Japan Nuke Update March 24

Almost two weeks into the nuclear accidents at Fukushima, and little progress has really been made other than laying in a new electrical line to hopefully supply power to the six reactor complexes. Radiation will continue to be released in gaseous form and in irradiated water for many more weeks or even months before the accidents are deemed “over.”

The reality to the nuclear industry, as I said before, is that radiation has been released from a reactor…something we’ve spent billions of dollars on and the experts said could never happen in an American designed reactor operated in a technologically advanced nation. Add to that the fact that major problems have occurred in the spent fuel pools of all six reactors…something that very few gave any thought to. This alone will require expensive review and retrofit. And to and injury to insult, the fact that no technology, planning…basically thinking…on how to deal with the accidents once they happened. Nobody knows what to do. Right now, the focus is to pour sea water into the demolished reactor buildings to cool the vessels and spent fuel. All containment is gone, so the thousands of tons of sea water is just going in, some of it evaporating leaving behind caustic salts, and the now radioactive remainder just runs right back out to the ocean.

Here is our 2011 technology at work:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozNg6Tnp_r8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEc64XckJgI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RoJAYsT8Zbs&feature=player_embedded

Some possible plans of action include using the military (sorry, ours is busy someplace else) to bombard the site (280 acres) with a mixture of sand and concrete, and bury this for ever…sort of like the Egyptian pyramids, except not as expertly constructed.

Meanwhile, the 300 “engineers” are giving up their lives for their country. Hundreds of thousands of people have been evacuated within a 20 mile radius, while Americans within 50 miles were told to leave.

As far a radiation levels and exposure, we missed the “Chernobyl” bullet (or bomb). But that is beside the point. "There is no safe level of radionuclide exposure, whether from food, water or other sources” says physician Jeff Patterson, a former president of Physicians for Social Responsibility.

http://www.psr.org/news-events/press-releases/physicians-for-social.html

Everything is NOT OK, as the nuclear industry is continuing to claim. “We think we're pretty well equipped," said Tony Pietrangelo, a spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry lobbying group. "We do plan for blackouts, earthquakes, and tsunamis. Clearly what happened in Japan is well beyond what they were designed for. It's highly unlikely but we have a station blackout rule to deal specifically with what happened in Japan. We think we're pretty well equipped."] You think they would send some of our “engineers” over there to help spit water on the fires.

“Analyst Jeremy Gordon with the World Nuclear Association, however, said overall the situation is not one in which Japan would need to abandon this major source of electricity.” He said Japan's nuclear plants are built with multiple safety layers and earthquakes in mind. "The engineering standard goes so far beyond what you would ever expect, and the regulations go far beyond what you would ever expect. The end result is that the power plants are extremely robust."

These are highly paid “educated” industry leaders in the world!!!???????!!!!!????!!!????

Pay Fox News and our moron politicians to blare these statements 24/7 to the brainwashed public, and everything is ok!

What if this happened near New York City, or Diablo Canyon in California, where a crucial backup pump was shut off for 18 months, and just two weeks ago was discovered and turned back on. There has been a lot of criticism of TEPCO, the Japanese utility for their shortcomings…sort of like PG&E with their gas line inspections. The NRC just last week gave Vermont Yankee a 20 year license extension…same age and plant design as Fukushima…in spite of the overwhelming protest of citizens and lawmakers. Just follow the money! It’s a global economy. Lot of the same players.

More later...and later…and later, because this is not going away for many years to come.

Fail Safe Technology

Nuclear accident? It could never happen here in the US. The rest of the world is full of morons, especially the Japanese...they've given us the Prius and the Sony Walkman.....

Our nuclear industry knows it all...our nuclear engineers are sure smart people...they've calculated everything, and they never make any mistakes.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/03/18/BUA01IDTUO.DTL

This is like a Saturday Night Live skit! Who's in charge? Seems nobody has a clue. I wonder what PG&E's CEO's salary is going to be this year...I'm sure between the gas pipeline explosion in

San Bruno, and this, it will be reduced to a paltry $10 million???...what a bummer! But you have to pay high salaries to draw the best and brightest....lightbulbs?

Meanwhile,

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2011/0318/Nuclear-power-report-14-near-misses-at-US-plants-due-to-lax-oversight

And back in California...

http://www.baycitizen.org/pge/story/diablo-canyon/

"The CPUC said Thursday that its decision to cancel the scheduled April 13 hearing on the relicensing of Diablo Canyon was unrelated to the company’s gas pipeline pipeline problems and sloppy record-keeping.

Three-dimensional modeling of the impact of an earthquake on Diablo Canyon began two months ago, PG&E spokesman Kory Raftery said. He said that more advanced studies of the potential impact of an earthquake, requiring permits for underwater experiments, are also planned.

Those studies will be paid for with nearly $17 million in rate-payer funds and are expected to take three years, according to the California Energy Commission."

Sound like a tax hike to me. Maybe if the CEO and his cadre of VPs paid their fair share of taxes, that would cover it. But whoa...what would Newt say to that?

http://thinkprogress.org/2011/03/18/gingrich-corp-taxes/

What about all those jobs?????????

What ever happened to the joke "you can trust me, I'm from the government!"

Sorry...I've got to stop all this...I can go on for hours and hours every day. I will try and limit my rantings to more significant newsworthy items. But today's reality is so absurd that it's just so much fun.....!

Science vs the Media

The nuclear industry has always expounded mistruths, misinformation, and actual lies about the safety, economics, and need for nuclear power. So now the hype climbs to a new level, thanks to Fox News and its contributors, who shamelessly claim to be experts in everything, and feed their vitriol to the media-numb public.

Ann Coulter is now a medical expert, telling us that radiation is actually good for us. She joins, or rather stirs, the ultra-right in their rejection of basic science on all levels of our technological world.

There is no safe dose of radiation. Any exposure is capable of inducing biological change. The effects are linear – the larger the dose, the longer the exposure – the greater the risk. This is the belief of all medical and scientific entities worldwide. Over the years, with more information and scientific studies, radiation exposure standards have been tightened for the public, for nuclear workers, and for amounts allowable in food, water, and air.

Coulter spouts her lie without any supporting documentation. If such findings had ever been made public and undergone scientific peer review, we would surely know about it.

But a crisis, in some ways more serious than the Fukushima events, is very rampant in today’s society – the reckless and disgusting portrayal of opinion as fact in our “news” media.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/18/ann-coulter-radiation-is-_n_837512.html

Gee, I hope we don’t concede that the world is really flat…that would change a few things!

Japan's Nuclear Accident Continues

I am stunned! I have spent the last few days watching the events unfold through a variety of media. In spite of who you listen to, or what you read, these events are going to have enormous impact on global public health, economy, and environment for many years to come; and it will take weeks, months, or even years for us to begin to comprehend these impacts. The comparison everyone is making is “it isn’t as bad as Chernobyl.” We’ll see, as if it really makes any difference.

Just a few comments on where my thinking has been.

This was not just an accident at a nuclear power plant…this was a number of incredible malfunctions at four, (possibly) six, individual reactors and their support facilities. These were older American design, operated in one of the most technologically advanced country in the world. There is no clue as to how to deal with the events that are still out of control, and may continue unabated for who knows how long. At this writing, the “suicide” workers are being sent back in to do what they can.

Human suffering aside, the financial impacts of this accident will tax the Japanese, the US, and the rest of the world’s economies. Early estimates were $50-200 billion. I predict globally over $1 trillion. Forget the cost of replacing these reactors; what is it going to cost to control, seal and stabilize, and clean-up? Who will pay for that? I bet the insurance companies are glad they are not part of this. We will see the US recalculating the Price Anderson Act.

The ramifications to the US will be not only increasing the already unaffordable cost of new reactors, but the enormous amount of money that will go into re-studying and analyzing those 102 plants we now have in operation, and retrofitting them to current standards. Some will probably be shut down; many of the license extensions rubber stamped by the NRC will be revoked; new designs will be recalculated. The “new” era of small modular reactors, designed to be cheaper to build, will face the same scrutiny and financial burdens because it is really the same technology facing the same issues as the big plants. If there was debate as to the cost-effectiveness of plant construction before March 11, that dialogue is virtually over.

The other significant issue deals with nuclear waste. In Japan, the major problem is not so much the melting fuel in the reactor vessels, but the exposed spent fuel rods stored in basic swimming pools there, in the US, and all over the world. Once the pool is breached and the rods are uncovered, either by accident or terrorism, there has been no planning or technical methodology developed to deal with it. The US is sending fire engines with high pressure pumps to spray sea water into the buildings…for how long, nobody knows.

Here at Humboldt Bay, our spent fuel was put into storage casks and inserted into a below grade vault, at great cost. At least it is safe from our potential earthquake and tsunami risk. The enormous cost of dealing with this high level waste will now have to be addressed, rather than pushing it off to future generations.

And of course, to me, there is the concern and emotion I feel for people…the impacted citizens of Japan, and all the other unknowns who will be exposed to radiation from this accident. There is no threshold for radiation exposure…no set number where everything is ok…any exposure has potential for cellular disruption. I also pine for the environment…the diversity of life (as we saw impacted by Chernobyl), the effect on food chains (natural and human), the loss of contaminated land and ecosystems; the whole social and biological part of our existence.

One last dig….amazing to follow as many of the news media outlets that I could. My perception is that the right/conservative media was so concerned with the economic impacts to industry and production, and how this will effect business. Their in-depth reporting centered of a few “experts” from the nuclear industry who kept saying everything was fine since it wasn’t like Chernobyl. Most of what I saw was O’Reilly and his ilk laughing and making fun of those who are impacted the most. Very sad. No real constructive input as to the overwhelming implications of what this all really means. No Republican leadership as to what we will do…I guess they are to busy going to the bank.

In today’s radical fiscal environment, it will be interesting to see how long the nuclear corporate welfare will survive. Expensive energy? Looks like renewables are going to be our future.

Solar Power to the people…as well as other things!

Early Thoughts of the Japanese Nuclear Problems

Three days after a magnitude 9.0 earthquake and ensuing tsunami struck Japan, killing an estimated 10,000 people and leaving many more destitute, the country is still struggling to avert nuclear disaster, with problems reported at four separate nuclear power plants.

http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2011/03/massive-explosion-rips-through.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news

"Nuclear plant operators in Japan worked frantically to try to keep temperatures down in several reactors crippled by the earthquake and tsunami, wrecking at least two by dumping sea water into them in last-ditch efforts to avoid meltdowns."

Well, so much for that $10 billion investment. How long will it take to rebuild/replace these two units?

At what cost? Who will pay for it? Jobs?

"Japan's nuclear crisis intensified Sunday as authorities raced to combat the threat of multiple reactor meltdowns and more than 180,000 people evacuated the quake- and tsunami-savaged northeastern coast where fears spread over possible radioactive contamination.

Nuclear plant operators were frantically trying to keep temperatures down in a series of nuclear reactors — including one where officials feared a partial meltdown could be happening Sunday — to prevent the disaster from growing worse."

Of course, this could never happen in the US...those Japanese are using old, antiquated technology. Our new modular reactors could never have a problem like this ...we know it all...!!!!!!!!

And who cares about the 180,000 people evacuated...their lives changed...exposed to radiation?...they are expendable...the country needs cheap, safe, cost-effective electricity, and every one knows there are no cost competitive alternatives!

Remember, renewables offer us a very wide variety of small scale, decentralized, independent, local generation capabilities...not the huge centralized power plants that create complete chaos and havoc in the event of an accident.

A lot of lessons will be learned from this...all for the better...just another nail in that nuclear coffin.

Many references.....here just one

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110313/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_earthquake_nuclear_crisis

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The Republican leadership continues to show its continued total IGNORANCE, LIES, and MISINFORMATION in saying the US needs nuclear power to free us from our dependence on middle east oil. NOT TRUE...even a fourth grader can figure this out. Nuclear power plants produce ELECTRICITY....that's all. Less than 3% of the oil we use in this country is used for electricity generation...usually for emergency back up power, and for remote locations where gasoline/diesel generators are used. 70% of our oil use is for transportation fuels, and until we get the "all electric car" on the road, nuclear power plants do nothing to replace imported oil. And even then, nuclear will not be needed.

The push for nuclear has nothing to do with energy reality. It's just a giant suction of billions and billions of public dollars by the "big rich energy boys!"

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/13/japan-nuclear-reactor_n_835057.html

https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/energy.html

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One last quip for now.....here is a very heartfelt news story...from "Business Day"...

http://www.businessday.com.au/business/future-of-nuclear-power-faces-intense-scrutiny-20110313-1bsyp.html

The headline is :"The crisis could hurt the Australian uranium industry."

Bummer! All those jobs lost......but wait...look at all the jobs to be gained and all the money to be spent decommissioning and dismantling these destroyed radioactive reactors and disposing of all the wastes...I think Texas is considering putting in a bid to store the wastes...but, they'll have to fight Utah for it!

As always....life is very interesting...never a dull moment.

My Thoughts in Early March

Gee, I guess things are going to be all right, since the economy is improving so well...must be the Obama stimulus/bailouts that worked.

http://www.mlive.com/auto/index.ssf/2011/03/ford_rewards_ceo_alan_mulally.html

Business must be really good, now that they've gotten rid of all those commie union deals. Maybe some of those jobs might come back to the US.

You can bet these guys are not paying the 32% tax rate on this...probably not paying any taxes at all. But that is what the Republicans are all about...some of that money will find its way back into the political coffers of Boner, McConnell, and friends.

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2011/0309/Budget-hawks-Does-US-need-to-give-gas-and-oil-companies-41-billion-a-year

Gosh...all those terrible solar and wind subsidies...tsk, tsk! Eliminate ALL the subsidies to oil, coal, nuclear, and even renewables, and within a few years we would see the TRUE (REAL) cost of energy...gasoline at $10/gallon; coal electricity at $0.20/kwh; and we couldn't even build any new nukes. At those prices, renewables would be more than competitive, and their prices would be coming DOWN with time, and be more SECURE. We would then create an environment for new, innovative, cheaper, sustainable energy. Even the playing field? Not for a bunch of greedy cheaters like the Kock brothers and their Republican cronies

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/09/republican-2012-candidates-libya_n_833177.html#s250997&title=Sarah_Palin_

The Republican line...too much government spending...well, what we need now is another good WAR to boost the economy. War spending created jobs...building bombs, guns, tanks, Kevlar vests....and all the logistics of moving things around, building new barracks and showers...Halliburton must be drooling at the trough.....but wait! That's GOVERNMENT SPENDING...that's what got us into this mess in the first place. Bush took a huge surplus, spent it, and then spent another trillion dollars on Iraq...great for the economy...5% unemployment, huge amounts of money flooding into Wall Street, no way/idea on how to really invest it other than scams which the bankers, traders, etc. came up with...everything was rosy till it started to fall apart in 2007. Obama inherits it in 2009, and , oh, of course, the problems we have today are ALL due to Obama...he just wants to destroy America...and those American workers....union members, socialist, commies...they just want to destroy America.

SOME of us are being hoodwinked by the super rich, and their lackeys...the Republican politicians who will do/say anything for the continued cash flow into their coffers.

I think this is one of the most exciting times in American history/politics. The average citizen will soon become aware of the GAME being played on them, and will rise up and make some changes.

Viva la Revolution!!!! (I guess Spanish is ok...I'd say it in Chinese or Arabic, but...)

One last thing...first saw it in Moore's "Fahrenheit 911"...kind of says it all...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mn4daYJzyls

"...the haves, and the have mores..." I'm not in that club!

Nashville & the Grand Ole Opry

I recently had the thrill of a lifetime being able to be backstage at the Grand Ole Opry to view a Saturday night show. My most heart-felt thanks to Ronnie McCoury and Barry Brower for giving me the opportunity.

Check the photos out at:
http://cid-b32ec3aaa6ec96e7.photos.live.com/browse.aspx/Grand%20Ole%20Opry

Very Cool!!!!!