Re: [Amc-list] Hydrogen power

[adh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Sandwich Maker)]

" From: Tom Jennings <tomj@xxxxxxx>
" 
" On Monday 10 September 2007 20:19:26 Clarence Milstead wrote:
" 
" > Hydrogen power is a boondoggle as are some of the other alternative fuels.
" > The real answer is electricity and nuclear power, which are already proven,
" > available, and ready for use if the politicians will get out of the way and
" > let a lot of nuclear plants be built. They have pandered to the anti-nukes
" > for too long and we are way behind since it takes a long time to build a
" > nuclear plant.
" 
" I agree with you partly -- the problem with nuclear power is only partly the 
" crappy technology but mainly because it's run commerically at lowest possible 
" cost, and they always fine tune short-term costs downward, puttin of future 
" problems for... the future. It's not as simple as pandering to a special 
" interests, that's an over simplification. The commercial energy people have 
" long demonstrated an inability to do things right -- which requires thinking 
" of the future in a way that needs to disregard their own trival profit 
" concerns.

this bothers me.  also, the commercial nuclear tech we have today is
like curved dash oldsmobiles with side impact beams and airbags - 1st
gen tech with safety add-ons.  iirc they can only burn about -1%- of
the nuclear load before the fuel rods must be yanked and discarded.
this is like filling your gas tank, driving a few miles, then draining
it - paying for sare disposal! - and refilling.

more efficient approaches that have near-total consumption of the
fissionable load, with safety 'baked in', are on the drawing boards.
these even largely solve the disposal problem by leaving little or
nothing but lead to dispose of.  you can bet japan will build them
sooner or later.  india is getting interested...

but another thing which most folks overlook bothers me; uranium, and
thorium which reactors can also be made to run on, are finite
resources we dig out of the ground just like oil and coal, and the
biggest deposits are not in this country.

how about solar power satellites, constructed in space from lunar-mined
material?  the startup costs are about as staggering as you can
imagine, but once you could pop one out it'd be a self-sustaining
industry.  i've been re-reading gerard o'neill's 'the high frontier'.
some of his economics is hopelessly optimistic, but still...

" Clean up the crappy technology (of which I know a fair amount) and I'd be good 
" to go. But I agree we may end up with those bozos running the ship if we 
" really get backed into a corner.

i've heard some hair-raising near-miss stories, like the nuke
operators - supposedly in connecticut - that were challenging each
other to see who could 'scram' [shut down] the plant the fastest, not
necessarily observing safety protocols.  the image that rises most
clearly to my mind is the old aamco tranny commercial where the
competitor says yes, we have expert technicians - and the camera pans
over to show a couple of chimps whaling away at a tranny with baseball
bats.

" Fusion is the same -- that it's cleaner is a total 100% lie. Neutron 
" bombardment does the embrittlement and causes secondary fission-like products 
" in all of the surrounding materials. It's alie and a crock. Neutrons can't be 
" contained, they simply eventually impact nuclei and break them up or make 
" unstable isotopes. Physics doesn't lie.

my dad worked on the mit fusion project when it was shut down in favor
of princeton's in the early '80s.  he was coming to the belief that
the fusion plasma is a chaotic system, radically increasing the
complexity of the control system and perhaps making it impossible.
________________________________________________________________________
Andrew Hay                                  the genius nature
internet rambler                            is to see what all have seen
adh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx                       and think what none thought
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