Jeffrey et al, see the embedded comments.
On 21 March 2011 13:32, jeffrey chan <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Hi Fil,
> You suggest that by accepting some undesirables on behalf of one's 'neighbor', one does not undermine society. But everyone must have a stand somewhere, right? Imagine if there is in fact a hypothetical individual as township or region in this world where this entity takes on this encompassing acceptance--all the refuse in this world will head straight there. Even if you accept on the first or second instances, there will come a point where the logic of free-ridership overrides your altruism, or capacity to be altruistic, whichever fails first. For this reason, your logic and practical choice, granted to be noble at first glance, is not sustainable in a wider community of autonomous agents.
If I was convinced by "experts" that the best course of action was to
store a bunch of nuclear waste in my back yard, I'd accept it. And
then I'd move. I don't have a problem with that. And, I believe,
neither should anyone else. Why are you assuming that the people in
whose backyards things would go, would not think of leaving that
neighbourhood as a viable alternative?
...let me qualify this a bit. If they put the waste directly and
literally in my back yard, I'd move and expect to be compensated for
it. If it were only figuratively in my back yard, so long as I was
convinced that I was safe, I'd be just fine with it, and I'd continue
to live wherever I was.
> You mentioned that someone would invent a new way of dealing with waste. By induction, this line of thought brings to mind a whole slew of debates on technological fixes, which according to Jonas, is fundamentally predicated on a form of technological optimism--that subsequent technologies are capable of fixing the problems of prior technologies. If this was true, then we would not have something called Risk Society, don't you think?
That's not exactly what I wrote. I believe you're referring to "It
may be that someone will invent some new way of dealing with the
waste." So, it's not "would" but rather "could." And I didn't commit
to a technological solution. I just said a "new way."
I do not discount that we *may* come across a technological solution;
it is one possible outcome. I don't how likely it is.
BTW: I think that "technological optimism" is really just optimism
about the humans who develop and use that technology. If you accept
that, then I'm happy to be labelled a technological optimist.
> I don't have a reference or a set of data to show that living near a nuclear waste dump would lead to a high rate of say, cancer, compared to living far away from it (or at least a critical distance). But not having that set of data does not undermine my case: similarly, no one would want to live near a chemical dump or an organic refuse dump for reasons beyond imagined or real threat to health--these places are not conducive to the prosperity and functioning of well-rounded communities. To the extent that we are not completely data-led to find new homes for ourselves in new neighborhoods, we do not need a piece of data to show a higher risks of cancer to warn us against living near nuclear dumps. I think for many dumps, they are not only buried so deep into the mountains under granite, but regionally cordoned off such that even if one wants to live near it, it may well be impossible.
Yes, it's likely true in most of the world that land would be
appropriated and sequestered for use as a dump. But that land might
start out as land on which people live. Think Three Gorges....
I was kidnapped by purple aliens who communicated in limericks last
week. I don't have supporting data, but that doesn't undermine my
case.
I would say that data is the ONLY thing that matters. A distant
second would be a sound logical argument, but even those are suspect
because the non-linear behaviour of physical systems is rarely
captured well in any form except data.
Trivial, but relevant, example. There's a claim that putting tennis
balls in your clothes dryer will make the clothes dry faster. It's a
good logical argument: the balls bounce around and keep the clothes
from getting tangled up and thus taking longer (more energy) to dry.
I've never seen a proof of this, so I'm actually doing it. We've run
over 30 experiments. We've not yet seen the effect. We're still
working on it, but it looks like the rational argument was defeated by
factual data.
> Sure there is a difference between perceived risk and actual risk. But if the two are dissimilar, it does not follow from this that one is therefore true and the other false. In fact, both are true because they correspond empirically to the world. You cite actuarial data; but given a relatively smaller sample of nuclear deaths compared to the larger set on vehicular deaths, this actuarial risk data must therefore be only indicative, and hardly decisive for practical actions. Besides, do we really have any data on large scale catastrophes from nuclear disasters? No, and I hope not, 'not yet'. For this reason, where potential for large scale catastrophes is possible, actuarial data are considered 'fantasy documents'. The experience that Japan is undergoing now tells us so.
Did I use the word "actuarial"? I think not. I'm afraid we'll have
to just disagree on this. The actual risk is real; the perceived risk
is mental. The mental risk may "feel" true to the person experiencing
it, but it isn't.
Yes, extant data is only indicative. But anything else is only a
prediction. And in case you haven't noticed, humans tend to suck at
predicting things.
We don't have data on large scale nuclear disasters except Chernobyl,
which is an outlier to be disregarded when we talk about typical
reactors in use or under design/construction. But we do have usage
data. That is we know how many reactors have been used, how long
they've been used, how many workers have been in them, etc. We can
compare that "exposure" to exposure in other situations/industries and
see what falls out. What falls out is that, compared to other types
of exposure, nuclear reactors are "safe."
> To a great extent, I concur with you on the problem of where the wastes will go while 'we' argue about it. You are quite right: it is possibly safer to be locked under Yucca mountains than for it to sit in different locations near highly populated centers on the east coast of the US. This is a classic case of horned dilemma--I don't have a solution; I only have a reaction--that to reject it would prompt the outright banning of nuclear energy. Of course as you probably can see, this is not practical. We simply cannot afford a energy blackout for the sake of banning nuclear energy. Even if we tried cutting down now, our design commitments into all kinds of e-devices have committed us to an energy-hungry species.
Right. Look, I'd rather not have nuclear reactors around - I'd rather
have a Mr. Fusion from Back To The Future, or one of those beautifully
transparent anti-matter reactors from Star Trek. But while we figure
all that stuff out, we need "base load" capacity. I don't see any
reasonable alternatives - for some sites - to nuclear power. I *do*
see choices of technology. CANDU reactors are insanely safe compared
to BWRs. And thorium reactors should be even safer.
> You raised the possibility of trusting the experts. I think I can understand why and on what grounds. However, I think the issue is more complicated than simply 'trusting' or distrusting the experts. Just as a note, I don't trust my doctor because I have met enough doctors who seemed to represent their insurance groups more than they are concerned about my health. Similarly, I don't trust the experts personally because all experts, independent or institutional, have their own vested interests. But I trust public debates; I trust risk discourses: open, unfettered and discursive--where one expert argues against the another one, and perhaps with other watchdog groups. I find this to be more reliable, even though perhaps more fruitless in many cases, than outright trust or perhaps, distrust.
You think you understand why and on what grounds? Care to explain that?
Jeffrey, do you live in the US? Your line about doctors and insurance
groups makes me think so. I'm in the Evil Socialist State of Canada
(or so it was termed by Crazy Joe, a veteran of both the Korean War
and Colon cancer, who owns Crazy Joe's Smoke Shop in Palo Alto - true
story!). I can understand your position completely if you live in the
States and are subject to the American-style health care system.
Don't get me wrong, the Canadian system isn't all hugs & puppies, but
it does have advantages.
Insofar as experts debating, I guess it depends on the issue. I
consider the debating to be something that most people shouldn't
necessarily care about in any great detail. They should be content
with the consensus that comes out the back end, largely because
they're unlikely to understand the details of the arguments made.
Yes, it can be a long time coming, but the consensus is usually the
best of the known possible solution. I prefer the debates to be
carried out in peer-reviewed journals and at conferences, and the
consensuses (consensi?) being announced formally. I strongly dislike
the modern habit of announcing any scientific result to the media,
even before sufficient validation and replication has been carried
out. This kind of thing usually causes more trouble than it's worth.
And perhaps "debate" is the wrong word. The issues I'm talking about
here are quantitative. How good is this or that reactor? What
happens if it is struck by this or that kind of natural disaster? How
accurate is the simulation? What assumptions were made? Etc etc etc.
One doesn't "debate" those kinds of issues.
I can see debates mattering more in the more qualitative areas of
decision-making, and there, yes, I'd be with you. I just wasn't
thinking of that when I wrote what I wrote.
> Yes, you are right: I am not against nuclear energy per se as a means to the end of producing lots of energy, but I am against nuclear fission. I am not a nuclear physicist; and from the little I know, nuclear fusion produces alot more energy but produces alot less radioactive side-effects. Besides, if something is patently problematic, why are we still even interested to develop it further? To put this crudely, are 'we' as a species, patently foolish?
Fusion converts about 4% of the matter (hydrogen-y things) into energy.
Fission on average (depends on what you're... fissing) converts about
0.1% of its mass into energy.
So fusion can (ballpark) generate about 40x the energy of comparable
fission reactors. But fusion is now just about where fission was when
Fermi was mucking about in the old stadium at U-Chicago.
The problem with fusion is that we still don't really understand how
it works, except in... uncontrolled conditions. Fission can be done
with solid state fuel - which is comparatively easy to handle. Fusion,
as far as we know, only happens with plasma, which is comparatively
VERY difficult to handle. Furthermore, extracting the heat is harder
in fusion because to keep the reaction running you must isolate the
fusing materials completely from the environment; whereas in fission,
you can surround the fuel with material that carries the heat away to
be turned into electricity.
Fusion is cleaner than fission - but we haven't figured out how to get
a self-sustaining reaction. The best effort to date, as I recall was
a 1/2 second burst where the European JET reactor produced 1/2 as much
energy as was put into the ignition process. So fusion's no where
near ready for prime time. There's hope to get a reactor that
produces more energy that's put into it by the end of this decade.
It will take about another 20 yrs after that before - assuming
everything goes according to plan - before we can expect a sizeable
population of fusion reactors to start coming online.
I'd say 30 yrs (optimistically) to 50 yrs before we start to see
reasonable fusion reactors on our landscape. Most /existent/ fission
reactors won't last anywhere that long. Therein lies the quandary.
Then there's cold fusion. Dismissed as ridiculous science in the
mainstream, there continues to be scientific study of the effect. And
it would appear that something is happening. Whether it's really
fusion or not is an open question. One might tune one's browser to
http://www.lenr-canr.org/
> You mentioned thorium reactors. I have heard about these reactors in the same way just like how certain car companies boast about cars that run on chocolates or undersea kites that generate electricity. In order that we even come to fully know about these new reactors, we have to put them to the test--over many years, and under a hosts of new contingencies. Until then, they are just as good as advertising rhetoric about the best cars, or best planes or the best engines--until every one of them catches fire or undergo uncontrolled acceleration. Safety until proven to be so--wouldn't you agree as an engineer that failures under duress are the best indicators of robustness?
They exist. Indeed, the first working thorium reactor was running in
the 1950s. If we actually bothered to fund thorium reactors, we could
get them running quite quickly. They're not just rhetoric. There are
reactors in India that have been using thorium for years. China has
recently announced that they're going to push thorium reactors big
time.
Here's an excerpt from an article in the Telegraph:
"US physicists in the late 1940s explored thorium fuel for power. It
has a higher neutron yield than uranium, a better fission rating,
longer fuel cycles, and does not require the extra cost of isotope
separation.
The plans were shelved because thorium does not produce plutonium for
bombs. As a happy bonus, it can burn up plutonium and toxic waste from
old reactors, reducing radio-toxicity and acting as an eco-cleaner."
(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/ambroseevans_pritchard/8393984/Safe-nuclear-does-exist-and-China-is-leading-the-way-with-thorium.html)
Yes, we need to test these reactors much more, BUT the physics is
promising. If thorium is more abundant, safer, and cleaner than
uranium, then it follows that thorium reactors will be that too.
> I hope you don't see this as a quibble. I find this discussion to be exhilarating and productive for my own thinking, and I hope the same for all who read our little debate. In this sense, we are merely carrying on the debates on nuclear risk in this forum--and I thank the moderator for permitting me to air my views against yours!
No quibble at all!
Cheers.
Fil
> Best,
> Jeff
>
>
--
Filippo A. Salustri, Ph.D., P.Eng.
Mechanical and Industrial Engineering
Ryerson University
350 Victoria St, Toronto, ON
M5B 2K3, Canada
Tel: 416/979-5000 ext 7749
Fax: 416/979-5265
Email: [log in to unmask]
http://deseng.ryerson.ca/~fil/
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