Reply #42: Here's where you're wrong [View All]

[bananas]

In post #21, you wrote:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=242402&mesg_id=242509

A pebble-bed reactor thus can have all of its supporting machinery fail, and the reactor will not crack, melt, explode or spew hazardous wastes. It simply goes up to a designed "idle" temperature, and stays there. In that state, the reactor vessel radiates heat, but the vessel and fuel spheres remain intact and undamaged.

That's wrong. When South Africa realized the PBMR could melt down, they decided to defund it, because adding a containment dome would make it too expensive for generating electricity. They tried to save it by redesigning it for process heat, to melt oil out of tar sands and shale rock, but there wasn't enough interest in that.

This wasn't basic research, it was an attempt to build a commercial prototype. Once they knew the final product would be too expensive, they cancelled the project. It's not "anti-science" or "anti-research" to cancel development of a useless product. As the 2003 MIT report said, the "Future of Nuclear Power" for the next 40 years will be old-fashioned LWR's using a once-through fuel cycle.

You probably got some other things wrong, but I'm not going to waste my time reading the rest of your post.
There is a massive PR campaign by the nuclear industry, and a lot of people are falling for it.
You fell for it, your post #21 is based on junk science.