Japan...

I'm sure our hearts go out to the Japanese people, & I'm sure that most of us are witnessing & are horrified by some of the worst natural devastation that we have ever seen...

20:20 hindsight is a wonderful thing...

But surely the International Atomic Energy Commission should be given some statutary international powers to regulate the situating of nuclear power plants, if we must have them, it is making a bad situation even worse...

Or could this be the catalyst that is needed to make the world properly develop better & safer ways of energy generation?

Given that Japan has no option but Nuclear energy where would you put them? TBH for a 40 year old reactor that has suffered a catastrophic earthquake I am surrised at how well it is doing, relatively speaking.

I hope so, Spar.

Regarding Japan, to me there is a world of difference between having a few Nuclear power stations to supply needs and having more than 50 plants ( as Japan does) to supply needs and also an awful lot of energy " wants".

Especially if the plants are all are sited on a well known area of tectonic plate activity so would all be at high risk of earthquake damage.

Also although this plant has not has any documented incidents of high risk afaik, there have, of course, been other nuclear accidents in Japan

I hope that this will cause a rethink about Nuclear power , all over the world. Looks like it already has, if I heard the radio news correctly.

Japan's ~50 nuclear power plants supply only about 1/3 of its electricity "wants".

I have quite an attachment to Japan and it's people, having spent a bit of time there on several visits, and having good friends near to Tokyo. However, a walk around Tokyo at night, where the lights of a plethora of signs turn night into day, certainly shows that CW is right about "wants" rather than needs. Electricity is burnt like it is free. Even the toilet seats are electrically heated

It is by no means just the Japanese who need to rethink energy usage though !

Chilli-head wrote:Japan's ~50 nuclear power plants supply only about 1/3 of its electricity "wants".

I have quite an attachment to Japan and it's people, having spent a bit of time there on several visits, and having good friends near to Tokyo. However, a walk around Tokyo at night, where the lights of a plethora of signs turn night into day, certainly shows that CW is right about "wants" rather than needs. Electricity is burnt like it is free. Even the toilet seats are electrically heated

It is by no means just the Japanese who need to rethink energy usage though !

That is what I was getting at. Yes it is by no means just in Japan that energy is wasted...but to have no natural energy sources so you need to rely on nuclear plants and then to be so conspicuously consuming that you need a lot (more) of them seems a bit odd to me.

Obviously I wouldn't wish what has happened on anyone....but I have always thought an area of high risk for earthquakes seemed inherently a risky place to have so many plants.

Hi! Been off this forum for a bit due to eyes giving me wobblies.

This topic is a good one. I get really tired of people calling nuclear power "clean". There's a plant within twenty five miles of us (I think that's right -- I know it's close) which has a history of every year having leaks and improperly stored materials and incorrectly dealt with upkeep issues. I have a two-page list of the lies and stupid things the plant's management have done in the last ten years, the radioactivity released into our rivers, etc.

And the national Nuclear Regulatory Agency has okayed it for twenty more years. It's one of the oldest plants in the country.

The true price of nuclear power begins with the mines and the processing which poison miles of land and rivers. I forget how far the river takes the radioactive tailings. It's nasty stuff.

and what about the nuclear power station situated on the fault line in California?? Nice one, I thought, when I heard of it.

The Longsufferingspouse has just pointed out that our nearest nuclear power station is across the bay about half as far away from us as Tokyo is from the Fukushima plant.

I had no idea, though the chances of an earthquake and tsunami in the bay of Fundy are absurdly small.

Mm Bay of Fundy = Highest tidal drop in the world ( you have the biggest, River Severn next one ) so a very small tsunami would funnel right up the B of F a bit like the tidal Bore does, I would think.

Yeah, but the tidal bore only really runs up part of North eastern NS, you can go tidal bore rafting for run there, in fact the LSS did it last year and had a blast.