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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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Mar 18, 2011 - 05:06pm PT
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Could we generate a tsunami through resonant frequency amplification with the use of explosives? Probably. But, that would be stupid, wouldn't it? Like that couldn't be detected!
my question exactly
sounded stupid to me also
is anyone looking?
the idea as told to me twenty years ago involved:
1. analysis to characterize heavily stressed fault line sections
2. a line of deep bore holes along the stressed fault line with water injected as a lubricant
3. deep bore hole placement of a fission device as a trigger, with the energy release disguised as a natural release
also requires a lot of heavy equipment work over a period of years
it seems like spectrum analysis could detect the use of this method
he claimed the first target would be the Indian Ocean, then Japan, then US West Coast
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Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
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Mar 18, 2011 - 05:09pm PT
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jesus H f*#king christ!!!!
will you f*#king whackos take your conspiracy theory f*#king bullshit elsewhere?!?!? then i will delete this post. you guys can't f*#king be real.
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lostinshanghai
Social climber
someplace
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Mar 18, 2011 - 05:09pm PT
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By Michael A. Levi, Wednesday, March 16, 12:05 PM
Explosions. Radiation. Evacuations. More than 30 years after Three Mile Island, the unfolding crisis in Japan has brought back some of the worst nightmares surrounding nuclear power — and restarted a major debate about the merits and the drawbacks of this energy source. Does nuclear energy offer a path away from carbon-based fuels? Or are nuclear power plants too big a threat? It’s time to separate myth from reality.
1. The biggest problem with nuclear energy is safety.
Safety is certainly a critical issue, as the tragedy in Japan is making clear. But for years, the the biggest challenge to sustainable nuclear energy hasn’t been safety, but cost.
In the United States, new nuclear construction was already slowing down even before the partial meltdown at Three Mile Island in 1979; the disaster merely sealed its fate. The last nuclear power plant to come online started delivering power in 1996 — but its construction began in 1972. Today, nuclear power remains considerably more expensive than coal- or gas-fired electricity, mainly because nuclear plants are so expensive to build. Estimates are slippery, but a plant can cost well north of $5 billion. A 2009 MIT study estimated that the cost of producing nuclear energy (including construction, maintenance and fuel) was about 30 percent higher than that of coal or gas.
Of course, cost and safety aren’t unrelated. Concerns about safety lead to extensive regulatory approval processes and add uncertainty to plant developers’ calculations — both of which boost the price of financing new nuclear plants. It’s not clear how much these construction costs would fall if safety fears subsided and the financing became cheaper — and after the Fukushima catastrophe, we’re unlikely to find out.
2. Nuclear power plants are sitting ducks for terrorists.
It’s easy to get scared about terrorist attacks on nuclear plants. After the Sept. 11 attacks, a cottage industry sprung up around the threat, with analysts imagining ever-more horrific and creative ways that terrorists could strike nuclear facilities and unleash massive consequences.
There are certainly real risks: Nuclear expert Matthew Bunn of Harvard University has pointed out that well-planned terrorist attacks probably would produce the sort of simultaneous failures in multiple backup systems that Japan’s reactors are experiencing. But it’s much harder to target a nuclear power plant than one might think, and terrorists would have great difficulty replicating the physical impact that last week’s earthquake had on the Japanese plants. It also would be tough for them to breach the concrete domes and other barriers that surround U.S. reactors. And although attacks have been attempted in the past — most notoriously by Basque separatists in Spain in 1977 — none has resulted in widespread damage.
To be sure, the water pools in which reactors store used fuel, which reside outside the containment domes, are more vulnerable than the reactors and could cause real damage if attacked; there is a debate between analysts and industry about whether terrorists could effectively target them.
3. Democrats oppose nuclear energy; Republicans favor it.
Yes, the GOP base is enthusiastic about nuclear energy, while the Democratic base is skeptical. Moreover, many Republican politicians support assistance to the industry such as loan guarantees for nuclear developers, while many Democrats oppose them. But the politics of nuclear power have changed in recent years, mainly because of climate change.
Democrats, including many supporters in the environmental movement, have become more open to nuclear power as a large-scale zero-emissions energy option. Steven Chu, President Obama’s energy secretary, has been enthusiastic about the nuclear option. When asked to compare coal and nuclear energy in 2009, Chu responded: “I’d rather be living near a nuclear power plant.”
The biggest prospective boost for nuclear power in the past two years was an initiative championed by Democrats and scorned by Republicans: cap-and-trade legislation. Cap-and-trade would have penalized polluting power sources such as coal and gas emitters, thus tilting the playing field toward nuclear power. Department of Energy simulations of the ill-fated Waxman-Markey climate bill projected that it would have increased nuclear power generation by 74 percent in 2030.
Yet although Democrats may have become more accepting of nuclear power, few became fully enthusiastic. Japan’s tragedy may make many reconsider their stance.
4. Nuclear power is the key to energy independence.
When people talk about energy independence, they’re thinking about oil, which we mostly use in vehicles and industrial production. When they talk about nuclear, though, they’re thinking about electricity. More nuclear power means less coal, less natural gas, less hydroelectric power and less wind energy. But unless we start putting nuclear power plants in our cars and semis, more nuclear won’t mean less oil.
This wasn’t always the case: During the heyday of nuclear power, the early 1970s (45 plants broke ground between 1970 and 1975), oil was a big electricity source, and boosting nuclear power was a real way to squeeze petroleum out of the economy. Alas, we’ve already replaced pretty much all the petroleum in the power sector; the opportunity to substitute oil with nuclear power is gone.
5. Better technology can make nuclear power safe.
Technology can increase safety, but there will always be risks with nuclear power. The Japanese reactors at the center of the current crisis use old technology that increased their vulnerability. Next-generation reactors will be “passively cooled,” which means that if backup power fails like it has in Japan, meltdowns will be avoided more easily. (Passive-cooling systems vary, but their common feature is a lack of dependence on external power.) Other lower-tech improvements, such as stronger containment structures, have also mitigated risk.
But what happened in Japan reminds us that unanticipated vulnerabilities are inevitable in any highly complex system. Careful engineering can minimize the chance of disasters, but it can’t eliminate them. Operators and authorities will need to make sure that they’re prepared to deal with unanticipated failures even as they work to prevent them.
Most energy sources entail risks. In the past year, we’ve seen an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, fatal explosions at the Upper Big Branch coal mine in West Virginia and now the crisis in Japan. The American public will need to decide whether the risks of nuclear power — compared with those of other energy sources — are too high.
Michael A. Levi , a senior fellow and director of the program on energy security and climate change at the Council on Foreign Relations, is the author of “On Nuclear Terrorism.”
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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Mar 18, 2011 - 05:42pm PT
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obviously we shouldn't be mentioning anything outside the paradigm of uncontroversial common knowledge:
yeah, sounded pretty wild to me at the time, particularly coming from a guy with extensive credentials in the icbm program
obviously not anything you should be troubled with hearing about...
do you really want to restrict everyone from exploring unusual areas of interest??!
(and just how did you get interested in rock climbing??)
IMHO some of you would fit right in with the spanish inquisition
It's fine for Klimmer to go off and explore wild ideas; and he doesn't deserve a lot of the treatment he gets.
back off!
:-)
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Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
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Mar 18, 2011 - 05:44pm PT
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you and klimmer should get a room. put your tin hats on and tell each other stories.
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bmacd
Social climber
100% Canadian
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Mar 18, 2011 - 05:58pm PT
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My apologies to rrrADAM for the disrespect, and for what its worth I am still pro nuclear, but generation IV designs only. Still praying for all those affected ...
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john hansen
climber
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:11pm PT
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I have been holding off saying anything, but I wonder why they did not airlift in large generators the first day when they knew there were problems with the on site generators? They must have plenty in other parts of the country.
Being a private sector contractor I would think that if you had a "Full Speed Ahead" signal and an open wallet you should be able to mobilize the equipment you need and get it to the site. I mean,, you need ten miles of roads cleared so you can bring in flatbeds, then get some big old dozers in there and do it! I am sure somewhere in Japan they have SkyCranes that could lift large generators,, they are bringing them in now from US bases, why did they wait so long?
Are there not large pumps that could be brought in and adapted to the existing equipment? It just seems they are using a limited response when they should be throwing all possible resources available at it. You see pictures of towns with loaders and excavators where they have cleared the roads to at least make them passable. Much of the country in the south was unaffected. Given enough money and man power it seems they could do more.
Perhaps they are too confined in their own industry, or too insulated to think of this as a national instead of a corporate problem.. Maybe they had to wait for a building permit or some such BS...
Then again I could be a fool..
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
Full Silos of Iowa
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:21pm PT
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Factoid:
93 out of the 104 U.S. nuclear plants have battery backup power to run the cooling generators for only four hours. (Japan's battery backup was 8 hour capability.)
Source: MSNBC
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
Full Silos of Iowa
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:25pm PT
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re: climbing
It's impossible to make climbing failsafe. So it's incumbent upon us as we move forward to ask ourselves whether we're willing to risk it. Clearly, the answer should be no.
Adapted from a crazy anti-nuclear action group spokesperson - who'd be out of a job if not for her crazy anti-nuclear action group.
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Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:30pm PT
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not the point Tom,
this is for the most part an informative thread. many people interested in the tragedy, wishing the Japanese people well, understanding of the unfolding nuclear tragedy.
if you want to interject fairy tales go start another thread (imho).
if you want to proclaim that this was some man-made event from some american black ops, go start another thread as i am pretty sure most posters here would find the very idea laughable and offensive.
exploring the unknown is great. but the unknown only becomes understandable with verifiable facts, not your fairy tale conjectures.
edit:
concerrning your back off, what are you going to do? call your black ops guys after me??? klimmer would not like that it does not abide by gods will....
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Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:32pm PT
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good point hcfs.
we risk coal fired power plant emissions every day and not too many people bitching about that.
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lostinshanghai
Social climber
someplace
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:37pm PT
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Oh! No! Well forget about experts and saving or restoring the facility The Japanese are doomed.
They just announced that General Electric has sent also nuclear engineers to Japan to working with Tokyo Electric Power Co., the plant's operator, to prevent a meltdown, a company spokesman told the Wall Street Journal. (Msnbc.com is a joint venture between NBC Universal and Microsoft. GE is a part owner of NBC Universal.)
Comcast just took ownership 51% in last couple of months. If anyone has done business with Comcast such as having TV cable service with them you can count on them fu$king it up.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
Full Silos of Iowa
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:38pm PT
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Simple question,
As part of the new 21st century FAILSAFE design,
why can't new nuclear power stations be built over 2,000' deep vertical shafts. Then in the event of ANY worst case scenario, the whole shebang - fuel + 500 ton containments - can be jettisoned... straight down into hell fire. Then access to this nuclear satan could be terminated with a 2,000' thick door.
I bet Japan wishes it had this sort of shaft under each of its fuel containment systems right now.
Just another afternoon musing from a washed up (or is it washed out) former systems engineer.
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:42pm PT
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it is interesting to look at this whole question of using nuclear energy in the context of using fire
we have been using fire for a long time
we know a lot about fire and have come to depend upon it
yet we still periodically get into a lot of trouble with fire
and we still tell kids not to play with matches
one could discuss at what point are we are sufficiently mature to use fire
nuclear energy is sort of a next step with greater capability and risks
one could discuss at what point are we are sufficiently mature to use nuclear energy
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
San Diego
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:43pm PT
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Tom,
Thanks for some back-up, I do appreciate it.
I don't understand the hostility towards thinking outside the box.
Some STers would have put Sir Isaac Newton to the death for even imagining the end of the world would occur by 2060 AD along with Christ's return. Spending so much time on Bible Code etc. Dang it all. What was he thinking?????
I do agree . . .
The thread should be about Japan, what they are going through, the dangers they face, what we might face, and how we can help.
I do think we need to bring over Japanese families here to America that have lost everything and give them a new start if they agree to it and the Japanese government oks other countries taking them in.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
Full Silos of Iowa
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:44pm PT
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What's more,
knowing how things work around bureaucracies, I'd give my left nut to know if anyone's even considered that idea - the straight to hellfire idea for rogue nuclear fuel gone Sarah Palin - let alone pushed it more than a page or two - in all the history of the nuclear power plant safety designs.
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Hawkeye
climber
State of Mine
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:45pm PT
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I don't understand the hostility towards thinking outside the box.
that's the whole problem.....you consider your fairly tales to be thinking...
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:49pm PT
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Sir Isaac Newton to the death for even imagining the end of the world would occur by 2060 AD along with Christ's return
a perfect example of why you incur wrath, you have misread and misrepresented Newton's statements to make your own points. You are an unreliable scholar, Klimmer...
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Mar 18, 2011 - 06:58pm PT
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Some STers would have put Sir Isaac Newton to the death for even imagining the end of the world would occur by 2060 AD along with Christ's return. Spending so much time on Bible Code etc. Dang it all. What was he thinking?????
He was thinking like a late 17th century philosophe.
Which is why we today sensibly separate out that part of his work that has stood the test of time and call it "science" while we set aside all of his end-of-the-world wingbattery and refer to it as theological speculation.
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