Portable nuclear reactor program sparks controversy

Re:Portable nuclear reactor program sparks controversy by Johnny555 on Tuesday June 29, 2021 @07:30PM (#27683108)

For example, it's hard for people to really grok that, even if you added up all the people who have died from nuclear and radiation accidents in all of history[1], including not just the sources you mentioned, but disasters like Chernobyl and Fukushima, it would be far less than the number of people who die from pollution caused by fossil fuels every month

That's kind of a false equivalency since fossil fuel plants are much more common than nuclear plants (nuclear generates ~10% of the world's electrical power), and they tend to be highly regulated and maintained, and run by first world nations. But if nuclear was as ubiquitous as fossil fuel plants, it would also be run by poorer nations with less ability to maintain them.

So you can't really compare nuclear plants that exist today with what we'd see if nuclear were as common as fossil fuel plants.

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Re:Portable nuclear reactor program sparks controversy by foxyv on Wednesday June 30, 2021 @09:17AM (#27688117)

Nuclear power currently makes up 20% of US electrical power. Fossil fuels are 60% of grid electricity. Multiply by 3 and you are there in the US. France is at 70% so they are already there. I don't see any significant deaths from nuclear power there.

I agree that nuclear isn't currently a great solution for stuff like trucks and planes. However for baseline power generation it is one of the best low carbon energy solutions when taking into account storage costs to provide constant power from intermittent sources like wind and solar.

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