Thanks a lot for this. I’m not really sure why the risk of meltdown of nuclear power plants is mentioned here. This intuitively seem like a marginal concern, and would want to see more arguments for meltdown being a risk worth considering.
In the scenario you are considering, the main source of death is from something like nuclear winter in which people would die over the course of a few months. I take it in that case, people would have enough time to just turn the nuclear power plants off before they had the change to melt down. If the catastrophe killed everyone in the surrounding area immediately, there would be incentives for others to go and turn the plant off.
In the massive Chernobyl meltdown, “As of mid-2005, however, fewer than 50 deaths had been directly attributed to radiation from the disaster, almost all being highly exposed rescue workers, many who died within months of the accident but others who died as late as 2004.” Up to 4000 deaths could be attributed to the disaster in the longer term—so a series of large meltdowns only seem likely to mildly reduce life expectancy over the course of a few decades, which doesn’t seem like a meaningful contribution to the catastrophe. The death toll from the Fukushima meltdown is similarly small and long-term.
On 2: I know very little about the Chernobyl meltdown and meltdowns in general, but those numbers seem be the referring to the actual consequences of the meltdown. My understanding is that there was a substantial emergency reaction that liited the severity of the meltdown. I’m not sure, but I can imagine a completely unmanaged meltdown to be substantially worse?
Also on 1: I have no idea how hard it is to turn a nuclear power plant off, but I doubt that it’s very easy for outsiders with no knowledge (and that are worried about survival so don’t have time to research how to do it safely?)
Thanks a lot for this. I’m not really sure why the risk of meltdown of nuclear power plants is mentioned here. This intuitively seem like a marginal concern, and would want to see more arguments for meltdown being a risk worth considering.
In the scenario you are considering, the main source of death is from something like nuclear winter in which people would die over the course of a few months. I take it in that case, people would have enough time to just turn the nuclear power plants off before they had the change to melt down. If the catastrophe killed everyone in the surrounding area immediately, there would be incentives for others to go and turn the plant off.
In the massive Chernobyl meltdown, “As of mid-2005, however, fewer than 50 deaths had been directly attributed to radiation from the disaster, almost all being highly exposed rescue workers, many who died within months of the accident but others who died as late as 2004.” Up to 4000 deaths could be attributed to the disaster in the longer term—so a series of large meltdowns only seem likely to mildly reduce life expectancy over the course of a few decades, which doesn’t seem like a meaningful contribution to the catastrophe. The death toll from the Fukushima meltdown is similarly small and long-term.
On 2: I know very little about the Chernobyl meltdown and meltdowns in general, but those numbers seem be the referring to the actual consequences of the meltdown. My understanding is that there was a substantial emergency reaction that liited the severity of the meltdown. I’m not sure, but I can imagine a completely unmanaged meltdown to be substantially worse?
Also on 1: I have no idea how hard it is to turn a nuclear power plant off, but I doubt that it’s very easy for outsiders with no knowledge (and that are worried about survival so don’t have time to research how to do it safely?)