Serious Your Opinion On Nuclear Energy

Hi! Mantis here. I'm supposed to write an essay on the pros and cons of nuclear energy, and it'd be great to have a few others opinions!


I'd like everyone to post their opinions on nuclear energy, its pros and cons (if possible) and if nuclear energy should be THE main alternative energy sauce for fossil fuels! Furthermore, I'd also appreciate it if you could input your opinion on funding research on nuclear energy! Lets have a lively debate without flamewars. Thanks!


Some information on nuclear energy:

Basically, if you can turn a turbine, you can generate electricity. Nuclear energy does this by splitting atoms of dense elements (Urannium - 235) by firing a neutrons at them. This spits the atom, making two smaller atoms, and releasing a buttload of energy, radiation, and more neutrons! (E = MC2) This energy is then used to heat up water, turning it into steam, which then turns a turbine! EZ electricity!

Pros and cons:

Pros:
Very reliable source of energy
The most efficient source of energy
Clean, doesnt release harmful pollutants into the environment
1 KG of Uranium 235 is equal to 1500 tons of coal
We have large deposits of nuclear fuel
Relatively safe

Cons:
While nuclear energy IS safe, when accidents occur, shit gets real. (Chernobyll, Fukushima)
Expensive. Constructing a nuclear reactor is a costly investment.
Generations of suffering. When an accident occurs, generations of people or animals might be affected due to DNA mutations.
Nuclear waste is created in the process of making energy via nuclear sources. This waste stays radioactive for thousands of years.


Here are some VERY VERY informing videos on nuclear energy. I HIGHLY recommend you check them out!

Nuclear energy
3 reasons why nuclear energy is bad
3 reasons why nuclear energy is awesome
Fusion reactors explained

Thanks!

 

Nuclear energy is one of the cleanest forms of energy possible, so it leads to almost no air pollution.

Only bad thing I could think of is nuclear waste. Radioactive material can leak out into the surrounding areas if one of the reactors overheat and causes a leak. Fukushima is a good example.

Also, if terrorists somehow took control of a nuclear plant, bad things can happen.

 

Thanks for your input! Thread has been edited for more information!

 

its a clean form of energy and the waste can be used in other processes so it poses no danger out of an attack on the core

 

Nuclear energy? Well, it seems alright. I have a balanced opinion on this, becuase you make some good points, although when the damage is done, there is no going back.

 

actually there is, the waste is easy to contain and collect, the problem is with spillage to rivers and oceans.

 

also if you get radioactive dust it can spread over a large area.

 

This is true too. This actually happened in the Chernobyll disaster; radioactive particles spread thousands of miles away

 

I was not expecting a full-on essay about nuclear energy from Nemract's bar, of all places

 

nuclear energy is pretty good.
I say we rely on Fission reactors until we can get a Thorium reactor running. I desperately want to run the world on Thorium instead of oil.

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That is a lot of kurzgesagt by the way

 

Hello fellow kurtzgesat subscriber :)

Nuclear energy: With

Nuclear Fusion:
So far a good and (almost) clean way to produce a lot more energy. Despite accidents happen in powerplants, such as explosions and radioactive waste leaking into the earth, it is much safer than what fossle fuels do to our environment. Not only that but we can create our own Uranium 238, unlike fossle fuels which can run out.

Nuclear Fission:
So far sounding cheap as hell (since you can use ocean water as fuel), very efficient in energy (Produces more energy than Nuclear Fusion), very safe (Doesn't create waste or explodes), and reliable. It hasnt really become a reality to harness that energy yet, since it can cost a shot ton of money to create the fusion plants.

 

Nuclear energy is largely good and is use to make up a small percent of power. I've seen the videos before (and sub to the channel a while back) and the list you have is so far good. Now Fukushima, you should note, did not give out with the earthquake. It took a 3o foot wave to mess it up afterwards. You got to think if a Reactor can at least survive an earthquake, it can't be that bad. As for being expensive, you sould figure which is cheaper to mine, coal or Uranium (also the 1 kg thing is about the energy it makes. I'm pretty sure a 1kg is much less than 1500 tons of coal).

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Also the energy to power the reactor is more than the energy it produces. So that's a tiny problem.

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Neither was I expecting to be the only like

 

we get a thread like this from time to time, the last one was by @huge6446

 

Which thread was that?

 

he made this debate thread

 

Energy engineer here.

1) The most efficient source of energy.
Debatable. What do you consider as efficiency? Input vs output, the overall cost, how much an X sized power plant can generate power from Y source!? Usually, solar generation is more efficient as it requires no fuel and it's generation is the cheapest. However, you are required a lot of solar panels to generate the same amounts of energy. It's hard to compare efficiency from different sources. Nuclear energy is more efficient in terms of output vs waste, while solar's efficiency is only important if you have a limited space.

2) Clean, doesn't release harmful pollutants into the environment
Again, debatable, as it depends on what you see as "clean". Yes, when the uranium is falling apart, air isn't getting polluted. However, it leave a LOT of radioactive materials that need to be stored appropriately.
Directly, nuclear generation doesn't pollute environment, indirectly, it does. Look at what happened to Chernobyl and Japan. Chernobyl won't be livable for the next 20,000 years. Excuse my French, but that's a huge amount of radioactive pollution.

Do you eat fish? If yes, chances are, your fish caught radioactive waves from the Japan's meltdown. 2 years after the disaster in Japan, people measured 10 times higher radioactive values in the fish *on the opposite side of the world*. 4 years after the Japan disaster, nuclear power plant was still releasing radioactive water into the ocean.

3) We have large deposits of nuclear fuel
Uranium will be depleted in the next 100 years.

4) Relatively safe
That's usually an argument governments use when they can't generate power the other way. NE is not safe, never was, never will be.
"While nuclear energy IS safe, when accidents occur, shit gets real. You basically contradicted your own "pro safe" argument. I understand you said "relatively", and it's all peachy until something goes wrong, but when it does, it really goes wrong.
"Any man who must say I am the king is no true king." Same goes for NE, if it was safe, there wouldn't be such an uproar about it's safety.

Nuclear energy is on the decline. If was on the incline years after Chernobyl's disaster until Japan did the boo-boo, and now many countries are looking to switch to something else. Can't remember which country, but a particular government stopped financing nuclear power plant, after the Japan disaster, even after they spent billions on it due to pressure from the people. I want to say Denmark, but I am really not sure and can't find the source. Currently the largest users of NE energy are USA, France, Russia and China. Unsure about Russia, but France and China are trying to find different sources of energy, renewable being on the wish-list. USA, due to Trump, will probably increase oil usage.

 

Hehe oopsie

 

Very interesting topic.
I'll sum my opinion: Yes, we should use nuclear energy. If you disagree, stop being ignorant, and start reading about the topic.

Reason: It's common sense to invest time and money into nuclear power, whether it's thorium or uranium. There are actually no reasons to avert it. Hippies and pro-earthers disagree because they read "nuclear". This is not bad at all. Today's technology and previous experience more or less kills the chances of another disaster. Toxic waste can be solved quite easily.
I support both uranium and thorium, though I prefer thorium because of the non-fissile capabilities, less waste, more abundance and amazingly efficient energy per kilogram output (compared to uranium).

 

Here in New Zealand we have as shit tonne of dams instead . Dams a pretty cool. Every time any nuclear activity happens around us bat shit happen. Our last terrorist attack was by the french gov. who wanted to stop protesters turning up to where they were truing to nuke stuff in the pacific. The public has stopped any nuke stuff.