Haiti

It's a public forum.

See what I think is the debate is being taken over by anti-capitalist
luddites. They have a One World agenda and would like to move us all back to
the 16th century.

For me, the threat of man made change to the atmosphere is a technology
opportunity, primarily for the Western world. And phasing out the burning
of fossil fuels for energy generation is already 20 years overdue.

Thanks very much Thatcher for the Rush to Gas.

Nice that Mr Obama has proved to be smarter than the opposition.

 

How are you going to generate all that electricity?

 

[...]

Yeah, we all know the dreadful Chernobyls will rove the postnuclear
landscape
of the devastated Earth, eating small babies alive and spitting out their
little bones (which will glow sickly green in the dark).

FFS. There was only one Chernobyl, the design of the reactor was unsafe,
the death toll wasn't really that much (and primarily among the people who
went in to plug the leak), even taking into account small statistical
increase in cancer-related deaths in the neighbouring areas. WHO study
has shown that about 50 people have died directly because of Chernobyl,
and about 4000 might have died earlier because of Chernobyl. Coal kills
many, many more people (both directly - coal mining is not a safe
job - and indirectly, by cancer caused by atmospheric emissions).

The number of deaths per TWh for coal energy is 161 deaths per TWh
worldwide,
25 deaths per TWh in the EU.

Nuclear, taking into account Chernobyl, is 0,04 deaths per TWh.


I know, facts only stand in the way of a good emotional outcry.
"Think of the Chernobyls, we're all gonna die, aaaeeieieie!"

Sigh.

 

I think much more of a problem is what to do with all the nuclear
waste.

 

I don't know what version of AC they subscribe to. Many I expect. But it
is the usual suspects.

 

Leszek Karlik wrote:
snip

Stuff really has to pass the "would I have it in my back yard" test.
Don't suppose I would like a coal *or* nuclear powered station at the
end of my street. Coal because of it's immediate dirtiness, nuclear
because of it's long term dirtiness.

 

On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 16:13:57 +0100, DozynSleepy

[...]

I would like a nuke at the end of my street.

But yes, most people would like their energy to come from wall sockets,
where it would appear through the magic of pink fairy dust.

Wind power? NIMBY, kills birds and makes noise! Hydro dams? NIMBY, they
have to flood a large area and stop salmon migrations. Solar? NIMBY, they
look gash and have to be cleaned on a regular basis. And so on.

Unfortunately, we don't have the money to pave Sahara with thermal solar
and run superconducting cables through the Gibraltar strait.

(Oh, yeah, and people would object to high-voltage power lines anyway.
NIMBY, the electromagnetic radiation from power lines causes cancer and
wounds mather Gaia!)

 

The old gimmer doesn't know anything about power generation.
Yeah most power generation should be from Nuclear and natural resources.
Tidal and wave. Wind and Hydro. Solar where they get the sun.

But all of this is already tried and tested by the French. Not that they
can't be improved on. All the anti nuke lobby conveniently forget 67% of
French generation.

As for accidents, power station accidents might not be good for folks living
close by at the time. But global environmental damage for other than
people, not a lot. Chernoble has become a bit of a wildlife haven.

In an advanced reactor design a Chernoble type incident isn't possible. It
was an ancient badly designed badly run POS.

 

I'm sure that's a serious comment so I'll answer. It comes in two parts.

The industrial plant has to be designed in a modular way that is easy to
handle in service and during decommissioning.

Waste should be stored in deep underground repositories. If you use Salt
Domes there is already enough capacity for the next few thousand years.

UKAEA et all want to dig a new and custom deep repository out under the
Irish sea so stuff goes straight from Sellafield. Either way it really
isn't a technology barrier.

It will be a whole lot less pollution that the oil and coal industries
produce.

 

See France.

 

Yeah again. Just like Haiti.

Oh the press will have a field day.

 

I rather think they are responsible for their own problems.

 

Am I the only one who parsed that as SeaFrance & got a bit confused?

 

I'm coming to this thread a bit late, but I think you'll find this
interesting:

http://www.icrc.org/web/eng/siteeng0.nsf/htmlall/health-bodies-140110

(ICRC notes on management of dead bodies during disaster operations).
It's a myth, which shows up again after every major disaster, that
bodies are a serious public health concern.

It's also been a bit frustrating to see so many reports about how slow
the response has been. My GF is involved in mobilising the UN assessment
teams, so I know that process was under way (in part from our kitchen)
within minutes of the automatic earthquake alert coming through[1], and
the team were on their way within hours. At the same time search and
rescue teams from all over the world were mobilising, and the first ones
were arriving within less than 24 hours, in spite of the problems of
getting many tons of equipment and dozens of personnel and dogs into a
broken airport.

By Friday I understand the UN was aware of 26 international SAR teams in
place, and many field hospitals and other emergency response units had
arrived. But, unfortunately, in a disaster of this scale no amount of
assistance that could practically be delivered in the first few days
will be enough.

[1] Anyone who is interested in receiving these alerts can - go to
www.gdacs.org .

 

And then? You seem to be ensuring that we're entering the last few
millenniums of the Earth's existence. I thought we were trying to
ensure that we weren't.

 

On Mon, 18 Jan 2010 16:53:31 +0100, Colin Irvine

[...]

In a few millenia, either humans will be dead or they will have the
technology
to use the radioactive "waste" as a resource.

Just throw it into a molecular assembly/disassembly sieve, aka "fax
machine". ;-)

 

Coal power stations emit more radioactive fallout than nuclear stations.
Surprising but true.

 

Coal fired power stations are allowed to dump radioactive waste products
direct into the atmosphere.

 

[...]

Yep, it's rather good. I actually started with "To Crush the Moon",
about 50 pages in I've decided that it's rather good, a bit like the
Golden Age trilogy by John C. Wrigh, but it's only one book instead of
three. And then I've checked and discovered that it's the fourth, last
book of the "Queendom of Sol" cycle. Blimey.

Collapsium is IMO better than the next two, The Wellstone and Lost In
Transmission, but the entire cycle is a good read. Space-operatic far
future hard SF is what Tiggers like best. ;-)

 

Have you ever actually tried living the alternative Tree Hugger lifestyle?
I have (1). It blows goats. Give me technology excess every time. Lets
just not rape the environment.

"He who dies with the most toys wins"

(1) I know, it seems as incredible as me being a Veggie. But hey we were
almost plumbed into grade fuckin' A Dutch acid production. That sort of
thing has consequences. And those impossibly cute tight figured artistic,
spiritual, hippyish sort of women always interested me.