Is nuclear power a safe place for the future?

Answer 1

People disagree on the answer to this question, and sometimes rather loudly. Personally, I think it is the least safe, and most dangerous, source of power we have. But there are many learned people who disagree with me.

If you want details, I suggest you look at the related question, "What are the advantages and disadvantages for nuclear power?" A link to this question is below in "Related questions."

Answer 2

This is a controversial subject. The question revolves around two questions of safety. One is the safety of the nuclear plant and spent fuel. The other is the question of greenhouse gas emissions.

The cost of a worst case nuclear disaster is extremely high. The Chernobyl disaster actually could have been worse, and probably would have been but for the actions of some very courageous people who did some necessary work knowing they would die within a few weeks as a result of their exposure. Even so, the economic cost has been estimated as high as a trillion US 1995 dollars, and the area evacuated was very large. Though few plants have the design flaws that lead to the disaster, a catastrophe of similar scale could happen at almost any nuclear plant.

Another problem with nuclear power is the waste. Conventional nuclear plants produce waste that is highly toxic and lasts a very long time. The position of the US government is that this waste will take a million years to be safe. The European position is that "safe" means as safe as naturally occurring uranium ore (which is not especially safe), and it will take waste about six million years to get to this point.

The carbon emissions associated with nuclear power are not trivial, though many people seem to think there are none. Early estimates did not include mining, refining, and enriching nuclear fuel. Nor did they include plant construction, decommissioning, or waste disposal. Since manufacture and installation were included for such power sources as hydro, wind, and solar, the early estimates of global warming emissions favored nuclear over solar and made it similar to hydro and wind. Treating all these power sources similarly, however produces very different results. Estimates put nuclear at 4 to 16 times the emissions of hydro and wind, 2 to 8 times the emissions of solar photovoltaic, and 15% to 60% of the emissions of combined cycle natural gas turbines in distributed power generation.

My own feeling is that nuclear power, as it is currently used, is not safe for the future. Technologies change, however, and it is possible a safer way to generate nuclear power could be developed.

Answer 3

Nuclear power is already one of the safest forms of energy we know of, per unit of energy produced.

We should be working to make other forms of energy safer:

• Every 3 weeks, coal power pollution in India kills as many people as the Chernobyl disaster.
• Every 2 days, coal power plants in the US release as much radiation into the environment as the Three Mile Island disaster.
• More Americans have been killed working on wind power plants (53 as of 2010) than have been killed by nuclear power plants (3, from a single incident at an Army experimental reactor), and nuclear plants produced ~30 times as much electricity in the process.
  

Answer 4

Yes.