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More info: http://www.sfwater.org/index.aspx?page=391
Damn. The powers that be better do something about this fast. SF is about one of the last places in the US to develop new things. Heck just a temporary prolonged outage of Google alone would have huge negative consequences for the US (not to mention the world). Amazon AWS US west is in Northeren California. I wonder how big the negative effect will be on just how many companies?
Is there a sim where I can go an blow these places up in a simulator, eg anti terrorist training ?
I've no idea if it lives up to its own hype.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Molten salt thorium reactors are "continuous reprocessing" ones, which means they burn all the (active) waste they create for more energy. Solid thorium reactors mix Th with the existing waste piles of Plutonium sitting in cooling pools and burn that up for us[1]. There's no waste materials to release from either of these reactors. [1] http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/160131-thorium-nuclear-re...
Waste != Materials. These reactors by definition have a fair amount of very "hot" materials; it hardly matters if none of them are declared "waste" if they'll still kill you in a few minutes of direct exposure.
molten salt reactors (the kind in the comment at the top of this thread) are at atmospheric pressure, and are designed with a drain plug which isolates the (very hot) materials from the neutron source, after which they cool down happily on their own in a separate but similarly shielded compartment.
release of materials is one of the most unlikely outcomes ever.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Molten salt thorium reactors are "continuous reprocessing" ones, which means they burn all the (active) waste they create for more energy. Solid thorium reactors mix Th with the existing waste piles of Plutonium sitting in cooling pools and burn that up for us[1]. There's no waste materials to release from either of these reactors. [1] http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/160131-thorium-nuclear-re...
Waste != Materials. These reactors by definition have a fair amount of very "hot" materials; it hardly matters if none of them are declared "waste" if they'll still kill you in a few minutes of direct exposure.
This article is vague (and overly alarmist); other sources I have read indicate that the threat is to SF's municipal power company, which provides power primarily to municipal buildings (including, most notably, SFO!). The vast majority of people in SF and the Bay Area get their power from PG&E, which has power plants in many more places than just Yosemite. More info: http://www.sfwater.org/index.aspx?page=391
A few facts, with sources:
- The water coming out of Hetchy Hetchy is still well within the 'usable' range [1]
- The total loss of power is 293 MW (Holm and Kirkwood), which is a tiny percentage of the power generated in CA [1,2]
- The SF PUC is already dealing with the loss of those 293 MW: San Francisco is making up the difference in power generation by accessing power in an existing power bank and purchasing power on the open market. [1]
- PG&E is reporting no problems in their network (at 10:20 PT) [3]
Keep calm, carry on. Perhaps take it as an opportunity to turn of the lights you're not using, like you should every day ;)
1. http://www.sfwater.org/index.aspx?page=711 (see chart) 2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_power_stations_in_Calif... 3. http://www.pge.com/en/myhome/customerservice/energystatus/gr...
This article is vague (and overly alarmist); other sources I have read indicate that the threat is to SF's municipal power company, which provides power primarily to municipal buildings (including, most notably, SFO!). The vast majority of people in SF and the Bay Area get their power from PG&E, which has power plants in many more places than just Yosemite. More info: http://www.sfwater.org/index.aspx?page=391
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you mean "protect these units from bad guys so they don't threaten our electrical system," that's kind of the point of having a decentralized system of smaller reactors: if one or two get sabotaged, others in the system can easily pick up the slack. If you mean "protect these units from bad guys so they don't steal the thorium and weaponize it," that's one of the great things about thorium reactors: thorium and it…
What about the health impact following a release of materials?
There could be a risk of contamination from the cooling loop, but such contamination might even be less than the normal radioactive fallout from the flues of coal plants.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What about the health impact following a release of materials?
How would the materials be released? The reactors operate near 1 Atmosphere. If they are switched off, the molten salt cools and solidifies. There could be a risk of contamination from the cooling loop, but such contamination might even be less than the normal radioactive fallout from the flues of coal plants.
Damn. The powers that be better do something about this fast. SF is about one of the last places in the US to develop new things. Heck just a temporary prolonged outage of Google alone would have huge negative consequences for the US (not to mention the world). Amazon AWS US west is in Northeren California. I wonder how big the negative effect will be on just how many companies?
Don't believe your own hype. It's bad for you.
For anyone wondering what the relationship between wildfires in Yosemite and San Francisco proper, its worth a small comment. California's Sierra Nevada range is a couple hours east of SF. These mountains include the highest points in the continental US. Trapping most of the water from the east-west jet stream. The sierras hold massive amounts of high-quality water, which runs out of the non-porous terrain of the hig…
The SF water supply has some interesting politics: https://www.baycitizen.org/news/water/raise-rent-hetch-hetch...
(Incidentally, in the modern era, the US Supreme Court's original jurisdiction case load is made up almost entirely of states suing one another over either water rights or boundary disputes based on rivers.)