www.RogerWendell.com
Roger J. Wendell
Defending 3.8 Billion Years of Organic Evolution^SM

Nuclear Power A bad way to boil water and wage war! (Coal, Gas, and Oil aren't such "hot" ideas either...)

Nuclear power plants operate the same way as their fossil fuel counter-parts in that heat is used to boil water. This boiled water, in turn, creates steam that turns the turbine generators. In the case of a nuclear power plant, fission, or the splitting of uranium atoms, is what's used to generate heat in the reactor's core. The danger of radiation, explosion, and "melt-down" are extremely high. At present (and for thousands of years to come!) there are places on our planet that cannot be inhabited due to either a nuclear accident or simply from the storage of accumulated waste...

Okay, I can see why nuclear power is becoming more attractive now that we're at Peak Oil. With one single atom of fissionable uranium able to produce 10 million times as much energy as burning a single carbon atom (Uranium can produce two million times as much energy per unit mass of oil) it's no wonder big business, government and some "conservationists" are rubbing their hands over the nuclear genie-in-a-bottle "solution."

However, the nuclear "solution" is not only an extremely dangerous health hazard, but very short-lived experiment at best. Why? Because our fossil fuel economy was/is the essential ingredient for constructing, manufacturing, mining, and processing all aspects of the nuclear power wet dream. Think about it - cheap fossil fuels not only support our highly technological civilization and the machinery that runs it, but is absolutely necessary to mine the Uranium, construct the reactors, and maintain the power distribution networks and infrastructure. Sure, nuclear power might keep the lights of modern society burning a decade or two longer (after expensive, difficult to reach fossil fuels become available only to the military or economic elite) but after that these dangerous, radioactive husks will have been nothing more than the symbolic dying gasps of an overpopulated, wasteful civilization too self-consumed to concern itself with the future, sustainability, or the natural world...

- Roger J. Wendell
Golden, Colorado - May '07

Click Here for fossil fuel folley and peak oil...

With permission: The Toxic Garden by Janet Culbertson

The Trojan nuclear power plant, located 40 miles north of Portland, Oregon, was closed in 1993 due to safety and financial concerns. On May 21st, 2006, 2,800 pounds of explosives were used to implode it's 499 foot cooling tower. The remainder of the plant won't be cleaned up until 2024 as there are spent radioactive fuel rods and other debris that need to be removed...

Radiation Basics

"Radioactivity is the release of tiny particles or waves of energy from unstable elements such as uranium. Simply stated, atoms in these elements break apart, decaying into other elements over time, usually ending up as lead. The breakup of these atoms causes three basic types of radiation to be emitted: alpha particles, beta particles and gamma rays. Alpha particles are dangerous only if inhaled or ingested, as they normally cannot penetrate the skin. Beta particles can penetrate the skin but are often blocked by clothing or light shielding. Gamma rays are far more penetrating and usually require lead shielding to absorb them." "With all three types, radiation intensity varies with the inverse square of the distance (just as with transmitted RF power). So if you move twice as far away, the level drops to 25% of what it was before." - Charles Kitchin, N1TEV QST, April 2008, p. 72

Nuclear Proliferation:
KGNU's Joel Edelstein interviewed Robert G. Gard, Jr. Lt. General, U.S. Army (ret.)
on Wednesday morning, January 16, 2008 - transcribed by me!

• JE: Well it's 8:22 here on the Morning Magazine. Retired General Robert Gard with the non-partisan Center for Arms Control and Non-proliferation is in Colorado to talk about the nuclear arms race. In his 31 years of military service he was executive assistant to two secretaries of defense and served as president of the national defense university and the Monterey Institute for International Studies. Yesterday afternoon I asked him about the current threat of the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
• RG: We are at something of a tipping point just as we were in the 1960s when president Kennedy expressed concern that there might be 20 to 30 more nuclear powers by the end of the next decade. And we're in a similar situation today and we need to take action, immediately, to build on the non-proliferation treaty and to develop a non-proliferation regime to meet the current situation.
• JE: When we have countries that find they have other countries that are hostile to them, for example Iran definitely finds hostility form Israel as well as from the United States, and both of those countries Israel and the US are nuclear powers, isn't it just smart defense for Iran to have a nuclear capability?
• RG: It certainly is and is it's understandable that they want to pursue enrichment of uranium so they would have that capability to produce a nuclear weapon if they felt it necessary to do so. This is precisely the reason that we need to take the kinds of actions that make certain potentially hostile states feel less threatened.
• JE: What is our current policy toward Iran, is this going to help us to get them to not choose to develop a nuclear capability?
• RG: No, I think our current policy toward Iran does encourage them, as you suggested, to develop a nuclear weapon, because we are quite blatant about saying all options are on the table and we have indeed threatened 'em with military action. What we need to do is to engage in a dialogue with Iran, as we finally did after five years of the Bush administration with North Korea, and we now have a protocol with the North Koreans in which we have agreed that we will take the military option off the table in exchange for the North Koreans dismantling their nuclear program.
• JE: So we have seen change on the part of this administration with regard to North Korea, do you think we'll see further change, or do you have hope for change coming from the election of 2008?
• RG: I believe that reducing the nuclear threat will receive greater emphasis by the next administration. This administration has treated the most serious threat to the country's security as a routine matter and has under funded the programs that we have to secure weapons and nuclear materials in Russia and to nail down the highly enriched uranium that's spread across some 40 countries in a number of facilities that have only minimum security.

A Defunct Nuclear Plant:
Satsop Nuclear Power Plant
Satsop, Washington (near Olympia)

Okay, it's probably obvious I'm not too keen on nuclear energy - in my opinion it's expensive, dangerous, inefficient, and downright scary. That being said, I'm still fascinated by gadgetry so anytime I see those huge nuclear cooling towers, anywhere, it's not only eye-catching but gets me thinking about wiring up some Ham radio stuff or fixing the garage door opener...

Anyway, I had the good fortune of getting Kendall to take me to the expired Satsop nuclear plant in Washington State - it's located on a ridge about half way between Seattle and Portland, Oregon, so its huge cooling towers can be seen from all over the place. The good part is, now that the thing has been abandoned, you can drive right up to the base of not only the cooling towers, but the reactor buildings as well!

Right now the property is being used as an industrial park. It's pretty safe since there never was any nuclear fuel on the site - back around 1980 they defaulted on 2.25 Billion Dollars in Municipal bonds - the largest default of its kind, thus closing up shop. So, as a result, happy tourists like me are able to drive around the industrial park and take photos of stuff that was certainly off limits a couple decades ago. And, with any luck, all the other nuclear plants can be abandoned and turned into tourist stops or museum curiosities!

- Roger J. Wendell
Golden, Colorado

Click on any of this page's "Thumbnail" images for a larger view
(All photos were taken by me while Kendall patiently waited in his truck...):

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A Not So Defunct Nuclear Plant:
Torness Nuclear Power Station
Scotland, United Kingdom

Tami and I "stumbled" upon the Torness nuclear power station just a few miles south of Dunbar, Scotland. Torness is easily visible along a great stretch of main road A-1. And, you can even park next to the facility to hike the path that takes you to the seashore. I was amazed that the plant not only sits so close to the highway but that the security fence was within a stone's throw of the reactors! Anyway, although the British government had done its best, in this case, in trying to get the plant to "meld" into the environment there's very clear there's potential for danger all around the facility...

One of my biggest complaints about Torness, besides the nuclear danger, is its uses of seawater to cool its so-called "advanced gas-cooled" reactors (AGR). At full output, Torness is capable of pumping 555,000 gallons of water, per minute, back into the ocean - at temperature increase of over ten degrees centigrade (18 degrees Fahrenheit)!!! This is a HUGE amount of over-heated water being dumped back into the ocean so I can only imagine the damage it's doing to the environment.

Finally, of course, there's the usual radiation hazard associated with any nuclear power plant and Torness is no different. Back in 1999 a Royal Air Force fighter jet crashed less than one kilometre from the power plant. The crew survived and were later commended by the UK Ministry of Defence their "...exceptional levels of airmanship and awareness..."

Hiroshima - City of Peace:

In May, 2004 (Japan Year 16) we travelled through a large part of Japan and thoroughly enjoyed it! The Japanese people are respectful, orderly, industrious and have a long history of dignified and proud traditions - we are grateful we were able to experience their country!

Hiroshima, although one of the highlights of our trip, was extremely sad and sobering. While there, we learned that America had bombed the city, with the World's first atomic bomb, without warning - this in stark contrast to the warnings the U.S. government released, for the benefit of civilians, throughout all the fire bombings of Tokyo and other areas.

When we first arrived at the "A-Bomb Dome" (Picture 1: The only surviving structure immediately below the blast or "Ground Zero") two elderly women asked if they could pray over us for peace. They were practitioners of Japan's original religion, Shintoism, so we eagerly agreed.

Ever since the nuclear test treaties of the 1960s the Mayor of Hiroshima has submitted a protest letter to whoever the offending government was that authorized such a test. There were well over 100 of these letters on display in Hiroshma, the most recent of which was sent to President Bush for a test that took place in the Nevada desert while were still on our visit in Japan...

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Click Here for the Hiroshima Peace Declaration

Click Here for pictures of our trip throughout Japan...

Mayors for Peace:

The Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice center was distributing this interesting postcard in early 2005:

Click Here for the Mayors for Peace 2020 Vision Campaign page...

Cerenkov Radiation:

Highly radioactive objects, when observed under water, become bathed in an intense blue light. In the water used in nuclear reactors, including the storage of spent fuel pieces, this light is easily seen and photographed. This "Cerenkov Radiation," as it is called, is caused by particles entering the water at speeds greater than what light is capable of traveling through that same medium. As these particles slow down, to that of light through water, they produce a cone of light that's analogous to the bow wave of a boat. Such a bow wave, in the case of a boat, is caused when the boat is moving through the water at a speed greater than the wave speed on the water's surface. This bow wave effect of Cerenkov Radiation is also similar, in ways, to the sonic boom of high speed (greater than the speed of sound) aircraft.

Fusion

Fusion involves the joining of either of two hydrogen isotopes, deuterium or tritium. Deuterium exists in great quantities in ordinary water and, theoretically, should be an almost infinitely renewable energy resource. Fusion has been an energy dream for most of my adult life (I was born in 1955) and will continue captivating business and science minds for years to come.

Problem is, fusion is the energy that powers the sun where temperatures range from about 10,000 degrees Celsius on the surface to maybe 15 to 18 million degrees on the inside where the fusion takes place. That's one very hot "bottle" that's going to be difficult to reproduce here on Earth. Nevertheless, with huge population pressures and dwindling oil supplies the quest for fusion generated electricity will probably never end...

Movie quote:

WarGames (1983)
With Mathew Brodrick, Ally Sheely, Dabney Coleman, and John Wood

		[David hacks into the military computer]

Computer: Shall we play a game?
David: Love to. How about Global Thermonuclear War?
Computer: Wouldn't you prefer a good game of chess?
David: Later. Let's play Global Thermonuclear War.
Computer: Fine. Which side do you want?
David: I'll be the Russians.
Computer: Please list primary targets.
David: Las Vegas
       Seattle

		[next day]

Computer: Yesterday's game was interrupted although
          primary goal has not yet been achieved.
David: What is the primary goal?
Computer: You should know professor, you programmed me.
David: What is the primary goal?
Computer: To win the game.

		[on Falken's island]

Dr. Falken: But back at the war room, they believe
            you can win a nuclear war, that there are
            acceptable losses.

		[the computer learns]

Computer: A strange game. The only winning move is not
          to play.

Pentagon: Inventory ordered of all U.S. nukes
CNN March 27, 2008

"Defense Secretary Robert Gates has formally ordered the Air Force, Navy and Defense Logistics Agency to conduct an inventory of all U.S. nuclear weapons and nuclear weapon-related materials to make sure all items are accounted for, according to a Pentagon memo released Thursday." "Defense Secretary Robert Gates orders an inventory of all U.S. nuclear weapons and related materials. "The order comes in the wake of the discovery last week that four nuclear warhead fuses were accidentally shipped to Taiwan in 2006. "Gates' memo, issued Wednesday, calls for all items to be accounted for by serial number. "Pentagon officials said at a news conference Tuesday that Gates would call for the review in addition to a full investigation into how the shipment to Taiwan from a Defense Logistics Agency warehouse happened 18 months ago.

"The inventory review, which will involve thousands of items, is due to Gates in 60 days. Pentagon officials said the request was ordered, in part, because this latest incident comes after the August 2007 accidental flight of six nuclear-tipped cruise missiles on a B-52 bomber across the country."

Links:

1. Appropriate Technology
2. Cancer
3. Effects of Nuclear Weapons
4. Engineers Without Borders (Ingénieurs sans frontières)
5. Fossil Fuels
6. Home Energy Awareness by Chuck Wright
7. HYDESim map - overpressure radii generated by a ground-level nuclear detonation
8. Motorcycle (Supposedly) ridden by a woman rides through the ruins area of the Chernobyl reactor disaster (PRIPYAT ghost town)
9. Nuclear Project and their world world map
10. Science
11. Peace
12. Plutonium Free Future resource library
13. Space 4 Peace Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space
14. War and Terrorism
15. We Said No Nukes

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