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Why the sun is a poor dumping ground for nuclear waste (2010)

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Re: Why the sun is a poor dumping ground for nuclear waste (2010)

#51

Post by michaelsbradley »

rcthompson wrote: post #29
jbert wrote: post #3

Is there any way to use drag to decay the orbit? We don't have to reach the sun quickly . The solar wind is blowing past, is it possible to "sail" against that at an angle and - over time - dump orbital velocity and so end up in the sun?

That's not how sailing works. The only reason you can sail upwind in a sailboat on the water is because you have a keel pushing against the water to prevent you from blowing downwind. Essentially, a sailboat sits on the interface between two fluids (air and water) that are moving relative to each other, and abuses that fact to go wherever it wants to. If you couldn't push against the water, or in the extremely unlike…

There is a heliospheric current sheet[†], but it's not clear to me if/how it could be practically employed to achieve a sailing effect.

[†] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heliospheric_current_sheet

Re: Why the sun is a poor dumping ground for nuclear waste (2010)

#52

Post by MichaelCrawford »

Sometimes rockets fail. I mean like they blow up on launch.

When the Shuttle was first commissioned, my concern at the time was that America's most reliable rocket was the delta, which failed every thirty launches.

When it's nuclear waste, it's not good enough just to have launch insurance.

Re: Why the sun is a poor dumping ground for nuclear waste (2010)

#53

Post by maxerickson »

tesseract wrote: post #44
acadien wrote: post #39

It draws some doubt that the author lists accelerations in units of km/sec, not km/sec^2.

If you read "delta-v" for "acceleration" throughout the article, the whole thing makes more sense.

The author always says "an acceleration", which is the same thing as delta-v.

I have no idea how particular it is to phrase it that way, but it isn't confused.

Re: Why the sun is a poor dumping ground for nuclear waste (2010)

#54

Post by 3JPLW »

Crito wrote: post #35
3JPLW wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's is expending a whole lot of energy to "remove" earth's orbital velocity[1]. Why remove it when you can just deflect the rocket by the gravity of Venus and redirect the rocket directly towards the sun? Or are we missing something more fundamental? 1. http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=orbital%20velocity%20of...

> "Gravitational assists can help, but they can also help you get other places." Without gravitational assists, you need ~30km/s to drop into the sun, and far less to go other places. With gravitational assists both can be easier, but going to the sun will still be one of the harder places to go. That aside, if you are going to loop it around Venus, why not just hit Venus? I'm sure Venus wouldn't mind.

Yes, I did read that. But what I didn't understand is why you were disregarding what seems to be a key part of interplanetary travel. The point that johngalt and I are making is that "falling" isn't the only way to get there.

Now, the real point seems to be that the Sun's gravity doesn't help you get there — in fact it works against you! You must rely on very precise calculations and instrumentation to target yourself there. So why not dive straight into another planet instead of using it for a gravity assist. That I can understand.

Re: Why the sun is a poor dumping ground for nuclear waste (2010)

#55

Post by iwwr »

It could be much lower than that if you take roundabout trajectories with gravity assists from Earth, Venus and Mercury. Not having to establish orbit is definitely a plus.

Besides, nuclear waste is still mostly unburned fuel which could be reprocessed and burned for power in special reactors.

Re: Why the sun is a poor dumping ground for nuclear waste (2010)

#56

Post by stonogo »

cpeterso wrote: post #48
aqme28 wrote: post #24

I always thought the biggest reason was that if a rocket carrying nuclear waste exploded in our atmosphere, it would be catastrophic. It's a lot less risky to just bury it underground and pray it never leaks.

Or bury the nuclear waste in oceanic trenches. It is out of the way and future generations won't stumble upon it when humans forget where they buried all this stuff.

This is how you start a war with Atlantis.

Re: Why the sun is a poor dumping ground for nuclear waste (2010)

#57

Post by Kalium »

MichaelGG wrote: post #12
Kalium wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Were this universally the case, creationism would have ceased to have adherents several generations ago. Therefore, I submit that your position is only true for rational positions reached and held by rational people who are willing to be convinced by rational discourse.

Most people don't have such ... strongly-held ... beliefs about rocket science as they do their origin.

I suspect you are correct.

I simply wished to make a point about the generality of parent's point.

Re: Why the sun is a poor dumping ground for nuclear waste (2010)

#59

Post by foreigner »

jbert wrote: post #3

Is there any way to use drag to decay the orbit? We don't have to reach the sun quickly . The solar wind is blowing past, is it possible to "sail" against that at an angle and - over time - dump orbital velocity and so end up in the sun?

Solar wind won't help you but there are other ways of moving slowly - e.g. an ion drive.
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