Germany Nuclear Waste: Activists Vow To Continue Protests Against Storage Facility (VIDEO)

BERLIN -- Anti-nuclear activists have vowed to continue their protests against a nuclear waste storage facility in northern Germany after 11 containers of reprocessed fuel arrived there.

The containers reached the facility in Gorleben late Monday, five days after they left a reprocessing facility in northern France.

Officials say some 100 police officers and 300 activists were injured during protests in which demonstrators chained themselves to the railway tracks and cement vehicles to roads in an effort to block the transport. Some 8,000 protesters turned out along the route.

The German government voted earlier this year to shut down by 2022 the nation's nuclear power plants, which are deeply unpopular with the public.

Comments

[Terry Floyd]

04:08 PM on 12/02/2011

Why dont these misinformed, misguided souls show some positive community action like

putting some solar water heaters on some poor people's home with

Habitat for Humanity??

They are just creating a fog for the security police and an opportunity for terrorist.

http://www.triplepundit.com/2011/08/thorium-reactors-carbon-free-answer/

[Genders]

05:33 PM on 01/18/2012

Yeah, they should let their country become France's dumping ground,m Somalia did.....

Thorium is not the answer. Give it up. LFTR is not the answer. 10-20 years from a working closed loop prototype, another 10 years till the first commercial would could be built, if we were foolish enough to ignore the insurmountable risk of disaster, waste, and proliferation. http://daryanenergyblog.wordpress.com/ca/part-8-msr-lftr/8-4-the-isotope-separation-plant/

You misguided pro nuke souls should do something useful and install solar panels on your roofs, and get the governments to remove the 500M$ per reactor, per year breaks nukes and coal get and apply that to the ONLY REAL SOLUTION: rooftop solar, offshore wind and waste bio char bio fuels for backup.

Solar is already cheaper than nuke power, about 16 cents.

Wind and waste bio char are both half that, and efficiency is half that again.

energy source amounts: http://cleantechnica.com/2011/08/23/solar-power-intro-3-key-solar-power-points-top-solar-power-news/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:LLNL_US_Energy_Flow_2009.png

Solar without storage can provide over 30% of total energy needs when plug in hybrids are included. That reduces oil use 90%.

Wind can provide some 50% over energy depending on location.

Efficiency can drop our energy use in half at least.

[professor]

05:54 PM on 11/30/2011

Trs refuse to give evidence and then insist you give evidence and then blow smoke.

There is too much evidence of fraud in nuclear plant construction. Fukushima falsified its safety reports. So do all NPP. They would not exist if they didn't.

[SLS11]

11:40 PM on 11/30/2011

Trs will be Trs. What can you do? :)

[Silken17]

02:28 PM on 12/02/2011

Give them a hug; everyone could use a hug now and then.

[vmf211]

11:34 PM on 12/06/2011

What if it could survive a 32 ft tsunami?

[QuantProgrammer]

12:19 AM on 11/30/2011

So who wants this stuff kept at their local nuclear reactor rather than buried in the Nevada desert. (BTW, it will be safe to touch- just not eat- after 500 years when the fission products have gone through 15 half-lifes.)

[Genders]

08:22 PM on 11/30/2011

Who wants a real solution?

[QuantProgrammer]

08:32 PM on 11/30/2011

Unless you have a process for speeding up time, the real solution is to bury it somewhere safe for 500 years.

[Terry Floyd]

09:48 PM on 11/29/2011

Waste Not Want Not

http://www.motherboard.tv/2011/11/9/motherboard-tv-the-thorium-dream

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rv-mFSoZOkE

Here are some figures from Kirk Sorenson's Google presentation:
6600 tonnes of thorium (500 quads) is equal to one of the following in the list below:
- 5.3 billion tonnes of coal (128 quads)
- 31.1 billion barrels of oil (180 quads)
- 2.92 trillion m3 of natural gas (105 quads)
- 65,000 tonnes of uranium ore (24 quads)
more figures.
6 kg of thorium metal in a liquid-fluoride reactor has the energy equivalent (66,000 MW*hr electrical*) of:
- 230 train cars (25,000 MT) of bituminous coal or,
- 600 train cars (66,000 MT) of brown coal or,
- 440 million cubic feet of natural gas (15% of a 125,000 cubic meter LNG tanker),
- or, 300 kg of enriched (3%) uranium in a pressurized water reactor.
Kirk Sorenson is an expert on the matter, check his site for how things are developing:

[Silken17]

10:15 PM on 11/29/2011

The actinides from that waste can be used to start up new LFTR reactors.

[Genders]

03:57 PM on 12/01/2011

nope, no such reactor. just more fantasies. No system eliminates the nuclear waste problem.

[QuantProgrammer]

12:06 AM on 11/30/2011

Breeder reactors aren't exactly cheap, though. I like the French system. Burn the U-235, send the spent fuel to be reprocessed, burn the actinides/trans-uranics, and the waste is safe in 500 years.

[Silken17]

12:55 AM on 11/30/2011

Actually, the LFTR thermal breeder is projected to be significantly less expensive than IFR breeders or conventional LWR reactors. Fueling is even cheaper since no fuel fabrication is required, just thorium fluoride salt is required.

[eddy joe]

09:16 PM on 11/29/2011

The German government voted earlier this year to shut down by 2022 the nation's nuclear power plants, which are deeply unpopular with the public.....and our government wants to build more.

[Joffan]

09:27 PM on 11/29/2011

Not really. Congress seems to be too busy hiding from its own shadow and squabbling to make any actual decisions.

Over in the UK they seem to have taken more definite action towards new nuclear build.

[eddy joe]

10:38 PM on 11/29/2011

In the USA there are proposals for over twenty new reactors and 12 combined construction and operating licence applications for these are under review. All are for late third-generation plants, and a further proposal is for two ABWR units. it is expected that some of the new reactors will be on line by 2020. http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf17.html

[QuantProgrammer]

12:11 AM on 11/30/2011

If only. The debate over Yucca mountain means that waste is sitting on the shores of Lake Michigan, on the Mississippi, 30 miles up the Hudson from NYC, etc. instead of in the deserts of the Nevada test range. After 500 years, the fuel will be safe to touch but not eat, and if we decide to go the reprocessing route like France, the waste will be completely gone in 500 years, period. France doesn't have to engineer beyond 500 years, because the waste will be harmless at that point.

[undsoweiter]

08:40 PM on 11/29/2011

I swear, these guys crack me up.
They don't want the waste, but they don't want anyone to move it.
How they ever hope to get rid of the stuff without moving it is a real headscratcher.

[maslin]

09:34 PM on 11/29/2011

Not really. The solution that these guys have to the transport and storage problem, just as the power production is: 'Alhambra Ala Kazam! Hey look over there!'

[MoeJoeGetlow]

09:37 PM on 11/29/2011

There is no such thing as a safe place to put nuclear waste on earth and those protesters know it! Germany should develope a space program and try shooting that crap into deep space. That's the only place that can handle it.

[undsoweiter]

09:47 PM on 11/29/2011

Right. Because rockets are so much safer than trains.

[PoloniumMan]

11:13 PM on 11/29/2011

The WIPP site in New Mexico is a safe place.

[Kenz300]

08:37 PM on 11/29/2011

Nuclear energy is too costly and too dangerous.

The disaster at Fukishima continues today with no end in sight. The costs will go on FOREVER.

Chernobyl is raising a billion dollars for another containment building 25 years after their disaster.

The cost never ends. The danger goes on and on.

[MoeJoeGetlow]

09:13 PM on 11/29/2011

The cost (Will) end, for every human on this planet, we are going to pay the price, count on it!

[Joffan]

09:27 PM on 11/29/2011

Do you have doom & gloom soundtrack playing when you make this stuff up?

[undsoweiter]

09:49 PM on 11/29/2011

Barber's Adagio for Strings.....he has it on 8-track.

[MoeJoeGetlow]

11:50 PM on 11/29/2011

Yes, it's called Taps and it plays for every country that has adopted nuclear power. It can be heard loud in Japan.

[rocksage7]

07:44 PM on 11/29/2011

Did you see where the army in Japan said 8% of there land is fried by that accident they had with there nuke plant and that millions are going to die.....we must stop all nukes in America...just like Germany did .NO NUKE IS GOOD NUKE.....end it all......so what if we go back to the dark ages...at least people would live.....

[undsoweiter]

07:54 PM on 11/29/2011

...in the dark.

[rocksage7]

10:22 PM on 11/30/2011

ya, but then people would get more sleep and slow down a little...I would like cars done away with also...mass trans and more people working in the fields...more of a back to nature type of USA instead of a greedy capitalist exploitive program like we have now where it only feeds the 1%

[SLS11]

11:51 PM on 11/30/2011

Have you ever heard of daylight? Now, I am not saying that we need to go back to cave man times (never really been fond of the way Fred Flintstone dresses).
But! I firmly believe that nature has it's rhythms.
Daytime is our natural productive time, dusk is our time to unwind, night time is our time to give our bodies and minds a rest (aka sleep), daybreak is our time to greet the new day and gently ease into it.

[maslin]

09:31 PM on 11/29/2011

You know, I find this refreshing. A call to move humanity back to the Dark Ages rather than embrace a power technology that you find worrisome, but not cloaked in even an effort at rational argument.

Good show.

[rocksage7]

10:17 PM on 11/30/2011

thanks its just common sense..to bad it is not so common these days.... nukes are bad for everyone we should follow Germans lead...have a good day

[Joffan]

06:19 PM on 11/29/2011

Monbiot had some observations that could be applied to this misdirected passion.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2011/nov/22/christopher-busby-nuclear-green-party
=========
Those who oppose nuclear power often maintain that they have a moral duty to do so. But it seems to me that moral duties cut both ways.

We have a moral duty not to spread unnecessary and unfounded fears. If we persuade people that they or their children are likely to suffer from horrible and dangerous health problems, and if these fears are baseless, we cause great distress and anxiety, needlessly damaging the quality of people's lives.

We have a moral duty not to use these unfounded fears as a means of extracting money from frightened and vulnerable people, whatever that money might be used for.

We have a moral duty not to divert good, determined campaigners away from fighting real threats, and into campaigns against imaginary threats. Dedicated and effective activists are a scarce resource. Wasting their lives by encouraging them to chase unicorns is a disservice to them and a disservice to everyone else.
=========

[outnow]

04:48 PM on 11/29/2011

The choice is not just between Russia and its fossil fuel vs. the nuclear industry saving Europe from depending on Russia. The Germans have the technology to go beyond this choice. Siemens dumped nuclear. Germany dumped nuclear and does not want nuclear waste. These Greens disagree with George Monbiot that nuclear is green and are willing to show up 10,000 strong year-after-year. A 1,000 or so went to the hospital last year to stop a French train of deadly radioactive waste.

If you go to Munich, you will see technology of alternative energies emerging from the Universities and technical institutes to challenge the old guard of oil and gas and nuclear monopolies. People use public transportation and ride bicycles. Everything is clean and in order, except for nuclear reactors and dangerous radioactive waste.

Enough damage to the environmnet has already happened that can be overcome in time so long as it isn't nuclear.

[Joffan]

06:13 PM on 11/29/2011

We shall see whether Germany has any non-fossil alternatives. So far, they have not - their response to the closures has been to import (leaving someone else burning more fossil fuel, eventually) and to build coal and gas stations.

I'm not sure whether their plan to close more plants in the next 5 or 6 years (prior to the 2022 final date) is more foolishness or perhaps an opportunity to experience the reality of the problems and reverse course. Call me an optimist, I hope it's the latter.

[Genders]

04:03 PM on 11/29/2011

Good. Nuclear power is more expensive the rooftop solar, slow to build, and suffers from several catastrophic unsolved problems: waste, proliferation, disaster and terrorism.

rooftop solar, offshore wind and waste bio char bio fuels are cheaper than nukes, wind and char, some of the cheapest electricity we have. Forever, 24/7, carbon land and water negative, faster to install, doubling every year or so, thus able to replace 100%+ of fossils and nukes within 7 to 15 years depending on our will. Far cheaper than nukes.

In the USA, each reactor is subsidizes with 500M$ per year per reactor! Otherwise all of them would default instead of ONLY 50%. Yet world nuclear and other PR propaganda sites, have millions, maybe billions to create thousands of fake biased web sites, and buy politicians. It's a multi trillion dollar industry.

[PoloniumMan]

05:33 PM on 11/29/2011

Genders,
If nuclear power is so bad then why must you write so many lies in nearly every post?

[Bullitt08]

12:15 PM on 11/30/2011

Must pay well.

[Silken17]

05:52 PM on 11/29/2011

LMAO!

[Joffan]

02:38 PM on 11/29/2011

So far the nuclear closures in Germany have made the country into a net importer of electricity, from being a net exporter of electricity. http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/newsarticle.aspx?id=30668 Future plans are to buld a lot more coal and gas burning plants. Accelerated plans to close some of the remaining reactors are a simple refusal to face reality.

In what possible way is this anti-nuclear hysteria good for Germany or for the world?

[maslin]

02:42 PM on 11/29/2011

I am sure that Vladimir Putin and his pet fossil industries are very pleased.

Is it good for the world?

No. Lower carbon emissions is good for the world.

[PoloniumMan]

11:18 PM on 11/29/2011

He will charge German industry more for Russian gas than his own industries, which will then lead to German industries moving (along with their jobs and taxes) operations to Russia. Brilliant!!

[maslin]

02:06 PM on 11/29/2011

Dumb, any way you slice it.

If you're against nuclear power, then this stuff needs to be stored safely and transit safely.

If you're for nuclear power, then this stuff needs to be stored safely and transit safely.

If you're indifferent about nuclear power, then this stuff needs to be stored safely and transit safely.

These activists are attempting to prevent safe transit and/or safe storage.

Dumb.

Protest a different feature of the nuclear economy if you must.

[Joffan]

02:37 PM on 11/29/2011

It's not rational, it's tradition.

[undsoweiter]

09:05 PM on 11/29/2011

It's religion.

[maslin]

03:25 AM on 11/30/2011

I really have no idea what these people are thinking. I have tried to understand it, but I can't.

[Lunamoth]

12:45 PM on 11/29/2011

Lead on, Germany. You are on the right track.

[PoloniumMan]

02:00 PM on 11/29/2011

The right track for higher energy costs, increased CO2 emissions, and a greater reliance on foreign sources of fossile fuels. Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroder, who negotiated the original nuclear phaseout is now employed by the Russian natural gas company Gazprom. In 2010, the nuclear power plants in Germany provided 133 billion kilowatt hours of electricity. Interestingly enough, that's almost equal to the amount of electricity (150 billion kilowatt hours) that could be produced by the gas the will be pumped each year through a new gas line under the Baltic Sea, connecting Russia gas suppliers directly with German customers.

[Lunamoth]

03:07 PM on 11/29/2011

Your input might just be a little biased, RadonMan.

[niumarmion]

04:28 PM on 11/29/2011

France will surpass you as the richest country in Europe by exporting carbonless nuclear energy while not being dependent on Russian fossil fuels.