Re: Al Gore Gets Global Warming Science Right According To Experts

Alan Baker wrote:
In article <Ydiqg.33777$VE1.17079@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
"Edwin" <thorne25@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

Alan Baker wrote:
In article <hPhqg.33768$VE1.6509@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
"Edwin" <thorne25@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

Alan Baker wrote:
In article <91hqg.33754$VE1.24684@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
"Edwin" <thorne25@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

Alan Baker wrote:
In article <1Qfqg.79680$4L1.37165@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
"Edwin" <thorne25@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

<snip>

[snip]

"In an atomic bomb the chain reaction is designed to increase in
intensity until much of the material has fissioned. This
increase is very rapid and produces the extremely sharp,
tremendously energetic explosions characteristic of such bombs.
In a nuclear reactor the chain reaction is maintained at a
controlled, nearly constant level. Nuclear reactors are so
designed that they cannot explode like atomic bombs."

Well, Edwin? Are all these sources wrong? Or will you just admit
that you weren't as well-informed as you thought you were --
that you were simply wrong about this?

I don't disagree with any of the above (except where you call me
not well informed or wrong). I didn't mean to say a reactor
would spontaneously explode. My only point was that the
principle of the atomic bomb is simple, to have enough of a
atomic material in one place. A reactor is also just so much
atomic material in one place. The two are not completely
unsimilar concepts. I said from the beginning that a reactor
dilutes this material to the point that it won't make an atom
bomb.

The experts say that enough material can't combine from the
melting of the fuel to make an atomic blast, so I'll accept
that. Thanks for doing the Google searches to find out about
this stuff.

But your "only point" is simply incorrect. The principle of an
atomic bomb is *not* simple once you realize that the "enough
material" means converting uranium into a gas in order to separate
the isotopes by atomic weight until you've removed enough of the
U-238 to make the remaining amount of U-235 of sufficient
*density* to achieve criticality.

Hmm... it seems to me the middle of a molten reactor core is a good
place to vaporize things into gases and let them condense into
layers according to density...

You're doing it again. The difference in density is *TINY*. That's
why they need gas centrifuges, running in series of dozens to get
sufficient enrichment.

So when the whole core, and all the spent fuel melts together, maybe
we get enough of the right stuff brought together. That would be
the U235 or Pu239 you said wasn't present in nuclear fuel.

I never said it wasn't present in nuclear fuel.

Alan Baker: "Atomic reactors don't use the same mix of isotopes as atomic
bombs."


And if the heat is sufficient to vaporize the Uranium, how is it
going to recondense?

When the hot cloud of gas drifts away to a cooler surface.

<sigh>

Do you always sigh when a little simple physics alludes you?

Edwin, if this phenomenon could happen spontaneously in a reactor, why
doesn't the industry use something like it to create the fuel in the
first place.

I never said it would happen spontaneously in the reactor.

They have to enrich the fuel from 0.7% U-235 to about 5%
U-235 (weapons grade uranium is about 80% - 90% U-235). The industry
has to use techniques that raise the level of U-235 by a few tenths
of a percent per iteration. If they could simply vaporize uranium to
get it enriched, don't you think they do it?

No, I don't think they'd attempt to produce enriched Uranium (or Plutonium)
by allowing a large, uncontrolled mass of liquid and gaseous nuclear
material to form, and letting it condense out as it will.



It's not that you need x grams of U-235 to get a critical
reaction, you've got to have x grams per cubic centimetre to get
enough neutrons spontaneously released to cause enough neutrons
to be released by collision to achieve that runaway chain
reaction.

Thanks for the repeat, but I got that already.

One of the flaws in your understanding to this point is the idea
that nuclear fuel is diluted. As I said above, nuclear fuel must
be enriched in a vary complex process. Fuel for nuclear reactors
is never enriched to the point where that is *ever* possible.

Nobody has allowed a large amount of this material to just melt
together to see what would happen. Not even at Three Mile Island.

They don't have to actually do it. They understand the physics, as
you do not.

You just can't keep libel out of what you write, can you? You
have no idea what I do or do not understand.

I *know* you don't understand the physics of this, because if you did,
you wouldn't be arguing what you are arguing.

Says the guy who didn't know how hot gases can condense.

Hell, I know you have done the basic fact checking.

You know nothing of the kind.


The idea that these people wouldn't tell you if this could happen,
even if it could, never entered your mind did it? For decades
what I wrote here about the atom bomb could not be printed or
broadcast publicly. Yet now you expect these same people who
suppressed the truth for so long to suddenly be 100% honest and
forthcoming.

I've done the fact checking. Multiple sources, both inside and outside
the industry agree.

IOW, you didn't understand a thing I wrote above. And you don't have any
sources outside of Google.



What you've been saying is akin to saying that since TNT and
nitroglycerine are both nitrogen based explosives, they must both
behave the same way.

No, I'm not.

It is *different* atomic material than that
used to make nuclear weapons and so it has inherently different
properties.

No, it's not. They're both either U235 or Pu-239, the difference
is the percentage of each present.

Yes, it does. The percentages make all the difference.

Different percentages don't make them different isotopes, or did you
forget claiming they are different? And what happens when the
material all melts and separates into layers of differing density?
You do realize liquids and gases do that, right?

Actually, unless they're densities are wildly different, they don't.

Incorrect.

Or why doesn't oxygen settle to the bottom of a container because it's
heavier than nitrogen?

It would if it were liquified.

The difference in molecular mass between O2 and
N2 is about about 14% (molecular oxygen is 14% massier than molecular
nitrogen), but they won't separate after years and years.

You're not adding in the dynamics of a melting atomic reactor.

And you
think that U-235 and U-238 are going to spontaneously separate fast
enough to cause a chunk of 80% - 90% U-235 large enough to go
critical to spontaneously form when their difference in masses is
less than 2%?

And what if the 100% density figure to achieve critical mass, that you were
given, was a lie?

I'll tell you why: because the kinetic energy inherent in the gaseous
state is more than enough to keep it

You're still not considering the insides of a melted reactor.

Do the basic research, Edwin.

You just can't help but be arrorgant, eh?

<http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/intro/u-centrifuge.htm>

Short form: it takes *thousands* of centrifuges operating for a year
to produce enough weapons grade material for *one* bomb.

<http://www.nrc.gov/materials/fuel-cycle-fac/ur-enrichment.html>

Or maybe just a few low grade tons of the stuff boiling an roiling in a
molten reactor core.




But I can see this is just another of your "wrong again"
crusades, so I'll just leave it at that. It was almost an
enjoyable conversation for awhile, but your need to talk down to
others is just winning out again.

It's not a *crusade*, Edwin.

Sure it is.

Look at how I started. I just tried to
give you better information than you had had up to that point.

You arrogantly decided I lacked information, or my information is
of poor quality.

I was correct.

No you weren't.

You've admitted as much.

No I haven't.


Your conclusion was (as you have admitted) faulty,

I said I accepted the experts opinions over my own.

thus I knew you could have the correct background information.

You arrogantly came to that 'conclusion' *before* I made any alleged
"admission."

And I was right.

No you weren't.

I was right because I know enough about the subject.

You only know what Google found for you.



I
tried to show you that your understanding was incorrect without
any insult or condescension,

No, you were your usual arrogant, condescending self, as you
continue to be.

What is arrogant or condescending about knowing what one knows?


and you immediately told me that I was
wrong.

I disagreed with you.

You told me that nuclear fuels use the same mix of isotopes as
the nuclear material for bombs, without even doing the courtesy of
any further checking of any kind.

Now you're lying again. I provided quotes that showed they are
the same isotopes, U235 and Pu239.

But you didn't understand that nuclear fuels is U235 and *mostly*
U238.

You are incorrect.

You still don't understand it, apparently.

You are still incorrect.



There wouldn't have been any kind of "crusade" at all, if you'd
just actually went and checked the facts that are easily
available from google search.

Once again you resort to libel.

Where's the libel? You've admitted that the information I provided
you changed your mind

I said I'd accept what the experts had to say.

and if you looked it up and still disagreed with me,
that would have been even worse.

Disagreeing with you was not a problem, and I didn't say anything
would get "worse."

Try to remember the expert here is not you.

Compared to you, I'm a freaking nuclear reactor designer.

No you're not. That's just your arrogance and ego talking. Your hastily
Googled articles do not make as much out of your as your ego tells you they
did.



Frankly, you owe me an apology.

Frankly, you have that ass backwards.

I truly feel sorry for you, Edwin.

That's just you being condescending again.

That's honesty.

Alan, honesty and you parted company years ago. You're a picture on
Honesty's milk carton.


I informed you of the facts.

That's more of your arrogance.

That's truth.

You're incapable of truth, Alan.


You declared I was wrong with no further checking.

And that's more of your lies and libel.

That's more truth.

Nope. Not by a country mile.


And you call me arrogant and condescending...

And you prove me right, in spades.

LOL


LOL

See what I mean?

Yup. Too bad you don't.

You misspelled "no," you arrogant egotist.


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