Terror Free Oil

[Irish Caesar]

If we expand the use of nuclear energy more research can be done to explore ways to harness fusion power, or how to better reprocess spent material to provide a nearly infinite supply of energy.

I'm not sure expanding the use of fission power would expand the research into fusion power; while both are nuclear energy, the processes and hardware required are very different. I think we should definitely be researching fusion power, though.

We can reprocess material easily, the engineering and the science isn't the problem. The public policy is. President Carter decided that the United States shouldn't reprocess its fuel lest plutonium be extracted--a show of good faith to the rest of the world that America isn't making weapons from its reactors. As a result, we have vast amounts of perfectly good spent fuel sitting around which contains plenty of energy. We'd like to throw the junk in Yucca Mountain, but that won't be open for at the very least 10 years, so for the time being, spent fuel (or the fearmongering term for it, nuclear waste) is just sitting in pools next to the power plants.

This ties back into White Elk's comments about waste: we have plenty of fissile material sitting around, but we can't reprocess it, and it's not good enough to be put into a reactor as is, so it waits in a tank until it can be buried in the desert.

 

[CIVPhilzilla]

I'm not sure expanding the use of fission power would expand the research into fusion power; while both are nuclear energy, the processes and hardware required are very different. I think we should definitely be researching fusion power, though.

I think I worded my post poorly. I meant to say fusion research and reprocessing research should be done, while at the present time we expand nuclear energy, not that the expansion of nuclear energy would lead to breakthroughs in technology.

We can reprocess material easily, the engineering and the science isn't the problem. The public policy is. President Carter decided that the United States shouldn't reprocess its fuel lest plutonium be extracted--a show of good faith to the rest of the world that America isn't making weapons from its reactors. As a result, we have vast amounts of perfectly good spent fuel sitting around which contains plenty of energy. We'd like to throw the junk in Yucca Mountain, but that won't be open for at the very least 10 years, so for the time being, spent fuel (or the fearmongering term for it, nuclear waste) is just sitting in pools next to the power plants.

This ties back into White Elk's comments about waste: we have plenty of fissile material sitting around, but we can't reprocess it, and it's not good enough to be put into a reactor as is, so it waits in a tank until it can be buried in the desert.

I thought it was more a problem of not being able to cost efficiently reprocess, I guess I need to do a little more research into it.

 

[Irish Caesar]

I thought it was more a problem of not being able to cost efficiently reprocess, I guess I need to do a little more research into it.

I'm not sure on this, but I believe France reprocesses its spent fuel. Would any of our French posters be able to verify or deny this?

 

[mythmonster2]

Oh, Allah. What's next? Terror free PLASTIC!? Terror free URINALS!? Terror free PRINTERS!?

 

[Princeps]

Americans fund enough terrorism by paying their taxes.

 

[White Elk]

I think that although biofuels are helpful in using less petroleum, they're a step in the wrong direction in that we should be looking more at electrical power to run things. Electrical power can be generated in a number of ways which don't burn hydrocarbons, and subsidizing biofuels is just money that could have been put into more efficient solar power research and engine technology which isn't just an intermediate and temporary step.

Sorry this reply took so looong. Blah blah blah....

I agree that other options are superior (though I disagree on your support for the nuclear option... with that comes a waste product which threatens humanity). But as far as bio-diesel etc is concerned is not only the best option we have but it is one which we can utilize RIGHT NOW. And one which will fund the intergration of the alternates. And in some locals the bio-diesel generated from waste products will remain to be the best viable option for some time to come. I dont like the idea of burning one type of fuel over the other. But I do like killing two birds with one stone which is what this option will do for us RIGHT NOW... not tomarrow. Turning waste into a fuel which is less polluting than the current alternate is extremely interesting to me. Particularlly since the cost of dealing with these human waste products consume even more fossil fuels which directly pollutes the air the locals breathe. Add to that the fact that fossil fuels appear to dictate foreign policy and I am even more willing to adopt an alternate. Furthermore I see that good people of America are daily losing ancesteral farm land and I see a way that they can immediately begin to turn their fallow lands into a venture which preserves thier heritage... and it is cleaner for the global and local enviroment, and helps to reduce the need for my nations foreign policy to be dictacted by some precious resource such as petrolium. Heck yes I embrace an intermediary alternative. But Hell No do I think this is the end all. But it is here RIGHT now and we can utilize this for Immediate gain. Farmers gain, the locals gain, the country gains, and the world gains. Heck yes I support this option!!

 

[Slaughter]

Use BRAZILIAN ETHANOL. Believe me, you're turning the world a better place by making us richer. Well. at least MY PART of the world will be a better place if richer. I think we should begin to use Ethanol for things like cars and stuff, and the oil for stuff that Ethanol can't do nothing. Spares oil and brokes terrorists (and Hugo Chavez too).

 

[White Elk]

I agree though I do now suspect as foul play, Anything that is gw bush supported lol. But I think it right. But I think it should be localized every chance we get. For national demand perhaps we do need the resources of other nations such as Brazil.

But I think that American farmers who stand to lose their land in rural communtities who can not substain them.... well they should be subsidized with American tax money so they can grow crops which will provide some of the fuel needs for their other local communal needs. Snow plows, logging equipment etc. Some if not all of the fuel can be GROWN locally. Why spend fuel to transport fuel to remote locals when it can be produced locally? Farmers in these remote locals are being forced off their lands because of huge corporate enterptises who have cornered the market and are forcing them out of business. Then since there are no options in these rural communities for other oppurtunities to support these displaced farmers... well then they end up living under poverty under the public dole. They end up in situations where they have no funds to move to a city to find work which is not there, and there are no other jobs available for them. So the American taxpayer pays for thier support anyway. Why not subsidize them a fraction of the tax money and then save a bundle on local road maintenance etc by having them grow the local fuel rather than transporting it at high cost over thier local roads? And then having to expend more fuel to repair the roads that the fuel transport damages?

The only reason I can suspect that this logical option is resisted is because it leads to independance which apparently threatens the currenty system of control over the people. If we are free to acquire our own energy then we are freerer to resist unpopular resitrictions upon our local communities. By providing our own regional power, we gain political power to just say No to federal controls which support monopolistic enterprises!

 

[Irish Caesar]

Sorry this reply took so looong. Blah blah blah....

I agree that other options are superior (though I disagree on your support for the nuclear option... with that comes a waste product which threatens humanity).

Yes, it does; progress is learning how to avoid that. Reprocessing used fuel so that it can't be made into weapons is really no different than the guy who learned that you shouldn't drink water you crap in: it's taking a harmful waste product and making it not harmful. Well, I think it's more like the guy who found out hwo to use it as fertilizer...but enough analogies.

But as far as bio-diesel etc is concerned is not only the best option we have but it is one which we can utilize RIGHT NOW. And one which will fund the intergration of the alternates. And in some locals the bio-diesel generated from waste products will remain to be the best viable option for some time to come. I dont like the idea of burning one type of fuel over the other. But I do like killing two birds with one stone which is what this option will do for us RIGHT NOW... not tomarrow. Turning waste into a fuel which is less polluting than the current alternate is extremely interesting to me. Particularlly since the cost of dealing with these human waste products consume even more fossil fuels which directly pollutes the air the locals breathe. Add to that the fact that fossil fuels appear to dictate foreign policy and I am even more willing to adopt an alternate. Furthermore I see that good people of America are daily losing ancesteral farm land and I see a way that they can immediately begin to turn their fallow lands into a venture which preserves thier heritage... and it is cleaner for the global and local enviroment, and helps to reduce the need for my nations foreign policy to be dictacted by some precious resource such as petrolium. Heck yes I embrace an intermediary alternative. But Hell No do I think this is the end all. But it is here RIGHT now and we can utilize this for Immediate gain. Farmers gain, the locals gain, the country gains, and the world gains. Heck yes I support this option!!

I've heard the argument that it is something that can be used right here, right now. But so can coal, really. It's certainly good to use what we have, but I'm not convinced it can be done efficiently. There's an awful lot of capital investment into ethanol; many refineries are being built and opened in Georgia (I don't know much about the rest of the country in this department), which to me is a sign that this isn't supposed to be very temporary. It's not like we can throw the corn cobs into the fuel tank and go, they still have to be trucked to refining plants and trucked (or tanked or whatever) back to where they can be used.

I'm also not convinced this will help everyone. Sure, farmers gain, but this comes from massive government subsidies on ethanol production. This means that everyone loses; we're paying for a fuel the market doesn't want. Sure, if it's a better solution, than some prodding is needed or the market will use the cheap and dirty alternatives, but I don't see it as necessarily better. Locals gain? Well, the communities with refineries get $ from more industry and jobs in the area, so that much is true.

But it's still tacky politics at work. If ethanol was really the cure-all that it's made out to be by the government's Midwest lobby, we'd remove sanctions on Cuba and buy their abundant and cheap sugar cane.