You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider jgentry.
Click here to go back to viewing the entire thread.
Incredible show so far. I hope it make some people think about just what lengths humans will go to and risk to provide energy for people's comfort.
I had a former employee (I am an environmental chemist) that actual went to Chernobyl 3 times over the course of 18 months to help with heavy metals testing. He has had cancer twice already. He spent limited time on site with full hazmat suites.
Quoted from CrazyLevi:The U.S’ history when it comes to nuclear secrecy and environmental disasters isn’t exactly spotless. I’m sure you’ve seen the footage of American troops marching directly towards mushroom clouds.
And patiently waiting for the HBO series about Love Canal.
Now now, merica was smart enough to seal its nuclear waste in uncrackable concrete on an island 100 yards from the ocean in a hole below sea level. Nothing could possibly go wrong.
Quoted from Grandnational007:I worked in the civilian nuclear power generation field as an engineer and consultant at a number of plants in the U.S. for a number of years prior to my current career.
I do not recall any dry cask storage units or depots being in a hole below sea level. But I may be wrong.
I think you meant "to NOT seal" alluding to Japan?
Not from nuclear power plants. From bomb testing.
images (1) (resized).jpegQuoted from Grandnational007:Ahh, cactus dome...where the surrounding area is more contaminated than the actual contents under the concrete. A sad, and undeniable side effect of the advancement of our understanding of fission and fusion at a time where a ruthless future belligerent was in a race at any cost with us to harness the technology. I'm not saying it's ethical, but now that it's been done, we have a significantly greater understanding of nuclear physics, which will undoubtedly greatly help future generations in harnessing the power in a safe, peaceful, manner.
My stance on nuclear technology is this: as with most technological advances in modern history, they mostly derive from military endeavors; thusly, nuclear power generation being an offshoot of nuclear weapon development, it is our duty to stay at the forefront of nuclear technology, both militarily as well as civilian, as to keep advanced ahead of any current or future users who may use the technology for evil. I.E. now that the dragon is out of the box, we must be the caretakers of it.
It's not the world I would have created, but now that we're here, it's the stance I must take...
I don't really disagree with this. We can't undiscover it. As a chemist that has worked in the environmental testing field for my whole career it is hard to accept that we are OK generating power that produces waste that we have no way to dispose of and that is deadly to all life as we know it on earth though. That's not to say that other means of generating electricity are clean in anyway or do not have a negative impact on earth. We just have no real answers on how to deal with nuclear waste which should be enough to give people a reason to find another way. I was discussing it with someone a few weeks ago and their solution was to send it to the sun. My response was "Did you see the Challenger launch?".
Quoted from Grandnational007:This is NOT targeted at you sir/ma'am:
Brilliant! We will use nearly infinite resources to send a finite resource we are not even close to fully understanding the full potential of, to literally oblivion, in a highly risky, extremely inefficient manner.
Remember, not that long ago, natural gas was simply burnt off at the well head as a waste product; vs today, where it is either used to cleanly and efficiently generate electricity, heat, etc., or is pumped back into the ground for future use.
I'd feel a lot safer if there was a scientist for every social media blogger but that's just not the word we live in. Unfortunately very few people understand anything about how power is generated. Most have no clue how the power at their own house is generated. People would be horrified to know what is in all of the coal ash that we generate each year and how it is kept. The person that said send nuclear waste to the sun was a biologist with a masters degree and you could see the wheels turning in their head after my statement still trying to decide is it really was a bad idea or not 
You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider jgentry.
Click here to go back to viewing the entire thread.
Wanna join the discussion? Please sign in to reply to this topic.
Great to see you're enjoying Pinside! Did you know Pinside is able to run without any 3rd-party banners or ads, thanks to the support from our visitors? Please consider a donation to Pinside and get anext to your username to show for it! Or better yet, subscribe to Pinside+!
This page was printed from https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/chernobyl-hbo-whos-watching?tu=jgentry and we tried optimising it for printing. Some page elements may have been deliberately hidden.
Scan the QR code on the left to jump to the URL this document was printed from.
