Posted on 04/25/2016 10:02:42 PM PDT by Vince Ferrer
Combined with Generation IV reactors, energy problems and pollution solved at the same time.
Now all we need is the brains to agree on it...
Bwahahahaha...!
Pretty incredible.
Makes me think of the Night Gallery episode with William Windom as a Scientist that develops Fission from non Nuclear Material.
He is depressed about the Death of his Young Daughter and is a Basket case. A Team of Government Scientists carry on his work and then they decide to Test it.
Bad move.
I must agree.
I think the environmentalists will tie this up with so many lawsuits, propaganda attacks, etc, that this won’t ever see the light of day.
‘Ice nine’
What about the real issue of spent uranium fuel disposal safety?
Understandably, the public has a low risk appetite for nuclear power in light of the ongoing Fukushima Japan nuke power plant disaster.
Also, hasn’t it been established that nuclear power plants are very costly to operate over their 30 - 50 year life span?
Are their currently any breeder reactors in use to compare costs with traditional pressurized vessel fission reactors?
RE: “Combined with Generation IV reactors, energy problems and pollution solved at the same time.
Now all we need is the brains to agree on it...”
A long time ago, I read a scifi story about how they had genetically modified coral to absorb gold from seawater, and that gold had become just a pretty, but nearly worthless, metal.
That man is Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter outlawed the reprocessing of nuclear waste, do the only way to deal with nuclear materials to bury them in some remote site
The rest of the world simply reprocesses nuclear materials
What about ridding the oceans of mercury so we can all eat more fish without getting sick?
That would be worth something.
I’m just wondering if there is any application to this in using a salt to extract uranium from land sources in mining, as opposed to using the mechanical we use now.
I’m assuming uranium has an affinity for salt when I ask this question.
Beaches of thorium bearing monazite sand just waiting for extraction.
Relative to energy needs nuclear can well supply our demands. We do not have enough nuclear at this present moment to supply our energy needs. This is because of politics and not engineering.
Until we are a nuclear powered society we must rely on coal, natural gas, and oil. By the way, CO2 is plant food and world production of grains has increased dramatically because of increased CO2 levels.
Relative to wind and solar power they are good if they can compete in the marketplace of energy. At present they can not and will not. Not one damn solar system or wind system would have ever been built if not for government subsidies or mandates.
PS
That Prius you may be driving that is all electric gets its electricity in the major part from Coal, Natural Gas, or Oil Fired Generators. If you look at the power losses from the generator until it charges your battery of your Prius it is appalling. If you look at the power required to make the batteries it is appalling. Electric cars do little to reduce CO2 levels.
Considering the subsidies given by the government and tax credits, a Prius makes great sense. You buy it and your are getting a free ride on someone else’s tax dollar.
The government has distorted normal market forces by picking winners and losers and CO2 is not a pollutant.
A 1966 Chevelle with two four barrel Holleys. It does not get much better than that. I must admit that new engineering, computer controlled fuel injection systems and turbos are superior. If you have never driven that Chevelle and listened to the sound you will never understand.
That's probably a yes/no answer. We probably can devise a way to extract mercury. However, there is so much mercury in the ocean, on the sea floor, and coming in from rivers that any attempt probably wouldn't make a difference. It is an environmentalist scare that mercury comes from coal plants, which it does. However, it also is contained in the rocks and soil, and leaches out into water and is carried by rivers into the ocean. So mercury is added to the ocean whether or not we burn coal. Better pollution controls on power plants may help some, but I think it is just there naturally as well, and the effort to get rid of it is not economical.
If they can do a heavy metal like uranium what about other heavy metals like platinum, gold or silver. Maybe we can really go to a gold standard monetary system.
bookmark.
>At present we have ample supplies of Uranium. This Uranium can also be used in breeder reactors to make plutonium which is also a fuel for reactors. This is good. In addition we have huge amounts of thorium which is also a nuclear fuel. And as the article said the oceans are full of uranium.
Plutonium is about to get much more valuable. The EM drive will under go high powered superconductor tests next month to see if the effect can scale. If so we’re going to need a ton plutonium isotopes as power sources for EM drives to explore the solar system.
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