The Nuclear Plant Question: To Build or Not to Build?

I'm from Australia where we have no Nuclear power plants. So taking a totally objective look I wonder why Nuclear plants use antiquated steam generating systems. It seems to me we need to rethink the whole generation process considering the different heat transmission systems availble with Nuclear fuels.

the british built a small nuclear generator using a stirling cycle which was very clever as it ran on Nuclear waste, low temperature material.

Nuclear's big advantage is actually the one thing most people hate... radiant energy. Waste producing microwave energy can drive steam generators for years without the high levels of enrichment currently required todays plants. This is due to microwaves energising the water/steam in a cumulative fashion, not relying on a temperature differentical to convect the heat. Consequently the system itself can also be totally sealed as the energy passes through the container wall.

The attraction of complex, inefficient projects is epitomized by nuclear electricity generation. Why not put aside the safety red herring and address why financiers are loath to invest without huge taxpayer subsidies from mining, R&D, safety oversight expenses, and finally waste disposal. The claim of "clean power" is belied by uncontrolled blowing dust from mining, polluting transportation of ores from far away, refining processes that create wastes, and tremendous heat expulsion into rivers and atmosphere. The growth of the "Peaceful Atom" was an attempt to sanitize the image of a frighteningly powerful destructive force that war strategists wished to keep "in play" for the anticipated face-off with the Soviets.

<...better engineer our nuclear pants to handle these inevitable catastrophes...>

How are they to be made terrorist-proof?

<...better engineer our nuclear pants to handle these inevitable catastrophes...> I for one, would like to acquire a pair of nuclear pants.

I thought he was a peanut farmer?

Actually, he was a ne.

His brother was a drunk, but I'm not being judgemental.

Nice link. Interesting. He (Jimmy Carter) had me fooled for thirty years on the NE issue.

Why politically would someone make up something like that? Not normally needed for a political career. Carter is a really strange dude.

His mom was really smart. I think he tried to live up to her expectations. Maybe that was it.

Good Answer on Carter. He is responsible for so much wrong with this country (but I digress).

I worked for a Nuke Operating company for a while on loan from an industrial style engineering consulting firm. I was surprised how much crap was in my head from the media on TMI, Chernobyl, etc. I remember as a young teen when Jimmy Carter banned breeder reactors based on how "evil" it was (plutonium might get into the hands of terrorists). Suddenly, for the first time, I was in the middle of the nuclear industry, and saw how things had been politically twisted. In the years following my work with nukes, I have read more about how breeders can keep the industry going in perpetuity.

So - to be on topic: yes we should build. And we should build a couple of compounds on military bases (protection from terrorists) for breeders to process the waste.

Hi AnhydrousBob,

it is not necessary to have a breeder reactor for longterm use of nuclear energy.

There is ample uranium in this world, the only problem may be the price to get and concentrate this.

But as there is so much energy in, there is nearly no price limit at todays values.

Cost of nuclear energy is not changed much if uranium cost will rise a factor of 10. (Now prices are at 80$/lb some years ago this was 8$/lb, nobody cares!)

For any factor of 10 in price there will be a factor of 300 in available quantity. (Source: SciAm)

Future reactors will be much more efficient: if switching to existing designs it is possible to reduce the degree of U235 enrichment from 3.5% to 1.5% (reducing considerably the cost) and being able to extract much more energy as a considerable part of the U238 is burnt in the process of radiation and conversion to other elements.

Going to plutonium will pose some problems as Pu is 100million times more poisonous as (natural) uranium. This is the result of Pu enrichment at the bone surfaces doing concentrated damage there.

More information on modern reactors: search for "CANDU" and "ICENES"-conferences.

RHABE

You're right. He was a civil engineer. However, while his foreign policies left much to be desired, if regan hadn't rescinded Carter's energy plan we wouldn't be having this discussion today.

"...Carter, a nuclear engineer by trade..."

Uhhh...well, not exactly. I think he may have studies naval nuclear power systems, though. And he certainly didn't "push" for construction of new plants.

"...catastrophic 1979 Three Mile Island nuclear meltdown caused large amounts of radiation to seep into the Pennsylvania air..."

Well...not quite. There was a release of some radioactive iodine gas as I recall, but less total than naturally occurring radon gas in granite rock. Now, Chernobyl WAS catastrophic, but that was a different kind of reactor than ours, and was fiddled with by over-eager engineers according to what I read and heard about it.

Some of the newer designs I've read about are even safer than the older plants, and apart from Three Mile Island none of the older ones have had difficulties. I've worked around two of them, and I have no concerns, apart from long-term storage of spent fuel, and even that has a couple of smart fixes.

Hello VM1998:

I read a book several years ago outlining the sequence of events that led to Three mile Islands problems, unfortunately I cannot recall the name. The author summed up a consensus of opinion that if the operators had simply gone to lunch when the alarms went off and allowed the automatic safety systems to do their job (even though they were partially disable by human error) the plant would've been damaged but probably been back online within a month.

Unfortunately the hysteria generated by the event and cemented in the American public's consciousness by the virtually concurrent release of the movie ,The China syndrome has permanently polarized public opinion in this country.

Of course the popular press will exploit anything to get ratings. The CERN HLC is starting up today and the media is covering the doomsayers extensively. So were the American public is concerned their minds made up don't confuse them with the facts.

The problem lies in the lack of understanding people have of radiation and nuclear energy. Even more than 100 years after discovery, most peole still do not have any realy understanding of radiation. For most people respond to anything they do not understand and that has some degree of perceived danger, as far more dangerous than it is. Many people still do not understand that radioactive materials are all over the place on the planet and we just mine and refine them for the most part (except plutonium and heavier materials), they think of them as something extremely dangerous that we have made. The use of the term radioactive alone causes most people to become afraid, even though we may be talking about gloves won by the X-ray technician who gave you your X-ray. Since the vast majority of even Graduate level educated persons in the US have never taken a Physics course, and only have a rudimentary undestanding of chemistry at a freshman inorganics level. All they know is someone who they think may be more knowledgeable than themselves say it is dangerous, and they do not think they have any experience to draw on relating to the subject even though they are exposed to radiation every day and just use different terminology for the exposure.

Yes it is truely sad that those of us who have a working knowledge of the phenomena involved are subjected to the irrational fear of the unknown that so often accompanies ignorance and is likewise exacerbated by a profit-driven national media. It's similarly disturbing that we have to pay the price literally as we watch our energy bills climb knowing as we do that it could have been prevented.

You are right, but the lack of education on the subject isn't the only problem. What a person really needs to know they can learn without finishing high school,or never learn after completing a doctorate. In paraphrasing many philosophers, when you realize you know nothing, you begin to know something.

When you get there, either through education, or life experience you're less likely to form an opinion right or wrong without at least researching the subject. Most form an opinion from what they see on TV news or read in the newspaper. I realize television news was a very poor source of information a long time ago, I found that in the areas I had knowledge of they were as likely to miss state the information, or overly sensationalize it and ignore reality, as to give accurate information on the subject. The controversy is how they make their living. Even in the presentation of incomplete or controversial information they do a a public service, it's up to the individual from that point to research the subject if it has an impact on their life.

In the old days that meant a trip to the library. Once the Internet was readily accessible to all, or at least most, there is no excuse not to at least investigate important subjects such as nuclear power before going off half cocked. We are probably more likely to die of being drowned by the melting of the ice caps, or lung disease from breathing polluted air than by an accident involving a nuclear reactor.

Now off the soapbox. I actually read something about a natural nuclear reactor that it probably ran hundreds of years being discovered some place in Africa. And of course if that was the case plutonium would've been produced.

The problem of knowledge obtained outside of academic training in traditional physical sciences based programs is that there is a huge amount of information that has the appearance of sientific theory supported by factual evidence. Most people do not have the time to back track the evidence , analyze the scientific studies conducted, research studies that disprove the theroy, etc.. So if it appears to be sound based on their current level of knowledge in scientific principles, they believe the theory (no matter how hair-brained). Academic training teachs the underlying fundamentals, and sorts through all of that BS to present the well established evidence (though this is admittedly a conservative approach that limits he rate of acceptance of new idea until they can be substantially supported by experimental proof). Life experience is strongly biased by the observer; previous corrupted information biasing the perception and recollections of the observer, documentor or others in the line of informational conveyance; the environment observations are made in; effects of time on peoples memories; and the fact that one persons life experiences represent a very small population of data with a very limited scope within the field. Great care must be taken with life experience, and many cultures mythologies are based on a number of peoples life experiences. Consider the Illiad, this is knowledge based on life experience conveyed through people eventually to Homer. Most people actually end up forming corrupted incorrect opinions based on their own life experience even against strong well proven evidence, unless they are taught to think in a manner consistent with scientific methods. The real trick is for people to overcome their own perceptions and recollections of their life experiences or stories of other life experiences and look past them for the truth.

You might also mention that the Chernobyl facility had no containment vessel at all. In fact the original squash court reactor was safer because Enrico Fermi recognized that danger and had commissioned Goodyear make a giant balloon with closable flaps that he could flood with Helium if the reactor were to become unstable. The reactor was built inside the balloon.

Hi, agreed to point 1 to 9 and want to add some more:

10: Natural Uranium cost is not significant but enrichment adds considerable cost so new reactors should be used that can operate on lower grade enriched uranium: the CANDU derived reactors: these burn with only 1.5% U135 instead of 3.5%! And these reactors produce less waste as a considerable amount of the waste is re-burnt until the uranium rods are replaced.

11. Everybody (especially political people) discuss the necessity of a final disposal facility. Why, we do not need this. Future reactors will burn our todays waste (I am referring to the high activity long-lifetime waste. So it is advisable to store the used elements until reuse is feasible.

12. More may be good reactors are ready for further research and development: ICENES conferences report on concept and progress.

So if you search for CANDU and derived reactors and for ICENES you will get a wealth of additional information.

Many political people do not want to discuss these as their old and not well motivated concepts may be turned upside down.

So I think that the small countries will have a decisive role in prudent and careful future use of nuclear power as these countries are not linked to their own nuclear industry nor dominate by a big neighbour.

RHABE

The CANDU designs can also use mixed oxide (recycled/reprocessed mixture of uranium/plutonium/neptunium oxides) fuel as well.

By the Way Dave, the original squash court reactor was at University of Chicago under Stagg Field.

Thanks for the correction. At least I got the first letter right!

I'm not so sure - Everyone in Springfield is yellow!! and Marge has bright blue hair!

Seriously though point 6 isn't correct. The waste is stored in the tubes it was in when in use. These are made of Zirconium which can be as much as 17% thinner than manufactured size due to corrosion. The stuff still gives off convected heat, consequently the rods needs to be stored at a distance from each other so as not to overheat the ground. This happened in Russia where they managed to boil a lake dry.

Is three mile Island the disaster where they didn't find one engineer tilll like weeks later when someone happened to look at the roof and see him nailed there by a fuel rod which had blown out of the reactor during maintenance?

17% is not much at all, and the original thickness has a corrosion margin built into it.

The rod bundles are not separated. they are already spaced enough to radiate heat way, that is their intended purpose after all. Three Mile Island is not the accident you are thinking of, and your memory of the accident is incorrect as well. The accident you speak of was the SL-1 research reactor in Idaho. It was the only nuclear accident in the US that caused a fatality (3 of them).

BTW, Bundles are kept in a deep water pool immediately after their removal from the reactor until the very short lived fission products have decayed. This decay generates significant secondary heat which is why they are kept in water cool down pools until the heat falls below dangerous levels. The water in these pools is carefully monitored for corrosion and fission products. That is one reason why your memory of a lake drying up is hard to believe. Additionally Russia does not use the same type of BWR's that we do and their fuel is not in rods. Russia's reactors are similar to the original CP-1 pile at the University of Chicago.

And that water is an almost saturated solution of boric acid - boron damps neutrons very well.

Hi,

water is better on slowing neutrons as elastic collisions between particles with the same mass (neutrons and hydrogen) will be more effective in slowing down the initially fast neutrons.

Boron (here as boric acid) is used as a very effective neutron capture. Inside reactors there are boron containing control rods that are used to control the reactivity of the reactor and thus regulate the power generated.

But what is the boric acid used for in the cool-ponds?

RHABE

It prevents the further transmutation of elements during cool-down.

Nuclear Power is cheap? I don't think so. As pointed about before wall street will not invest in nuclear without government subsidies. No private insurance companies will insure nuclear power plants. Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute, an energy think tank, has done the numbers. Nuclear power is a money looser period. In the amount of time it takes to build one nuclear power plant you could build thousand of wind generators. These wind generator could be producing energy within a year or two while you would have to wait 10 years for the first KW to be generated from nuclear. The French just recently was looking for some place outside of France to dump their nuclear waste. Anyone who believes in nuclear should invest in nuclear, but do your research first.

A nuclear power plant is just like a coal-fired plant without the coal, using the reactor as the heater. It should not be fundamentally more expensive in terms of time and materials to make a nuclear plant than a coal plant of similar size. There is some additional cost for more concrete and steel plus additional safety elements. The primary cost is political - endless legal activity by those that do not like the idea of nuclear power.

The cost of the uranium is a tiny fraction of the cost of the coal to make the equivalent amount of electricity.

One thousand wind generators at 1 MW each (BIG wind generators) = 1 nuclear power plant at 1,000 MW. Not clear that you can get all 1,000 up and running in 1 year, for example. Lots of stuff to build and install, lots of concrete to pour.

Nuclear is better than coal, and - I think - better than buying oil from the Middle East. It can replace coal plants and run 24/7. They are the 18-wheelers of power.

"They are the 18-wheelers of power." implies they need to be shut down quite frequently to refuel diesel that must somehow be the underlying power source behind their power generation. Also, I don't think they need to be shut down every few night so the operators can spend some time with a prostitute for a few hours at a truck stop. Additionally, I susppect the educational requirements for the operators and engineers are substantially greater (or at least I hope so).

Wind power:

If you look at maintenance and cabling to the power grid and some blown down by moderate wind and some loosing a wing and most cracking the gears...???

Then you have to order the wind to blow your 1000 plants steadily, good luck.

Wind generators to me are like blueberries: tasty, like to have some.

Heat driven (coal, oil gas, nuclear) power plants are like potatoes and apples to live on.

RHABE

Nuclear energy is not cheap. Using nuclear energy to make electricity is the cheap part. The politics, lobbing, smear tactics, and what is in it for me, BS costs billions extra from the economy.

Every bureaucrat/courtier will want some of the action, every defense/war machine contractor will want to supply over studied over tested parts, that if not over tested will be defective to induce more cost so the same percentage profit from a larger gross will increase the net that will fund more pork R&D to minimise taxes.

Oil and other interest will fund anti nuclear antagonist by anonymous donations to stir the pot trying to limit market loss.

I will not go into the terrorist BS that much of it we created, both at home and abroad.

Any one who actually does some real research will realise there are good nuclear options, down to the transportation level, for people that are responsible enough to use them.

Brad

I currently live approximately 1 hours drive from a nuclear plant. I have visited the facility as a tourist and it appears to be well controlled. I have a family (three children) and I have no fears for their safety from the nuclear plant. Perhaps this is due to my lack of knowledge or understanding of what is happenning internally in the plant - my feeling is that there is more of a risk from a car accident.

It is interesting to read all the detailed knowledge that you seem to possess on this matter.

Kind Regards

Mr. W.A Snow

HoleInTheSnow,

You said most of what I was thinking! I grew up in a medium-sized city with two nuclear plants,which my grandfather helped build. My view of nuclear power has always been positive because it was always around me. When I would go swimming in the lake, I could even see one of the plants!

Like you said, I don't have a great deal of knowledge of the inner-workings of the plants either, but I do not fear them. I know that my hometown is trying to get another (3rd) plant built, which would bring many (much needed) jobs to the area.

Figures provided by Tokyo Electric Power on Thursday show that most of the dangerous uranium at the power plant is actually in the spent fuel rods, not the reactor cores themselves. The electric utility said that a total of 11,195 spent fuel rod assemblies were stored at the site.

That is in addition to 400 to 600 fuel rod assemblies that had been in active service in each of the three troubled reactors. In other words, the vast majority of the fuel assemblies at the troubled reactors are in the storage pools, not the reactors.

Now those temporary pools are proving the power plant's Achilles heel, as the water in the pools either boils away or leaks out of their containments, and efforts to add more water have gone awry. While spent fuel rods generate significantly less heat than newer ones, there are strong indications that the fuel rods have begun to melt and release extremely high levels of radiation. Japanese authorities struggled Thursday to add more water to the storage pool at reactor No. 3.

Four helicopters dropped water, only to have it scattered by strong breezes. Water cannons mounted on police trucks - equipment designed to disperse rioters - were deployed in an effort to spray water on the pools. It is unclear if they managed to achieve that.

Nuclear engineers around the world have been expressing surprise this week that the storage pools have become such a problem. "I'm amazed that they couldn't keep the water in the pools," said Robert Albrecht, a longtime nuclear engineer who worked as a consultant to the Japanese nuclear reactor manufacturing industry in the 1980s and visited the Fukushima Daiichi reactor then.

Very high levels of radiation above the storage pools suggest that the water has drained in the 39-foot-deep pools to the point that the 13-foot-high fuel rod assemblies have been exposed to air for hours and are starting to melt, he said. Spent fuel rod assemblies emit less heat than fresh fuel rod assemblies inside reactor cores, but the spent assemblies still emit enough heat and radioactivity that they must still be kept covered with 26 feet of water that is circulated to prevent it from growing too warm.

Gregory Jaczko, the chairman of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, made the startling assertion on Wednesday that there was little or no water left in the storage pool located on top of reactor No. 4, and expressed grave concern about the radioactivity that would be released as a result. The spent fuel rod assemblies there include 548 assemblies that were only removed from the reactor in November and December to prepare the reactor for maintenance, and may be emitting more heat than the older assemblies in other storage pools.

Even without recirculating water, it should take many days for the water in a storage pool to evaporate, nuclear engineers said. So the rapid evaporation and even boiling of water in the storage pools now is a mystery, raising the question of whether the pools may also be leaking.

Michael Friedlander, a former senior nuclear power plant operator who worked 13 years at three American reactors, said that storage pools typically have a liner of stainless steel that is three-eighths of an inch thick, and they rest on reinforced concrete bases. So even if the liner ruptures, "unless the concrete was torn apart, there's no place for the water to go," he said.

At each end of a pool are 16-foot-tall steel gates with rubber seals, used to swing fresh fuel rod assemblies into a reactor and to swing out and store the spent assemblies. The gates are designed to withstand earthquakes, Mr. Friedlander said, but could have sprung leaks given the power of last Friday's quake, now estimated to have had a magnitude of 9.0.

Even if water gushed out of the gates, there would still be about 10 feet of water left on top of the fuel rod assemblies.

When the water in a storage pool disappears, residual heat in the fuel rods' uranium left over from their time in a nuclear reactor continues to heat the rods' zirconium cladding. This causes the zirconium to oxidize, or rust, and even catch fire. This breaks the seal of the rods, and pressurized radioactive gases like iodine, which accumulated in the rods while they were in the reactor, suddenly spurt out, Mr. Albrecht said.

Each rod inside the assembly holds a vertical stack of cylindrical uranium oxide pellets. These pellets sometimes become fused together while in the reactor, in which case they may stay standing up even as the cladding burns off. If the pellets stay standing up, then even with the water and zirconium gone, nuclear fission will not take place, Mr. Albrecht said.

But Tokyo Electric said this week that there was a chance of "recriticality" in the storage ponds - that is to say, the uranium in the fuel rods could become critical in nuclear terms and resume the fission that previously took place inside the reactor, spewing out radioactive byproducts. Oh Great it gets worse

Hmm, considering how forthright all the nuclear energy people involved have been in disclosing accurate and precise information in a timely fashion and disclosure of their predictions of the lack of risk associated with this incident, I feel very comforted. I get the feeling that British Petroleum had established a precident in risk management and disclosure, and the nuclear energy people have adapted rapidly. Well at least nothing any worse can happen. Oh, wait I might still be working from Tuesdays prognostications.

I live about 4 miles from a nuclear generating plant with, I believe, two units online. I'd rather live here for a hundred years than next to a coal-fired plant (or heavens forbid, a coal MINE) for a hundred hours. I defy anyone to take a tour of an fossil-fuel fired generation station (I worked for one, so I know what they're like), or a coal mine in Kentucky, and then tour a nuclear plant and not come away convinced of nuclear's potential. How many coal miners die and/or become disabled each year? How much foreign oil do we burn to make electricity to recharge our iPhones and iPods? The nuclear power industry suffers from political BS, not scientific or engineering problems. As a previous poster noted, the Navy's been running nuclear boats for decades...

In the old days that meant a trip to the library. Once the Internet was readily accessible to all, or at least most, there is no excuse not to at least investigate important subjects such as nuclear power before going off half cocked. We are probably more likely to die of being drowned by the melting of the ice caps, or lung disease from breathing polluted air than by an accident involving a nuclear reactor.

http://www.capitalmotion.com/

However, unlike the library, the internet has far more biased, unsubstantiated, and incorrect information than valid scientific information, and it is nearly impossible to back track supporting source information for many claims presented on the internet. Of course you can limit your search to reputable scientific organizations and the research articles they publish, e.g. AICHE, ACS, APS, etc.. You just need to be careful to avoid the industry oriented (and funded) organizations, as opposed to field oriented, as they tend to be extremely biased and are skillful at presenting information in a manner that is extremely hard to discern from valid scientific research. Tobacco industry research is a good example of the skill and bias of such to create the appearance of valid medical research to offset the research presented in medical organizations articles.

I disagree that industry funded research should be avoided, just keep their biases in mind. And not all of the "reputable scientific organizations" are without bias either, many do have a bias, but they may be hidden. Remember that the people who write papers for these organizations do not work exclusively for these organizations, and they bring their outside biases to their work as well. I would much prefer a known bias to an unknown one. At least I can take the known one into account when I make my decision.

The problem is that you wont be able to take the bias into account in industry research, as they have a tendency to leave out contrary findings or any discussion of research that contraindicates the position the industry is taking, except to refute existing research contrary to industry profitability. This is where Tobacco and Oil made be leads in the field of industry marketing. Selective disclosure of results from research means you don't know. Admittedly, many times in their attempts to disprove academic research, the industries do spend many orders of magnitude more money on research, but their published research tends to just not mention those findings from their own studies that does not support their own position. It is actually easier to account for academic researchers bias, as they tend to disclose all the results, even the ones they do not understand, but then their bias appears in their discussions and conclusions. While you do know that industry research tend to be strongly biased towards industry marketing endeavors, industry "research" tends to only disclose the results that support their position, thus you can not readily identify the bias or approximate the degree.

The problem is money, as usual. Industry research can be biased because the results can affect their income. Academic research can be biased because the results can affect their income.

The government seems to be the primary source of academic research money. This can result in a bias. Research dollars are organizationally addictive. The spenders of the money do not want it to stop. Neither does the government organization that gets the money in competition with other government organizations. Washington is full of funded projects that never end, even though their reason for existence is long past.

A research project that proves that there is no more need for research or activity in a given area (as in, the original problem was solved) will be very unpopular by all concerned. This unpopularity is both overt and subconscious. So the research often gets fudged at some levels to justify its continued need.

For example, in a recent UN global warming report, the data was "massaged" to cause the well known warming period in the 1400-1500 period shown in previous reports to disappear. If you torture the data enough, it *will* confess. Global warming is also global funding for R&D, regardless of its validity.

However, not to pick on global warming; it is only one example. When reading research, follow the money as well as the logic. Use the poker rule: If you want to keep your friends and your money, trust everyone, but cut the cards.

Research is also a broad spectrum word, their is market research and sociological research, etc.. for validation many researcher like to add scientific to their research, even though it does not meet that standard. This is part of the problem, the public misunderstanding of science and the use more often of the word to validate anyones speculations and ranting.

Global warming is a perfect example of where politicians learned from the early marketing strategies of the Tobacco and Oil industries. Anytime you hear of a "scientific" endeavor being lead by a politician, you should be suspect. What Global wamring "science" has done is shown where political interests can subvert the word "science" to be used for corrupted, highly biased, non-scientific method studies that take some older research to develop their findings after some manipulation of the data. Most global Warming studies actually do not involve any origninal research, they just base their findings on others seminal research with very little support for correlating different research studies results. This is why speaking language is a extremely poor language to demonstrate research results and theories in science. You should utilize a logical language to express scientific theories, one which has not ambiguities. So if the theory does not have an associated mathematical proof, it really can not meet the standards for the scientific method. Additionally, the theory should be for the most part developed independent of the statistical data fitting. You must develop a theory based on observations yes, but you do not first find a best fit statistical curve then develop a theory to fit the statistical curve. The field research support the scientific theory, a "scientific" theory should not be developed in order to justify the field research results. Field research is an attempt to disprove the theory, and the more research is done that doesn't disprove the theory, the more acceptable it becomes. This does not mean that a theory may not be tue, it just does not meet the criteria of a scientific theory. Anthropogenic Global warming theories almost never even come close to meeting the criteria of a scientific theory, and many are just someone coattail the political wind by publishing a compendium of others work and compositing others theories, frequently without justifying the integration of multiple works that were developed with differing degrees of accuracy and precision and utilized dissimilar methods.

Additionally, admittedly some academic research in many other fields, particularly the psuedo-sciences like biology and psychology, sociology, never have undisputable results, nor a valid proof supporting the theories. Additionally, since none of these theories are scientifically supportable the research can be a never ending process to prove something. While you can show a statistical correlation, you can never prove anything through research, only disprove it. the interst of the government and public is greater in these psuedo scientific research as it goes directly to the human condition, is much simpler for people to comprehend, and allows room for argument in the common languages we speak (math really doesn't allow much room for this and most people do not understand much more than rudimentary math anyways). the statistic that most woemn buy car based on the cup holders is more interesting to the public and understandable to the politicians, than general relativity. So I guess the thing with research is, academic scientific research is usually well founded, non-academic research is frequently not scientific as it tends to not disclose anything that might be adverse to the product sales. Academic nonscientific research also tends to be strongly biased and lacks full disclosure as it is financially, socially, and politically motivated. some of the worst non-scientific academic research is frequently conducted by persons with strong personal bias, minimal funding, and strong political/religious/social opinions. Conflicts over the theory of evolution of animals rights, and the related activists research comes to mind.

"...psuedo-sciences like biology..."

Exsqueeze me? I'm a biologist...

I met a woman here a while back who was studying the eastern "science" of reflexology, she seemed to feel the same way when i suggested that reflexology might not actually be a science. She seemed to base her argument on the fact the name of the field had the suffix -ology attached. Surprisingly she too did not seem to understand that -ology meant to study or the study of, not the science of. I would venture to guess sociologists, psychologist, etc.. feel much the same way, as the attachment of the concpet of the field being a science tends to validate the fields work in the public eyes. To many people you do not have to understand it to have faith, just know that you have been told it is a scientific theory. I do not really understand the need to be a science amongst such groups, most engineers don't run about claiming their work is scientific, but the theories are more supportable under scientific scrutiny then most "sciences". How far do we extend the word science before it basically means everything we do. It is sort of like the term maintenance engineer.

Yes, well, just don't go comparing reflexology to biology! Biology is firmly rooted in chemistry, physics, mathematics, and is considered a "hard" science. And it has a greater degree of difficulty than most other fields of study. After all, we end up studying things like this:

In South Korea, they have and used Nuclear Power Plant as an alternative source of energy, and they said that it is safe.

Yeah, but i am more intersted in North Korea's position. They don't have all the business corruption you find in south korea, so i am guessing they have investigated it more throroughly for the peoples interest, plus they don't have to consider business interest in acommunist society so they tend to make progress much fast when they come across something good and want to implement it. Just look at how fast the Chinese government can get an entire metropolitan city the size of San Francisco built, it took us about 200 years, they can do it in 10.

plus they don't have to consider business interest in acommunist society so they tend to make progress much fast when they come across something good and want to implement it

For proof of this, just look at the marvelous advances made in concrete by the Soviet regime over a 50 year span. :) Or any other technology with the possible exception of satellite launching. Soviet industry was always at least 25 years behind any country in the West precisely because of its 'central planning'. To state that a communist society will be more protective of the 'peoples interest', or that they have the 'speed' to implement something faster than an (implied) capitalist society is laughable.

The Chinese can get an entire metropolitan city built in 10 years because they stand over the workers with submachine guns and tanks.

Even though i was joking. We should also maybe consider that maybe the lack of rapid development by the Soviet Union was more because of corruption in government. Obviously the chinese, while still corrupt get things done way faster then the US. Look at what they could do for the olympics, I know for a fact you would never accomplish that much change in someplace like LA in that same timeline, they still can not get the air quality addressed after nearly 50 years. Though you must admit the Soviet Union developed many things far better than western societies, geologic research greatly surpassed our, they developed the best rifle of the 20th century, they were always advancing weapons technology as fast as the US (along different lines, leading in some areas, falling behind in others). the down side, is that while communist governments in theory are supposed to directly represent the people, frequently they are very totalitarian (this is a corruption of communism), and don't care much for the peoples interests. However, a Republican system can be just as corrupt, as there are many examples of this in US and Roman history (e.g. think railroads). And democracies can be so fickle, as they are essential rule by the masses or mob rule, they accomplish nothing particularly productive and sometime actually cause more harm than good, unless they have a very strong lead (best example Imperial athens). Every governance system has its own flaws and corruptions that must be overcome by honest, intelligent persons of strong charisma and character with a strong, cohesive, realistic vision of the future.

One can hardly be suprised that Soviet "technology" was best at producing weaponry. Did Stalin use the 'best rifle of the 20th century' to murder 35 million of his citizenry?

Your point that every method of governance has flaws and corruptions is perhaps the best argument for anarcho-libertarianism, eh?.. :)

Of course anarchy just leads to micro governance, and more frequent and bloddy localized conflicts. Eventually a few locals get behind one man, frequently in thos smaller groups it tends to be the biggest bully, they utilize his talents against their neighbors rather than dealing with him internally. Think of the gold rush in California, racisms and prejudices become prevalent in local poorly or ungoverned areas, mythologies develop, outsider become prey or the enemy, and everyone becomes an outsider.