Toshiba to open up U.S. nuclear-power business

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Class starts now.

The previous poster mentioned Three-Mile Island, Chernobyl and Sellafield as disastrous melt-downs, which is indeed the case. They are also the ONLY major nuclear melt-downs that have occurred in the 25+ years that we as a species have used nuclear power.

So by your logic 12 major nuclear meltdowns per century are exceptable? Here is the consequences of the worst accident so far:
Chernobyl
57 immediete deaths, upwards of 12,000-15,000 subsequent cancer deaths in the surrounding countryside and projected to 90,000 to 500,000 total fallout related cancer deaths including neighboring countries, 336,000 people homeless and relocated, 150,000 Sq.km contaminated and 2,827 sq.km of the Ukraine left uninhabitable for up to 50 years. with agricultural restrictions up to 300 years. In certain areas Plutonium particles in the soil will emit fatal
Neutron radiation for 24,000 years.

Considering the benefit in the sheer amount of energy created by the various plants that requires much less fossil fuel to be used, I say that the three accidents are more than worth it.

I'll not comment on your cavelier attitude about such loss, but rather ammend your claim of only three accidents to say only 3 full core meltdowns at commercial reactors. There have in fact been many more full reactor meltdowns on research reactors and military submarines (though at a smaller scale) and several partial core meltdowns at various places such as NRX in Ontario, EBR-1 in Idaho, Santa Susana in California, SL-1 in Idaho, Enrico Fermi Nuclear generating staion in Michigan, Chapelcross in Scotland as well as countless criticality accidents worldwide.

I am not completely against nuclear power, but trying to paint it as a harmless miracle science with no risk or consequences is either woefully uninformed or intentionally misleading.

Posted by: Tigertank   Posted on: 03/06/08 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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