Can't help but wonder how things would be had we begun development 30 years ago when Jack was doing his thing.
.

The electric car is around 100 year old, the quest for a better battery had been going for years, fuel cells have been around for a long time but still are very costly and hydrogen is dangerous, costly and very hard to store. There was a show on the Discovery channel called "Connections" where they explored the fact that a series of inventions and ideas have to come together at the same time to make something new. It looks like we are reaching the point where that can happen in the automotive industry. To reply to your statement, development was going on 30 years ago or Jack would not have had his car.

When I say development I don't mean a prototype. I mean full on infrastructure logistics. Solar and wind electricity have been around for so long it's embarrassing we haven't implemented them before now. So much open land just sitting there doing nothing at all.

The modern auto is the results of over a 100 years of development. To produce something that will survive in the market place, the product must be at least as good as what is already out there. Prototypes and limited runs are the only way to prove if you have something that you will not go broke when produced in large numbers. The auto industry as already turned out Edsels and now days has been burned by the SUV. If the oil prices stay high, it will be worth the risk for the auto industry to introduce something better because people will be willing to risk new technology and a higher price tag to save a few bucks at the pump. If oil cost were low, the customers would never buy small cars and would stick with SUV's. The auto industry can only produce what people will buy. I don't know how old you are, but when the 1970 oil price spike happened, every one wanted a small car. This is when Japan took over the auto market place because they were the only one producing small cars. Within a few years, oil dropped in price and people moved back to bigger cars because the small cars didn't meet American needs(you just can't haul six kids and gear in an econobox). The real problem is getting people to want something like this, other wise you have to make something that meets there needs and wants.
You also appears you have not been around a wind farm. They can only be put in a few places and people don't like living near them. To be cost effective the U.S. could only provide a small percentage of it's power needs from wind. Also, the wind tends to blow mostly during the day. This makes wind good for day time power but useless at night.
As for Solar, you only get about 100 watts a square meter. If you looked at my first link, you would have found it takes more power to produce solar cells than they produce but this may change in the future. Other forms of solar power have also have problems when you want to go big. The only good replacement for Coal is Nuclear and as for the waste problems, we should be pushing development of Fast Neutron Reactors (also known as breeder reactors). They solve the waste problem by burning not only their waste products but the waste from old style reactors and produce waste that breaks down in a few hundred years instead of thousands of years. We can thank Jimmy Carter for banding fast neutron reactors in the U.S. and giving us a real waste disposal problem.
You may look at Arizona, California and New Mexico as waste land, but it's ecology is just as important as that of the east coast and far more fragile. Damage to it can take 100 years to recover because growth is much slower.

Try reading about solar someplace else. My BS meter went off when I started reading that. From the article "The longer you run a solar panel the worse...". Simply not true. The longer you run a solar system the better the payoff. The energy cost is paid off in 2 to 4 years. The dollar cost takes a bit longer but will still be paid off well before the end of the 30 year estimated lifespan of a solar electric system. He is mixing the dollar cost with the energy cost as if they are the same (they are not).

---

BOINC WIKI

Plenty of excuses and not many results

Maybe 'they' should learn how to LISTEN... for a change... ;)

---

It may not be 1984 but George Orwell sure did see the future . . .

Can't help but wonder how things would be had we begun development 30 years ago when Jack was doing his thing.
.

The electric car is around 100 year old, the quest for a better battery had been going for years, fuel cells have been around for a long time but still are very costly and hydrogen is dangerous, costly and very hard to store. There was a show on the Discovery channel called "Connections" where they explored the fact that a series of inventions and ideas have to come together at the same time to make something new. It looks like we are reaching the point where that can happen in the automotive industry. To reply to your statement, development was going on 30 years ago or Jack would not have had his car.

When I say development I don't mean a prototype. I mean full on infrastructure logistics. Solar and wind electricity have been around for so long it's embarrassing we haven't implemented them before now. So much open land just sitting there doing nothing at all.

The modern auto is the results of over a 100 years of development. To produce something that will survive in the market place, the product must be at least as good as what is already out there. Prototypes and limited runs are the only way to prove if you have something that you will not go broke when produced in large numbers. The auto industry as already turned out Edsels and now days has been burned by the SUV. If the oil prices stay high, it will be worth the risk for the auto industry to introduce something better because people will be willing to risk new technology and a higher price tag to save a few bucks at the pump. If oil cost were low, the customers would never buy small cars and would stick with SUV's. The auto industry can only produce what people will buy. I don't know how old you are, but when the 1970 oil price spike happened, every one wanted a small car. This is when Japan took over the auto market place because they were the only one producing small cars. Within a few years, oil dropped in price and people moved back to bigger cars because the small cars didn't meet American needs(you just can't haul six kids and gear in an econobox). The real problem is getting people to want something like this, other wise you have to make something that meets there needs and wants.
You also appears you have not been around a wind farm. They can only be put in a few places and people don't like living near them. To be cost effective the U.S. could only provide a small percentage of it's power needs from wind. Also, the wind tends to blow mostly during the day. This makes wind good for day time power but useless at night.
As for Solar, you only get about 100 watts a square meter. If you looked at my first link, you would have found it takes more power to produce solar cells than they produce but this may change in the future. Other forms of solar power have also have problems when you want to go big. The only good replacement for Coal is Nuclear and as for the waste problems, we should be pushing development of Fast Neutron Reactors (also known as breeder reactors). They solve the waste problem by burning not only their waste products but the waste from old style reactors and produce waste that breaks down in a few hundred years instead of thousands of years. We can thank Jimmy Carter for banding fast neutron reactors in the U.S. and giving us a real waste disposal problem.
You may look at Arizona, California and New Mexico as waste land, but it's ecology is just as important as that of the east coast and far more fragile. Damage to it can take 100 years to recover because growth is much slower.

Try reading about solar someplace else. My BS meter went off when I started reading that. From the article "The longer you run a solar panel the worse...". Simply not true. The longer you run a solar system the better the payoff. The energy cost is paid off in 2 to 4 years. The dollar cost takes a bit longer but will still be paid off well before the end of the 30 year estimated lifespan of a solar electric system. He is mixing the dollar cost with the energy cost as if they are the same (they are not).

That article was written by an engineer with over 40 years in the industry who as been working with making ideas real. It appears you don't understand the point being made. The real number don't back up your argument. Even out here when they sell you solar systems for your house, the payoff is over 15 years and thats not counting the cost of the land under them. The last few years Solar cell cost have been dropping and in a few year may reach the point where they will worth using for applications other than off grid usage. Incase you haven't noticed, with oil prices going up, the price of EVERYTHING is going up. When engineering power systems, power and money are tightly bound because the only reason for producing power is to make money. If you don't have an engineering or physics background you may not be able to work through the document. It also doesn't hurt to have a little economics as well.
To make it simple, the power from the cells must pay off the cost of the land, the solar cells, and people to keep the operation running and do this at a cost of less that TWO CENTS a kilowatt to compete with other forms of power. Yes, the power company get 10 cents a kilowatt or more to bring the power from the source to your house. Now this kilowatt of power is going to be produced by 8 to 10 square meter of cells. I am not saying it will not happen. If you are off the gird, it pays. For the power companies, it will be a few years but if things continue at the current rate, it will not be very many.

---

Nuclear waste disposal will cost US $96B

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080805/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/nuclear_waste

---

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." - Dr. Seuss

So, did you deliberately mis-state my position, or was that just an "oops?"

[Gray] said: (Message ID 792751)

We dump that on our enemies and Rush says there are absolutely no health hazards!

[Rush] said: (Message ID 603753)

Now... Do you have any idea what a single particle can do to a human?

Absolutely nothing because single particles (whatever that means) aren't enough to cause heavy metal poisoning and they're too small to contain enough radioactivity to cause radiation poisoning either. In fact, you'd have to eat enough of it to really poison you bad to get enough such that the radiation contained in it would cause you problems. But so what? You could do that with lead. Or iron. Both will kill you very very quickly if ingested as powder, far far faster than DU would. And they aren't radioactive at all.

If I mis-stated your position I apologize. It was not intentional.

Wow. So let me get this straight, because I want to be sure you actually said this.

In all of the time we have discussed this back and forth, in all of the posts on the subject. Given the posts in this thread, the original thread, and in other places. Given all that, and the context of the discussion, are you actually saying to me that you think that those two words, out of all that I wrote, after what I quoted in this thread, demonstrate that my position is that there are absolutely no health hazards from DU?

I mean, do you actually think that that comment about what one particle can or cannot do, cut from within the entire discussion, is representative of my position?

Is that seriously what you "think?"

---

Cordially,
Rush

elrushbo2@theobviousgmail.com
Remove the obvious...

Hard to read you sometimes,

What is your position on it?

---

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." - Dr. Seuss

Hard to read you sometimes,

What is your position on it?

Brilliant.

---

Cordially,
Rush

elrushbo2@theobviousgmail.com
Remove the obvious...

Hard to read you sometimes,

What is your position on it?

Hey MrGray, hope my butting in doesn't offend. If I'm reading this right, you asked Rush what harm a single particle of DU would do, and he said none, as a single particle of anything is too small to do damage. Since then it seems you've said that this means Rush stated there are "absolutely no health hazards" from DU. Rush has repeatedly objected to this characterization of his initial statement.

Rush has said a number of times that DU is harmful, while at the same time providing details of other substances that we are more likely to encounter in our day to day lives that are just, if not more, harmful than DU. It is clear, to me at least, that Rush is not saying that there are "absolutely no health hazards" from DU.

A minor correction for Rush, both iron and lead are radioactive, but at extremely low levels, from the wikipedia lead article:

Lead has seven isotopes in total (3 stable, 3 unstable, 1 radiogenic). The 3 unstable isotopes are 204Pb (1.4%, half-life: >1.4×10^17 years), 205Pb (synthesized, half-life: 1.53×107 years) & 210Pb (trace, half-life: 22.3 years). The one common radiogenic isotope, 202Pb, has a half-life of approximately 53,000 years.

and from their one on Iron:

Naturally occurring iron consists of four isotopes: 5.845% of radioactive 54Fe (half-life: >3.1×10^22 years)

Still, the same is true for Carbon (14C, trace, half-life: around 5700 years), and I suspect we're not too concerned about that.

---

I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that ...

The dynamic duo strike again!

Photo Op

---

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." - Dr. Seuss

The dynamic duo strike again!

More brilliance.

---

Cordially,
Rush

elrushbo2@theobviousgmail.com
Remove the obvious...

The dynamic duo strike again!

Photo Op

Clearly it has escaped your attention that Rush and I have disagreed on virtually every thread we've posted to, with the exception of those related to 9/11. Just as it escaped you that I also took as much space (and spent more time reseaching) as my correction of Rush.

But nice ad hom all the same. When reason fails attack the person.

Brilliant! :-)

---

I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that ...

When time is limited post a funny pic for the small but attentive audience.

---

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." - Dr. Seuss

Walloping websnappers Batman...

We've been bamboozled into the politics forum!

Must have been the Joker!

---

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." - Dr. Seuss

Can't help but wonder how things would be had we begun development 30 years ago when Jack was doing his thing.
.

The electric car is around 100 year old, the quest for a better battery had been going for years, fuel cells have been around for a long time but still are very costly and hydrogen is dangerous, costly and very hard to store. There was a show on the Discovery channel called "Connections" where they explored the fact that a series of inventions and ideas have to come together at the same time to make something new. It looks like we are reaching the point where that can happen in the automotive industry. To reply to your statement, development was going on 30 years ago or Jack would not have had his car.

When I say development I don't mean a prototype. I mean full on infrastructure logistics. Solar and wind electricity have been around for so long it's embarrassing we haven't implemented them before now. So much open land just sitting there doing nothing at all.

The modern auto is the results of over a 100 years of development. To produce something that will survive in the market place, the product must be at least as good as what is already out there. Prototypes and limited runs are the only way to prove if you have something that you will not go broke when produced in large numbers. The auto industry as already turned out Edsels and now days has been burned by the SUV. If the oil prices stay high, it will be worth the risk for the auto industry to introduce something better because people will be willing to risk new technology and a higher price tag to save a few bucks at the pump. If oil cost were low, the customers would never buy small cars and would stick with SUV's. The auto industry can only produce what people will buy. I don't know how old you are, but when the 1970 oil price spike happened, every one wanted a small car. This is when Japan took over the auto market place because they were the only one producing small cars. Within a few years, oil dropped in price and people moved back to bigger cars because the small cars didn't meet American needs(you just can't haul six kids and gear in an econobox). The real problem is getting people to want something like this, other wise you have to make something that meets there needs and wants.
You also appears you have not been around a wind farm. They can only be put in a few places and people don't like living near them. To be cost effective the U.S. could only provide a small percentage of it's power needs from wind. Also, the wind tends to blow mostly during the day. This makes wind good for day time power but useless at night.
As for Solar, you only get about 100 watts a square meter. If you looked at my first link, you would have found it takes more power to produce solar cells than they produce but this may change in the future. Other forms of solar power have also have problems when you want to go big. The only good replacement for Coal is Nuclear and as for the waste problems, we should be pushing development of Fast Neutron Reactors (also known as breeder reactors). They solve the waste problem by burning not only their waste products but the waste from old style reactors and produce waste that breaks down in a few hundred years instead of thousands of years. We can thank Jimmy Carter for banding fast neutron reactors in the U.S. and giving us a real waste disposal problem.
You may look at Arizona, California and New Mexico as waste land, but it's ecology is just as important as that of the east coast and far more fragile. Damage to it can take 100 years to recover because growth is much slower.

Try reading about solar someplace else. My BS meter went off when I started reading that. From the article "The longer you run a solar panel the worse...". Simply not true. The longer you run a solar system the better the payoff. The energy cost is paid off in 2 to 4 years. The dollar cost takes a bit longer but will still be paid off well before the end of the 30 year estimated lifespan of a solar electric system. He is mixing the dollar cost with the energy cost as if they are the same (they are not).

That article was written by an engineer with over 40 years in the industry who as been working with making ideas real. It appears you don't understand the point being made. The real number don't back up your argument. Even out here when they sell you solar systems for your house, the payoff is over 15 years and thats not counting the cost of the land under them. The last few years Solar cell cost have been dropping and in a few year may reach the point where they will worth using for applications other than off grid usage. Incase you haven't noticed, with oil prices going up, the price of EVERYTHING is going up. When engineering power systems, power and money are tightly bound because the only reason for producing power is to make money. If you don't have an engineering or physics background you may not be able to work through the document. It also doesn't hurt to have a little economics as well.
To make it simple, the power from the cells must pay off the cost of the land, the solar cells, and people to keep the operation running and do this at a cost of less that TWO CENTS a kilowatt to compete with other forms of power. Yes, the power company get 10 cents a kilowatt or more to bring the power from the source to your house. Now this kilowatt of power is going to be produced by 8 to 10 square meter of cells. I am not saying it will not happen. If you are off the gird, it pays. For the power companies, it will be a few years but if things continue at the current rate, it will not be very many.

He may or may not have a message, but his presentation if full of BS. The longer you run a Solar System, the less it costs (it is after all producing some energy all the time). The solar system costs some number of $. Some of that is energy, some is labor, and some is materials. He makes the claim that ALL of the $ cost is energy cost - and that is just not true. He claims that the longer you use the solar system the worse the energy balance is, and this is just plain not true. The solar system is producing energy all of the time that the sun shines making the energy balance better, not worse. I understood him perfectly, he is just plain wrong about many things on the page. Also, just because he claims to be an engineer with experience in the field does not mean that he actually IS such. There are places where solar systems make perfect sense, and there are places where they make little sense. Examples of the former include most of the hot deserts of the world where the sun always shines during the day, and examples of the later include the cloudier areas. I know people that have reduced their electric bill by $100 per month with a $5000 solar system. That is a 50 month payback - or just over 4 years, not the over 20 years he claims.

---

BOINC WIKI

John, could you please post some links to the $5,000 system you mentioned. I would like to take a look, since it would make sense to go that route where I live.

---

Pluto will always be a planet to me.

Seti Ambassador
Not to late to order an Anni Shirt

I missed that the first time round,

Thanks John.

That was BS!

---

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." - Dr. Seuss

John, could you please post some links to the $5,000 system you mentioned. I would like to take a look, since it would make sense to go that route where I live.

Unfortunately, I don't. What I have is verbal from someone that claimed to have installed it. I'll see if I can get some more details about it.

---

BOINC WIKI

http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2220098/mit-team-debut-solar-thermal


MIT team debut $5,000 solar thermal system

Start up claims low cost solar thermal dish will deliver return on investment in just two years
Joanne McCulloch, BusinessGreen, 26 Jun 2008

---

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." - Dr. Seuss

http://www.switch2hydrogen.com/h2.htm

---

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." - Dr. Seuss

http://www.businessgreen.com/business-green/news/2220098/mit-team-debut-solar-thermal


MIT team debut $5,000 solar thermal system

Start up claims low cost solar thermal dish will deliver return on investment in just two years
Joanne McCulloch, BusinessGreen, 26 Jun 2008

This is interesting. 1000 times more power than solar cells. OK, Solar cells convert 10 to 15% of the light. That means you are getting 100 times more power out than you get from the sun. This is a perpetual motion of the first class which is clearly impossible. If you don't understand what I just said, you shouldn't comment about energy until you do.

---