My understanding is that both wind and solar can't just placed anywhere, while a nuclear reactor can. A nuclear reactor is also more efficient in terms of GW per surface area.
>We're replacing nuclear power generation capacity six times faster than we're losing it
That's a rather odd metric, don't you think? "We haven't added or removed a single reactor, and we added a wind turbine. We're adding infinitely-many wind turbines for every reactor we're losing!"
>"Oh fuck, that crazy dictator is shooting his tanks at that wind farm! Will this cause a nation-scale disaster?"
The same can't be said for, say, hydroelectric dams. Those are arguably even more dangerous than nuclear plants.
>"Oh fuck, terrorists are trying to steal old solar panels!"
Oh, no. Now all they need to do is separate the uranium from the graphite in the fuel pellets and enrich it in centrifuges and figure out how to build nuclear bombs.
>"It's so sad that thirty years after that solar farm fire disaster, kids within hundreds of miles from it still have significantly higher cancer rates."
I really don't think that's true of Chernobyl.
>"Oh fuck, that tsunami damaged that wind farm, we need to evacuate people from thousands of square kilometers of area around it and not allow fishing anywhere near it"*
You need to evacuate because there was a tsunami and flooding. Look up how many people died as a result of the tsunami and as a result of the nuclear accident.
> My understanding is that both wind and solar can't just placed anywhere, while a nuclear reactor can.
A nuclear reactor has the same placement restrictions as any other thermal power plant: it needs significant cooling, which usually means a nearby large body of water. Since wind and solar need almost no cooling, they can be placed in some locations where a nuclear power plant can't. There's also other restrictions due to size and safety which limit nuclear power plant placement even more.
> The same can't be said for, say, hydroelectric dams. Those are arguably even more dangerous than nuclear plants.
Imagine a hydroelectric dam "Chernobyl".
At least the mid to longterm consequences would be softer.
I think they would have figured out a few years later how to rebuild everything.
Chernobyl (>35 years ago) on the other side is still buzzing and the rebuilding of the sarcophagus is ongoing and will be for a long time
Did you not see the predictions of what would have happened if the Three Gorges Dam had failed? A dam failing is utterly catastrophic. Chernobyl by comparison is small potatoes, even if no one had done anything.
(Also, the comparison isn't 1-to-1, since Chernobyl wasn't attacked. I have no idea what the failure modes of modern reactors are when damaged by munitions.)
>We're replacing nuclear power generation capacity six times faster than we're losing it
That's a rather odd metric, don't you think? "We haven't added or removed a single reactor, and we added a wind turbine. We're adding infinitely-many wind turbines for every reactor we're losing!"
>"Oh fuck, that crazy dictator is shooting his tanks at that wind farm! Will this cause a nation-scale disaster?"
The same can't be said for, say, hydroelectric dams. Those are arguably even more dangerous than nuclear plants.
>"Oh fuck, terrorists are trying to steal old solar panels!"
Oh, no. Now all they need to do is separate the uranium from the graphite in the fuel pellets and enrich it in centrifuges and figure out how to build nuclear bombs.
>"It's so sad that thirty years after that solar farm fire disaster, kids within hundreds of miles from it still have significantly higher cancer rates."
I really don't think that's true of Chernobyl.
>"Oh fuck, that tsunami damaged that wind farm, we need to evacuate people from thousands of square kilometers of area around it and not allow fishing anywhere near it"*
You need to evacuate because there was a tsunami and flooding. Look up how many people died as a result of the tsunami and as a result of the nuclear accident.