Hi Everybody!!

A few months ago we had this rather interesting assignment while touching on Nuclear Physics (its first year physics so we didn't cover much more than the basics). The results of the assignment were very interesting though and I thought I'd pose it to the message board and see what the responses would be.

Do you support the building of more nuclear power plants in South Africa (Yes/No).

Please give a reason/reasons with your answer. It can be one line, a paragraph, whatever you feel comfortable with.

This should probably be a poll, but I'm more interested in your comments than the actual results...

Just to break the ice I'll go first...

Yes (I support the building of more nuclear power plants).

Reason: Its the cheapest and most efficient form of energy currently available.

Woohhh!! this is a tuff one!

My answer is; Yes

But its a very borderline one and its difficult to either say yes or no.

We all know that Nuclear is never going to be any good for the environment simply because we have no way to dump the left over waste and we have to mind that waste for the next 1000 years until it decays. The other problem is that we are human and by our very nature, we make mistakes. We have seen the result in Chernobyl and the consequences speak for themselves.

But SA is a growing industrial nation and i am very much in favor of development. The most powerful industrial nations in the world like USA, GB, Germany, Japan, etc, are all facing the fact that we are very hungry for power and the only way to meet the need is currently through Nuclear power. So yes, if SA is to keep up with the rest of the world, i feel Nuclear power is a necessary evil.

S.A. BOINC wrote:... we have to mind that waste for the next 1000 years until it decays.

Yeah, that is my biggest problem with nuclear energy... the legacy of waste it leaves behind.

stackoverflow wrote:

S.A. BOINC wrote:... we have to mind that waste for the next 1000 years until it decays.

Yeah, that is my biggest problem with nuclear energy... the legacy of waste it leaves behind.

Yep, and no matter what technology mankind developes, you still cannot make Nuclear waste decay any faster. The half life of radio active material is a universal constant.

I think we will still be battling with this ethical problem for centuries to come.

Update on the Nuclear Waste problem...

There's an article in the journal "The Physics Teacher", Volume 35, February 1997, titled "Will New Technology Solve the Nuclear Waste Problem?". The article was written by Ludwik Kowalski who at the time was at Montclair State University.

Normally you have to buy the journals to read the articles but if you have access to a university library I recommend you go looking for this one. It mentions approaches which could be used to reduce the amount of time taken for radioactive waste to completely decay. At time the article was written many of the approaches were still being investigated, and judging by the sparse information retrieved when doing an internet search on the content, we still have a long way to go.

If nothing else it gives hope that future generations may not have to deal with our waste long after power generation through nuclear fission has stopped.

Maybe they should send the nuclear waste into outer space. I imagine that's quite an expensive option, but one which will be unlikely to come back and haunt us.

In general, as long as adequate maintenance programmes are followed, I'm in favour of nuclear power. It could also be combined at the coast with water desalination plants, which would be useful in a dry country like South Africa.

I'm pleased to see that Eskom is finally looking at wind power generation. I believe Germany produces something like 21% of it's electricity from wind and there's no reason why we could not have a similar proportion. In addition, with all the sunshine we get, surely solar power should be better utilised.

The dependance on coal, with a small fraction of nuclear and even smaller amount of hydroelectric power, is just not sustainable.

I'm sure you're not the first person to suggest that - transporting the waste to space I mean. I agree it would be expensive but far cheaper than having to keep the waste in a geologically stable environment on Earth for the next 50 000 years.

But there is one tiny problem with that. It would be extremely dangerous. If the vehicle carrying the waste into space were to have an accident of some sort we could have a major disaster on our hands. Still space travel is relatively safe and an accident like that isn't likely (i think) but I don't think everyone will see it that way.

The first commercial wind farm in SA. Its a good start.

While researching renewable energy I found this on Iceland phasing out fossil fuels. Is this incredible or what?! I hope we as a country can also get there in a couple of decades.

Looks like it could go either way at this point. I do wonder though on what grounds people wish for Nuclear Energy to be regarded as renewable...

If they go through with the proposed increases of 45% per annum for the next 3 years, nuclear power will be quite attractively priced!

Agreed but I think that the nuclear option will be strongly opposed.

Even though things don't look that good for us right now, I still do hope that a slighter cheaper alternative to their proposed price hike will be approved.


By the way, I would have posted sooner but I've been having issues logging in lately. Might be my browser settings... or something else.

stackoverflow wrote:By the way, I would have posted sooner but I've been having issues logging in lately. Might be my browser settings... or something else.

The phpBB people decided to make a wholesale change to the forums (of which ours is one). Our forum looked a bit sick for a few days and I also experienced great difficulty logging in and trying to sort things out. SA BOINC (John) had to come to our assistance.

Hopefully things will settle down now, although it's painfully quiet!

Warped wrote:The phpBB people decided to make a wholesale change to the forums (of which ours is one). Our forum looked a bit sick for a few days and I also experienced great difficulty logging in and trying to sort things out. SA BOINC (John) had to come to our assistance.

Hopefully things will settle down now, although it's painfully quiet!

I'm sure things will pick up soon enough.