NPPs and terrorism -- a response to magnu96196@aol.com

To: Bob Aldrich <boba@energy.ca.gov>, graydavis@governor.ca.gov, "Barbara Boxer, Senator (CA, D)" <senator@boxer.senate.gov>
From: "Russell D. Hoffman" <rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com>
Subject: Re: NPPs and terrorism -- a response to magnu96196@aol.com

Re: NPPs and terrorism -- a response to "magnu96196@aol.com"
Date: September 15th, 2001
From: Russell Hoffman

To Whom It May Concern,

Regarding Magnu96196's comments (shown below) about my comments on shutting the nukes down NOW:

Organized phase-out?  1/3 will freeze in the winter?  Finally no longer cost effective?

What are you talking about?

NPPs provide only about 17% or 18% of our electricity nationwide (and a much smaller percentage of our total energy), so it is mathematically extremely illogical to say "1/3 will freeze".  Furthermore, I'm confident (and you should be too, because this is a great country!) that we can find 1000 simple things which together would conserve that percentage of our electricity, without severely impacting our work force OR our ability to heat our homes.

Considering that on a per-capita basis, we use double or triple the energy used by citizens in other so-called civilized countries, I think the question is moot, personally.

So anyone who threatens that people will need to freeze if the nukes are shut down is either seriously misinformed or bought off by the Nuclear Mafia.  Sure, it can be ORCHESTRATED such that people will not have heat if we shut the nukes down, but that would simply be political horseplay.  As a reason to keep even one nuke open, "people will freeze" is ludicrous.

Maybe some peripheral industries will be affected.  The airline industry might be eliminated, including private aviation for some period of time.  That happened during World War Two.  The movie and gaming industry might be affected. But nobody would freeze.  That's another industry lie.

Financially, nukes were never cost effective to begin with, because a full accounting must include the cost of R&D as well as the cost of taking care of the radioactive waste for about a million years (an unknown bill which will fall due sooner or later, mostly later).

One nuclear accident will make the bill for the World Trade Center attack seem like pocket change.  Of course, with the Price Anderson Act in effect, people who suffer from nuclear contamination will receive fractions of a penny on the dollar for their losses, if they receive anything at all.  Certainly the costs will not fall upon the electric company whose nuke melted down due to a tsunami, earthquake, tornado, terrorist, or maybe spilled coffee in the control room (I love that commercial, don't you?).

The added security measures which are now clearly needed to protect the plants should finally sink them financially, even without a full accounting for all their other costs.  (Of course, security measures have always been necessary,  but the industry refused to accept this reality.)  Unfortunately, they'll probably just pass some special bill to cover the costs, and everyone but the utilities will pay for the added security measures.  Even so, the plants won't be properly protected, a task which would require millions and millions of dollars and a substantial force around each one, and so May God Help Us, since the U. S. Government won't.

For your information, I have never advocated the increased use of fossil fuels.  Oil should be used for plastics, not burned.

As for your suggestion that we switch to renewables, I've written about that often.  I've spent the past decade developing descriptions of tools which are needed to make that switch.

Shutting down the nukes and switching to renewables should be easy.  For example, Boeing could build wind turbines instead of behemoth airplanes (aka, flying bombs).  General Motors could spend a year or two building solar panels instead of car panels, to jumpstart the long-term switch away from fossil fuels and nuclear power to clean energy.

But the nukes have to be shut down right away, regardless of how we solve our long-term energy problems, or even our short-term ones.  They are too dangerous and too vulnerable.

These are things we civilians (you are a civilian, aren't you?) need to do to protect ourselves from potential terrorist attacks.  We need to eliminate the targets wherever possible.  It so happens that the most deadly things on Earth are those nuke plants, especially when operational.  It's obvious the military cannot protect us entirely, try as they might, so civilians must take the necessary steps.  (As things now stand, the military still makes most major policy decisions affecting both military and civilian nuclear power in America.)

Shutting the nukes down is the primary step we must take in America in light of what we saw Tuesday.

There are lots of things we can do to eliminate our dependence on nuclear power and fossil fuels.  So please don't tell me there needs to be a phase-out of nukes.  Don't tell me 1/3 of the population will freeze.  It's not true.

Don't tell me nukes have to be -- how did you put it -- "priced out of existance (sic)".  Not at all!  Nukes can be shut down for safety reasons, and to hell with cost-effectiveness or some such crap.

So get real, already!  The nuclear power plants can and should all be shut down TODAY, and no one needs to freeze or be put out of work.  That's just Nuclear Mafia propaganda.  Don't believe it.  Don't promote it.

Russell Hoffman
Carlsbad, CA

Here's an essay in which I go into some detail about the need for a worldwide energy grid:
http://www.animatedsoftware.com/geni/rh2000ge.htm

Here is my collection of over 70 different kinds of mechanical pumps, many of which could provide us with much greater efficiency if we would simply started manufacturing the more advanced designs instead of the pumps we now make.  Pumps are estimated to be the second-most common machine on Earth (after electric motors).  Moving fluids and slurries is the #1 use of energy in most cities around the world.  By the way, this is the largest collection of different kinds of pumps on Earth:
http://www.animatedsoftware.com/pumpglos/pumpglos.htm

Attachment:  Incoming mail from "magnu96196@aol.com"
>>>>> At 08:01 PM 9/14/01 , Magnu96196 wrote: >>>>>

In a message dated 9/14/01 7:21:17 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com writes:

<< NPPs are a fantastic threat to our security and should all be shut
 down immediately so they start to cool. -- rdh >>
==========

Getting rid of nukes is a good idea-----however they have to be priced out of
existance and these kind of threats might do it.

However, fossil fuel is not good either due to emissions of acids and metal
oxides.

We need to do what we can to switch things to green techniques like wind,
solar, geothermal, and tidal/wave systems.


I don't think we can propose shutting down all nuke immediately, unless you
want 1/3 of the population of freeze this winter?    I think it has to be an
organized phase out.    Even Germany could not just switch theirs offline.

<<<<< END OF Magnu96196 email <<<<<
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First posted September 22nd, 2001.

Webwiz: Russell D. Hoffman