[fgpwd]

The initial estimates for the cost to repair the damage caused by Fukushima were as far as I remember, around 50 billion dollars. According to a recent news article [1], the costs are now estimated at 250 billion dollars. They just keep on increasing. And then there is also the human/environmental damage to consider.

I have been excited about nuclear since my school days, but at this point the downside if something goes wrong is imo just not financially worth it. I would much rather pay 2x for a safer solar plant with similar output than invest something this high-risk. It's like selling uncovered options, with no way to set a stop-loss or to recover if anything goes wrong.

I think it is likely that at some point the global community will also realize that the cost considering the risks is just not worth it and begin to move away from nuclear fission. Especially if any another incident like Fukushima happens in the next decade or so; that could have big implications on nuclear policy.

[1]:http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-17/fukushima-nuclear-c...

[underrun]

The advantages of advancing technology and building smaller safer reactors would go a long way to avoiding such disasters. Because things can go wrong is not a reason to stop research into making them better and safer. The real way to keep ahead of this is not to extend the life span of existing reactors but to build aggressively in order to take older ones offline as newer smaller safer reactors are ready.

And keep doing that.

[MichaelApproved]

Iterating aggressively is great when the consequences aren't as dire as nuclear mistakes.

The last thing I'd want is more plants built aggressively when stupid mistakes happen at the non-aggressive rate, such as installing the reactor backwards.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Onofre_Nuclear_Generating_...

[shawn-furyan]

+1

Design is not actualization.

So the salient question becomes:

How robust are modern reactor designs to manufacturing/construction/installation/etc. errors?

[wyager]

> I would much rather pay 2x for a safer solar plant

That kind of cost increase would hurt a lot more people than the (very) occasional reactor malfunction.

Quality of life is strongly dependent on energy availability. We need an incredible amount of energy for modern food logistics, goods production, infrastructure, R&D, etc. Keeping society energy-impoverished is a sure way to harm as many people as possible.

[therealdrag0]

My impression is that the cost of negative externalities of nuclear are less than that of fossil fuels (the health and environmental costs of coal for example are extreme). Does anyone know if those comparisons use more updated numbers you reference?

[visarga]

> the costs are now estimated at 250 billion dollars

I call it a fat research grant for disaster recovery robotics that will pay off in future applications.