[beginning of rant mode]
I didn't meant to preach about nuclear power risks (and I don't want to deny non-nuclear power plant impact on public health), but....
But it's rather "funny" you "accept" as an argument an
estimation about coal burning consequences and take into account only
immediate & direct deaths due to nuclear power industry...
In contrast, commercial nuclear power has killed about 42
All statistics can and are generally manipulated.
ie pro nuclears when they want to demonstrate the danger of, say, coal, include in the deaths toll every death in that industry, including the guy who was killed in a car crash while on the job in the mining company !
OTOH, concerning death in nuclear industry, they only enter into account, people who obviously died from direct exposure, during "incidents" that can't be hidden.
42 dead people only : that's a laugh !!!!! any kind of human activity, any industry, has a higher death toll thru out the world....
If you want references, you should look for some and you will find others : ie this one
this one, about Chernobyl's facts too .
just a quote :
A common misconception is that only about 31 people died as a result of the Chernobyl disaster......
Approximately 134 power station workers were exposed to extremely high doses of radiation directly after the accident. About 31 of these people died within 3 months. Another 25,000 "liquidators" - the soldiers and firefighters who were involved in clean up operations - have died since the disaster of diseases such as lung cancer, leukemia, and cardiovascular disease.......
... millions of people will continue to be exposed to such doses of radiation for decades to come.
I just want to point out :
-
it's true nuclear power plant have some huge advantages compared to coal power plants ;
-
OTOH , it's technicaly easy to make coal power plant much much safer ; I'll admit it may be not so easy in a full liberal economic system...
-
it's true nuclear power plants have the best security mesures (in the western world at least) in industry
-
OTOH because of the specail risks involved, it's both a necessity and not enough to insure there NEVER will be any accident (and I don't even want to speak about terrorism possibilities...) : IMHO a 0.001% risk in nuclear industry is worse than a 10% risk in classic fuel industry.
-
it's true nuclear power plants give enormous amount of energy, (up-to-now the only one..) compatible with our western (and especially USAern (??) <img src="/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />...) way of life.
-
OTOH , it may be interesting to calculate the real amount of energy created by nuclear INDUSTRY (take the output of power plants and deduced the amount of energy used for :
- extracting ore
- refining uranium
- building those power plants
- destroying them after their - short : mostly 20 max 30 years - lifetime
- eliminating (how ??), reducing and stocking the wastes
- etc...)
Then may be the real final energy output would not be so huge ......
(and yes, you're right, it sure should be done for ANY power industry...)
-
it's true other methods for producing energy (ie renewable energy) are not really producing much energy up-to-now....
-
OTOH , invest as much money in those methods as there has been in nuclear industry (and don't forget to take military money into account : the main reason the first civil power plants have been build was to mower the cost of military fissile materials) and soon they will have better results.
-
it's true renewable energy won't ever give such enormous amount of centralised energy ;
-
OTOH decentralizing energy production might be a good thing ...
-
it's true a whole site of windmills might not be a pretty sight ..
-
OTOH , even if noisy and disturbing in the landscape, IMO it's so much less than any nuclear (or coal..)power plant with its refrigeration towers and its high tension power lines,
- aso ....
Like Chris said in an other post, may be we should look not always for more energy, but we should wonder about our life style.
I'm no extremist in either way, and I'm sure humanity could find mid-way between Cro-Magnon way-of-life and New-Yorkers (just an example... no offense intended to New-Yorkers specifically <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />).
and when I say midway, I have to admit I would rather it be closer to new-yorker's one... <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />.
Because I'm also sure that if every earth inhabitant want to have the same "confort" level as any New-York (or even Paris ...) citizen, that won't be possible, even with nuclear power plant.
You want an example ? Look at the present consequences of China economic boom : they need more steel to build their infrastructures .... buy any economics newspaper and read about steel price...
That's just the beginning ....
[end of rant mode]
P.S. :
let me add a few facts.
In France :
- most of our electricity comes from nuclear power plants ....
- some people, calling themselves environmentalists, refuse windmills due to aesthetical considerations ....
- right after Chernobyl's disaster, the french government had the "courage" (ooopss... I was about to use another word... and I remember Chris warning ... <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> )
to declare that the radioactive clouds had stopped at our frontiers and kindly moved along, on the other side ; thus french people had nothing to fear, no risk involved .... <img src="/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />
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