[TheForge] nuke plants and other thoughts OT: POL:

[Andrew Vida]

Todd Todd Todd...  What's the matter with you, boyo?  Talking sense and 
all...  jesus louisus... come on now, this is AmeriKa in the 21st 
century where sense makes no sense at all.  This sort of likens to that 
quote: "in an empire of lies, telling the truth is treason"  Tailor to 
the current context as may please you.

Sheesh.

Todd Rich wrote:
> 
> On Mon, 21 Mar 2011, Gladish, Andy wrote:
> 
>> Heard an interesting talk about radiation levels in coal plant waste.
>> Apparently it's something we should be aware of- not as acute as with
>> reactor waste of course, but far from benign.
>> I always think of nuke by products as being in a class by themselves, but I
>> think it makes more sense to think of them as one end of a bell curve.
>> A.G.
> 
> http://www.ornl.gov/info/ornlreview/rev26-34/text/colmain.html
> 
>> Based on the predicted combustion of 2516 million tons of coal in the 
>> United States and 12,580 million tons worldwide during the year 2040, 
>> cumulative releases for the 100 years of coal combustion following 1937 
>> are predicted to be:
>>
>> U.S. release (from combustion of 111,716 million tons):
>> Uranium: 145,230 tons (containing 1031 tons of uranium-235)
>>
>> Thorium: 357,491 tons
>>
>> Worldwide release (from combustion of 637,409 million tons):
>>
>> Uranium: 828,632 tons (containing 5883 tons of uranium-235)
>>
>> Thorium: 2,039,709 tons
> 
> Also, to get a perspective on amounts of radioactive exposure, here is a 
> nice visual chart:
> 
> http://xkcd.com/radiation
> 
> And Pete?  Radioactive isotopes activity is inversely proportional to its 
> longevity.  Yes U-285 will have a half life of 700 million years, but it's 
> specific activity is so low it isn't an issue.