$3.00 per gallon gasoline. Why is everyone so panicked?

Really? Where did they get the money? ExxonMobil's total revenue for the

2006 year was about $378 billion.

My memory is not perfect. No one's is. That is why I check my figures and facts, especially when it takes less than a minute with the internet.

Quite frankly, I didn't remember what the profit was (although I remember it was something like $600 a *second*). So I looked it up.

You can read minds. Very good. But you need to take more lessons. You're not doing a good job.

Have a lovely day.

Jeff

Don't forget nuclear bombs, Chernobyl and the risk of dirty bombs, which are convential bombs that are contaminated with radioactivity, so that radioactivity would be spread around an area. And there is a general fear of the unknown. So many people would rather live next to a coal-fired power plant than a nuclear plant (actually, I would, too, because the exhaust from the plant is so high up that it affects people miles away, but rarely in the immediate neighborhood).

The biggest risk as far as dirty bombs is concerned is that the radioactivity will come from the former Soviet Union, where oversight of nuclear plants and nuclear waste is a lot less than in the US. Plus Soviet nuclear scientists are a risk, because they are under-employed, making them easier to hire by terrorist organizations.

For the fear of the unknown, think about how so many people are concerned about microwave radiation for cell towers above schools. Again, the antennea are tuned so that the microwave signals and radiation spreads outward, not down. So if cell phones were a risk (almost all studies show they are not), then kids are actually safer with cell towers above them.

The rarity of reports of problems at nuclear power plants might actually be a problem, because people notice them when they occur, unlike car crashes, which occur so often that we don't even pay attention (unless they are in the lanes going in the other direction, when people slow down to look).

Nuclear power plants are actually pretty safe. They require good security, properly trained engineers and proper oversight.

And with the ability to have standardized design, like the big makes of power plants are trying to do, oversight, licensing and engineer would be easier, and the plants safer.

Unless there is a big release of radioactive gas. AFIK, there hasn't been one in the US in the last 25 years. There was one at TMI, but I don't think that release was even a danger.

There is most likely an increase in cancer in those who lived around TMI at the time.

The increase is hard to measure.

Maybe the number is around 10 or 15.

However, coal also release radioactivity.

Small amounts of uranium and thorium are released from the burning of coal. But so much coal is burned, the total amount is not small.

Plus workers are exposed to radioactivity as well as other problems (like being crushed by a mine collapse) during the mining and processing of coal and uranium (for reactors), the building of power plants, the transport of fuel, etc., so it is really hard to calculate the danger to the workers. Overall, I think nuclear comes out as safer.

The problem both with TMI and Chernobyl wasn't just design. There was human error. In the case of TMI, one of the things that made the emergency bigger (I don't call these accidents because they were avoidable) is that the engineers didn't believe their gauges for a while. The folks at Chernobyl weren't following the rules that were in place there, either.

I don't think Chernobyl would be shut down for refit in the US. I think it would just be shut down, for scrap and disposal.

The risk of an emergency the size of Chernobyl is real in the US. But very small, close to zero. With new plant designs, the risk is even closer to zero.

Overall, nuclear power is the lesser of two evils.

Jeff

Actually, people tend to be quite nasty on the web. So don't take what people say personally. Teenagers are really especially bad.

Jeff

Except of course, Bob is responding to articles which were 1) not at all nasty, and 2) posted by a gray haired old fellow who was a teenager decades before Usenet existed.

Bob just thinks he has a right to post fabricated "facts" (such as Alaska is half the size of the Lower-48, and oil companies are not allowed to drill in most of Alaska) to support his opinion, and is upset that he was called on it.

Bob now wants to discuss my personality rather than the issues that started the discussion. That is because while I can post references that prove his fabricated facts about oil/alaska/etc are false, what can I say when he says I'm mean and nasty and scared to fight with him?

Close but no cigar. If one does a search of the Congressional Record they will discover Henry Ford II testified before the US Senate that Ford was in favor of the proposed laws and that Ford had been developing safer vehicles since 1952. However he suggest that the automobile companies be given time to properly engineer replacement vehicles, to bring cars on line with the new safety and emission standards, rather then be forced into adding yet undeveloped technology into the current vehicles.

He testified that if we are required to piecemeal the engineering, the cost of a car like its new Pinto was likely to nearly double the current $1,890 base price, in the five to seven years it takes to develop a totally new vehicle. They basically laughed at his price assertion. He was wrong, by 1974 when the '75 came to market, the base price of the Pinto was $4,500.

By setting dates certain into the law, rather than goals to be met, the replacement for the Pinto did not come to market until ten years later as a result Had we at Ford been allowed to engineer new technology into a totally new RWD vehicle, with the much better and more comprehensive safety and emission standards, the replacement would have sold at around $3,500 and been available in around five or six years

I bought the '71 Pinto, that I still own, in August of 1970 when they were first introduced. Last year, at nearly 300K, was the first the engine had work, I had to refinish the head ;)

mike

Not even a mouse, as far as I know ;)

mike

The nuke plant in my back yard, Palo Verde, is rated by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission as one of the two least safe plants in the US.

What types of jury rigging had to be done, and what technologies were delayed in development?

I'm not sure of your conclusion, Mike. I was around in the 70's as well, and my take is that the crap they jury rigged was at best a stop-gap effort. I am not supporting that stuff, and having a car of that era now would be a nightmare for me. But, had we gone another 15 years (your number) with nothing before technology caught up, then we would have been much worse off in terms of environmentalism.

I agree with your premise that extremists generally do more harm than good, I just question that your conclusion about the application of then-current technology to fight smog was a giant step in the wrong direction. I think it was a tiny step forward, and was a step that was better than doing nothing.

I never said you were afraid or scared. I did however think it interesting you speak the way you do yet live in a very remote part of our country.

I'll end this if you're willing to end it?

Sequoyah Nuclear Power Plant is less than 8 miles from this house and I couldn't give less of a damn. It's safe. I recall in school some of the engineers came to talk about the odds of a disaster. It was 1 in some many billions. They said we had a greater chance of being hit by

10-20 meteorites at the same time than an accident of any degree from the power plant.

It's in Chattanooga and run by TVA in case you wanted to know.

p.s. I used to live less than 2 miles from it, you could see the flashing lights from the cooling towers at night. I had relatives who lived across the street from the plant for decades, none died before they were 75 years old.

It's a bunch of hype about nuclear power plants being dangerous.

TNT plants are VERY dangerous.

Now I live near some of those very HUGE Gasoline storage tanks, about

10 all bunched together. My risk of death increased 10,000% compared to the nuke plant.

Why is it you just can't be honest about *anything*?

"You're likely far more pleasant in person. /Of/ /course/ /you/ /only/ /are/ /because/ /it/ /keeps/ /you/ /safe/."

Hilarious, but that's what you did say. Veiled, but there it is.

Eh? Your exposure seems to be extremely limited.

In a small community public perception of your integrity becomes a very significant factor. People who fabricate their own set of "facts", the way you do, don't do well.

Nobody would dare trust you; and cooperative efforts with neighbors is pretty much the most universal characteristic of being successful in an environment as harsh and unforgiving as we have.

Just to add even more clarity, *you* don't have a clue as to why I live where I do, what it is like to live where I do, or how to even so much as stay alive where I do! You wouldn't make it.

Then why don't you simply stop posting such silly comments?

Gas companies making enormous profits - something tells me - PRICE GOUGING. ITS WILD - ITS WILD MANNNNN !!!!