The following is a guest post from Matt Wald, senior communications advisor at NEI. Follow Matt on Twitter at @MattLWald.
From the batteries in our cell phones to the clothes on our backs, "nanomaterials" that are designed molecule by molecule are working their way into our economy and our lives. Now there’s some promising work on new materials for nuclear reactors.
Reactors are a tough environment. The sub atomic particles that sustain the chain reaction, neutrons, are great for splitting additional uranium atoms, but not all of them hit a uranium atom; some of them end up in various metal components of the reactor. The metal is usually a crystalline structure, meaning it is as orderly as a ladder or a sheet of graph paper, but the neutrons rearrange the atoms, leaving some infinitesimal voids in the structure and some areas of extra density. The components literally grow, getting longer and thicker. The phenomenon is well understood and designers compensate for it with a …
From the batteries in our cell phones to the clothes on our backs, "nanomaterials" that are designed molecule by molecule are working their way into our economy and our lives. Now there’s some promising work on new materials for nuclear reactors.
Reactors are a tough environment. The sub atomic particles that sustain the chain reaction, neutrons, are great for splitting additional uranium atoms, but not all of them hit a uranium atom; some of them end up in various metal components of the reactor. The metal is usually a crystalline structure, meaning it is as orderly as a ladder or a sheet of graph paper, but the neutrons rearrange the atoms, leaving some infinitesimal voids in the structure and some areas of extra density. The components literally grow, getting longer and thicker. The phenomenon is well understood and designers compensate for it with a …
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In defense of the rest of the people who are opposed to the project, however, there are many reasons other than spoiling views why they are worried.
I have actually spent some time out on the water very close to the area where the wind turbines will be built. Their presence would have had a detrimental effect on our ability to move through the water since we were on a sailboat.
Though there have been people harnessing the wind for power in the sound for hundreds of years, the Cape Wind project has somehow convinced some people that it has a right to take that wind from those people. (Sailing in a wind farm would be exceedingly frustrating because of all of the turbulence and reduction in energy of the wind.)
Another group of people that are opposed to Cape Wind are the fishermen who have been working the prolific sound for generations. They are not sure what the effect will be, but they are pretty sure that massive construction projects for foundations and transmission infrastructure will not have the effect of making their fishing grounds more productive. They are also worried about the vast increase in navigational hazards especially for conditions of reduced visibility (fog).
The fact is that massive wind farms are a classic case of "tragedy of the commons". Their success is based on a small group taking what used to be public property (views, fishing grounds, wind) and turning into private property without compensating the public.