Program to Use Russian Nukes for US Electricity Comes to an End 148
gbrumfiel writes "For the past two decades, about 10 percent of all the electricity consumed in the United States has come from Russian nuclear warheads. Under a program called Megatons to Megawatts, Russian highly-enriched uranium was pulled from old bombs and made into fuel for nuclear reactors. NPR News reports that the program concludes today when the last shipment arrives at a U.S. storage facility. In all nearly 500 tons of uranium was recycled, enough for roughly 20,000 warheads."
Primary goal was disposal, not energy (Score:5, Interesting)
Our proven uranium reserves would last us over 200 years at current consumption; Well beyond the life expectancy of any of our reactors. The only reason for this program was to provide a failing country with a cheap way of disposing of highly hazardous materials without losing face. It is the proverbial "turning a negative into a positive". It will have zero effect on our energy costs or programs.
Re:Primary goal was disposal, not energy (Score:5, Informative)
Our proven uranium reserves would last us over 200 years at current consumption;
If we built fast reactors, we would have enough fuel, in the form of depleted uranium sitting around idle in barrels at enrichment plants, to supply the entire planet's energy for about 1000 years.
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The problem is fast reactors are un economical.
We need breeder thermal reactors, that's really though to do !
The only known design that might do that trick is Thorium / U-233 based.
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If we built fast reactors, we would have enough fuel, in the form of depleted uranium sitting around idle in barrels at enrichment plants, to supply the entire planet's energy for about 1000 years.
Current reactor designs, given current geologically-proven reserves and what has already been refined and available in world markets, is about 200 years. The definition of proveable is that someone's already done it.
Fast reactors aren't economical right now. Maybe in two hundred years, assuming no new sources of uranium are discovered, we'll need to revisit it. It's economically absurd right now to suggest switching over. The 200 years estimate is based on today's technology, with today's known quantity, in
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..without a single ounce of extra CO2 added.
People are not rational about nuclear power, and politicians are spineless, so invest in natural gas and oil companies. Burn, baby, burn..
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And if we build fusion reactors, we would not need uranium in first place.
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I like your post, but it propagates a myth due to severe omission. I'd like to correct it.
The big problem is, you're off by a factor of 100.
Our current fuel cycle is once-through. Thus, new fuel enters the reactor at 100% capacity, and when "spent" leaves the reactor at around 98% capacity.
"Known reserves" is also problematic, as it means those reserves that we know about and can recover for the same price as the market currently prices Uranium at. In a multi-billion dollar plant, a doubling of the cost
Re:Primary goal was disposal, not energy (Score:4, Interesting)
I like your post, but it propagates a myth due to severe omission. I'd like to correct it. The big problem is, you're off by a factor of 100.
False. "Uranium reserves available at up to $100 per pound of U3O8 represented approximately 23 years worth of demand, while uranium reserves at up to $50 per pound of U3O8 represented about 10 years worth of demand. Domestic U.S. uranium production, however, supplies only about 10 percent, on average, of U.S. requirements for nuclear fuel"
Source [eia.gov]. Domestic US production gives us 23 years of demand at 100% capacity. It is currently at 10% capacity. Conclusion: About 230 years.
A second estimate [world-nuclear.org] looking at global supply had this to say: "Thus the world's present measured resources of uranium (5.3 Mt) in the cost category around present spot prices and used only in conventional reactors, are enough to last for about 80 years. This represents a higher level of assured resources than is normal for most minerals. Further exploration and higher prices will certainly, on the basis of present geological knowledge, yield further resources as present ones are used up." It goes on to state "This is in fact suggested in the IAEA-NEA figures if those covering estimates of all conventional resources (U as main product or major by-product) are considered - another 7.6 million tonnes (beyond the 5.3 Mt known economic resources), which takes us to 190 years' supply at today's rate of consumption."
200 years is an accurate assessment given available data. Your assessment is based on non-existant technology and substantial change in current industry practices. Mine is based on today's technology, and no change.
Higher prices = 80 years (Score:2)
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Any argument that...
Please stop. I've now cited an official government source, and a reputable international source. Both of these analysis were done by a team of economists, nuclear engineers, and accounted for as many factors as reasonably can be taken into consideration. You have cited... absolutely nothing.
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Any argument that...
Please stop. I've now cited an official government source, and a reputable international source. Both of these analysis were done by a team of economists, nuclear engineers, and accounted for as many factors as reasonably can be taken into consideration. You have cited... absolutely nothing.
That the oceans contain enough uranium for 10,000 years of once-through energy production is well known and easily confirmed [ieee.org]. The IEEE Spectrum article cites current research results that indicate the cost of seawater extraction can be performed at a cost of about $300/kg, a price point that the uranium spot market has already broken in the past [uxc.com], and the additional cost added to electricity by paying $300/kg vs current prices of around $100/kg is only about 0.6 cents per kwh [world-nuclear.org] still quite competitive with co [world-nuclear.org]
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We paid good money for that Uranium and IIRC the Russians got a bunch of jobs mixing the highly refined into low grade at the 2% rate that reactors use. They didn't need it, and it was a security risk laying around. It was a win-win for both nations.
Modern weapons don't use Uranium anyway because you need so much more of it versus a plutonium trigger on an H-Bomb. IIRC the US phase uranium based weapons out decades ago and used up the excess uranium in exactly the same way we're using the Russian uranium. T
Re:Primary goal was disposal, not energy (Score:4, Interesting)
Our proven uranium reserves would last us over 200 years at current consumption; Well beyond the life expectancy of any of our reactors. The only reason for this program was to provide a failing country with a cheap way of disposing of highly hazardous materials without losing face. It is the proverbial "turning a negative into a positive". It will have zero effect on our energy costs or programs.
Zero effect, eh?
An oil sheik farts in the wrong direction and gas prices go up by 10 cents a gallon, creating hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue instantly.
What in the FUCK makes you think the powers-that-be won't take this non-story and turn it into the next US energy crisis to justify a 20% increase in costs?
Sorry for being so harsh, but your last statement there pegged my bullshit meter.
The small increase in nuclear fuel price due to the ending of this program is insignificant. Fuel price is only a small cost of nuclear power, and enrichment cost only a fraction of that. The real problem for nuclear power is the bottoming out of energy prices due to the huge oversupply of natural gas from fracking. The latter being responsible for the closing of two power plants this year.
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According to this site the average price/kwh has been steadily increasing, doesn't look like it accounts for inflation though. http://data.bls.gov/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet?series_id=APU000072610&data_tool=XGtable [bls.gov]
Re:Primary goal was disposal, not energy (Score:4, Interesting)
According to this site the average price/kwh has been steadily increasing, doesn't look like it accounts for inflation though.
Yeah, but the OP was right: This isn't a fuel problem. In truth, it's a NIMBY problem. Nobody wants a power plant built near them, so no new plants are being built. The net result is demand is rising, but supply isn't. That's why the price is going up; It's not because the cost of the inputs have changed. It doesn't matter whether the plants are natural gas, nuclear, coal, solar, or wind... if you can't build one to begin with.
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The issue is not the average energy price across the country. The problem is local, where natural gas is produced in such abundance but cannot be stored or transported, they practically give it away, which nuclear (nor coal or any other generation method aside from hydro) can compete with.
'cause it has to be posted... (Score:2)
In Soviet Russia (Score:2)
In Soviet Russia, nukes use you for power.
They're doing it wrong (Score:2)
No wonder. A program to do this would never work. This is clearly a hardware problem.
Smart Move (Score:2)
So you are recycling russian nukes to build your own nukes! Thats smart ;)
Low EROEI (Score:3)
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You seem to be unaware that commercial fuel is only moderately enriched, and the enrichment process is done with (very energy efficient) centrifuges. (Actually, I'm being kind here, your handle, homepage, journal, and posting history all make your bias abundantly clear.)
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The sound you heard was my point whooshing over your head. Again, unsurprising considering your bias, and what I must now conclude is deliberate ignorance on your part.
Had you bothered to read what I quoted, you'd note I was addressing your comment on US nukes.
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In what terms do you measure the energy efficiency of a centrifuge? ... ...
You clearly have no clue
Perhaps they use not much energy in relation to the energy provided by the fuel
But that is not called efficiency!
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No, the one lacking a clue is you.
You measure the efficiency of a centrifuge by measuring the energy consumed per SWU. This feeds into determining the EROEI that is the subject of grandparent's (clueless and disconnected from reality) complaint.
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pffft, thank you that you answered ho you measure the efficieny of a centrifuge, I will take your opinion into account for my thesis.
Best Regards
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Supply and demand works, even (and especially) on the international weapons market.
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Fine, but I didn't hear anyone suggesting that starting another cold war and then ending it, in order to harvest the leftover nuclear material, ought to be on the table in terms of possible future energy strategies.
This was a one time deal that only made sense given the outrageous history of the 20:th century.
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I don't know how outrageous the 20th was - look at the wars, plagues and general cocked-uppedness of the 19th, 18th, and 17th. The only reason antiquity doesn't seem as bad is because we've got lousy records of it.
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I don't mean to diminish the suffering of anyone in earlier centuries, but the 20:th is special in that was the first century in which one man's decision could potentially destroy most of civilization.
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one man's decision could potentially destroy most of civilization.
I hope that isn't as true as Hollywood makes it out to be. Multiple authentication requirements, etc. are hopefully even stronger than they claimed they were _before_ Dr. Strangelove was released.
Turning back to antiquity, wasn't it Caesar who essentially tanked Rome? Though, "we" (civilization) will be taking the barbarians down hard with us if the nuclear option gets out of control.
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one man's decision could potentially destroy most of civilization.
I hope that isn't as true as Hollywood makes it out to be. Multiple authentication requirements, etc. are hopefully even stronger than they claimed they were _before_ Dr. Strangelove was released.
Turning back to antiquity, wasn't it Caesar who essentially tanked Rome? Though, "we" (civilization) will be taking the barbarians down hard with us if the nuclear option gets out of control.
No, Caesar changed Rome from a republic to an Empire. You could say he laid the ground works for the imperial Rome that we most often think of.
The fall of Western Rome was a drawn out process that took at least a couple of centuries, so you can't blame it on any one person. Rome probably fell for reasons not much different from why the Soviet union fell. It was too large an empire and way too reliant on central planning.
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O.K. - but who was playing his fiddle while Rome burned?
Obviously, where we are today is never the product of one person's decisions, the current conditions in the U.S.A are in large part thanks to pre-colonial English monarchs and their policies, but often one man is handed the blame or praise for terrible or great things that happened on their watch.
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O.K. - but who was playing his fiddle while Rome burned?
Considering that the fiddle wasn't developed for the greater part of a thousand years after he died, it probably wasn't Nero. He probably wasn't playing his lyre either, since the historical records that aren't crazy conspiracy theories place him out of time when it happened. It is fairly historically certain that he introduced building codes to help prevent that sort of thing from happening again after the fire, however.
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Sorry, been too many decades since my ancient history classes (can you imagine the early 80s!) - Google informs me that was thinking of Nero.
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Personally, I don't care how efficient the process was or wasn't, I'm just pleased that the uranium delivered (and will continue to deliver for some time) its energy in a controlled fashion via the electrical grid, instead of all at once with a hydrogen jacket around it.
As far as I'm concerned, this was a "disarming the BOMB" program, any side effects that generated electricity, at any cost, are a bonus.
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Ah, the classical solution to pollution: dilution.
The world is a really big place, we'd be better off with a global nuclear waste dump the size of Utah than we are currently with the products of fossil fuel combustion in the atmosphere. Of course, Utah residents would disagree, but if you churned up the unwanted radioactives into cement at a "safe" concentration, whatever that is, started laying a 6' thick layer of the stuff at the center of the biggest non-draining desert in the state, it would be a very
In Post Soviet Russia (Score:2)
Swords and Plowshares (Score:2)
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...and they shall beat their swords into plowshares... That's what $14 Billion can buy.
Note that the estimated cost of a single nuclear attack by terrorists is between $250 billion and $1 trillion.
So never mind the electricity by-product; if this program kept nuclear weapons out of the wrong hands, then it was well worth it [washington.edu] for that reason alone.
US Hegemony (Score:2)
While some people complain about the geopolitical status of the United States, it has to remembered that the US emerged from isolationism outside the Western hemisphere only after the second World War. Sure there was some involvement after the Spanish-American war and the first World War, but current state of affairs was created by the actions of countries around the world. If there is anything especially exceptional about the United States, it is that it is a large political conglomerate that continuously
The new US centrifuge plant is up and running. (Score:2)
There's no danger of a fuel shortage. The new US centrifuge enrichment plant [google.com] is up and running, and the second section of the plant is under construction.
2 Years' Worth of Electricity for $17 Billion? (Score:2, Insightful)
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Problem #1: that's how the French do it.
Problem #2: TMI - Never Again! - NIMBY!!!
Problem #3: Greenpeace & the like, no they're not a big force, but in the 51-49 world of red-blue U.S. politics, they're just big enough to make any new nuclear projects a political liability.
Diversity is strength, we should have many sources of power, but I do think that keeping our existing nuke plants running past 2x their original design lifetimes while making it virtually impossible to construct new plants with fundame
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Fuel is only a small part of the cost of operating a fission power plant. It non-trivial, but it's a lower percentage than for simpler / lower-energy-fuel power plants such as coal or natural gas.
With that said, I agree that we should be expanding on fission power. Not at the expense of renewables - those are still well below where they could be - but at the expense of things like coal (which is currently needed to provide a lot of the base load that nuclear plants could handle so well and easily). However,
and to think... (Score:5, Funny)
the us spent almost fifty years worried by the prospect of russian nukes lighting up their cities
It wasn't "recycled"... (Score:2)
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Because if we wanted to nuke the hell outta someone, we wouldn't need Russian uranium to do it.
I think you're confusing irony with tragedy.
Re:And why ... (Score:5, Informative)
Specially since this is U-235 (the primary nuclear fuel currently in use on civilian nuclear power stations).
Using U-235 for nuclear weapons is only common in first generation nuclear programs. You see, enriching uranium is a PITA (separating isotopes), while separating plutonium from anything else is soooo much easier (chemical separation).
The trick is having a reactor that takes thatplentiful U-238 and hit it with a neutron to make Pu-239 (that nasty plutonium used in bombs). Plutonium isn't naturally occurring.
If there are still US nuclear weapons that use U-235, those must be the oldest in the inventory.
So, any association from that Russian nuclear fuel with nuclear bombs is only made by those without any nuclear physics knowledge.
U-238 is 99,3% of natural uranium. It's the stuff that enrichment removes from the base material (producing depleted uranium).
A holy grail of peaceful nuclear is breeding Pu-239 from U-238 on the fly inside the reactor and the fission it, but having this happen mixed with all kinds of nasty beta emitters that make using that Pu-239 for nuclear weapons another PITA. Beta radiation is the stuff that really kills (used to kill cancer cells in radiotheraphy), but inside the reactor it's not an issue.
Not to mention that everybody that has significant stockpiles of Pu-239 want to destroy most of it ! Most nuclear reactors can't deal with nuclear fuel with lots of plutonium.
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U-238 and hit it with a neutron to make Pu-239
IANANuclear Engineer, but isn't it a proton that's needed for that?
</pedantic>
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Google is your friend, but for the lazy:
Right, the neutron capture makes U-239, then it undergoes two beta decays that add one proton to the nucleus:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium-238 [wikipedia.org]
I'm also not a physicist, but this explanation must the right, because it's the same in multiple sources (Wikipedia, nuclear lectures from multiple sources).
For explanation of why the double beta decay adds a proton to the nucleus, see here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta_decay [wikipedia.org]
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My bad...
Beta decay doesn't add protons to the nucleus, it converts neutrons into protons+electron in this case happens twice:
U-238 + neutron = U-239
U-239 (beta decay) -> Np-239 (one more proton/electron, one less neutron)
Np-239 (beta decay) -> Pu-239 (one more proton/electron, one less neutron)
That's what happens when you pretend you try use chemistry knowledge 20 yrs after studying it (and not using).
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U-238 and hit it with a neutron to make Pu-239
IANANuclear Engineer, but isn't it a proton that's needed for that?
</pedantic>
After U-238 absorbs a neutron it becomes U-239, which decays (half life = 23 m) to Np-239, which decays (half life = 2 d) again to Pu-239.
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Oops forgot to clarify, the decays are beta decay, where a neutron in the nucleus turns into a proton and ejects an electron and antineutrino.
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Proton: positively charged .... ...
Neutron: neutral, hence the name
I leave the rest to your imagination.
(* facepalm *)
Re:And why ... (Score:5, Informative)
Almost.
U238 + n -> U239 (neutron capture)
U239 -> Np239 + e (beta decay)
Np239 -> Pu239 + e (beta decay)
Re:And why ... (Score:4, Funny)
Oops, just notice I forgot the antineutrinos.
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Concise and educational. Thank you.
Re:And why ... (Score:5, Informative)
Specially since this is U-235 (the primary nuclear fuel currently in use on civilian nuclear power stations). Using U-235 for nuclear weapons is only common in first generation nuclear programs. You see, enriching uranium is a PITA (separating isotopes), while separating plutonium from anything else is soooo much easier (chemical separation).
Your notion is about 50 years out of date - this was a common idea in the 1950s. The perfection of the gas centrifuge, available since the early 1960s completely changed the equation.
Highly enriched uranium is much cheaper than plutonium gram for gram (the cost differential is more than 10:1). That "easy" chemical separation you speak of has to be done in a hot cell, and produces large amounts of highly radioactive waste, and requires first making uranium into fuel, then cooking it in an expensive reactor for months, and then more months of cooling. HEU these days simply takes slightly radioactive natural or low enriched uranium and sends it through a gas centrifuge cascade in a modest-sized warehouse giving you product easily converted to metal at the other end after several days later.
Highly enriched uranium (aka HEU, your "U-235") is widely used in modern thermonuclear weapons. The secondary casing is made out of it, the secondary spark plug is likely made out of it, and perhaps half of the total yield of warhead is when the highly enriched uranium is fissioned by the flood neutrons from the thermonuclear burn. There is roughly ten times more HEU in a modern weapon than plutonium, which is only used for the primary (where the fact that it has a lower critical mass is very important).
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Plutonium is naturally occurring. The problem is we find only trace amounts because its half life is relatively short.
"Plutonium is the heaviest primordial element by virtue of its most stable isotope, plutonium-244, whose half-life of about 80 million years is just long enough for the element to be found in trace quantities in nature.[3]"
It is a primordial element - meaning it was extant since before the Earth condensed and solidified.
Re:And why ... (Score:4, Interesting)
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France, UK, Japan, etc. could have done it instead ... if they had tried.
Guess they were leading from behind.
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The US has double the installed power of nuclear reactors compared to France or Japan, and more than 5x the capacity of the UK.
The UK and France already have reprocessing plants to convert weapons-grade plutonium into reactor fuel, which isn't yet done in the US, so I'm guessing they have even less need for uranium.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOX_fuel#Current_applications [wikipedia.org]
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Would you prefer the Russians sold their warheads on E-bay?
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Well, sure. For a very, very short amount of time.
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You mean, we pay to ship it to the Savannah River Site in South Carolina because we never could agree on a permanent storage solution at Yucca Mountain. We won't be completely rid of it for many, many years.
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Maybe we can get them to toss our spent fuel into an unused building at Chernobyl.
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Chernobyl is in Ukraine, not Russia. I think they might object.
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Not if you lobby for their EU membership.
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Just wait; once we get the Slingatron [space.com] built and working, we'll just toss all that garbage into the sun.
Er, well, towards it.
Re:And why ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Really? REALLY??? Do you have any idea what was happening in Russia after the USSR fell apart? They were in some serious economic trouble. Securing nuclear assets was of vital importance not just to us, but to them and the entire world. If anything we didn't do enough. I heard there were RTGs left to rust in Siberia. Some of their naval nukes were also mothballed under questionable circumstances.
I'm the first to admit that the USA's actions aren't always for the best; but not in this case.
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"Do you have any idea what was happening in Russia after the USSR fell apart?"
Most Slashchan readers aren't that old, nor are they "nerdy" enough to care about ancient times.
Re:And why ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Trust has very little to do with it. The people who have these weapons have them. The best that can be hoped for is a process of disarmament that does not cause too much damage if trust is broken, and one which prevents other parties from gaining the weapons and thus becoming risk factors in and of themselves.
That said, this particular program was an ingenious way of proving that these weapons were destroyed. It put the most critical parts -what actually makes these things nuclear weapons- through a relatively open, transparent, and auditable process that rendered them, if not precisely inert, then at least unsuitable for use in weapons. Trades of this sort should be more common among countries decreasing their stockpiles.
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Trust has very little to do with it. The people who have these weapons have them. The best that can be hoped for is a process of disarmament that does not cause too much damage if trust is broken, and one which prevents other parties from gaining the weapons and thus becoming risk factors in and of themselves.
A general perspective from Sen. Sam Nunn. [nti.org] The world requires more progress. I think people have become too complacent about these weapons.
Re:And why ... (Score:5, Insightful)
And why do we feel the US is more trusted with this than anybody else?
Because we already have enough warheads to destroy the entire planet 100x over? How is a bit more Uranium going to help us? So we can destroy it 101x over?
Re:And why ... (Score:4, Interesting)
And why do we feel the US is more trusted with this than anybody else?
Because we already have enough warheads to destroy the entire planet 100x over? How is a bit more Uranium going to help us? So we can destroy it 101x over?
No, we really don't. Nuclear stockpiles are a fraction of 1% of their cold war peaks (I calculated it once, but don't remember the exact number). I believe our silo-based missiles in the U.S. are down to 150 single-warhead Minuteman IIIs, at around 300 kT each. That's about 450 MT, which is still a lot of destructive power, but the largest single device ever detonated was 50 MT all by itself, and was supposedly capable of being boosted to 100 MT.
And the OP entirely missed the point: This was not "giving" new nukes to the U.S. This was taking old nukes out of circulation and using them for energy. Using your analogy, this is going from 100x to 99x or lower, not the other way around.
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Re:And why ... (Score:5, Insightful)
The US is a leader because we don't just talk big on the internet and rave into video cameras.
Yes, once in a while we actually do something right. Buying the Uranium, which largely gave the substance a safe direction to travel, and a cash reward for compliance worked out well.
Although, in 1995 I was in Prague when the news carried a story about a car being discovered with 6 pounds of enriched Uranium scooting around town. I was pretty alarmed because the people were evidently looking for a buyer.
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Although, in 1995 I was in Prague when the news carried a story about a car being discovered with 6 pounds of enriched Uranium scooting around town. I was pretty alarmed because the people were evidently looking for a buyer.
Well, you know, the life of a repo man is always intense.
Re:And why ... (Score:5, Funny)
We didn't install the cameras we just accessed the ones you already had set up.
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Action has that consequence, you fuck up a lot.
But then you learn from it and move on.
Mea Culpa.
Re:And why ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, apparently you wiretap the internet and install the video cameras.
Who, specifically, are the two of you referring to when you say "you" and "we"? All Americans? Really?
Yes sir, no Americans "just talk big" on the internet as they rave into video cameras, and all Americans support "wiretapping the internet" as we giggle our asses off installing the video cameras... and all Irish are drunks, all Brits have bad teeth and all Muslims are terrorists.
You really put your names on this shit? Both of your posts are sense-free trolls. Give it a rest.
Re:And why ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Not saying all Americans support this, but it's done in your name by your government. Often against the laws of the country where it happens (which apparently are deemed irrelevant by your laws).
So, like it or not, these are things America is currently doing right now.
Sadly, my country is one of the Five Eyes, and I need to accept that Canada is doing this as well. I don't like it either, but that doesn't change that it's happening in my name or that I wish it wasn't.
But when someone says "ZOMG, teh Canajuns are doing teh spying (eh)" -- the best we can say is "yeah, we don't like it either".
Unfortunately, when our politicians act like douchebags, it reflects on us all. And, sadly, I suspect in many countries where this is occurring those of us who disagree with it are vastly outnumbered by the ones who think that it's OK.
But if you think that still doesn't create some negative backlash against a country in general, you're fooling yourself. If most of your country believes this is OK and what you should be doing, well, then on balance, the whole country bears the blame for it.
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So you admit that your government is doing exactly the same thing and even in exactly the same program as the American government. Funny, then, that you say that Americans are all about spying on everybody, however when it comes to Canada, all you have to say is "yeah, we don't like it either."
Unless you've been living under a rock, we (American citizens) aren't too happy about the thing as a whole. It doesn't mater which country it is that's behind it; whether our own or another.
Re:And why ... (Score:5, Insightful)
the best we can say is "yeah, we don't like it either".
Unfortunately, when our politicians act like douchebags, it reflects on us all. And, sadly, I suspect in many countries where this is occurring those of us who disagree with it are vastly outnumbered by the ones who think that it's OK..
I don't think so. I have a feeling that those who don't like it do out number those who find such behavior appalling. The problem is, is that it doesn't seem there is any way to fix it within the framework any longer. The politicians/lawyers have warped and twisted the system to the point that it no longer serves "we the people" but the politicians themselves. I'm sure it probably always did to a point, but it's almost palpable now. Sadly we don't even have a good option for who to vote for any longer. Our last two presidents were voted into office on good wishes and little else. Bush was going to be reach across the aisle and work with both parties and focus on internal matters and avoid "nation building" and deficit reduction... Our current president was going to close Gitmo, cure global warming and give us unicorns and rainbows. My father has gotten to the point that he simply votes against whomever the incumbent is. If the incumbent is running unchallenged, he uses the write in.
I hope I'm wrong, but I fear we have crossed the line where things can be fixed in a peaceable manner. I don't think we've come to the point where it will take an all out revolt to fix things. But I do fear there may come a time where riots will start occurring. Or even worse, the American people have become so complacent and distracted, that all of the diversions will keep us placated indefinitely. Then we are truly lost.
Re:And why ... (Score:4, Insightful)
I believe the time has long since passed where nothing except peaceful means and working within the system will be effective in causing change in some countries.
Between the fact that they can monitor everything you do, use terrorism laws to detain you without trial, and have a huge imbalance in terms of force available to them -- the days a revolt being anything other than a suicide pact are long gone.
Any attempts at anything more drastic will only allow them to say "see, terrorists". Unfortunately, they seem quite unwilling to listen to protests and reasoned debate.
Ideally, opinion and policy swing back the other way and things get better. I, like you, fear they won't -- but hopefully countries start to realize you don't need to get as far down the path as needing an armed revolt to adhere to what were your starting principles.
One would like to hope that civil disobedience and less violent means are still viable. And maybe that's truly naive, but the alternative is terrifying: if Western democracies have to resort to armed insurrection, it's all pretty much downhill from there. Because every piss-pot dictator will say "but see, you do the same thing", and the world as we know it will have changed for the worse.
And, sadly, for a lot of people as long as their day to day lives are mostly the same, they're never going to understand why this is happening and not going to side with it. Ideally, you exhaust all other options before resorting to anything more drastic.
One would like to hope there's still some shreds of enlightenment and finding a better way available to us.
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Not that you should give a damn about my opinion, but this post is as well thought out and on target as the first was knee-jerk.
What you have written above is the most realistic and insightful analysis that I have seen to date of our situation and options.
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Yes, of course, like the USA is the only country with NSA/CIA like organizations right?
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heat swords into glow sticks
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I first thought of the city and could not understand the reference.
I suspect you are referring to Professor Leslie London and his "Affirmative Action and the invisibility of white privilege," article.
Google led me to: http://www.uct.ac.za/mondaypaper/archives/?id=6412 [uct.ac.za]