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[Buzzman]

Yes, nuclear has a bad name and yes most of it is overblown, but the effects on the environment shouldn't be diminished. I mean, Fukushima and Chernobyl are basically a nuclear wasteland for hundreds of years to come.

Dude what

A wasteland visited by tens of thousands of tourists every year without any danger and slowly being repopulated, and not to mention becoming a wildlife reserve.

was the world’s worst nuclear accident less damaging to natural ecosystems than humans?

Of course there are drawbacks with nuclear power and accidents can irradiate large areas, but this amount of scaremongering is really overblown. Nagasaki and Hiroshima were already being rebuilt in 1946.

And the question has to be asked, are we willing to trade the risk of these accidents versus the definite death of a million people (and rising) every year?

 

[andthebeatgoeson]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but a good portion of the Earth's core contains radioactive material, right? Perhaps we can find a way to store far into the Earth (away from causing contamination and such)

Like fracking? What could go wrong? Small radioactive earthquakes?

 

[zoukka]

Just to help visualize it:

Study on Air Pollution

WHO on Chernobyl

Disclaimer: I'm being generous and counting cancer cases as deaths.
You could multiply nuclear deaths by several orders of magnitude and you'd still not even come close to the numbers put up by coal.

So does this graph take in account the amount of facilities and people working in each field?

 

[clarknova156]

When do you think radioactive space dumping or send to a collision course to the sun or out of our solar system will be a thing? Until they figure out how to truly nuatralise radiation (might be a double edge sword in disguise) i can see looking at space as the next best thing providing they can avoid the garbage going into orbit (which would be another disaster if that happen).

When space flight is down to $1 a pound. So not for a long time that'll make any difference. Right now it's about $10,000 a pound.

 

[Trojan X]

When space flight is down to $1 a pound. So not for a long time that'll make any difference. Right now it's about $10,000 a pound.

My gosh. Looks like until our society turn into star trek's system we would take eons to progress.

 

[Frankfurter]

Dude what

A wasteland visited by tens of thousands of tourists every year without any danger and slowly being repopulated, and not to mention becoming a wildlife reserve.

was the world’s worst nuclear accident less damaging to natural ecosystems than humans?

Of course there are drawbacks with nuclear power and accidents can irradiate large areas, but this amount of scaremongering is really overblown. Nagasaki and Hiroshima were already being rebuilt in 1946.

And the question has to be asked, are we willing to trade the risk of these accidents versus the definite death of a million people (and rising) every year?

No to both of course. Coal and nuclear are both terrible options. That's why more (much much more) investment in renewables is needed.

 

[lastflowers]

There are also more deaths in solar production per peta-watt hour than there are by nuclear(It's still a fraction of coal, though). Nuclear is literally the safest energy source.

Yes, nuclear has a bad name and yes most of it is overblown, but the effects on the environment shouldn't be diminished. I mean, Fukushima and Chernobyl are basically a nuclear wasteland for hundreds of years to come.

While you are correct, I'd caution the reader that oftentimes dangerous situations arise because lack of continual investment and upkeep costs, not due to the technology.

In a weird sort of way, Nuclear is one of the better energy sources we have primarily because its so dangerous. We place more care in its regulation than to long-term effects from poor extraction or inefficient burning of other fuels.

 

[Fuchsdh]

Just to help visualize it:

Study on Air Pollution

WHO on Chernobyl

A 2010 government report pegged total deaths attributable to coal in the U.S. to around 13,000 per year (that's before new coal emissions rules came into effect which were designed to dramatically lower that number, although with Trump in office I think it's safe to say those are irrelevant now.) That's .04% of the population. In China, their death total is .02%. So clearly at least half of those deaths could be prevented now with what are basic pollution controls for the western world. Four times more people in the U.S. kill themselves than coal does.

Dude what

A wasteland visited by tens of thousands of tourists every year without any danger and slowly being repopulated, and not to mention becoming a wildlife reserve.

was the world's worst nuclear accident less damaging to natural ecosystems than humans?

Of course there are drawbacks with nuclear power and accidents can irradiate large areas, but this amount of scaremongering is really overblown. Nagasaki and Hiroshima were already being rebuilt in 1946.

And the question has to be asked, are we willing to trade the risk of these accidents versus the definite death of a million people (and rising) every year?

We can transition to renewables. Framing the question as choosing between nuclear or coal is disingenuous. There is no "perfect" power source—renewables can have outages, solar can cook birds, dams interfere with fish spawning. But there are plenty of options besides "oh hey let's be fine creating tons of radioactive waste we can't do anything about."

 

[A Fish Aficionado]

Yes, nuclear has a bad name and yes most of it is overblown, but the effects on the environment shouldn't be diminished. I mean, Fukushima and Chernobyl are basically a nuclear wasteland for hundreds of years to come.

Chernobyl is far from a nuclear wasteland.
Animals Rule Chernobyl 30 Years After Nuclear Disaster

 

[TheRedSnifit]

Just to help visualize it:

Study on Air Pollution

WHO on Chernobyl

Disclaimer: I'm being generous and counting cancer cases as deaths.
You could multiply nuclear deaths by several orders of magnitude and you'd still not even come close to the numbers put up by coal.

You mentioned it, but it needs to be reiterated that the deaths caused by Chernobyl there are more of a "worst case scenario" guesstimate of people who may or may not die earlier due to the accident in the decades to come.

Beyond that:

As of mid-2005, however, fewer than 50 deaths had been directly attributed to radiation from the disaster, almost all being highly exposed rescue workers, many who died within months of the accident but others who died as late as 2004.

. . .

About 4000 cases of thyroid cancer, mainly in children and adolescents at the time of the accident, have resulted from the accident’s contamination and at least nine children died of thyroid cancer; however the survival rate among such cancer victims, judging from experience in Belarus, has been almost 99%.

So basically, 50 people died. As opposed to hundreds of thousands of people dying each year thanks to fossil fuels, and us more or less permanently fucking up the planet and humanity's future due to continued fossil fuel use.

Oh, and this:

Alongside radiation-induced deaths and diseases, the report labels the mental health impact of Chernobyl as “the largest public health problem created by the accident” and partially attributes this damaging psychological impact to a lack of accurate information. These problems manifest as negative self-assessments of health, belief in a shortened life expectancy, lack of initiative, and dependency on assistance from the state.

Hmm.

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2005/pr38/en/

 

[Xe4]

Fusion can't get here soon enough , we can get safe energy which does not pollute or have a chance of meltdowns ... Fusion plus renewals should sort out energy in the long run.

You don't even need renewables when you have fusion power. You'll be able to power the entire world at a fraction of the cost it is today. That's why it's such a highly researched subject, its development will change our world forever.

No to both of course. Coal and nuclear are both terrible options. That's why more (much much more) investment in renewables is needed.

That doesn't change the fact that renwables that are able to supply our entire power generation needs aren't going to come for quite a while. We need to move away from coal and other greenhouse gasses right now. Even when renewables come, we need some more consistent power source, and it's either going to be nuclear or natural gas.

Anyhow, nuclear is a fine power source, the newest generation of reactors is great, they are far safer, and have way less waste. The problem is convincing people to build them so we can get rid of the older ones that are more likely to melt down.

 

[A Fish Aficionado]

Fusion power is only 10 years away...

 

[TheRedSnifit]

A 2010 government report pegged total deaths attributable to coal in the U.S. to around 13,000 per year (that's before new coal emissions rules came into effect which were designed to dramatically lower that number, although with Trump in office I think it's safe to say those are irrelevant now.) That's .04% of the population. In China, their death total is .02%. So clearly at least half of those deaths could be prevented now with what are basic pollution controls for the western world. Four times more people in the U.S. kill themselves than coal does.

Oh, thank god. We can reduce people killed by coal in a single country to only ~170,000 per year.

That practically qualifies us for sainthood.

 

[Culex]

People do not realize just how scary the situation is for this plant, and TEPCO wants to downplay it. They are perpetually running water through the reactors just to keep the rods cool.

 

[Frankfurter]

That doesn't change the fact that renwables that are able to supply our entire power generation needs aren't going to come for quite a while. We need to move away from coal and other greenhouse gasses right now. Even when renewables come, we need some more consistent power source, and it's either going to be nuclear or natural gas.

Anyhow, nuclear is a fine power source, the newest generation of reactors is great, they are far safer, and have way less waste. The problem is convincing people to build them so we can get rid of the older ones that are more likely to melt down.

That's not a fact, it's pure BS. Renewable energy is out there. It works perfectly fine. It can be produced in huge quantities. Plus keeping nuclear while "transitioning" to renewables actually makes the whole thing way more complicated. Nuclear is not able to complement renewables at all. You need sth. that can adapt, nuclear can't do that at all.

Just btw. I think nuclear is the worst power source we have at our hands right now. No matter how safe it is, it's just way too expensive.

 

[hydragonwarrior]

Like fracking? What could go wrong? Small radioactive earthquakes?

Lol I am talking about putting the radioactive material where other radioactive material in the Earth already is - I believe fracking doesn't go anywhere near the core.

Either way I don't think we have the tech to bore our way into there anyway - it looks like our only options are:

1. Store it away for a very long while, such as within a mountain, which I believe is what is currently done for most nuclear waste. For example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_repository

2. Send it into space, which I doubt will happen for a long time due to the potential hazards of doing so - some nice info here: http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/299608/is-it-possible-to-send-all-nuclear-waste-on-earth-to-the-sun

 

[JoeMartin]

People do not realize just how scary the situation is for this plant, and TEPCO wants to downplay it. They are perpetually running water through the reactors just to keep the rods cool.

Scary is just a word used to motivate people that don't understand it.

Is it dangerous? Yes. But if you do it right it poses an absolutely containable risk set.

Much like driving a car. Moving your body in a cage of several tons of steel hopelessly faster than evolution could have prepared it to go, several feet away from each other in opposite directions, is scary - but so long as you do it right no one gets hurt; the concept of a highway is objectively insane, and despite the fact that over three thousand people die per day in automobile accidents and ignoring that they contribute a full fifth of all carbon emissions globally, we've built society around it.

Fearing something because you don't understand it is no less insane, and the mentality that in the future we're going to create some form of extremely compact, efficient but inherently safe power source is also insane. Nuclear isn't the final answer, but it is a glimpse into the future that we're to live - we need to encourage society to embrace the idea that energy is inherently dangerous to humans, but with education, technical rigor, and experience, we can accomplish more - safely - and move society as a whole forward.

 

[Zantetsuken]

I was hoping this would be posted, and I'm glad it did.

 

[TyrantII]

Well someone needs to figure out how to contain the fusion. It's here and as been done. Just not sustained

Not true.

Issue right now is containment is too large and to expensive. ITER is a proof of concept semi-commercial design, but also proof of the old cost/size limitations.

But new superconductors and material science have recently had breakthrough miniaturizing the powerful magnetic fields needed. MIT is finding funding to build (I kid you not) their ARC/SPARC generation of reactors that are closer than ever to proving it's cost effective.

 

[Pomerlaw]

They need to come up with something that can stop radiation, somehow. There has to be a way to stop the process.

China has 21 more plants under construction, and already has over 30. There are more catastrophes like this one coming one way or another.

Wonder what is happening with those radioactivity-eating bacterias?

https://phys.org/news/2015-05-extremophile-bacteria-key-nuclear-problems.html

 

[Shouta]

Yes, nuclear has a bad name and yes most of it is overblown, but the effects on the environment shouldn't be diminished. I mean, Fukushima and Chernobyl are basically a nuclear wasteland for hundreds of years to come.

Highly, incorrect. See Buzzman's post about Chernobyl for one. Fukushima is the 3rd largest prefecture in Japan, that also incidentally looks like Australia, and only a small part of the land in the prefecture was contaminated at all. I've been back there for the last 3 years and there's no problem at all with the prefecture/state aside from just around the plant itself.

 

[DouglasteR]

Fusion power is only 10 years away...

For the last 50 years =/ !

 

[Buba Big Guns]

Yup, nuclear is actually extremely safe, and the best part is, it's the most regulated source of energy. There were deficiencies with Fukushima, but that was definitely more of a problem with Japan's mechanisms.

Compared to other sources, nuclear is definitely the cleanest and one of the safest, even compared to sources like solar. No emissions is hugggeee and goes a long way in preventing premature death.

 

[Eye for an Eye]

No to both of course. Coal and nuclear are both terrible options. That's why more (much much more) investment in renewables is needed.

We could never increase the the amount of renewable energy to compete with coal or nuclear. Nuclear is the only power option that could get rid of coal energy, but it's too stigmatized to be a world wide solution.

 

[pr0cs]

Until fusion is realized nuclear power is too dangerous and creates too much waste to be considered viable

 

[Eye for an Eye]

Lol I am talking about putting the radioactive material where other radioactive material in the Earth already is - I believe fracking doesn't go anywhere near the core.

Either way I don't think we have the tech to bore our way into there anyway - it looks like our only options are:

1. Store it away for a very long while, such as within a mountain, which I believe is what is currently done for most nuclear waste. For example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_repository

2. Send it into space, which I doubt will happen for a long time due to the potential hazards of doing so - some nice info here: http://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/299608/is-it-possible-to-send-all-nuclear-waste-on-earth-to-the-sun

Yucca mountain has never been used. Nuclear waste is still stored onsite. But the amount of nuclear waste in existance since the 50's and 60's is so miniscule compared to the daily waste of coal that is pumped into the atmosphere.

 

[Pomerlaw]

Until fusion is realized nuclear power is too dangerous and creates too much waste to be considered viable

1) Read the thread
2) You are wrong, deadly wrong.

 

[Frankfurter]

We could never increase the the amount of renewable energy to compete with coal or nuclear. Nuclear is the only power option that could get rid of coal energy, but it's too stigmatized to be a world wide solution.

Why not?

Edit: Several countries have done that already btw.

 

[Steel]

Why not?

Edit: Several countries have done that already btw.

If you're talking Germany, they still get most of their energy from coal. You can fudge the numbers by looking at how much of the grid renewables take up at peak hours, but then you realize the amount of time that that section of the grid is taken up by renewables is small each day. Nuclear also provides for more of the grid than solar and wind in germany despite the overwhelming push for renewables.

https://www.euronuclear.org/info/encyclopedia/p/pow-gen-ger.htm

This is true for most countries. Even countries that overwhelmingly push for solar and wind can't fuel the entire grid through it. That's getting more viable overtime, but we'd already be off coal if nuclear production never stopped.

 

[Lord Error]

Fusion power is only 10 years away...

I'm old enough to get that joke.

 

[Eye for an Eye]

Why not?

Edit: Several countries have done that already btw.

Because we don't have the space or the ability to store power for future use. Of all the renewable energy we do use, it's still a tiny percentage of the power we use. Not to mention, the elements used in creating these power sources are not unlimited and takes a lot of energy to do. Plus solar panels have a much shorter life span than nuclear.
http://m.resourceinvestor.com/2008/...-cells-i-silicon-very-abundant-very-expensive

We created the EBR-II. Ran for 30 plus years with no problems. It was shut down because of bureaucratic red tape rather than any failure with the system. Hell, it could be turned on again today.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_Breeder_Reactor_II

 

[Buzzman]

But nuclear power produces so much waste!
With coal you don't have that problem since any byproducts are just spewed directly into the atmosphere instead, much healthier.

 

[cilonen]

I do wonder how many other reactors that are at risk of flooding and / or earthquake have since been adjusted towards closure or upgrade towards self-containment, and how many risky older ones are still left. Globally, not just Japan.

I also hope they even have decades to finish the clean-up, considering global warming isn't going to wait for them to finish.

Hell, there are still RBMK reactors of the Chernobyl design operating today with very minor safety upgrades.

 

[Maedre]

Nuclear is just to expensive. You guys are always thinking from 12:00 to 12:01 and romanticise this whole topic. Without subsidies nuclear is one of the most expensive energy source per kWh. The plant itself and the waste disposal are the problem.
I can't see any fourth generation reactor at work that is able to reduce the waste.
China is working on 30 reactors (let's see how many will be completed ) because they don't care about the waste.

 

[curls]

We are so behind on nuclear power generation - we should have been using thorium based power decades ago, whilst developing future LENR and vacuum energy systems.

 

[Frankfurter]

Because we don't have the space or the ability to store power for future use. Of all the renewable energy we do use, it's still a tiny percentage of the power we use. Not to mention, the elements used in creating these power sources are not unlimited and takes a lot of energy to do. Plus solar panels have a much shorter life span than nuclear.
http://m.resourceinvestor.com/2008/...-cells-i-silicon-very-abundant-very-expensive

We created the EBR-II. Ran for 30 plus years with no problems. It was shut down because of bureaucratic red tape rather than any failure with the system. Hell, it could be turned on again today.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_Breeder_Reactor_II

The article you linked literally says ABUNDANT in the title. It may or may not be expensive, fact is that solar costs are falling and falling every year. Also PV cells have a life span of sth. like 30+ years with little to no maintenance. I'm totally confused how that could possibly count as a point against PV.

The storing thing is a problem that we won't face for atleast another 10 years. And there are concepts out there. Large scale batteries and power 2 gas for instance.

The fact that right now renewables are a relatively small part of all our power consumption isn't an argument at all against renewables being able to do that in the future.

If you're talking Germany, they still get most of their energy from coal. You can fudge the numbers by looking at how much of the grid renewables take up at peak hours, but then you realize the amount of time that that section of the grid is taken up by renewables is small each day. Nuclear also provides for more of the grid than solar and wind in germany despite the overwhelming push for renewables.

https://www.euronuclear.org/info/encyclopedia/p/pow-gen-ger.htm



This is true for most countries. Even countries that overwhelmingly push for solar and wind can't fuel the entire grid through it. That's getting more viable overtime, but we'd already be off coal if nuclear production never stopped.

Give it another ~10 years and that won't be the case anymore.

Just btw. it doesn't make much sense to use data for 2014 in a market that's growing as fast as the renewables. It's terribly outdatet within just a single year.

Concerning your point about being off coal if nuclear production never stopped: we'd also be out of money, so uh ^^

 

[Sir Abacus]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but a good portion of the Earth's core contains radioactive material, right? Perhaps we can find a way to store far into the Earth (away from causing contamination and such)

Disposing of waste in subduction zones is one of the possible ways that has been discussed to dispose of nuclear waste but is improbable because disposing of nuclear waste at sea is a huge no-no.

 

[Steel]

Give it another ~10 years and that won't be the case anymore.

Just btw. it doesn't make much sense to use data for 2014 in a market that's growing as fast as the renewables. It's terribly outdatet within just a single year.

Concerning your point about being off coal if nuclear production never stopped: we'd also be out of money, so uh ^^

Yes, solar power is growing so fast that 2014 is irrelevant. right. Here's 2016's numbers:
https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/germanys-energy-consumption-and-power-mix-charts

Oh, wait, solar energy is at 5.9%, a .2% increase over two years. What a huge difference. Solar is definitely growing fast.

And, to your point about being out of money, France is doing alright compared to other european countries.

 

[pr0cs]

1) Read the thread
2) You are wrong, deadly wrong.

Nope, any energy source that forces people to move and makes their home uninhabitable is not a solution.
Nuclear power, in its current form is too risky

 

[SpecX]

Is that what that movie is about? Never bothered to watch it.

 

[Frankfurter]

Yes, solar power is growing so fast that 2014 is irrelevant. right. Here's 2016's numbers:
https://www.cleanenergywire.org/factsheets/germanys-energy-consumption-and-power-mix-charts


Oh, wait, solar energy is at 5.9%, a .2% increase over two years. What a huge difference. Solar is definitely growing fast.

And, to your point about being out of money, France is doing alright compared to other european countries.

I said outdated, not irrelevant. It would help of course if you wouldn't cherry pick. A growth from 160 TWh to ~190 TWh in 2 years (if those 2016 numbers are true after all, there are no official numbers out yet) from all renewables is an increase in production of almost 20%!

France is doing alright isn't an argument. Nuclear is expensive, no matter how you spin it. Hinkley Point in Britain for example is only being built because, after all is said and done, the tax payer will pay for it. EDF got a fixed price (+ increases accounting for inflation) which is way over current market prices. This thing would be dead in an instant if the rules of the free market were to be applied.

 

[TheOMan]

There was a guy in the original thread for when this first happened...FlashFlooder I think - who seemed pretty knowledgeable on this. Is this in line with what he was saying would happen? I can't recall the details.

 

[Steel]

I said outdated, not irrelevant. It would help of course if you wouldn't cherry pick. A growth from 160 TWh to ~190 TWh in 2 years (if those 2016 numbers are true after all, there are no official numbers out yet) from all renewables is an increase in production of almost 20%!

France is doing alright isn't an argument. Nuclear is expensive, no matter how you spin it. Hinkley Point in Britain for example is only being built because, after all is said and done, the tax payer will pay for it. EDF got a fixed price (+ increases accounting for inflation) which is way over current market prices. This thing would be dead in an instant if the rules of the free market were to be applied.

If you're counting growth in TWH then you're already looking at it wrong. Solar is being heavily subsidized and pushed by the government in germany and it is barely outpacing the growth in coal generation and barely keeping up with the growth of the needs of the grid. That's no way to replace coal.

And it's precisely the fact that solar is heavily subsidized that you bringing up the point about free markets is hilarious. We could've paid billions decades ago to not have to deal with global warming now. We can pay billions today to not have to deal with global warming by coal in 20 years. The rate of solar's growth with the money we're putting in is pathetic given the situation.

Not to mention that the longer we're on coal the more mountaintops are destroyed, the more land is stripe mined, the more environmental devastion occurs, the more people die. In comparison, a very small amount of land in fukushima is uninhabitable because of a tsunami that killed 15k people and, on top of that, there were shitloads of mistakes made on site that in their absence would not have resulted in a reactor failure.

 

[RipperGrim]

It's literally the most insane thing I have heard about. I watched a vice special on it and I couldn't believe the amount of short sightedness.

 

[Buba Big Guns]

It's already been said, but Germany purchases a lot of energy from Poland (fossil fuel) and France (nuclear). 100% renewable is not a viable solution at this point, especially if we are to tackle GHG and dangerous emissions. It is a great way to augment the energy mix and microgrid is definitely a really good trend for the future.

Also in terms of electricity cost (Canadian study from a report I received a week ago):

1) All electricity from nuclear: average monthly bill decrease of $20, and a decrease of 25 tons of CO2e per year

2) All nuclear replaced with gas: monthly increase of $60, and yearly increase of 270 tons of CO2e

3) Nuclear replaced with equal parts solar, wind, hydro, and gas: monthly increase of $120, CO2e increase of 80 tons per year

 

[PdotMichael]

It's already been said, but Germany purchases a lot of energy from Poland (fossil fuel) and France (nuclear). 100% renewable is not a viable solution at this point, especially if we are to tackle GHG and dangerous emissions. It is a great way to augment the energy mix and microgrid is definitely a really good trend for the future.

Also in terms of electricity cost (Canadian study from a report I received a week ago):

1) All electricity from nuclear: average monthly bill decrease of $20, and a decrease of 25 tons of CO2e per year

2) All nuclear replaced with gas: monthly increase of $60, and yearly increase of 270 tons of CO2e

3) Nuclear replaced with equal parts solar, wind, hydro, and gas: monthly increase of $120, CO2e increase of 80 tons per year

You have no idea how the European energy market works. Of course Germany buys energy from other states, it also sells energy to other states at the same time.

Fact is that Germany never exported more energy than today.

 

[A Fish Aficionado]

Brave New Climate has a multi-part post on sustainable energy and nuclear power.

Sustaining the Wind Part 1 – Is So Called ”Renewable Energy" the Same as ”Sustainable Energy?"

Sustaining the Wind Part 2 – Indium and Beyond...

Sustaining the Wind Part 3 – Is Uranium Exhaustible?

 

[Snaku]

At least this shit fuck nightmare gave us Shin Godzilla. :/

 

[Frankfurter]

If you're counting growth in TWH then you're already looking at it wrong. Solar is being heavily subsidized and pushed by the government in germany and it is barely outpacing the growth in coal generation and barely keeping up with the growth of the needs of the grid. That's no way to replace coal.

First, the "growth of the needs of the grid" is approx. zero since 2006. Source: http://www.ag-energiebilanzen.de/in...Name=20161216_brd_stromerzeugung1990-2016.pdf (this is using official data provided by the German Statistisches Bundesamt)
Look at "Bruttoerzeugung insgesamt", which translates into total power generation. It's pretty much unchanged since 2006. The slight growth in 2015 and 2016 (preliminary for the latter) are due to higher exports.
For actual domestic consumption, check "Brutto-Inlandsstromverbrauch", which peaked in 2007.

Second, "barely outpacing the growth in coal generation". That's just total nonsense. PV has grown more than threefold just since 2011 for example. Coal and lignite on the other hand have seen a temporary growth, which is already gone again. They are back to ~260 TWh combined, which is the lowest since 2009 (check my previously posted source for "Braunkohle" and "Steinkohle"). There is no such thing as a "growth in coal generation" to begin with. It's the complete opposite!

I don't quite get what you are trying to say with the thing about TWh/growth being wrong.

And it's precisely the fact that solar is heavily subsidized that you bringing up the point about free markets is hilarious. We could've paid billions decades ago to not have to deal with global warming now. We can pay billions today to not have to deal with global warming by coal in 20 years. The rate of solar's growth with the money we're putting in is pathetic given the situation.

Solar is still a relatively new technology and obviously it needed to be kickstarted by subsidies. Nuclear on the other hand is not. It has received enough funding in the past. At some point a technology has to able to work by itself. Nuclear can't.

Not to mention that the longer we're on coal the more mountaintops are destroyed, the more land is stripe mined, the more environmental devastion occurs, the more people die. In comparison, a very small amount of land in fukushima is uninhabitable because of a tsunami that killed 15k people and, on top of that, there were shitloads of mistakes made on site that in their absence would not have resulted in a reactor failure.

I'm not here to argue that coal is a great choice as an energy source. It isn't. Nuclear isn't either, though.

 

[4Tran]

I've got to agree with the nuclear enthusiasts in this thread. Nuclear power is one of the cleaner energy sources that's available right now, and it can provide enough power generation to replace more polluting sources. Modern reactors are a lot cleaner, safer, and more efficient than the ones built decades ago so there's a lot less reason to be concerned about their construction and safety than the ones that are 50 years old.

The main issues with nuclear power nowadays are political unpopularity, the initial investment costs, and that the plants take a pretty long time to get built. Nuclear waste is also an issue, but it's probably more of a political issue than it is a technical one. What all this means is that it takes quite a bit of political capital to adopt nuclear power en masse so it's unlikely to happen in most Western countries despite the utilitarian benefits.