Humor Random Comments Thread

[N_Molson]

You better should be, too. Not partial to my side, not partial to anybody elses side. Partial to your side and perspective. Don't pretend that you don't care about your life, because it would either belittle your opinion (Why should we care about yours, if you don't care about it?) or make it feel less authentic.

My perspective is that there should be more "goodwill" on OF. People don't get paid for what they do here. So I think it would be suitable to keep that in mind, and not write things that put people away from each other. I believe in "collective motivation", in the idea that people should respect and inspire each other, and share their skills. Orbiter is a great idea and it is by essence something "universal", what could be more universal than spaceflight and science, and as the years go by (and we make revolutions around the Sun) I think that we should not get that much into politics, because it ruins the cause and as a community we could do better than we currently do. I don't say it is bad to have an "ego", but here we have to consider that other people that might contribute to the cause have egos too, and respect that.

 

[jedidia]

My perspective is that there should be more "goodwill" on OF

I haven't really noticed any lack of good will in this thread so far. If my wording came over as strong, I apologise. My purpose was to point out different perspectives, since your opinion seemed to mostly be rooted in a well-intentioned western-european perspective that wants to keep the peace most of all, which Isn't a bad thing, but didn't see the potential cost involved in that to some parties of the conflict.
My issue, specifically, was that you seemed to mostly interpret the NATO power projection as silly comparison of certain anatomical properties with Putin, which I fully agree, would be an unacceptable reason to have a war.
My main intention was to point out that in this particular situation, and certainly from a Ukrainian perspective, that's really not what this is about, and that the situation can therefore not be acceptably solved by simply stopping.

This whole line of discussion has probably gotten political enough by now to be basement material, though. Maybe we should move.

 

[Notebook]

Hooray, free energy. Soon.

Major breakthrough on nuclear fusion energy

A lab in Oxfordshire takes a big step towards harnessing the energy source of the stars.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[N_Molson]

This whole line of discussion has probably gotten political enough by now to be basement material, though. Maybe we should move.

I think so.

 

[N_Molson]

Hooray, free energy. Soon.

That would be a real good new because French nuclear reactor are currenly having some issues. Corrosion has been noticed on several reactors emergency cooling systems. Those reactors have been halted, which forced EDF (the partly state-owned electricity company) to lower the power production goal for next year. It seems to be happening on "young" reactors, which points to some pipes QC issues. Replacing those parts is a complex and delicate operation, it will take some time, probably a year or more.

EDF's Penly nuclear reactor suffering corrosion problems -BFM

One of two nuclear reactors at French utility EDF's Penly plant is suffering the same corrosion problem already detected or suspected on four other EDF reactors which have been halted, BFM TV reported on its website, quoting nuclear safety institute IRSN comments to French news agency AFP.

www.reuters.com

 

[Urwumpe]

That would be a real good new because French nuclear reactor are currenly having some issues. Corrosion has been noticed on several reactors emergency cooling systems. Those reactors have been halted, which forced EDF (the partly state-owned electricity company) to lower the power production goal for next year. It seems to be happening on "young" reactors, which points to some pipes QC issues. Replacing those parts is a complex and delicate operation, it will take some time, probably a year or more.

EDF's Penly nuclear reactor suffering corrosion problems -BFM

One of two nuclear reactors at French utility EDF's Penly plant is suffering the same corrosion problem already detected or suspected on four other EDF reactors which have been halted, BFM TV reported on its website, quoting nuclear safety institute IRSN comments to French news agency AFP.

www.reuters.com

Are you sure it is only about these younger reactors? I remember that others are ten years older, when similar issues appeared in 2016, with corrosion rapidly increasing in speed.


Shutdown so far because of the current corrosion issue in the emergency injection system are:

• Chivaux 1 and 2 (operational 2002)
• Chooz 1 and 2 (2000)
• Penly 1 and 2 (1992)

All are N4 type reactors, the generation before the ill-fated EPR. This list overlaps with the NPPs affected by the following event from 2016:

France’s Nuclear Storm: Many Power Plants Down Due to Quality Concerns

The discovery of widespread carbon segregation problems in critical nuclear plant components has crippled the French power industry.

www.powermag.com

It is noticeable in the european energy market statistics, that the amount of nuclear power produced by France is slowly dropping every year, another sign that the rather old nuclear reactors in France (50 years on the average) are approaching their limits.

The really bad news is, that this happens at a time, when France already has financial troubles for the nuclear power program: EDF has 50 billion Euro debts, the PLEX program already needs 100 billion Euro until 2030....

 

[N_Molson]

Are you sure it is only about these younger reactors?

Well those you listed are clearly amongst the "youngest" ones. Some are quite very old. What I heard is that a couple of decades ago a lot of skilled nuclear engineers searched jobs elsewhere because the pay wasn't up to the level of qualification, and overall some know-how was lost. Massive investments will be required to keep the reactors working and safe, anyway there is little to do about that. Energy prices will certainly steadily rise in the forecoming years. The good news is that there seems to be a decent monitoring job, those are controlled shutdowns and not disasters...

 

[Urwumpe]

Well those you listed are clearly amongst the "youngest" ones. Some are quite very old. What I heard is that a couple of decades ago a lot of skilled nuclear engineers searched jobs elsewhere because the pay wasn't up to the level of qualification, and overall some know-how was lost. Massive investments will be required to keep the reactors working and safe, anyway there is little to do about that. Energy prices will certainly steadily rise in the forecoming years. The good news is that there seems to be a decent monitoring job, those are controlled shutdowns and not disasters...

Weird, I thought all German nuclear engineers went to France. Except those who had been too incompetent and ended up in obscure pro-nuclear and anti-renewable lobby groups...

Well, Germany also shutdown three of the remaining reactors with the turn of the year (as planned in 2012) and still Europe did not go dark. Because of the stormy week, we even had almost 100% renewable at some times (except those powerplants also running for district heating). But we should better get more renewables, should Frances plans with the SMRs also backfire....

 

[N_Molson]

Well, Germany also shutdown three of the remaining reactors with the turn of the year (as planned in 2012) and still Europe did not go dark.

Yes, there's no imminent shortage threat, more like the perspective of escalating costs. Which, in any way, is going to happen, we'll need even more (clean) electricity for the generation of electric cars to come. Unless something miraculous happen like sustained nuclear fusion, but we're not there yet, and even then the construction and maintenance costs of fusion reactors would probably be extremely high.

 

[Urwumpe]

Yes, there's no imminent shortage threat, more like the perspective of escalating costs. Which, in any way, is going to happen, we'll need even more (clean) electricity for the generation of electric cars to come. Unless something miraculous happen like sustained nuclear fusion, but we're not there yet, and even then the construction and maintenance costs of fusion reactors would probably be extremely high.

Economically, unless some miracle happens, fusion is already dead. Its far too complicated to become cheap. Same for many 4th generation reactor concepts. Any reactor that wants to compete with renewables (which are simple and cheap now), will have to operate with less complexity and thus likely with reduced power levels and higher quality fuel elements (because the fuel for reactor is relatively cheap, while the operation costs are astronomic).

The good news I see, heat pumps are already around to reduce the requirements for building heating a lot and could also help cooling a building with changing climate.

 

[MaxBuzz]

nuclear power plants require constant management oversight, when Russian specialists arrived at the accident in Fukushima, they said that in Japan there is no such position as the Minister of Energy, there was anarchy at the nuclear power plant itself, it is not clear who is in charge. the station is collapsing, no one cares (there was a similar station nearby, but the necessary measures were taken there in time)

Liquidator interview at fukushima

 

[jedidia]

hey said that in Japan there is no such position as the Minister of Energy, there was anarchy at the nuclear power plant itself, it is not clear who is in charge.

It's weird to imagine that Japan of all countries would forget to put someone in charge of something...

 

[Notebook]

Neanderthal extinction not caused by brutal wipe out

New fossils challenge ideas that modern humans wiped out Neanderthals after arriving from Africa.

www.bbc.co.uk

Well, I didn't know that:

BBC News - Neanderthal genes 'survive in us'

news.bbc.co.uk

 

[jedidia]

I had heard the hypothesis that Neandertals mostly vanished due to assimilation and the ice age for quite a while now. Nice to see some tangible proof of it.
Comparing the physical build of Neanderthals to Homo Sapiens, it does seem rather questionable how homo sapiens could have wiped them out that quickly...

 

[Notebook]

So we are The Borg?

 

[Linguofreak]

I had heard the hypothesis that Neandertals mostly vanished due to assimilation and the ice age for quite a while now. Nice to see some tangible proof of it.
Comparing the physical build of Neanderthals to Homo Sapiens, it does seem rather questionable how homo sapiens could have wiped them out that quickly...

I think the idea was that we're supposed to have been less starvation-prone. The extra muscle is helpful in a fight if you can feed it.

 

[Urwumpe]

I had heard the hypothesis that Neandertals mostly vanished due to assimilation and the ice age for quite a while now. Nice to see some tangible proof of it.
Comparing the physical build of Neanderthals to Homo Sapiens, it does seem rather questionable how homo sapiens could have wiped them out that quickly...

Well, it looks like Neandertals never really reproduced in the needed masses. Even at their peak population, it was a very small and limited genepool. Maybe modern humans simply outnumbered them eventually, possibly by also surviving better in the changing world of that time. Neandertals died very young on the average. Maybe a few of them survived among the modern humans for some generations, before everything was one modern human race.

It does not look like the Neandertals died in a conflict - they simply disappeared where the modern human arrived.

 

[jedidia]

I think the idea was that we're supposed to have been less starvation-prone. The extra muscle is helpful in a fight if you can feed it.

Yes, that's where the ice age comes in.

 

[N_Molson]

Europe is Defcon 2, previous occurences were 1991 Gulf War and 1962 Cuban crisis.

This is not very good. ?

https://www.defconlevel.com/european-command-news.php

 

[Urwumpe]

Europe is Defcon 2, previous occurences were 1991 Gulf War and 1962 Cuban crisis.

This is not very good. ?

https://www.defconlevel.com/european-command-news.php

Expected begin of war is in 5 days. At least, from US reports. At least we can still watch Superbowl before grabbing our rifles and helmets.

Still no NATO alert BTW, everything quiet on the western front.