Exactly. For one thing, they'll all storing their spent fuel in the basement of the power plants rather then shifting it to a remote storage facility. So decommissioning has to be a larger expense because it includes all the spent fuel that should have been offloaded decades ago.
Yes and the amount that they pay into the account is pre-specified.
So what you're saying is that your energy bill should have doubled to account for the large increase in what had to be paid into the decommissioning account?
As to rocket science, I believe they did save to the pre-specified amount. It's just the amount changed. It's not their fault if someone else changed the rules on them.
Yes... This is especially true of the older reactors that were built before the anti nuclear lobby became so strong.
We basically don't build reactors anymore because that political lobby over powers any attempt to build new reactors.
As to granting licenses... that's a form of contract too.
For example, if I buy a fishing license then I have a right to fish in a given place in stipulated ways... right? What if while I'm out on the lake they come at me with a speed boat and say "new rule, you can only fish blindfolded"... is that legitimate? Lets assume the fishing license was expensive and I sunk considerable capital into fishing on that day. How fair would it be for the government to issue a license and then after I began using it they change the rules prior to it expiring?
I'm sorry if you find this inconvienent but if you issue me a license to fish on that lake and I obey all the rules as stipulated at the time of the issuing. I can fish on that lake without people coming out to harass me.
And if that isn't good enough for you then I want my money back for the license and I want to be compensated for damages resulting from capital investment.
In this case, you can buy the reactor at fair market value and refund the license if that hasn't depreciated already.
Regulations COST something. People throw laws around like it doesn't mean anything. It's fine because it's always someone else's problem or someone else's expense. But if you make the people throwing these laws around or supporting them understand that their little regulation has a price tag then I think they'll be a little more careful about the laws they pass. They might also bother to ask the people in the industry if there are efficient ways to getting to the same place.
Often their are win win solutions that are over looked because the lobbying group is so hostile to the industry that actually think the damage it does is a good thing. That is, they're often seeking BIG WIN and BIG LOSS solutions. That sort of hostility is destructive and only makes people cynical and paranoid. People after all will know that some people really are out to destroy them. And that the system is being used against them.
That's not good for a society because it turns us against each other. We should seek win win solutions. They exist.
If they followed all the rules as stipulated upon being granted a license to operate a nuclear reactor then they broke nothing.
They are liable for those contractual costs. If you want to add additional costs after that point you may do so as long as you understand that they are not covered under the initial contract and they have on obligation to accept that liability.
No one accepts limitless liabilities. That you don't seem to grasp this is really rather amusing. Liabilities are defined before hand and are not subject to later change.
This has been a common legal practice for the last 2000 or so years.
As to grabbing profit now and leaving a mess for later. Of course it isn't okay. That's why you have to define liabilities beforehand. If you take care of all stated liabilities then you technically didn't leave a mess.
Again, you can redefine what a mess means but you can't retroactively apply it to old contracts without acknowledging that you changed the deal. And in doing so they're not really liable for all that.
Look, no one wants to cause a problem and no one wants to be unresonable. But you need to understand that often you're not so much dictating terms here as you are negociating. Everyone is willing to adjust policies so long as everyone is respectful of rights and willing to occasionally accept partical responsibiltiy for cost increases.
None of this is forever. These contracts and licenses aren't forever. When the contracts are renegotiate you can stipulate new terms. And they will then build those new expenses into their business model. If it turns out that they can't make a profit due to a combination of price caps and high regulation then they simply won't build. At which point you'll probably think you've won in that the government will have to build it themselves and assume ALL risk.
The hilarity in that case is that government agencies tend to get exemptions to practically all the regulations people like you throw at corporations. The new healthcare laws are a good example. The federal healthcare system is exempt from the rules corporate america must follow. the states are also exempt... and many of the large labor unions are as well.
Most military bases are exempt from most of the EPA regulations as are many municipal water treatment facilities. In many cases a factory making battery acid will be more regulated then a water treatment facility that millions drink from.
But whatever... double standards are part and parsel to this little game. I'm not complaining. I'm just noting the game is rigged.
Not true actually. It's written instead by whichever interest group is most interested in that industry and has the most power.
That is USUALLY the industry's own lobby. However, the anti nuclear lobby is stronger then the pro nuclear lobby. As evidence, how many nuclear power plants have we built in the last 20 years? Exactly. Anti nuclear lobby is MUCH stronger. And because that lobby is stronger it writes the regulation and not the nuclear industry.
As to being a horrible human being, I don't think you're self aware, introspective, or conscious enough to judge another human being.
I'd tell you to eat shit but that would be cannibalism.;-p
A question might be why they would be required to update it?
Look... if you change the rules. that is if you change the terms of the contract EX POST FACTO then you're responsible for those extra costs. They held up their end of the bargain. They didn't change the rules. The government did. So who's responsible? The party that changed the rules... eg the government.
Don't like that? Don't change the rules.
That's why contracts are written down. So everyone can remember what everyone agreed to in black and white.
A major problem with new regulation is that politicians and their supporters often don't grasp that new legislation has far ranging expenses. They don't care because in their mind it is someone else's problem. However, the buck will be passed around until it comes right back at the consumer or the tax payer.
You always pay for it in the end.
Lets say you get everything you want and you stick it to the evil nuclear power company. Guess how they're going to pay for it? They're going to charge you more for electricity. So you'll pay for anyway.
Mission accomplished?
Trust me... everyone is going to be happier if you find the most reasonable, low cost method of safely disposing of the waste. If you dick around with a lot of things that mostly exist to waste money it will all be passed on to you in your bill or your tax form.
The smart thing is to be efficient. Waste other people's time and money and they'll return the favor. The only people that actually get away with it are the politicians because they're screwing around with other people's money.
When a company sets up and agrees to follow all regulations including providing a fund for dismantling the reactor at the end of it's life they have to make assumptions about what that will cost.
if those assumptions are unreasonable and due to things outside of their control the costs are not sufficient to meet dismantling costs then that isn't their fault.
It's a question of determining responsibility and fault.
Is their liability for the reactor unlimited? No. It clearly isn't. I mean, that isn't a controversial point. It's a matter of contract that their liability has an exact dollar figure.
So if your policies even if they're scientifically valid happen to cause their expenses to exceed their liabilities they won't actually pay them.
In these matters, you might have to consider contributing public funds to the issue or simply accept that the reactor will sit there until such time as the fund can handle the expense. Or you can adopt a different dismantling procedure that is less expensive.
You literally will be unable to stick it to these guys if they held up their end of the contract. So "ideas" that aren't going to happen in reality because they're about as illegal as feeding radioactive waste to babies... it isn't going to happen.
if that's true then I'm all with sticking it to the pigs. Though that blade cuts both ways and if you're honest you'll have to admit the government does sometimes change the rules on people and someone else to pay for it out of their own pockets.
Neither policy should be tolerated. If they're scamming the government then by all means nail them. If the government screwed them then stick it to them instead. Someone else pointed out that "we" pay for the government's mistakes. That's true. Doesn't change who's responsible if the government caused the company to experience some new expense.
Someone also said that the issue is less either of these issues and instead it's just the economic down turn hurting the funds. If that's the case then no one is at fault. It's just a 'shit happens' situation.
ah, in that case they're not at fault. They put their money into AAA investments considered equal to treasury bonds.
If this is the case then no one is at fault besides possibly the rating agencies. And that means the reactors will sit there for years until their funds recover unless someone can figure out a way to finance it that doesn't punish people who ultimately are not at fault.
True, which will make the real cost of regulation relevant. When people grasp that passing a given law means money out of their wallet they'll take the situation more seriously.
Who can say. I'm sure that did happen in at least one case. If there is fraud or looting or mismanagement then I would of course agree the company is liable for that.
However, it is also very likely that they did plan for dismantling costs it's just that the costs have gone up radically in recent years because the rules have changed. Do you think the new regulations don't have a price? Who's paying for it? It has to come out of that dismantling fund and if they set it up assuming the old rules then they probably couldn't have enough in it.
The point is that an entirely responsible and honest company could find itself flatfooted if between point A and point B the rules change. They couldn't anticipate that the dismantling costs would double or quadruple.
So in the case of fraud or looting or mismanagment... yes... the company should be squeezed to pay the difference.
However, in instances where the company did save but the rules were changed... either the government should take responsibility for it's own decisions or you should simply accept the reactor sit there for 60 years while the fund gains value as a compromise.
Short of that, you can't make ex post facto regulations and then expect everyone to pay for it. A possible compromise would be to grand father all the reactors that were built prior to the new regulations....that would be all of them because they're all pretty old.
Its very important in law to be reasonable. When you get unreasonable people stop obeying the law. Criminals don't get away with that because they're typically pretty stupid an a minority. But when laws get unreasonable for everyone then suddenly you find that law loses all it's teeth.
Just be careful... when you make everyone an outlaw you'll find that the outlaws outnumber everyone else.
It's easy to forget that when these reactors were set up the world was a different place. The "retirement" accounts for these reactors probably assumed a MUCH lower retirement cost. So it's not the fault of the utility if there isn't enough money in the accounts if the rules changed between point A and point B.
Something that is irritating about many regulations is that they're very casually passed sometimes without really considering what the rule actually costs. If these fellows didn't save enough by the standards of the old cost projections then I see no fault with them. This is a situation where the government should probably take responsibility for the costs IF they are in fact responsible for making them go up.
If they never were going to save enough even by the old rules then these utilities are at fault for mismanagement and I'd be fine with squeezing them to pony up the difference.
Regardless, the money required to dismantle these reactors is probably in excess of what the utilities are themselves liable. So the government should probably pay that difference.
I know a lot of people don't like this idea because budgets are getting tight. But when you pass regulations they cost someone money. If the government doesn't want to pay it can always relax the regulation in some circumstances. But short of that it isn't reasonable to change the rules on the utilities and then expect them to make up the difference.
Short of that, the utilities will do what they're already doing... just leaving the money in an account to mature until such time as it can cover dismantling costs.
So those are the options on the ground. Maybe I'm being unfair to someone... this is my impression of the matter.
I don't have a vagina myself but I don't see why the sonic screw driver for example increases the romance? It just murders the plot or any attempt at making sense of anything.
That's not true. We have technologies that can shoot down the missiles at every stage. The subs in particular are actually easier to stop because you know roughly where the subs will be launching from... And that means you can station interceptors in that area to shoot the missile down.
As to the other comment that suggested I don't care if it starts WW3, take it as granted that I don't see that as remotely likely. I believe they are complaining but are not so upset they'll cause their civilization to go extinct over that complaint.
We have offered them the technology. With it they can nullify much of the US's weapons and make themselves safe from third rate ICBM powers.
If that is not sufficient and they feel they need to be able to nuke the US then that's just too bad. What exactly are they going to do about it? Russia thinks they're getting back at the US by giving tech to the Iranians... they're just aiding a mutual enemy out of childish ire.
The chinese has finally realized this and are starting to aid the US in isolating Iran. If Russia wants to remain unreasonable then they can continue to wither.
I don't mean to troll so if this offends anyone that is unintentional. But I really don't "get" the show.
I like science fiction but Dr Who just seems to be endless deus ex machina. His "sonic screwdriver" can apparently do just about anything except when it's not convenient and then it's inexplicably useless. There's no logic or reason to anything. Everything seems to happen almost at random. And while some might argue that's part of the fun of it the show pales in comparison to shows like Red Dwarf that were also very random but at least had an internal logic that remained consistent to itself at least for an episode or two.
I just don't get Dr Who... I've tried to understand it... I've probably watched a couple seasons of it and I always walk away rolling my eyes.
I suppose I genuinely like the "Angels" while they don't make any more sense then anything else they at least create great suspense on the screen so the episodes are always fun. But the rest... It's just sad.
I get that the show was started in the dark ages of television but so were a lot of shows can concepts that have since been updated so they're not quiet so embarrassing.
As I said, I don't mean to troll... if I offend I'm sorry... I just don't get the show. It make me a lot happier if they make some effort to make sense... even in the abstract. If they made sense but it was highly complex or philosophical that would be okay as well. But as it stands, I'm pretty sure any brain power spent trying to make the plots make sense is wasted.
I'm pretty sure apple has similar rules about buying MS products with company funds.
Would apple be okay with their employees buying lots of MS mobile phones using company resources? I doubt it. Sure, there's not much chance of them choosing to do that but the reality is that no company is going to be happy about it's employees using company resources to buy a competitor's products.
I'm watching all these franchises getting raped and it's nice that i don't actually care about any of them.
Never liked the smurfs. Never really liked transformers. Never liked TMNT. Never really gave a damn about starwars. Empire strikes back was awesome but the rest I could care less about. I did like Indiana jones but I just liked them... I'm not a "fan."
Anyway... It's nice not caring. I am sorta of a startrek fan so it was nice that they did that some justice. But beyond that it can all go to hell.
Good games can not only sell for 60 dollars but can sell for considerably more then that.
Bad games are worth something between 60 dollars and nothing.
If you have a lackluster game that no one really has much enthusiasm for then going free to play is probably a good idea with some micropayments. If you have a great game that people are really going to be excited about playing specifically then you don't need to make any sort of accommodations.
The same is true for music, movies, books... 80 percent of everything is crap. Go to the bookstore... go to the new releases... 80 percent is garbage. Same thing at the theater and same thing for new games. Always been this way and probably always will be that way.
What we need are more flexible prices to take into consideration the varying quality of content. Bad games are not worth 60 dollars but they might be worth 10 dollars or 20 dollars... or 2 dollars in micro payments.
If you're a mediocre game company known for making mediocre games then you're going to have to adopt a business model that takes your poor quality into consideration. If you're a TRUE AAA game maker that people ACTUALLY like then you can basically set your own prices and people will pay.
Frankly, I don't care if it makes them mad. They can either go to defcon 1 and start WW3 or they can stew in it.
The US is going to make itself safe. We have even offered Russia and china this technology repeatedly. We don't mind if they can stop our missiles too. The goal is not to give the US first strike capability as much as it is to take first strike capability away from any other ICBM power.
As to Iran and NK this makes the cheap third rate ICBMs from these powers totally ineffective. Already Israel is shooting down the cheap missiles from the palestinians on a daily basis. And that's just a test bed for the short range applications. Ultimately, we're going to have a global system of anti ICBM nets that detect at launch and then have MANY opportunities at various ranges to shoot down missiles. Practically from the start they're going to have to start dodging anti ICBM fire. And by the time the missile storm gets to the target very little if anything should have survived.
This is how we kill the ICBM. We're not disarming. We need to make ICBMs obsolete.
The cable must be kept cool to be super conducting. I'm assuming we have to do that with some very cold compressed or chilled gas. Is it possible to place the cable in a pressurized chamber, fill it with liquid nitrogen, and then keep the gas cool by keeping the chamber under pressure?
That is, are there passive ways to keep the cable cool? Or must the cable(s) be actively cooled? I'm hoping you can simply keep them in a chamber under so much pressure that nitrogen can't evaporate and is thus kept in a liquid state... and that that state assuming good insulation and pressure can maintain a very low temperature almost indefinitely with little or no maintenance.
You'd think one of the newspapers would crow about this if it were true. I mean, some of them are anti EU... it's sorta suspicious that none of them are... suggests that this might not be accurate. Just a feeling...
Slashdot Mirror
Exactly. For one thing, they'll all storing their spent fuel in the basement of the power plants rather then shifting it to a remote storage facility. So decommissioning has to be a larger expense because it includes all the spent fuel that should have been offloaded decades ago.
Horrible example. You're comparing an "act of god" or some natural disaster with a pure regulation change.
Try again.
Yes and the amount that they pay into the account is pre-specified.
So what you're saying is that your energy bill should have doubled to account for the large increase in what had to be paid into the decommissioning account?
As to rocket science, I believe they did save to the pre-specified amount. It's just the amount changed. It's not their fault if someone else changed the rules on them.
Are you kidding?
Yes... This is especially true of the older reactors that were built before the anti nuclear lobby became so strong.
We basically don't build reactors anymore because that political lobby over powers any attempt to build new reactors.
As to granting licenses... that's a form of contract too.
For example, if I buy a fishing license then I have a right to fish in a given place in stipulated ways... right? What if while I'm out on the lake they come at me with a speed boat and say "new rule, you can only fish blindfolded"... is that legitimate? Lets assume the fishing license was expensive and I sunk considerable capital into fishing on that day. How fair would it be for the government to issue a license and then after I began using it they change the rules prior to it expiring?
I'm sorry if you find this inconvienent but if you issue me a license to fish on that lake and I obey all the rules as stipulated at the time of the issuing. I can fish on that lake without people coming out to harass me.
And if that isn't good enough for you then I want my money back for the license and I want to be compensated for damages resulting from capital investment.
In this case, you can buy the reactor at fair market value and refund the license if that hasn't depreciated already.
Regulations COST something. People throw laws around like it doesn't mean anything. It's fine because it's always someone else's problem or someone else's expense. But if you make the people throwing these laws around or supporting them understand that their little regulation has a price tag then I think they'll be a little more careful about the laws they pass. They might also bother to ask the people in the industry if there are efficient ways to getting to the same place.
Often their are win win solutions that are over looked because the lobbying group is so hostile to the industry that actually think the damage it does is a good thing. That is, they're often seeking BIG WIN and BIG LOSS solutions. That sort of hostility is destructive and only makes people cynical and paranoid. People after all will know that some people really are out to destroy them. And that the system is being used against them.
That's not good for a society because it turns us against each other. We should seek win win solutions. They exist.
If they followed all the rules as stipulated upon being granted a license to operate a nuclear reactor then they broke nothing.
They are liable for those contractual costs. If you want to add additional costs after that point you may do so as long as you understand that they are not covered under the initial contract and they have on obligation to accept that liability.
No one accepts limitless liabilities. That you don't seem to grasp this is really rather amusing. Liabilities are defined before hand and are not subject to later change.
This has been a common legal practice for the last 2000 or so years.
As to grabbing profit now and leaving a mess for later. Of course it isn't okay. That's why you have to define liabilities beforehand. If you take care of all stated liabilities then you technically didn't leave a mess.
Again, you can redefine what a mess means but you can't retroactively apply it to old contracts without acknowledging that you changed the deal. And in doing so they're not really liable for all that.
Look, no one wants to cause a problem and no one wants to be unresonable. But you need to understand that often you're not so much dictating terms here as you are negociating. Everyone is willing to adjust policies so long as everyone is respectful of rights and willing to occasionally accept partical responsibiltiy for cost increases.
None of this is forever. These contracts and licenses aren't forever. When the contracts are renegotiate you can stipulate new terms. And they will then build those new expenses into their business model. If it turns out that they can't make a profit due to a combination of price caps and high regulation then they simply won't build. At which point you'll probably think you've won in that the government will have to build it themselves and assume ALL risk.
The hilarity in that case is that government agencies tend to get exemptions to practically all the regulations people like you throw at corporations. The new healthcare laws are a good example. The federal healthcare system is exempt from the rules corporate america must follow. the states are also exempt... and many of the large labor unions are as well.
Most military bases are exempt from most of the EPA regulations as are many municipal water treatment facilities. In many cases a factory making battery acid will be more regulated then a water treatment facility that millions drink from.
But whatever... double standards are part and parsel to this little game. I'm not complaining. I'm just noting the game is rigged.
So you believe the utility has UNLIMITED liability?
*laughs*
Have fun enforcing that, sport. The buck will be passed. So while you're at it try to make it as expensive as possible.
Enjoy the tax hike. ;-)
Not true actually. It's written instead by whichever interest group is most interested in that industry and has the most power.
That is USUALLY the industry's own lobby. However, the anti nuclear lobby is stronger then the pro nuclear lobby. As evidence, how many nuclear power plants have we built in the last 20 years? Exactly. Anti nuclear lobby is MUCH stronger. And because that lobby is stronger it writes the regulation and not the nuclear industry.
As to being a horrible human being, I don't think you're self aware, introspective, or conscious enough to judge another human being.
I'd tell you to eat shit but that would be cannibalism. ;-p
***BURN***
I win the flame war.
A question might be why they would be required to update it?
Look... if you change the rules. that is if you change the terms of the contract EX POST FACTO then you're responsible for those extra costs. They held up their end of the bargain. They didn't change the rules. The government did. So who's responsible? The party that changed the rules... eg the government.
Don't like that? Don't change the rules.
That's why contracts are written down. So everyone can remember what everyone agreed to in black and white.
A major problem with new regulation is that politicians and their supporters often don't grasp that new legislation has far ranging expenses. They don't care because in their mind it is someone else's problem. However, the buck will be passed around until it comes right back at the consumer or the tax payer.
You always pay for it in the end.
Lets say you get everything you want and you stick it to the evil nuclear power company. Guess how they're going to pay for it? They're going to charge you more for electricity. So you'll pay for anyway.
Mission accomplished?
Trust me... everyone is going to be happier if you find the most reasonable, low cost method of safely disposing of the waste. If you dick around with a lot of things that mostly exist to waste money it will all be passed on to you in your bill or your tax form.
The smart thing is to be efficient. Waste other people's time and money and they'll return the favor. The only people that actually get away with it are the politicians because they're screwing around with other people's money.
When a company sets up and agrees to follow all regulations including providing a fund for dismantling the reactor at the end of it's life they have to make assumptions about what that will cost.
if those assumptions are unreasonable and due to things outside of their control the costs are not sufficient to meet dismantling costs then that isn't their fault.
It's a question of determining responsibility and fault.
Is their liability for the reactor unlimited? No. It clearly isn't. I mean, that isn't a controversial point. It's a matter of contract that their liability has an exact dollar figure.
So if your policies even if they're scientifically valid happen to cause their expenses to exceed their liabilities they won't actually pay them.
In these matters, you might have to consider contributing public funds to the issue or simply accept that the reactor will sit there until such time as the fund can handle the expense. Or you can adopt a different dismantling procedure that is less expensive.
You literally will be unable to stick it to these guys if they held up their end of the contract. So "ideas" that aren't going to happen in reality because they're about as illegal as feeding radioactive waste to babies... it isn't going to happen.
if that's true then I'm all with sticking it to the pigs. Though that blade cuts both ways and if you're honest you'll have to admit the government does sometimes change the rules on people and someone else to pay for it out of their own pockets.
Neither policy should be tolerated. If they're scamming the government then by all means nail them. If the government screwed them then stick it to them instead. Someone else pointed out that "we" pay for the government's mistakes. That's true. Doesn't change who's responsible if the government caused the company to experience some new expense.
Someone also said that the issue is less either of these issues and instead it's just the economic down turn hurting the funds. If that's the case then no one is at fault. It's just a 'shit happens' situation.
ah, in that case they're not at fault. They put their money into AAA investments considered equal to treasury bonds.
If this is the case then no one is at fault besides possibly the rating agencies. And that means the reactors will sit there for years until their funds recover unless someone can figure out a way to finance it that doesn't punish people who ultimately are not at fault.
True, which will make the real cost of regulation relevant. When people grasp that passing a given law means money out of their wallet they'll take the situation more seriously.
Who can say. I'm sure that did happen in at least one case. If there is fraud or looting or mismanagement then I would of course agree the company is liable for that.
However, it is also very likely that they did plan for dismantling costs it's just that the costs have gone up radically in recent years because the rules have changed. Do you think the new regulations don't have a price? Who's paying for it? It has to come out of that dismantling fund and if they set it up assuming the old rules then they probably couldn't have enough in it.
The point is that an entirely responsible and honest company could find itself flatfooted if between point A and point B the rules change. They couldn't anticipate that the dismantling costs would double or quadruple.
So in the case of fraud or looting or mismanagment... yes... the company should be squeezed to pay the difference.
However, in instances where the company did save but the rules were changed... either the government should take responsibility for it's own decisions or you should simply accept the reactor sit there for 60 years while the fund gains value as a compromise.
Short of that, you can't make ex post facto regulations and then expect everyone to pay for it. A possible compromise would be to grand father all the reactors that were built prior to the new regulations... .that would be all of them because they're all pretty old.
Its very important in law to be reasonable. When you get unreasonable people stop obeying the law. Criminals don't get away with that because they're typically pretty stupid an a minority. But when laws get unreasonable for everyone then suddenly you find that law loses all it's teeth.
Just be careful... when you make everyone an outlaw you'll find that the outlaws outnumber everyone else.
It's easy to forget that when these reactors were set up the world was a different place. The "retirement" accounts for these reactors probably assumed a MUCH lower retirement cost. So it's not the fault of the utility if there isn't enough money in the accounts if the rules changed between point A and point B.
Something that is irritating about many regulations is that they're very casually passed sometimes without really considering what the rule actually costs. If these fellows didn't save enough by the standards of the old cost projections then I see no fault with them. This is a situation where the government should probably take responsibility for the costs IF they are in fact responsible for making them go up.
If they never were going to save enough even by the old rules then these utilities are at fault for mismanagement and I'd be fine with squeezing them to pony up the difference.
Regardless, the money required to dismantle these reactors is probably in excess of what the utilities are themselves liable. So the government should probably pay that difference.
I know a lot of people don't like this idea because budgets are getting tight. But when you pass regulations they cost someone money. If the government doesn't want to pay it can always relax the regulation in some circumstances. But short of that it isn't reasonable to change the rules on the utilities and then expect them to make up the difference.
Short of that, the utilities will do what they're already doing... just leaving the money in an account to mature until such time as it can cover dismantling costs.
So those are the options on the ground. Maybe I'm being unfair to someone... this is my impression of the matter.
I don't have a vagina myself but I don't see why the sonic screw driver for example increases the romance? It just murders the plot or any attempt at making sense of anything.
I think it's all the writing really. I can't blame the actors or the costume department until that's fixed.
I think the writers don't actually know what science fiction is or like it. Get rid of them and try again...
That's not true. We have technologies that can shoot down the missiles at every stage. The subs in particular are actually easier to stop because you know roughly where the subs will be launching from... And that means you can station interceptors in that area to shoot the missile down.
As to the other comment that suggested I don't care if it starts WW3, take it as granted that I don't see that as remotely likely. I believe they are complaining but are not so upset they'll cause their civilization to go extinct over that complaint.
We have offered them the technology. With it they can nullify much of the US's weapons and make themselves safe from third rate ICBM powers.
If that is not sufficient and they feel they need to be able to nuke the US then that's just too bad. What exactly are they going to do about it? Russia thinks they're getting back at the US by giving tech to the Iranians... they're just aiding a mutual enemy out of childish ire.
The chinese has finally realized this and are starting to aid the US in isolating Iran. If Russia wants to remain unreasonable then they can continue to wither.
I don't mean to troll so if this offends anyone that is unintentional. But I really don't "get" the show.
I like science fiction but Dr Who just seems to be endless deus ex machina. His "sonic screwdriver" can apparently do just about anything except when it's not convenient and then it's inexplicably useless. There's no logic or reason to anything. Everything seems to happen almost at random. And while some might argue that's part of the fun of it the show pales in comparison to shows like Red Dwarf that were also very random but at least had an internal logic that remained consistent to itself at least for an episode or two.
I just don't get Dr Who... I've tried to understand it... I've probably watched a couple seasons of it and I always walk away rolling my eyes.
I suppose I genuinely like the "Angels" while they don't make any more sense then anything else they at least create great suspense on the screen so the episodes are always fun. But the rest... It's just sad.
I get that the show was started in the dark ages of television but so were a lot of shows can concepts that have since been updated so they're not quiet so embarrassing.
As I said, I don't mean to troll... if I offend I'm sorry... I just don't get the show. It make me a lot happier if they make some effort to make sense... even in the abstract. If they made sense but it was highly complex or philosophical that would be okay as well. But as it stands, I'm pretty sure any brain power spent trying to make the plots make sense is wasted.
I'm pretty sure if ol' steve jobs saw some employees walking around with MS products he might well have fired them on the spot.
Admit it... the man was like that.
Just have some perspective here. It keeps people honest.
I'm pretty sure apple has similar rules about buying MS products with company funds.
Would apple be okay with their employees buying lots of MS mobile phones using company resources? I doubt it. Sure, there's not much chance of them choosing to do that but the reality is that no company is going to be happy about it's employees using company resources to buy a competitor's products.
I'm watching all these franchises getting raped and it's nice that i don't actually care about any of them.
Never liked the smurfs.
Never really liked transformers.
Never liked TMNT.
Never really gave a damn about starwars. Empire strikes back was awesome but the rest I could care less about.
I did like Indiana jones but I just liked them... I'm not a "fan."
Anyway... It's nice not caring. I am sorta of a startrek fan so it was nice that they did that some justice. But beyond that it can all go to hell.
Good games can not only sell for 60 dollars but can sell for considerably more then that.
Bad games are worth something between 60 dollars and nothing.
If you have a lackluster game that no one really has much enthusiasm for then going free to play is probably a good idea with some micropayments. If you have a great game that people are really going to be excited about playing specifically then you don't need to make any sort of accommodations.
The same is true for music, movies, books... 80 percent of everything is crap. Go to the bookstore... go to the new releases... 80 percent is garbage. Same thing at the theater and same thing for new games. Always been this way and probably always will be that way.
What we need are more flexible prices to take into consideration the varying quality of content. Bad games are not worth 60 dollars but they might be worth 10 dollars or 20 dollars... or 2 dollars in micro payments.
If you're a mediocre game company known for making mediocre games then you're going to have to adopt a business model that takes your poor quality into consideration. If you're a TRUE AAA game maker that people ACTUALLY like then you can basically set your own prices and people will pay.
Frankly, I don't care if it makes them mad. They can either go to defcon 1 and start WW3 or they can stew in it.
The US is going to make itself safe. We have even offered Russia and china this technology repeatedly. We don't mind if they can stop our missiles too. The goal is not to give the US first strike capability as much as it is to take first strike capability away from any other ICBM power.
As to Iran and NK this makes the cheap third rate ICBMs from these powers totally ineffective. Already Israel is shooting down the cheap missiles from the palestinians on a daily basis. And that's just a test bed for the short range applications. Ultimately, we're going to have a global system of anti ICBM nets that detect at launch and then have MANY opportunities at various ranges to shoot down missiles. Practically from the start they're going to have to start dodging anti ICBM fire. And by the time the missile storm gets to the target very little if anything should have survived.
This is how we kill the ICBM. We're not disarming. We need to make ICBMs obsolete.
Question since you seem to be knowledgeable.
The cable must be kept cool to be super conducting. I'm assuming we have to do that with some very cold compressed or chilled gas. Is it possible to place the cable in a pressurized chamber, fill it with liquid nitrogen, and then keep the gas cool by keeping the chamber under pressure?
That is, are there passive ways to keep the cable cool? Or must the cable(s) be actively cooled? I'm hoping you can simply keep them in a chamber under so much pressure that nitrogen can't evaporate and is thus kept in a liquid state... and that that state assuming good insulation and pressure can maintain a very low temperature almost indefinitely with little or no maintenance.
You'd think one of the newspapers would crow about this if it were true. I mean, some of them are anti EU... it's sorta suspicious that none of them are... suggests that this might not be accurate. Just a feeling...