Japan Kamaishi

[VMX247]

Oh well as some wise old vmxer once said "back to the man cave"  
cheers A

[IT400C]

I don't know the facts well enough but the 60 odd windmills they've put up near here are an absolute eyesore...

That's what they said about the Taj Mahal, it's the way yoo loogit them. Next time try looking through rose tinted glasses, nice big props going round, very majestic, mesmerising..............

The main trouble with wind turbines is the debilitating migranes everyone suffers, they recon...........what do the peeble who work on them do? Must wear tinfoil hats, maybe peeble who are having trouble could do that, a bonus is they would stop the mind control of aliens as well.
They are of coarse dangerous to birds, they explode when they get too near them.
If you paint your house the paint won't dry.
The noise is horrendous they recon, a four wheel drive on a road 2K's away is louder.
The dog gets sick
These are all problems trotted out by NIMBY's

hahaha - what happens when the wind's not blowing?  Have you never heard of 'Base Load'?

You may be happy to only have electricity to your house when the wind's blowing (or the sun's shining with solar), but i would lke to be able to turn my lights on when it gets dark.. 
And not have constant brown outs
Cool - let's all hold hands, sing kumbaya, and voluntarily move back to the middle ages..

[Graeme M]

That may not be so far from the truth either. I see in the UK the head of their electricity commission has suggested that in the future people may need to get used to electricity being 'on demand' rather than 'always on'.

Here's a few thoughts on 'base load'. It's an interesting read.

http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2011/03/the-base-load-misconception-part-1/

[IT400C]

And that worries me just as much.
Electricity on demand?  Electricity becoming rare?
What happens when something becomes rare?  Prices get pushed up...
Those that can afford it offer to pay a premium to ensure they have access all the time (I know I would if I could), and those less fortunate miss out entirely.
The electricity ends up going to those that can afford to pay the most for it.
Suddenly we've undone all the social advances made over the last 150 years and moved back to the Class System (have's and have nots)...

[500Fool]

Mr 400c, I wasn't saying just use wind. Gas is a very underused resource, can use that to support peak loads. Lotsa coal left too, maybe only 150 years but there will be betterer technoligies by then.
Power/water used to be considered utlily's, now their commodity's just to make money. Tell everybody how rare they are and you can gouge more. Look at the oil crises in the 70's, they said there was only enough oil in the world for thiry years!!!! Now they say there's only enough oil in the world for thirty years........................

[IT400C]

Mr 400c, I wasn't saying just use wind. Gas is a very underused resource, can use that to support peak loads. Lotsa coal left too, maybe only 150 years but there will be betterer technoligies by then.
Power/water used to be considered utlily's, now their commodity's just to make money. Tell everybody how rare they are and you can gouge more. Look at the oil crises in the 70's, they said there was only enough oil in the world for thiry years!!!! Now they say there's only enough oil in the world for thirty years........................

Not a problem - that's what I get for turning up late to a discussion heh?  haha

[Mike52]

I don't know the facts well enough but the 60 odd windmills they've put up near here are an absolute eyesore...

If you paint your house the paint won't dry.

Paint will dry[ real quick] if you have one of those nuclear thingys up wind of the turbine.

[lukeb1961]

Anyway, the chance of large scale radiation leak, categorically NO .... clouds of death floating over Tokyo, NO. Possibility to cool the reactor now that they are all shut down.... very high.

http://mitnse.com/ doesn't sound quite so sanguine.

[crash n bern]

Not a big fan of nuclear power.  It has one major flaw, it's run by humans.  I would suggest that all pro nuclear people be put on an emergency call out list.  So whenever there's a melt down they can volounteer to clean it up.
If they could scale nuclear powerplants down to a small size would you have one in the house to supply your power?

[EML]

Not a big fan of nuclear power.  It has one major flaw, it's run by humans.  I would suggest that all pro nuclear people be put on an emergency call out list.  So whenever there's a melt down they can volounteer to clean it up.
If they could scale nuclear powerplants down to a small size would you have one in the house to supply your power?

vERY WELL

[EML]

I'll try again........
Very well put crash & Burn.

What I don't get is if they are sitting on a pile of hot rocks, why don't they use thermohydro like Un Zud.

[TooFastTim]

What I don't get is if they are sitting on a pile of hot rocks, why don't they use thermohydro like Un Zud.

Probably because they can't get the same power from a thermo power station that they can get from a nuke.

[Marc.com]

Last night the Tepco power company workers announced that 150 of them had volunteered to give up their lives at the work site to repair the damage. It was very moving.

Today road is bulldozed to allow heavy fire appliances direct access plus helicoptors are dropping water from monsoon buckets in relay, so things are moving/

I met with Japanese friend who works for Nuclear Research Institute last night, he said key issue is fuel pool that is exposed to amosphere. But they have direct access to flood it.

[mx250]

I'll try again........
Very well put crash & Burn.

What I don't get is if they are sitting on a pile of hot rocks, why don't they use thermohydro like Un Zud.

+1

I know the attractions of nuclear but even accepting the engineers reassurances of guaranteed safety (which is obviously absolute bullshit given the latest events) the question has always been 'what do you do with the radioactive spent fuel?'. And don't give me bullshit that its being safe on the bottom of the sea for the last 50 years. It's got to be guaranteed safe, not 'maybe with a bit of luck' safe, for 20,000+ years.

And don't get me started about the forking French who get 80% of their electricity from nuclear, and thereby putting all the world at risk, and then being the 'holier than thou' reduce your carbon pollution advocates. If they haven't got an agenda and ulterior motive I haven't seen one. fork the French and their selfish ways.

Now we have 'The Experts' saying "gee we were unlucky, the plant survived the earthquake but we got the double whammy of a tsunami!!!" Earthquake = tsunami, tsunami = earthquake, Japan the most earthquake prone, the most tsunami prone country on earth - who would have thought!!!

And geothermal is probably the most concentrated natural occurring source of energy there is.  

Venting off.

[TooFastTim]

key issue is fuel pool that is exposed to amosphere. But they have direct access to flood it.

This is a concern internationally. Increased environmental pressure has curtailed free movement of waste hence there is a build up of used rods in the storage pools in all nukes. These rods MUST be kept a minimum distance apart and MUST be cooled (remember the rods will continue to fission even when removed from the reactor). Failure to adhere to either condition can result in the rods going critical. Not "bang" critical (that's impossible at the levels of enrichment used by power stations) but very radioactive critical.