If It Weren't For Liberalism, Today America Would Have Safe, Functioning Nuclear Power Plants Instead of Fossil Fuels (weapon, environmentalists)
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And how many nuclear disasters have we had in the U.S?
At least 3, The partial meltdown of the Enrico Fermi Reactor near Detroit MI, The partial meltdown of the Three Mile Island Unit 2 reactor near Harrisburg PA, and The loss of control accident (Fire burned the control cables workers took radiation doses in turning off the reactor by manually inserting the control rods and opening or closing valves to cool the reactor) at the Browns Ferry Power Plant in TN (run by TVA). The failure of liquid nuclear waste storage tanks at the Hanford Site and the contamination of the Columbia River might count as an accident or at least an oops.
Fortunately none of our disasters approached the 1957 British Winscale (now called Sellafield) reactor fire, The 1987 Chernobyl reactor explosion and fire, the 1958 explosion of nuclear waste storage tanks at the Soviet Mayak (Chelyabinsk 40) plant in the Urals, or the large scale radioactive contamination due to nuclear materials and weapons production near Tomsk and Krasnoyarsk in Russia (one of the contaminated areas is as big as the entire state of TN) .
Another hurdle to the public acceptance of nuclear power has the name Dai-ichi where 6 reactors have suffered meltdowns and explosions due to the flooding of the reactor site by salt water on the Pacific shore line when a 15 m Tsunami hit the site after the Tohoku Earthquake in March 2011. Elevated levels of radioactivity are now be seen in waters off the Pacific coast of the USA and Canada as debries from Japan still washes ashore.
Just like the title of the thread states: If it weren't for liberals and liberalism, America would have a vast and expansive nuclear power infrastructure, renewable for infinity, more efficient than fossil fuels, less damaging to the environment than scavenging for coal, oil and natural gas, and more economically efficient than high-cost wind and solar farms.
For the past 40 years, America could have been building upon a tried and true energy infrastucture. But, no. We can't have that here in America. Liberals just won't allow it. And because of that, America missed the boat.
In essence, no one should listen to any liberal anywhere when it comes time to have a thoughtful discussion on energy policy. They screwed America royally on the nuclear power issue. And now they have the gall to tell us how bad coal, fracking, and oil is?
As a democrat, I absolutely agree with you. The far left tree hugging liberals who are SO against Nuclear Power without realizing that we have had the technology for sometime to conduct EXTREMELY safe and carbon free Nuclear Power, are still against it. France has this system in place already and it is serving their country well, America could have done better. The far left really is to blame for this.
Already linked and commented on this, if you want you can find that information on Wikipedia.
Thankfully it has been a long time since our last big disaster. I would never want to see any place have to deal with what Japan had to deal with, would you?
False claim. MAYBE if Japan had the same regulations as we do, the disaster would NOT have been as bad.
Some people like you say we should be like other countries when it comes certain issue like health care, then when other countries a re lax on regulations and enforcing them you try to say we should NOT be like them.
It is called "cherry picking"
If you want you can find that information on Wikipedia.
"Thankfully it has been a long time since our last big disaster"
OK, I looked it up.
According to a 2010 survey of energy accidents, there have been at least 56 accidents at nuclear reactors in the United States(defined as incidents that either resulted in the loss of human life or more than US$50,000 of property damage). The most serious of these was the Three Mile Island accident in 1979. Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Plant has been the source of two of the top five most dangerous nuclear incidents in the United States since 1979.[1] Relatively few accidents have involved fatalities.[2]
"At least 56 nuclear reactor accidents have occurred in the USA. Relatively few accidents have involved fatalities
Id' say you are grossly exaggerating!
Not ONE is described as a "DISASTER". "Relatively few accidents have involved fatalities.[2]
This dog won't fight. We have nuclear power plants in America. When's the last time we had a nuclear accident?
One and only one in the USA. THANK YOU "LIBERALS". Your argument that we don't need the regulations because we don't have any accidents is like arguing that you shouldn't maintain your car, because after 10 years and 250,000 miles it hasn't broken down.
On the other hand, take Fukishima. They did not follow standards which were developed in the USA, and look what happened. Facts, they are a pesky little thing, aren't they?
One and only one in the USA. THANK YOU "LIBERALS". Your argument that we don't need the regulations because we don't have any accidents is like arguing that you shouldn't maintain your car, because after 10 years and 250,000 miles it hasn't broken down.
On the other hand, take Fukishima. They did not follow standards which were developed in the USA, and look what happened. Facts, they are a pesky little thing, aren't they?
One plant out of a hundred had a significant accident, and none have caused civilian fatalities and none have caused civilian damage. Can the fossil fuel industry say the same? No. I think our regulations work just fine thank you very much. Facts, they are a pesky little thing, aren't they?
Just like the title of the thread states: If it weren't for liberals and liberalism, America would have a vast and expansive nuclear power infrastructure, renewable for infinity, more efficient than fossil fuels, less damaging to the environment than scavenging for coal, oil and natural gas, and more economically efficient than high-cost wind and solar farms.
For the past 40 years, America could have been building upon a tried and true energy infrastucture. But, no. We can't have that here in America. Liberals just won't allow it. And because of that, America missed the boat.
In essence, no one should listen to any liberal anywhere when it comes time to have a thoughtful discussion on energy policy. They screwed America royally on the nuclear power issue. And now they have the gall to tell us how bad coal, fracking, and oil is?
One just has to "recycle" those fuel rods in drums off our cost lines that will eventually rot away and contaminate the oceans. I think the OP doesn't know what the word "sustainable" means.
Science Fail.
Technology Fail.
Nuclear Fail.
IQ Fail.
Ignorant narrow-minded people lacking common sense don't understand the difference between nuclear reactor types. Oddly, it was Liberals who dumbed everyone down.
Fission reactors generate hazardous waste which must be disposed, and is quite costly.
Breeder reactors generate no waste. In fact, breeder reactors generate fuel for breeder reactors.
In other words, I take the "waste" from a breeder reactor and put in right back into the reactor, or into another breeder reactor, and burn it up.
How is that not sustainable?
The Environmentally-challenged Duo of Clinton/Gore cancelled funding for the IFR, which is a special type of breeder reactor.....it renders the risk of nuclear weapons proliferation almost nil.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hyperthetic
All of the nuclear power plants are nuclear bomb targets.
Tactical Fail.
Strategy Fail.
Nuclear Weapons Fail.
Common Sense Fail.
IQ Fail.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mwruckman
Another hurdle to the public acceptance of nuclear power has the name Dai-ichi where 6 reactors have suffered meltdowns and explosions due to the flooding of the reactor site by salt water on the Pacific shore line when a 15 m Tsunami hit the site after the Tohoku Earthquake in March 2011.
You live on an island....it is volcanically active...it sits on fault/fold and suffers repeated earthquakes.....there are sea-quakes that have repeatedly caused tsunamis....and there's a potential for cyclones (hurricanes).
What moron would be stupid enough to build nuclear reactors that could be flooded?
That's like a Geology Fail, Engineering Fail, Common Sense Fail, IQ Fail.
Quote:
Originally Posted by AeroGuyDC
All this other blather about the length of time it takes to get nuclear infrastructure approved and running is just that....blather. 40 years is plenty of time to get many more plants than we currently have up and running. That's 40 years of wasted time.
I wouldn't necessarily disagree, I would just suggest that fission reactors are antiquated. You need to be using breeder reactors.
I've mentioned before that policy changes permitting open inspection would go a long, long way to appeasing the uneasy.
The Department of Energy notifying a nuclear power plant 6 months in advance that it intends to conduct an inspection defeats the whole purpose of having inspections.
You need open inspection. Any municipality, county, State or federal agency, plus any approved private groups (like Green Peace) can walk up to the gate and announce an inspection.
Those gates and turnstiles had best be open within 30 seconds...
No, but it's far more unsafe than nuclear power. How many people does nuclear power kill every year in this country? Maybe a handful of old folks from 50s-60s era of experiments due to cancer. How many people do cars kill every year in this country? Over 34,000. So if you oppose nuclear on risk, then you should be far more strongly opposed to cars as well.
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