Cold starting on crappy wvo

[kyradawg]

Troy,

Your beautiful and anyone that thinks different is simply wrong!

Peace&Love , Darren

[solarguy]

Dear Hotater and other illustrious group members,

Just to get a little fact check, here's a typical quote concerning one of the isotopes we have to deal with from high level nuclear waste:

"The rate of decay of a radioactive isotope is called its half-life, the time in which half the initial amount of atoms present takes to decay. The half-life of Plutonium-239, one particularly lethal component of nuclear waste, is 24,000 years. The hazardous life of a radioactive element (the length of time that must elapse before the material is considered safe) is at least 10 half-lives. Therefore, Plutonium-239 will remain hazardous for at least 240,000 years."

So even if you compute some ridiculously low number for storage cost per kg per year, the sum is still fantastically high, making nuclear more expensive per kwh than hiring poor people to run on treadmills to make electricity.  Many very smart engineering types think it's not just difficult to store the waste securely and safely for that long, it's impossible.

So ignoring the nuclear proliferation problem of plutonium (an unavoidable byproduct) which make lovely bombs for terrorists (even dirty bombs just to distribute the stuff), and ignoring the fact that we have less than two decades worth of mineable uranium, and ignoring the decommisioning costs, which typically run 1x to 2x the cost of building the plant, and ignoring the typical cost overuns to get it built in the first place (1.5x to 3x original projected cost are typical), and ignoring the costs of a big whoops (the USSR lost more money on chernoble than all the money it ever saved on energy costs from all of its nuclear plants), it all boils down to the right tool for the right job.

Nukes are not that tool.  It's just too expensive to deal with the waste for a quarter of billion (with a B) years. (strike that.  It's Million with an M.  EMMMMM.  Million.)

Facts supplied to support all of that upon request.

Not a tree hugger, more like a spreadsheet guy.  I do like trees though...

Not a flamer, not a troll, I want an answer just as bad as you guys do.

Finest regards,

troy

[kyradawg]

Peace&Love , Darren

[rocket]

in northern wisconsin we can only grow 1 crop per year.

in response to the nuclear power issues. i trained at the feet of galen winsor the nuclear physicist that design and managed the plutonium recovery plant in morris illinois in the late 70s and was also the one sent into three mile island to inspect the core.

nuclear power is cheap plentiful and safe. and there is no such thing as nuclear waste. that is a myth created by the oil cartels

the government has spent billions of dollars building underground holes for nuclear waste but not an ounce has ever been put in the holes. the reason why....  i will say it again... there is no such thing as nuclear waste. why did they dig the holes? maybe for their underground cities for when they reduce the worlds population like they are always talking about.

here is the physics and economics. uranium oxide known as yellow cake costs $10 a pound. nuclear fuel rods (invented for metalic uranium fuel and used because of the stupid rules which abound for reactors) are placed in the core to burn. the burn is ejection of neutrons which split atoms.... yellow cake is approximately 99 percent inert (usless dirt) Uranium 238 and 1 percent fissionable uranium 235 the 235 splits.. ejects neutrons some split addition uranium, others are absorbed by the U238.

when U238 absorbs a N it goes through a double beta decay (ejects two electrons) and mutates into plutonium. the plutonium is very valueable on the order of $30,000 a lb and more.

what about the nuclear waste? there is no nuclear waste. all the isotopes have value in medical, food industry, agriculture, research.........

rods are called spent after approx 3 years in the reactor. these spent fuel rods are not spent but enriched. enriched as in more radioactive, more powerful, and more valueable. the $10 a pound yellow cake has been spun into material more valueable then gold or platinum.

bottom line is they lie... they lie alot. the reason is to steal from us. they sit on trillions of dollars of isotopes while making us pay for the storage. they tell us the stuff is so poisonous that one ounce can kill 50,000 people. Galens joke was he would take an ounce and slug it down with a beer and say.. i do that to piss them off so they have to bury me in a lead lined coffin 3,000 feet deep.

the most famous accidents in the history of nuclear fuel are 3 mile island and chernobyl. both were staged on purpose. at 3mile island it was the day fema was created and they needed a test, so they scrammed the reactor 3 times until they were able to crack one percent of the fuel rods and by law had to shut down the reactor. again the fuel rods were created to isolate metalic uranium from the water so it would not oxidize but the 3mile island reactor used uranium oxide so there was no need to ever shut it down.

the second and maybe more famous accident was chernobyl. america designed and built that reactor. it was powered by unshielded uranium oxide until american engineers told the potatoe farmers that they could increase output 50% by switching to metalic uranium. of course their scientists liked the idea because metalic uranium creates metalic plutonium which is easily chemically extracted for making bombs. the russians took the bait. the unshielded metalic uranium reacted with the water U + H2O = UO + H2 pretty simple reaction even for potatoe farmers to understand. as the levels of free hydrogen rose above 4% it only took a spark to blow the reactor up. end of story.

until we can clean the rats from the district of corruption, i will look to burn wvo in a listeroid.

[solarguy]

It is indeed, all about conservation.  So, on that note, how about this:

http://www.canadiandriver.com/articles/gw/vw1litre.htm

It's a ~300 mpg Volkswagon and it's not a hybrid.  Holds two folks and some gear and it doesn't look like a turd either.

Or how about this:

http://www.worldcarfans.com/news.cfm?newsid=2050607.004/country/gcf

It's a 70-80 mpg mercedes with room for four and plenty of luggage along with all the comforts.

We can and we will learn to  conserve, hopefully before we damage our economy too much.

Finest regards,

troy

[rgroves]

These are great concept cars. But Mercedes already has an 80 mpg diesel, the Smart Fortwo.  They make it with four seats too.

I can buy one in Canada.  But i can't buy one in the US.  Guess what US agency won't let me? 

Russell

It is indeed, all about conservation.  So, on that note, how about this:

http://www.canadiandriver.com/articles/gw/vw1litre.htm

It's a ~300 mpg Volkswagon and it's not a hybrid.  Holds two folks and some gear and it doesn't look like a turd either.

Or how about this:

http://www.worldcarfans.com/news.cfm?newsid=2050607.004/country/gcf

It's a 70-80 mpg mercedes with room for four and plenty of luggage along with all the comforts.

We can and we will learn to  conserve, hopefully before we damage our economy too much.

Finest regards,

troy

[hotater]

Maybe somebody should remind these idiots they're designing cars that have no streets smooth enough to drive on.

What difference is mileage if the first pot hole totals the car??

You WON'T catch me riding in a carbon fiber roach waiting for for the stomp.....even if they AND the fuel is totally free of charge.

[rgroves]

Maybe somebody should remind these idiots they're designing cars that have no streets smooth enough to drive on.

What difference is mileage if the first pot hole totals the car??

You WON'T catch me riding in a carbon fiber roach waiting for for the stomp.....even if they AND the fuel is totally free of charge.

Hell, Jack, you live about 50 miles past the end of everything.  I don't think you fit their demographics anyway. 
I'd like one, but I don't know where I'd hang the gun rack.

[rpg52]

Hi Guys, (why not guys & girls?    Something about Listeroids and Y chromosomes, don't you agree?) 
In any case, I'm always astounded at how a thread about starting on crappy wvo evolves into discussions of world energy needs.  I'd just like to mention the real-life problem found at Chernobyl.  Though the Russians (the old USSR) was not noted for their rampant environmental ethic, somehow several hundred citizens willingly sacrificed their lives pouring loads of concrete from a helicopter onto a nuclear meltdown.  Subsequently, the government evacuated about a hundred square miles of city and farmland because of contamination by nuclear isotopes which will remain toxic for several thousand years to long-lived animals like ourselves.  I seriously doubt that they (the Russians) did it because of any plot by western oil companys.  Interestingly, rodents and some other short-lived animals have re-occupied the lands, and seem to be thriving.  Radioactive isotopes are unlike any other toxic material, in that while they can be caught and isolated with extremely expensive processes, their radioactivity can never be "de-toxified".  Radioactive atoms run down (throw off those additional particles until they attain a stable isotope) at their own rate, independant of anything mortal humans are capable of.  Alteration of the nucleus of an atom by adding extra neutrons or protons is what happens all day every day in stars like our very own sun.  That is why, IMHO, any  nuclear process active enough to produce heat belongs at least 93 million miles away from my back yard.  I think humans are just too corrupt/greedy/ignorant/stupid/mistake-prone to safely use nuclear power to run a toaster.  Better to do without the toaster than risk contaminating our only home.  Maybe freezing in the dark really is an attractive alternative to an early death from radiation induced cancer?  Having watched family members go through the dying process with all the comforts of western medicine, it really doesn't look like much fun.  Just my $0.02.  Thanks for reading my personal rant, 
Ray

[kyradawg]

Peace&Love , Darren

[rocket]

thats an interesting post about chernobyl, but totally fabricated

[Stan]

The BBC ran an interesting program on Chernoble and evidently they are taking tourists through one abandoned town but they have to wear radiation monitors and when they start to beep you have to run back to the bus and get out of town.  Not my idea of a holiday
Stan

[rpg52]

Welllll, I didn't live, nor have I ever visited Chernobyl.  I did visit Hiroshima in June of 2004.  Anyone who really believes radiation induced sickness is a hoax, needs to visit the Peace Museum there.  And, if that is a hoax, the huge scar running down the back of my wife's great-uncle's neck from when he was a child of 8 just outside the blast zone is not a hoax.  I saw it, and no jive is going to convince me it isn't real.  Incidentally, none of the people living in Hiroshima will talk about the bomb.  Too many awful memories.  What this has to do with Listeroids is beyond me though.  Sigh-ning off,
Ray   

[rocket]

you visited hiroshima, you mean it wasnt a nuclear wasteland for thousands of years. tell us about all the people walking around with cancer or two heads... wait thats right cancer rates in hiroshima are actually half the national average

[lgsracer]

I served on five nuclear attack submarines never further than 150 feet from the reactor for months on a time. When I was junior I slept over a thermonuclear warhead with, (subroc) 34 millirem an hour at the warhead skin. I still have all my fingers and toes too.