Alternative energy doesn't work page

[Shrykull]

take a look http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/altenergy.html

What do you think about his hitting yourself with a hammer analogy? Sure it would help to use less energy, but doubling it as he points out would work too. Is he suggesting we don't build more power plants at all?!

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

He seems to have nothing against people going green, per se. However, what he's objecting to is the attitude that going 'green' and switching to alternative energy will permit us to continue using energy like there's no tomorrow. And that, I imagine, is what most people are thinking when they think about alternative energy. They want to know how they can have both their electricity and eco warm-fuzzies too, or, alternately, how to get those damned dirty bunny-hugging hippies off their backs. They're not really thinking about sustainability, or the impact all that energy usage is having on the environment.

What he is suggesting is that if folk reduce their energy consumption, then the amount of pollution we generate would go down, as would the rate of consumption of energy sources. Get it down low enough, and you can sustain civilization on alternative energy. (Part of what ought to make the notion of peak fossil fuels so frightening is the fact that alternative energy resources, such as wind, solar, tidal power, geothermal power, etc, etc, etc cannot possibly hope to supply more than a fraction of our current energy usage. Not reliably and not without making the cost of energy generation ludicrously high.)

[Shrykull]

Also, what about his statement about nuclear waste, what if you launched into space, or the sun?

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Also, what about his statement about nuclear waste, what if you launched into space, or the sun?

At 62 MJ per kilogram to get that shit into LEO plus whatever you needed to get it out of Earth orbit? Disposing of nuclear waste by shooting it into space is both costly and stupid. Of course, this means that whatever nuclear waste you generate has to go somewhere. Which is another point for conservation. The less nuclear waste you produce, the fewer NIMBY assholes you have to deal with when you tell them that yes, all that delicious nuclear power does have its drawbacks.

[darthdavid]

You do know that with reprocessing nuclear waste more or less becomes a non-issue, right?

[CaptainChewbacca]

You do know that with reprocessing nuclear waste more or less becomes a non-issue, right?

Indeed. But America won't reprocess nuclear waste, which is another reason to hate Jimmy Carter.

[Zixinus]

Sounds sane I guess.

Also, what about his statement about nuclear waste, what if you launched into space, or the sun?

Waste of effort and time. We can recycle ("reprocess" as they call it) nuclear waste, or at least allot of it.

Even accounting for that, putting nuclear waste underground is still a better option that putting allot of uranium from coal into the air or wasting precious oil by the ton every day.

[TithonusSyndrome]

You do know that with reprocessing nuclear waste more or less becomes a non-issue, right?

Indeed. But America won't reprocess nuclear waste, which is another reason to hate Jimmy Carter.

There are ways around that. We here in Canada can take it off your hands for a price until, like Italy, you learn to stop being luddites.

[Guardsman Bass]

You could also just did a very deep hole beneath the water table (so it doesn't seep into it, in concentrated form at least) and drop it down there. The dangerous shit degrades pretty quickly, and the rest isn't really a problem. Of course, that would be wasting valuable re-processing material.

[Singular Intellect]

Anyone got some links or suggestions on what to read up on for reprocessing nuclear waste? Like how much does it reduce actual waste material that in the end does have to be disposed of, etc.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Anyone got some links or suggestions on what to read up on for reprocessing nuclear waste? Like how much does it reduce actual waste material that in the end does have to be disposed of, etc.

There's the primary source for the details on modern reprocessing.

And the Thorium fuel cycle in MSR reactors of the Generation IV, which offers the potential for 99.9% reprocessing efficiency in comparison with modern waste production, with 97% of the fuel put into the reactor, burned by it. This means that the amount of waste produced by such a reactor with continuous reprocessing will be .1% of the waste currently produced by modern LWRs in the United States, or that we would have to run such reactors, producing the same amount of power, for 55,000 years or so to get the same amount of waste we currently have.

[Gil Hamilton]

There are ways around that. We here in Canada can take it off your hands for a price until, like Italy, you learn to stop being luddites.

It's simplier than that. The ban on chemical and nuclear reprocessing of nuclear waste was an executive order. Any president could just sign another executive order and undo it. It's easy to blame Carter for it in the first place, but every president since has found reasons to let it ride.

[CaptainZoidberg]

Even without reprocessing nuclear waste, Yucca Mountain is quite safe. (In fact, it was shown definitively in the Environmental Impact Statement that radiation levels would not exceed the legal threshold for 10,000 years. But some idiot judge made them change it to something on the order of a million years).

And the DOE was still able to show that Yucca Mountain would be safe, even with insanely overcautious timeframes.

On a second note, I think that we need to create a national licensing process for energy and environmental scientists, and then create federal laws prohibiting people from giving energy/environmental assessments without being licensed. A lot of the problems we have today stem from the fact that any idiot (like the guy who runs this website) can say anything they want, like that we're not close to finding a solution for storing nuclear waste, and get away without even a slap on the wrist.

I know some people will think that's a violation of free speech. But we already have laws that would stop me from offering assessments of a building's structural integrity (because I'm not a professional engineer). And we have laws that would stop me from saying that I'm a doctor and giving crackpot medical advice. But we have no laws that stop unqualified people from saying that they're environmentalists, and saying that nuclear power is unsafe.

On a third note, I am pretty dang pissed off at that guy, and a lot of the crackpot environmentalists out there who are like him. He obviously doesn't give a shit about the dangers of nuclear power. He just doesn't like it because it produces a lot of power, and won't force people to adopt his reactionary lifestyle.

[Sea Skimmer]

People are forgetting that reprocessing creates huge amounts of mid and low level waste, while reducing high level waste. This classifications are also all a matter of radiation levels, even low level nuclear waste can still be highly toxic if ingested and so still has to be carefully stored. Uranium mining is also just filthy as shit, the world has some very huge reservoirs of uranium mine waste which are just waiting to cause disasters, and even with reprocessing of all spent fuel we still need more.

Its nothing that can’t be overcome, but people shouldn’t assume that just because you can find a place to stick some high level waste for 90 billion dollars means the problem is solved.

[Ma Deuce]

It's simplier than that. The ban on chemical and nuclear reprocessing of nuclear waste was an executive order. Any president could just sign another executive order and undo it. It's easy to blame Carter for it in the first place, but every president since has found reasons to let it ride.

Ronald Reagan already reversed that executive order, so the blame rests on Congress for refusing to allocate funds to restart reprocessing even after the ban was lifted.