Newsgroup sci.environment 114746

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In article <32DCDCC4.62DD@c031.aone.net.au>,
John Taylor   wrote:
>[to G Ebeling]
>1)	The aviation industry is one which has intensively and systematically
>researched and designed for safety over a period of 50 years (at least),
>using some of the biggest budgets and best people available throughout
>the world. Every year there are fatalities caused by system failures and
>people failures. What makes you think that the nuclear industry is going
>to be any different? The main difference is, an accident in an aircrafrt
>could kill maybe 1000 people. An accident in a nuclear power plant could
>kill tens to hundreds of thousand people directly, and many more
>indirectly.
I was interested in the "release" of some not-so-secret information
about US nuclear testing of the 50s. Particularly the case of the missle
that was programmed to take off from one Pacific Island and strike a nearby
island. Seems the launch site was switched to the other island but
a leak developed in the chain of command and no-one told the nav system.
Up she went. Down she came... neatly zeroed in
over the launch site..  with a few people scrambling to avoid the effects
of the blast when they realised the little problem.
-- 
R. Kym Horsell
KHorsell@EE.Latrobe.EDU.AU              kym@CS.Binghamton.EDU 
http://WWW.EE.LaTrobe.EDU.AU/~khorsell  http://CS.Binghamton.EDU/~kym

I agree that, at our current rates of consumption, we have far overstepped
the carrying capacity of the Earth.  (One source I read [can't remember
which one] estimated it at 2 billion people... there are current;y about
3x that, with more on the way.)
I believe, though, we could support the current population relatively
easily, with a little "creative re-arrangement" of natural resources. 
Unfortunately. this would take major, catastrophic changes in our society.
 It would require drastic changes in our consumption habits, and land use,
and severe redistribution of resources. Mahatma Ghandi has been quoted as
saying that "Nature can provide for the Needs of Man, but not for his
Greeds." 
Call me a pessimist if you want (I prefer 'realist'), but I just don't see
this happening in our lifetimes.  Humans tend to fight even small changes
tooth-and-nail;  this would require an almost total reversal.  
Just my opinion.  I have been wrong from time to time.  
Jeremy

joew wrote:
> 
> Does anyone know what the status of the stormwater portion of NPDES is in
> Florida... or any other state.
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> Joe Walter, BSEEnv EIT
>         "Water water everywhere..."
> -----------------------------------------------------
By "status" do you mean the status of permits, or Florida's role in
issuing stormwater permits?  EPA gave Florida NPDES authority a year or
two ago.  EPA has published several stormwater regulations, as well as
some general permits and the multi-sector industrial permit.  Phase I
permits (major cities, industries) have already been issued, Phase II
(everyone else) is pending.
Some of the EPA stormwater documents are available on the web at:
http://pipes.ehsg.saic.com/storm.htm
Other docs are available on a BBS (dial-up only, I think).
For more info you can call Florida DEP (Bureau of Surface Water
Management, 904-487-1855), the appropriate EPA regional office (Atlanta,
for Southeast U.S.) or the EPA HQ Permits Division, 202-260-9545.
Eric Strassler
EPA HQ (but not in the Stormwater office)
-- 
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In article ,
John McCarthy  wrote:
>John Taylor is comparing his idea of how many people a nuclear
>accident "could kill" with how many airplane accidents have killed.
>If we ask how many an airplane accident could kill, then we can
>postulate two 747s colliding over a stadium in which both the stands
>and the field are crowded by an enormous Greenpeace rally.  Tens of
>thousands could die.
>
>If we ask how many people nuclear accidents have killed in several
>thousand reactor years of operation, we come to numbers comparable to
>or perhaps smaller than the number killed in comparable amounts of air
>travel.
>
>Perhaps we should compare a billion dollars worth of nuclear plant
>with a billion dollars worth of airplanes.
>
>Also the nuclear death toll depends strongly on whom you believe about
>Chernobyl.
I know Chernobyl was the headline-grabber last year, but you could
(since we're apparently into "possibly" land here)
consider a number linke 0.1% (or some such) of the world cancer 
deaths as possibly being linked to nuke testing (this particular
"maybe" works out to 12500 deaths pa).
For other, perhaps more subtle, "possible" influences of rad
not-quite-poisoning, I note that a reports were circulating last week
about a study on the workers at Sellarfield. Apparently it is now
bordering on statistically significant that they have more male offspring
than the average population (something like 109 per 100 female children,
vs 105 per 100 for the overall Brit population).
-- 
R. Kym Horsell
KHorsell@EE.Latrobe.EDU.AU              kym@CS.Binghamton.EDU 
http://WWW.EE.LaTrobe.EDU.AU/~khorsell  http://CS.Binghamton.EDU/~kym

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