SpaceWeatherNews @SunWeatherMan
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Trying to shoot a hole in this argument. Can’t. Any takers?
prayingforexits 🏴‍☠️
@mrexits
He is kind of asking the right questions here

There exist magic rocks that can boil water.

Boiling water gives us energy.

We stop using magic rocks because they exploded that one time.

Are we re*ed? Imagine if pre historic (sic) peoples stopped using fire because some red burnt his house down once.
10:54 AM · Dec 2, 2024

It's an interesting question. It's also a great illustration of the irrational thinking in some quarters when things like climate change are concerned. The fact is that nuclear energy is safer, with a lower rate of injury, than any energy method other than solar.

Climate scolds, people who want to keep the earth at some human-approved level, are all about "clean energy." They love the intermittent, low-energy-density sources - windmills, solar power - but can't abide and will not discuss nuclear power or "magic rocks." And when it comes to energy density, there just isn't any comparison. One fuel pellet of uranium in a light-water reactor produces as much energy as 1.3 tons of coal, 250 gallons of oil, and 34,000 cubic feet of natural gas. In a breeder reactor, the numbers are much higher: 22 tons of coal, 4,350 gallons of oil, and 590,000 cubic feet of natural gas. //

Forget what climate scolds claim to want. Look at what they are in favor of: You (not they) reducing your standard of living to meet their claimed goals. Look at the actions of the high-profile members of the opposition: Jetting around the globe in private jets, living in huge mansions a few feet above the tide line in the oceans they claim are rising out of control. They expect you to pay the price they aren’t willing to.

Do you want clean energy? This is clean energy. It's safe energy. No “still just thirty years away” fusion boondoggles are required. Not that fusion wouldn’t be even greater if we can make it work on an industrial scale, but how long have various organizations been trying to make that happen? This technology, nuclear power, especially the promising small modular reactors, is a technology we have now.

The new, improved small modular reactors described above could and should be built today. Technological societies like ours are dependent on abundant, cheap energy, and nuclear power has the ability to provide that power. Throughout our history, every major technological advance in power – from animal to machine, from wood to coal to oil to gas – has had one key characteristic in common, and that is increased energy density. Nuclear power represents just such an increase over generating electricity with coal or gas. Solar and wind power run in just the opposite direction, which is why they don’t scale up. //

anon-j5pd
a day ago
I’m an engineer and was a nuclear operator in the Navy. I’m a big supporter of nuclear power.
My dad used to work at the Palo Verde nuclear power plant in AZ. It’s the biggest nuke in the country.
Just for fun I calculated the area of solar panels required to match Palo Verde’s output. It would require a field of panels 25 miles on a side, 625 square miles of panels. I used the power conversion factor and highest rate of sunlight incidence on the panels.
Palo Verde churns out the same amount of power day and night and isn’t impacted by dust. //

They Call Me Bruce
a day ago
Can't argue with a word of this.

As for safety, I used to be fond of pointing out that more people died in Ted Kennedy's car than in every civilian nuclear accident in the US combined.