The headline of this thread reads thusly, "Nuke Plants In Europe Power Down As Global Warming Dries Up Cooling Rivers."
This title is pretty illustrative. Let's follow the links to the original article, which is here:
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=34051Let's start with the first two words. "Nuke plants."
First we have to scroll through nearly 3/4 of the article - which is about something called "global climate change" that is caused by an emission called "carbon dioxide" that is actually
minimized using nuclear power - to find the first mention of nuclear power plants.
Here is the first such reference:
The heat is also taking its toll on agriculture, and affecting the generation of electricity, especially in nuclear power plants.
The lack of fresh water for the nuclear plants' cooling systems has led German private electricity suppliers to slow down their generators.
Of course, there is no information about what is happening in Germany's coal plants - coal being the
primary new source of energy being built in Germany now that they have ruled out further nuclear power. As a person who is aware of the second law of thermodynamics though, I will tell you that the thermal output is
still there. All power plants, nuclear and otherwise, need cooling water. (I had a thread here recently showing the cooling towers of the sixth largest greenhouse emitting plant in Europe, a
British coal plant.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x60818So in spite of the contention
clearly implied by the thread title that this is a special case limited to nuclear power plants we see that the article
actually says the situation is effecting
all generation.
The next item is in the title: "Power down."
Let the reader decide. Clearly the title seems to imply, especially coupled with the words in the OP, that the nuclear plants of France and Germany are totally unavailable.
The above reference to the German plants, of course, says "slow down" which is something quite different that "shut down."
Now France. The article says:
In France, the state-owned Electricité de France (EdF) was allowed to continue to drain hot water from the cooling system into rivers, although the water temperatures exceeded the limits imposed by environmental authorities. But output has had to be lowered.
Of course France has
zero coal plants to compare, so the omission is somewhat less disingenuous.
But didn't the opening post title tell us that global warming had
dried up the rivers? What rivers then are the cooling waters pouring into? Are cooling waters from coal and gas plants in Germany not exceeding their temp limits? If France
started using coal again - if they banned nuclear power in order to build new coal facilities as Germany proposes to do, would the coal plants not
also exceed the thermal output, especially modern
supercritical water coal plants? Does the second law of thermodynamics not apply if you dump millions of metric tons of carbon dioxide into the air
along with hot water into the rivers?
If the plants are shut down because of the dried up rivers, why then are they still putting out heat?
And what does the article say about the renewable
panacea that is used to obscure the new German coal plants. Let's read:
In Italy, hydroelectric plants have had to slow down due to a shortage of water in rivers.
European agriculture has also been hit by the heat wave and the drought.
In Germany, president of the association of farmers Gerd Sonnleitner told the press that this year's harvest on cereals would be 10 to 15 percent lower than in 2004, for which figures are available. "We had excellent expectations, but the heat and the drought have destroyed them."
I thought, from the title of the thread, the
whole article was about
nuclear power and not about renewables like hydroelectric and biofuels.
This thread is a
perfect example of the almost Rovian spin that the anti-nuclear pro-coal squad employs, a perfect example of "if you don't know what you're talking about, make stuff up."
Global climate change is
real. It is an
immediate crisis. The solution to global climate change does not involve
more coal. Of course, there is a subset of people who think
you, the reader, are stupid. But you are not stupid. You know a
distortion when you see one. You can read for yourself.