative" energy sources, all of which have their own technical limitations that prevent them from being a perfect substitute for conventional fossil fuels in their current form:
Wind, solar (seasonally variable)
Hydro, geothermal (geographically limited)
Biomass (very land intensive, air pollution concerns)
Nuclear (politically problematic, some safety concerns)
CCS (expensive/immature technology)
Ocean (expensive/immature, geographically limited, seasonal or monthly variability)
And that's an very simplified overview. Many of these limitations _might_ be ameliorated by future technological developments, but we really don't know the extent or the time frame for that. It's also worth noting that most of these technologies are sensitive to local geography or culture, and that it's quite possible the strengths of some of these technologies could make up for the weaknesses of others. So I'd say it was worth making sure research funding was going to all of these technologies. I'd also be quite skeptical of anyone saying that one particular technology is the solution to all our problems, or anyone catagorically dismissing an entire energy source.
Geothermal is possible almost anywhere using binary phase plants. But there are also many other things it can be used for, ground heating has a huge potential as one of the biggest energy uses is heating right now and it's incredibly easy and cheap to install. It is especially a good solution for anyone living in places where district heating isn't viable.
Our environments determine who we are. Changing ourselves is *OUR* responsibility after leaving the environments we grown up in.
Very interesting topic, but disappointing conclusion... Firstly, using France as an example, the cost/timing issues can be significantly impacted/mitigated by political decisions - this should rather be used as an argument to really push widespread implementation over a short time.
And secondly, you forget the most important argument for nuclear - which we are only starting to realize now. Solar and wind need vast areas, and in many areas there is a conflict of renewable energy vs. biodiversity. If we cannot keep the biodiversity, we reduce nature's ability to help us limit the CO2 level in the atmosphere given a certain human-caused emission level. We need to start putting a value on biodiversity to reflect this. If we did, we would quickly realize that we do in fact need extensive nuclear energy along with expanding renewable energy.
Was thinking this would be an impartial video and it sure wasn't. Definitely a slight spin piece.
Yeah he was way to soft on the cost of nuclear.
And the "France is an outlier" part. He didn't even mention that phrase is starting to phase out nuclear cause even with subsidies nuclear can't compete in the future.
As a young designer/engineer, I had been following the nuclear question for most of my life. Even early on there was little question in my mind that despite its bad reputation, nuclear was the answer to unlocking all of our energy needs for the foreseeable future. As the early 2000âs came in and the conversation about climate change began to expand, I became even more certain and was sure that a consensus on the benefits of nuclear would rapidly be reached. Unfortunately, this is where I was wrong. Years dragged on and renewables became the craze. I grew frustrated because I knew absent some drastic technological advancement, wind and solar would not come even close to meeting the energy needs of our modern world. Then Fukushima happened which further slowed progress caused mostly by the naive public hearing the word âradiationâ and freaking out. As years turned into more than a decade I began to believe we may never utilize nuclear energy to its full potential. Sold on a lie, the very people who claimed to be fighting for our world (environmentalists) were the one slowing progress on saving it. Ignorant yet self righteous, it was infuriating trying to reason with these people.
But then something changed. It was maybe two or three years ago that I began to hear discussion about nuclear power again. It came out slowly but built up faster than I could have ever imagined. Ive seen more people come around to nuclear in the past 3 years than the 20 before. I believe that in the past year we have reached the tipping point. The point where it is now undeniable by any reasonable person who understands pros and cons, that nuclear fission is the answer and will continue to be until nuclear fusion comes on line.
Your comment put faith in my heart. I also came around to nuclear this year (I'm a German) through Kirk Sorensen, Michael Shellenberger and Gordon McDowell.
There are also the problems with renewables that make nuclear energy somewhat more attractive. Wind mills are responsible for the near extinction of several bat and bird species, because the animals get hit by the blades. Also, solar panels take up an enormous amount of ground, which has to be cleared of all kinds of ecosystems before it can really work. Broken solar panels are still wasteful and get shipped to the hoghest bidder, where poor people will dissect the panels and get exposed to heavy metals.
These are all 'smaller' problems, but it shows just how complex energy and sustainability issues are.
That's nonsense, the numbers of birds and bats hit are nowhere near what would be needed to cause extinction. They are less that tall buildings, cars or cats.
@@Jimmy4video Gonna go ahead and say that the smoke from fossil fuel plants and the steam from nuclear power plants is probably infinitely more dangerous to birds than wind turbines. Birds don't even fly that low, they usually fly much higher than wind turbines reach and off shore ones rarely are even close to paths of migrating birds. Not to mention wind turbines are easy for birds to see since they're huge moving blades.
Okay: for waste storage, there are two options. 1. Store it someplace. Long term storage can be done on site and safely for decades, or in the case of Yucca Mountain repository, if it ever gets opened, forever. 2. Reuse it . It's time to rethink what nuclear waste is. It's not "waste" - it is a resource. With a few hundred companies around the world designing new types of reactors (molten salt reactors to be specific) nuclear waste can be reused and there's enough of this resource to last the entire planet for 10,000 years. Any waste generated after continual reuse is greatly reduced in size and only has to be buried or contained for 300 years rather than the 10K years for conventional waste.
Cost: There are about 400 nukes world wide. They are almost all based on the light water reactor design. Each plant is custom built on site, making it grossly expensive and harder to repair and maintain. Newer, MSR's are smaller and can be manufactured in factories where quality control and standardization would be the norm, thus vastly lowering capital and operational costs.
Regulation: LWR's are highly pressurized reactor vessels which require many back up safety systems and procedures to prevent emergencies from occurring. On the whole, nuclear is about the safest industry out there. In developing MSR's, the real hang up is not the tech involved, but overcoming government regulatory inertia to change. Applying current nuclear safety rules to MSR's is like applying railroad safety regulations to the aviation industry. Both industries carry freight and passengers and both roll on wheels, but after that the similarities end.
3 bad incidents in the whole history of nuclear energy only proves how safe it is.
And now no one can even go near those places without protection, is that safe?
@@edu6900 Yes you can. The radiation near Chernobyl is still livable. It may increase you changed if cancer over your life.
Jared Garbo yep! And a lot of other things increase your chance of cancer as well. It's still a collection of diseases we don't quite understand, and fearing one possible cause while ignoring many other (including pollution from fossil fuels) is ridiculous. I lost my sister to cancer caused simply by a genetic problem that she was born with
@@jaredgarbo3679 well I did not know of that, but that doesn't rule out the danger of a reactor exploding and all the radiation it causes, and having to manage all of the nuclear central's waste.
@@edu6900 it's not safe for humans, but Chernobyl has clearly shown the world that nature can retake and adapt to radiation while humans cannot.
The whole problem with nuclear energy it's a simple human nature thing: an anormous energy source that can be weaponized. You can't reprocess waste because it's weapons grade nuclear material, and you can't build small de-centralized generators because they can be used by terrorist. And don't forget economic interest behind regulatory organizations like IAEA that actually slow research on modern and potentially safer approaches for nuclear energy.
Hi, just got my B.S. in nuclear engineering last weekend. My personal favorite advanced reactor is the small modular reactor due to its affordable capital costs, standardization, off-site manufacture, and passive safety.
@Matt Bergman Pebble Bed??
What are you doing now? I also completed my bsc in nuclear engineering this year.
@@royvirafayet6687 I'm a little over halfway through my PhD in the same field now!
@@alyssahayes268 I am about to apply for PhD as well. Which university?
@@royvirafayet6687 University of Tennessee
Well there goes my thoughts of being a nuclear engineer
I was working in nuclear. Now I install solar panels ;)
Do it! Follow your dreams! I'm doing a PhD in nuclear engineering! It's exciting stuff!
Honestly go for what you want, if you just wanna work with green energy wind and solar are also interesting but it's not like nuclear is useless. It'll probably end up finding use for the growing space industry some day.
Youâre going to let this guy dissuade you?
Quotes from just one physics professor plus describing nuclear energy in France as 'unfortunate' makes it seem like you have a personal issue with nuclear energy. You told us mostly the scary stuff about nuclear, but didn't compare it to the fossil fuel problems it solves. It might take a long time to set up, but nuclear energy can be very safe. This video is making me reconsider this channel as valid unbiased source on climate change.
Glad to see this comment. If a student turned this in for a grade, I would have sent it back noting the lack of sources.
what editing software do you use? you're incredible.
oh ok nvm just got to the end
It seems to me that your emissions graph does not include the emissions caused by battery production (a huge amount of co2 is emitted in battery production) for solar and wind. If you really want to get to a point where a mayority of USED energy comes from wind or solar, you need batteries to make up for the inevitable deficits of renewables in peak times of energy consumption. So in the end the emissions of wind and solar will be much higher than in your graph. To me, modern nuclear plants (IV) are the most viable option to combat climate change.
I donât fully agree with your conclusions but great video anyway!
Can you do a video on the future of nuclear fusion?
So, in your area there has been NOT any problems directly attached to nuclear power. Just "concerns that..." So, what the problem with nuclear?
Closing down nuclear power plants if you canât completely replace them with renewable energies is actually bad for the environment, because it will inevitably lead to an increase in fossil fuels consumption, and therefore produce more carbon emissions. And even if you can replace nuclear energy with renewables, it would actually be more environmentally friendly to use that investment in renewables to phase out fossil fuels, which are still widespread, instead of nuclear.
Our rejection of Nuclear power was a massive mistake, and the environment has payed dearly for it as we continue to rely on fossil fuels for our electricity
Molten salt reactors will be walk away safe and if mass produced in a factory, will be dramatically cheaper than the old antiquated light water reactor. See "LFTR in 5 minutes" on CZcams.
A major reason why nuclear is so expensive is that nearly every reactor is bespoke. Every site wants some special treatment. If some over-arching body could just mandate a single design further reactors could be churned out as though on an assembly line. Parts could be standardized and mass produced. This is a strategy China is pursuing right now.
It's true in France too!
We should use nuclear energy first and then research into fusion energy which is better than nuclear power
Do a vid on Thorium MSRs
There are none. Should he also do a video on unicorn farts?
@@Chris-ie9os There were several molten salt reactors, 2 were stable salt pool reactors used as prototypes for the nuclear powered bomber jets that the US prototyped during the early cold war. The third was the MSRE at oak ridge. The oak ridge team first mathematically proved out the feasibility of a molten salt core. Then they built the MSRE to prove operational viability of the of the 'kernel' or fissile core molten salt breeder reactor core running on U233. The MSRE ran for 6000+ power hours. It generated a huge swath of data. When the neutronics data was analysed it proved the feasibility of the MSBR and LFTR concept. The last thing left to do was to build a thermal breeding blanket prototype to prove viability. That got waylaid by the Nixon administration in favor of weapons manufacturing programs.
@@retovath 'Were'. The #1, 2 and 3 problems with nuclear is Economics. Prototypes don't tell us the commercial viability of MSRs. How much do they cost to build? How much to maintain? Wind and Solar are already cheaper than just the process of converting heat into electricity and getting cheaper. Why bother?
You talk about renewables not meeting their full potential, but nuclear isnât even close to either. Itâs been basically unfounded for the past 3 decades, while renewables have seen tons of money pouring in on research. We havenât even gotten to research thorium and other designs which could reduce waste by nearly 1/100 and increase power production even more than currently. Nuclear isnât the future because weâre not choosing it to be. If we actually took it as seriously as renewables, we would have a much better solution than current renewables which produce even MORE waste than even current nuclear power plants. The materials used to make solar panels are extremely poisonous to our earth and canât be recycled
I usually not don't comment on videos but there is a nuclear waste repository in New Mexico, there is also the Hanford Vit plants, and Yucca Mountian.
In another edition of "my agenda/ideology is more important than facts"
"The processes surrounding nuclear, like uranium mining and refining, demand emissions."
So does the construction of EVERY other power production platform. Irrelevant. Mining materials for solar panels and the construction of them produce the same effect, but, they take up considerably more surface area and destroy more habitats in the process. Saying that it *could* be a viable low-carbon option, after presenting data that shows it has the lowest emissions, is mind-boggling. You should state that it *is* an option, not *could* be.
"Waste: this is a big sticking point for the anti-nuclear movement, and rightfully so."
No, not rightfully so. Nuclear waste is the only one that is meticulously maintained. Tell me, what are the plans for solar waste disposal? You can't answer that, because there are none. How many people have been affected by nuclear waste disposal? Zero. In fact, nuclear waste can be reprocessed and used as fuel again. It isn't waste, it's spent nuclear fuel (SNF). The anti-nuclear lobbyist whine about not having a depository for nuclear, when those same people have lobbied against legislation efforts for them. The same is for reprocessing, when the Clinton administration shot it down. A lot of these negligible complaints wouldn't even be a potential talking-point if people didn't try to impede nuclear to begin with.
"No one has implemented viable, long-term plans for nuclear waste storage."
Lie. Plenty of plans have been put forward. Thank anti-nuclear lobbyists for that.
"Reprocessing spent fuel could be the proliferation of nuclear weapons."
Oh my, you really are resorting to fear-mongering. The US government, for example, already has nuclear weapons. No one that has access to reprocessing fuel needs them to begin with. The federal government already oversees nuclear operations in the US.. it's the NRC. Please, tell me, how on earth you conceive reprocessing turning into nuclear weapons for the people that actively want to use them. Don't spare details. I don't see France's reprocessing turning into WW3.
"Cost"
Thank anti-lobbyists.
"Nuclear isn't free energy"
Nor is any other power platform.
"France is the outlier, not the norm."
Because they're not bat-shit insane anti-nuclear fundies.
"Renewables haven't reached their potential.. BATTERY STORAGE"
Which is so negligible and laughable at this point that when you consider *rapid, swift* decarbonization a priority, this shouldn't be an argument for renewables. In fact, it's an argument against them. They're not even close to the power production of conventional plants, let alone nuclear, and will never be able to be the baseload for a *rapid* transition to decarbonization. Six soon-to-be decommissioned reactor plants produced more power last year than all of US solar, which is humorous when you considered the amount of square footage each take up.
*Your biggest dispute is cost, so are you more concerned about decarbonization, or about spending money and convincing people that their irrational fear of our most promising power production is bullshit?*
I think I know your answer.
He should have brought up energy returned on investment. The EROI of solar is only 7 (with storage only 3.5), Oil 100 (and dropping), traditional nuclear 80, and a molten salt breeder reactor almost 2000! (by estimate). A breeder reactor can get 200 times as much energy out of uranium AND it doesn't need enriched uranium, meaning you don't lose tremendous amounts of energy enriching fuel to get that extra magnitude EROI among other things.
MCFR's or other molten salt reactors don't need giant pressure vessels so we should be able to build gigawatts a day off an assembly line; no massive forgings.
France is currently planning to phase out nuclear cause they can't afford the subsidies anymore and even their next gen reactors can't compete with wind/solar plus storage.
@@TBFSJjunior There is no storage. Germany has started to look at hydrogen
@@KarlTykke
Germany has storage capacities for hydrogen (or E-gas) of over 300TWh (year electricity consumption of Germany is 550TWh), so hydrogen is an obvious storage solution for Germany, but up to now there wasn't enough demand for storage.
@@TBFSJjunior Yes. Existing salt mine cavities,. Using salt mines converts the storage problem into an equally challenging distribution problem. A huge, expensive distribution system has to be created to trans poert hydrogen to the mines, and then to locations for use,
Given that most tortoise died after having relocated from the deserts of California for a huge solar farm, you can see that nuclear is the only option
In the beginning of the nuclear age, the Sierra Club to use one example, was pro nuclear. Their policy flipped in the early sixties. They are now consistently one of the best fear-mongers in the world.
There's another problem with nuclear that's not often mentioned. Most proponents of nuclear don't sell it as a replacement to solar and wind. It's sold as something we do in addition. To support solar and wind. But traditional nuclear power do not work well in tandem with these renewables. Solar/wind is best paired with load following plants like hydro and gas, and energy storage.
There's more modern design that can take some of that role. But that's what it often comes down to with nuclear. We need a new modern design that is safe, small (lower construction costs, faster iteration), with low risk of proliferation, waste with lower half-life, etc.
I fully support massive investments into R&D of nuclear. We really need it, and there's nothing in the laws of physics that says we can't make a plant with all these properties. But I'm also pessimistic that it'll actually read to a nuclear renaissance. The laws of physics also tells us there's nothing stopping us from getting all our power via solar+storage. I also think the non-nuclear solutions create much more value for developing nations.
Follow this one up with an episode on Thorium reactors!
Where are they? There are no thorium reactors.....
It is the solution, I dont even know why this is still a debate
"France is the exception, not the norm" Reasons: the government pushed for nuclear. Well, yeah, if you enable and help finance something, it gets done, crazy.
what everyone neglects to mention is that thorium is far more efficient, safe as it in itself will not go into the fusion state, does not need enrichment and thus it probably is the best energy source since it doesnât rely on the external forces(sun/wind/waves etc)
edit:i cant write properly
Thorium isn't developed yet (and may never be developed) so it's not even an option.
And here I thought I just started to like your channel. With this kind of information and the way you distort facts to suit your narrative, and as already expressed in your comment section, I do not need to add more. One has to wonder if you also distort facts in other videos and what then is the value of your channel when you dismiss the single most important technology that can save our planet from this carbon crisis.
I agree completely, couldn't have said it better. It makes me sad.
@@meltingzero3853 Seriously this guy is ridiculous. He talks about waste and fails to mention all of the waste we have produced since the 1950's can fit into a football stadium only a few feet high. He also failed to mention fast breeder reactors, which use spent uranium as fuel. Also no mention of thorium reactor of any kind. This dude definitely didn't do enough research.
This is the video I'm looking for! Thank you!!!
The ratio of energy output to land usage doesnât even compare btw nuclear and renewables like solar and wind. This is constantly overlooked by those who dismiss nuclear and its technology as a possible stepping stone to carbon-free energy. Nuclear produces an immense amount of energy given how much land it uses and even the land needed to store waste. To meet current energy demands we would literally be unable to by relying on solar and wind just because there wouldnât be enough space for what we would need to provide that energy. So either we cut back our energy use DRASTICALLY (not happening) or we use something else besides solar and wind to make up the difference (nuclear).