Nuclear Winter?

[HarveyH42]

Up until Japan started dumping nuclear waste into the Pacific ocean, it was summer, in sunny Florida, with temperatures in the mid to upper 80s. Don't think it made the mid 70s today, and its currently a chilly 64 degrees. A little concerned, as I started some tomato plants from seed, and their first set of true leaves have just come in.

I can't remember ever having winter weather this late in the year. Have I been mislead? This seems to be going against the science we've been fed the past several years, so the must be some explanation. I'm pretty sure they've be down-playing the extent of the nuclear disaster in Japan. Kind of looks like the core has burned through all protective layers, and the cooling water has been seeping out for sometime.

Their safety claims of the radioactive Iodine's short half life, seems a little odd, being that it's still going to be radioactive, only half as potent. Nuclear physics wasn't a huge interest of mine in college, so only a vague recollection of these things, but what they have been saying the news, just doesn't match up well with what I do remember. Could be I never really understood, or remembering it a little off, or maybe things have changed over the past couple of decades (it was mostly theory).

Guess it could be just normal and natural climate change, the past couple of winters have been abnormally harsh (killed my Orange tree year before, maybe a Madagascar Palm this past winter). Just kind of seems like something strange is going on.

 

[HiTech]

Forget Japan it's not that. Weather scientists have been discovering that recent global weather variations may very well be the norm afterall. They believe so-called global weather extremes during the past few years is more in linel to what was more common a few hundred years ago according to weather records of that era. That would place much less creedence on world industrialization as a root cause behind global warming.

 

[KeepItSimpleStupid]

Half life. You want it nearly gone, you have to wait 5 time constants which I THINK means 5x the half life. The half life is when 1/2 is gone.

 

[killivolt]

Edit: Make some changes to help next yr, if the tomato's don't ripen, plan ahead.

 

[dknguyen]

Nuclear winters are caused by nuclear explosions filling the atmosphere with lingering dust that blocks out sunlight. Similar to volacnoes.

Nothing to do with leaking radioactive materials.

 

[Reloadron]

All I see is 80s and 90s for this week in southern Florida? Thinking yesterday (Tuesday) it was like 91 in Miami? The tomatoes should do fine. However, after picking don't eat them if they glow in the dark.

Hell we had snow flakes yesterday and this morning the current temperature is 37 degrees. I won't put tomatoes or anything else in for a month!

Ron

 

[HarveyH42]

All I see is 80s and 90s for this week in southern Florida? Thinking yesterday (Tuesday) it was like 91 in Miami? The tomatoes should do fine. However, after picking don't eat them if they glow in the dark.

Hell we had snow flakes yesterday and this morning the current temperature is 37 degrees. I won't put tomatoes or anything else in for a month!

Ron

It's 5:20 AM, and 51 degrees this morning. Last week was 80s and 90s, Monday was fair, but yesterday it was cool and wet. Miami is way south of here, I'm closer to Orlando. Hoping the cold front moves through as quickly as the thundershowers yesterday. I'm mostly just kidding about the cold, it's not really all that bad, or a big concern, just unusual here, and figure some of the people up north are getting some real cold weather. Other than the heat, the climate doesn't kill many plants. Bugs, birds, and squirrels do most of the damage to vegetables, the dog watering them doesn't help much either (he means well).

It's been almost a month since the earthquake, and they don't seem to have any control over the three damaged reactors. The are focusing all the attention on the worst one, and only mention the others when a cloud of smoke or steam escapes, and somebody notices. Dumping large volumes of radioactive cooling water in to the ocean can't be good. Japan relies on fish from the ocean pretty heavy for food, really love that stuff, even raw. Just seem like the best they can do, is slow it down, and not much hope of actually getting it under control or contained.

 

[Mikebits]

I think this will be a lesson learned story. It does concern me since I live not too far from a nuke power plant San Onofre.

 

[ericgibbs]

I think this will be a lesson learned story. It does concern me since I live not too far from a nuke power plant San Onofre.

hi Mike,
The nuclear 'bit' didn't fail due to the earthquake/tsunami, it failed because of the failures in the peripheral equipment, ie cooling support.

If you compare other man made disasters, they are usually caused by the supporting equipment and not the 'power/central' technology.

ie: the recent Gulf oil disaster, 3 Mile Island, Chernobyl... etc... don't blame the basic technology...

 

[Reloadron]

I think this will be a lesson learned story. It does concern me since I live not too far from a nuke power plant San Onofre.

San Onofre is still running? Wow, that one has been going a good while now. I remember it well from my living in CA days.

Actually on the bright side if there can be a bright side to a nuclear disaster, they seem to have finally stopped the flow of radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean.

I believe what got them in Japan wasn't a 9.0 magnitude earthquake but the subsequent wall of water that followed. While it is pretty much impossible to predict an earthquake it is possible to build reactor systems that will sustain the shock of a quake. The reactors in Japan acted exactly as they were supposed to. They immediately scrammed. They shut down just as they were supposed to do.

Then things got ugly real fast as the tsunami came ashore and came ashore more inland than anyone forecast. Their diesel generators were submerged in seawater and mud. When they tried to start it was a hydraulic disaster and they were literally destroyed in short order. They were screwed from that moment on.

Looking at a thirst for electric power Japan has few options. Japan simply lacks natural resources to generate power. Coal mining in Japan ceased years ago as there was no coal to speak of. No natural gas either for gas turbine generators. That pretty gets them down to solar or wind and they just can't generate enough power using those means. That pretty much narrows them down to nuclear generated power.

Something else that bit Japan in the ass and I can see biting many countries in the ass is their aging nuclear power plants. A large number of nuclear power plants on a global basis were designed and built in the 1970s. This is sans France who has a very good and current nuclear program spawned by the presence of Areva which is a a world leader in nuclear energy based in France.

Here in the US applications for nuclear power permits are finally on the rise to replace what are now obsolete plants and operating beyond their projected life cycles. This is where the NRC should be thinking long and hard about extending licenses. The applications we see today should have been applied for a decade ago for new builds.

Just my little take on some of that.......

As to the weather? Florida was having a rough winter before Japan had problems. We have mild winters and then we have bitter winters. Sometimes we win and sometimes we lose I guess.

Ron

 

[BrownOut]

Things here seem to be going just as science predicted. Winter was over by mid-Feburary. Pretty much 70s and 80s excpet for brief cold fronts that pass through. 75 and Sunny now, and temps back on the rise. By mid May, it'll be too hot to go outside. If this summer is anything like last summer, I'm not looking forward to it.

 

[Reloadron]

I really need to get retired and move south!

Yeah BrownOut, even up here last summer was hot, not hot like you guys down south had but hot!

Right now, upper 30s and wet. They say upper 60s by the weekend and more wet.

Ron

 

[Birdman Adam]

My dad's trick for starting tomato plants is to put a heat pad under them on medium, the heat along with nice moist soil helps a lot to trigger the seed into sprouting!

This whole radiation thing is so blown-out with concern to what might happen to the US... They even reported on tiny amounts very slightly above background radiation reaching us...

BTW I live less than 20 miles from the Harris Nuclear Plant (In NC obviously), not scared one bit. I know its designed well, even though we don't have earthquakes here... Plus, no tsunami to kill backup power...

It's cool to hear the test sirens. "This is only a test..."

 

[BrownOut]

I really need to get retired and move south!

Yeah BrownOut, even up here last summer was hot, not hot like you guys down south had but hot!

Right now, upper 30s and wet. They say upper 60s by the weekend and more wet.

Ron

Hi Ron. I'm working as hard as I can to get to retirement. Don't know if I'll make it though. If I do, I'm gonna spend all my winters in south florida, and all my summers in Maine.

 

[Reloadron]

Hi Ron. I'm working as hard as I can to get to retirement. Don't know if I'll make it though. If I do, I'm gonna spend all my winters in south florida, and all my summers in Maine.

Now that is a good well thought out plan. I always really enjoyed Maine in the summer. I know you enjoyed your trip to Florida especially from some of the real nice pictures you took. Yep, Florida in Winter & Maine in Summer the best of everything.

Ron