Xref: utzoo sci.energy:3744 sci.electronics:16754 sci.physics:16243 sci.space:26836 Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!umich!sharkey!teemc!fmeed1!cage From: cage@fmeed1.UUCP (Russ Cage) Newsgroups: sci.energy,sci.electronics,sci.physics,sci.space Subject: Re: solar cells Summary: It's easy to take the worst case of something to make it all look bad. It is also dishonest. Message-ID: <9254@fmeed1.UUCP> Date: 4 Jan 91 23:06:10 GMT References: <37448@cup.portal.com> <1991Jan2.015717.23554@amd.com> <37487@cup.portal.com> <88637@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV> <37550@cup.portal.com> Reply-To: russ@m-net.ann-arbor.mi.us (Russ Cage) Followup-To: sci.energy Organization: Ford Motor Co., Electronics Div., Dearborn, MI Lines: 107 In article <37550@cup.portal.com> Ordania-DM@cup.portal.com (Charles K Hughes) writes: > I don't think the "allergy" is irrational given 3-mile island, >Chernobyl, lists of missing nuclear fuel, 55 gallon drums of nuclear waste >carelessly spewn across the ocean floor (& associated tales of using rifles >to shoot holes in drums that wouldn't sink), etc. Three-Mile Island neither killed nor harmed anyone. It was also about the worst possible accident for that reactor type. Chernobyl was a bad design, and thus a special case. Just because an airplane built by an idiot is likely to crash and kill him does not mean all airplanes are dangerous. Lists of "missing" nuclear fuel can mean nothing more than bookkeeping errors. They do not imply hazard except to the hysterical; nuclear fuel != nuclear bombs. Said drums sound like an apocryphal horror story. However, a steel drum would not last long in the sea, and would be crushed by ocean-floor pressure anyway. If it contained, say, machine parts with enough air space to float it, shooting holes in it to sink it is perfectly reasonable. (A barrel full of heavy sludge wouldn't float.) > Radioactive materials are dangerous to complex organisms, and the more >RM that is around, the more dangerous it is (the probability of an >accident increases). Really? Then tell me why there have been far more medical disasters (Minimata (sp?) syndrome) caused by chemical poisons than by nuclear ones? > Heavy metals don't need to be decomposed - they can be refined and reused. How are you going to refine the 5 ppm of lead in your drinking water into metallic lead for re-use? Do you have any concept of the thermodynamic property of ENTROPY, and the ENERGY input required to reduce it? I thought not. > What we can make, we can unmake. I don't think the environment should be >responsible for decomposing the unnatural chemical compounds that we >introduce into it. The nice thing about short-lived radionuclides is that they un-make themselves, and many of them have useful properties while so doing. (Iodine for radio-immuno-assays and treatment of thyroid disorders. Cobalt for radiation therapy and food preservation. Krypton for lights which require no power, for safer roads in remote places.) > The cost of "unmaking" is very high, mainly because it is cheaper in the >short run to just discard the waste byproducts. In the long run, these >byproducts will come back to haunt us - cf. Lovecanal, DDT, etc. Yet another reason why nuclear power is a good idea. For a few tons of material per year (which is EASY to track, comparatively), you can avoid using millions of tons of something else which is likely to yield chemical poisons like Love Canal's sometime during its production or use. > What is RTG? > A nuclear power plant? RTG = Radioisotope Thermal Generator. They are not "reactors"; they generate power using the heat given off by certain isotopes, which are refined from spent nuclear fuel. These are ideal for powering space probes which go far from the sun, and are yet another useful byproduct of nuclear power. > Hmmm...why not ground or space power generation for those satellites >that orbit the earth & moon? Deep space satellites are of little concern >here because once they leave, they're gone for good. Satellites built for trips inside Mars orbit typically use solar cells. Galileo (bound for Jupiter) and Ulysses (heading for the south pole of the Sun via Jupiter), plus the Pioneer and Voyager probes (remember the Voyager-Saturn encounter on TV?) are all powered by RTG's. Lander probes (such as the lunar ALSEP packages and the Viking Mars landers) use RTG's to get through the night. > RTGs (assuming they are small nuclear plants) are dangerous in any orbit >that decays before the nuclear fuel becomes non-radioactive. Wrong. They are sufficiently well-encapsulated to survive re-entry and impact without loss of fuel, unless they strike rock. The RTG's on board the Apollo 13 LEM re-entered and hit the Pacific somewhere. No trace of radioactive material was found. > This is war buddy....you know the saying... :) A war on truth, perhaps? > I still don't like the idea of a blob of nuclear goop falling from the >sky into my living room. :) You won't see one from us. The chances of seeing one from the Soviets goes down steadily. > If the energy is free, who cares how much it took to make them? If you have to put energy in to make something, is it "free"? (Is this the best thinking you can present?) -- Russ Cage Ford Powertrain Engineering Development Department Work: itivax.iti.org!cfctech!fmeed1!cage (CHATTY MAIL NOT ANSWERED HERE) Home: russ@m-net.ann-arbor.mi.us (All non-business mail) Member: HASA, "S" division.