I think that's a very charitable way of describing opponents of nuclear power. I would say that those people believe we should just use less energy, and have fewer people, and if that means a lower quality of life and something something population reduction, well sustainability is the main thing in the end so whatever means we use to get there...
Opponents of nuclear power aren't anti-nuclear, they're anti-progress.
This outlook makes no sense. If 'anti-progress' or population control were a goal for misguided environmental groups, it would make more sense to simply do / say nothing.
Every cause picks up people jumping on the bandwagon, but they have no intent of heading to the same destination.
Various "environmentalist" causes have long suffered from picking up all sorts of utterly crazy - and loud - secondary ideas. The whole "we must use less and expect to have less thing" is one particularly irritating one.
EDIT: We probably should have fewer people, but the idiotic thing is that history shows us that we can accomplish that by doing nothing. Provided standard-of-living continues to climb, people have fewer children all on their own and population stabilizes. Dick Smith is on my shitlist because he went to some effort to stir up "the population debate" in Australia which was one of the most idiotic things we'd had in our national discourse in a while.
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JuliusCaptain of Serenityon my shipRegistered Userregular
I think that's a very charitable way of describing opponents of nuclear power. I would say that those people believe we should just use less energy, and have fewer people, and if that means a lower quality of life and something something population reduction, well sustainability is the main thing in the end so whatever means we use to get there...
Opponents of nuclear power aren't anti-nuclear, they're anti-progress.
This outlook makes no sense. If 'anti-progress' or population control were a goal for misguided environmental groups, it would make more sense to simply do / say nothing.
Every cause picks up people jumping on the bandwagon, but they have no intent of heading to the same destination.
Various "environmentalist" causes have long suffered from picking up all sorts of utterly crazy - and loud - secondary ideas. The whole "we must use less and expect to have less thing" is one particularly irritating one.
EDIT: We probably should have fewer people, but the idiotic thing is that history shows us that we can accomplish that by doing nothing. Provided standard-of-living continues to climb, people have fewer children all on their own and population stabilizes. Dick Smith is on my shitlist because he went to some effort to stir up "the population debate" in Australia which was one of the most idiotic things we'd had in our national discourse in a while.
It's pretty retarded since a big problem facing us now and in the near future is the result of us getting less children. Baby-boomers are going to require more and more care in the future and there are not a lot of young people.
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HacksawJ. Duggan Esq.Wrestler at LawRegistered Userregular
I think that's a very charitable way of describing opponents of nuclear power. I would say that those people believe we should just use less energy, and have fewer people, and if that means a lower quality of life and something something population reduction, well sustainability is the main thing in the end so whatever means we use to get there...
Opponents of nuclear power aren't anti-nuclear, they're anti-progress.
This outlook makes no sense. If 'anti-progress' or population control were a goal for misguided environmental groups, it would make more sense to simply do / say nothing.
Every cause picks up people jumping on the bandwagon, but they have no intent of heading to the same destination.
Various "environmentalist" causes have long suffered from picking up all sorts of utterly crazy - and loud - secondary ideas. The whole "we must use less and expect to have less thing" is one particularly irritating one.
EDIT: We probably should have fewer people, but the idiotic thing is that history shows us that we can accomplish that by doing nothing. Provided standard-of-living continues to climb, people have fewer children all on their own and population stabilizes. Dick Smith is on my shitlist because he went to some effort to stir up "the population debate" in Australia which was one of the most idiotic things we'd had in our national discourse in a while.
It's pretty retarded since a big problem facing us now and in the near future is the result of us getting less children. Baby-boomers are going to require more and more care in the future and there are not a lot of young people.
Robots can't do that sort of work. Outside of science fiction.
I'm not sure that there's a lack of young people, so much as a lack of money to pay them to become care assistants. There's lots of unemployed young people.
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JuliusCaptain of Serenityon my shipRegistered Userregular
Robots can't do that sort of work. Outside of science fiction.
I'm not sure that there's a lack of young people, so much as a lack of money to pay them to become care assistants. There's lots of unemployed young people.
There's enough young people to conceivably meet the current demand, but the baby-boomers for the most part require little care at the moment still.
Robots can't do that sort of work. Outside of science fiction.
I'm not sure that there's a lack of young people, so much as a lack of money to pay them to become care assistants. There's lots of unemployed young people.
There's enough young people to conceivably meet the current demand, but the baby-boomers for the most part require little care at the moment still.
Also robots are not the only means of more efficiently taking care of people, specialized tools help also. The idea that you need a constantly expanding population to continue to increase your economic prosperity is an odd idea, most of the benefits in the modern world are due to industrialization and other efficiency improvements.
If you want to do it CHEAPLY then you need a large workforce of desperate people.
He's a shy overambitious dog-catcher on the wrong side of the law. She's an orphaned psychic mercenary with the power to bend men's minds. They fight crime!
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JuliusCaptain of Serenityon my shipRegistered Userregular
Robots can't do that sort of work. Outside of science fiction.
I'm not sure that there's a lack of young people, so much as a lack of money to pay them to become care assistants. There's lots of unemployed young people.
There's enough young people to conceivably meet the current demand, but the baby-boomers for the most part require little care at the moment still.
Also robots are not the only means of more efficiently taking care of people, specialized tools help also. The idea that you need a constantly expanding population to continue to increase your economic prosperity is an odd idea, most of the benefits in the modern world are due to industrialization and other efficiency improvements.
If you want to do it CHEAPLY then you need a large workforce of desperate people.
yeah, much like with clean energy we really need to focus right now on getting more efficient and basically do it right because we've got enough time to do it easily.
Sadly, the mindset seems to be that we wait till the last second to do anything.
Robots can't do that sort of work. Outside of science fiction.
I'm not sure that there's a lack of young people, so much as a lack of money to pay them to become care assistants. There's lots of unemployed young people.
Robots can't take care of old people? I'm pretty sure robots can humanely kill, seperate and process meat along every step, up to the final step of adding preservatives and green food coloring
Nuclear, solar, geo, hydro and hydrogen have all been discussed, so I'ma throw in a new angle:
So does anyone have knowledge of what fusion reactors are looking like these days?
Has there been any actual progress in getting a Tokamak or other reactor design into something other than a pre-alpha/don't erase that chalkboard stage of development?
Or is it still the same situation we've been in for the past 40 years of "give us 5 more years and we'll have a working reactor to demonstrate to the Nobel prize committee"?
Raekreu on
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
Nuclear, solar, geo, hydro and hydrogen have all been discussed, so I'ma throw in a new angle:
So does anyone have knowledge of what fusion reactors are looking like these days?
Has there been any actual progress in getting a Tokamak or other reactor design into something other than a pre-alpha/don't erase that chalkboard stage of development?
Or is it still the same situation we've been in for the past 40 years of "give us 5 more years and we'll have a working reactor to demonstrate to the Nobel prize committee"?
I'm pretty sure we're nowhere near fusion being viable. There was a promising project out in California, but Congress nuked its funding like five years ago.
Nuclear, solar, geo, hydro and hydrogen have all been discussed, so I'ma throw in a new angle:
So does anyone have knowledge of what fusion reactors are looking like these days?
Has there been any actual progress in getting a Tokamak or other reactor design into something other than a pre-alpha/don't erase that chalkboard stage of development?
Or is it still the same situation we've been in for the past 40 years of "give us 5 more years and we'll have a working reactor to demonstrate to the Nobel prize committee"?
I'm pretty sure we're nowhere near fusion being viable. There was a promising project out in California, but Congress nuked its funding like five years ago.
Bolded for applied physics wordplay.
That's a shame, though...I guess fusion is like the ultimate vaporware.
There's a pretty big EU project on it ITER, but at this point the target date for the first plasma is 2019...and 2026 to actually generate power. If they have power out by 2035, I'd be amazed.
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
I firmly believe that someone somewhere will figure fusion out, within the next hundred years if we can keep from having some horrible catastrophe probably, but right now it's just not there.
Yeah, it's not that people are ignoring fusing, it's just not viable at this point in time.
We're probably stuck waiting for one of the following:
1) The vast majority of the voting population to start demanding that our political leaders do something (I'm very cynical about this happening). By vast I mean, that the demand for it is so high that refusal to do anything would be politically toxic.
2) We hit peak oil (quite possible at this point).
3) The shit finally hits the fan when it comes to adverse weather changes that result from global warming (another that's quite possible).
4) Several people with shit loads of money and influence decide we're going to get some alternative energy going to replace fossil fuels and anyone that is against it can go right the fuck off. This is a mixed bag, I'm skeptical that we'll see someone take the initiative because it's good for mankind, but I could see someone eying the bottom line jumping right in if they think they can pull off the winning move by doing so.
Public transit is another area where we could help cut down on the global warming issue and it has the bonuses of creating jobs and making our transportation infrastructure more bearable. I'd imagine that it might be much more appealing once we have our alternative to fossil fuels lined up and being transition too since certain aspects of public transportation require a source of power (I'm leaning towards high speed rail mostly, with some bus route to supplement it).
I'm not sure if we're in a really good spot to deal with the current fleet of cars. I'm sure getting it over to hybrid vehicles would help but I don't think that's an ideal set up. I'm not sure how practical electric cars are at this point, IIRC some can get over 100 miles in before needing a recharge but I can see a number of situations where that just isn't ideal because an individual needs to take freqquent long distance trips to areas where public transit isn't ideal for them (to sparse to justify a subway and to have covered with convenient bus shuttling [as in short wait times]). Perhaps if we get a decent public transit system in this country, long distance trips with electric cars might be feasible since traffic won't be as god awful as it frequently is now, to the point where you can rest assured that won't get a scenario where someone's car battery runs empty because congestion trapped them in an area where they couldn't get out to recharge it. Also being fairly familiar with the interstate, giving how god awful it can be at times, right now it's just better to sit in the car for 2-4 hours if that means you get to your destination without stopping. Arguably, one would probably be better if they took a break from driving every hour and did some stretches, which I'm sure the current electric car technology would require since you'd probably need to recharge you car about every hour.
$0.02 and an anecdote on hydrogen technologies & fuel cells:
I'm a mechanical engineering undergrad, and one of the electives I could choose to take in the fall revolves around fuel cells. Since I'm not terribly interested in energy systems, I didn't sign up for the class. I did, however, have a conversation with a few friends who have taken the class. One guy who took it said that on the first day, the professor straight out tells all the students that hydrogen is a dead end technology. It will go nowhere, because hydrogen is a gas which is:
1. Too difficult to deal with - as H2 is one of the smallest molecules in existence, it readily diffuses through most materials. This is what we call a bad thing, because the effects on storage vessel and pipeline wall material properties by having them impregnated with hydrogen tend to be detrimental [they usually become much more brittle]. H2 also needs to be kept under pressure and/or cryogenically cooled, which consumes a lot of energy even when it's just being stored; imagine the electrical cost of trying to keep hundreds of miles of pipeline that cold, or at least the problems with supplying every gas station in the US with the refrigeration equipment.
2. It's too expensive. See: cost of maintaining such a low temperature in so many things, exotic materials required to minimize diffusion rate and its effects at crygogenic temperatures, producing enough of it period, etc.
3. There are already better alternatives. By using processes that produce natural gasses (like methane) or alcohols (like methanol) that are far more stable, easier to store & transport, and easier to utilize in both fuel cell and combustion chambers, hydrogen is beaten by cost and usability on all fronts. One of the big reasons hydrogen fuel cells even became common was because of the demand from NASA. It's rather convenient when your power source produces drinking water, thus lightening your spacecraft.
Fuel cells in general aren't a bad idea: a petroleum fuel cell, if it can be developed at low enough cost, would be incredibly efficient compared to combustion (and would take advantage of the incredible energy density of petroleum fuels). But for "clean" technologies, advances in batteries, supercapacitors, and artificially catalyzed fuels outstrip them.
So does anyone have knowledge of what fusion reactors are looking like these days?
There was a recent Q & A with some MIT fusion researchers on Slashdot that is relatively comprehensive on what the current main problems are with fusion and what is a realistic timeframe for commercially viable fusion (about 40 years at current funding levels, maybe as little as 10 years with unlimited funds).
So does anyone have knowledge of what fusion reactors are looking like these days?
There was a recent Q & A with some MIT fusion researchers on Slashdot that is relatively comprehensive on what the current main problems are with fusion and what is a realistic timeframe for commercially viable fusion (about 40 years at current funding levels, maybe as little as 10 years with unlimited funds).
The interesting thing there is the comment that we are funding fusion at below the level that the DOE said would never lead to a reactor and are still slowing dragging ourselves towards one. Imagine how well we would have done if we had spent money on this rather than wasting it.
$0.02 and an anecdote on hydrogen technologies & fuel cells:
I'm a mechanical engineering undergrad, and one of the electives I could choose to take in the fall revolves around fuel cells. Since I'm not terribly interested in energy systems, I didn't sign up for the class. I did, however, have a conversation with a few friends who have taken the class. One guy who took it said that on the first day, the professor straight out tells all the students that hydrogen is a dead end technology. It will go nowhere, because hydrogen is a gas which is:
1. Too difficult to deal with - as H2 is one of the smallest molecules in existence, it readily diffuses through most materials. This is what we call a bad thing, because the effects on storage vessel and pipeline wall material properties by having them impregnated with hydrogen tend to be detrimental [they usually become much more brittle]. H2 also needs to be kept under pressure and/or cryogenically cooled, which consumes a lot of energy even when it's just being stored; imagine the electrical cost of trying to keep hundreds of miles of pipeline that cold, or at least the problems with supplying every gas station in the US with the refrigeration equipment.
2. It's too expensive. See: cost of maintaining such a low temperature in so many things, exotic materials required to minimize diffusion rate and its effects at crygogenic temperatures, producing enough of it period, etc.
3. There are already better alternatives. By using processes that produce natural gasses (like methane) or alcohols (like methanol) that are far more stable, easier to store & transport, and easier to utilize in both fuel cell and combustion chambers, hydrogen is beaten by cost and usability on all fronts. One of the big reasons hydrogen fuel cells even became common was because of the demand from NASA. It's rather convenient when your power source produces drinking water, thus lightening your spacecraft.
Fuel cells in general aren't a bad idea: a petroleum fuel cell, if it can be developed at low enough cost, would be incredibly efficient compared to combustion (and would take advantage of the incredible energy density of petroleum fuels). But for "clean" technologies, advances in batteries, supercapacitors, and artificially catalyzed fuels outstrip them.
SpaceX, Elon musk's rocket company, uses kerosene instead of liquid H2 because of the difficulties and expenses of dealing with it even in highly controlled world of rocketry. The idea that people would drive around with it, even without the cryogenics, in their cars is crazy.
$0.02 and an anecdote on hydrogen technologies & fuel cells:
I'm a mechanical engineering undergrad, and one of the electives I could choose to take in the fall revolves around fuel cells. Since I'm not terribly interested in energy systems, I didn't sign up for the class. I did, however, have a conversation with a few friends who have taken the class. One guy who took it said that on the first day, the professor straight out tells all the students that hydrogen is a dead end technology. It will go nowhere, because hydrogen is a gas which is:
1. Too difficult to deal with - as H2 is one of the smallest molecules in existence, it readily diffuses through most materials. This is what we call a bad thing, because the effects on storage vessel and pipeline wall material properties by having them impregnated with hydrogen tend to be detrimental [they usually become much more brittle]. H2 also needs to be kept under pressure and/or cryogenically cooled, which consumes a lot of energy even when it's just being stored; imagine the electrical cost of trying to keep hundreds of miles of pipeline that cold, or at least the problems with supplying every gas station in the US with the refrigeration equipment.
2. It's too expensive. See: cost of maintaining such a low temperature in so many things, exotic materials required to minimize diffusion rate and its effects at crygogenic temperatures, producing enough of it period, etc.
3. There are already better alternatives. By using processes that produce natural gasses (like methane) or alcohols (like methanol) that are far more stable, easier to store & transport, and easier to utilize in both fuel cell and combustion chambers, hydrogen is beaten by cost and usability on all fronts. One of the big reasons hydrogen fuel cells even became common was because of the demand from NASA. It's rather convenient when your power source produces drinking water, thus lightening your spacecraft.
Fuel cells in general aren't a bad idea: a petroleum fuel cell, if it can be developed at low enough cost, would be incredibly efficient compared to combustion (and would take advantage of the incredible energy density of petroleum fuels). But for "clean" technologies, advances in batteries, supercapacitors, and artificially catalyzed fuels outstrip them.
All of these are very good reasons why the technology is bad. But the real kicker for me is that the energy economy is just totally off. Even if none of those tech problems you mentioned were present I still wouldn't really be in favour of it.
Its not an energy source. Its a giant battery. Which means that if you replaced every existing car with a hydrogen powered car, we would need to come up with more energy than we currently use to power these cars. One reason we use hydrocarbon fuels is because they have a really large energy content. If all of a sudden we decide not to power our vehicles with these fuels, we need substantially more power generation than we have. Like, multiples. And thats just to replace the cars we have today, let alone what we will have in 5/10/20+ years.
I like the idea of biofuels. They are carbon neutral. I don't really like Corn ethanol, though.
$0.02 and an anecdote on hydrogen technologies & fuel cells:
I'm a mechanical engineering undergrad, and one of the electives I could choose to take in the fall revolves around fuel cells. Since I'm not terribly interested in energy systems, I didn't sign up for the class. I did, however, have a conversation with a few friends who have taken the class. One guy who took it said that on the first day, the professor straight out tells all the students that hydrogen is a dead end technology. It will go nowhere, because hydrogen is a gas which is:
1. Too difficult to deal with - as H2 is one of the smallest molecules in existence, it readily diffuses through most materials. This is what we call a bad thing, because the effects on storage vessel and pipeline wall material properties by having them impregnated with hydrogen tend to be detrimental [they usually become much more brittle]. H2 also needs to be kept under pressure and/or cryogenically cooled, which consumes a lot of energy even when it's just being stored; imagine the electrical cost of trying to keep hundreds of miles of pipeline that cold, or at least the problems with supplying every gas station in the US with the refrigeration equipment.
2. It's too expensive. See: cost of maintaining such a low temperature in so many things, exotic materials required to minimize diffusion rate and its effects at crygogenic temperatures, producing enough of it period, etc.
3. There are already better alternatives. By using processes that produce natural gasses (like methane) or alcohols (like methanol) that are far more stable, easier to store & transport, and easier to utilize in both fuel cell and combustion chambers, hydrogen is beaten by cost and usability on all fronts. One of the big reasons hydrogen fuel cells even became common was because of the demand from NASA. It's rather convenient when your power source produces drinking water, thus lightening your spacecraft.
Fuel cells in general aren't a bad idea: a petroleum fuel cell, if it can be developed at low enough cost, would be incredibly efficient compared to combustion (and would take advantage of the incredible energy density of petroleum fuels). But for "clean" technologies, advances in batteries, supercapacitors, and artificially catalyzed fuels outstrip them.
All of these are very good reasons why the technology is bad. But the real kicker for me is that the energy economy is just totally off. Even if none of those tech problems you mentioned were present I still wouldn't really be in favour of it.
Its not an energy source. Its a giant battery. Which means that if you replaced every existing car with a hydrogen powered car, we would need to come up with more energy than we currently use to power these cars. One reason we use hydrocarbon fuels is because they have a really large energy content. If all of a sudden we decide not to power our vehicles with these fuels, we need substantially more power generation than we have. Like, multiples. And thats just to replace the cars we have today, let alone what we will have in 5/10/20+ years.
I like the idea of biofuels. They are carbon neutral. I don't really like Corn ethanol, though.
Exactly! That is actually one of the bigger hurdles in converting away from fossil fuels: you need to run your cars on something else, and you have to manufacture it. There are a huge number of different approaches, like algal/bacterial biofuels (not sure if those were oils or alcohols), direct CO2 to hydrocarbon catalysis, or stored electrical energy. The main problem with each is you need to put in at least 1.5 times or so the energy you desire to use as a fuel to account for efficiency losses; the power grid would need to effectively double in size to handle it.
$0.02 and an anecdote on hydrogen technologies & fuel cells:
I'm a mechanical engineering undergrad, and one of the electives I could choose to take in the fall revolves around fuel cells. Since I'm not terribly interested in energy systems, I didn't sign up for the class. I did, however, have a conversation with a few friends who have taken the class. One guy who took it said that on the first day, the professor straight out tells all the students that hydrogen is a dead end technology. It will go nowhere, because hydrogen is a gas which is:
1. Too difficult to deal with - as H2 is one of the smallest molecules in existence, it readily diffuses through most materials. This is what we call a bad thing, because the effects on storage vessel and pipeline wall material properties by having them impregnated with hydrogen tend to be detrimental [they usually become much more brittle]. H2 also needs to be kept under pressure and/or cryogenically cooled, which consumes a lot of energy even when it's just being stored; imagine the electrical cost of trying to keep hundreds of miles of pipeline that cold, or at least the problems with supplying every gas station in the US with the refrigeration equipment.
2. It's too expensive. See: cost of maintaining such a low temperature in so many things, exotic materials required to minimize diffusion rate and its effects at crygogenic temperatures, producing enough of it period, etc.
3. There are already better alternatives. By using processes that produce natural gasses (like methane) or alcohols (like methanol) that are far more stable, easier to store & transport, and easier to utilize in both fuel cell and combustion chambers, hydrogen is beaten by cost and usability on all fronts. One of the big reasons hydrogen fuel cells even became common was because of the demand from NASA. It's rather convenient when your power source produces drinking water, thus lightening your spacecraft.
Fuel cells in general aren't a bad idea: a petroleum fuel cell, if it can be developed at low enough cost, would be incredibly efficient compared to combustion (and would take advantage of the incredible energy density of petroleum fuels). But for "clean" technologies, advances in batteries, supercapacitors, and artificially catalyzed fuels outstrip them.
All of these are very good reasons why the technology is bad. But the real kicker for me is that the energy economy is just totally off. Even if none of those tech problems you mentioned were present I still wouldn't really be in favour of it.
Its not an energy source. Its a giant battery. Which means that if you replaced every existing car with a hydrogen powered car, we would need to come up with more energy than we currently use to power these cars. One reason we use hydrocarbon fuels is because they have a really large energy content. If all of a sudden we decide not to power our vehicles with these fuels, we need substantially more power generation than we have. Like, multiples. And thats just to replace the cars we have today, let alone what we will have in 5/10/20+ years.
I like the idea of biofuels. They are carbon neutral. I don't really like Corn ethanol, though.
Exactly! That is actually one of the bigger hurdles in converting away from fossil fuels: you need to run your cars on something else, and you have to manufacture it. There are a huge number of different approaches, like algal/bacterial biofuels (not sure if those were oils or alcohols), direct CO2 to hydrocarbon catalysis, or stored electrical energy. The main problem with each is you need to put in at least 1.5 times or so the energy you desire to use as a fuel to account for efficiency losses; the power grid would need to effectively double in size to handle it.
Well, hydrogen fuel cells would be very efficient. More so than internal combustion engines, so it wouldn't be quite that bad. Still, it makes a lot more sense just to use a fuel which is shelf stable. Hydrogen can't even really be stockpiled in case of emergency.
That's true for all fuel cells though, not just hydrogen - it's a much more efficient energy conversion device than any combustion reaction. I am by no means debating their efficiency. Most large-scale fuel cell units installed in buildings use the existing natural gas lines and the gas therein as their fuel, since they're generally more compact than gas turbines as well as a bit more efficient.
There is another problem with hydrogen as well: while it is a more energetic fuel by mass, it is far less dense as a liquid than gasoline. This means gasoline is still more than 6x as energy dense as liquid hydrogen, and diesel is something like 7x.
As we munch on takeout Subway sandwiches, a plate-glass window is the only thing separating us from the adjacent lab, which contains a glowing caldera of “plasma” three times as hot as the surface of the sun.
As we munch on takeout Subway sandwiches, a plate-glass window is the only thing separating us from the adjacent lab, which contains a glowing caldera of “plasma” three times as hot as the surface of the sun.
While cool, I'm pretty sure that that is an incinerator, just a really hot one. Although, it may actually make solid carbon instead of Co2...
edit - Ahh, ok, the reaction gives off hydrogen and CO, which you then make into methane and burn. It still makes CO2, although it is an excellent way to dispose of waste
Germany shutting down nuclear power because of Fukushima is one of the dumbest things Germany has done in the last ten years. Like, number one is the balls stupid way they set up the Euro and then this.
Fucking pointless NIMBY bullshit.
See, we got 1986 Chernobyl and 2011 Fukushima. The assumption was that nuclear power is safe if handled properly. We now know that isn't the case, with two major incidents in 25 years. If you do the statistics you can expect four major incidents in a century or about fourty each millenia. It means we render this planet uninhabitable in a relatively short ime if we continue this. Its playing russian roulette with your country.
Both of those examples are of nuclear power not being handled properly, so I repeat,
NIMBY.
Bullshit.
It pains me to agree with ACSIS, but... A system that can no tolerate human error without catastrophic consequence should probably be thought about more thoroughly than "lol user error"
It's not always about the possibility of an accident, but also about the severity of its consequences.
Nuclear, except for chernobyl, has a safer track record than just about every form of fossil fuel in terms of environmental damage, and it has grown leaps and bounds safer with every iteration. Fukushimi was hit with a combination of user error and nearly the most cataclysmic thing that can happen without involving extraterrestrial threats like asteroids, and still caused less damage than an exploding oil refinery would.
Every day coal puts more radiation into the environment than nuclear does each year, and the newest reactor designs cannot melt down. Yeah sure you can say "Well they said the titanic wouldn't sink", but nobody would have denied that it was physically possible for boats to sink.
Saying a pebble bed reactor cant melt down isn't like saying the titanic can't sink, it's like saying the titanic can't fly
So uh... what do you do with all the radioactive waste that keeps building up?
0
AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
Germany shutting down nuclear power because of Fukushima is one of the dumbest things Germany has done in the last ten years. Like, number one is the balls stupid way they set up the Euro and then this.
Fucking pointless NIMBY bullshit.
See, we got 1986 Chernobyl and 2011 Fukushima. The assumption was that nuclear power is safe if handled properly. We now know that isn't the case, with two major incidents in 25 years. If you do the statistics you can expect four major incidents in a century or about fourty each millenia. It means we render this planet uninhabitable in a relatively short ime if we continue this. Its playing russian roulette with your country.
Both of those examples are of nuclear power not being handled properly, so I repeat,
NIMBY.
Bullshit.
It pains me to agree with ACSIS, but... A system that can no tolerate human error without catastrophic consequence should probably be thought about more thoroughly than "lol user error"
It's not always about the possibility of an accident, but also about the severity of its consequences.
Nuclear, except for chernobyl, has a safer track record than just about every form of fossil fuel in terms of environmental damage, and it has grown leaps and bounds safer with every iteration. Fukushimi was hit with a combination of user error and nearly the most cataclysmic thing that can happen without involving extraterrestrial threats like asteroids, and still caused less damage than an exploding oil refinery would.
Every day coal puts more radiation into the environment than nuclear does each year, and the newest reactor designs cannot melt down. Yeah sure you can say "Well they said the titanic wouldn't sink", but nobody would have denied that it was physically possible for boats to sink.
Saying a pebble bed reactor cant melt down isn't like saying the titanic can't sink, it's like saying the titanic can't fly
So uh... what do you do with all the radioactive waste that keeps building up?
It's such a tiny tiny amount of space that you sacrifice, below some mountain in the desert. (The dryer the better, and the further away from a vaultline the better). It does add significantly to the $/kWh of course.
Germany shutting down nuclear power because of Fukushima is one of the dumbest things Germany has done in the last ten years. Like, number one is the balls stupid way they set up the Euro and then this.
Fucking pointless NIMBY bullshit.
See, we got 1986 Chernobyl and 2011 Fukushima. The assumption was that nuclear power is safe if handled properly. We now know that isn't the case, with two major incidents in 25 years. If you do the statistics you can expect four major incidents in a century or about fourty each millenia. It means we render this planet uninhabitable in a relatively short ime if we continue this. Its playing russian roulette with your country.
Both of those examples are of nuclear power not being handled properly, so I repeat,
NIMBY.
Bullshit.
It pains me to agree with ACSIS, but... A system that can no tolerate human error without catastrophic consequence should probably be thought about more thoroughly than "lol user error"
It's not always about the possibility of an accident, but also about the severity of its consequences.
Nuclear, except for chernobyl, has a safer track record than just about every form of fossil fuel in terms of environmental damage, and it has grown leaps and bounds safer with every iteration. Fukushimi was hit with a combination of user error and nearly the most cataclysmic thing that can happen without involving extraterrestrial threats like asteroids, and still caused less damage than an exploding oil refinery would.
Every day coal puts more radiation into the environment than nuclear does each year, and the newest reactor designs cannot melt down. Yeah sure you can say "Well they said the titanic wouldn't sink", but nobody would have denied that it was physically possible for boats to sink.
Saying a pebble bed reactor cant melt down isn't like saying the titanic can't sink, it's like saying the titanic can't fly
So uh... what do you do with all the radioactive waste that keeps building up?
Spray it into the atmosphere.
Wait, no, that's what we're doing right now with coal.
So uh... what do you do with all the radioactive waste that keeps building up?
The most important factor here is that the amount of waste per year is very, very small (especially in comparison to a coal-fired plant - it's just that the coal plant automatically deposits most of it's waste in the sky).
Most of it can be safely tucked underground, some of it can be recycled, and if the build-up really became a problem (we somehow started to produce more than could be safely buried) we could literally shoot it into outer space (reasonably cheap to do these days with a basic rocket, especially when you consider that each trip could handle multiple years worth of waste from a single facility).
I suspect it will be quite some time before we start running out of places to bury the stuff and by that point, I wouldn't be surprised if we made advances that allowed us to render the waste even safer for the environment. Or by the time it can become an issue, we'll have moved on to the next best thing.
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
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HacksawJ. Duggan Esq.Wrestler at LawRegistered Userregular
Hydrogen will have its use in the future; it will be on site generation, temporary storage, and immediate consumption to provide energy back to the grid.
We're not going to run out uranium. There's a lot of crap mostly pushed by anti-nuclear people that we would totally run out of uranium. It is a distortion of the truth at best, since it's based on ideas like "we won't reprocess any fuel rods ever" and "all the uranium in the world we currently mine, is all we will ever mine".
So, today, the final signatories for the Paris agreements on climate change made their commitments.
All in all, we have 171 nations now bound to the treaty.
This is pretty significant for two reasons:
1) It was never certain that we were going to get many people on board, and initial discussions looked discouraging. This demonstrates to some degree that there is agreement over the seriousness of the issue & enough overlap of interests to cooperate.
2) If we can hit the targets, the signatories involved should be more than enough to peak at a 2~ degree warming increase. Thing should stabilize and hopefully begin a decline to normal temperatures after that.
Weeee! Yay! When Do I Get My Pony???
Just so everyone is aware, because I have increasingly received an impression that many people are not aware of what this means, we're talking about significant draw downs in both extraction & fossil fuel use worldwide. Canada, for example, is looking to reduce emissions by 30% by 2030. That is going to hurt (America has yet to set a target, but must do so by 2020. And the longer the wait, the harsher the draw down is going to be).
The good news is that we might not break the planet afterall; but we're all going to have to stick together for this thing and probably shoulder some pretty hard times. Whatever politicians & celebrities have to say about it, no, industry is probably not going to cope well with having to somehow stop producing 30% (or better) of it's least visible pollutants, and transitioning over to sustainable energy is unlikely to be fun even if it's better in the long run.
Also, try to subliminally indoctrinate your neighbors into getting comfortable with the idea of nuclear power, because while the N word wasn't used in Paris, we're very likely going to need it.
Posts
Every cause picks up people jumping on the bandwagon, but they have no intent of heading to the same destination.
Various "environmentalist" causes have long suffered from picking up all sorts of utterly crazy - and loud - secondary ideas. The whole "we must use less and expect to have less thing" is one particularly irritating one.
EDIT: We probably should have fewer people, but the idiotic thing is that history shows us that we can accomplish that by doing nothing. Provided standard-of-living continues to climb, people have fewer children all on their own and population stabilizes. Dick Smith is on my shitlist because he went to some effort to stir up "the population debate" in Australia which was one of the most idiotic things we'd had in our national discourse in a while.
It's pretty retarded since a big problem facing us now and in the near future is the result of us getting less children. Baby-boomers are going to require more and more care in the future and there are not a lot of young people.
Robots.
Robots can't do that sort of work. Outside of science fiction.
I'm not sure that there's a lack of young people, so much as a lack of money to pay them to become care assistants. There's lots of unemployed young people.
There's enough young people to conceivably meet the current demand, but the baby-boomers for the most part require little care at the moment still.
Also robots are not the only means of more efficiently taking care of people, specialized tools help also. The idea that you need a constantly expanding population to continue to increase your economic prosperity is an odd idea, most of the benefits in the modern world are due to industrialization and other efficiency improvements.
If you want to do it CHEAPLY then you need a large workforce of desperate people.
yeah, much like with clean energy we really need to focus right now on getting more efficient and basically do it right because we've got enough time to do it easily.
Sadly, the mindset seems to be that we wait till the last second to do anything.
Robots can't take care of old people? I'm pretty sure robots can humanely kill, seperate and process meat along every step, up to the final step of adding preservatives and green food coloring
Yes robots can "take care" of the boomers for us
So does anyone have knowledge of what fusion reactors are looking like these days?
Has there been any actual progress in getting a Tokamak or other reactor design into something other than a pre-alpha/don't erase that chalkboard stage of development?
Or is it still the same situation we've been in for the past 40 years of "give us 5 more years and we'll have a working reactor to demonstrate to the Nobel prize committee"?
I'm pretty sure we're nowhere near fusion being viable. There was a promising project out in California, but Congress nuked its funding like five years ago.
Bolded for applied physics wordplay.
That's a shame, though...I guess fusion is like the ultimate vaporware.
We're probably stuck waiting for one of the following:
1) The vast majority of the voting population to start demanding that our political leaders do something (I'm very cynical about this happening). By vast I mean, that the demand for it is so high that refusal to do anything would be politically toxic.
2) We hit peak oil (quite possible at this point).
3) The shit finally hits the fan when it comes to adverse weather changes that result from global warming (another that's quite possible).
4) Several people with shit loads of money and influence decide we're going to get some alternative energy going to replace fossil fuels and anyone that is against it can go right the fuck off. This is a mixed bag, I'm skeptical that we'll see someone take the initiative because it's good for mankind, but I could see someone eying the bottom line jumping right in if they think they can pull off the winning move by doing so.
Public transit is another area where we could help cut down on the global warming issue and it has the bonuses of creating jobs and making our transportation infrastructure more bearable. I'd imagine that it might be much more appealing once we have our alternative to fossil fuels lined up and being transition too since certain aspects of public transportation require a source of power (I'm leaning towards high speed rail mostly, with some bus route to supplement it).
I'm not sure if we're in a really good spot to deal with the current fleet of cars. I'm sure getting it over to hybrid vehicles would help but I don't think that's an ideal set up. I'm not sure how practical electric cars are at this point, IIRC some can get over 100 miles in before needing a recharge but I can see a number of situations where that just isn't ideal because an individual needs to take freqquent long distance trips to areas where public transit isn't ideal for them (to sparse to justify a subway and to have covered with convenient bus shuttling [as in short wait times]). Perhaps if we get a decent public transit system in this country, long distance trips with electric cars might be feasible since traffic won't be as god awful as it frequently is now, to the point where you can rest assured that won't get a scenario where someone's car battery runs empty because congestion trapped them in an area where they couldn't get out to recharge it. Also being fairly familiar with the interstate, giving how god awful it can be at times, right now it's just better to sit in the car for 2-4 hours if that means you get to your destination without stopping. Arguably, one would probably be better if they took a break from driving every hour and did some stretches, which I'm sure the current electric car technology would require since you'd probably need to recharge you car about every hour.
battletag: Millin#1360
Nice chart to figure out how honest a news source is.
Warning, that is a long and fascinating read. Bonus points if you notice the part where the mafia got involved. http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2007-03/prophet-garbage
1. Too difficult to deal with - as H2 is one of the smallest molecules in existence, it readily diffuses through most materials. This is what we call a bad thing, because the effects on storage vessel and pipeline wall material properties by having them impregnated with hydrogen tend to be detrimental [they usually become much more brittle]. H2 also needs to be kept under pressure and/or cryogenically cooled, which consumes a lot of energy even when it's just being stored; imagine the electrical cost of trying to keep hundreds of miles of pipeline that cold, or at least the problems with supplying every gas station in the US with the refrigeration equipment.
2. It's too expensive. See: cost of maintaining such a low temperature in so many things, exotic materials required to minimize diffusion rate and its effects at crygogenic temperatures, producing enough of it period, etc.
3. There are already better alternatives. By using processes that produce natural gasses (like methane) or alcohols (like methanol) that are far more stable, easier to store & transport, and easier to utilize in both fuel cell and combustion chambers, hydrogen is beaten by cost and usability on all fronts. One of the big reasons hydrogen fuel cells even became common was because of the demand from NASA. It's rather convenient when your power source produces drinking water, thus lightening your spacecraft.
Fuel cells in general aren't a bad idea: a petroleum fuel cell, if it can be developed at low enough cost, would be incredibly efficient compared to combustion (and would take advantage of the incredible energy density of petroleum fuels). But for "clean" technologies, advances in batteries, supercapacitors, and artificially catalyzed fuels outstrip them.
There was a recent Q & A with some MIT fusion researchers on Slashdot that is relatively comprehensive on what the current main problems are with fusion and what is a realistic timeframe for commercially viable fusion (about 40 years at current funding levels, maybe as little as 10 years with unlimited funds).
The interesting thing there is the comment that we are funding fusion at below the level that the DOE said would never lead to a reactor and are still slowing dragging ourselves towards one. Imagine how well we would have done if we had spent money on this rather than wasting it.
SpaceX, Elon musk's rocket company, uses kerosene instead of liquid H2 because of the difficulties and expenses of dealing with it even in highly controlled world of rocketry. The idea that people would drive around with it, even without the cryogenics, in their cars is crazy.
All of these are very good reasons why the technology is bad. But the real kicker for me is that the energy economy is just totally off. Even if none of those tech problems you mentioned were present I still wouldn't really be in favour of it.
Its not an energy source. Its a giant battery. Which means that if you replaced every existing car with a hydrogen powered car, we would need to come up with more energy than we currently use to power these cars. One reason we use hydrocarbon fuels is because they have a really large energy content. If all of a sudden we decide not to power our vehicles with these fuels, we need substantially more power generation than we have. Like, multiples. And thats just to replace the cars we have today, let alone what we will have in 5/10/20+ years.
I like the idea of biofuels. They are carbon neutral. I don't really like Corn ethanol, though.
Exactly! That is actually one of the bigger hurdles in converting away from fossil fuels: you need to run your cars on something else, and you have to manufacture it. There are a huge number of different approaches, like algal/bacterial biofuels (not sure if those were oils or alcohols), direct CO2 to hydrocarbon catalysis, or stored electrical energy. The main problem with each is you need to put in at least 1.5 times or so the energy you desire to use as a fuel to account for efficiency losses; the power grid would need to effectively double in size to handle it.
Well, hydrogen fuel cells would be very efficient. More so than internal combustion engines, so it wouldn't be quite that bad. Still, it makes a lot more sense just to use a fuel which is shelf stable. Hydrogen can't even really be stockpiled in case of emergency.
There is another problem with hydrogen as well: while it is a more energetic fuel by mass, it is far less dense as a liquid than gasoline. This means gasoline is still more than 6x as energy dense as liquid hydrogen, and diesel is something like 7x.
Plasma. Converter.
While cool, I'm pretty sure that that is an incinerator, just a really hot one. Although, it may actually make solid carbon instead of Co2...
edit - Ahh, ok, the reaction gives off hydrogen and CO, which you then make into methane and burn. It still makes CO2, although it is an excellent way to dispose of waste
Spray it into the atmosphere.
Wait, no, that's what we're doing right now with coal.
The most important factor here is that the amount of waste per year is very, very small (especially in comparison to a coal-fired plant - it's just that the coal plant automatically deposits most of it's waste in the sky).
Most of it can be safely tucked underground, some of it can be recycled, and if the build-up really became a problem (we somehow started to produce more than could be safely buried) we could literally shoot it into outer space (reasonably cheap to do these days with a basic rocket, especially when you consider that each trip could handle multiple years worth of waste from a single facility).
I don't see why Canada isn't more receptive to nuclear power, considering we have the best geological formation to bury it in in the world.
battletag: Millin#1360
Nice chart to figure out how honest a news source is.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
NIMBY.
using thorium is a viable alternative right?
depends on the province
Ontario is pretty pro nuclear
In theory, yes, but it hasn't really been done yet except in experiments.
All in all, we have 171 nations now bound to the treaty.
This is pretty significant for two reasons:
1) It was never certain that we were going to get many people on board, and initial discussions looked discouraging. This demonstrates to some degree that there is agreement over the seriousness of the issue & enough overlap of interests to cooperate.
2) If we can hit the targets, the signatories involved should be more than enough to peak at a 2~ degree warming increase. Thing should stabilize and hopefully begin a decline to normal temperatures after that.
Weeee! Yay! When Do I Get My Pony???
Just so everyone is aware, because I have increasingly received an impression that many people are not aware of what this means, we're talking about significant draw downs in both extraction & fossil fuel use worldwide. Canada, for example, is looking to reduce emissions by 30% by 2030. That is going to hurt (America has yet to set a target, but must do so by 2020. And the longer the wait, the harsher the draw down is going to be).
The good news is that we might not break the planet afterall; but we're all going to have to stick together for this thing and probably shoulder some pretty hard times. Whatever politicians & celebrities have to say about it, no, industry is probably not going to cope well with having to somehow stop producing 30% (or better) of it's least visible pollutants, and transitioning over to sustainable energy is unlikely to be fun even if it's better in the long run.
Also, try to subliminally indoctrinate your neighbors into getting comfortable with the idea of nuclear power, because while the N word wasn't used in Paris, we're very likely going to need it.