• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Do You Favor Nuclear Power?

Do You Favor Nuclear Power?


  • Total voters
    93
building the power plant is just the start, then there is the grid. it takes a lot of money, and utilitlies should be allowed some protection. who wants to build a local grid and them make it available to competition? a certain amount of monoply is expected. Once a utility builds a system in a given area, that area should be theirs without competition, but not without regulation.

No. If someone can come along and build a cheaper grid and satisfies the needs of enough customers to make it's efforts commercially viable, there's no resason at all that the first entrant into the market should be granted protection by the government. What you're describing is how every coercive monopoly in history is established, by abuse of government power and use of political connections to bar competitition.

It's wrong, and it's why the US grid is falling apart and inadequately sized for modern demands. There's no competition driving the participants to improve services.
 
I voted "Not Sure". I think there's a lot of benefits and dangers to nuclear power, but I think the question is going to be irrelevant once the US wises up and looks into space-based solar energy collection and power beaming.

Yes, when the trillions of dollars invested yield an average price of a hundred buck per kilowatt hour as compared to the pennies per kw-H for nuclear and ground based generation, the nation will wise up.

There are many desirable resources in space for an earthbound economy. Beamed power isn't one of them.
 
No. If someone can come along and build a cheaper grid and satisfies the needs of enough customers to make it's efforts commercially viable, there's no resason at all that the first entrant into the market should be granted protection by the government. What you're describing is how every coercive monopoly in history is established, by abuse of government power and use of political connections to bar competitition.

It's wrong, and it's why the US grid is falling apart and inadequately sized for modern demands. There's no competition driving the participants to improve services.

It sounds like you don't know what a grid is.....
How many power lines do you want to see in your neighborhood? If 6 different power companies are competing for your energy dollars, there could be 6 sets of power lines, on 6 sets of poles just getting to your community, then 6 transformer stations, and 6 trenches getting the power to yet smalller transformers until the power is down to 240 volts...
When a grid falls apart, the power companies can't deliver electricity, so it behooves them to maintain the grid, and they do. The grid is not falling apart...
Can it be modernized? improved? yes, especially with respect to staying on line during storms, etc.
 
Last edited:
I voted "Not Sure". I think there's a lot of benefits and dangers to nuclear power, but I think the question is going to be irrelevant once the US wises up and looks into space-based solar energy collection and power beaming.

yeah, and if that beam gets off course, your house goes up in smoke....
 
It sounds like you don't know what a grid is.....
How many power lines do you want to see in your neighborhood? If 6 different power companies are competing for your energy dollars, there could be 6 sets of power lines, on 6 sets of poles just getting to your community, then 6 transformer stations, and 6 trenches getting the power to yet smalller transformers until the power is down to 240 volts...
When a grid falls apart, the power companies can't deliver electricity, so it behooves them to maintain the grid, and they do. The grid is not falling apart...
Can it be modernized? improved? yes, especially with respect to staying on line during storms, etc.


No, Mayor Snorkum must not know what an electrical grid is because he posted something contrary to what you said.

The must be the case.

Has to be.

Have you explored the corollary of what I posted, namely that if a competitor has the Constitutional freedom to build a competing distribution network it means also that the builders of the origninal network can claim exclusivity on their property?

This is how real capitalism works.

Now, should I bother to read the rest of your post or is it merely a hodge podge of irrelevant technical details not related to the philosophy of commercial enterprises in a free nation?


No, it was a paean against esthetic sensibilities.

Can't help you there, you either support freedom or you do not. The Mayor Supports freedom.
 
No, Mayor Snorkum must not know what an electrical grid is because he posted something contrary to what you said.

The must be the case.

Has to be.

Have you explored the corollary of what I posted, namely that if a competitor has the Constitutional freedom to build a competing distribution network it means also that the builders of the origninal network can claim exclusivity on their property?

This is how real capitalism works.

Now, should I bother to read the rest of your post or is it merely a hodge podge of irrelevant technical details not related to the philosophy of commercial enterprises in a free nation?


No, it was a paean against esthetic sensibilities.

Can't help you there, you either support freedom or you do not. The Mayor Supports freedom.
Technical details?
Unbridled capitalism should be allowed to ride roughshod over esthetic sensibilities? Do you want to see a hodgepodge of towers, substations, poles, wires all over the place. Capitalists don't have a right to profit at any cost to the public. There is a framework of rules to work within, and capitalism isn't excluded from those rules.
 
Technical details?
Unbridled capitalism should be allowed to ride roughshod over esthetic sensibilities? Do you want to see a hodgepodge of towers, substations, poles, wires all over the place. Capitalists don't have a right to profit at any cost to the public. There is a framework of rules to work within, and capitalism isn't excluded from those rules.

Like in the Philippines..............
images
 
Like in the Philippines..............
images

Yeah,, I saw something similar in Kingston, Jamaica years back....the local exchange just cut your wire and threw it out the window if you stopped paying your bills....
Old pics of our own major cities also show how messy things can get, especially when we had generators on every other block....
 
I am not an engineer and I don't pretend to be one. So, I don't know is nuclear power is good or not. I do definitely support electricity. I use relatively little electricity, compared to most of the big name environmentalist, but I do like my computer.

So, I would yield to people who actually know what they're talking about but I don't believe they can come from government.
 
I am not an engineer and I don't pretend to be one. So, I don't know is nuclear power is good or not. I do definitely support electricity. I use relatively little electricity, compared to most of the big name environmentalist, but I do like my computer.

So, I would yield to people who actually know what they're talking about but I don't believe they can come from government.

There are some govt employees who know their stuff, but not the politicians.....lots of them think that nuclear power is the answer to the oil problem....and it is not. There is no shortage of electricity supplies, weather permitting...
 
Does anyone realize that the spent fuel rods, and deadly, are stored outside and very vulnerable to a terrorist attack? If they hit one of these it would be a environment disaster. The Indian Point Nuclear plant on the Hudson River in Buchanan, NY is just a scant 35 miles from NYC and is thought to be one of original 911 targets.
 
Does anyone realize that the spent fuel rods, and deadly, are stored outside and very vulnerable to a terrorist attack? If they hit one of these it would be a environment disaster. The Indian Point Nuclear plant on the Hudson River in Buchanan, NY is just a scant 35 miles from NYC and is thought to be one of original 911 targets.

the storage casks are pretty stout, I saw video of one on a trailer, being nailed by a train at high speed, and it remained intact...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mHtOW-OBO4
 
Last edited:
Yes, when the trillions of dollars invested yield an average price of a hundred buck per kilowatt hour as compared to the pennies per kw-H for nuclear and ground based generation, the nation will wise up.

There are many desirable resources in space for an earthbound economy. Beamed power isn't one of them.

Investment costs money.

2001 NASA quote, for your review:
"According to Marzwell, using today's technology a space solar power system could generate energy at a cost of 60 to 80 cents per kilowatt-hour. This estimate includes construction costs for the first system.

"We believe that in 15 to 25 years we can lower that cost to 7 to 10 cents per kilowatt hour," said Marzwell. The market price today is around 5 to 6 cents per kilowatt-hour."

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2001/ast23mar_1/

Note that, since 2001, Japan and India have been doing much of our research for us, and estimated cost has been going down markedly.

yeah, and if that beam gets off course, your house goes up in smoke....

NASA plans to plant the receivers in the deserts and mountains, safely away from the populace.
 
Last edited:
Investment costs money.

2001 NASA quote, for your review:


Note that, since 2001, Japan and India have been doing much of our research for us, and estimated cost has been going down markedly.



NASA plans to plant the receivers in the deserts and mountains, safely away from the populace.

Using today's technology the photovoltaic cells will last less than a decade, and will require, of course, 20 square meters of array to generate 8 kw at end of life.

Now, since the United States consumes something on the order of a terawatt of electrical power, perhaps you can calculate how big an array must be launched to convert US electrical generation to this fantasy in the skies?

Note that the aforementioned array was priced at twenty megabucks, as a component of a satellite.

The launch vehicle for that satellite cost a hundred million dollars in itself.

So, the cost is going to be some factor times twenty million dollars for the SPS, depending on how much power it's going to convert from sunlight, plus, of course, the cost of the bus to provide the housekeeping services as well as the station keeping and re-transmission antenna, plus a hundred million bucks just to heave the thing into the sky.

And after it's launched it's going to be the biggest brightest lovliest target for any terrorist to attempt to steal and launch an A-sat weapon.

How many of these things should we launch? You are aware that the world's professional and amateur astronomical community is going to oppose anything so destructive of dark night skies, aren't you?

It's flatly impossible to use space borne assets to provide electricxal power at the prices quoted.

No, my sources are not publicly available, but they're the real deal just the same.
 
Does anyone realize that the spent fuel rods, and deadly, are stored outside and very vulnerable to a terrorist attack? If they hit one of these it would be a environment disaster. The Indian Point Nuclear plant on the Hudson River in Buchanan, NY is just a scant 35 miles from NYC and is thought to be one of original 911 targets.

I need to ask you where you got this information because I'm pretty sure it is wrong. I know for a fact that the military guards our spent rods through specific measures even when they are "stored outside and vulnerable to attack". I highly doubt that anything less is allowed by civilian plants either, since we, government and civilian nuclear sites, are all subject to strict regulation by NRC. I can't say too much about the security measures I know of but I do know that it is not nearly as simple as you seem to think it is for a terrorist to attack either spent fuel rods or any other nuclear material that could possible be used to inflict a nuclear disaster in some way or another.

Maybe you shouldn't get all this info from sites like these

Spent Reactor Fuel Security | Union of Concerned Scientists

Instead, check out the NRC's site,

NRC: Backgrounder on Transportation of Spent Fuel and Radioactive Materials

And everyone should keep in mind that if you were told about all the methods of security that the government insisted that plants employ to protect their potential terrorists targets, then it would allow for the terrorists to also know of those security measures and be better equiped to counter those security measures and thus attack or obtain that material that you are afraid that they will get.
 
I need to ask you where you got this information because I'm pretty sure it is wrong. I know for a fact that the military guards our spent rods through specific measures even when they are "stored outside and vulnerable to attack". I highly doubt that anything less is allowed by civilian plants either, since we, government and civilian nuclear sites, are all subject to strict regulation by NRC. I can't say too much about the security measures I know of but I do know that it is not nearly as simple as you seem to think it is for a terrorist to attack either spent fuel rods or any other nuclear material that could possible be used to inflict a nuclear disaster in some way or another.

Maybe you shouldn't get all this info from sites like these

Spent Reactor Fuel Security | Union of Concerned Scientists

Instead, check out the NRC's site,

NRC: Backgrounder on Transportation of Spent Fuel and Radioactive Materials

And everyone should keep in mind that if you were told about all the methods of security that the government insisted that plants employ to protect their potential terrorists targets, then it would allow for the terrorists to also know of those security measures and be better equiped to counter those security measures and thus attack or obtain that material that you are afraid that they will get.

I doubt terrorists will want to GET it....once they got it, then what?
Exploding it on site and letting the wind carry the results would be about the only thing they can do with it.
And that won't be easy.

There are so many more tempting, and effective, targets. They can easily poison our water supplies with little danger to themselves.
 
I doubt terrorists will want to GET it....once they got it, then what?
Exploding it on site and letting the wind carry the results would be about the only thing they can do with it.
And that won't be easy.

There are so many more tempting, and effective, targets. They can easily poison our water supplies with little danger to themselves.

I wasn't just referring to spent fuel rods though. There are other potential targets out there that are regulated by NRC that are much more portable and would work better if stolen and added to a bomb.
 
Some gen 4 nuclear power plants look good. The pebble bed one seems to be the one I like best.

For long term sustainability of the nuke industry the fast spectrum plants will be needed, and they seem to use what is considered waste as a fuel
 
The electrical grid

You are very unlikely to get local competition in the electrical grid as the costs of installation is rather high for limited profits if any.

To and from industrial uses/providers you could get compitition
 
The electrical grid

You are very unlikely to get local competition in the electrical grid as the costs of installation is rather high for limited profits if any.

To and from industrial uses/providers you could get compitition

I believe some heavy users just build their own power plants on site....
 
Using today's technology the photovoltaic cells will last less than a decade, and will require, of course, 20 square meters of array to generate 8 kw at end of life.

Now, since the United States consumes something on the order of a terawatt of electrical power, perhaps you can calculate how big an array must be launched to convert US electrical generation to this fantasy in the skies?

Note that the aforementioned array was priced at twenty megabucks, as a component of a satellite.

The launch vehicle for that satellite cost a hundred million dollars in itself.

So, the cost is going to be some factor times twenty million dollars for the SPS, depending on how much power it's going to convert from sunlight, plus, of course, the cost of the bus to provide the housekeeping services as well as the station keeping and re-transmission antenna, plus a hundred million bucks just to heave the thing into the sky.

And after it's launched it's going to be the biggest brightest lovliest target for any terrorist to attempt to steal and launch an A-sat weapon.

How many of these things should we launch? You are aware that the world's professional and amateur astronomical community is going to oppose anything so destructive of dark night skies, aren't you?

It's flatly impossible to use space borne assets to provide electricxal power at the prices quoted.

No, my sources are not publicly available, but they're the real deal just the same.

I trust you. I need to read into this more anyway.
 
Solar arrays in space are not in our near future, and shouldn't even be considered.
When it comes to energy, research funding should go FIRST to finding more efficient ways to use it, not that those efficiences should be an excuse to waste any of it. Along with those efficiencies, we should find ways to modify our lifestyles to use less of it.
We waste more energy in the USA than we realize. I know this may sound odd, but there was a time our neighborhoods didn't even have streetlights.
Where I lived in the early 60's was a nice area on the northeast side of Houston, TX.... but no streetlights....not til you get to the edge of the neighborhood and are about to enter a main road..
Even lighting on freeways could be cut back to half after midnight...
Nearly all the ideas presented to us are ways to make more energy, hardly anyone talks about using less of it.
 
Solar arrays in space are not in our near future, and shouldn't even be considered.
When it comes to energy, research funding should go FIRST to finding more efficient ways to use it, not that those efficiences should be an excuse to waste any of it. Along with those efficiencies, we should find ways to modify our lifestyles to use less of it.
We waste more energy in the USA than we realize. I know this may sound odd, but there was a time our neighborhoods didn't even have streetlights.
Where I lived in the early 60's was a nice area on the northeast side of Houston, TX.... but no streetlights....not til you get to the edge of the neighborhood and are about to enter a main road..
Even lighting on freeways could be cut back to half after midnight...
Nearly all the ideas presented to us are ways to make more energy, hardly anyone talks about using less of it.

Absolutely. I would love to see more encouragement given for walking, riding a bike, or using public transportation. These things should be encouraged as much as possible. There are many cities that have good transportation systems. I know because I lived in many of them, including pretty much the entire island of Oahu, almost the entire Puget Sound area, and San Diego. Others can be easily navigated if people would stop being so impatient and/or lazy and just walk to the place they want to go when it is within a mile or two and they aren't planning on getting anything that would be unmanageable to bring home when walking. I know people who will drive their car a block down the road for a movie or to pick up a couple of groceries.

I would also like to see measures taken to prevent communities and HOAs from denying people the right to be environmentally friendly even if it might cause aestetic displeasement to others, such as drying clothes outside.

Clotheslines a hang-up for some communities - USATODAY.com
 
UtahBill;1059358600 If 6 different power companies are competing for your energy dollars said:
Maybe in new development communities, but not in long established cities.

In my city, Grand Junction, Excel owns and maintains their own power lines from their part of the power grid, so if other company wanted to compete, they would have to put in new lines and hope they can use the same power grid, all on the faint possibility they can steal enough Xcel customers to make it cost effective.

ricksfolly
 
Back
Top Bottom