Petroleum becomes harder to get with each passing year. Diffuse solar is no replacement for concentrated solar (petroleum, natural gas, coal). Nuclear never really pays for itself, and poses serious risks if normalized "in every basement", due to social breakdown.
It is quite the predicament. Problems being fixable, while predicaments tend only able to be mitigated.
Producing much more stuff locally would radically reduce transport costs, while having the benefit of strengthening the local.
The game is rigged against nuclear power paying for itself. The moment it does, the regulations rise. It is actually the law. If the law was written: nuclear must be 10x safer than coal, nuclear price would drop.
I am no expert, just relating my best understanding. I do think nuclear is considerably more dangerous, so on some level I can understand the regulatory framework, though I am mindful how government is increasingly good at standing in the way of real innovation.
I've heard some people claim that the problem of nuclear waste could be solved by encasing the radioactive rods in concrete, going out into the middle of the Pacific, and then throwing them overboard. I can't decide if this is the Occam's Razor of nuclear engineering or the deranged suggestion of a philosopher stoner.
They used to throw the containers closer in, where the continental shelf is riding over the ocean floor. Burying waste under the crust of the earth is a pretty safe place.
Always remember: long lived radioactive isotopes aren't very radioactive. The nastiest stuff burns itself out. It's the intermediate isotopes that are the most problematic. Plutonium is the biggie, but plutonium can be used.
(Other intermediate nasties could be intentionally exposed to neutrons in order to transmute them into something else.)
An interesting analysis that jars a little given the continuous references to 'primitive' parts of the world and the (satirical?) reference to superpowers like "France". (They do have lots of nuclear reactors though.)
A mix of technologies is definitely the way to go, as you clearly set out, and reserving sensitive jobs for people with the skillset rather than the currently correct speech patterns... spot-on.
The relatively few genuinely primitive parts of the world can teach us a lot about how to actually live meaningful lives. It isn't necessarily with umpteen kilowatts of power passing through your walls (or even having walls in the first place, in some cases). The mix of technologies also needs to be balanced with realistic expectations of living standards, based on truthful sharing of knowledge and power, rather than pricing the poors out, as is currently the strategy.
I do not mean to be pejorative when I use words such as primitive and barbarian. I'm being technical. The skillset and culture of the primitive or barbarian is vastly different from the skillset/culture needed to handle nuclear power. I like the fact that the United States is more barbaric than Western Europe or East Asia.
For example, even though India had a huge poverty problem until recently, India is more
civilized than Northern Europe. India's poverty stemmed from overpopulation and flirtation with socialism. Today, I expect India to tap into thorium energy faster than the US.
Thanks for taking the time to contextualise, I thought possibly so.
My number one pedantic asshole trigger is when 'ideology' is used as some kind of swear word. "I have ideas, you merely have ideology", that kind of thing.
As for India, the Buddhist suttas constantly amaze me with their sophistication. Utterly ripped off by some Greek philosophers, and so on downstream from there. Still not much of a fan of their IT Helpdesks though ;-)
Also, I'm sick of PC nonsense so I go out of the way to use old simple words vs. modern euphemisms.
As for France, France still thinks of itself as a great power. They make their own fighter jets, and they still have African colonies, albeit in stealth mode. P.J. O'Rourke described going to former French colonies and finding locals operating the front government desks, but French bureaucrats running the office from the back rooms.
And I wish I could quickly find the reference, but I have read that many former French colonies had to hold all their foreign currency reserves in a special French bank, had to get French permission to use the funds, and the French were charging for this "service." Leaders who tried to get out of this system were quickly subject to a coup.
Petroleum becomes harder to get with each passing year. Diffuse solar is no replacement for concentrated solar (petroleum, natural gas, coal). Nuclear never really pays for itself, and poses serious risks if normalized "in every basement", due to social breakdown.
It is quite the predicament. Problems being fixable, while predicaments tend only able to be mitigated.
Producing much more stuff locally would radically reduce transport costs, while having the benefit of strengthening the local.
The game is rigged against nuclear power paying for itself. The moment it does, the regulations rise. It is actually the law. If the law was written: nuclear must be 10x safer than coal, nuclear price would drop.
I am no expert, just relating my best understanding. I do think nuclear is considerably more dangerous, so on some level I can understand the regulatory framework, though I am mindful how government is increasingly good at standing in the way of real innovation.
https://www.amazon.com/Health-Hazards-Not-Going-Nuclear/dp/0911762175/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2S2DE1MMACNE9&keywords=the+health+hazards+of+not+going+nuclear&qid=1707499627&sprefix=the+health+hazards%2Caps%2C116&sr=8-1
I've heard some people claim that the problem of nuclear waste could be solved by encasing the radioactive rods in concrete, going out into the middle of the Pacific, and then throwing them overboard. I can't decide if this is the Occam's Razor of nuclear engineering or the deranged suggestion of a philosopher stoner.
They used to throw the containers closer in, where the continental shelf is riding over the ocean floor. Burying waste under the crust of the earth is a pretty safe place.
Always remember: long lived radioactive isotopes aren't very radioactive. The nastiest stuff burns itself out. It's the intermediate isotopes that are the most problematic. Plutonium is the biggie, but plutonium can be used.
(Other intermediate nasties could be intentionally exposed to neutrons in order to transmute them into something else.)
An interesting analysis that jars a little given the continuous references to 'primitive' parts of the world and the (satirical?) reference to superpowers like "France". (They do have lots of nuclear reactors though.)
A mix of technologies is definitely the way to go, as you clearly set out, and reserving sensitive jobs for people with the skillset rather than the currently correct speech patterns... spot-on.
The relatively few genuinely primitive parts of the world can teach us a lot about how to actually live meaningful lives. It isn't necessarily with umpteen kilowatts of power passing through your walls (or even having walls in the first place, in some cases). The mix of technologies also needs to be balanced with realistic expectations of living standards, based on truthful sharing of knowledge and power, rather than pricing the poors out, as is currently the strategy.
I do not mean to be pejorative when I use words such as primitive and barbarian. I'm being technical. The skillset and culture of the primitive or barbarian is vastly different from the skillset/culture needed to handle nuclear power. I like the fact that the United States is more barbaric than Western Europe or East Asia.
For example, even though India had a huge poverty problem until recently, India is more
civilized than Northern Europe. India's poverty stemmed from overpopulation and flirtation with socialism. Today, I expect India to tap into thorium energy faster than the US.
Thanks for taking the time to contextualise, I thought possibly so.
My number one pedantic asshole trigger is when 'ideology' is used as some kind of swear word. "I have ideas, you merely have ideology", that kind of thing.
As for India, the Buddhist suttas constantly amaze me with their sophistication. Utterly ripped off by some Greek philosophers, and so on downstream from there. Still not much of a fan of their IT Helpdesks though ;-)
Also, I'm sick of PC nonsense so I go out of the way to use old simple words vs. modern euphemisms.
As for France, France still thinks of itself as a great power. They make their own fighter jets, and they still have African colonies, albeit in stealth mode. P.J. O'Rourke described going to former French colonies and finding locals operating the front government desks, but French bureaucrats running the office from the back rooms.
And I wish I could quickly find the reference, but I have read that many former French colonies had to hold all their foreign currency reserves in a special French bank, had to get French permission to use the funds, and the French were charging for this "service." Leaders who tried to get out of this system were quickly subject to a coup.