Really odd - in many countries people went into the streets to demonstrate against nuclear power plants.

In Germany for example. around 1 million people were joining the demonstrations against nuclear power plants and demanding them to be switched off.

Also lots of people in Spain demonstrated against nuclear power plants in the majority of cities.

In Italy, thousands of people also joined the demonstrations.

In France - the country with most nuclear power plants - people gathered around the Eiffel Tower to do the same (only 300 though).

In the UK people demonstrated as well - however against tax cuts. Currently Tories in the UK do not want to switch of nuclear power plants - in fact they are even planning to build new ones - now in 2011.



What do you think? Do we need nuclear power plants?

In my humnble opinion I think it would be wiser to use 25% less electricity and do without nuclear power plants and all the toxic waste you need to lock away for thousands of years.

Of course, the danger is a lot bigger in areas with earthquakes such as Japan - however human errors are the biggest danger. The probability of a plane hitting a nuclear power plant is small - however I don't think it is necessary to take such a big risk with there is plenty of other solutions to generate electricity - especially as there is a lot of room for saving electricity that is just wasted.

The UK will certainly not produce electricity for developing countries. So you can not argue with that.

Currently electricity from nuclear plants is only 20% in the UK - and 20% is something that could even be saved by wasting less electricity especially in the public sector and in public buildings and by replacing some old machines in factories.

- overall population in Europe is decreasing, not increasing (in the UK it is more or less stable)

- around 50% (?) of the electricity is lost during transportation -> so small plants (e.g. water energy, wind energy, solar panels) would also help to avoid transporting electricity over long distances

- Norway has more electriciy that it can consume due to the many waterfalls - so the UK could also buy environmentally friendly and zero carbon electricity from Norway which would also totally covery the 20% from nuclear plants

Personally I don't see why the money being invested in new nuclear power plants could not be invested instead into renewable energy. Especially hydro electricity, we have plenty of rivers and lakes in this country to make that work, not to mention many hundreds of miles of coast for wind farms.

Perhaps seeing the disaster in Japan recently has made people more aware of just how vulnerable we all are to nuclear contamination in the case of accidents and wars. A nuclear power station is a sitting duck for any country wanting to create as much impact as possible in a bombing raid against another country.

Data based on Belarus national cancer statistics, predicts approximately 270,000 cancers and 93,000 fatal cancer cases caused by Chernobyl alone. The fact the Russia has never disclosed the cancer statistics of other Soviet era disasters: such as the Muyrak reactor explosion which exposed 124,000 people to medium and high levels of radiation, or the Chelyabinsk nuclear waste disaster - surely, I would think, accounts for accidents involving wind farm construction?
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"The tighter you grasp Lord Vader, the more it will slip through your fingers."

I want to see more reactors in the end run its not a power source were going to run out of and is much more enviromentially friendly that any of the alternatives.

Yes that includes wind power and wave power and all the so called green renewables because you burn more coal and produce more greenhouse gasses producing the things than they save in thier lifetime.

Once you had a reactor in place it can run nigh on forever producing energy so its only one cost, fine you have a big of radiation but you can bury that and you get little waste in comparision to everything else

Nice controversial topic I like it

There's my idea...
The average unused area inside the average motorway roundabout is approx. 2 acres. I'd have all those dish-shaped and fitted with solar panels.
Say I did about 300 roundabouts = 600 acres of panels.
Any motorway side panels and central reservation areas that get light most of the day, I'd have fitted with solar panels.
Say I did the same amount as above, but it could be more I suspect.
So, 1200 acres of solar panels, so far...
Then I'm going to panel all the railways and the canals and some of the remoter beach or cliff areas and say I get twice the above = 2400 acres.
With the 1200 I already have, I'd have 3600 acres in total.
Now, here's what I don't know...
How much electricity am I generating, with all this?
(When the sun shines!)
How much approx. of the current UK usage would it make up?
(Yesterday we used just under 30Gigawatt.)
How much would it cost me to do it?
When would I start making my millions?
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Give me golf clubs, fresh air and a beautiful partner, and you can keep the clubs and the fresh air.
(Jack Benny)