(02-16-2010 03:24 PM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  

(02-16-2010 03:00 PM)Machiavelli Wrote:  (space elevator stuff)

This would be a HUGE breakthrough to getting serious about outer space, and provide economical disposal of waste. The problem is you'd need a sizeable no-fly exclusion zone around the elevator. I'm talking SERIOUS no-fly. Military AA and surface to air missles.

Oh, and it would need SERIOUS shielding of the cable in outerspace. Near earth orbit resembles a high tech waste heap. Bolts and paint chips flying around at 30,000 mph.

(02-16-2010 02:28 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  If you reprocess like the French do at Marcoule (military) and La Hague (civilian), you can use the reprocessed fuel and store what's left over back on site, or even put it back into the mine that you got it from in the first place.
Storing all the waste under a mountain in Nevada, or in one place anywhere else, really doesn't make sense. Spread it out enough, and the amount at each place can actually be handled pretty easily.
Before you enviroloons join those attacking the French reprocessing facilites for allegedly discharging nuclear waste, note that the amount of radiation they discharge in a year is less than I'll get on my flight to London and back next week.
We have Jimmy Carter to thank for our nutty policy in this area, as well as for the underutilization of natural gas. Carter's energy "plan" screwed us for 30+ years; Obama is trying to top (or bottom?) that.
In many cases, the solution to pollution is dilution. This is one of those cases.
France gets 80% of its electricity from nuclear. We could stand to build 50-150 nuclear plants, and cover 30,000 square miles of the desert southwest with solar panels, and put windmills everywhere that the wind blows, and convert to electricity as prime mover for the vast majority of uses that currently burn fossil fuels. This is one area where if Obama wants to turn us into France, he can be my guest.

How did Carter manage to cripple that area so badly. Was it a federal statute or an executive order?

(02-16-2010 01:15 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  Let's get the reactors going in California, this is the state that really needs them.

Amen! Stoopid state run by stoopid hippies!

(02-16-2010 02:19 PM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  I'm not against shooting it into space if we can build an indestructable container system. Think of the containers the use to transport the stuff on rail on steroids. Something that can be put between two real solid rocket boosters ... have both SRBs explode ... and survive easily. Granted this will make sending the stuff into space VERY expensive, as it adds alot of weight. But I'm of the opinion the power companies going nuclear should have to pay that cost.

I personally advocate the method used in the Oklo Nuclear Reactor. It's the only method known to have withstood the regulatory requirements of the US government regarding safe storage of nuclear waste. I believe that Owl 69/70/75 has advocated something very much like this in the past.

(02-16-2010 02:49 PM)Machiavelli Wrote:  This is not some fantasy, they actually have plans to make elevators out of a high tech carbon material to make an elevator cable that can reach to zero gravity. We can make the elevator but the cable is our undoing. An article I read ten years ago said we were close to that cable. How about an incased projectile shot from a giant gun. There are cheaper ways than a rocket.

If you think space elevators are good, but just too boring and practical, check out the 'space fountain'.



Although really, the damage was done when the party planners took the hole punch to the elevator ribbon to hang up the sign.

We would be have been better off as a country instead of pi$$ing $800 BILLION on that phony stimulus package to have built 40 Nuclear plants. It would have served as a national security hedge against an oil shortage. Provide a decent way to move to plug in hybrids. Provide jobs and afterwards still have something of VALUE. Instead we have more runways at airports in the middle of nowhere.

As long as the finances are reasonable, I don't have a problem with the loan guarantees.

THIS is the sort of project finance that the government can and perhaps should do. It's too big for a bank.

the PROBLEM comes in when and if we finance a project over 30 years that has an expected life of 10 yrs.

I'd think we'd need the energy pretty much "forever". Now, if cold fusion comes in, maybe not.

(02-16-2010 07:59 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  Now, if cold fusion comes in, maybe not.

That, sir, is the real solution, and would be perhaps mankind's greatest achievement if accomplished. Man harnessing the sun.

(02-16-2010 06:20 PM)I45owl Wrote:  
If you think space elevators are good, but just too boring and practical, check out the 'space fountain'.



Although really, the damage was done when the party planners took the hole punch to the elevator ribbon to hang up the sign.

I suspect this was tongue in cheek?? Obviously something strong enough to hold/lift many tons into space would take something exceptional to damage it.

(02-16-2010 08:15 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  

(02-16-2010 06:20 PM)I45owl Wrote:  
If you think space elevators are good, but just too boring and practical, check out the 'space fountain'.



Although really, the damage was done when the party planners took the hole punch to the elevator ribbon to hang up the sign.

I suspect this was tongue in cheek?? Obviously something strong enough to hold/lift many tons into space would take something exceptional to damage it.

There would need to be a sufficient tension in the line to overcome the extra pull added by any weight in the hypothetical line. Keep in mind though, hydraulic sheers can do serious work. Think of the jaws of life in reverse.

(02-16-2010 07:26 PM)NIU05 Wrote:  We would be have been better off as a country instead of pi$$ing $800 BILLION on that phony stimulus package to have built 40 Nuclear plants. It would have served as a national security hedge against an oil shortage. Provide a decent way to move to plug in hybrids. Provide jobs and afterwards still have something of VALUE. Instead we have more runways at airports in the middle of nowhere.

You mean the same stimulus package that all of the Republicans that voted against? THe one that many of those same Republicans then claim to have saved jobs or create jobs in their district when they take the stimulus money? THat stimulus bill? I know. It was a dismal failure.

(02-16-2010 08:35 PM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote:  There would need to be a sufficient tension in the line to overcome the extra pull added by any weight in the hypothetical line. Keep in mind though, hydraulic sheers can do serious work. Think of the jaws of life in reverse.

I haven't really looked at the physics of the space elevator, but consider that the other end of it would be whipping around at many thousands of miles an hour. But, the title of the second strip was "Tensile vs. Shear Strength".

(02-16-2010 08:15 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  I suspect this was tongue in cheek?? Obviously something strong enough to hold/lift many tons into space would take something exceptional to damage it.

Hambone!?! Really? What tipped you off, the fact that it was a comic strip?

(02-16-2010 02:54 PM)Rebel Wrote:  

(02-16-2010 02:49 PM)Machiavelli Wrote:  This is not some fantasy, they actually have plans to make elevators out of a high tech carbon material to make an elevator cable that can reach to zero gravity. We can make the elevator but the cable is our undoing. An article I read ten years ago said we were close to that cable. How about an incased projectile shot from a giant gun. There are cheaper ways than a rocket.

Wow. And there is nothing out there floating around in outer space that is of any importance to us, right?

Yeah, I can just imagine.

"Hey Bubba, watch me fire this cannon"

...and from a distance,

"Ma, what happened to the TV. It's all staticy."

...headline in the next day's paper:

"National Intelligence Agency has lost contact with a satellite of significant importance"


There's enough trash floating around in our gravitational pull. Shoot that **** to the sun.

Your description sounds like a Youtube video

Check out one of Bill Gates's pet projects...

http://intellectualventureslab.com/?tag=terrapower
http://technologyreview.com/read_article...0&id=22114

(yes, I know GTS, the name recognition offends your Linux sensibilities. What offends me is that they refer to depleted Uranium as nuclear waste on their website.)

Cold fusion is a fantasy. However, Fission reactors that produce little or no dangerous waste products should be pursued aggressively, including Thorium reactors.

Incidentally, is no-one the least bit interested in my reference to the Oklo Nuclear reactor? I was pretty floored when I first heard about it and I'm surprised I had never heard of it before.