Is Fallout 3 Around the Corner?

[epocalypse]

Now hold on a minute, if no one in this thread sees a problem with responsible nuclear power then how are we going to have a vitriolic and argumentative discussion!?!

[Dubious_wolf]

I guess we aren't.... I started the thread because
1. I didn't know much about it
2. I was leery of the nuclear waste produced
but everyone has been kind enough to reassure me that my fears of growing a third arm are unfounded.

Plus I felt an annex Canada joke needed to be made.

[Lord Chrusher]

Nice to see everyone here has sane views on nuclear power.

[Alja-Markir]

Isn't the Moonbase nuclear powered?

~Alja~

[Cake]

Obviously the solution is nuclear powered desalination plants.
...
Wait, hold on. That actually sounds like it might work.
~Alja~

What, like, condense the steam into drinking water and sell the salt for food?

[steelfox]

Now hold on a minute, if no one in this thread sees a problem with responsible nuclear power then how are we going to have a vitriolic and argumentative discussion!?!

I hate nuclear power! Bring back steam and coal. Power homes by burning kitten!

[Emperor Gum]

I hate nuclear power! Bring back steam and coal. Power homes by burning kitten!

One kitten can power a city the size of Luxembourg for twelve years, plus they're an easily renewable resource and cute.

[Alja-Markir]

Fools! You fail to account for the little known fact that kitten are in fact nuclear! How else can one power such levels of cute?

~Alja~

[Metcarfre]

I thought they were some form of matter/antimatter reaction?

[Emperor Gum]

If they weren't cute, people would notice that they were be killed by radiation poisoning.

[Dubious_wolf]

kitten are in fact nuclear!
~Alja~

And that is one for the quote book

[Unlucky]

Nice to see everyone here has sane views on nuclear power.

Agreed. Whenever I hear the usual arguments against it, I just raise my eyebrow and shake my head. Thankfully there really are just uninformed people out there who, once presented with both sides of the argument, are usually for nuclear power stations afterwards.

My countries entire opinion on nuclear power pretty much makes me shake my head though.

[Arius]

Nice to see everyone here has sane views on nuclear power.

Agreed. Whenever I hear the usual arguments against it, I just raise my eyebrow and shake my head. Thankfully there really are just uninformed people out there who, once presented with both sides of the argument, are usually for nuclear power stations afterwards.

My countries entire opinion on nuclear power pretty much makes me shake my head though.

BUT THEY'RE USING NUCLEAR POWER!!! IT'S EVIL! BECAUSE... EVIL!!!1! THE NUCLEAR WASTE MAKES FISH HAVE THREE EYES!! I SAW IT ON TV! THERE WAS THIS LITTLE BOY WHO WAS FISHING OUTSIDE A NUCLEAR POWER PLANT AND HE CAUGHT A FISH WITH THREE EYES, HIS NAME WAS BART SOMETHING.

AND WHAT ABOUT THE WASTE? HOW ARE THEY GOING TO TRANSPORT IT? I MEAN, THE SPECIALLY DESIGNED CONTAINERS THAT ARE CAPABLE OF WITHSTANDING CRASHES, EXPLOSIONS, FIRE, AND GUNSHOTS COULD BREAK!!!

ZOMG!

[Unlucky]

ZOMG!

I was once watching some people being interviewed about nuclear reactors and this is what they had to say:
"Psh, I don't no reactors near my house! What if it blew up?? I don't want to be turned into a mutant!"
"Well, I don't know much about nuclear power but, what I've heard I don't like so yeah, I don't want them."
"Honestly? I'm against them on an ethical level. The nuclear waste never disappears y'know? It just sits around in the Earth, wasting away - killing everything in it....it's bad for the environment!
And CO2 producing coal plants aren't?
Well, yeah sure they are but nuclear power's permanent!"

[Arius]

Sanity takes a back seat to propaganda.

[Rikadyn]

Sanity takes a back seat to propaganda.

in all things, always.

[Alja-Markir]

My favorite thing about nuclear panickers is they think that burying nuclear materials is unnatural, because they fail to realize that nuclear materials don't just magically appear but are in fact mined out of mountains.

We can't put it BACK into the ground where we got it! That'd be a danger to the environment! We should have just left in the ground where we got it to begin with, then it'd be perfectly safe for the environment!

~Alja~

[Master Gunner]

I wonder what they think of naturally occurring nuclear piles?

[Dubious_wolf]

My favorite thing about nuclear panickers is they think that burying nuclear materials is unnatural, because they fail to realize that nuclear materials don't just magically appear but are in fact mined out of mountains.

We can't put it BACK into the ground where we got it! That'd be a danger to the environment! We should have just left in the ground where we got it to begin with, then it'd be perfectly safe for the environment!

~Alja~

Well this could be more of the media's propaganda, but I was under the impression that many facilities used materials that are irradiated to use as nuclear fuel rods and can be much more unstable than the stuff dug up out of the ground. so while putting the stuff we got out of the ground back isn't a problem it's the stuff we artificially mack and put into the ground that is problematic...

[Smidge]

...

"Plutonium," I hear you saying, "What on Earth is that good for, other than bombs?" Well, the question is a good one: Plutonium is unbelievably dangerous. It's powerfully radioactive, and the key component of nuclear weapons. So what could extracting plutonium possibly be good for, in an age when nuclear proliferation is a global faux pas?

...

From what I remember Plutonium is not highly radioactive like Uranium.
Plutonium emits alpha radiation.
Alpha radiation does not penetrate the skin.
However when inhaled or ingested, it will irradiate internal organs.
Inhaling is the most dangerous as it will cause lung cancer.

So as long as you don't sniff or eat it... you'll be perfectly safe. I hope

[Master Gunner]

Many things generate alpha radiation, including the stuff in your smoke alarm. But yeah, unless you ingest those substances/breath in those substances (see: DoA), it's not a problem. Plutonium in its "natural" state isn't highly radioactive, however, the waste products from nuclear reactors, as I recall, are significantly moreso. However, burying them underground still solves that problem, especially if we can figure out a process to efficiently (and non-explosively) utilize those materials or split them down into less-dangerous elements (or at least, ones with shorter half-lives). Worst-case, we eventually make a massive mass driver, and shoot the damn stuff into space.

[Lord Chrusher]

I am sure the energy required to launch nuclear waste into space is greater than energy produced when the nuclear waste was created.

Fast reactors produces much larger amounts of high energy neutrons which destroy many of the isotopes with dangerous medium lifetimes.

[Arius]

I say we piss off the maximum amount of people at the same time.

Used-uranium tipped bullets.

[Alja-Markir]

I am sure the energy required to launch nuclear waste into space is greater than energy produced when the nuclear waste was created.

Spaaaaaaaace!
Elllevaaaaaator!



~Alja~

[Smidge]

Nuclear reactors like we have now will be obsolete once Europe and it's partners get the damn ITER reactors working correctly and then into mass production. No more nuclear waste.
One plant the size of a normal nuclear reactor would produce three times more energy.
And seeing there is no risk of a nuclear meltdown we could just build them everywhere. No more coal. No more Fission reactors.
Fusion! FTW!!!