Seriously, I'm getting pissed off and very frustrated with the hysteria about nuclear energy that is going on in Germany at the moment. In the face of the nuclear disaster in Japan at the moment our chancellor Merkel has announced that the government will now push forward its plans to abolish nuclear power in Germany (Atomausstieg) and will shut down the first few plants right away.
People who follow news in Germany may spot a pattern here: something bad happens elsewhere in the world and immediately Germans go into hysterics. This is, of course, especially true of the media and politicians. A day after the terrorist attack in New York and Washington in 2001 entire streets in Berlin were locked down for fear of a follow-up attack. Probably because someone spotted a bearded Muslim in Kreuzberg (people who know Berlin will get the sarcasm). My grandfather who follows the stock market says that when New York or Tokyo do a dip you can expect Frankfurt to do the same the next day. And now this. Japan is hit by a devastating earthquake and German politicians want to shut down our nuclear plants. Because the same thing could just happen here, right? Well, bullshit, Japan is right on a tectonic fault line between the Eurasian and Pacific plate. They have earthquakes all the time - even though the recent one seems to be the fiercest in history. Germany, however, is nowhere near a fault line. The only significant quake during my 31 years of life was in 1992 and did not cause a single casualty. A 9.something on the Richter scale does not happen here. There is no significant seismic activity and has not been for centuries. Fortunately, some people didn't switch off their thinking and the whole plan to shut down reactors has already been found unconstitutional (guess who's been playing bla-bla-bingo again).
I've even had arguments with some colleagues, many of who are also against nuclear power. The German media are (as usual) pointing their dirty fingers at China for building more nuclear power plants than anywhere else in the world and not considering the risks. Then again, they also pointed accusing fingers when China built the Three Gorges Dam - a green project that required some villages to be controversially displaced. I guess, if they talked as much about development projects in China as they do in Germany (vis. Stuttgart 21, Frankfurt Airport runway 4, expansion of Berlin Airport, etc.) they would probably still rank as Third World over there.
Anyway, that's beside the point. Other nuclear reliant countries (France and also China now) are re-evaluating the risks of nuclear plants but nobody is considering shutting existing plants down. We Germans are to lead by example. I wonder if anyone will follow or if they will just wait to snicker later.
But giving some thought to the matter:
Nuclear energy comes at a price. We've seen what a malfunctioning reactor can do - in Chernobyl and we may yet see it in Japan - although I pray to God that we won't. Obviously, high safety standards must be enforced. Also there is the problem of nuclear waste, which must be disposed of securely, future-proof and environmentally friendly. Fuel is finite but so is all other earthly fuel. On the other hand, energy generation by nuclear fission (rather than fusion which is still in its infancy) is the most efficient form of power source we have. It's really useful when you want to supply a lot of people with electricity at a low cost (guess why China is building so many of them). Fuel may be finite but it'll probably last us longer than fossil fuels. And aside from spent fuel rods nuclear plants run very clean. The only thing that pours out of them is steam.
You may say, the cons still have it. So what are the alternatives? Fossil fuels and green energies. Both have their shortcomings.
Fossil fuels (coal, oil or gas) are less efficient than nuclear power. They burn dirty and even though you equip power plants with carbon filters they still smoke (also, carbon filters are not even fitted in all countries). And fossil fuels are even more finite than nuclear ones.
Green energies (sun, wind or water) are the desired solution - especially here in Germany. They are infinitely renewable, environmentally friendly and hazard-free. They are also significantly less efficient than nuclear power. I believe they are even still less efficient than at least some fossil fuels. They are significantly more expensive than all other energies. I know this from when I was choosing a power supplier - they gave me the option to choose green energy at a surcharge. Plus, two out of the three are not even reliable.
Let's look at each in turn.
Solar energy: I remember, in Germany you have to get a reduction on your power bill if you have a solar panel on your roof. I also believe I remember that a solar panel as big as your roof is not enough to supply a large household with electricity. Now imagine how big an area of panels it would take to supply a large city the size of, say, Cologne or Hamburg or Berlin. Where would you put them all? Also, as I've recently been told, spent solar panels cannot just be scrapped but constitute fairly toxic waste. Moreover, I seem to remember that at least initially it used to take almost as much energy to produce a solar panel as that panel would produce during its average lifetime (maybe this is an urban legend or at least outdated). Finally, this energy is strongly reliant on the weather. In Germany, many regions tend to have lots of cloudy days. Frankly, I really don't want there to be a direct causal link between the sun shining and me having a hot lunch.
Wind energy: To capture the power of the wind you need a huge fan with attached generator mounted on a pillar some 20 meters tall. And, as with solar panels, one is not enough. Even for a single large household. Now the sheer size of each "windmill" makes this technology impractical for use in urban areas. You would need vast wind parks somewhere outside cities. One of my colleagues rashly commented that we would need to make use of nature reserves for this, too. But what of the environmental implications of that? To build this amount of structures you couldn't leave nature around them intact. Then, when built they would look horrible in the landscape and I wouldn't be surprised if the noise made by hundreds of wind generators and fan blades would disrupt wildlife in the entire area. By now we have a fairly good understanding of ecosystems and of how their parts depend on each other. If such parks were built on a large scale can we predict what effect that will have? And finally, wind energy is, again, very weather dependent. Of course, long periods of calm weather may finally make us go to bed a bit earlier.
Water power: This is maybe the only really infinite power source since it just depends on water flowing downward. However, it does heavily depend on the region. If there is no major river in the area you cannot build a water plant. A water plant also has significant environmental implications. For one, you have to build a barrier - the dam - right across a river. This may, for instance, impede the migration of fish. Furthermore, in some cases the course of the river itself has to be altered and most of the time the waters of the river are dammed up (as seen in the cases of the Hoover Dam or the Three Gorges Dam). Who knows what the effects of that may be. I believe when they started building the Three Gorges Dam environmentalists were shouting about some endangered species of frog whereas, fortunately, the Hoover Dam happens to be in the middle of the desert. Finally, you may also argue that the dams do not exactly enrich the landscape.
On the whole, I can see applications of green energies. Regions near major rivers can profit from environmentally friendly water power. Solar and wind power can grant autonomy from the power grid. There's a reason why satellites and space probes are fitted with solar panels. They may also allow outlying homes to be fairly autonomous - if the residents can afford to have the equipment installed. I have seen farms or homes on North Sea islands equipped with up to three wind generators. So that does make sense.
But
Even if we could snap our fingers, shut down all nuclear reactors and switch to green energies, what of the cost? The government, the media and a lot of average citizens are demanding an immediate halt to nuclear power. At the same time there's a public howl of disapproval when energy suppliers and even our clever chancellor start talking about a higher electricity price per unit. Isn't this childish? People want both: a clean conscience (and moral higher ground) and a low monthly electricity bill. Well, maybe they can't have it. And what if our output is not enough, then we'll buy power from abroad, maybe from France - nuclear power from France. We may boldly go forth and shut down our reactors but the nearest French nuclear power plant is just across the Rhine. If something goes wrong there we'd be the first to notice. As of now I can't see them shutting it down. I can't even remember hearing that the Japanese are shutting down any of their other reactors. I would expect that they are happy the other 50-odd ones are still up and running.
So, in summary, how are we to get away from nuclear energy at this time? Take a look at the electricity needs a single household may have: lights, fridge, cooking, appliances, phone, computer, TV, stereo, modem, exterior lighting, air con up to and including your electric tooth brush. We want all this stuff, we feel we need it. But too many people seem to believe the juice they need just comes from the wall socket. Of course, we should be aware of our use of electricity and not waste. Still, the more we rely on machines the more electric power we will need. Even more so if we are serious about moving toward electric cars. All that power has to come from somewhere and I cannot see a believable green solution yet. All I hear is heated talk but that's not enough to spin turbines.
So until somebody shows me a better solution I choose nuclear energy.
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