Greenpeace against fusion, muppets

bk

It seems that Greenpeace are against nuclear fusion:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/10/22/fusion_greenpeace_no/

Greenpeace Spokesperson Bridget Woodman said: "Nuclear fusion has all the problems of nuclear power, including producing nuclear waste and the risks of a nuclear accident."

Which is complete BS, as Nuclear fusion

1) Unlike fission produces no high-level radioactive waste.

2) There is no risk of a serious nuclear accident. Not unless the laws of physics have recently changed.

To me this just goes to show the greenpeace are completely off their heads and haven't a clue about science or technology and are simple fear mongers.

Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace who later left, said about Greenpeace: "By the mid-1980s, the environmental movement had abandoned science and logic in favor of emotion and sensationalism,"

lostexpectation

come back to us when they get one working

jaycen

Think GP have finally lost their logic not that they had a lot in the first place.

They're just objecting on the grounds of 'I don't like it' at this stage.

Nuclear is the most environmentally friendly source of electricity generation, can't argue against it antmore it's proven.

Macha

Would you be happy to have one beside your house? Because that's what will scupper any attempts at nuclear in Ireland. No one wants it beside them and local politicians would have a hissy fit over it.

SeanW

If Greenpeace now opposes Nuclear Fusion power, that would be disappointing, but not surprising given that Greenpeace are far-left enviro-extremists and everyone knows it.

It seems that they've applied the same "logic" to fusion power as they have to fission, i.e. Luddism. It is for these very reasons that Patrick Moore, co founder of Greenpeace, left that organisation and now, along with other real world environmentalists like James Lovelock, support nuclear energy.
To show the chasm between the two positions, I offer this speech Moore gave to a U.S. Congressional Subcomittee on Nuclear Energy:
http://www.greenspirit.com/logbook.cfm?msid=70

Versus Greenpeace's take on the matter:
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/campaigns/nuclear/nomorechernobyls
Notice in particular the flash presentation mid-page.

Draw your own conclusions.

Would you be happy to have one beside your house? Because that's what will scupper any attempts at nuclear in Ireland. No one wants it beside them and local politicians would have a hissy fit over it.

Quite right: thanks to all the scaremongering that's been going on, most people would rather take their chances with a particle matter, mercury, arsenic and radiotoxin spewing coal-fired monster nextdoor than a clean, safe, emissions free nuclear power plant of similar size.

I was once in your anti-nuclear camp until I opened my mind to the facts, so I know first hand all about the scaremongering, doublethink, lies and pathetic urban legends that surround the nuclear issue.

jaycen

taconnol wrote: »

Would you be happy to have one beside your house? Because that's what will scupper any attempts at nuclear in Ireland. No one wants it beside them and local politicians would have a hissy fit over it.

I live on the East coast, I have a big one as a near neighbour, pretty sure the new design would be better than a fifty year old one, so no I wouldn't have a problem living near one.

bk

lostexpectation wrote: »

come back to us when they get one working

They are working, just they take more power then they give at the moment, the new one is currently being built in France that produces more power then it inputs and this will be the basis for future designs.

taconnol wrote:

Would you be happy to have one beside your house?

I would be perfectly happy.

You do understand that we are talking about Nuclear FUSION here and not fission.

Nuclear FUSION being the complete opposite of Nuclear fission, the technology we currently use and that Nuclear FUSION is completely safe.

Or did you have the typical knee jerk reaction that most Greenpeace folks have that don't understand the difference?

taconnol wrote:

Because that's what will scupper any attempts at nuclear in Ireland. No one wants it beside them and local politicians would have a hissy fit over it.

Again Fusion is completely different then fission. This is what is shocking me about this Greenpeace announcement. Fusion is the clean solution to massively reducing the CO2 emissions, I'm very concerned that people like you haven't a clue what they are talking about and will confuse this with nuclear fission.

It is interesting to note that in France a survey found that 70% of people where very happy with their Nuclear power plants and 68% were happy to have one built in their area.

So it just goes to show that as long as they are well run, people can come to like them.

Macha

SeanW wrote: »

Quite right: thanks to all the scaremongering that's been going on, most people would rather take their chances with a particle matter, mercury, arsenic and radiotoxin spewing coal-fired monster nextdoor than a clean, safe, emissions free nuclear power plant of similar size.

I was once in your anti-nuclear camp until I opened my mind to the facts, so I know first hand all about the scaremongering, doublethink, lies and pathetic urban legends that surround the nuclear issue.

Yes, I have to say the discussions about nuclear here are making me re-think my position.

jaycen wrote: »

I live on the East coast, I have a big one as a near neighbour, pretty sure the new design would be better than a fifty year old one, so no I wouldn't have a problem living near one.

Good point.

bk wrote: »

I would be perfectly happy.

You do understand that we are talking about Nuclear FUSION here and not fission.

Nuclear FUSION being the complete opposite of Nuclear fission, the technology we currently use and that Nuclear FUSION is completely safe.

Or did you have the typical knee jerk reaction that most Greenpeace folks have that don't understand the difference?

You know, it will never cease to amaze me, the way people will be so rude to other strangers, just because they're communicating via the internet. I like to call it the Internet Dickwad Theory:
http://www.pennyarcademerch.com/pat070381.html

If you note in my post, I didn't actually state my own opinion on it because I'm currently reconsidering that. My point was that in a country that will roll out something as ridiculous as decentralisation just to vote-grab from the local electorate, I doubt very much that a nuclear power plant will go through an Bord Pleanala with no hiccups.

ChocolateSauce

Yep. Well I'm of the opinion that if greenpeace are against it, I should probably be for it. 0 respect.

taconnol

taconnol wrote: »

Would you be happy to have one beside your house? Because that's what will scupper any attempts at nuclear in Ireland. No one wants it beside them and local politicians would have a hissy fit over it.

no way, not in my backyard

how about we build them under ground, under the Dublin or wicklow mountains?

Húrin

When you hear a phrase like "sustainable energy" the opposite is usually intended - the speaker is referring to an energy source that won't sustain anything for very long or very reliably.

This makes me question the article's credibility. I doubt that Woodman is a spokesperson for Greenpeace at all.

djpbarry

bk wrote: »

To me this just goes to show the greenpeace are completely off their heads and haven't a clue about science or technology and are simple fear mongers.

You're only realising this now?

jaycen wrote: »

Nuclear is the most environmentally friendly source of electricity generation...

Let's not go nuts.

Ray69

It is interesting to note that in France a survey found that 70% of people where very happy with their Nuclear power plants and 68% were happy to have one built in their area.

So it just goes to show that as long as they are well run, people can come to like them.

I am sure everyone is happy with a nuclear reactor next door to them until:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5384001427276447319

bk

Ray69 wrote: »

I am sure everyone is happy with a nuclear reactor next door to them until:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5384001427276447319

Sigh, yet another person who doesn't know the true story behind Chernobyl and how different it is from western nuclear power plants or nuclear fusion in this thread (literally the complete opposite of nuclear fission).

I use to be like you, but then I did some actual research and I saw the truth about renewable energy and Nuclear power.

robtri

Fusion power is no-where near ready for commercial purposes, and I mean no-where near ready, we are talking years here and I mean many years...
the French Fusion station ITER, is not due to be built till 2018......
and then when it is ready it still won't be able to produce power for more than 1000 seconds..... ITER is only an experimental lab, it is not a power station.... and the cost to build is 9.3billion dollars
so at the end of the day who cares what the green party are saying... as for the next long while it makes no difference

bk

robtri wrote: »

Fusion power is no-where near ready for commercial purposes, and I mean no-where near ready, we are talking years here and I mean many years...
the French Fusion station ITER, is not due to be built till 2018......
and then when it is ready it still won't be able to produce power for more than 1000 seconds..... ITER is only an experimental lab, it is not a power station.... and the cost to build is 9.3billion dollars
so at the end of the day who cares what the green party are saying... as for the next long while it makes no difference

My opinion is that we continue to develop nuclear fusion for the future, while actually using nuclear fission today to cut down on the amounts of co2 that we release into the air.

Ray69

What is the "real" story behind Chernobyl bk?

Where would you build your fission reactor bk? and where are you going to site your storage or disposal facility for the waste?

SeanW

Ray69 wrote: »

What is the "real" story behind Chernobyl bk?

Where would you build your fission reactor bk? and where are you going to site your storage or disposal facility for the waste?

For starters, you could try reading the title of this thread which is about Nuclear FUSION power, not the fission power in use today. These are two completely different technologies.

As for the real story behind Chernobyl, to make a long story short what happened was that the Soviet Union blew it up, due to atrociously bad reactor design, arrogance, incompetence and a complete disregard for safety, a combination of factors that could only have occured under old-style Communism or something equally bankrupt.
The reactor type used in the Chernobyl-4 unit was of the RBMK design, which was so totally and absolutely unsafe for a number of reasons that it was never used outside the Former Soviet Union and communist Eastern Europe. It's primary purpose was to make nuclear weapons, electricity as a byproduct all in the cheapest way possible and damn everything else.
The reactor started commercial production in the usual (for the USSR) way - corruptly, incompetently and under political pressure - and it was all downhill from there. In short, the way the USSR ran its nuclear programme, something like Chernobyl was inevitable.

But the only people who think there's any connection between nuclear power behind the Iron Curtin and something in a new, modern, 1st world nuclear system are people who have swallowed whole the brainwashing of Greenpeace etc.

Some suggested reading and viewing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster
and a very good BBC documentary detailing the circumstances of the accident can be found here:
http://pripyat.com/en/media/bbc.html

Ray69

I don't think it is only the former soviet union that has there problems with nuclear technology as it stands:

http://www.google.ie/search?q=radioactive+waste+leak

that shows hits for france, germany, & usa.

Most worrying for me as an expat scot:

http://www.google.ie/search?q=radioactive+waste+leak+scotland

doesn't return 'no results found' either.

Whilst the heading does say 'nuclear fusion', it wasn't me who stated people were happy to live next to nuclear FISSION reactors, nor me who stated they would build one in Ireland to save on CO2 emissions.

Pgibson

bk wrote: »

It seems that Greenpeace are against nuclear fusion.

I didn't realise that they were so much against SOLAR energy:

Quote:

"The Sun's energy output (3.86e33 ergs/second or 386 billion billion megawatts) is produced by NUCLEAR FUSION reactions. Each second about 700,000,000 tons of hydrogen are converted to about 695,000,000 tons of helium and 5,000,000 tons (=3.86e33 ergs) of energy in the form of gamma rays. As it travels out toward the surface, the energy is continuously absorbed and re-emitted at lower and lower temperatures so that by the time it reaches the surface, it is primarily visible light."

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