The Biden Plan: a growth initiative borne of capitalist desperation

Climate change is "in the news" now. I really don't know why. Weren't the news-makers, the stenographers of power, all better off denying it until it kills them? You know, like the people who put up signs next to devastation zones saying "climate change is a hoax"? I live near people like this. Here's a thought: go to a factory farm, and tell the animals they're all going to be slaughtered. Would this knowledge do them any good?

No journalist on a salary wants to admit the truth: a few shreds of human life left the coming era of climate change will be preserved, maybe, if we jettison the capitalist system and try for something more cooperative. This can be accomplished at any time, the main question being one of how much we want to save. At any rate, if the planet is burned to a crisp and there's a resultant famine, the journalists won't be able to eat their money. And they're certainly not going to Mars with Elon Musk's money. So, everyone endorses infinite economic expansion on a finite planet undergoing climate change. Here we go, kids!

It isn't really a matter of "we only have so much time." Well, a lot of people only have so much time, but those who have heard the alarms sounding for quite some time now have found some sort of safe space to wait it out until those who are busy dying are finished. Rather, the strategy to be pursued is one of saying "jettison capitalism" until someone who's listening finally asks, "how?" First, before it happens, we have to want it.

Time Magazine has a big spread on the climate now. Justin Worland's headline article is about "the pandemic remade the economy. Now, it's the climate's turn." Biden's jobs plan y'know. Rolling Stone magazine had a big spread on the climate last month -- yep, Biden's jobs plan. Recently it's come out: the Biden plan involves Da Nookz. Now, notwithstanding the fact that my Mom's Dad died of the side-effects of radiation from the Hanford Nuclear Facility when I was three years old, there are some reasons why the interest in nuclear power isn't really about sustainability. But to add something to the six reasons listed:

1. The problem with uranium, apparently, is that the great preponderance of uranium ores are low-grade, meaning that a whole lot of environmental destruction has to happen for the sake of not a whole lot of uranium. (And if thorium were the solution, they'd be doing a lot more of it now than they in fact are.)

2. When they say nuclear power is "carbon-free," they just cite the nuclear reaction itself. The stuff that makes the nuclear reaction possible is still based on fossil-burning. The whole idea is to supplement the fossil-burning -- but sssh! Don't tell!

3. Are you down with this?

4. This problem would be solved with socialist nuclear power -- but the socialism would have to be of a better variety than what they had in the Soviet Union.

5. And the pundits complain about basing the grid on solar power!

6. Has the waste problem actually gone away? I mean, not in the minds of theorists who discuss breeder reactors, but in actual practice?

At any rate, back to the topic at hand.

There are plenty of critiques of Biden's jobs plan as not enough. The best is that of Stan Cox. As Cox points out:

The only strategy, it seems, is to infuse the U.S. economy with trillions of dollars of funds for energy and other infrastructure, then hand the keys over to the corporate sector and wait for them to figure out how to wean the economy off of fossil fuels.

But the main motivation of the corporate sector is profit, and profit includes profits off of fossil fuel assets. So that won't work.

Cox also points out that Biden resides in the Land of Dicey Promises. An example:

Biden himself has noted that fossil-fueled power stations can be made ostensibly “carbon-free” by capturing exhaust from the smokestack, extracting almost all the CO2, and injecting it belowground. This has not actually been done in practice (except as a technique for extracting more oil, which does not reduce emissions), but just the idea of carbon burial has long enabled governments and utilities to formulate “net zero by year X” emissions targets.

Cox concludes:

When the new White House fact sheet on the climate plan tells us there are “multiple paths” to reaching “carbon free” electricity and other goals “while supporting a strong economy,” it’s not talking about eliminating fossil fuels; rather, it’s implicitly referring to reliance on gimmicks like carbon-capture schemes or forest-based offset programs. (Under the latter, landowners can simply refrain from cutting their trees and thereby earn carbon credits that they sell to utilities or other companies, which can use the credits as permits to keep burning fossil fuels. The result is an overall increase in emissions.) Electric utilities are counting on the continued federal laxity toward fossil energy as they make plans to build a staggering 235 new natural gas–fired power plants in coming years.

The Biden plan is the capitalist way of pretending to do something about climate change. The fact of the matter remains that actually doing something about climate change means, at a minimum, taking large portions of planet Earth out of the category of "assets," and the quicker and more thoroughly this is done, the better. It means creating a NOT-CAPITALIST infrastructure, an infrastructure guiding the entire economy into a managed degrowth pattern away from fossil fuels. It's going to look bad on their statistics: GDP won't rise, and the DJIA won't benefit. And this appears to be something Joe Biden won't do, and something Bernie Sanders won't push Joe Biden to do.

So it's time for a revolution.

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Cassiodorus's picture

IEA: Mineral supplies for electric cars ‘must increase 30-fold’ to meet climate goals

This, you see, is the result of trying to duplicate the existing system on the basis of "alternative energy." Toward that end, I move that we create a new military draft. Only CEOs and corporate middle management are eligible to be drafted, and the military will be employed to draft these corporate lackeys into service as operators of lithium mines.

Patriotic duty calls!

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"The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide" -- Moon of Alabama

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Cassiodorus

if it's not being deployed by a capitalist or any other for-profit system--or a fascist one.

You have to have a system that seeks the survival of humanity and the persistence of human civilization. If you don't, your system won't make the right decisions no matter what policy it endorses. Everything is affected by what your real ends are. If your real goal is to maximize profit, (Fortune 500, Wall St, the City of London) or to kiss the asses of those who do (politicians), or to concentrate power into your own hands (CIA, etc.), any policy you say you support, no matter how good it sounds, will get twisted.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

earthling1's picture

the only way to feed any suvivors of the coming end of agriculture is to flash freeze any new deaths and store them in Antarctica for future consumption.
At least it's not Soylent Green.
s/

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13 users have voted.

Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

@earthling1 it's melting.

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PriceRip's picture

opening a can of worms: I comment on

Point # 1. The problem with uranium ores are that they are low-grade (as they are of low concentration and natural concentration processes are rather rare), given the reality of geo-physical processes. Fusion reactors as well as thorium reactors have their on set of problems but those issues will continue to intrigue a subset of my clan.

Point # 2. Nuclear power is not "carbon-free" by any reasonable definition. So ... Shout the Truth to The World.

Point # 3. Are you down with this? Hell No!

Point # 4. This problem will never be solved with socialist nuclear power or any other political crap.

Point # 5. The pundits have their heads up their asses.

Point # 6. Has the waste problem actually gone away? No and the problem is here to stay. I say this knowing more about this than any of you want to hear about from me.

The only way nuclear power could be even remotely acceptable is if Admiral Hyman G. Rickover were still alive and viable ...

RIP

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Lily O Lady's picture

@PriceRip

even though I’m not a chemist. As soon as I learned about half-life, I realized the danger of nuclear power. I’ve seen programs about the problems of storage and the problem of how to warn distant generations who may no longer know how to read the warnings or even know what they mean.

Those who push for nuclear power like to ignore any facts they don’t like. The facts won’t ignore them, though.

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"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"

PriceRip's picture

@Lily O Lady

Two worst cases:

First was the Nuclear Engineer teaching at ASU. As a grad student I got on his bad side by "covertly" correcting his most egregious errors whenever possible.

Second was the Engineer that taught a Nuclear Physics course where I came on as a new faculty. I was able to get him in hot water by causing the Rad License for the College to be revoked. I managed to survive (weather) the storm. This fellow died of Mercury Poisoning a few years later despite my suggestions of "Don't Do That" over the intervening years.

Yep, facts have a way of dealing with those that have a different view of reality.

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@PriceRip

unfortunately the stupids in power
live too long
guess it may be their diet?
Ha

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around the globe and the flights to and from these 800 outposts of our Imperialism, need re-stocking of supplies and re-cycling of troops.

In and out. Day after day. Our military is one of the single biggest hogs of fossil fuels and biggest single polluter.

My simple suggestion is: 1) Close most of the bases and outposts. 2) Ground those planes.

I said simple. Not likely to occur. A Sci-fi book I read recently pictures eliminating 60 flights from the sky simultaneously with cluster type drones. That solved the problem for a while. People were afraid to fly and the skies cleared up.

Sci-fi fantasy. But I like it.

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NYCVG

@NYCVG

shut down the bases, retrain the troops for domestic
re-structuring, and phase-out the military expenditures.

Sci-Fi is an intelligent approach to the future.
Strangle the needs for flying around the world and
find the less toxic methods of 'traveling'.

Save our globe!

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10 users have voted.

You might find this worth reading, it's long but good: https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/04/28/bidens-climate-plan-its-too-late... The headline could apply to any of our modern ills, but gradualism relabeled as revolution is the best we're going to get from this death cult.

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Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

We enrichen and grow our economy off of economic externalities. If we had to pay the real long term costs of extracting fossil fuels then we would not have anything close to our current infrastructures. In fact, extracting these sequestered forms of carbon would be strictly forbidden, except where they can be captured and re-sequestered. There is no money in capturing and long-term sequestration of carbon. On the other hand there are vast amounts of money is extracting more fossil fuels and burning them. How does that work into the capitalist model? It's so predictable that we are screwed. I don't see the possibility of fixing this as it runs contrary to our DNA and greed. I work towards climate sanity only because it's the moral thing to do.
I see Biden as a relief from Trump in one sector, in that he is not a climate change denier. On the other hand he is light years away from proposing any real solutions. As he is a dyed in the wool capitalist and imperialist. It's kinda like the conservatives are idiots and don't mean well, and the liberals are idiots and don't mean well, but have convinced themselves otherwise.
I agree with you Cassi, the only solution has to include Socialism. We have to do what is right for society and that is orthogonal to everyone maximizing their own profits (Capitalism).
The Soviet Union had some good ideas and some people in Russia dearly miss it. It became a dictatorship of the professional politician, and you know what I think of them. The next iteration needs to avoid that by rules and by a system that draws the best and smartest technical minds into running the country. Capitalisms starts with the premise that we are to stupid to run our own country therefore we let the Capitalists and the Oligarchs help themselves to all the political and economic power they can. We do this also in every government structure we build. The British system of class and power is in our DNA. The Chinese system has clearly destroyed any deception that our form of democracy and economic system is superior. Some people just refuse to believe it . It's amusing that Biden, or whoever programs him, believes that we are going to economically out grow China. Ha, and Ha! I just finished doing a spreadsheet that compares the production of useful commodities based on volume and weight, not USD. I used 11 critical commodities, from cement to chicken. The results- The Chinese economy is 9.0 times the size of the US economy, and as a bonus the Russian economy is 1.4 times the size of the US economy. So where is all of that economic activity in the US. You know where it is, in the bullshit sectors, based on pork, economic rent, and imperialism. There are three bright spots in the US economy, airplanes (Boeing), fossil fuels (running out) and Soybeans. But what part of the work force has anything to do with these?

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Capitalism has always been the rule of the people by the oligarchs. You only have two choices, eliminate them or restrict their power.

Cassiodorus's picture

@The Wizard https://problemspredicamentsandtechnology.blogspot.com/2021/02/what-woul...

What would it take? A revolution.

Just as a footnote, I kinda think the metaphor of "overshoot" is inappropriate. What are we overshooting? Things are going to die, people are going to die. We know this. Technology isn't static. People aren't static.

Rather, our model of ecotopia needs to stop looking so much like the world we currently live in. And we know which direction we should choose when opting to change the model.

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"The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide" -- Moon of Alabama

Lily O Lady's picture

whose matriarch (from the UK) had married an American GI after WWII. Her father was a baker and the GI stationed in the UK during WWII really like the bread the baker made. The GI suggested the baker take a contract to supply the local US military base with bread. The baker turned it down because his regular customers would no longer be able to buy his bread. He turned down short term profits for the good of the community. The world would be better if more people were like him.

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"The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?" ~Orwell, "1984"

@Lily O Lady

potential profit does not equate
to investing in societal benefit

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studentofearth's picture

A pilot project to see if current hydrogen technology is ready to become a successful energy use alternative. China’s hydrogen dream takes shape in Shandong

Leading the pack of the infrastructure projects being floated in Shandong is a 180-kilometer pipeline network to deliver hydrogen from its upstream “factories” to end-users scattered in both commercial and industrial centers across the province under a five-year “hydrogen for 10,000 plants and households” program.

The trunk route of the pipeline network will be between Shandong’s provincial capital, Jinan, and the province’s largest city, Qingdao, with feeder lines extending into neighboring industrial estates in two other cities, Weifang and Zibo, according to the state news agency Xinhua and the Economic Observer newspaper.

All service areas along the busy expressway connecting Jinan and Qingdao will run on 100% hydrogen power with retail hydrogen fueling stations for fuel cell vehicles. The province now boasts a fleet of 269 emissions-free buses running on hydrogen cells.

Talk of laying extensive hydrogen pipelines linking major cities in Shandong, not for trials but as a backbone distribution system, suggests that the groundwork of research and development for the transport and storage of the gas has been finished and that most of the production and application projects covered in the broad pact for the province are shovel-ready.

Citing Huang Zhen, deputy president of Shanghai Jiaotong University who sits on the expert panel for Shandong’s hydrogen drive, the Economic Observer reported that all technological hurdles had been surmounted to supply hydrogen to users. The next phase will be about extending pipelines and hammering out a pricing regime to entice the private sector.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

@studentofearth

although in the example you cite the hydrogen "factories" are dams - with significant
negative environmental downsides.

I've heard proposals for using dams (this was in reference to those on the Columbia River) to feed power into the grid as normal when demand is high, but to divert it to hydrogen production during off-peak times.

That seemed sensible.

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CB's picture

@Blue Republic

https://www.cleantech.com/chinas-hydrogen-society-beginning-to-take-shape/
13 October 2020

Last year, we detailed how China’s government had promoted ambitious plans for the development of a hydrogen economy and specifically, how the country’s Science and Technology Minister had expressed a goal of creating a hydrogen society in China.

This year, we are witnessing some of these ambitions bear fruit, as various cities and state-owned companies have launched initiatives which are spurning private sector and multinational investment, as compared to a noticeable absence of private sector involvement in the space this time last year.
...
Ningxia Baofeng Energy Group, a private coal production and processing company, announced in April of this year a start to construction on the world’s largest solar-powered hydrogen plant in Ningxia Hui, northwest China. The plant, which will begin producing hydrogen by 2021, will consist of two 10,000m3/hr electrolyzers powered by two 100 MW solar plants plus a 1,000kg/day hydrogenation station, producing 160 million cubic meters of hydrogen annually.
...
Situated along the ZhuJiang (Pearl) River in China’s fourth-largest city of GuangZhou is HuangPu District, an emerging industrial district with a population of 880,000, that has quickly built a reputation for fast implementation of hydrogen technologies. The district has used a policy mix of company registration incentives, capital expenditure alleviation, and a 5 billion Yuan venture fund to attract new companies and projects to the district. Perhaps more importantly, the district leveraged advantages in local hydrogen resources (industrial hydrogen by-products, wastewater for electrolysis, chemical production facilities) and infrastructure laid by a local automotive manufacturing and assembly industry to create a hydrogen industrial base predicted to be valued at 20 billion Yuan by 2025 and 100 billion Yuan by 2030.
...
Coal gasification remains the greatest potential source of hydrogen production in China; however, production of truly green hydrogen requires a comprehensive system of carbon capture, use, and storage that many facilities are not prepared to bear CAPEX burdens for. China’s mass deployment of solar and wind projects in the past two decades offers a unique path forward – many renewable assets were deployed without a reliable connection to a grid and many of the wind and solar technologies deployed are inefficient. This leaves an opportunity open to convert potentially stranded renewable assets into local producers of hydrogen for energy storage. Additionally, China is likely to see a boost to targets for wind and solar energy, with National People’s Congress recommending a minimum of 150GW wind capacity and 300GW solar capacity for inclusion in the upcoming 14th Five Year Plan.
...

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CB's picture

@CB

https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/europe-vies-china-clean-hydrogen-su...
24 Jul 2020
...
Green hydrogen made with water and renewable power has emerged as a "silver bullet" technology to clean up many CO2-intensive sectors where emission reductions are particularly hard, such as heavy industry and aviation. To date, its high costs stand in the way of a global deployment in the fight against climate change. But there is hope: the commercial rivalry between Europe and China, which could force prices down rapidly.

"Competition in hydrogen technology between Europe and China will be crucial to kickstart a global hydrogen economy because it will drive down the cost of the technology, which will play a key role in cutting emissions in many sectors," Kobad Bhavnagri, head of industrial decarbonisation at research service BloombergNEF, told Clean Energy Wire.

"In turn, this will enable more countries to commit to net-zero targets. We've seen this development in solar PV, where competition in manufacturing between Europe and China led to a drastic drop in prices, changing the economics, and thus paving the way for today's global roll-out of this technology and renewable targets in many countries," Bhavnagri said [Read the full interview here]. "It will be exciting to watch how this competition will unfold in the years to come."
...
European policymakers and industry regularly single out China as the most important competitor in the EU's ambition. "We are still leading as Europeans. But especially China is challenging that position," Jorgo Chatzimarkakis of the Hydrogen Europe business association told Euractiv in the spring. "The competition is catching up and we believe they are only 2-3 years behind us," Chatzimarkakis told Clean Energy Wire. German economy minister Peter Altmaier also said that his country must beat Asian countries to claim global leadership in the technology, naming China as an example. “Our goal is clear. We want Germany to be the global No. 1 in hydrogen technology,” Altmaier said.
...

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Pluto's Republic's picture

Speaking of nuclear power plants...

Japan has announced plans to slowly release an estimated 1.3 million tons of treated wastewater from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, the site of the extensive 2011 accident that was the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986.

•••

Expressing what it called “grave concern, China’s Foreign Ministry said in a written statement, “Japan has unilaterally decided to release the Fukushima nuclear wastewater into the sea before exhausting all safe ways of disposal and without fully consulting with neighboring countries and the international community. This is highly irresponsible and will severely affect human health and the immediate interests of people in neighboring countries. The oceans are mankind’s shared property.”

Also irate about the decision and preparing to fight against it is Greenpeace International, which accuses Japan of ignoring human rights and international maritime law.

“In the 21st century, when the planet and in particular the world’s oceans are facing so many challenges and threats, it is an outrage that the Japanese government and TEPCO think they can justify the deliberate dumping of nuclear waste into the Pacific Ocean,” executive director Jennifer Morgan said in a written statement. “The decision is a violation of Japan’s legal obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and will be strongly resisted over the coming months.”

•••

However, the International Atomic Energy Agency is giving Japan’s release plan a thumbs-up, which called it “both technically feasible and in line with international practice,” and described such a controlled release as routine. The organization has offered to help with technical support and a plan review.

The U.S. State Department, meanwhile, remained neutral, releasing a statement saying, “In this unique and challenging situation, Japan has weighed the options and effects, has been transparent about its decision, and appears to have adopted an approach in accordance with globally accepted nuclear safety standards. ”

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
Pluto's Republic's picture

...in order to provoke China. And the are correct.

U.S. Alone in Backing Japan Fukushima Water Plan Ripped by China

(Bloomberg) — The U.S. found itself alone backing Japan’s plan to release radioactive water from the wrecked Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant into the Pacific Ocean, with American partners South Korea and Taiwan joining China in criticizing the move.

“We thank Japan for its transparent efforts in its decision to dispose of the treated water from the Fukushima Daiichi site,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Twitter.

.

Expressing what it called “grave concern, China’s Foreign Ministry said in a written statement:

Japan's decision to release radioactive wastewater from the damaged Fukushima nuclear reactors has elicited strong condemnation by countries that may be affected, especially those that are in the immediate environs of the anticipated release. Both China and South Korea have voiced grave concerns about the proposed release. The United States, however, which pretends to be the grand protector of the global environment, has not only demurred in its criticism but has actually endorsed Japan's plans and praised it for its "transparency!"

,
US war crimes and attacks on China are coming fast and furiously, now. The China Seas are teaming with US war ships, while US bombers conduct frequent fly-overs.

The Chinese foreign ministry has called Japan's proposal highly irresponsible, saying it will "severely affect human health and the immediate interests of people in neighboring countries." It reiterated that prior leaks of large amounts of radioactive material have already impacted the marine environment, food safety, and human health and that the "treated" wastewater needs to be further purified to remove residual radionuclides.

China has also faulted Japan for its unilateral decision-making without fully consulting neighboring countries and the international community and called on it to exhaust all other possible safe methods for its disposal.

,

The water can be evaporated, for example.

Greenpeace criticized Japan’s plan to release the treated Fukushima water into the ocean and said there are other options that should be considered.

“Rather than using the best available technology to minimize radiation hazards by storing and processing the water over the long term, they have opted for the cheapest option, dumping the water into the Pacific Ocean,” the group said.

@Pluto's Republic

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____________________

The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
PriceRip's picture

@Pluto's Republic

On several occasions I have pointed out that the EPA doesn't properly track radiation in the dust carried in the air that we breath. And, it has not do so since the Radiation Network of sampling stations was created. Nobody cares. The releases will not amount to very much as dilution occurs, so go back to sleep, and pretend I said nothing.

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@Pluto's Republic @Pluto's Republic

The water can be evaporated, for example.

Can it? Without releasing more radioactivity anyway? I didn't see what Greenpeace's
proposed alternatives were.

I hate to defend anything about the Japanese nuclear policy, but it's clear there is not much point in just accumulating more and more of the partially treated water above ground.

There is not an ideal techno-fix for every problem. As this particular problem is the result of greed, stupidity, really poor policy decisions... it is particularly galling that there is not an easy fix for this but the decision to do a controlled release of the water *may* be the best among undesirable options.

Just looking at the current storage setup, I very much doubt it would stand up to an earthquake approaching the one that took out the plant - another would likely mean a massive and uncontrolled release.

We should save some outrage for the Japan and US government's failure to recognize and support the horrific injuries suffered by US Navy personnel aboard the carrier USS Ronald Reagan which was only a few miles offshore when the reactor explosion occurred - its water system contaminated, Japan and Korea refused to let it dock and it was forced to stay at sea for a further two months until it was finally allowed to dock in Thailand.

Numbers of the crew have died and many others seriously ill or disabled, but the USG, Japan and Tepco have all tried to shut down efforts to have their plight recognized and compensated.

Extensive article from Mint Press explains.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Pluto's Republic

That makes me happy.

Of course, they have every reason to, as they will definitely be impacted, but often S. Korea behaves as, well, a client state.

I'm even happier about this than I was when France decided not to support our reckless banditry in Iraq.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Pluto's Republic

as Japan never had any business going nuclear in the first place. And I'm shocked that they did, given their history (and our part in it).

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1 user has voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Not that I'm averse to dispensing with capitalism if there are better alternatives out there...

Or that I disagree with the characterization of the Biden "green" (as in astroturf? a 7-Up PET bottle?) initiative amounts to a colossal boondoggle.

But holding up China as some sort of alternative model doesn't stand up well to scrutiny.

Renowned expert hydrologist Wang Weiluo has likened Belt and Road deals between countries along the Mekong River and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as Faustian bargains, saying that while they bring investment they are deals with the devil that hurt livelihoods.

Speaking to the Hong Kong Epoch Times, Wang said that the dams on the Mekong River are destroying the ecological environment and directly threatening the development of fisheries and the livelihood of tens of millions of fishermen in the Mekong River basin.

Pretty comprehensive article here

Then there is:

​China’s greenhouse gas emissions in 2019 exceeded for the first time those of the US and other developed nations combined, according to a report published Thursday by an energy consulting group.

China’s 27 percent share of emissions surpassed the combined output of the US — the world’s second-largest greenhouse gas emitter at 11 percent — as well as all 27 European Union member states and India, which has the world’s third highest emissions rate at 6.6 percent, Rhodium Group’s analysis showed.

China, India and other developing nations have balked at efforts to reduce global emission rates, arguing that richer developed nations like the US and the EU should take action before them and help them foot the bill for the costs.

source

and this - from 2013 - about all that has changed is that although the population is no longer really growing food self-sufficiency is decreasing:

China has a growing population of 1.35 billion at the moment and has been largely self‐sufficient in its food production. In consideration of the major agricultural resources (land, available fresh water, and ambient temperature), China is actually very vulnerable in maintaining its food security. Due to the unfavorable distributions of its water resources and temperature conditions, almost all the land that can be cropped has been utilized. Over cropping and over irrigation has led to some serious problems in two major areas of this country. In Northwest China where most of the land belongs to the inland river system, over expanding of irrigated area has resulted in some serious ecological problems, such as shrinking of oasis and desertification of grasslands. In North China Plain where about half of the country's wheat and maize are produced, over cropping has been supplemented with underground water for several decades, which has led to fast drop of underground water table, for example, 0.88 m per year in the recent 30 years at Luancheng County. China's food security is threatened by its diminishing and unsustainable use of water resources. Integrative agronomic, biological, engineering, and administrative practices that can sustainably use the water resources will be the key ways out to secure the country's future food production.

China's food security is threatened by the unsustainable use of water resources in North and Northwest China

Taisheng Du Shaozhong Kang Xiying Zhang Jianhua Zhang
First published: 12 November 2013 https://doi.org/10.1002/fes3.40

Japan, too is going to get a grim reality check on food supplies one of these days. Import (calorie basis) about 70% of their food and are still burying rice fields for houses (despite having millions of unoccupied ones) convenience stores and such. Much farmland also just abandoned due to lack of farmers to work it.

Plenty of water, though. Which has likely not escaped China's notice.

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earthling1's picture

is the propaganda arm of the Falun Gong, which is the funded regime change arm of the see-eye-a. Any thing that comes out of there should be suspect and as credible as the New York Times.
IMHO

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Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.

and nuclear power I think about the people left behind in disasters. The world moves on to something new and leaves those harmed behind. What happens when there is no place for the world to move on to? Mars? We were designed to live here, this is our garden of Eden.

https://www.angelfire.com/extreme4/kiddofspeed/people/index.html

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@Snode wow. No further comment on those beautiful people who are doomed.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver