As long as nuclear is controlled by an omnipotent regulatory system based on the false premise that a large release is intolerable, there can be no real progress.
As long as nuclear is controlled by an omnipotent regulatory system based on the false premise that a large release is intolerable, there can be no real progress. If a large release is intolerable, then there should be no nuclear.
With the exception of Chernobyl, there has never been a "large release" and reactors designed similar to Chernobyl are long gone. As you are well aware, at TMI the dome functioned as designed and radioactive release was negligible. Same with Fukushima. I am sure you agree that reactors can be built for far less expense without sacrificing safety. The regulations are the problem. Not the engineering as you have pointed out.
I had the same concern. We need to define "large release". I guess Jack is talking about a bunker buster hitting a large reactor on a windy day, near a big city. That could rival the Bhopal disaster, but a lot less probable, I think. Terrorist groups won't have bunker busters, and countries like Russia will have better ways to nuke a city.
You guys still don't get it. You still buy the Intolerable Harm Lie. We can detect no harm from radiation, no increase in cancer from the Chernobyl release to any member of the public with the exception of an increase in thyroid cancer due to kids drinking I-131 contaminated milk. That only occurred because iodine concentrates in the tiny thyroid gland multiplying the dose rates to that organ by well over a factor of 1000. It could have easily be prevented by confiscating local milk for a few weeks as was done at Windscale and Fukushima. A Chernobyl sized and larger release is tolerable.
We can never say never. Mr Murphy has a better imagination than you or me. In my view, if nuclear power is truly successful and we have 10,000 one GW plants, a Chernobyl sized release is inevitable. It's only a question of when. And on top of that we have the bunkerbuster threat.
BTW, when we do have that release I want it to be on a windy day. The more we spread a given amount of radioactive material around the better off we will be.
To be clear, I don't buy the Intolerable Harm Lie. Given the value of nuclear power, and the low probability of the bunker buster scenario, I will tolerate the risk. I also agree with you that a Chernobyl size release should be tolerable.
Then why do you need a definition of "large"? In this context, "large" is the point at which a release becomes intolerable. The Intolerable Harm Lie has been so pervasive, so unchallenged for our whole lives that we just can't let it go. David may say he will accept the risk, but he wants an NRC that is based on the IHL because he thinks that will make that risk smaller, and he's willing to accept the increase in power cost that an NRC induces. Not good enough.
What !!? You must be mistaking me for someone else. The only thing I've said about the NRC is that trying to abolish it is futile. Even Elon Musk couldn't accomplish that.
If I were an NRC commissioner, with the support of two others, I would find ten experts from among the hundreds of employees, set up a committee to approve the new designs, and bypass, not abolish the thousands of other employees, who could raise hell with Congress, and get our bypass outlawed.
The challenge I see is getting the public to overcome their irrational fear of radiation. Until that happens, the politicians won't move, and the bureaucracy will stay as it is. If every journalist understood what your articles are saying, public opinion would change rapidly.
First, you've got to get over you irrational fear. You called Chernobyl a Bhopal. At Bhopal, there was very real very clear chemical harm,killing about 4000 quickly and disabling tens of thousands of the public. At Chernobyl, there was nothingof the sort.
You called getting rid of the NRC a bad idea, not impossible, but the fact that you would now like to get rid of the NRC is some sort of progress.
In any event, the "better pigs" argument has been around at least since teh 1930's.
An autocratic regulatory system that depends on all powerful self-sacrificing know-it-alls does not work in the real world. Orwell got it right.
Getting rid of the NRC will stop being futile when people like you stop calling it futile. The Trump administration never tried to get rid of the NRC. That would take an act of Congress. Nor did they take the obvious, easily feasible first step of outlawing LNT. Instead they focused on funneling more taxpayer money to toy reactors, attracting a bunch of promoters who are now squabbling over who gets our money.
By any reasonable scale TMI would NOT be large and Fukushima release as well should be tolerable. Even embracing LNT I would assume. These are "large enough" by the industry of "ambulance chasers" though and the system that enables it.
Abolishing LNT/NRC or however serious reform will be called requires IMHO incredible bottom up approach with the public having incredible trust in administration doing it for benefit of people. People need to want it with basic understanding "why". If it will be done by administrations that cannot be trusted about anything objective- risk of it being dismissed, reversed with even tighter stupidity is high. Headlines will write itself "they want to kill us with radiation for the profit of wealthy". I have seen headlines of this kind in Polish press already regarding some suggested changes in US, and support for NP in Poland is as strong as can reasonably be(sadly with assumption that high cost is some kind of must because "otherwise", and NRC being "the golden standard").
I understand the point you are trying to make, but getting pretty close to the "no partisan politics" line. Pls nobody step over it.
Not one person in 50 can tell you what LNT stands for. Any administration can get rid of it by an E0. This all important first step would have little political consequence, but the policy consequences would be enormous when we redid all the EPA/NRC risk calculations.
Thank you Jack for informing your excellent essay based on your experience in South Korea.
I am confused by your statement:
As long as nuclear is controlled by an omnipotent regulatory system based on the false premise that a large release is intolerable, there can be no real progress. If a large release is intolerable, then there should be no nuclear.
With the exception of Chernobyl, there has never been a "large release" and reactors designed similar to Chernobyl are long gone. As you are well aware, at TMI the dome functioned as designed and radioactive release was negligible. Same with Fukushima. I am sure you agree that reactors can be built for far less expense without sacrificing safety. The regulations are the problem. Not the engineering as you have pointed out.
I had the same concern. We need to define "large release". I guess Jack is talking about a bunker buster hitting a large reactor on a windy day, near a big city. That could rival the Bhopal disaster, but a lot less probable, I think. Terrorist groups won't have bunker busters, and countries like Russia will have better ways to nuke a city.
You guys still don't get it. You still buy the Intolerable Harm Lie. We can detect no harm from radiation, no increase in cancer from the Chernobyl release to any member of the public with the exception of an increase in thyroid cancer due to kids drinking I-131 contaminated milk. That only occurred because iodine concentrates in the tiny thyroid gland multiplying the dose rates to that organ by well over a factor of 1000. It could have easily be prevented by confiscating local milk for a few weeks as was done at Windscale and Fukushima. A Chernobyl sized and larger release is tolerable.
And it is certainly possible, especially in the US given regulatory induced use of dense packing. https://jackdevanney.substack.com/p/yes-we-could-have-another-chernobyl
We can never say never. Mr Murphy has a better imagination than you or me. In my view, if nuclear power is truly successful and we have 10,000 one GW plants, a Chernobyl sized release is inevitable. It's only a question of when. And on top of that we have the bunkerbuster threat.
BTW, when we do have that release I want it to be on a windy day. The more we spread a given amount of radioactive material around the better off we will be.
To be clear, I don't buy the Intolerable Harm Lie. Given the value of nuclear power, and the low probability of the bunker buster scenario, I will tolerate the risk. I also agree with you that a Chernobyl size release should be tolerable.
Then why do you need a definition of "large"? In this context, "large" is the point at which a release becomes intolerable. The Intolerable Harm Lie has been so pervasive, so unchallenged for our whole lives that we just can't let it go. David may say he will accept the risk, but he wants an NRC that is based on the IHL because he thinks that will make that risk smaller, and he's willing to accept the increase in power cost that an NRC induces. Not good enough.
What !!? You must be mistaking me for someone else. The only thing I've said about the NRC is that trying to abolish it is futile. Even Elon Musk couldn't accomplish that.
If I were an NRC commissioner, with the support of two others, I would find ten experts from among the hundreds of employees, set up a committee to approve the new designs, and bypass, not abolish the thousands of other employees, who could raise hell with Congress, and get our bypass outlawed.
The challenge I see is getting the public to overcome their irrational fear of radiation. Until that happens, the politicians won't move, and the bureaucracy will stay as it is. If every journalist understood what your articles are saying, public opinion would change rapidly.
First, you've got to get over you irrational fear. You called Chernobyl a Bhopal. At Bhopal, there was very real very clear chemical harm,killing about 4000 quickly and disabling tens of thousands of the public. At Chernobyl, there was nothingof the sort.
You called getting rid of the NRC a bad idea, not impossible, but the fact that you would now like to get rid of the NRC is some sort of progress.
In any event, the "better pigs" argument has been around at least since teh 1930's.
https://jackdevanney.substack.com/p/beyond-the-better-pigs-argument
An autocratic regulatory system that depends on all powerful self-sacrificing know-it-alls does not work in the real world. Orwell got it right.
Getting rid of the NRC will stop being futile when people like you stop calling it futile. The Trump administration never tried to get rid of the NRC. That would take an act of Congress. Nor did they take the obvious, easily feasible first step of outlawing LNT. Instead they focused on funneling more taxpayer money to toy reactors, attracting a bunch of promoters who are now squabbling over who gets our money.
By any reasonable scale TMI would NOT be large and Fukushima release as well should be tolerable. Even embracing LNT I would assume. These are "large enough" by the industry of "ambulance chasers" though and the system that enables it.
Abolishing LNT/NRC or however serious reform will be called requires IMHO incredible bottom up approach with the public having incredible trust in administration doing it for benefit of people. People need to want it with basic understanding "why". If it will be done by administrations that cannot be trusted about anything objective- risk of it being dismissed, reversed with even tighter stupidity is high. Headlines will write itself "they want to kill us with radiation for the profit of wealthy". I have seen headlines of this kind in Polish press already regarding some suggested changes in US, and support for NP in Poland is as strong as can reasonably be(sadly with assumption that high cost is some kind of must because "otherwise", and NRC being "the golden standard").
ms
I understand the point you are trying to make, but getting pretty close to the "no partisan politics" line. Pls nobody step over it.
Not one person in 50 can tell you what LNT stands for. Any administration can get rid of it by an E0. This all important first step would have little political consequence, but the policy consequences would be enormous when we redid all the EPA/NRC risk calculations.