Nuclear Power - For/Against

[Guest Geoff]

With the recent explosion of Japanese Nuclear reactors, nuclear power has once again come under question. Some put the incident on par with the Three Mile Island accident in the US. However, the situation in the US was clearly much less troublesome than the one in Japan.

 

Some also compare this accident of Chernobyl. Separately, with each reactor, this incident would not match the scale of Chernobyl. Cumulatively, though, do the six combined reactors come close? Do they surpass the incident in the Soviet Union? Furthermore, are western nations guilty of exaggerating the Chernobyl accident, and downplaying the Japanese accident? Simply some questions to consider.

 

What is your opinion on this issue?

[Lu5ck]

With the recent explosion of Japanese Nuclear reactors, nuclear power has once again come under question. Some put the incident on par with the Three Mile Island accident in the US. However, the situation in the US was clearly much less troublesome than the one in Japan.

 

Some also compare this accident of Chernobyl. Separately, with each reactor, this incident would not match the scale of Chernobyl. Cumulatively, though, do the six combined reactors come close? Do they surpass the incident in the Soviet Union? Furthermore, are western nations guilty of exaggerating the Chernobyl accident, and downplaying the Japanese accident? Simply some questions to consider.

 

What is your opinion on this issue?

 

Both incidents are different. Chernobyl had a explosion within the core while Fukushima's explosion is not within the core and is after the control rods are inserted.

[Guest Geoff]

I phrased it in the form of a question, though; I didn't say they weren't different, I asked if they were.

[Krydos]

What is your opinion on this issue?

 

I think nuclear energy is fairly safe. In the case of Japan it seems like they had plans for if there was a huge earthquake the reactor would be fine. If there was a tidal wave the reactor would be as safe as it could be. If there was a power outage the reactor would be safe for months as they restored power. They hadn't really counted on all of the above occurring at the same time though. Even with all of the above happening in a sort of perfect storm of messing up the reactor they always had the safeguard of being able to dump sea water on the reactor.

 

The main problem I think that occurred with the Fukushima reactors is they are owned and ran by TEPCO which is a private company. Capitalism is all great and fine; hell we've all been brainwashed since birth -- especially here in the USA -- that capitalism is the most amazing thing since the concept of freedom, but in this case it might be the problem. TEPCO knew that if they dumped sea water on the reactors they would be ruined forever and they would no longer ever be able to produce electricity and therefore wouldn't ever produce anymore revenue for them.

 

I wonder if the disaster would have been a lot less horrible if the reactors were overseen by the government instead of a private company. With anything capable of causing so much destruction the first concern always has to be the safety and health of human beings, not money. I will almost always advocate the reduction and size of any government, but do large corporations that have been built from the ground up with the primary focus on profit really ever truly have the good of the general public in mind?

 

Just my opinion.

[jneves4pt]

I think nuclear power should be used more but for that it would have to be built in safe places, far from people and animals. It would also need a very strong structure in case some catastrophe happens :S

Now we are needing a lot of energy: to stop pollution. Cars need to be electric!

[Firefighter/EMT Hawkins]

I side with Krydos on this one. He makes a very valid point about the priorities of a private company overseeing the nuclear power compared to the government. I think that plays into the fact that they want a government needs a vast majority of people on its side, since a company can always be restarted, and a government takes years to build up.

 

On the other hand,

nuclear energy makes me very weary, especially the reactors and facilities, not to mention what can happen when something goes wrong. I don't claim to know a lot of knowledge about nuclear energy, nor will i say i do, but i do know that if something goes wrong in the United States, we can be in some deep poo. Doing a quick google, Fema state that within 10 miles of the nuclear plant, people can be exposed to direct uranium exposure, and can contaminate food, water and other goods up to 50 miles radius. This worries me, although it may be clean burning, I'm one that always worries about the "what if?". It makes me nervous, but if everything were to be in place, even in an event that all incidents happen at the same time as Krydos said happened in Japan, i would feel much better, knowing that EVERY aspect of a failure has been thought of, and something is in place to take care of it.

 

jneves4pt also makes a wonderful point that i would love to see happen. If these reactors could be placed in old blasting areas or something of the sort that's out of ALL contamination zones if something were to happen, i'm sure that would put a lot of people's mind to ease.