tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5478338160174751106.post2068096198812042376..comments2023-08-27T03:12:18.044-07:00Comments on Ace Hoffman's Nuclear Failures Reports: Fantasyland... LaTourrette's syndromeAce Hoffmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15783994798725897466noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5478338160174751106.post-15793651471229068822012-03-20T16:32:57.753-07:002012-03-20T16:32:57.753-07:00Great post and great reporting....I know that surr...Great post and great reporting....I know that surreal feeling...all the dignitaries lined up, they're wearing their business threads, everyone's serious, but not actually engaged. I'll bet none of those listening posed a single challenge. <br /><br />It's creepy and disgusting when you really consider how poisonous this stuff is to life forms of all kinds, how you can't insure it even, how it's being used throughout the country to the effect of continuously producing hot waste even as there is no way to safely dispose of it. Are these folks in denial? I mean---I cannot understand how they are allowed to blithely ignore evidence that doesn't fit their fantasy of how things are. Next time some jackass like this decides to speak hit me up and I'll come and help stare his ass down. I'll ask questions, too. What a travesty.<br />thanks for the great, detailed & funny reporting.Lee Kramer https://www.blogger.com/profile/12725366402959404334noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5478338160174751106.post-87576320281855235772012-03-20T11:24:56.552-07:002012-03-20T11:24:56.552-07:00Thanks for the additional viewpoint! BTW, Victor ...Thanks for the additional viewpoint! BTW, Victor Gilinsky states emphatically that he was not there, despite being announced as present by his former employers. He also claims never to have debated me in email, which is possible, since when I finally went and looked (this morning) I couldn't find the correspondence... from about 15 years ago... whatever... Anyway, in 2005 I did a brief summary of the Dr. Gilinsky for someone who was praising him, and shouldn't have been:<br /><br />------------------------------------<br />Let's talk about Dr. Victor Gilinsky:<br /><br />In a 2000 report, he didn't think North Korea should receive nuclear power equipment from the U.S. until "North Korea is a trustworthy recipient." After that little matter is taken care of, why of course, it's okay.<br /><br />He stated that "the very large size" of the nukes we were proposing to sell to North Korea "makes the project both uneconomic and unsafe." Smaller nukes, however, would have been entirely OKAY with Dr. Gilinsky.<br /><br />He worked at the Atomic Energy Commission for several years starting in 1971, as assistant director for policy and program review. Nothing anti-nuke there, that's for sure. In fact, those were some of the strongest years for nuclear power development in America's history. And he obviously helped.<br /><br />From 1973 to 1975 he was head of the RAND Physical Sciences Department. The RAND corporation has always been a pro-nuclear "think tank" as you may know, and a revolving door for those with militaristic thinking and world domination on their minds.<br /><br />Then it was back to government, and a stint at the new NRC from 1975 to 1984 where he was "heavily involved in nuclear export issues" according to one brief biography. So I wonder how many of the rest of the world's ~335 nuclear power plants are courtesy Victor Gilinsky's efforts, don't you?<br /><br />He was appointed to the NRC by President Gerald Ford and re-appointed by President Jimmy "nukes are our last resort -- and we're down to our last resorts!" Carter.<br /><br />In testimony in 2002 regarding Yucca Mountain he proclaimed that onsite storage of nuclear waste allows for "ample opportunity" for the continued -- and even expanded -- use of nuclear power -- that Yucca Mountain is not needed for this reason. So we can EACH have mini-Yucca Mountains -- without the mountains -- at our nuclear power facilities.<br /><br />His view of the near disaster at Davis-Besse in 2002 due to corrosion was that "a serious accident was barely averted." This in no way impacted his support for nuclear power. To call the potential loss of the state of Ohio and an increase in worldwide radiation levels merely a potentially "serious accident" IS an understatement. It was a catastrophe that was averted, and that by pure luck.<br /><br />There ARE good people who were formerly nuclear industry insiders who have learned the truth and become whistleblowers, but Gilinsky doesn't appear to be one of them. In fact, it is an insult to those who actually have taken that extremely difficult route to suggest that Gilinsky is anything but a life-long shill for the nuclear industry.<br /><br />The most positive statement I found by him is that he thinks that nuclear reactors and their fuel, especially those in "iffy" (he has a doctorate to use that term) countries, will "always need close IAEA oversight." I refer to my previous email for comments about the IAEA's ingrained bias towards nuclear power.<br /><br />Now, you say Gilinsky is a good man, and attack me for questioning it. I say he supports nothing you've claimed to me you believe in, but if you know something about Dr. Gilinsky the rest of the world longs to hear, please share it with us.<br />---------------------------------------<br />I didn't get a response, of course...Ace Hoffmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15783994798725897466noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5478338160174751106.post-52304074098096334072012-03-20T11:06:28.794-07:002012-03-20T11:06:28.794-07:00Hi Ace - Just found your blog at a friend's re...Hi Ace - Just found your blog at a friend's referral. My husband and I also attended the RAND lecture. Here's my March 10 debrief posted on the Safecast google group. Very best regards, Annette Trisler, Concerned Mom.<br />p://www.rand.org/multimedia/audio/2012/03/08/nuclear-energy-after-fukushi... <br />On Thursday, March 8, we attended Dr. Tom LaTourrette’s (Ph.D. <br />geology) lecture at policy think tank RAND Corp's Santa Monica <br />headquarters, summarizing RAND Corp.'s vision for America's nuclear <br />energy future, with a focus on managing spent nuclear fuel. The link <br />above directly accesses the recorded audio podcast. <br />The audience included many eminent scientists and dignitaries, <br />including RAND Corp.'s new CEO, consuls from Belgium and Switzerland, <br />a Japanese researcher and representatives from Sen. Dianne Feinstein's <br />office and DHS. <br />It was downright freaky to sit amid such self-professed eminent minds <br />and policy shapers as they all "yes, manned," the speaker's extremely <br />superficial presentation based upon selectively incomplete <br />information. This was RAND Corp research after all, and I cannot <br />imagine any missing information was unintended. Although this was <br />billed as a discussion of the "pros and cons of nuclear energy in a <br />post-Fukushima world, (to) shed some light on lessons learned over the <br />past year," it was not a balanced or complete presentation, because <br />the data set and assumptions were incomplete, and the missing data <br />happened to be that which evidences the dangers of nuclear power <br />generation. <br />RAND Corp is the preeminent think tank informing US public policy, so <br />their “science” has and will determine our futures. Listen to the <br />podcast and get a glimpse into the pro-nuke scientific circle's <br />communication flow. The knowledge of nuclear physics, the dream, the <br />hope and vision of the miracles that nuclear energy could bring... <br />these were all present. What was conspicuously absent was the human <br />element, that I associate with the understanding of right and wrong, <br />good and bad… that ethical social structure that informs our daily <br />actions. I have not utterly condemned those people for their <br />apparent amorality, laughing at the odd silly quip as they discussed a <br />public policy direction that holds the power of life and death/ <br />economic success and devastation over so many. Many of them were <br />kindly and elderly and I am not able to determine if they were simply <br />idealistic with much faith in the dreams of their youth; if their <br />information input was so controlled (only fed information that <br />supported the cause) that they could not be blamed for their <br />positions; if they were consciously turning a blind eye to the huge <br />flow of data contradicting the industry spin and heroically toeing the <br />line; or they were simply selfish and egomaniacal, with an obstinate <br />obsession on continually pushing the scientific limits of "what can <br />we do," without regard to the very real health and economic toll and <br />unquantifiable risks their industry is inflicting on real people by <br />refusing to consider the humble and tempering, "but then, what should <br />we do?" <br /><br />... rest of post at:<br />http://groups.google.com/group/safecast-japan/msg/ecc851d38ae6231c?Annettehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05470631531084187123noreply@blogger.com