Talk:Nuclear power/Archive 1

message: "emissions problems of fossil fuels" removed because it doesnt belong in a nuclear power article.
:I re-added refrence to emissions based pollution as an advantage without refrencing fossil fules. I also removed the word 'directly' in refrence to not contributing to the greenhouse effect since I could not think of anythign less than a 3rd or 4th order effect that would be inherint to any use of electricity. Dalf | Talk 05:05, 8 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Emissions problems of fossil fuels 

message: http://www.oprit.rug.nl/deenen/
http://www.afeas.org/greenhouse_gases.html
http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:gVNRnsSRKK8J:www.nuclearpolicy.org/NewsArticle.cfm%3FNewsID%3D2268+%22Nicholas+Kristof%27s+article+%22Nukes+are+Green%22+is+incorrect%22&hl=en
Various sources associated with info on the following link
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12835747^12332,00.html
nuclear power produces only three times fewer greenhouse gases than modern natural-gas power stations.
:-In the US, where much of the world's uranium is enriched, including Australia's, the enrichment facility at Paducah, Kentucky, requires the electrical output of two 1000-megawatt coal-fired plants, which emit large quantities of carbon dioxide, the gas responsible for 50per cent of global warming.
:You could use the same argument for solar enenrgy not being green energy: to make those solar panels from plastic and silicone required energy from some possibly coal power plant as well as water, and other resources. But this is going into a gray area. I think if we start counting all indirect relations the list could go on and on infinitely. --Berkut 06:55, 8 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Yea, the argumet that Nuclear power uses fossil power by proxy is a bit weak.  If the power stations that powered the mines were Nuclear as well for example.  Also the electricity created by the plant could be used to produce greenhouse gasses.  However, neither of these thigns are intrensic to Nuclear power.  That is they are not necessarry for it to work, and ideal could be eliminated.  Dalf | Talk 07:33, 8 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Nuclear power greenhouse emissions 

message: I'm going to be bold and revert this back to the May 4th version. All of the recent additions have messed up the introduction quite badly, and belong in the 'Benefits and Disadvantages' section. At the moment it's reading like 'Nuclear power is bad, mmkay?' which isn't what a NPOV encyclopedia should be aiming for. Djbrianuk 00:26, 9 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reverting 

message: I just reverted the last edit by 203.51.156.215 to the last version by the same user.  I think including those sentances in the introduction give a decent overview of the article.  Additionally I think having a single sentence composed of a single clause followed by the TOC looks really bad.  If anyone feels strongly that the sentences in the introduction do not belong there then go ahead and move them but perhaps we can replace them with something that you feel is more approprate, instaed of just leaving it mostly blank? Dalf | Talk 00:47, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I am still not happy with the opening paragraph.  Looking around wikipedia (and reference sources in general) this sort of meta comment is not a proper introduction.  The only articles that begin with meta comments are disambiguation pages and Lists and such.  The opening paragraph should actually have content in it.  When I look up a term on wikipedia I will frequently read the first paragraph only, this is usually enough for me to understand what the article says even if I do not get the details.  I liked how it was since it did just that.  It covered highlights of the article without going into details.  Am I wrong in my thinking that the paragraph above the TOC should be an abstract of the article?  I wont revert it again in any event unless people agree with me.Dalf | Talk 02:41, 10 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually strike that, Its probbly fine. Dalf | Talk 04:24, 10 May 2005 (UTC)

text: I reverted, it was not intro appropriate, used unnecessarily flowery language and lessened the presentation of facts.  History belongs in the history section. zen master    T  06:32, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

text: I think labeling it "proponents this" is exactly the way of phrasing the issue, redundancy is necessary to avoid ambiguity over what is fact and what is disputed.  At best nuclear proponents claim it to be true (previously it was being presented subtly as fact).  I agree with you above that "proven technology" is a marketing speak misstatement since all new reactor designs have no track record.  zen master    T  06:49, 19 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Introduction paragraph 

message: Some observations about article:
Viewpoints
I quickly counted the occurences of pro and con opinions as prefixed:
11 instances Proponents Argue, Also Claim, Maintain, Argue, They Argue, Also claim, contend, contend, point out, point out, point out
3 instances Critics assert, point out, Opponents claim
Yes this is clearly unbalanced but thats not the point.
This article should be about facts rather than stakeholders opinion for or against.
Maybe we could create a new article titled 'Nuclear Power Proponents and Opponents Points of View'. This would make it clear to contributors that the focus of that article was about peoples opinions rather than the topic itself and then people could knock themselves out in that virtual space in an opininated ideological  edit war free from the constraints of reason and scientific concensus.
This trojan practice of dressing up ones opinions in the guise of 'proponents / opponents argue, claim, assert etc' is doubly damaging to the quality of the article because it changes the focus of the article away from fact to opinion and because it allows the creation of a special class of text that is less subject to challenge; one cannot argue that someones opinion is not theirs. If however their opinion is rephrased as a fact by the removal of 'proponents / opponents argue, claim, assert etc' then it becomes open to challenge.
Also both 'sides' could improve the depth and quality of the article by taking a neutral approach and by contributing rather than deleting other peoples work without notification, explanation, debate or concensus.--Theo Pardilla 13:48, 13 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: But, you also added such things as civilized countries (apparently meaning the west) and characterized India and China as having violent intolerance for popular participation in civil discourse which is I suppose moderately supportable in the case of China but India?  You also POVized most of the paragraphs and changed so many instances of Nuclear Power Plant to include the adjective Experimental that one might think that there were only experimental ones.  I tried going through and re-wording for NPOVness but found that the article was going to be a mess that way, so I reverted your changes. If you feel strongly about any of them hopefully we can work them out on this talk page.  Mostly I am worried about the article drawing rather categorical conclusions about the economics and safety of Nuclear Power out of hand as if it was not something people disagree on. Dalf | Talk 06:00, 19 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually the pebble bed reactors have something of a history (one was operated in Germany for long enough to be decommissioned).  South Africa which in terms of energy economics could be called developing is doing some of the most research and new developments in this area and is hardly authoritarian.  As far as I know the Indian government does not operate on a caste system (though I could be wrong), and I have not heard of any references to the caste system in India being used to suppress opposition to nuclear power. Dalf | Talk 07:15, 19 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Some observations about article 

message: My contribution in the 'Risks' section, where I highlighted the confirmed risk of Leukemia by living near to a nuclear power station (see Wikipedia note at Leukemia#Radiation), has been removed by user Ultramarine and replaced with links to World Nuclear Association  and an outdated (and since retracted) conclusion from scientist Richard Doll 
Faced with growing evidence of the scientific untenability of his virtual dismissal of causes of cancer other than smoking and lifestyle, coupled with damaging revelations of conflicts of interest, Doll has suddenly retracted his long-standing dismissal of environmental causes of cancer.
I'm all for informed debate, but let's not just present a single point of view here, and let's avoid outdated research.
--Sgkay 16:16, 14 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Actually, virus is an environmental cause of cancer. Ultramarine 16:31, 14 May 2005 (UTC)

text: Here is a summary of studies  Ultramarine 16:54, 14 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Risks of Leukemia from proximity to nuclear power plants 

message: First:
I am a native speaker of English.... and this section—especially the first paragraph—makes almost no sense to me.  The parts that do make sense are either so POV that they strike me as wrong or at least not meriting inclusion.  I mean it reads like something that came from the postmodern essay generator Ok maybe it is not THAT bad but the wording is ..... Sub-optimal.  Then we have such things as: dangerous nuclear experimental power plants again as I have pointed out below, most of these new plants are pebble bed reactors which are not experimental or dangerous or new.  All that about wealth transfer is also a bit POV.
Second:
Wikipedia is an encyclopedia NOT a PowerPoint presentation.  This means that unless it is REALLY necessary adding a heading and subheading for every paragraph degrades the quality of the article.  And headings like "Irrationals, Subsides and Externalities" which once again mean almost nothing to me a native speaker of English represent the very worst of PowerPoint.  Headings should allow the reader to look at them and have a pretty good idea of the content of the following section.  The ones that have been added are vague and ambiguous and seem to be more to confuse the issue than illuminate. Dalf | Talk 07:31, 19 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Cool, I see that you re-did it under the heading "Subsides" which makes sense.  I still have some concerns and some questions about the content.  Specifically, what exactly is it about this act that makes it a "wealth transfer", and what wording in the act describes who the wealth is being transferred from and to whom?  How are these groups defined.  I also object to describing Chernobyl as a moderate nuclear accident, it is at prese4nt the worst one that anyone has had anywhere and the after effects are not in anyway moderate.  The position that things could have been much worse I think would have to be supported by more than a thought experiment. I imagine that most in the nuclear industry at present would say that the probability of having another equally bad accident in the present environment much less a worse one is vanishingly small.  Weather or not we agree with such an idea we would have to support the contention. Dalf | Talk 07:54, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

text: Then we should include this information in the article instead of all that nonsense about "wealth transfers", ofcorse while including it we should leave out any conclusions as to the adequacy of liability numbers; including the actual numbers would be nice then people can decide for themselves.  Again how you describe the degree of a nuclear accident is subjective.  What is the measuring rod?  Are we to use only past incidents?  If so then Chernobyl was the end all be all worst case.  Are we to use theoretical possible damages?  If so then nothing sort of total destruction of the bio-sphere is even more than minor.  I suspect if we were endeavoring to say what is moderate and what is serious and what is minor we would have to find documentation of probability studies and failure scenarios and there would be lots of contentious stiff there.  Personally I have read from several sources that in the new types of reactors being built an accident on that scale is impossible in every way, and that it is nearly the case for all the running reactors as well.  I will not be surprised if you disagree  but then that disagreement is the crux of the problem.  Your number on the cost of a Chernobyl sized disaster is I think enough that the readers can look at it and decide for themselves and I don't see why we have to characterize the event as moderate or serious etc.  It was what it was and as there is no agreed classification system I think trying to classify it as if there were is POV. Dalf | Talk 08:33, 19 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Price Anderson Act 

message: .....is laughable.  It's completely pro-nuclear after Ultramarine's recent edits.  The majority of my edits have been purged from the article, such as the point that the UK Department of Trade+Industry consider nuclear too expensive compared to other solutions.  I don't want to get into a edit war, so could someone else take a look and consider reinstating some of the earlier economy points, or add new content? --Sgkay 16:28, 19 May 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Please read. That point and link is in the article. The problem with your POV is that you have very little facts but many emotions. Do not complain when claims without any bases are removed. Ultramarine 16:32, 19 May 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Economy section of this article