Re: replacing fossil fuels

On 06/14/2010 07:51 PM, Dan Minette wrote:
>> SBSP will get into that range if there is a way to get transport to
>> GEO down into the $100 per kg or less range.
>
> Which I think will happen when Star Wars works. :-)  In the field of
> synthetic biology prices have been falling a factor of two per year for the
> last decade or so.  That's one of the reasons it fits the black swan model.
> With solar and space, it's always tomorrow when prices fall like a rock.

What about nuclear? Aren't most its operating costs well known today? 
Why aren't "we" (and by "we", I mean everyone, not just this list) 
talking more about nuclear power in light of the oil spill?

I've been wondering how much the oil spill puts nuclear into 
perspective: off-shore drilling has put almost all of the Gulf ecosystem 
into turmoil with 1 (!) accident/disaster. (And a chunk of the Atlantic 
ecosystem if they don't cap it sooner rather than later?) Doesn't that 
have a larger long term impact than either (or possibly both) 3 Mile 
Island or Chernobyl? (Did those events cause extinctions?)

I've heard the criticism that "at least oil is natural", but how likely 
is a natural disaster that would have caused this sort of disastrous 
spill? (What factor of earthquake would we be talking about to cause 
this? Wouldn't there be more things to worry about than an oil spill in 
such a case-- volcanoes, tidal waves, perhaps even continental drift?)

(...not to mention that it is surprising how many people today need it 
explained that "radioactivity" is also a "natural" effect and not all 
radioactivity in the world/universe is human-enriched/"created"...)

-- 
--Max Battcher--
http://worldmaker.net