I'm fairly certain that it's actually the taxpayer that licenses the right to use these frequencies to the broadcaster in the first place. Shouldn't the taxpayer have some say in how they are subsequently used?
You never build a Solar plant because you need more electricity. Because if you build one you also have to build a traditional plant in order for cloudy days and night. it just doesn't make economic sense.
I think you left out the bit that because it's a solar THERMAL plant, it still generates power for hours after the sun goes down, but yeah, the details from reading the article probably aren't that important if you have a point to make.
The real issue is to understand why people like to be locked in, shackled and then anally fist fucked by DRM. It's because they like it and, realistically as long as it's shiney, they don't care being bitches. Of course, what is critical is not to use any of the core features of DRM to quickly so that they actually start to wonder why people who know about DRM, don't like it and are forced to educate the targets about why it's bad. Generally people will respond with "I quite like being fist fucked - whats your problem".
It's only when they start to get uncomfortable with the situation that they start to care about how much and how regularly they are being fist fucked (why am I paying for ads), unfortunately by then they have no choice but to submit to the fist fucking (why am I forced to watch ads) when the reality of the situation and the tightness of the shackles is really felt.
I know this is a highly graphic description of DRM, but if you look at the history as Palladium, NGSCB and all the other acronyms it has changed from there is a carefully orchestrated plan to get DRM out there is a way that users actually look forward to having it on their computers. I see how it's being sold. It's been going on for years. As a developer of software and a producer of music, I don't want it because my users are part of my lively hood so looking after them in the long term is important to me. The question is when will the day come when the cameras on your screen detect when you are not watching ads and pause them until you do.
Of course, some people actually enjoy being fist fucked, butt, on the hole, most people don't.
Chernobyl was x times worse than Fukushima and we didn't see a cancer epidemic in Europe and the middle east.
Educating yourself about which international organisation has interdiction authority over the W.H.O in publishing results for Nuclear matters may assist you finding that actual truth here. Hint: it has I and A and E and A in its name.
Even considering the pride of the nation as a factor it's now becoming an international problem for any country that shares the pacific ocean.
If every bit of contaminanted water was dumped in the ocean, and raw seawater was pumped in for cooling and not collected, would the levels have an effect that would be measurable from the US?
That's a great question but not the issue that is a threat to human health, the best answer I have (in light of the lack of real data being provided) is probably not very measurable.
It's the effects radionuclides bio-concentrated in the food chain, how they analogue micronutrients presented to metabolisms and the gestation period of cancer in humans that is the issue. Propagation and transportation of radionuclides is more likely to occur via biological and random means as higher order predators eat, humans being the most sophisticated predator. Also it's likely that even the direct effects won't even be noticed in Japan until at least 2018, and even then only in children as their uptake of vital nutrients is higher than adults while they grow. Chernobyl saw a very large increase in Thyroid cancer in children many years after the actual accident. It's reasonable this will happen in Japan and, possibly the west coast of the US.
The ocean is pretty big. Japan does more harm with illegal whaling than this, and the US condones that.
The US did not really have any choice about the airborne fallout that they would receive from Fukushima as the Jet stream would have been the perfect vehicle to carry all sorts of radionuclides to the west coast affecting any produce grown there.
The size of the ocean is pretty much irrelevant as our lives are relatively small compared to the geological timeframes of the radio-isotopes involved. For example, Plutonium (pu-239 - a biological analogue of Iron to metabolisms) has a half life of 24000 years. Fukushima (and Chernobyl) have left behind a radio-isotope legacy that will affect the human race for generations to come. This is a radiological legacy left for future generations the same way a carbon legacy was left for our generation. The sooner we resolve this issue, the less of an issue it will be for future generations.
dump the fucking slagged reactor core directly in the Pacific ocean and you would be safe across the Pacific.
Your comment suggests you are unclear on the difference between radiation and radionuclide which illustrates you have a poor understanding of the situation. Whilst it is clear you are trolling Mr AC, you are also propagating misinformation and ignorance detrimental to both sides of this debate.
More than likely the workers are all getting fatigued and small mistakes are starting.
It's well beyond time for the Japanese government to bring the Japanese military in to bring this under control. After that an international effort to assist Japan in any way required. Even considering the pride of the nation as a factor it's now becoming an international problem for any country that shares the pacific ocean.
This is well beyond TEPCO's ability and expertise, they are a utilities company. Furthermore it was their negligence through nonfeasance that got us into this mess in the first place. A criminal investigation should be conducted and the future of the company considered.
However, a video on inBloom's Web site suggesting what this techno-utopia might look like may give readers of 1984 some pause. In one scene, a teacher with a tablet crouches next to a second-grader evaluating how many words per minute he can read: 55 words read; 43 correctly.
Since when is the idea of a teacher evaluating a student's abilities an Orwellian concept?
When they read too much one day they'll become a threat.
However, a very likely alternative cause for you guys feeling colder would be that you're getting older; as people get older, they feel colder quicker.
Oh no doubt about that, I have to leave my walking stick at the beach so I can find my towel!!!
I cannot find any data on the Pacific ocean near Australia, but in many places oceans are getting slightly cooler. This has nothing to do with melt water, though; there's much too little of that to have a measurable influence, especially at your latitude. Instead, it is most probably due to changing currents.
I'm generally lean but have a bit of fat after winter so the icey water just strips it from you (apart from having a wettie on - which slows me down) so it seems to balance out and I want to catch as many waves as I can.
The thing is I have to swim really hard to get the waves so I'm working a lot to get them. The waves I'm after are about the same as the ones for a board as I am a pretty big guy and I get moving pretty fast. Catching them close to shore is dangerous as the waves tend to dump you on sand and I have been badly concussed from that before. Because of that I generally swim a good 100-300 meters from shore where the waves are bigger from sand banks - which you can see underwater.
When I'm out there I can feel the difference between the first metre and, when diving down, the next four or five (I'm a shark chicken - I don't want to be lunch so I keep an eye out). The water temperature is generally more stable the deeper you go but what gets me is that it is more often consistently cold all the way to the surface than not. You can feel the difference in certain patches of water as the temperature changes when you swim through them. This is the biggest change that I note (apart from seeing less penguins, seals and turtles).
Current change seems like a good point however I would then expect it to cycle between behaviours. So it could be because I'm an old bastard however there is a distinct change in the patterns of water temperature that entails the frequency and duration of warm patches of water. Whatever is happening, something is going on.
I also wanted to mention that it would be cool to get some little robots into these streams and map them under the ice to find out where they start and finish.
I know, the correlation/causation comment will come up, but you would never know the water temperature unless you got in the water and feel it for yourself over 2-3 decades of actually being in the water and knowing when to get in. I wouldn't call 250metres a stream, but other noticable thing is the way the weather has changed from a smooth transition to summer where it gradually got hotter to bursts of weather change where you will suddenly get days of really warm weather in winter and then back to cold and visa versa in summer.
I regularly goes for a swim or a surf on the east coast of Australia and for the last decade years the water has been really cold during seasons where I used to notice it was pretty warm. It has altered my whole habit of surfing. I used to go into the water around September and now it's late October. I love the waves but the goolie shock is just to severe. My mates would say the same thing and often the comment 'at least we know where the ice caps are melting to' would come up.
At least, you have the language down. Now all you need is the thinking. I suggest starting by looking at evidence.
As I pointed out, the evidence is not being made available which is why I said it's just difficult to quantify. A more accurate statement would be "We don't know what threat Fukushima poses to life on this planet" . In absence of hard data the only thing that remains is estimations, known facts about operational characteristics of the reactors, the status of the reactor during the disaster and the behaviour of the radionuclides.
Thinking does not begin with statements like "I don't see that because it isn't a threat to life on this planet" which indicates dogmatic skepticism on this subject and unprepared to accept any evidence.
Iron bio-accumulates too.
Iron isn't toxic as a micronutrient, and it isn't a highly energetic radionuclide. It's also a component of haemoglobin, plutonium isn't.
Nope. If it is breathed in, that's the claimed lethal dosage. We need to recall that this may be a bit of Cold War fiction since exaggerating the danger of plutonium would hinder nuclear proliferation to some degree.
The science was conducted In 1944 by J. Robert Oppenheimer with an original lethality of 50-100 micrograms later revised down by Evans. Calculation led to answers between 0.5-5.0 micrograms [.033-.33 uCi of Pu-239].
That's not fiction, it's information.
Not really. These things have a half life too. So while there are ways for them to enter the environment, there are also ways that they exit the environment.
In sr-90's case that's 600 years, so eventually. The question is where it ends up decaying, in the earth not to bad - in your body, not to good.
Complete bullshit. A completely laughable claim.
So says you
There was a fire pushing considerable mass into the atmosphere from Chernobyl. Even the fuel rod fire wasn't comparable.
and an explosion that blew some portion of the core, the reactor head and the building above it into the sky.
Why I grant your first number may be close to accurate, the other two are laughably off by orders of magnitude. Nobody eats fish directly from Fukushima. The biosphere of the Japanese coastal area is vast and people don't eat 1% of that mass. And that's a ridiculous exaggeration of the chances of getting cancer.
I wasn't claiming that was the case with Fukushima, I was claiming it was the case for Chernobyl. I don't have enough data I can use to make an estimation for Fukushima yet as that information is being suppressed. There is a much larger mass of fuel material and surface area there though because of the spent fuel in the pools from previous refuelling efforts and that it is going into the ocean where it is impossible to control. What we know is the explosion at Fukushima was from vented hydrogen exploding as opposed to extreme pressure and heat in the core of Chernobyl.
It's important to remember that the result is cumulative doses from both these disasters in the environment. The Fukushima disaster took that from 160 to roughly 1000 tons of uncontrolled pu-239 in the environment.
These manifest as a long term "threat to life on this planet" over time. How much of a threat that is depends much on the human capability to contain and control the release of all the radionuclides, not just plutonium. To be specific though, humans are "life on this planet" and the various threats, via implications to human health, will increase everyday more radionuclides released into the environment.
You don't see four nuclear reactors leaking radioactive substances directly into the ocean as a threat to life on this planet?
You got it right in my case as well. I don't see that because it isn't a threat to life on this planet.
Personally I go off of evidence. The evidence for this danger is in the nature of bioaccumulation and the quantity and type of radionuclides being released, which is being suppressed. I get really tired of people ranting about "it isn't a threat to life on this planet" who couldn't even figure out basic risk management. Risk management can handle long term risks as well as short term ones.
In reality there is a threat, it's just difficult to quantify. A more accurate statement would be "We don't know what threat Fukushima poses to life on this planet". I'll giving you the benefit of the doubt here, I wouldn't blame you for not being able to work it out, it's a hard problem, but saying it isn't a threat is just foolish optimism.
However if there is no danger why do anything at all? So there must be some danger otherwise why not just bull doze the entire thing into the ocean?
The answer is in the way radioactive elements accumulate in the food chain like some other dangerous chemicals like Poly Chloride Biphenyls. However radioactive isotopes also analogue a variety of elements that living creatures need to survive. Compounding this further they are emmiters of alpha, beta and, gamma radiation at various energetic levels.
So, pu-239 presents to the metabolism as a micro-nutrient. In Plutonium's case it presents as Iron to a metabolism. In the ocean a *lack* of iron is what stops metabolic processes, so Iron is readily absorbed ergo Plutonium is readily absorbed. So a small sea creature absorbs the plutonium and it gets eaten by steadily larger creatures, like a fish and then it's in the human food chain. Considering the size and variety of the human food chain, this is inevitable more than once.
This is the main reason to arrest the flow of Fukushima cooling water into the ocean, as plutonium is only one of the elements that it contains that has this property - but I'll follow with this single radioisotope as an example.
A single micro gram of plutonium is a fatal dose to a human being when ingested. As more isotopes are released into the environment the likelihood of exposure increases. The amount of time it takes to move through the food chain introduces a random amount of time before eventually ingested - by an actual person. From there a gestation time passes, like the flu is approximately 7 days, cancer is approximately 6 years. So even if someone ingests something immediately from Fukushima you still have a 6 year wait before you notice aything wrong.
Depending on the radionuclide, there are different cancers, radon 220 that causes lung cancer, or radium 226 that causes bone cancers, strontium 90, americium, iodine 131, cesium 137, the list goes on. The exposure vectors are many and varied. What has protected us is the likelihood of encountering one was low. Everyday this continues the possibility increases.
For airborne fallout, say just like TMI, the jetstream was the perfect carrier to the west coast of the US ensuring good coverage of land based produce. A cow eats radioactive grass, accumulates, say, strontium 90 in the milk, the milk is made into chocolate and you eat it in one of those multi-colored candy covered chocolate treats you so enjoy. Do you enjoy sushi? You can be exposed one or multiple times and after you die cremation makes the radioisotope airborne fallout amd decay allows it back into the watertable.
As for the risk, it's somewhere above 0% that some people will be exposed. However using an established case of Chernobyl. 5% of a 160 ton Nuclear reactor core that was about to be refueled - let's call it 100 tons, that's 5 tons of radioactive core into the atmosphere. At conservative estimates thats 5000,000,000,000 fatal doses. If
Actually I talked to some Australians recently who strongly believe that mandatory voting is a big failing of the Australian system. They say that this means that idiots are voting, and because they don't want to do any thinking on their own they just blindly follow voter guides given to them. Ie, they vote "above the line".
It's somewhat ironic since I could walk 100 feet and find an American who will claim that one of the biggest problems in the US is that not enough people vote.
Well they would be wrong. The participation rate is very high, but yes the electorate is manipulated by the media. It's so polarised right now that a narrow cross section of swinging voters can decide for the whole country. But I think the media is in its death throws and more younger people are finding other ways to interact in the electoral system.
I just hope we can reclaim some control of our countries from these vested interests that are destroying our way of life.
You had me sold on this theory, right up until you said "warrant".
Then I knew it was bullshit.
Like our government feels the need to recognize the legal process anymore.
You know that he's going to have a trial, right? And that the FBI won't want him to get off because there was no warrant for the evidence the prosecution presents in that trial, right? There might very well be unconstitutional monitoring in this process, but to bring it to court and get a conviction, a warrant is necessary paperwork.
I simply don't understand why it's such a big deal for America to fix something that is so obviously broken, your a superpower and your people are sneaking into Canada. It's really a sign that the US political system is so incapable of dealing with important infrastructure issues and the next stop is despotism.
It's the fundamental challenge of governing in the US: how to run an effective government when half the population is stupid. Really stupid, as in anti-science (no evolution, no global warming) gun-loving retards that listen to conservative talk radio and believe every bullshit conspiracy theory they hear. Those same people vote the Plutocracy Party and willingly support any sort a give away to the wealthy or corporations after being distracted by simple slogans.
I don't know why you've been modded down as it seems to be a straightforward pragmatic answer. We have the same problem in Australia, just less people (probably the same ratio of stupid though). Voting is mandatory and I think it's a citizens duty to participate in democracy otherwise they don't belong. We have the same problem though with our 2 party system and it's frustrating just how many people don't give a shit. Occasionally though the electorate doesn't give the politicians what they want and the minority voices get a say. In that short window of time the political process (Westminster) works as intended the politicians are actually forced to work and the country inches forward.
I'm not saying we are better, but I do think the two party system must die so we can start to solve these infrastructure issues before it starts to pose a major threat to the survival of our species. It seems to be an issue in many countries.
If I don't like Apple's bugs or capacity problems, I have the option to never pay for another Apple product. I don't have the option to opt out of ObamaCare.
Just opt out of getting sick or injured, I hear your fucked if you do in your country. When I get sick or injured i just go to the doctor or hospital and then go home until I'm better. Healthcare in the USA is something I hear everyone say "I hope our country is never that screwed". I can't opt out of my healthcare but I don't see my investments as so fragile that they need the extra $7.50 per month that it costs me to make sure I can go to hospital if I need to.
I simply don't understand why it's such a big deal for America to fix something that is so obviously broken, your a superpower and your people are sneaking into Canada. It's really a sign that the US political system is so incapable of dealing with important infrastructure issues and the next stop is despotism. Seriously, someone should tell your far right republicans to pull their heads in and stop acting like spoilt brats because they can't get their way.
I like you guys better than China, so I really hope that you can sort it out and get back to being the America that we used to look up to. I like (most) American people I've met, I think you deserve better than being discarded because of some misfortune and no decent heathcare.
For fuck sake, I KNOW I'M YELLING, I WANT TO FUCKING YELL content filter - ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
This is not fucking twitter or fuckfacebook IT'S FUCKING SLASHDOT where I come to get my ever-dwindling supply of geek through the stream of "first post" retards to eventually, occasionally come to some comment that makes it worth...
READING
You know that thing that all the "too lame ; don't read' morons don't do - so they don't come with their eternal stream of shallow, annoying, fucking bullshit to pollute my mind any further. I CAN FUCKING READ, I don't want pictures and all the other bullshit things you have been listening to your "FOCUS GROUP" bullshit audience has been telling you to do.
If I want pictures I'll read the article. What I want is a synopsis longer than the attention span of the gnat brains and frankly, scares the CRAP out of all the small IQ morons. FUCK OFF MORONS. It's not about modernization or keeping up with... whatever... it's about a fast, efficient delivery mechanism for a bunch of words, which is what you have. So DON'T RUIN IT ANYMORE by making it any more accessible to the small IQ morons.
Slashdot Mirror
3d metal printing - the possibilities for robotics projects excite me, although the dawning of skynet also fills me with dread.
This is the Vatican.
I'm fairly certain that it's actually the taxpayer that licenses the right to use these frequencies to the broadcaster in the first place. Shouldn't the taxpayer have some say in how they are subsequently used?
You never build a Solar plant because you need more electricity. Because if you build one you also have to build a traditional plant in order for cloudy days and night. it just doesn't make economic sense.
I think you left out the bit that because it's a solar THERMAL plant, it still generates power for hours after the sun goes down, but yeah, the details from reading the article probably aren't that important if you have a point to make.
The real issue is to understand why people like to be locked in, shackled and then anally fist fucked by DRM. It's because they like it and, realistically as long as it's shiney, they don't care being bitches. Of course, what is critical is not to use any of the core features of DRM to quickly so that they actually start to wonder why people who know about DRM, don't like it and are forced to educate the targets about why it's bad. Generally people will respond with "I quite like being fist fucked - whats your problem".
It's only when they start to get uncomfortable with the situation that they start to care about how much and how regularly they are being fist fucked (why am I paying for ads), unfortunately by then they have no choice but to submit to the fist fucking (why am I forced to watch ads) when the reality of the situation and the tightness of the shackles is really felt.
I know this is a highly graphic description of DRM, but if you look at the history as Palladium, NGSCB and all the other acronyms it has changed from there is a carefully orchestrated plan to get DRM out there is a way that users actually look forward to having it on their computers. I see how it's being sold. It's been going on for years. As a developer of software and a producer of music, I don't want it because my users are part of my lively hood so looking after them in the long term is important to me. The question is when will the day come when the cameras on your screen detect when you are not watching ads and pause them until you do.
Of course, some people actually enjoy being fist fucked, butt, on the hole, most people don't.
Chernobyl was x times worse than Fukushima and we didn't see a cancer epidemic in Europe and the middle east.
Educating yourself about which international organisation has interdiction authority over the W.H.O in publishing results for Nuclear matters may assist you finding that actual truth here. Hint: it has I and A and E and A in its name.
I will say it again: measurable != dangerous.
Like I said: a poor understanding of the situation.
That's a great question but not the issue that is a threat to human health, the best answer I have (in light of the lack of real data being provided) is probably not very measurable.
It's the effects radionuclides bio-concentrated in the food chain, how they analogue micronutrients presented to metabolisms and the gestation period of cancer in humans that is the issue. Propagation and transportation of radionuclides is more likely to occur via biological and random means as higher order predators eat, humans being the most sophisticated predator. Also it's likely that even the direct effects won't even be noticed in Japan until at least 2018, and even then only in children as their uptake of vital nutrients is higher than adults while they grow. Chernobyl saw a very large increase in Thyroid cancer in children many years after the actual accident. It's reasonable this will happen in Japan and, possibly the west coast of the US.
The US did not really have any choice about the airborne fallout that they would receive from Fukushima as the Jet stream would have been the perfect vehicle to carry all sorts of radionuclides to the west coast affecting any produce grown there.
The size of the ocean is pretty much irrelevant as our lives are relatively small compared to the geological timeframes of the radio-isotopes involved. For example, Plutonium (pu-239 - a biological analogue of Iron to metabolisms) has a half life of 24000 years. Fukushima (and Chernobyl) have left behind a radio-isotope legacy that will affect the human race for generations to come. This is a radiological legacy left for future generations the same way a carbon legacy was left for our generation. The sooner we resolve this issue, the less of an issue it will be for future generations.
Your comment suggests you are unclear on the difference between radiation and radionuclide which illustrates you have a poor understanding of the situation. Whilst it is clear you are trolling Mr AC, you are also propagating misinformation and ignorance detrimental to both sides of this debate.
More than likely the workers are all getting fatigued and small mistakes are starting.
It's well beyond time for the Japanese government to bring the Japanese military in to bring this under control. After that an international effort to assist Japan in any way required. Even considering the pride of the nation as a factor it's now becoming an international problem for any country that shares the pacific ocean.
This is well beyond TEPCO's ability and expertise, they are a utilities company. Furthermore it was their negligence through nonfeasance that got us into this mess in the first place. A criminal investigation should be conducted and the future of the company considered.
become a threat...to the landed gentry.
Finish your jokes off properly, please.
my apologies, I thought it would be to obvious.
rrrrrrrrr, too obvious.
become a threat...to the landed gentry.
Finish your jokes off properly, please.
my apologies, I thought it would be to obvious.
Since when is the idea of a teacher evaluating a student's abilities an Orwellian concept?
When they read too much one day they'll become a threat.
However, a very likely alternative cause for you guys feeling colder would be that you're getting older; as people get older, they feel colder quicker.
Oh no doubt about that, I have to leave my walking stick at the beach so I can find my towel!!!
I cannot find any data on the Pacific ocean near Australia, but in many places oceans are getting slightly cooler. This has nothing to do with melt water, though; there's much too little of that to have a measurable influence, especially at your latitude. Instead, it is most probably due to changing currents.
I'm generally lean but have a bit of fat after winter so the icey water just strips it from you (apart from having a wettie on - which slows me down) so it seems to balance out and I want to catch as many waves as I can.
The thing is I have to swim really hard to get the waves so I'm working a lot to get them. The waves I'm after are about the same as the ones for a board as I am a pretty big guy and I get moving pretty fast. Catching them close to shore is dangerous as the waves tend to dump you on sand and I have been badly concussed from that before. Because of that I generally swim a good 100-300 meters from shore where the waves are bigger from sand banks - which you can see underwater.
When I'm out there I can feel the difference between the first metre and, when diving down, the next four or five (I'm a shark chicken - I don't want to be lunch so I keep an eye out). The water temperature is generally more stable the deeper you go but what gets me is that it is more often consistently cold all the way to the surface than not. You can feel the difference in certain patches of water as the temperature changes when you swim through them. This is the biggest change that I note (apart from seeing less penguins, seals and turtles).
Current change seems like a good point however I would then expect it to cycle between behaviours. So it could be because I'm an old bastard however there is a distinct change in the patterns of water temperature that entails the frequency and duration of warm patches of water. Whatever is happening, something is going on.
I also wanted to mention that it would be cool to get some little robots into these streams and map them under the ice to find out where they start and finish.
I know, the correlation/causation comment will come up, but you would never know the water temperature unless you got in the water and feel it for yourself over 2-3 decades of actually being in the water and knowing when to get in. I wouldn't call 250metres a stream, but other noticable thing is the way the weather has changed from a smooth transition to summer where it gradually got hotter to bursts of weather change where you will suddenly get days of really warm weather in winter and then back to cold and visa versa in summer.
I regularly goes for a swim or a surf on the east coast of Australia and for the last decade years the water has been really cold during seasons where I used to notice it was pretty warm. It has altered my whole habit of surfing. I used to go into the water around September and now it's late October. I love the waves but the goolie shock is just to severe. My mates would say the same thing and often the comment 'at least we know where the ice caps are melting to' would come up.
As I pointed out, the evidence is not being made available which is why I said it's just difficult to quantify. A more accurate statement would be "We don't know what threat Fukushima poses to life on this planet" . In absence of hard data the only thing that remains is estimations, known facts about operational characteristics of the reactors, the status of the reactor during the disaster and the behaviour of the radionuclides.
Thinking does not begin with statements like "I don't see that because it isn't a threat to life on this planet" which indicates dogmatic skepticism on this subject and unprepared to accept any evidence.
Iron isn't toxic as a micronutrient, and it isn't a highly energetic radionuclide. It's also a component of haemoglobin, plutonium isn't.
The science was conducted In 1944 by J. Robert Oppenheimer with an original lethality of 50-100 micrograms later revised down by Evans. Calculation led to answers between 0.5-5.0 micrograms [.033-.33 uCi of Pu-239].
That's not fiction, it's information.
In sr-90's case that's 600 years, so eventually. The question is where it ends up decaying, in the earth not to bad - in your body, not to good.
So says you
and an explosion that blew some portion of the core, the reactor head and the building above it into the sky.
I wasn't claiming that was the case with Fukushima, I was claiming it was the case for Chernobyl. I don't have enough data I can use to make an estimation for Fukushima yet as that information is being suppressed. There is a much larger mass of fuel material and surface area there though because of the spent fuel in the pools from previous refuelling efforts and that it is going into the ocean where it is impossible to control. What we know is the explosion at Fukushima was from vented hydrogen exploding as opposed to extreme pressure and heat in the core of Chernobyl.
It's important to remember that the result is cumulative doses from both these disasters in the environment. The Fukushima disaster took that from 160 to roughly 1000 tons of uncontrolled pu-239 in the environment.
These manifest as a long term "threat to life on this planet" over time. How much of a threat that is depends much on the human capability to contain and control the release of all the radionuclides, not just plutonium. To be specific though, humans are "life on this planet" and the various threats, via implications to human health, will increase everyday more radionuclides released into the environment.
You don't see four nuclear reactors leaking radioactive substances directly into the ocean as a threat to life on this planet?
You got it right in my case as well. I don't see that because it isn't a threat to life on this planet.
Personally I go off of evidence. The evidence for this danger is in the nature of bioaccumulation and the quantity and type of radionuclides being released, which is being suppressed. I get really tired of people ranting about "it isn't a threat to life on this planet" who couldn't even figure out basic risk management. Risk management can handle long term risks as well as short term ones.
In reality there is a threat, it's just difficult to quantify. A more accurate statement would be "We don't know what threat Fukushima poses to life on this planet". I'll giving you the benefit of the doubt here, I wouldn't blame you for not being able to work it out, it's a hard problem, but saying it isn't a threat is just foolish optimism.
However if there is no danger why do anything at all? So there must be some danger otherwise why not just bull doze the entire thing into the ocean?
The answer is in the way radioactive elements accumulate in the food chain like some other dangerous chemicals like Poly Chloride Biphenyls. However radioactive isotopes also analogue a variety of elements that living creatures need to survive. Compounding this further they are emmiters of alpha, beta and, gamma radiation at various energetic levels.
So, pu-239 presents to the metabolism as a micro-nutrient. In Plutonium's case it presents as Iron to a metabolism. In the ocean a *lack* of iron is what stops metabolic processes, so Iron is readily absorbed ergo Plutonium is readily absorbed. So a small sea creature absorbs the plutonium and it gets eaten by steadily larger creatures, like a fish and then it's in the human food chain. Considering the size and variety of the human food chain, this is inevitable more than once.
This is the main reason to arrest the flow of Fukushima cooling water into the ocean, as plutonium is only one of the elements that it contains that has this property - but I'll follow with this single radioisotope as an example.
A single micro gram of plutonium is a fatal dose to a human being when ingested. As more isotopes are released into the environment the likelihood of exposure increases. The amount of time it takes to move through the food chain introduces a random amount of time before eventually ingested - by an actual person. From there a gestation time passes, like the flu is approximately 7 days, cancer is approximately 6 years. So even if someone ingests something immediately from Fukushima you still have a 6 year wait before you notice aything wrong.
Depending on the radionuclide, there are different cancers, radon 220 that causes lung cancer, or radium 226 that causes bone cancers, strontium 90, americium, iodine 131, cesium 137, the list goes on. The exposure vectors are many and varied. What has protected us is the likelihood of encountering one was low. Everyday this continues the possibility increases.
For airborne fallout, say just like TMI, the jetstream was the perfect carrier to the west coast of the US ensuring good coverage of land based produce. A cow eats radioactive grass, accumulates, say, strontium 90 in the milk, the milk is made into chocolate and you eat it in one of those multi-colored candy covered chocolate treats you so enjoy. Do you enjoy sushi? You can be exposed one or multiple times and after you die cremation makes the radioisotope airborne fallout amd decay allows it back into the watertable.
As for the risk, it's somewhere above 0% that some people will be exposed. However using an established case of Chernobyl. 5% of a 160 ton Nuclear reactor core that was about to be refueled - let's call it 100 tons, that's 5 tons of radioactive core into the atmosphere. At conservative estimates thats 5000,000,000,000 fatal doses. If
Actually I talked to some Australians recently who strongly believe that mandatory voting is a big failing of the Australian system. They say that this means that idiots are voting, and because they don't want to do any thinking on their own they just blindly follow voter guides given to them. Ie, they vote "above the line".
It's somewhat ironic since I could walk 100 feet and find an American who will claim that one of the biggest problems in the US is that not enough people vote.
Well they would be wrong. The participation rate is very high, but yes the electorate is manipulated by the media. It's so polarised right now that a narrow cross section of swinging voters can decide for the whole country. But I think the media is in its death throws and more younger people are finding other ways to interact in the electoral system.
I just hope we can reclaim some control of our countries from these vested interests that are destroying our way of life.
You had me sold on this theory, right up until you said "warrant".
Then I knew it was bullshit.
Like our government feels the need to recognize the legal process anymore.
You know that he's going to have a trial, right? And that the FBI won't want him to get off because there was no warrant for the evidence the prosecution presents in that trial, right? There might very well be unconstitutional monitoring in this process, but to bring it to court and get a conviction, a warrant is necessary paperwork.
His name was Kevin Mitnick.
I simply don't understand why it's such a big deal for America to fix something that is so obviously broken, your a superpower and your people are sneaking into Canada. It's really a sign that the US political system is so incapable of dealing with important infrastructure issues and the next stop is despotism.
It's the fundamental challenge of governing in the US: how to run an effective government when half the population is stupid. Really stupid, as in anti-science (no evolution, no global warming) gun-loving retards that listen to conservative talk radio and believe every bullshit conspiracy theory they hear. Those same people vote the Plutocracy Party and willingly support any sort a give away to the wealthy or corporations after being distracted by simple slogans.
I don't know why you've been modded down as it seems to be a straightforward pragmatic answer. We have the same problem in Australia, just less people (probably the same ratio of stupid though). Voting is mandatory and I think it's a citizens duty to participate in democracy otherwise they don't belong. We have the same problem though with our 2 party system and it's frustrating just how many people don't give a shit. Occasionally though the electorate doesn't give the politicians what they want and the minority voices get a say. In that short window of time the political process (Westminster) works as intended the politicians are actually forced to work and the country inches forward.
I'm not saying we are better, but I do think the two party system must die so we can start to solve these infrastructure issues before it starts to pose a major threat to the survival of our species. It seems to be an issue in many countries.
If I don't like Apple's bugs or capacity problems, I have the option to never pay for another Apple product. I don't have the option to opt out of ObamaCare.
Just opt out of getting sick or injured, I hear your fucked if you do in your country. When I get sick or injured i just go to the doctor or hospital and then go home until I'm better. Healthcare in the USA is something I hear everyone say "I hope our country is never that screwed". I can't opt out of my healthcare but I don't see my investments as so fragile that they need the extra $7.50 per month that it costs me to make sure I can go to hospital if I need to.
I simply don't understand why it's such a big deal for America to fix something that is so obviously broken, your a superpower and your people are sneaking into Canada. It's really a sign that the US political system is so incapable of dealing with important infrastructure issues and the next stop is despotism. Seriously, someone should tell your far right republicans to pull their heads in and stop acting like spoilt brats because they can't get their way.
I like you guys better than China, so I really hope that you can sort it out and get back to being the America that we used to look up to. I like (most) American people I've met, I think you deserve better than being discarded because of some misfortune and no decent heathcare.
the gubberment!!!!...Wow
This is not fucking twitter or fuckfacebook IT'S FUCKING SLASHDOT where I come to get my ever-dwindling supply of geek through the stream of "first post" retards to eventually, occasionally come to some comment that makes it worth...
READING
You know that thing that all the "too lame ; don't read' morons don't do - so they don't come with their eternal stream of shallow, annoying, fucking bullshit to pollute my mind any further. I CAN FUCKING READ, I don't want pictures and all the other bullshit things you have been listening to your "FOCUS GROUP" bullshit audience has been telling you to do.
If I want pictures I'll read the article. What I want is a synopsis longer than the attention span of the gnat brains and frankly, scares the CRAP out of all the small IQ morons. FUCK OFF MORONS. It's not about modernization or keeping up with ... whatever... it's about a fast, efficient delivery mechanism for a bunch of words, which is what you have. So DON'T RUIN IT ANYMORE by making it any more accessible to the small IQ morons.
FUCK
WHY!