Nuclear Power: Should We Use More or Less? - TLDR News

We asked our audience what they thought about increasing our reliance on nuclear power, so in this video, we're examing the pros and cons of building more nuclear power plants.

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[markus.schiefer]

Never thought I'd say this, but yes. The new generation of reactors with walk-away safety are pretty good and the environmental impact is even less than solar and wind. Investment in getting Thorium reactors up and running would even solve the problem with nuclear waste - even the existing one - reducing the half-life to only 30 years.

[WinterWeaver]

When talking about the numbers dead due to nuclear disaster or radiation, you should really compare that to the number of deaths due to coal inhalation and the health risks associated with that as well. When you do that you will see that the combined deaths/health issues from both nuclear disasters doesn't even come close to that of coal for example.

[sclair]

Nuclear was the issue that caused me to leave the Greens. Given how geologically stable the UK is, how safe modern designs are, and how small the area needed to contain the waste is... I think the benefit outways the high cost of building them.
I think if we use them as a crutch to wean ourselves from gas we can feasibly switch to full renewables by the 2040s with better battery technology (and fingers crossed fusion if ITER is succesful)
But I definitely believe EVERY non-fossil fuel energy source needs massively more investment than its getting.

[iwiffitthitotonacc]

Nobody ever mentions the Onagawa Nuclear Power Plant when mentioning Fukushima.
It was closer to the earthquake and tsunami and the reactor was completely fine, whereas the Fukushima management cut corners.
Failure to mention Onagawa is a surefire way to spot anti-nuclear bias or just shoddy reporting.

[rikstan]

I really like that you guys actually do your notes and references in the video, nobody else I watch does that and they really should

[nutyyyy]

Nuclear and Renewables are the way to go, you dont need to pick just one.

[liamhalliday]

So this is mostly fine, but a couple of points:

1) When talking about energy transfer, your arrows point to N. Ireland. I confess I'm a bit behind on your Brexit videos, but they seemed a little high for Ireland.
2) When talking about nuclear disasters, Three Mile Island is usually considered. Admittedly the outcome was significantly less than the other 2, but it was a disaster all the same.
3) You talk about the deaths and victims from nuclear disasters, but offer no comparison against fossil fuels. For example, 500K - 1m die from coal alone, every year, as well as the many millions who are victims to unclear air. If you look at deaths per TWh between power generation methods (full cycle, disasters and pollutants), nuclear is tiny, with gas the next safest method at x40, and coal more than x450(!). We should really be comparing these if we're going to critique safety / risk of nuclear power.
4) You talk about the life cycle cost which is good, and highlight the geopolitical risk for relying on uranium production, but fail to discuss the damage and risk from solar, which relies on rare Earth metals that often have near monopolies controlled by China. At least with uranium, a 1/3 is in Australia and Canada a further 10%, countries which lessen any geopolitical risk. There is way more spread across multiple ideologies axis, making a uranium version of OPEC less likely.

[hobog]

More nuclear power with up to date, standardized tech, yes please

[acadoe]

Nuclear is like that annoying childhood friend that you tried to leave behind as you got older, but you keep noticing that they have always been there for you and are actually becoming less annoying. In fact, they are the best friend you`ve ever had.

[gadgetpotato]

Just use Thorium, it’s easy to stop a meltdown reducing security risk. it’s also more energy rich, abundant and is extremely difficult to be weaponised. Did I mention it also has an abysmal nuclear waste output?

[MKcz]

in near future we might use traveling wave breeding reactors that actually run on so-called burned nuclear fuel so the residual waste would be dramatically lower in volume and severity

[MyCrafcik]

9:50 And yet it still way lower than the amount of people who will die because of us burning coal and gas ;p

[MattJones-kiwh]

With leaving the EU, we lose the free energy trade that was highlighted in this video. The UK therefore needs a quick, efficient way of generating power as come January, we will not be producing sough electricity to meet demand. Nuclear is cheap and has a stable production rate, if Thorium power stations are used, it is safe and without waste also. In addition to this, more reliable renewable sources should be built, I'm thinking the severn barrage as the UK has one of the largest tidal flows in the world and this could reliably power about a third of the country from one plant.

[Accessless]

Are we on the verge or an energy shortage crisis? - Yes
Can we build more fossil fueled power plants? - No
Can it be resolved with renewable energies? - No
Should we build nuclear power plants?
- What do you think Sherlock?

[InderjeetSingh-imeh]

There are designs available that address many of the issues that people have with nuclear. Designs that prevent a Chernobyl or Fukishima type event. Some of those designs also can be used to draw CO2 from the atmosphere or from the sea. You can also use the designs for desalination AND Hydrogen production or for creating carbon neutral fuels for the aviation industry. They also cannot be used for being a material souce for terrorism due to how the nuclear fuel is diluted in the core. Additionally these designs can also address the waste issue by consuming the existing waste and reducing the amount AND time needed to bring it down to natural uranium sources. Some of the Thorium based designs can also allow countries to gain some resouce independance for rare-earth elements as some of those are found with Thorium, so you can reduce the cost of mining these elements. Liquid designs can also allow you to extract medical grade isotopes for cancer treatments and for RTGs, RTGs are needed for space missions that are too distant from the sun for solar panels to be effective.

[eddualmeida]

The world should use ALL OF IT! Since power generation accounts for 70% of all CO2 emissions.
And preferably with MSR reactors that are safer and produce only 10% of the waste of old reactors.

[karinmagnificent]

Please lower the volume of the background music in the last minutes or use a less intrusive track. Thank you.

[badboy]

Nuclear, plus renewables, with Hydro storage to help cope with surges in demand. Could also manage demand to some extent. Remember that a 'cost' to the buyer is 'wages' to the builders, which ploughs back into the economy. It's a question of how we as a country wish to allocate our resources and how we are going to look after our environment. I think we should build and maintain a national pool of excellence and expertise in order to reduce the risks. The risk of a disaster is always there so we need good technical and political competence over the very long term. Funny though, people like me won't be around when all this comes on stream, and the people making the key decisions don't have the experience and wisdom to make them. And are the 'general public' voters sufficiently educated and informed to make the political choices? Are they/we simply being manipulated? We need proper adult non-tribal conversations. The human condition Still I think TLDR are doing their bit quite well

[Bitrey]

The background music is so awful, it's like a 6 second loop

[Mitjitsu]

12:10 - Damn, and I remember when a nuclear power plant only cost $5000 to build



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