• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

I swear, each month of 2025 will have its own history degree.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

White supremacy is terrorism.

“Facilitate” is an active verb, not a weasel word.

He really is that stupid.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

People are complicated. Love is not.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

No one could have predicted…

American history and black history cannot be separated.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

Disappointing to see gov. newsom with his finger to the wind.

They want us to be overwhelmed and exhausted. Focus. Resist. Oppose.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

Museums are not America’s attic for its racist shit.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

If a good thing happens for a bad reason, it’s still a good thing.

Let the trolls come, and then ignore them. that’s the worst thing you can do to a troll.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

Marge, god is saying you’re stupid.

Mobile Menu

  • Seattle Meet-up Post
  • 2025 Activism
  • Targeted Political Fundraising
  • Donate with Venmo, Zelle & PayPal
  • Site Feedback
  • War in Ukraine
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • COVID-19
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • 2025 Activism
  • Garden Chats
  • On The Road
  • Targeted Fundraising!
You are here: Home / Science & Technology / I’m Not Uptight, I’m Not Unattractive

I’m Not Uptight, I’m Not Unattractive

by John Cole|  June 7, 201110:02 am| 140 Comments

This post is in: Science & Technology

FacebookTweetEmail

Mistermix’s frequent discussions of Fukishima have caused me to search for news every day, and it seems that every day the news gets worse:

The amount of radiation released by the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in the days after the 11 March tsunami could have been more than double that originally estimated by its operator, Japan’s nuclear safety agency has said.

The revelation has raised fears that the situation at the plant, where fuel in three reactors suffered meltdown, was more serious than government officials have acknowledged.

In another development that is expected to add to criticism of Japan’s handling of the crisis, the agency said molten nuclear fuel dropped to the bottom of the pressure vessel in the No 1 reactor within five hours of the accident, 10 hours earlier than previously thought.

By the end of last week, radiation levels inside the reactor had risen to 4,000 millisieverts per hour, the highest atmospheric reading inside the plant since the disaster.

The agency also speculated that the meltdown in another reactor had been faster than initially estimated by the plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco).

It is not clear whether the revised account of the accident, the world’s worst since Chernobyl in 1986, would have prompted Tepco to respond differently at the time.

But it is expected to raise questions about the ability of Japan’s nuclear authorities to provide accurate information to the public.

According to the latest estimates, 770,000 terabequerels – about 20% as much as the official estimate for Chernobyl – of radiation seeped from the plant in the week after the tsunami, more than double the initial estimate of 370,000.

Japan will never be the same.

FacebookTweetEmail
Previous Post: « Tomorrowland
Next Post: How Washington works »

Reader Interactions

140Comments

  1. 1.

    Strandedvandal

    June 7, 2011 at 10:10 am

    Props for the title.

  2. 2.

    Loneoak

    June 7, 2011 at 10:12 am

    Let’s hope they’re never the same. That kind of management structure and submission to authority in charge of technology that will kill for millennia is a dangerous proposition. Not that we have it much better …

  3. 3.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 7, 2011 at 10:13 am

    The nostrum my brigade commander once fed me as a young lieutenant on brigade staff duty one day stays with me: “bad news does not improve with age”.

    We’re seeing that here, as more and more bad news comes out, with less time available to wrestle with it.

    The problem with nuclear power is “what if it goes wrong?” America’s nuclear industry doesn’t want to face that question.

    30 years ago a decision was made on the future of energy for the United States, and it was a very bad one. Reagan can never be forgiven for shitcanning all of Carter’s research initiatives out of spite and greed.

  4. 4.

    vor

    June 7, 2011 at 10:13 am

    My guess is they wind up with an exclusion zone around the plant likd Chernobyl.

  5. 5.

    gypsy howell

    June 7, 2011 at 10:15 am

    Too bad we won’t learn anything from their disaster here.

  6. 6.

    zmulls

    June 7, 2011 at 10:16 am

    I assumed that, too. How big a geographical area will have to be cordoned off, and for how many decades?

    Will the amount of unusable and uninhabitable land equal a percentage of Japan in the single digits?

  7. 7.

    PurpleGirl

    June 7, 2011 at 10:19 am

    But it is expected to raise questions about the ability of Japan’s nuclear authorities to provide accurate information to the public.

    Uh, I’d say it will raise questions and convince many that any government and industry group will not provide accurate and timely information about any “accident”.

  8. 8.

    C.J.

    June 7, 2011 at 10:20 am

    Never any good news from there, it seems.

  9. 9.

    jeffreyw

    June 7, 2011 at 10:22 am

    I pray to the FSM (Praise be to His Tentacles) the ramen supply is not affected. Ramen

  10. 10.

    Steve

    June 7, 2011 at 10:26 am

    Yeah, if there’s one thing Japan could never, ever recover from, it’s the unexpected release of large amounts of radiation.

  11. 11.

    brendancalling

    June 7, 2011 at 10:26 am

    by next year, I fully expect to read articles about “mysterious” fish kills on Japan’s coast and “inexplicable” levels of radiation in milk, just like we get her in the US about the Gulf Coast.

    perhaps the japanese will follow our lead and put a gag order on scientists dealing with the aftermath.

  12. 12.

    bkny

    June 7, 2011 at 10:27 am

    this blog does frequent updates on these disasters (anyone remember the gulf of mexico) … prolly too many links; but nevertheless depressingly informative:

    http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/

  13. 13.

    patrick II

    June 7, 2011 at 10:27 am

    This link was posted in another comment on another thread, but perhaps worth reposting here. Physicist Michio Kaku asserts that we almost lost Northern Japan
    Also, that there was 100 percent meltdown in three reactors and only the last minute decision to cool the reactors with seawater saved Japan from three containment breaches and three simultaneous Chernobyls.
    And that TEPCO did not want to put in the seawater — they were still trying to save their investment.

  14. 14.

    PeakVT

    June 7, 2011 at 10:28 am

    Arnie Gundersen on US evacuation plans.

  15. 15.

    Doug Harlan J

    June 7, 2011 at 10:30 am

    Great title.

  16. 16.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 7, 2011 at 10:32 am

    @patrick II:

    And that TEPCO did not want to put in the seawater—they were still trying to save their investment.

    Money is more important than life itself.

    That’s the epitaph of modern man.

  17. 17.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 10:33 am

    Bunny born without ears, Outside the exclusion zone:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iw2R7y65nFg

  18. 18.

    MattF

    June 7, 2011 at 10:34 am

    Lesson from history: one should not believe initial statements about nuclear reactor meltdowns, period. Not from industry, not from government, not from nobody.

  19. 19.

    kdaug

    June 7, 2011 at 10:35 am

    I’d thought that everyone understood that it would be years or decades before the effects of radiation poisoning would manifest themselves.

    But then I saw a man on my TeeVee telling me that WAY more people were killed in the tsunami – in fact, no one has died of radiation poisoning at all! So we’ve got nothing to worry about!

  20. 20.

    niknik

    June 7, 2011 at 10:35 am

    @Steve: What a funny joke, ass.

  21. 21.

    Michael Finn

    June 7, 2011 at 10:40 am

    A few things…

    There is a containment dome around the plants, unlike Chernobyl, that is keeping the majority of radiation in-house. Most of the fuel is covered by water which is a good neutron absorber which is keeping it from melting down.

    After the earthquake, please remember that everybody everywhere had no clue in what was happening. A 9.0 earthquake occurs and all communication/transportation goes down. The executives of the company did want to go down there and oversee what was happening but gave their ride to government officials to help them direct the flow of aide.

    I’m not making excuses for anybody here but when a natural disaster occurs that destroys a good portion of your country/infrastructure, communication gets fucked up.

  22. 22.

    gizmo

    June 7, 2011 at 10:40 am

    Doesn’t it seem that the nuclear-powered nations ought to have an international ready-response team that is fully equipped and funded to act immediately in the event of a crisis? The early stages of a nuclear accident are critical, and perhaps there would be better outcomes if there was a standing team that could act pronto.

  23. 23.

    lonesomerobot

    June 7, 2011 at 10:42 am

    There could be an entire college course on corporate public relations that focuses only on the response to the BP spill and TEPCO meltdowns. The new proven formula, courtesy of BP:

    1) prevent any outside authorities from having any immediate access to the accident site
    2) deny, deny, deny that the problem is as bad as it is
    3) flood the internets with pro-industry shills who exhibit specific, demonstrable “knowledge” of how the industry works and attack anyone who suggests the problem might be worse
    4) manage the flow of inevitable truth, keeping it to a trickle and obfuscating any metrics that the public might use to come to their own conclusions
    5) after a long enough time, when the story falls far enough off the radar, THEN go ahead and admit, yes, it really was that bad all along. But by then not nearly as many people will care.

    I’d personally like to thank Hillary Rosen (former head of the RIAA), who PR-managed the BP crisis, for helping devise this conscientious, socially-responsible corporate smiley face that any business should know as a valuable tool for public affairs crisis-management.

    And to any commenter on any blog that used words like “unhinged” to describe those of us who knew all along that this was a grand-scale disaster: FUCK YOU.

  24. 24.

    RareSanity

    June 7, 2011 at 10:43 am

    Japan will never be the same.

    Physically and emotionally, no. But politically? It will be like it never happened.

    Having worked in a Japanese company for going on 8 years, the responses from the government and Tepco during this disaster, were all to predictable. It’s the same tact Sony took when their networks were getting hacked left and right, and the same one Toyota took during the last two major recall situations.

    Japanese government/business culture is a very regimented, top-down control structure. And I don’t use the word “control” lightly. The culture demands that situations have every variable be controlled as much as possible. Now we all know that some variables just can’t be controlled, but that does not deter attempts.

    The structure is basically setup to honor executives/government officials when things go well and to protect them when they go wrong. I don’t say these things is in a negative light, as a matter of fact, it is quite amazing the level of dedication and pride, the culture produces.

    However, mistakes that bring embarrassment and shame upon a company, or the country, are not easily forgiven. Pride is the driving force behind all of this. The government and Tepco behaved exactly as I would expected. First, try to avoid embarrassment, we don’t air our dirty laundry in public. Second, try to handle the situation as quickly and as quietly as possible, with no outsiders involved, that may reveal things about us that we would find embarrassing. Thirdly, if we begin to lose control of the situation, we must control the public perception of the incident to avoid embarrassment. Fourth, allow the truth the get out in a controlled manner to spread out the embarrassment, over time. We do not want to be perceived as dishonest.

    It’s all standard operating procedure. I wish you all could experience how many times me and my U.S. engineering brethren have made the statement, to our Japanese counterparts:

    “Why didn’t you just tell us that months ago? This situation wouldn’t have gotten to this point if we would have known that then.”

    It’s just a different culture. In some ways it’s better than American culture, some ways it’s worse. Such is the world…

  25. 25.

    Michael Finn

    June 7, 2011 at 10:43 am

    @bkny: I was reading that blog until they started to give bullshit answers on these bullshit comparisons to Chernobyl, they went from this being 2x as bad as Chernobyl to 24x very quickly.

    Chernobyl was a nuclear reaction going off in the air with no cooling or protective layering. It released something on the order of 200 million curies which Fukishima has released 4 million (different measurement of different types of radiation).

  26. 26.

    WereBear

    June 7, 2011 at 10:44 am

    @Villago Delenda Est: Reagan can never be forgiven for shitcanning all of Carter’s research initiatives out of spite and greed.

    Nor should he.

  27. 27.

    DBrown

    June 7, 2011 at 10:47 am

    @vor: A saving grace is it occured on the coast and nearly at sea level …

  28. 28.

    Matt in HB

    June 7, 2011 at 10:48 am

    @Loneoak: That’s really the problem with nuclear energy though, isn’t it? There is no “management regime” that can be devised to last as long as the hazardous materials we’re generating. It’s the height of hubris to think we can manage a very dangerous problem that will last hundreds of generations.

    I’m guessing clean up costs and thousands of years of waste storage aren’t included in these projects’ ROIC calculations.

  29. 29.

    Alex S.

    June 7, 2011 at 10:49 am

    @lonesomerobot:

    Very nice! I really like point 3. There were even some examples on this blog, commenters that suddenly appeared and were never heard of again.

  30. 30.

    Steve

    June 7, 2011 at 10:54 am

    @niknik: It’s not a joke. It’s a roll of the eyes at what I consider an overly melodramatic line.

  31. 31.

    lonesomerobot

    June 7, 2011 at 10:54 am

    @Alex S.: and the truth is, BP hasn’t to this day had to progress to step 5. The nature of that crisis is just murky enough for them to be able to ride out step 4, ad infinitum. At this point, step 5 would be admitting guilt and they have no reason to do so.

  32. 32.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 10:55 am

    @gizmo: What we need, those of us in the world who consume electricity, is modern reactor designs. There is not a reactor in the world that was built with designs that are more recent than forty years.

    Thorium reactors are much safer than uranium or plutonium reactors. If we can put people on the moon, we can design a safe reliable power source. Wind and sun are mostly just fine, but neither is reliable.

  33. 33.

    DBrown

    June 7, 2011 at 10:57 am

    @Alex S.: Yes, but it appeared to me thart some of the paid trolls (a few) really knew their shit and were willing to answer detailed questions with good information and not BS – not all were worthless shrills. BJ did get some of the better and knowledgable ones, and for that, I think we own some thanks to some of the more knowledgable people here that ask good questions all the time.

  34. 34.

    Poopyman

    June 7, 2011 at 10:58 am

    @PeakVT:

    Fairewinds’ chief engineer Arnie Gundersen emphasizes the need to enlarge evacuation zones around US nuclear plants to 50 miles. Reducing US evacuation zones to only 10 miles during a nuclear power accident compromises public safety.

    Too bad the White House is only 45 miles from Calvert Cliffs.

  35. 35.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 7, 2011 at 11:01 am

    @RareSanity:

    It’s just a different culture. In some ways it’s better than American culture, some ways it’s worse. Such is the world…

    Reminds me of a very basic problem I observed during my tour in Korea. My unit had a number of KATUSAs (Korean Augmentee To the United States Army) and an ongoing problem was the issue of eye contact. In Korean culture, eye contact between superior and subordinate is considered disrespectful, while the lack of eye contact in our culture is considered disrespectful. So, obviously, there is a clash on pretty fundamental terms.

  36. 36.

    DBrown

    June 7, 2011 at 11:02 am

    @John Weiss: The CANDU is safe and as for thorium – there are zero examples; either every nuclear scientist is on the take or something about thorium reactors do not make anyone desire to build them – of course, cureent uranium reactors aren’t exactly cost-effective, so maybe thorium needs a look.

  37. 37.

    lonesomerobot

    June 7, 2011 at 11:05 am

    @DBrown: Of course they knew their shit. But they were still defending their own livelihoods. I can’t blame them for that, but still, I won’t pretend that they were unbiased.

  38. 38.

    Alex S.

    June 7, 2011 at 11:08 am

    @DBrown:

    I agree.

  39. 39.

    jheartney

    June 7, 2011 at 11:09 am

    @Poopyman:

    A 50-mile exclusion zone from Indian Point essentially eliminates NYC.

    Gundersen doesn’t connect the dots, but the bottom line is requiring a realistic exclusion zone would effectively shut down most nuke plants.

  40. 40.

    bkny

    June 7, 2011 at 11:12 am

    michael finn .. i still find it a very good source for links for issues long forgotten except by those impacted.. and those with a conscience.

    re evacuation zones for nuke plants — saw something yesterday that the nebraska nuclear power plant is in danger re the flooding of the missouri river…

  41. 41.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 7, 2011 at 11:14 am

    @gizmo:

    The early stages of a nuclear accident are critical, and perhaps there would be better outcomes if there was a standing team that could act pronto.

    You really want to piss off the bean counters, don’t you?

  42. 42.

    comrade scott's agenda of rage

    June 7, 2011 at 11:20 am

    @MattF:

    Lesson from history: one should not believe initial statements about nuclear reactor meltdowns, period. Not from industry, not from government, not from nobody.

    This. Alas, it seems that nobody but the Swiss and the Germans will actually learn and remember this little history lesson.

  43. 43.

    RareSanity

    June 7, 2011 at 11:24 am

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    So, obviously, there is a clash on pretty fundamental terms.

    This is so true.

    Our company rotates their “up and coming” employees for 5 year terms in the U.S. office. One of the things that they notice right away, is what to them, is the extremely informal (almost insulting) manner in which we address each other only by first name. To them, it’s almost always Mr. (suffix with -san) when addressing each other, even if only using the first name.

    The funniest thing to me, is to see the look on their faces when the American employees not only challenge, but will openly mock their “superiors”. In a meeting, no less! The look of, “I can’t believe you just said that to your boss…” is priceless.

    We don’t do it to Japanese management though, we would like to continue our employment…

  44. 44.

    jurassicpork

    June 7, 2011 at 11:39 am

    Guys, I am so sorry for this offtopic comment but I wouldn’t be violating blog protocol it we weren’t so close to extinction. Details are here but our backs really are against the wall and I swear to Christ I am not making this up. We really are this close to living out of a car that we may not be able to keep on the road. I am positively wide-eyed with panic and fear right now.

  45. 45.

    BO_Bill

    June 7, 2011 at 11:47 am

    We nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki and both are doing just fine. People do not understand the difference between the half-life of an isotope such as Cesium-137 and the effects of fission. The really nasty products of a fission reaction are gone after a few seconds. After this much time, the only surviving radioisotopes left in Japan are relatively benign, and will not hurt anyone.

    President Barack Obama let women run his Libya policy and now thousands consist of nothing more than torn, decaying flesh. Nobody died as a result of Japan’s nuclear challenges.

  46. 46.

    Michael Finn

    June 7, 2011 at 11:52 am

    @bkny: I’m just saying that in this particular case the numbers on that site are multiplying very quickly without any evidence.

  47. 47.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 7, 2011 at 11:55 am

    @BO_Bill:

    It’s difficult to distill stupid to this level of purity, yet, here we have it.

  48. 48.

    PanAmerican

    June 7, 2011 at 11:59 am

    Using fission to boil water is a solution looking for a use. I think it was driven by the need to justify\rationalize\leverage the costs sunk into weapons and propulsion systems for the War Machine.

    On a domestic US political note, the economic knockdown effect from this disaster may very well cost Obama re-election.

  49. 49.

    trollhattan

    June 7, 2011 at 12:12 pm

    The IAEA, UCC and especially our own NRC were a lot more realistic in their appraisal of the TEPCO situation (especially the controversial evacuation zone radius) than the Japanese government. TEPCO was tragically, vastly unprepared and have yet to regain their footing.

    I haven’t a clue what they’re going to do with the puddles of fuel at the bottom of those reactor vessels–burial in situ for perpetuity seems likely. Unit 2 is of most interest to me because of the plutonium fuel component, but I don’t know that it’s the most compromised reactor.

    “It could never happen here” doesn’t convince me, here in the Land of E-5 Tornadoes.

    Speaking of which, a photo:

    http://hubbub.wbur.org/2011/06/06/tornado-from-space

  50. 50.

    trollhattan

    June 7, 2011 at 12:14 pm

    @BO_Bill:

    Get outta the deep end of the pool, kid.

  51. 51.

    trollhattan

    June 7, 2011 at 12:16 pm

    @PanAmerican:

    Atoms for Peace(tm), baby. I especially enjoyed the halcyon days when we used nukes as giant construction shovels. Seems reasonable, right?

  52. 52.

    handsmile

    June 7, 2011 at 12:17 pm

    @Michael Finn:

    A few things:

    You write (at #21 above): “There is a containment dome around the plants…”

    Would you be so kind as to disclose your top-secret source on this assertion? No other news organization or website has reported that there was a single containment dome covering the Fukushima Daichi plant. There were individual containment domes enclosing each separate nuclear reactor there, several of which, as you may have heard, were destroyed by hydrogen gas explosions in the days immediately following the earthquake/tsunami.

    You continue: “..keeping the majority of radiation in-house.”

    That certainly is an unorthodox measure of radiation leakage contamination and must be of great comfort to the tens of thousands of people who remain evacuated up to 30km distance from the plant.

    You write: “The executives of the company did want to go down there and oversee what was happening but gave their ride to government officials to help them direct the flow of aide. [sic]”

    Aside from a clumsy paraphrase of a TEPCO press release, what does that sentence even mean? “Gave their ride”?

    You write: “When a natural disaster occurs that destroys a good portion of your country/infrastructure communications gets fucked up.”

    An atlas may be of some help here. The March 11 earthquake/tsunami affected a relatively small area of the coastline of central northeastern Japan. While the human and property annihilation was and continues to be catastrophic in that region, the rest of Japan and its infrastructure/communications networks remained stable and viable. I know this not only from family members in-country, but also from daily podcasts from NHK and Japanese newspapers reporting on the situation from the very first day.

    Sorry, but it does appear as if you’re making excuses – and not very well.

  53. 53.

    alwhite

    June 7, 2011 at 12:23 pm

    @zmulls:

    Given the half life, somewhere between 500 and 1000 decades

  54. 54.

    alwhite

    June 7, 2011 at 12:26 pm

    @MattF:

    Its not just nukes – whenever there is a problem, care recalls, food safety issues, oil spills, military invasions, the first reports are always, always, always, lies. And then they wonder why people don’t believe them,

  55. 55.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 12:29 pm

    @DBrown: Quite right about CANDU reactors. Thorium is interesting in several ways: it commonly occurs, compared to uranium, it cannot sustain a reaction without a source of neutrons (meaning that with some designs one can regulate power output without moderators and shut it down quickly) and it’s radioactive by-products are less toxic and have a much shorter half-life. And what’s really cool about it? One can’t make a bomb with it.

  56. 56.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 12:38 pm

    @PanAmerican: “Using fission to boil water is a solution looking for a use. I think it was driven by the need to justifyrationalizeleverage the costs sunk into weapons and propulsion systems for the War Machine.”

    Don’t know about you, but I’d rather live downwind from a nuke than downwind from a coal-fired plant. Odds of a happy, long life are much better.

  57. 57.

    NoPublic

    June 7, 2011 at 12:39 pm

    The thing I still don’t get is why people are so very concerned about the long term potential death toll of this and simultaneously willing to ignore the nearly 3000 people each year directly killed by coal mining (let alone those dying due to second order effects of coal-based energy production). But that’s just me.

  58. 58.

    p mac

    June 7, 2011 at 12:40 pm

    Lessons learned:
    * Always put your nuclear plants to the East [coast]. (Prevailing wind is from the west, so most of your fallout will fall somewhere else, hopefully on the ocean, but other countries will do in a pinch.)
    * If You can’t do that, put your nuclear plants near the ocean (You get to dilute your fallout with everybody else’s sea water.)
    * But do put your nuke plants above the tsunami line. Despite these ameliorations, fixing broken plants really is expensive.

  59. 59.

    Yutsano

    June 7, 2011 at 12:40 pm

    @John Weiss:

    And what’s really cool about it? One can’t make a bomb with it.

    You just discovered the fatal flaw for the MIC and therefore why thorium will stay hypothetical.

  60. 60.

    mrmobi

    June 7, 2011 at 12:40 pm

    @BO_Bill:

    People do not understand the difference between the half-life of an isotope such as Cesium-137 and the effects of fission. The really nasty products of a fission reaction are gone after a few seconds.

    Well BO, let’s try to distill this idiocy just a bit.

    From Wikipedia:

    Fission products have half-lives of 90 years (Samarium-151) or less, except for seven long-lived fission products with half-lives of 211,100 years (Technetium-99) and more. Therefore the total radioactivity of fission products decreases rapidly for the first several hundred years, before stabilizing at a low level that changes little for hundreds of thousands of years.
    This contrasts with actinides produced in the open (no nuclear reprocessing) nuclear fuel cycle, a number of which have half-lives in the missing range of about 100 to 200,000 years.

    So, BO, don’t go wading the the Pacific near Fukushima for 100,000 years or so, ok?

    Public officials from large corporations lie all the time. If a spokesman for a large corporation tells you that things are just fine, you should gather up your family and run away as fast as possible.

    Nobody died as a result of Japan’s nuclear challenges.

    I don’t have a link for this, but my understanding is that at least three of the 50 Fukushima plant workers have already died from radiation exposure, (not that TEPCO is being forthcoming with information about worker health) and, unfortunately, the amount of radioactive water that continues to pour into the ocean pretty much guarantees many more deaths. But don’t worry, officials at Fukushima will continue to obfuscate, and radiation is odorless, colorless and tasteless, so who’s to know?

    Things are so bad at Fukushima Daiichi that a group of senior citizen engineers and scientists have volunteered to work on the cleanup, with the expectation that they would be allowed to exceed radiation exposure limits, even at the cost of their own lives. Reminds me of the people who volunteered at ground zero at little, but straight up heroic, in any case.

  61. 61.

    Linda Featheringill

    June 7, 2011 at 12:43 pm

    Paul Rogers and The Firm, Radioactive.

    Great song. Deep, deep biting sarcasm to use it with this topic.

    I guess that you went with this title because this shit makes you angry. I understand.

  62. 62.

    BO_Bill

    June 7, 2011 at 12:55 pm

    I forgot how challenging many of you were. This is most likely a consequence of your education. The activity, or health threat, of an isotope is the inverse of its half-life. When you read something that says ’90 years or less’ , that means that there are isotopes with a half-life of less than 90 years. And, as I previously informed you, the really nasty stuff goes away after a few seconds. Any isotope with a long half-life is inherently stable and does not give off much radiation. If your city was to get nuked, you would probably want to say in the basement for a couple of weeks.

    Now, BEHOLD, Nagasaki Today.

  63. 63.

    ItinerantPedant

    June 7, 2011 at 1:01 pm

    @John Weiss: Modern reactor designs are only as good as the people running them. In short, until you tell me that you’ve designed an entirely new management system to manage a plant (and likely an entirely new economic paradigm to go with it) then all the neat designs in the world can’t overcome running plants well past their “sell by” dates, shorting maintenance in the interest of short term profits, and managing to protect careerist managers rather than maximizing safety.

    In short, everyone who talks about reactor technology has ENTIRELY MISSED THE POINT of this particular incident.

  64. 64.

    Neutron Flux

    June 7, 2011 at 1:06 pm

    You say true, I say thankya.

  65. 65.

    Neutron Flux

    June 7, 2011 at 1:07 pm

    My reply in #64 is addressed to ItinerantPendant

  66. 66.

    PeakVT

    June 7, 2011 at 1:09 pm

    @handsmile: Very nice. (Minor note: none of the containment structures at Fukushima are actually domed like they are at most PWRs. The containment is a substructure of/within the reactor building.)

  67. 67.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 1:10 pm

    @Yutsano: Now that’s rather cynical. Though probably at some point true.

    The world leader in thorium power is… India! She’s got plans for start-ups within ten years! And the US? Lots of old, complicated (read that unsafe) plants based of designs 40 years old. And no plans for the future but wind and solar, unreliable and diffuse sources. Something isn’t right, don’t you agree?

  68. 68.

    Linda Featheringill

    June 7, 2011 at 1:11 pm

    @BO_Bill:

    Is this, by any chance, Brick Oven Bill?

  69. 69.

    daveNYC

    June 7, 2011 at 1:12 pm

    @BO_Bill:

    I forgot how challenging many of you were. This is most likely a consequence of your education.

    That’s true, but not in the way you probably meant.

    Anyhoo, Cesium-137. Thirty year half-life, not your friend.
    Strontium-90. Twenty-nine (ish) year half-life, not your friend.
    Iodine-131. Eight day half-life (long enough to get in someone’s thyroid), not your friend.
    Plutonium (any of it). Effectively around forever (as far as we’re concerned, low radioactivity but toxic as Hell.

    But other than that, nuclear reactors produce nothing but sunshine and happy thoughts.

  70. 70.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 1:15 pm

    @ItinerantPedant: Well, management is a universal problem (it’s hard to find good help). Modern uranium-fueled designs shut themselves down if they get too hot without any intervention by ‘management’. Google you some “pebble bed reactors”. And some “thorium reactors” while you’re at it.

  71. 71.

    PeakVT

    June 7, 2011 at 1:16 pm

    @John Weiss: …. India! She’s got …

    Wait, when did India grow breasts and other parts that scare conservative NYT columnists?

  72. 72.

    trollhattan

    June 7, 2011 at 1:17 pm

    @BO_Bill:

    You ignorant putz, we (the U.S.) are still dealing with waste from the Manhattan Project–is that enough elapsed time for you, or would you like to go live in a tent on the Hanford Reservation and make tea from the groundwater and explore the idea further? And let’s park forever the notion that an airburst atomic explosion and a reactor meltdown have anything in common.

    I did so love it after JC banned your sorry butt.

  73. 73.

    trollhattan

    June 7, 2011 at 1:19 pm

    @daveNYC:

    Geez, don’t get him confused by bringing up alpha, beta and gamma emitters.

  74. 74.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 1:20 pm

    @PeakVT: If a country could grow breasts, it would be India, and she wouldn’t stop with breasts, either.

  75. 75.

    Yutsano

    June 7, 2011 at 1:21 pm

    @trollhattan: Well FWIW that waste is keeping my father gainfully and happily employed and the Japanese have already come knocking on his door wanting his expertise. I think the old gruff wants to retire on time though.

  76. 76.

    BO_Bill

    June 7, 2011 at 1:31 pm

    Trollhaten; The principle difference between a nuclear power plant and a nuclear warhead is that while the radioactive materials from a nuclear power plant largely stay in the engineered containment vessel in the case of a meltdown, the radioactive materials from a warhead BLOW UP AND GO ALL OVER THE PLACE DUMBASS.

    Now, analyzing this difference, we conclude that warheads are less conducive to public health than engineered containment vessels. And we further conclude that if a person was to accumulate and concentrate Cesium-137 to be their friend in the kitchen, perhaps Mother Nature does not intend for that particular person to reproduce. Now, again,

    BEHOLD! Nagasaki Today.

  77. 77.

    trollhattan

    June 7, 2011 at 1:31 pm

    @Yutsano:

    Well, bless your dad for sticking with it–talk about a profession where you know you’ll never outlive the project timeline.

    Maybe he can land a nice quarter-time consulting gig, paid in vast buckeds of yen? That would ease the pains of retirement some.

  78. 78.

    trollhattan

    June 7, 2011 at 1:32 pm

    @BO_Bill:

    Heh-heh, you so funny.

    Now. Go. Away.

  79. 79.

    ItinerantPedant

    June 7, 2011 at 1:32 pm

    @John Weiss: Sure I was aware of pebble bed reactors (not so much thorium) and other dead man switch type rectors.

    None of which (like everything else with more than 2 moving parts) can survive the kind of institutional willful avoidance of uncomfortable realities that a manager faced with hitting their Q2 retained earnings is capable of. Handwaving “Management is a universal problem” misses the point. Again.

    Any system is weakest where it interacts with the people running it. I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess you’re an engineer of some sort. Every engineer I know thinks that somehow they can design a fool proof system. You can’t. You. Just. Can’t.

    So as a society you decide which systems and technologies you’re going to approve with that in mind. If the downside is Chernobyl bad, you don’t get to point to technology. You want to build more of the damn things, you tell me how you’re going to manage them organizationally, not technologically.

  80. 80.

    trollhattan

    June 7, 2011 at 1:39 pm

    @ItinerantPedant:

    Has anybody constructed a pebble bed reactor? I’ve read of them for, geez, more than a decade but am unaware if there’s a functioning one somewhere.

  81. 81.

    Yutsano

    June 7, 2011 at 1:39 pm

    @trollhattan: It’s so nice to put up nice bright shiny pictures of a modern city…and totally ignore the numerous and long-lasting health effects both Nagasaki and Hiroshima are still experiencing. But life is always easier in BoBworld, reality not allowed.

    My dad has dealt with nukes pretty much his entire working career (20 in the Navy) so it’s his comfort zone.

  82. 82.

    ItinerantPedant

    June 7, 2011 at 1:40 pm

    And for what it’s worth I’ve seen one suggestion warranting further review, from SF author Charlie Stross over at his blog.

  83. 83.

    daveNYC

    June 7, 2011 at 1:43 pm

    @John Weiss: Fuck that shit. How about you come up with some new ultra-safe nuclear tech that I can Google and get results back that include the words “currently in use in the real world”.

    It’s like we’re talking about the problems with the shuttle program, and you’re telling us to read more about warp drives.

  84. 84.

    ItinerantPedant

    June 7, 2011 at 1:47 pm

    @trollhattan: Nope. They were designed after the manifest problems of the older technologies became known, coupled with the kind of management that gets you Three Mile Island, Bhopal, and the Pinto, which resulted in such massive protests and hassles that no power company here wanted to build a new reactor.

    Coupled with (then) falling fossil fuel prices and the rationale for nuke construction went away. Most everywhere else (France, Germany, Japan, etc.) seemed to have an installed base of the older designs (especially France which went great guns nuke early and often) which, like most large fixed cost investments, had a long nominal lifespan.

    Which is to say, I’m not sure a lack of pebble bed reactors points to anything other than the inherent structure if the nuclear power industry.

  85. 85.

    ericblair

    June 7, 2011 at 1:50 pm

    @daveNYC:

    Fuck that shit. How about you come up with some new ultra-safe nuclear tech that I can Google and get results back that include the words “currently in use in the real world”.

    If nobody ever builds anything unless someone else has built it first, you realize that nobody will build anything new ever again, right?

    I’m not a big fan of nuclear power, but it seems you have to think about what the alternatives are going to be. We should go balls to the wall on green power technologies, but that’s not going to give you anywhere near 100% of power needs (I’ve seen figures around 30%). So you’re going to need other base power sources, and that most likely means more coal plants. We’re exchanging risks of a nuclear catastrophe to increasing the likelihood of a global, universal climate catastrophe. It really sucks, but there you are.

  86. 86.

    trollhattan

    June 7, 2011 at 1:57 pm

    @ItinerantPedant:

    Okay, thanks. I sort of answered my own question, Germany built a small (15MW) working model that ran for 21 years.

    http://www.newsweek.com/2002/04/07/the-last-great-hope.html

    There was some sort of US-South African consortium at one point, but it dissolved. Now, it may be up to the Chinese. Here’s hoping they don’t cut too many corners.

  87. 87.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 2:01 pm

    @John Weiss:

    Wind and sun are mostly just fine, but neither is reliable.

    This has to be one of the Stupidest things I have Ever read.

    Oil Spill Vs. Wind Spill Vs. Sun Spill:

    http://www.thegoodhuman.com/2010/05/03/oil-spill-vs-wind-spill-vs-sun-spill/
    Nuke spill:
    http://www.pixelpress.org/chernobyl/index.html

  88. 88.

    El Cid

    June 7, 2011 at 2:02 pm

    The comparisons to Chernobyl, and exceeding Chernobyl, most recently by Michio Kaku’s comments when the Japanese government finally admitted that there were indeed 3 complete meltdowns, were based on the conclusion that only the massive and untried inrush of seawater for cooling prevented the sort of core fire which released the radiation throughout so much of the former Soviet Union at its most concentrated.

    So apart from the seawater, it was indeed going to be Chernobyl, and more serious, given the Japanese government’s admission of the meltdowns. Though there were certainly reasons for Fukushima’s immediate placement, it might very well have been situated even locally (even if you have to imagine a slightly different topology) in such a way that such quantities of seawater weren’t available.

    The comparison is entirely apt, as long as one is realistic about the multiplier of what seemed likely to be released versus Chernobyl.

  89. 89.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 2:07 pm

    Nuke Spill:

    http://www.pixelpress.org/chernobyl/index.html

  90. 90.

    Marcellus Shale DIscount Sale

    June 7, 2011 at 2:12 pm

    no problems dudes, i got your back.

  91. 91.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 2:18 pm

    @Strandedvandal:

    Props for the title.

    The Title:

    I’m Not Uptight, I’m Not Unattractive:
    http://www.pixelpress.org/chernobyl/screen8.html

    I’m Not Uptight, I’m Not Unattractive:
    http://www.pixelpress.org/chernobyl/screen12.html

  92. 92.

    daveNYC

    June 7, 2011 at 2:19 pm

    @ericblair: Not my point. I’m just sick of the pro-nuclear posters name dropping tech that either doesn’t work, is still in the wishful thinking design stage, or has nearly as many issues as the tech that they want want to replace. Read the wiki on Pebble Bed and Thorium reactors. They are not the superawesomesauce winfests that the posters imply they are.

    It’s about as useful as mentioning a Tokamak fusion reactor as the solution to our energy problems.

    You know what our potential sources of energy are? Fossil sources that are finite in availability and create piles of pollution, wind and solar that are intermittent and inefficient, and nuclear reactors that suck and are run by morons.

  93. 93.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 2:30 pm

    @ItinerantPedant: Good. Dead man switch reactors. The point being that I agree with you about “any system is weakest where it interacts with the people running it”. Of course it is. Hence the DMS design.

    PS Your guess was close. I was raised by a ceramics engineer and a school teacher.

    You know, I’ll bet that you’re old enough to know that no matter what, you won’t live forever and that anything at all can go wrong. So what do you do? You play the odds. Do we need electricity to live? Nope. Do we need it to maintain our civilization? Until something better comes along or until we modify our civilization, we do.

    So, whaddya want, (hopefully) well-designed nukes (’till we figure out fusion) or a declining level of tech/civilization? I don’t see a choice.

  94. 94.

    virag

    June 7, 2011 at 2:32 pm

    @Steve:

    jesus.

  95. 95.

    virag

    June 7, 2011 at 2:36 pm

    @John Weiss:

    wow, that’s quite a lack of imagination and innovation.

    the only choice is nukes–and fusion!! what’s the kwh on that jobby gonna be?–or declining level of civilization? really?

  96. 96.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 2:36 pm

    @daveNYC: Aww, Dave. Aren’t you something?

    If the wise, educated public will ever get over their irrational fear of nuclear power, thus allowing a new plant to be funded, you’ll see newly designed power plants. I’m not talking warp drives, I’m talking about stuff that works and is within the grasp of current tech.

  97. 97.

    virag

    June 7, 2011 at 2:37 pm

    @brendancalling:

    mysterious fish? blinky?

  98. 98.

    ericblair

    June 7, 2011 at 2:37 pm

    @daveNYC:

    You know what our potential sources of energy are? Fossil sources that are finite in availability and create piles of pollution, wind and solar that are intermittent and inefficient, and nuclear reactors that suck and are run by morons.

    Hey, at the end of the day, at least we at BJ can all agree that life sucks.

  99. 99.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 2:40 pm

    @Cliff in NH: I’m flattered. I excel, at least in one person’s mind, to the ultimate.

    I said that wind and solar were unreliable. They are, ’cause no one has come up with a practical method of storing the energy that they create.

    I don’t see what oil spills have to do with the current discussion, do you?

  100. 100.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 2:44 pm

    @virag: Thanks for the kind thoughts. As long as humans keep breeding the way most rodents do, yeah, we’re going to need power and lots of it. Perhaps you favor orbiting solar stations?

  101. 101.

    virag

    June 7, 2011 at 2:46 pm

    @PanAmerican:

    atoms for peace! not only justify the cost and existence of nuclear weapons, but also to mollify the conscience of some of the nerds who were instrumental in getting the things going in the first place. that’s a huge incentive on its own.

    that’s why some of those idiots pushed for star wars missile defense so hard under ronnie alzheimer’s. if they could 100% protect from nuclear weapons, they weren’t so bad!

  102. 102.

    virag

    June 7, 2011 at 2:49 pm

    @John Weiss:

    i don’t have a blind belief in the worst choice as the first choice, that’s all.

    orbiting solar stations? that kind that would shoot microwaves to receivers on the surface, or the other kind?

  103. 103.

    virag

    June 7, 2011 at 2:56 pm

    you know what’s pretty safe? looking at the ways the electricity and energy are used and wasted and making improvements to infrastructure and appliances and shit.

    you know what else? it’s a ginormous economic boost, too!

  104. 104.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 3:06 pm

    @John Weiss:

    You Clearly have no idea what you are talking about.

    How about you look at a power usage graph for ANYWHERE in the world – You are free to explain how peak solar energy and peak usage are Soooo very different.

    You should also explain your unsubstantiated claim that widely distributed wind resources are not base load power.

  105. 105.

    daveNYC

    June 7, 2011 at 3:33 pm

    @John Weiss: You mean their irrational fear that the safety systems won’t work as advertised and that management will be more interested in covering their asses than ensuring the safety of the plant and the surrounding population?

  106. 106.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 3:36 pm

    @daveNYC:

    their irrational fear that the safety systems

    suffer from corrosion. (and failures of cap-ex aka maintenance)

  107. 107.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 3:48 pm

    @Cliff in NH:

    If its too hard for you John, here is a vid of the distribution of CO2 over the us, which shows a high resolution, interactive map of United States carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels (directly related to total energy use)

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJpj8UUMTaI

  108. 108.

    Robert Sneddon

    June 7, 2011 at 4:19 pm

    @daveNYC: As well as the sources you list there’s also hydro power, which is claimed as a renewable energy source by some folks until you mention the Banquaio dam disaster in China (between 100,000 and 200,000 dead) and they shuffle their feet and look shifty. Of course Banquaio isn’t the only lethal dam failure in history, just the poster child for the industry. China has now built the Three Gorges dams (about 19GW of generating capacity) which, if they ever let go will kill millions.

    As for comparisons between Tchernobyl and Fukushima, I recently took a look at a map showing the exclusion zone(s) around Tchernobyl dated 1996. The exclusion zone around Fukushima Daiichi to scale is only a little bigger than the marker on the Tchernobyl map showing where the reactor was located.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Chernobyl_radiation_map_1996.svg

  109. 109.

    Robert Sneddon

    June 7, 2011 at 4:33 pm

    @Cliff in NH: Energy usage, especially for home heating in Europe tends to be highest in winter when solar energy collectors are at their least productive due to long airpaths (the sun remains low in the sky during the day) absorbing UV energy. We also get extended periods of continuous cloud cover which also doesn’t help. In addition the days are much shorter than in summer, of course — in midwinter in my home city of Edinburgh we get about 6 hours of daylight. It is somewhat different in the US though.

  110. 110.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 4:45 pm

    @Robert Sneddon:

    Yup the wind stops blowing, the tides stop flowing. great call.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy_in_Scotland

    You better be doing some research dude.

  111. 111.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 4:53 pm

    @virag: “orbiting solar stations? that kind that would shoot microwaves to receivers on the surface, or the other kind?”

    The microwave sort. The idea is a large array of receivers, so the microwave density is low enough so’s not to be dangerous, just in case. Nukes, however, are much less expensive.

  112. 112.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 4:59 pm

    @Robert Sneddon:

    Here is Your governments plan:

    http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/54357/0013233.pdf

    At present, and for the immediate future
    reflected in existing use of system contracts, the availability of a significant tranche of existing
    thermal and renewable generation in Scotland means that expansion of network export capacity to
    take power out of Scotland is the priority. Such capacity will reduce the need to constrain the
    operation of generation in Scotland that wishes to participate in the GB market.

    Oh, woops, You generate too much and can’t export it, well now, that’s Surely a problem of not enough generation.

    41. We conclude that changes to the generation mix in Scotland by 2020, including the potential
    closure of the large conventional generation plants, do not present a barrier to the
    achievement of renewables installed capacity of around 6 GW. This is because, even if
    Scotland only has renewable generation in the future, the system can still be managed by
    virtue of transmission reinforcements and also being operated on a GB wide basis. In fact,
    renewable generation in Scotland will delay the need for alternative solutions (e.g. further
    interconnector strengthening) that would be required to allow the import of electricity into
    Scotland.

  113. 113.

    Robert Sneddon

    June 7, 2011 at 5:01 pm

    @Cliff in NH: There’s been a few folks who have built tidal and wave power systems and tried them out in sheltered coastal areas around Scotland. One of the better ones, a concrete wave-tower system lasted six months before it broke up from the effects of the waves and weather. The north Atlantic is a monster.

    It takes a lot of effort and maintenance to keep something planted in the ocean from falling apart in rough weather and that’s when it is not trying to stand in the way of the waves and tides to extract energy from them. See the Alexander Kielland disaster for an example, or the Brent Alpha disaster, and they were situated in the North Sea which is a millpond compared to the more enegetic Atlantic.

    The cost of maintaining anything at sea is ten times or more that of a land-based facility, never mind the extra costs and losses involved in transferring the energy back to the shore. It’s one reason I’m puzzled at the offshore wind generation plans being put forward here and elsewhere as the capital costs of building ANYTHING offshore are eyewatering.

    Scotland probably could become energy independent based on renewables; it’s a country with a small population, only 15% that of California and now the older smokestack industries have died off (steel, shipbuilding etc.) its manufacturing base doesn’t require a lot of power per se. Norway is in the same boat with its abundant hydro power but again it has a small population and corresponding small energy demand. The problem, as such, is that Scotland is a net energy exporter to its bigger more populous neighbour to the south but that’s only based on its nuclear and coal-burning power stations; the intermittent wind power generators (grid solar here is a non-starter for obvious geographical reasons) are a drop in the bucket. The current (no pun intended) tidal and sea-current generators being trialled are very experimental and it may be impossible to build them cheaply enough for the energy they produce to be cost-efficient in any scenario unless we are somehow forced to gear down to the level of hamster-wheels.

  114. 114.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:04 pm

    @John Weiss:

    Nukes, however, are much less expensive.

    Prove it.

  115. 115.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 5:04 pm

    @Cliff in NH: “You Clearly have no idea what you are talking about.

    How about you look at a power usage graph for ANYWHERE in the world – You are free to explain how peak solar energy and peak usage are Soooo very different.

    You should also explain your unsubstantiated claim that widely distributed wind resources are not base load power.”

    Thank you for the kind words.

    The congruence of peak solar energy and peak useage match where the climate is hot and cloudless, as, say Arizona, where AC is practically needed to live there. In another climate, where our bugaboo is heat in the winter, it’s (you guessed!) not very sunny. Widely distributed wind sources result in the problems we have today with widely distributed sources, to wit: a big ‘ol power grid, which even if made ‘smart’ is still wasteful and expensive to maintain.

    As for wind power, it suffers the same sort of disadvantages that solar does. Both kinds of generation are unreliable. Fine for those days when they work. Until some sort of storage of the power they generate that is inexpensive and practical, these methods of power generation are certainly helpful, but they aren’t going to shut the coal plants down.

    I want a thorium reactor in every town. I want one for my house!

  116. 116.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:09 pm

    @Robert Sneddon:

    The north Atlantic is a monster.

    Source of renewable energy.

    Love the concentration on failures, instead of successes.

    It takes one experiment to spark a concept. By experiment 10 one should have fleshed things out and have defined a direction. By experiment 100 one hopes to have found something that is sublime

  117. 117.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 5:09 pm

    @Cliff in NH: Cliff, Cliff. I’ve nothing to prove. You do know that the happy feets for putting a pound of something into LEO is around 10,000 dollars, right? Well, the miceklwave thingies are going to have to be placed in geosync orbit, right? Maybe double the cost? And then one must go UP THERE to service them, right?

    Those orbiting satellites will have to wait for a ‘space elevator’, or something.

  118. 118.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:11 pm

    @John Weiss:

    As for wind power, it suffers the same sort of disadvantages that solar does. Both kinds of generation are unreliable. Fine for those days when they work. Until some sort of storage of the power they generate that is inexpensive and practical, these methods of power generation are certainly helpful, but they aren’t going to shut the coal plants down.

    http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/winds/aj07_jamc.pdf

  119. 119.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:13 pm

    @John Weiss:

    Wha??? WTF you talkin’ ’bout fairy-tails for, I’m talking about things that exist on earth, for purchase, NOW.

  120. 120.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 5:21 pm

    @Cliff in NH: Well, thanks for the link. What did I say about power grids?

    I think that a much better solution is locally generated power. No brown-outs, you know.

    http://pediaview.com/openpedia/Electricity_transmission#Losses

  121. 121.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:25 pm

    @John Weiss:

    Solar

    Solar thermal

    Geothermal

    Air-source heatpumps

    Ground-source heat pumps

    Water source heat pumps

    Waste heat from industrial source heat pumps

    Wind

    Tidal Flows

    but they aren’t going to shut the coal plants down.

    But how much more coal will be preserved for the future?

  122. 122.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:30 pm

    @John Weiss:

    The congruence of peak solar energy and peak useage match where the climate is hot and cloudless

    Yup, Germany is Just Like Arizona, try again?

    Although it might be counterintuitive, photovoltaic cells can operate just fine under cloudy skies, since despite the grayness of a rainy day, there is still solar radiation in the air, otherwise it would be dark.

    While the sunniest spots in the world, like the Sahara desert, have a solar energy potential of about two thousand kilowatt hours per square meter per year, Germany’s manages a respectable one thousand, according to Henner Weithöner of Solarpraxis, a company that tracks Germany’s solar sector.

    “This shows how much even Germany or parts of northern Europe, how much solar energy we have and what huge potential,” he said. “We just have to use it.”

  123. 123.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 5:30 pm

    @Cliff in NH: OK. You can buy a pebble-bed reactor, if you can get a permit to build any kind of reactor. You can build a thorium reactor if you can get a permit. If you have the bucks. Both are available, here and now.

    Or you can accept the status quo, you know, where they’re hauling mountain tops away to the power plants and throwing everything but the coal into the valleys.

    Because I do not believe that wind/solar power will ever fill the need, and because the idea of a national grid, which we have of course, is dumb. Like old nuke plant designs: they work, but they are high maintenance and not particularly efficient.

  124. 124.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:37 pm

    @John Weiss:

    From the paper you didn’t read:

    Contrary to common knowledge, an average of 33%
    and a maximum of 47% of yearly averaged wind power
    from interconnected farms can be used as reliable,
    baseload electric power. Equally significant, interconnecting
    multiple wind farms to a common point, and
    then connecting that point to a far-away city can allow
    the long-distance portion of transmission capacity to be
    reduced, for example, by 20% with only a 1.6% loss of
    energy.

  125. 125.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 5:37 pm

    @Cliff in NH: Here’s a two-fer: the thing about coal, is it’s dangerous to burn, and past that, it has limited usefulness. Not useless, limited usefulness (unlike oil).

    Who said Germany is just like Arizona? I’m sayin’, in case you’re listening, is various climates make solar and wind more or less useful. Unless there’s a flopping huge grid. Can’t be the only sources of power at this point in techno history.

    Then there’s fracked natural gas. Don’t get me started, please.

  126. 126.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:39 pm

    @John Weiss:

    Because I do not believe

    Ah, There, Found your problem. No Facts.

    Solar has come down ~20% in cost recently… Must be unrelated to all that research…

  127. 127.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 5:41 pm

    @Cliff in NH: Oh, stop being rude. Of course I read the article. I think that in practice, it’s very optimistic. What, you collect the power from a bunch of wind farms and shoot it over a single line to somewhere and it increases transmission efficiency by eighteen percent?

    I doubt that, it sounds like magic to me.

  128. 128.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:43 pm

    @John Weiss:

    Unless there’s a flopping huge grid.

    Are you attempting to claim we don’t have a powergrid in this country?

    Are you saying we can’t upgrade?

    WTF?

  129. 129.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 5:44 pm

    @John Weiss:

    Oooooh, science is Magic now.

    You are obtuse.

  130. 130.

    John Weiss

    June 7, 2011 at 5:50 pm

    @Cliff in NH: Ok, ok. I know solar has come down in cost. I also know that wind and solar simply don’t work in many places (though they don’t hurt). I think that local power generation is “the answer”, apparently you don’t. That’s fine. You’re a fan of low density power generation, I’m not. You like large distribution grids, I don’t.

    You accuse me of not having facts. Fine. I think I’ll go plant something.

  131. 131.

    Robert Sneddon

    June 7, 2011 at 6:06 pm

    @Cliff in NH:
    Who is going to pay for the dedicated wind farm interconnects? I know wind farm operators in the UK won’t pay for them, they only pay for the haul from their farms to the nearest regular grid connection point and after that they sit back and collect the money from their real profit centre, Renewable Obligation Certificates (ROCs).

    Building out a Smart Grid is going to cost a lot; in the case of the US it will probably end up costing trillions of dollars and it will not add one solitary watt to the actual generating capacity; the only structural benefits are that it makes it easier and more efficient to move power created by the existing generators around the country.

    An energy journalist I read a while back explained the two real reasons behind the US energy industry’s drive for a smart grid and smart metering. The first reason is the ability to black out very small areas like residential suburbs without knocking out the neighbouring hospital or military base when the limited baseload is all committed elsewhere and the wind dies or the sun goes behind a cloud. The existing grid can’t allow for such fine-grained control and high-priority facilities have to maintain backup generators on-site in case of area blackouts due to supply failures.

    The second reason for smart metering is more avariciously capitalistic; the ability for electricity suppliers to auction power on a real-time basis to individual customers. If you want your lights to stay on and the power supply is non-optimal then you can bid on-line against your neighbours. Low bid and you can light candles instead. Basically the smart grid will permit a million Enrons to bloom where only a single state-wide operation could exist previously given the crude grid control structures in place back then.

  132. 132.

    mapaghimagsik

    June 7, 2011 at 6:16 pm

    @RareSanity:

    I work in an american company and thats how it is too.

  133. 133.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 7:00 pm

    As far as I can tell, the only argument so far is “Don’t invest! We Cant afford it! Hell no You Can’t!”

  134. 134.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 7:12 pm

    @Robert Sneddon:

    http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/05/29/980087/-My-Solar-Panels-Rock?via=tag

    Each 1MW equals 1 SREC. Standard Solar estimates that BGE will pay me about $318.50 for each SREC.

    http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/06/03/981774/-Making-My-First-Clean-Kilowatt?via=search

    It can even be done up North here:
    The Maine Solar House:
    http://www.solarhouse.com/

    2010 Power Generation Summary
    Friday, 31 December 2010 18:58
    __
    Another strong year for electrical production from our 4.2 kW array: 4,229 kWhrs! That’s an average of 352 kWhrs per month.
    __
    In December we generated 205 kWhrs of electricity…on the low side, but now the days are getting longer as the sun rises higher in the sky each day.
    __
    As you can see from the chart, it’s not quite a bell curve but does reflect higher output in the middle months with a decided decline in the fall through the end of the year.
    __
    We’re now in our 16th year and the PV array continues to deliver electricity in the 4,200 kWhr range annually. That’s some 62,000 kWhrs over the first 15 years which is, as they say in Maine, ‘wicked good!’

  135. 135.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 7:40 pm

    @Robert Sneddon:

    If you want your lights to stay on and the power supply is non-optimal then you can bid on-line against your neighbours. Low bid and you can light candles instead. Basically the smart grid will permit a million Enrons to bloom where only a single state-wide operation could exist previously given the crude grid control structures in place back then.

    http://www.solarhouse.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=68:battery-backkup-system&catid=38:core&Itemid=62

    Battery Backup System
    __
    Written by Administrator
    Friday, 16 April 2010 07:40
    __
    The winter of 97-98 was a tough one here in Maine. Ice storms ravaged the state and most Mainers were without power from several days to several weeks. Not to be out done, the mid-December ice storm of 2008 barreled in with half an inch of ice that took down tree limbs which in turn took down the power lines.
    __
    Battery Backup System
    Inverter & 12 Batteries
    After the first great ice storm, we added a separate inverter/battery system as backup for the times the grid power is down. Since our main intertie inverter system depends on grid power to work, we have a second system to handle those few but critical times when the power is out.
    __
    This is the standard Trace backup system installed by Talmage Solar Engineering in Kennebunkport, Maine. I’ve taken off two of the three front panels to show the inverter and charge controller in the top ‘box’ and the six batteries in the middle ‘box.’ There are another six batteries in the lower section.
    __
    Here’s what happens when the grid power goes out:
    __
    1. The main inverters shut down so that no power goes out on the grid (safety issue plus it really is an electric appliance).
    __
    2. Before the lights can go off, the backup inverter senses the loss of power and switches itself on, powering a small number of necessary loads (specific lights, communication, solar pumps, heating system, refrigerator and well pump).
    __
    3. I can then recharge the batteries with the solar panels (when we have grid power, the house current keeps the batteries topped off). This means that we can be independent almost indefinitely as long as there’s sun to recharge the system.
    __
    4. When the grid power returns, the backup inverter shuts down and the main inverter starts up – all seamlessly.
    __
    It’s certainly paid for itself.

    and as a reminder, 62MW in 16 years…

    That’s some 62,000 kWhrs over the first 15 years which is, as they say in Maine, ‘wicked good!’

    If the SERC program existed for that entire time, that would be about $19,000+

  136. 136.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 7:49 pm

    @Cliff in NH:

    As a simple exercise in math, compare the current return on a US Treasury bond VS the return on a solar system of equivalent value. (consider also the solar system pays till it wears out – No silicon based system has yet ‘worn out’.)

  137. 137.

    Cliff in NH

    June 7, 2011 at 9:12 pm

    HAHAHA.

    No answers to factual real world examples, even hours later.

    HaHaHa!!!

  138. 138.

    mclaren

    June 7, 2011 at 9:49 pm

    @vor:

    My guess is they wind up with an exclusion zone around the plant likd Chernobyl.

    And if they do, know what will happen?

    Wildlife will flourish. Species long thought extinct will make a dramatic comeback. Wildflowers, birds, animals, insects will all proliferate wildly.

    How horrible!

    How unthinkable!

    How horrendous!

  139. 139.

    Caz

    June 8, 2011 at 12:55 am

    They recovered from two atom bomb attacks, so I’m sure they’ll recover from this lesser nuclear event. They’ll be the same, and it won’t take as long as you think.

    That being said, they sure fucked up! With a country that size, you can’t afford to have nuclear plants spreading radiation all over the place. It’s not like the U.S. were we can detonate actual nuclear weapons in a desert 500 miles from the nearest population center.

    I hate to say this, but at least this nuclear disaster will curb their out-of-control and immoral fishing practices for at least one year. They kill dolphins by the hundreds every year, they kill as many whales as they can get their harpoons on, they kill sharks just to cut of their fins to make soup. They are the worst destroyer of ocean ecosystems on the planet, so at least the sea will be healthier this year because of Japan’s catastrophe.

    They would literally hunt numerous species of fish intentionally to extinction, and then just move on to the next species. Abhorrent. I’m sorry that people are suffering from a nuclear radiation disaster over there, but environmentalists should be happy that the fish and mammals in the sea may survive for another year.

  140. 140.

    DPirate

    June 9, 2011 at 4:43 am

    According to the latest estimates, 770,000 terabequerels…

    …which, as everyone knows, is more than +1?

Comments are closed.

Primary Sidebar

Image by GB in the HC (5/23)

Recent Comments

  • Kayla Rudbek on How about some springtime respite? (May 24, 2025 @ 12:13am)
  • Lynn Dee on How about some springtime respite? (May 23, 2025 @ 11:47pm)
  • tommyspoon on Why Raw Story (and other outlets) Make Me Crazy (May 23, 2025 @ 11:45pm)
  • Another Scott on Open Thread: TFG’s Memecoin Dinner Grift Grab (May 23, 2025 @ 11:44pm)
  • Buggrit on How about some springtime respite? (May 23, 2025 @ 11:32pm)

PA Supreme Court At Risk

Donate

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year
View by Past Author

Featuring

Medium Cool
Artists in Our Midst
Authors in Our Midst
War in Ukraine
Donate to Razom for Ukraine

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal

Meetups

Upcoming Ohio Meetup May 17
5/11 Post about the May 17 Ohio Meetup

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Submit Photos to On the Road
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Links)
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Posts)
Fix Nyms with Apostrophes

Hands Off! – Denver, San Diego & Austin

Social Media

Balloon Juice
WaterGirl
TaMara
John Cole
DougJ (aka NYT Pitchbot)
Betty Cracker
Tom Levenson
David Anderson
Major Major Major Major
DougJ NYT Pitchbot
mistermix

Keeping Track

Legal Challenges (Lawfare)
Republicans Fleeing Town Halls (TPM)
21 Letters (to Borrow or Steal)
Search Donations from a Brand

PA Supreme Court At Risk

Donate

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2025 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!