I've been trying to find a place to work in a joke about Michael Mann being on the look out for some Nobel Prize medals, but this has turned into some kind of Race Rant.
Perhaps they should just be licensed, with things like customer service, fleet cleanliness, and driver's performance of knowledge of the city routes evaluated to decide who gets them. They could also just give them to whoever wants them and let the market decide which company survives.
Now, don't get all pissed and shit and whipping out the negative mods, but in Austin, the primary cause of power failures are all the people who go ape shit whenever the power company starts to trim trees. "Preserve the Historical Nature!", "Save the Trees!", etc.
Then, when an Ice Storm comes along or high winds, the tree limbs break and fall on the lines. Of course, then they go ape shit because they have no power. What is really funny is that the power company is owned by the City.
Actually, I'd be for this. Nuke sub power plants are over engineered to be safer for obvious reasons and powerful and small. Design them into a black box and drop them into any power plant.
Design Defects discovered during construction or after completion would be be evaluated. Actual defects would be documents, fixes designed and repairs directed. This process exists for aviation and is well documented and tuned.
Operating costs associated with hiring qualified personnel are but a speck on the over all operating costs. You could double the pay from an average of $77k to $154k without materially affecting the bottom line.
See my comment on smaller nukes to address the manufacturing of parts.
It should be noted that I didn't say anything about the size of the nuke approved. I would prefer that the plants be made up of small modules that are completely manufactured in one location and transported to the site and then back again at the end of its life. Sealed and turnkey nukes are safer that "stick built" plants.
For that matter, the actual power generation portion of the plant should be completely independent of the power source itself. That allows you to swap fusion for fission, gas for coal, or whatever else comes down the pike. The turbines and grid infrastructure stay the same.
The high costs of nuclear are driven by non technical issues. Five year Environmental impact studies, lawsuit after lawsuit, etc.
And the feds can definitely provide a framework and structure to a thriving private industry. Pre-approved designs, standard manufacturing facilities and techniques, etc can drive costs down. Right now, every plant is a one off and many parts are only made by one overseas company...the most expensive way to build anything.
Nukes need to move forward in a deliberate manner.
1. A few reference designs need to be established, accounting for some reasonable subset of possible sites such as coastal, inter coastal, inland, etc. 2. These designs would be vetted by the Industry, the feds, and what the hell, invite the Greenies. 3. Once approved, the designs should be exempted fro EPA meddling and some reasonable level of lawsuit immunity...as in the construction can't be delayed decades by lawsuit after lawsuit. 4. Operators should undergo the same rigorous training as military nuke operators...subs, ships, etc. Not the same, but just as rigorous. We don't need fucking button pushes on the night shift. They have to understand the plant, the theory and they consequences of each action they take. 5. Parts should be manufactured in factories using standard methods and specifications. Parts should be interchangeable from site to site. Minimize customizations as much as possible.
The Free Market is great, but this is one of those things he Feds can and should do.
Oh, and none of this jetting into D.C. for 1 day a month for hearings crap. Get all the experts into the same room and lock the door. Make it into a Manhattan Project kind of thing...get it done and get it done right.
Suburbs are about homes, choice, privacy, and self determination. They have plenty of shops, I work in a manufacturing facility, and a great indoor Mall.
Your idea of the suburbs is inaccurate and probably colored by your life of living in densely packed people containers in urban environments.
That said, I will never give up my car. I will be driving it until they take away my license, cussing and honking at the morons who no longer know how to drive in their fancy self driving cars. I work in the computer industry and I know computers are as reliable as a fucking 16 year old teenage boy.
"you'll never be happy" is not a Strawman. Its existence is proven by this very topic...They want to convert the coal plant to natural gas and the environmentalists aren't happy...some strawman eh? Careful, this one walks, talks and files lawsuits.
Slashdot Mirror
So...saying Microsoft Sucks and being a flaming racist asshole are pretty much the same thing now...they both are modded -1.
I've been trying to find a place to work in a joke about Michael Mann being on the look out for some Nobel Prize medals, but this has turned into some kind of Race Rant.
It would be interesting to see what NASA could do if it didn't have Lucy constantly pulling the football away.
Perhaps they should just be licensed, with things like customer service, fleet cleanliness, and driver's performance of knowledge of the city routes evaluated to decide who gets them. They could also just give them to whoever wants them and let the market decide which company survives.
100 Terabytes.
Even I would have a hard time finding enough porn to fill that.
Now, don't get all pissed and shit and whipping out the negative mods, but in Austin, the primary cause of power failures are all the people who go ape shit whenever the power company starts to trim trees. "Preserve the Historical Nature!", "Save the Trees!", etc.
Then, when an Ice Storm comes along or high winds, the tree limbs break and fall on the lines. Of course, then they go ape shit because they have no power. What is really funny is that the power company is owned by the City.
Actually, I'd be for this. Nuke sub power plants are over engineered to be safer for obvious reasons and powerful and small. Design them into a black box and drop them into any power plant.
Design Defects discovered during construction or after completion would be be evaluated. Actual defects would be documents, fixes designed and repairs directed. This process exists for aviation and is well documented and tuned.
Operating costs associated with hiring qualified personnel are but a speck on the over all operating costs. You could double the pay from an average of $77k to $154k without materially affecting the bottom line.
See my comment on smaller nukes to address the manufacturing of parts.
It should be noted that I didn't say anything about the size of the nuke approved. I would prefer that the plants be made up of small modules that are completely manufactured in one location and transported to the site and then back again at the end of its life. Sealed and turnkey nukes are safer that "stick built" plants.
For that matter, the actual power generation portion of the plant should be completely independent of the power source itself. That allows you to swap fusion for fission, gas for coal, or whatever else comes down the pike. The turbines and grid infrastructure stay the same.
The high costs of nuclear are driven by non technical issues. Five year Environmental impact studies, lawsuit after lawsuit, etc.
And the feds can definitely provide a framework and structure to a thriving private industry. Pre-approved designs, standard manufacturing facilities and techniques, etc can drive costs down. Right now, every plant is a one off and many parts are only made by one overseas company...the most expensive way to build anything.
Spent nuclear fuel can be reprocessed again and again until it's pretty much a lump of lead.
Just need to put on the Big Boy Pants and reprocess it. Carter's E.O on reprocessing was born of irrational fear and politics.
Nukes need to move forward in a deliberate manner.
1. A few reference designs need to be established, accounting for some reasonable subset of possible sites such as coastal, inter coastal, inland, etc.
2. These designs would be vetted by the Industry, the feds, and what the hell, invite the Greenies.
3. Once approved, the designs should be exempted fro EPA meddling and some reasonable level of lawsuit immunity...as in the construction can't be delayed decades by lawsuit after lawsuit.
4. Operators should undergo the same rigorous training as military nuke operators...subs, ships, etc. Not the same, but just as rigorous. We don't need fucking button pushes on the night shift. They have to understand the plant, the theory and they consequences of each action they take.
5. Parts should be manufactured in factories using standard methods and specifications. Parts should be interchangeable from site to site. Minimize customizations as much as possible.
The Free Market is great, but this is one of those things he Feds can and should do.
Oh, and none of this jetting into D.C. for 1 day a month for hearings crap. Get all the experts into the same room and lock the door. Make it into a Manhattan Project kind of thing...get it done and get it done right.
Guess they want Flame Broiled Burgers like Burger King.
How many times to you have to reboot Windows in a week?
In case you missed Comp Sci 101, computers are programmed by the very same people who cause over 99.999% of accidents through human error.
All you are talking about is coding in that unreliability. And did you ever notice that the cockpits still have yolks for the pilots?
10 minutes to work...12 miles, including lights. Twenty minutes if I decide to stop for breakfast.
Suburbs are about homes, choice, privacy, and self determination. They have plenty of shops, I work in a manufacturing facility, and a great indoor Mall.
Your idea of the suburbs is inaccurate and probably colored by your life of living in densely packed people containers in urban environments.
That said, I will never give up my car. I will be driving it until they take away my license, cussing and honking at the morons who no longer know how to drive in their fancy self driving cars. I work in the computer industry and I know computers are as reliable as a fucking 16 year old teenage boy.
Shit...have you NOT seen the Slashdot Beta?
And incessant lawsuits.
Funny you should say that since the Libs want to:
- control what I do in my bedroom
- control my social life
- control what I talk about
- control who I do business with
- control what I believe
- control what business I'm allowed to engage in
It's time to reassess your opinion on who wants to to micromanage your life.
And I'm sorry, but what doesn't hold water is an argument that the Sierra Club is interested in saving anyone money.
They want the plant shut down, period.
"The utility, National Grid, said shutting it down could make local power supplies less reliable..."
Hugh says it could be fixed by boosting transmission capacity.
Hmmm...The Utility or Hugh? Utility or Hugh?
I think I'll go with the Utility on that one.
"you'll never be happy" is not a Strawman. Its existence is proven by this very topic...They want to convert the coal plant to natural gas and the environmentalists aren't happy...some strawman eh? Careful, this one walks, talks and files lawsuits.
I would use the term Schizophrenic.
I bet they are all about reliable and inexpensive energy now that their oxygen pumps and other medical equipment relies on it.
Yeah...they'd just have to dig one up and cart off all one hundred tons of it off in the middle of the night when no one is looking.