Talk:Nuclear power

continued discussion from Talk:Equipment_for_autonomous_growth

The Fraunhofer-Institute in Karlsruhe calculated the real costs of nuclear power generation under free market conditions, i.e. without subsidies and including insurance against damage to third parties. This calculation was done on behalf of the Bundeswirtschaftsministerium of the German government. Result: 1.80 Euro per kWh. (Source: Franz Alt, Krieg um Öl oder Frieden durch Sonne. Munich 2004, page 35)

Thanks, Rfc, for the reference. I know that it is hard or sometimes impossible for me to find the sources of things that I remember having read.

When I get around to it we might have an article on Nuclear power. Until then I might say that the difference in cost for liability insurance in different markets reflects the legal environment for suing people liable for a particular sort of damage and the supposed likelihood of such damage. In the Three Mile Island accident in the United Sates of America there was no loss of life shown to be caused by the accident with an estimate that perhaps two additional cancer deaths from radiation exposure in the 10 mile area might eventually result. Some consider that this is the worst nuclear accident ever likely to happen with the current level of safety practices in the U. S. nuclear industry. The Chernobyl accident caused at least 43 deaths directly attributable to the accident. The eventual number of cancer deaths may be about 4000. If it were expected that there were any reasonable probability of an accident like that at Chernobyl happening in a U. S. nuclear plant, I believe all of the nuclear power plants would be shut down regardless of economic damage from the loss of electric power.

It does not seem reasonable to set a cost of insurance for an accident like that at Chernobyl. Insurance takes losses that happen every now and then with some low statistical predictability to members of a large group and distributes the cost among all members of the susceptible group whether they suffer the loss directly or not. That cannot be done with an accident like that at Chernobyl. A sample size of one gives no statistical data. People either decide to accept the risk as a fair trade for the economic benefit or not have nuclear power. Setting insurance rates at $2.30 per kilowatt-hour is deciding not to have nuclear power.

I think the environment that allowed the Chernobyl accident to happen was one of always pretending that things were going well in the Soviet Union and hiding mistakes. Mistakes by government run industries were hidden to the extent that citizens could not complain of damages they suffered caused by negligent agents of government industries. There would be no compensation. It was as if one were struck by lightning and it would not help to seek compensation from the clouds. That is the situation in China today, but not in the U. S. of A. That is why I believe that it is reasonable to allow nuclear electric power generation in the U. S.

Regardless of the situation on Earth, nuclear accidents could not have such great affects on Mars. If a nuclear plant were to explode on Mars it would not be a nuclear bomb just as the Chernobyl disaster did not involve a nuclear bomb. A specific engineering effort must work to make a nuclear bomb or there is no nuclear bomb. A melt-down can result in steam pressure that causes an explosion. On Mars any effort to mine needed material for a colony could scrape a few contaminated centimeters off of a deposit an set it aside. Then the underlying ice (for example) could be mined and safely used. At the worst I might guess four people directly involved in nuclear maintenance at the time of an accident might die from an explosion. I doubt that that bad of an accident would occur because we have learned from past accidents and there is unlikely to be general practice of hiding all mistakes on Mars. I doubt that a modern industrial economy like that in Germany could exist on all solar and wind derived power. The cost of storing power for when sun and wind fail is considerable. On Mars there is no possible use of fossil fuel for power, but space based solar power could be continuous 24 hours a day every day of the year- Farred 21:23, 17 January 2013 (UTC)