Archive for the ‘Nuclear Power’ Category

‘Revenge of Gaia’ a Modern Horror Story

Sunday, July 23rd, 2006

BOOK REVIEW

“The Revenge of Gaia,” by James Lovelock, Basic Books, August, 2006; 177 pgs.

By David L. Brown

If you enjoy horror stories, here is a fascinating book that will keep you up late at night. The plot involves a dire threat to the very existence of all human life, as our very own Mother Earth turns against her own creations.

James Lovelock is an environmental scientist known for his theory of Gaia, the metaphoric idea that the entire Earth is a self-regulating entity that responds to change in ways similar to those of living species of plants and animals. I do not intend to go into detail about the theory here, except to remind readers that there is much evidence that the concept of Gaia provides an accurate metaphor for the ways our planet has found to maintain the conditions required by life over more than three billion years. Those interested in knowing more can read Lovelock’s previous works, or the informative book The Coevolution of Climate and Life by Stephen H. Schneider and Randi Londer (1984).

In his latest book, Lovelock paints a gloomy picture of the near future, a time during which he now believes that global warming is about to rise precipitously, creating an ecological disaster that will make many parts of the planet unable to sustain life as we know it.

Basic to Lovelock’s theory is that the natural features of the Earth — such as forests, unbroken prairies, marshlands and peat bogs — are essential elements in the planet’s ability to maintain climate within the bounds required for life. By claiming those natural features for itself — burning or cutting down forests, plowing up prairies and meadows for monocultural agriculture, and draining wetlands — humankind has severely wounded its home planet, perhaps beyond the point of salvation.

Lovelock pulls no punches. It is clear that he believes we have already moved well past the tipping point from which there is no return. Sustainable alternatives are no longer viable solutions, and only what he terms a strategic retreat can save humanity. It is essential, he believes, to quickly reduce and even reverse the addition of carbon to the atmosphere. Even this may not be enough, for popular proposals for “sustainable” models could involve even further damage to Gaia (e.g., growing more crops to produce ethanol) and lead up a blind alley which will result only in more disaster.

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Posted in Book Reviews, Climate Change, Nuclear Power | 1 Comment »

Fusion Power, the Ever-Receding Dream

Tuesday, June 13th, 2006

By David L. Brown

It is a wonderful idea to think that someday fusion power plants could generate cheap, clean, sustainable energy for a world whose addiction to fossil fuels is beginning to strain our planet’s dwindling resources. Unfortunately, the dream of fusion power is likely to remain nothing more than a wistful fancy unless and until significant advances are made in the proposed technology. And after a half-century of searching, those advances seem less and less attainable.

As an article in a recent issue of Science Magazine points out, the development of the first fission nuclear power plants followed just three years on the heels of the atomic bombs produced by the Manhattan Project. When the hydrogen bomb was developed soon after World War II, scientists and engineers grasped the hope that fusion power could hold the key to unlimited power for the future.

Nuclear fission quickly found applications in civilian technology … and yet after more than half a century the dream of fusion power remains on the far horizon. Not only that, in fact that dream seems to recede further into the future with each passing year. Many now believe it can never be achieved on any practical level.

The late William E. Parkins, author of the Science paper (“Fusion Power: Will It Ever Come,” 10 March 2006), pointed out that the problem is less one of physics than of engineering. Various atomic nuclei can be made to fuse, and yield large amounts of energy in doing so. However, to induce fusion in itself requires a large input of energy.

(more…)

Posted in Energy Technology, Nuclear Power | 1 Comment »

Saving the Planet, One Quasi-Solution at a Time!

Saturday, May 27th, 2006

by Val Germann

Not too long ago this writer introduced a term invented in 1971 by computer scientist Eugene S. Schwartz: the “quasi-solution.” For Schwartz, all technological “solutions” were at least partly “quasi,” if not crwazi (or crazee!), because they were always at least incomplete and many times counterproductive. And they were incomplete or counterproductive due to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, the Entropy Law. Yes, even the Gods struggle in vain against Entropy.

Today, of course, the primary technological “fix” revolves around the god “efficiency” — which is directly related to size. Yes, bigger is better, in every way, where production and even marketing is concerned. This idea gained serious traction back in the day of the original Standard Oil and U.S. Steel, when America still had a “horse and buggy” economy in most places. But it’s still the rage today, as the latest wave of mergers and acquisitions goes to show. Yes, indeed, bigger is always better, just ask almost anyone. However, don’t ask them the questions: “Better for whom and in what ways?” No, that would be wrong.

Eons ago, back when I was taking economics courses at the graduate level, I was exposed to a concept that has stuck with me through the years: minimum optimal scale. This idea was a precept of the quasi-discredited (today) school of Institutional Economics, which could be the subject of another article.

No matter, it’s “minimum optimal scale” I’m concerned with today. In a nutshell, the idea is that for any process there are economies of scale up to a point of diminishing returns to that scale, and that’s where the growth in scale should stop. Embedded in this concept is the original idea of economic competition combined with a recognition of the Second Law, and what would become Schwartz’s “Quasi-Solution.”

For Adam Smith “competition” implied many buyers and sellers in the relevant market, which resulted in the non-existance of what is called “monopoly power.” A fine example of this is the position of wheat farmers here in the U.S. — selling into a market in which they have no power over price at all, because there are tens of thousands of wheat farmers and they are not organized. However, the other side of the wheat market consists of exactly five huge and privately-held agri-businesses, an “oligopoly” which IS organized and does in fact have “monopoly power” — and lots of it. Those firms “share the market” under a “rivalry regime” which sees them primarily protecting their share against their rivals while at the same time protecting their group all from outsiders. And they do NOT “compete” with each other on something like the price they give farmers.

I mention the above because my set of quasi-solutions works directly against the interests of giant firms like the ones in the grain markets and so has exactly ZERO chance of ever being put into practice. This is because giant firms have the money and staff to suffocate or co-opt all socio-political phenomena not to their liking. The spectacle of British Petroleum and General Electric both “going green” recently drives the point home, and with a .50-caliber bullet! (more…)

Posted in Agriculture Issues, Climate Change, Desertification and Soil Loss, Economics, Energy Technology, Essays and Opinion, Nuclear Power, Politics | 1 Comment »

Our Energy Future: Peering into the Abyss

Friday, May 19th, 2006

By David L. Brown

Here is an excerpt from a speech by American Vice President Dick Cheney, as reported by BBC.com:

The country must build new oil refineries, power plants and pipelines, find ways of reducing the impact of fossil fuels on the environment, and—most controversially—probably open Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Reserve to oil exploration.

Very timely, right? But surprise!…this is a quote from a speech Mr. Cheney made more than five years ago. It was reported on May 1, 2001. Have we made any progress toward solving the problems he addressed? Well, you be the judge but it seems to us that both the Administration and Congress have dithered and delayed, dragged their feet and backfilled, but virtually nothing has been accomplished to help mitigate the looming energy crisis that is about to engulf the world. If things looked bad five years ago, how do they look today.

Let’s look further at the report on Mr. Cheney’s comments, made to a business group in Toronto half a decade ago. According to the BBC:

The US “cannot simply conserve or ration our way out of the situation we’re in”, he said.

And:

The vice-president said that America is on the verge of an energy crisis, with drivers facing spiralling petrol prices at the pumps, and the possibility of electricity blackouts at home.

The report added:

In order to meet projected energy demands over the next two decades, he said, the country would have to build between 1,300 and 1,900 new power plants – “more than one new plant per week, every week, for 20 years running”, he said.

(more…)

Posted in Age of Oil, Energy Technology, Fossil Fuels, Nuclear Power, Politics | Comments Off

Nuclear Power—An Opportunity Lost

Sunday, May 14th, 2006

By David L. Brown

As the world nears a dangerous period when supplies of oil and gas appear to be peaking, many nations are taking a new look at nuclear power. In his 2006 State of the Union Address, President Bush called for a renewal of nuclear power plant construction in the U.S. Other places, too, are thinking twice about the kneejerk reaction to halt nuclear development after the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl events.

The sad truth is that at the very time nations banned construction of nuclear plants, new and safer designs were just becoming available. The problems arose with older models—the Chernobyl plants were particularly primitive. Three Mile Island did not result in any significant danger to the public and should have been viewed as evidence that nuclear power could be relatively safe. Atomic power technology was at the threshold of a new era of safer, more efficient plants that would have helped reduce both carbon emissions and the reliance on fossil fuels. If continued, a large proportion of the world’s electricity needs today could be coming from clean nuclear plants.

But fear and political expediency brought development to a halt in most places. A major force driving the decisions by national governments to stop nuclear power projects has been the pressure from so-called “Greens,” activists who seem to be against anything and everything that is required for the continuance of humanity and the world economy.
Some countries did not turn away from nuclear power, and surprisingly one of those in the forefront of renewed develoopment of nuclear power is Ukraine, home of Chernobyl. Even there, Greens are providing the primary stumbling block but their efforts are not succeeding in holding back planned re-nuclearization. Here is the lede from an article on developments in Ukraine from Germany’s Spiegel Online (English Site):

The Chernobyl disaster rattled the trust of Ukrainians in atomic power. But after a natural-gas showdown with Russia last winter, the nation is flirting with going nuclear again. Kiev wants to build 14 new reactors.

A Wednesday protest against nuclear power by Ukrainian green party activists in Kiev.
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AFP
A Wednesday protest against nuclear power by Ukrainian green party activists in Kiev

The explosion of reactor no. 4 in Chernobyl, Ukraine, in the early morning of April 26, 1986, is still the biggest civilian nuclear catastrophe the world has ever seen. Huge swaths of Europe were blanketed with radiation; helpless officials at the disaster site sent an unknown number of emergency personnel to their deaths. The calamity was a shock for the entire world — Ukrainians especially. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, both the populace and the parliament of the newly independent Ukraine leaned against continuing with nuclear power and at the start of the 1990s, the parliament passed a moratorium on it, and no further reactors were to be built.But the memory of Chernobyl faded, as did awareness of the dangers and popular fear. Two new-model reactor blocks in Chmelnitzki and Rowno — about 80-percent complete in the ’90s — were recently finished despite the moratorium, and fired up two years ago. Old scruples vanished. A small, politically-insignificant group of Greens called for a nuclear phase-out this year before parliamentary elections in March — with no success. In the meantime, four still-active plants with 15 reactor blocks supply about half of Ukraine’s domestically-produced electricity. Read the rest.

Green activists who oppose nuclear power must be torn between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, because the main alternatives to nuclear power are pollution and CO2 producing fossil fuel plants. Even sustainable and clean energy projects such as wind power are all too often opposed by environmental activists on the grounds that they might harm wildlife, or merely because they are unsightly. In fact, it is a tragedy that the world has let a quarter century pass by with little effort toward developing sustainable nuclear power. Since the 1970s we have been able to build safe, clean, breeder reactors that produce their own fuel, the perfect answer to our planet’s energy needs. (more…)

Posted in Age of Oil, Energy Technology, Environmental Activism, Essays and Opinion, Fossil Fuels, Nuclear Power | Comments Off

Nuclear Power … Too Little Too Late?

Friday, April 28th, 2006

By David L. Brown

The development of efficient breeder reactor designs during the 1950s and 60s was followed by a virtual shut-down of construction of nuclear power plants in the U.S. Now, several decades later, President Bush said in his 2006 State of the Uniion address that he plans to take the nation back toward atomic power as a means of reducing dependence on imports of oil and gas.

In our opinion, this is too little, too late. During the last phase of nuclear power plant construction in the early 1980s, it took approximately 15-20 years to build a new nuclear plant, including licensing and site approval. If nuclear power were to be an answer for us today, we should have begun to build new plants 15-20 years ago.

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