[wazoox]

Nuclear energy kills about zero person per annum. Coal itself kills at least 50000 Europeans every year. Even taking into account the worst case scenarios such as Chernobyl, coal (and fossil fuels generally) is several orders of magnitudes more dangerous than nuclear.

I just don't get this mindset. People prefer killing literaly millions of persons right now while there's a safer alternative. That's incredible, really.

[suetoniusp]

There is a safer alternative in the short term. The two are comparable in the long term for safety. Also "Coal itself kills at least 50000 Europeans every year." is far from a truth. Coal may have increased the chance of death by some amount for at least 50000 Europeans every year is more correct.

[titzer]

I believe that statistic. Air pollution is a killer. That causality chain is more indirect and longer than dying of acute radiation poisoning, but that radioactive coal fly ash is a stochastic killer; roll 400 million dice (the population of Europe) and just bias them a tiny bit (.01%), and a number like 40,000 easily pops out.

[wazoox]

In fact recent estimations are much worse: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/c-change/news/fossil-fuel-air-p...