Hmmm..... Not much sound out of the pro-nukes today. I wonder why?

But Mark D- I'm not in the position to question steel and concrete tonnages per MWe, but the point that I constantly make is that the resources required aren't just those used on-site. As I have said, ultimately one has to track every skerrick of energy used at all stages of the life-cycle of the generator- not just the excavators digging uranium ore, but the energy used to build the dongas for the fly-in/fly-out miners, the things they buy with their salaries etc etc. But as I hypothesise, money is a reasonably good proxy for energy and it all gets accumulated in the final cost- so long as externalities are included- such as decommissioning, environmental spoilage, etc.

Yes, at present nuclear scrubs up quite well economically. I suspect that costs will go up significantly after 3/11- both more engineering and higher insurances.

In the meantime, as I have said, the cost of renewables are reducing- you can't take a snapshot of the past decade's average cost and infer future costs from that- you have to loook at cost projections- which are pretty well known. You can get them all via Google pretty quickly.

jm "Hmmm..... Not much sound out of the pro-nukes today. I wonder why?"

because it would be churlish to exploit the current disaster in Japan to support your own personal views .. oh

what a guy eh .. nice one jm, all's fair in politics isn't it mate .. let's not get confused about true compassion for the environment when you can score points on the back of a disaster and reveal your real motivation isn't the environment at all, it's just politics isn't it?

This is so typical of the lefties on this site, berate the conservatives for all manner of "not caring", but then pump up when you might be able to have a tiny little win at someone else's expense

exploiting such tragedy is below what normal people would do but clearly at the forefront of a lefties politics

I saw all the posts online from people who said Japan deserved the disaster because they hunted whales .. and the finger pointers who immediately linked the earthquake to climate change .. but didn't expect to see such blatant churlishness

you must be rolling on the floor laughing jm .. "yay, Japan has had a disaster, I'll be able to score points on OLO!", and though we know bugger all apart for hysterical news reports, you could not resist having a go .. as I said, what a guy!

the technical types out here, will wait to see what happens, since the IAEA says there is no danger, there have been minor issues and the sites are built to withstand earthquakes .. you called yourself a physicist .. clearly you have abandoned science for politics, the AGW way isn't it?

am I disgusted with your comment, sure, surprised .. not at all

rpg- and YOUR comments?

It was good enough for Ziggy S to be all over the media on Sunday and Monday saying that all was fine when he had neither the information nor the qualifications to do so, but for me to ask why he and other nuke boosters were now quiet is sufficient for you to unleash a disgusting diatribe against me.

I have reported your comments to the editor.

well done jm ..

gosh, you should report me to wikileaks as well! what a coup! that's a dobber's site isn't it? .. occasionally used by whistleblowers but it appears more often by attention seekers .. but I would never say that.

By the way Ziggy is qualified to comment on Nuclear Power .. He has a Bachelors degree and PhD in Nuclear Physics .. more eminently than anyone else, and apparantly more than those who believe churlish premature hysteria is the way to go

regardless of the breathless hysteria nuclear is still the best option for the future is you really care about reducing CO2, I want nuclear because more of it will lead to better reactors. This will then supply our offspring with the best chance of a brilliant future, and not have to live in caves, the way of the greenies.

We would have better reactors now and less waste if the world had not been held up by hysterics in the 70s .. who have held progress back

in fact this may lead to many countries improving their reactors by pouring in R&D funding, renewables are far too expensive and are hobby technologies at best we need to stop funding and get away from populist R&D analysis and into something with real potential.

Nuclear is better thought of by the community than the AGW alarmists think .. then again, the majority tends to be quieter about such things.

The Japanese disaster is the result of a Tsunami, not nuclear reactor problems .. let's wait to see what happens, and not sign up to hysterics all trying to trump each other with disaster BS

Jedimaster, I support rpg’s observations, not that he needs my support as he makes the points very eloquently. Please feel free to report me to the editor also.

The proposed CO2 tax is a product of the AGW phenomena, the advocacy block is captive to these phenomena, and the “organic” nature of the advocacy block requires it to react to a wide range of “trigger words”. This weeks’ trigger word is “nuclear” meltdown.

Fundamentalism never has anywhere else to go other than more fundamentalisms, which is where you, the ABC and much of the MSM have just driven yourselves. The ideological salivating over and trivializing of a human tragedy of this magnitude seems perfectly acceptable to the organic advocacy block.

We should be grateful that it is both on display for all Australians to see and is entirely predictable.

without claiming to be a prophet, it is likely the nuclear reactors in Japan will eventually be bought under control with little or no loss of live.

And once again we will see a major problem with power generation by nuclear reactor be overcome and controlled like at Three Mile Island.

Now since loss of live in neither has occurred nor any great malaise inflicted on populations that would mean nuclear power generation in the west is pretty well fatality and sickness free.

It could quite concievably argued after the current crisis is controlled that nuclear power generation in the west is in fact quite safe.

Rarely a follower but right here I'd go along with all rpg and spindoc's comments ... so go ahead and report me to the headmaster too.