You’re calling out MiG?? I thought YOU were…wait, no I guess I didn’t.
Seriously, what are you arguing? I think we’ve all acknowledged that nuclear power has it’s drawbacks but they can be dealt with to minimize the effects. Are you saying we shouldn’t use nuclear power? Should we keep on burning fossil fuels? If not are you even suggesting an truly viable alternative?
You’re worried about nuclear waste laying around for generations and that’s a valid concern. But if we keep our current rate of pollution up there is a strong likelyhood that nuclear waste will be the least of anybodies concerns by that point. Provided there’s much in the way of ‘anybody’ left to be concerned.
I’d take all the nuclear waste created by a few large reactors over the devastation of the Tar Sands any day. You could do lots of creative things with nuclear waste, including recycling it, storing it in unused mines, or whatever.
It’s a matter of volume – there just isn’t that much waste. We’re talking about a few Volkswagens-worth over the life of an average power plant. (Volkswagens, football fields and Libraries of Congress being the scientific measurements we all love)
I’d take that over destroying an environment the size of Vancouver Island any day.
And hey, it’s ok to disagree with me without questioning my intelligence. I’m sorry if I questioned yours.
once I get the flux capacitor to work, my cold fusion box will be a reliable and cheap source of energy, my goal is that every house hold will have a box that will generate all the energy needed… 
Is there an X prize for fusion?
That might kick research in the pants!
I don’t know why “wind power” isn’t a more discussed option. If we combined a community used wind power source with individual residential solar power, then we could probably solve our problems pretty easily. Or is that just too Utopian?
Wind power is an awesome idea, and every year the equipment cost and efficiency is improved.
The only problem is that the wind won’t blow on demand. So if a large portion of your electricity supply is wind-based, you’re screwed when the wind doesn’t blow.
Wind + Hydro works nicely, because you can use the wind power first, if the wind isn’t cooperating, you can use Hydro. The more the wind blows, the more you can “store” water in the hydro system.
This is pretty simplistic, it’s a bit more complicated than that.
Too bad you need to flood so much land for hydro power to work. Hydro has the ability to store power. For example during the California electricity shortage, BC Hydro bought cheap coal-fired power from Alberta at night and turned off the hydro-based systems in BC, therefore storing water in the dams. In the daytime, when power was more expensive, it ran the hydro systems at full steam (pardon the pun), selling the excess power to California at a huge profit margin.
Anyway, yeah, wind and solar are both great, but not consistent enough to run a big system.
http://www.archinect.com/images/uploads/turbine_freeway_structure_2.jpg
Cool design/bad photoshop skills.
[quote=“MiG”]
And hey, it’s ok to disagree with me without questioning my intelligence. I’m sorry if I questioned yours. [/quote]
No - you didn’t question my intelligence. I apologize for sounding like I question yours. It is just that usually I quite agree with your opinions - I found myself a bit shocked at how differently we viewed this issue. I reacted competitively and childishly. Thank you for pointing it out to me.
I guess I feel strongly that we should no longer accept the ‘lesser of two evils’ - both fossil fuels and nuclear energy have long term impacts on those of our children not even born yet. Our race is much to “big” to not think globally and inter-generationally!! We have the capacity to wreak untold havoc upon this earth and each other - it is high time we (as a race) accept that responsibility and make choices accordingly!
pantpantpant
Lordy - these soap boxes can be exhausting hey?
Hi,
As now a days we are getting the energy from non renewable source of energy ,in future it will be hard for us to get the fuel.
The only thing that can help us is to use the renewable source of energy such as solar ,wind ,hydro.
I think the tragedies that occurred previously were the result of human mistake .Also the problem of energy sources was not so great those days.
Uh, all the water back east is “hard”. Hard water isnt a problem, I think you must have meant “heavy” water, also they are finding uses for heavy water these days. Nuclear is by far the best source of energy we have that is actually viable and can produce the amount of energy needed, none of the other “alternate” new energy sources come even close and are also cost prohibitive. Hydrogen is a pipe dream, research it, it takes more energy to produce it than ya get out of it, and it isnt really an energy source, it is an energy store, there is a big difference.
The tides on earth could provide all our energy needs if it were to be developed, the real problem we have isnt no new source of energy, it is there isnt enough moola to be made from them, the real issue underlying the comming “energy crisis” is not a lack of new potencial sources of energy, its how to make all of the money off of them. Once there is legislation allowing only governments and specific corporations to produce and market solar power they will dive in head first, they fear a future in which the citizen produces their own power and is self sustaining, this is really an economic issue, not an energy shortage. The problem is not no replacement for oil, but how to make all the money off of its replacement.
… and you can only fire so many spent uranium shells around Iraq …
Don’t worry, there’s Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, N Korea to fire it at. And China if they elect another fucking Republican.
There’s a scary thought. I never would have believed that the Americans were stupid enough to re-elect Bush, but, they did. Things in Iraq are just bad enough now that the Democrats may have a chance in 08 unless they shoot themselves in the foot and nominate a really stupid candidate. The months leading up to November should be interesting.
I wish I had the slightest faith in them, BUT
- There’s so far only ONE state that allows gay marriages
- Oregon came within 170 votes of being forced to remove health, insurance, survivor benefits for same sex couples (Oregon is one of the more progressive states)
- The biggest opposition to ANY environmental initiative is still the USA. They’re still denying Global Warming at the same time their trying to steal our NW PAssage.
- New Jersey became the first state to abolish capital punishment in the last couple decades…
- Just watch: AlQaeda and the Taliban killed Bhutto. That will be a “fact” by Monday morning carried by every US media outlet there is.
- Clinton has an uphill battle due to the sheer number of Americans who will not vote for her because she is a woman
- Obama will face the same problem, the same percentage will not vote for him because he’s black
You’re kidding yourself if you think democrats are any different than republicans. In the US politics is all about who has the most money and who can provide the best smear campaign. It’s certainly not about their platform, what they stand for etc.
They argue about “hot button” issues like gay marriage and other irrelevant shit in an attempt to split voters based on their religious, moral, and financial beliefs. Once they have all the sheeple arguing over whether or not they should be allowed to fuck each other in the ass they no longer have to worry about public catching on to the backroom deals they are making with large corporations.
The presidency of the USA is not about governing its about making yourself richer.
The scary thing is we are starting to see the same thing in Canada now.
[quote]- Clinton has an uphill battle due to the sheer number of Americans who will not vote for her because she is a woman
- Obama will face the same problem, the same percentage will not vote for him because he’s black[/quote]
Agreed. They are both capable candidates who are un-electable. I hope another Democrat will start to gain some traction, maybe John Edwards. Unfortunately he’s not that inspiring, kind of dull really. Maybe a dark horse will come out of the shadows and light up the Democrats. Now I am dreaming:-)
[quote]You’re kidding yourself if you think democrats are any different than republicans. In the US politics is all about who has the most money and who can provide the best smear campaign. It’s certainly not about their platform, what they stand for etc.
The scary thing is we are starting to see the same thing in Canada now. [/quote]
I’ll agree that the Democrats will resort to gutter politics in order to win as that is the nature of American politics; it is a dirty business. In my opinion the Democrats are at least marginally better than the GOP. At least they’ll pretend to give a shit about the environment when they’re in office. America can’t afford the GOP, they spend to much money, lol.
Yes. Agreed. Harper is a scary fellow indeed.
I’d better invest all my money in the military-industrial complex, just in case they elect Clinton or 9iul1an1.
That’s definitely a growth industry, you’ll get a good return on your investment:-)
Did you know they grounded the USA’s F-15s and Alaska is relying on Canada for temporary air defence?
When that’s widely known there’s gonna be a screaming rush to get those new F22 Raptors delivered. Buy stock now!