Coal Ash Is More Radioactive than Nuclear Waste

[Ignis Fatuus]

NotAllThere, I take your point about dam failure: that's the abnormal accident that is equivalent to nuclear meltdown. Mind you I wouldn't live downstream from a hydroelectric dam either.

Actually as long ago as the 1970s, Gordon Rattray Taylor warned that dams seem to cause earthquakes, by the intense stress that the huge mass of water places on the crust. One of the depressing things about being as old as I am is that I have seen the warnings a generation or two ago: then they were ignored, now they are denied. Humans are idiots. Frogs boiling.

[VectraMan]

1. It's not normal service that scares people about nuclear, it's the risk of abnormal situations. Coal-fired power stations don't melt down and make whole counties uninhabitable.

There are plenty of other industrial processes that potentially could. The Bhopal disaster was probably far worse than Chernobyl, yet there isn't the same fear of chemical plants. And Chernobyl is far worse than anything that could happen today. Nobody died at Fukushima.

[NotAllThere]

Grauniad, surely? I've corrected the spelling mistake now - thanks.

It was 171'000 people - according to official figures. 21'000 killed immediately, the rest in the subsequent famine. Unofficial figures put the number of deaths at round 230'000, so "hundreds of thousands" is not hyperbole.

However, it was caused by Typhoon Nina, not an earthquake . But that did cause devastation - 69 dams failed for goodness sake!

The word catastrophic I stand by entirely - it's a term used in structural engineering to describe sudden, total and irretrievable failure.

[SupremeSpod]

There are more deaths attributable to hydroelectric power than nuclear in the past 60 years. Mainly due to catastrophic dam failures that happened in China after a devestating earthquake. Hundreds of thousands died.

Have you started "writing" for the "Wail"?

[NotAllThere]

NAT ffs, you can't make a statement like that and not elaborate ...

But it does produce some lovely knee-jerk reactions founded in irrationality.

There's a huge amount of ignorance and fear surrounding nuclear power. Sometimes a sensationalised headline is needed to grab sheeple's attention.

1. It's not normal service that scares people about nuclear, it's the risk of abnormal situations. Coal-fired power stations don't melt down and make whole counties uninhabitable...

Nor do properly built and run nuclear power stations. Chernobyl is more an indictment of the soviet system than it is of nuclear power.

There are more deaths attributable to hydroelectric power than nuclear in the past 60 years. Mainly due to catastrophic dam failures that happened in China after a devastating earthquake. Hundreds of thousands died.

Hydroelectric power also is responsible for vast quantities of greenhouse gases - from the rotting vegetation when valleys are flooded to make the dams.

Fossil fuels are far deadlier than nuclear power - tech - 23 March 2011 - New Scientist



Of course, nuclear waste gradually gets safer as time goes on. Non-radioactive toxic waste - which needs as much careful handling and is produced in far higher quantities, never gets safer.

(Hmm, perhaps we should mix the two types of waste. Then non-radioactive could become radioactive, then decay into something safer).

[doodab]

Sorry, that post is so misleading, sensationalised and so out of context.

Sort of puff you read in mags and the MSM. Even look at some of the comments in SciAm let alone other O&G and engineering sources.

It's true. People drown in resevoirs and rivers al the time. We should ban water.

[eek]

NAT ffs, you can't make a statement like that and not elaborate

Water more deadly than nukeystuff, how???

It can be used to make Dihydrogen Monoxide.

[hyperD]

Coal has killed more people per Gigawatt than Nuclear since the first nuclear reactor went online. Hydroelectric is more lethal than nuclear.

Sorry, that post is so misleading, sensationalised and so out of context.

Sort of puff you read in mags and the MSM. Even look at some of the comments in SciAm let alone other O&G and engineering sources.

[suityou01]

There's relatively little nuclear waste compared to coal waste. Coal waste is mildly radioactive, but in terms of radioactivity per amount of energy produced, coal is way ahead of nuclear. The total amount of radioactivity released into the environment by coal power stations is far greater than that from nuclear power stations.

Here's a book that explains this, and other issues, in nice clear terms Radiation: What It Is, What You Need to Know: Amazon.co.uk: Robert Peter Gale, Eric Lax: Books

Coal has killed more people per Gigawatt than Nuclear since the first nuclear reactor went online. Hydroelectric is more lethal than nuclear.

NAT ffs, you can't make a statement like that and not elaborate

Water more deadly than nukeystuff, how???

[Ignis Fatuus]

1. It's not normal service that scares people about nuclear, it's the risk of abnormal situations. Coal-fired power stations don't melt down and make whole counties uninhabitable.

2. Radioactivity per kWh may be less, and that's interesting or at least amusing, but radioactivity per kg of waste is rather more intense. Otherwise nobody would need to look for places to bury it safely.


Note: I do know that coal sucks. And I do think that nuclear is probably a necessary option, but I do think that we should not stop being scared of it.

[xoggoth]

Take a look at this article on wildlife around Chernobyl with very few signs of abnormality:

Life after Chernobyl: Sergei Gaschak

Probably good for you actually, I am off to lick my smoke detector.

[NotAllThere]

There's relatively little nuclear waste compared to coal waste. Coal waste is mildly radioactive, but in terms of radioactivity per amount of energy produced, coal is way ahead of nuclear. The total amount of radioactivity released into the environment by coal power stations is far greater than that from nuclear power stations.

Here's a book that explains this, and other issues, in nice clear terms Radiation: What It Is, What You Need to Know: Amazon.co.uk: Robert Peter Gale, Eric Lax: Books

Coal has killed more people per Gigawatt than Nuclear since the first nuclear reactor went online. Hydroelectric is more lethal than nuclear.

[stek]

Coal Ash Is More Radioactive than Nuclear Waste: Scientific American

Well how about that!

Think I'd rather stick my hand in some ash rather than a Magnox Fuel Rod...

stek, ex-BNFL!!

[SimonMac]

Coal Ash Is More Radioactive than Nuclear Waste: Scientific American

Well how about that!