03-15-2011, 12:43 AM
(03-11-2011, 10:33 PM)Cracker Wrote: All nuclear plants are an earthquake away from failure.
Most plants have a life expectancy of 30 years (40 at the outside) before they become too degraded to be safe. America has around a hundred nuclear power plants, most of them built in the late 60's or early 70's. You do the math.
LOL. All power plants have low life expectancy, even hydrocarbon plants. Do you know a coal power station is only rated to last 50 years?
HOWEVER
You can increase life expectancy infinitely by replacing parts. It's generally accepted to be cheaper than building a new plant.
Fission research has come on in leaps and bounds. All those valves you see now are being phased out. The reason we're dismantling nuke stations is because we can now build them to be more efficient.
Fuck yeah, technology.
(03-12-2011, 05:06 AM)Lady Cop Wrote: i know. i live not too far from one. a number of my friends when i lived up here years ago were nuke plant operators, and their favorite expression was "we're all going to china".
and since my Dad designed some of our earliest reactor vessels for land and for nuke subs (the metals and their fracture properties) i am well aware of what can go wrong. it's some scary shit. i think the locals in the area just live with it and try not to think about it, since it's been there so long.
Silly opinion is silly.
Fission is controlled chaos. Neutrons hit Uranium and cause a thermodynamic reaction. It's controlled by (aptly named) control rods made of 'nuclear poison' this basically absorbs neutrons and muons so you can control how many reactions take place.
Operating at full whack (dumbass idea) will not cause fracture. It will eventually transmute the lead into gold (an alchemists dream.Citation: http://chemistry.about.com/cs/generalche...50601a.htm)
which while being a softer metal is better at conducting electricity and therefore increases the efficiency of your reactor. (critical mass is achieved)
Fission CAN be stopped. The only thing left over is heat, which can be dealt with using large quantities of water or air.
Panic, yes.
Disaster? Nope.