Mining is something we all benefit from, but it's not actually that great from a practicality standpoint. Huge investments of capital are required to produce and maintain the equipment required to do the work. I mean just look at the variety of drill heads that are available for various different kinds of mining. Don't judge... Continue Reading →
I've talked about the costs of energy before, but money is just money and they are always making more of it. But what about the costs in terms of something that is actually finite? Land usage. I've touched on it before, but never really explored what those numbers actually look like. First we need to... Continue Reading →
So if you dug into my link on Friday to the Alberta Nuclear Consultation document, at the end of it you would have seen a survey that was given out back when that was published in 2009 for residents and interested parties to fill out. One astute reader pointed me in the direction of the... Continue Reading →
So recently I found this. The public release document about the attempt to put a CANDU facility up in Peace River, Alberta. It's a great document, very clearly written and covers all the need to know bases for people wondering about nuclear power in Alberta. But what I really want to draw peoples attention to... Continue Reading →
SMRs are a rapidly expanding field of interest in the modern nuclear industry, seeking to provide all the benefits of current nuclear energy, while dramatically reducing costs and construction times and taking advantage of modern factory construction logistics. There are dozens of companies that are active in this field such as Westinghouse, GE-Hitachi, TerraPower, NuScale,... Continue Reading →
Efficiency is the name of the game in society nowadays. Fuel efficiency, energy efficiency, mechanical efficiency, transmission efficiency... We hear or think about these things with impressive amounts of regularity, but what about other kinds of efficiency? How efficient we are at doing our tasks at work? How smoothly we can get the kids packed... Continue Reading →
So today I went out to see the Edmonton portion of the #StudentStrike4Climate. Aside from learning that I am not a very protesty kind of advocate, I saw a few hundred people getting together in the sun (read: slightly above freezing temperatures) and chant at the closed front doors of the Alberta Legislature. Instead of... Continue Reading →
To every student around the world taking part in #SchoolStrikeforClimate, remember, the people getting angry are exactly the ones you need to be pissing off. Be Bold in your demands but also be Truthful in your pursuits. A foundation that hides a weakness will fail when needed most. And you will need that foundation because you're... Continue Reading →
Australia, I just want you to know before I get started that I love you and I don't mean to hurt you. You're surrounded by friends here and we just want what is best for you and all the rest of us. This is an intervention against your pointless fear. These questions were taken and... Continue Reading →
For thousands of years, humanity has had the crazy idea that things could be turned into other things. The most famous example of this pursuit is the transmutation of lead into gold. But nowadays it is not much more than a metaphor than the creation of something valuable from something considered basal, put in the... Continue Reading →
So most waste is barely radioactive and the stuff that is dangerous is a tiny fraction of what we currently consider it to be... so what do we do with it? Well, right now the answer is not a lot. As I said, the LLW gets held onto until it's below background levels and then... Continue Reading →
10,000 years, 50,000 years, 100,000 years... figures regularly tossed around to scare people into wanting to prevent nuclear reactors from being built because "what will we do with the waste?" So let's dive a little deeper into what High-Level Waste is. Remember from the last article, HLW is the spent fuel bundles that were used... Continue Reading →
I'm sure you've seen images like this before. Something to make you feel unsafe or scared. Bright colours, visible warning signs, all things that point to those drums being filled with things that are horribly dangerous, and likely to leak out at any moment and poison the surrounding area à la The Simpsons. The reality is... actual... Continue Reading →
People don't seem to believe me when I say that Nuclear would be one of the cheapest ways to switch over to zero-carbon energy. So welcome to another rough and ready math attempt. We'll take 3 different scenarios: nuclear, solar PV and off-shore wind as these seem to be the most common grid-scale applications of... Continue Reading →
I have always been a man of seemingly conflicting interests. I'm an engineer and scientist in my core, I appreciate the ability to be productive and useful in logical and quantifiable ways. But I have also been vigorously involved in the Arts and know that unquantifiable efforts can be productive in their own right. Every... Continue Reading →
I've been seeing another lie popping up about nuclear energy lately. People saying that Even though Nuclear Energy is low carbon, we lack the accessible supplies of Uranium to supply our power requirements for enough time to help combat climate change. ( I plan on touching on those other points in other articles.) Let's be... Continue Reading →
So it has come to my attention that a surprising number of people don't actually know what half-lives are and what they describe. And as you know, when there is something about nuclear science that the general population does not understand, they immediately assume the worst possible thing. At it's most fundamental a radioactive half-life... Continue Reading →
Short post today, I'm getting ready for a presentation this upcoming Tuesday at Edmonton NerdNite So fingers crossed for me! Today I want to talk about something that most people seem to forget about when they are talking about climate models and CO2 reduction and emission targets. We don't win if we hit those targets... Continue Reading →
I know I give solar a hard time. I point out the flaws and failings of it on a semi-regular basis here, but only because I know it can do better. Solar right now is a victim of the success of the ideologies that it has been picked up by. A whole movement about how... Continue Reading →
I've covered more than a few items on this blog about basic education and understanding of nuclear power. Today though I'm going to switch gears and talk about one reason I think nuclear energy is the way we need to go forward into the future. Something aspirational rather than merely educational if you will. So... Continue Reading →
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