Greenpeace Jerks, Episode #9,945
I think you’re wrong in that you underestimate them. They won’t be happy until we are living in caves, wearing leaves, and foraging for grass. These losers are anti hunting too.
So, “Oil, Right answer”?
My preferred method of getting the pictured protestor down would be Rifle with Scope.
Posted by Oink
11/29/2005 at 10:34 AM
Skipper and everyone, it’s way worse than that, as I’m sure you’re aware. My brother did a post on our group blog, Mazurland Blog, a couple of weeks ago about the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement called “Green With Self-Loathing”. You’ll be amused, or BMEWSed.
Greenpeace: Obstruction without solutions.
I see nuclear power as the best available source for power in the forseeable future. We must, however, do a better job of regulating it than has been done so far. I’ll bring up the near disaster at Davis-Besse again as an example of how close we have come. Regular, thorough inspections with no waivers. Bean counters be damned.
Kerr - I provisionally agree about nukes. Human fallibility and stupidity being unlimited, I’m nervous about stuff that stays poisonous for 50,000 years. I’m hoping for fusion reactors.
Posted by Oink
11/29/2005 at 01:51 PM
DAMN!!!! ... OCM FOR Nukes(?) ... There IS hope for an orderly civilization after all!
... man ... for want of one (or 2) well placed hollow point(s)I have been with (and around) a company that has been making control systems for nuclear (and other) power plants for as long as I can remember (1970?). I have dealt with the NRC for years. There is no other oversite agency on the face of this earth, as strict as these guys and girls. ... to the point of being ridicules sometimes. As long as everyone plays by the rules, I believe that nuclear energy generation is as safe as any other. Anyone caught not playing by the rules should be sent outer Mongolia for the rest of their lives ... no questions asked.
Carguy: My concern is not the level of safety, it’s the cost of a massive screw-up.
Probability x Cost = Risk
Posted by Oink
11/29/2005 at 02:33 PM
The same can be said about any other method of power generation. There isn’t enough available water resource without screwing up what’s left of the natural environment (cost)… coal is REALLY dirty and either dangerous to get or, again, screws up the environment (cost) ... oil ? we all know where that’s going (cost)...solar (?), not practical yet (cost)… wind (?), see “solar” (cost)… see where this is going?
The “Probability” of “Cost” in all of the above, I believe, outweighs the “Probability” of a “major” screw-up at a nuclear plant. We have never had a “major” screw-up in this country. TMI was a minor goof with no lasting consequences. Learn from it.
Besides, I was about 2 miles from TMI in Cherry Hill, NJ at the time. Nothing wrong with me!
I did say I was for nukes but nervous about the long lasting character of fissionable material. It’ll remain deadly ten times longer than we have had a human civilization. That is some serious stuff to ponder.
Anything that can be misunderstood WILL be misunderstood,
Anything that can go wrong WILL go wrong,
And at the worst possible time.That’s not counting terrorists. Fact is, I see no alternative to nukes. Burn a
load of coal? oil? Keep working on fusion and a super battery—call this an interim thing.
Posted by Oink
11/29/2005 at 03:20 PM
Sounds like a plan, Oink.
Hey, what’s wrong with throwing this
“to infinity and beyond” anyway. Why is it that nobody’s talking that up? Gotta be cheaper in the long run than trying to store it safely forever.
These jerks won’t be happy until we’re all living in caves again and running around half-naked, hunting buffalo with spears.
They want to go a bit farther than that.
Posted by mt
11/29/2005 at 11:00 PM
I’m less concerned with accidents than I am with terror attacks. Lets face it, if they want through they will figure a way. We have to have plans in place to minimize the effects for when that happens. I personally think that Nuking Medina after the first attack would be AOK, and threatening to nuke Mecca if 100% of the terrorist organization are not in custody within 48 hours.
I have my doubts as to how strict the NRC is, Carguy. I doubt that they are as strict or as powerful as the Navy’s nuclear oversight group Naval Reactors. Inspections are conducted on time and can result in the shutdown of a reactor and decertification of a ship/sub. Not a career enhancer for the CO. There are no waivers granted and economic priorities do not impinge on the process.
The NRC on the other hand can be played by the reactor operators as was done at Davis Besse. First Energy, the owner/operator kept getting inspection waivers and therefore missed a hole growing in the reactor head. It was finally discovered purely by accident while someone was investigating another problem. That link goes to the NRC report. You can Google and get more information, the Toledo and Cleveland papers were all over it.
First Energy got nailed for a record fine. It wasn’t enough. In my opinion they should have lost their license. Their concern for financial gain/cost superseded the safety of the reactor and the surrounding communities. Let them burn coal somewhere. It’s safer.
Again ... I said that “as long as everyone plays by the rules ...”. Clearly First Energy didn’t, and someone at the NRC let them get away with it. Yes, First Energy should have had their license to operate revolked FOREVER, and someone at the NRC should have been axed ... literally!
As with a lot of other things going on in this world, you cannot mess around with this . IT WILL KILL YOU! (and other people as well)
I still like Oink’s plan. However, while we sit around and discuss it, we will freeze to death in the dark.
Me, I don’t care. I can solve that problem in a hurry. I’m REALLY pissed though that my children and grandchildren may not get the opportunity to experience all the joys that I have because a bunch of short-sighted assholes prefer to talk things to death instead of taking positive action.Yo MT (#16): Check out comment #4. It links to a pretty good story on VHEM that got lost in the extended discussion on nuclear power, etc.
Thanks Marty, I missed that when scanning the comments.
Posted by mt
11/30/2005 at 04:12 PM
I don’t know much about fusion. That looks like a decent general overview for others likewise ignorant of the subject.
It appears that we’re going to have to wait for a while for it to become practical on the scale required.
In the meantime, nukes appear to be the way to go. I’ve always been a proponent of nuclear power but lately I see that it must be closely supervised with draconian measures available lest some damn bean counter calculate profits before safety. No waivers, no bending the rules.
The NRC did prevent the William H Zimmer power plant, near Cincinnati, from starting up as a nuclear power plant because it couldn’t pass inspection. Depending on which version you might hear, it was a matter of lost construction documentation, faulty construction or increasing cost. I’m not buying the cost issue as I’ve been paying for the damn thing for decades in my electric bill in two states. In any case, it was changed over to a coal burning facility. The greenies didn’t like that either. Fuck ‘em.
Thanks for the link Stin. I also believe that fusion is the ultimate way to go, but we have a bit to get there.
The greenies aren’t going to like anything proposed. Their sole purpose in life is to be a hinderance to everyone else. That’s what makes their world go around. They all should be made to live in in the middle of Utah, with no electricity or running water.I mentioned in my #14, a battery that stored huge amounts of electricity quickly would make solar/wind power practical. I hope some respected scientist will explain why it’s impossible—then I know it’ll happen.
Posted by Oink
11/30/2005 at 05:06 PM
Sounds like what you want is a capacitor, Oink. There is a slight “rise time” but they charge up very quickly. They’ve been getting smaller over the years but still won’t hold the total charge that a battery of the same size will hold.
They can discharge just as quickly with spectacular results. I once saw one the size of a coffee cup discharged with a short across the terminals. Sounded like a shotgun going off. Wooo, baby. Lightning in a can. No
I also got “hit” with one in a piece of gear that had been off for days. I had removed an air filter for cleaning and when I was putting it back in I got nailed.
Hmmmm, nothing like the taste of copper in the mouth. 
Kerr: Reminds you of victory, right? Stupidity?
I was dreaming of a battery that stores a lot, real quick, for a long time, and is significantly smaller than a refridgerator.
Posted by Oink
12/01/2005 at 11:19 AM
The pop off started as a classroom demonstration and we conned the instructor into some non standard experiments.
Getting nailed myself was probably stupidity. I have no idea why that cap was still charged as the gear was off. It should have been dead. Yeah, usually when I get hit it’s stupidity or carelessness. Same thing, I suppose. I don’t play daredevil games with the sparky stuff. Welllll, mostly, I don’t.
Batteries seem to be getting better all the time. Caps are advancing too, although at a slower pace. It’s a very simple device and therefore harder to improve. We’ll get there, it just won’t be by the end of the week.
