HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: russ@pmafire.inel.gov (Russ Brown)
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 93 15:14:44 GMT
Organization: WINCO
Subject: Re: pollution from woodburning fireplace
Summary: 
Followup-To: 
Organization: WINCO
Keywords: 

In article <JMC.93Jan5091800@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>The slogan was "Split wood, not atoms."
>--
>John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
>*
>He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
>
Couldst be that there may have been _more than one_ bumper sticker in
favor with the advocates of forest destruction?

As the Fool said to the King, "The reason why the seven stars are no
more than seven, is a pretty reason".  The King replies, "Because they
are not eight".  The Fool replies, "Yes indeed, thou wouldst make a good
Foole". 

:-)
From: mwilson@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM (Mark Wilson)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Off Thoughts. Sheep!?
Date: 5 Jan 93 18:36:20 GMT
Organization: NCR Engineering and Manufacturing Atlanta -- Atlanta, GA

In <1993Jan5.145017.25718@nstn.ns.ca> dc_ags@ac.nsac.ns.ca (Don Christie) writes:

|The men and women whose ideas became our rights and freedoms had no way to
|foresee how they would be interpreted in the late 20th century. If they could
|see the range of useless products, needless waste, the pollution and mayhem
|we have produced, they'd roll over in their graves! 

Just because you think a product is useless or needless, does not mean that
everybody agrees with you.
Do you want to use government to force people to live in a manner you approve
of or are just trying to shame them into it.

|If Joe Herbie can make a buck producing and selling widgets, then Joe Herbie
|is allowed to make and sell widgets... regardless of whether or not the product
|is needed (or wanted). 

This has got to be one of the most idiotic statements I have seen in a long
time.  Just how does Joe Herbie make money selling a product that nobody
wants.  What is he doing holding a gun to the consumers head.

Just because you don't have a use for a product, does not make the product
useless.

|In my opinion, what we do not need is _more_ government involvement in our
|lives, and what we _do_ need is a system of government that actually does
|work... on a global scale.

But what you have advocated is precisely more government.  How do you plan
to get all those people to stop doing those things that you disaprove of.
-- 
Mob rule doesn't become any prettier, just because the mob start to call itself
a government.
It ain't charity if you are using someone else's money.
Mark.Wilson@AtlantaGA.NCR.com
From: yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu (victor yodaiken)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Sheep in Organizations
Date: 5 Jan 93 19:05:52 GMT
Organization: University of Massachusetts, Amherst

In article <726209629snx@tillage.DIALix.oz.au> gil@tillage.DIALix.oz.au (Gil Hardwick) writes:
>
>In article <58223@dime.cs.umass.edu> yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu writes:
>You don't solve problems by shying away from them, fellow. Research
>facilities here are as good as anywhere in the world, most especially
>in medical radiology and energy systems.
>
>Gil

A touch defensive, are we?


-- 


yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu

Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: env_sprd@solomon.technet.sg (Min of the Environment)
Subject: How to get access to USEPA
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL8]
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 01:57:50 GMT


I am desperately looking for the USEPA source test method for polynuclear aromatic
hydrocarbons in incinerator flue gas.  I understand that it is possible to
obtain this info thro Internet.  If anyone can help me access this info, I
would really be grateful.
  
Thank you and Best wishes for 1993.


Indrani, Senior Scientific Officer,
Ministry of the Environment, Singapor
From: Rodger_Madison@rand.ORG (Rodger Madison)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Nuclear Power and Climate Change
Date: 12 Jan 93 14:39:10 GMT
Organization: The RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, California

Kevin Brown says:

Could one, I wonder, successfully argue that there is a correlation between
general energy usage and standard of living?  I would think so, but I have
no proof of this.

This argument was presented fairly persuasivly in a book called "Energy and
Society" by a sociologist named Fred Cottrell.  Going beyond that Prof. Cottrell
argues that "the amounts and types of energy employed condition man's way of life
materially and set somewhat predicatable limits on what he can do and how society
will be organized." 
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska)
Subject: Re: Nuclear Power and Climate Change
Organization: VEXCEL Corporation, Boulder CO
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 16:24:48 GMT

In article <svtrpg@dixie.com> jgd@dixie.com (John De Armond) writes:
>louis@aupair.cs.athabascau.ca (Louis Schmittroth) writes:
>
>>I agree that one of the options which has to be taken seriously by the
>>environmental community is nuclear fission reators.  
>
>>But how are we to proceed.  A first step here would be to quit calling
>>us names, and realizing that there are deepseated fears of reactors
>>even among otherwise rational people.  I tried last night to convince
>>a couple of friends that Chernobyl could not happen with a Candu type
>>reactor, or for that matter with any of the reactors designed outside
>>the former Soviet Union.  I failed...  There was nothing that I could 
>>point them to for reading.  Where is the non-doctrinaire, non-PR
>>type of literature explaining the benefits of nuclear power to the
>>general thinking public?
>
>Here is the crux of the problem.  Fear of the nuclear genie has become
>religious in nature in that people who hold the fear are absolutely,
>positively convinced the danger exists even in the face of no hard
>evidence at all.  And they tend to grasp at random and/or unrelated
>events and rationalize their fears with them.  Fearing Western nuclear
>power because of Chernobyl is an example. (Quiz of the day:  Was the
>explosion at chernobyl a steam explosion, a nuclear explosion or something
>else? Bonus point:  What was the triggering event?)  
>
>I see the debate to be quite similar to that on abortion.  There is really
>no middle ground and no room for compromise amongst the combatents.  Our 
>leaders, presumably wiser than the public opinion under the Constitution, will
>ultimately make a decision that will please some and piss off others.
>
I think it needs to addressed one step at a time.  In a recent discussion
with some environmentalists friends, rather than directly attacking the
problem, I pointed out that even if many of the "technical" skeptics,
such as Gofman are believed, the damage to environment in general, and
people in particular, of coal power production is larger, and that it
is part of its normal operation, rather than the result of some
accident.  This argument got a positive response.  Its result,
eventually, could be to get environmentalists to more accurately
prioritize.

>
>John
>-- 
>John De Armond, WD4OQC               |Interested in high performance mobility?  
>Performance Engineering Magazine(TM) | Interested in high tech and computers? 
>Marietta, Ga                         | Send ur snail-mail address to 
>jgd@dixie.com                        | perform@dixie.com for a free sample mag
>Need Usenet public Access in Atlanta?  Write Me for info on Dixie.com.


-- 
==============================================================================
A thought for the holidays:
   "Wine is living proof that God loves us and likes to see us happy"
	- Benjamin Franklin			dean@vexcel.com
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: kevin@nuchat.sccsi.com (Kevin Brown)
Subject: Re: Nuclear Power and Climate Change
Organization: I can't see any in the immediate vicinity...
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 19:45:15 GMT

In article <58447@dime.cs.umass.edu> yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu (victor yodaiken) writes:
>In article <1993Jan7.093103.2732@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman) writes:
>>Actually that's mostly incorrect. My father owned an "early industrial
>>revolution" machine shop that was powered by a single 15 hp electric
>>motor driving overhead jackshafts that turned the machines by way of
>>flat belts. That type of power transmission is over 95% efficient.
>>He ran 5 lathes, 2 milling machines, 3 drill presses, a shop compressor,
>>the blower on the forge, and a fan off that 15 hp motor. Today the same
>>lathes *each* require a 7 hp motor. That single motor could run everything
>>because it didn't have to overcome startup inertia because it was always
>>running.
>
>I admit defeat on this. What I should have said is that there was at
>one time, a correlation between the use of water power 

A type of energy...

>and living
>standard, just as there has been a correlation between the use of
>electicicty 

Another type of energy...

>and living standard. 

Could one, I wonder, successfully argue that there is a correlation between
general energy usage and standard of living?  I would think so, but I have
no proof of this.

>yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu


-- 
Kevin Brown					kevin@nuchat.sccsi.com
This is your .signature virus: < begin 644 .signature (9V]T8VAA(0K0z end >
	    This is your .signature virus on drugs: <>
			Any questions?
From: paul.burnett@pcs.sj.ca.us (Paul Burnett) 
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: [energy source] pollu
Date: 8 Jan 93 14:13:00 GMT
Distribution: world
Organization: PCS-BBS - San Jose, CA - 408-270-4085
Reply-To: paul.burnett@pcs.sj.ca.us (Paul Burnett) 

TO: constant@gn.ecn.purdue.edu

T>1. With a fleet of electric cars that would recharge during off-peak hours
 >(night), the price for electricity would drop, due to plants running at
 >full capacity all the time

Amazing - if it would actually be cheaper to generate more electricity,
why don't all power plants run flat out all the time, and have gigantic
banks of resistors to radiate away the heat caused by shunting the
unneeded electricity to them?  Something's wrong here....
---
 . QMPro 1.0 41-8688 . ...from San Jose, CA
From: gil@tillage.DIALix.oz.au (Gil Hardwick)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Education and the Environment by Gregory A. Smith
Distribution: world
Date: Tue, 05 Jan 93 05:21:32 GMT
Organization: STAFF STRATEGIES - Anthropologists & Training Agents


In article <1993Jan4.192632.16294@beaver.cs.washington.edu> pauld@cs.washington.edu writes:

 > Rather, the author is recognising that all education is in part
 > "training to share opinions", and that we have a choice about what
 > those opinions are. 

Under the Western European tradition derived from Mosaic Christianity
and explicitly intended to engender loyalty to the status quo. The
etymology of the word "education" arises from "to the Duke".
                        ^^^                           ^^^^
Traditional Aboriginal pedagogy teaches children to protect and defend
their own quite different opinions, yet spend a lifetime learning to
negotiate from one context to the next as people need to work with one
another on a particular project, or participate in particular rituals
or ceremonies together.

 > It would be nice if all education consisted merely of the skills that
 > adults use to discern information and ideas about the world;
 > unfortunately nobody has any idea how to teach such skills to children
 > without also passing along some opinions on the way; Smith's point is
 > that the choice of opinions (and there is no choice that we have a
 > choice) is important.

Nobody? Wah!

Ever thought of learning something about other cultures? Such skills
and how to teach them to children are at least 5,000 years old in some
parts, much older in others, and quite a good deal younger in other
parts again. It is the West now trying to sort it out in their turn.

 > hybrid rather than pure; compromising rather than clean;    | Militant Agnostic
 > distorted rather than straightforward; ambiguous rather than| I Don't Know
 > articulated; both-and rather than either-or; the difficult  |   and You Don't
 > unity of inclusion rather than the easy unity of exclusion. |   Know Either

Isn't this little admonition somewhat self-contradictory?

Gil

Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: gil@tillage.DIALix.oz.au (Gil Hardwick)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Natural Gas, Combo?
Distribution: world
Date: Fri, 08 Jan 93 16:12:38 GMT
Organization: STAFF STRATEGIES - Anthropologists & Training Agents


In article <1993Jan7.091804.1@acad3.alaska.edu> nsmca@acad3.alaska.edu writes:

 > What I Was trying to say was that some forms of new/old power can be
 > combined on the same land.. Such as methane land files (where the land fill
 > has been filed in and the compost is being digested and methane being
 > produced) and on top of the land fill have a solar panel field. Have the
 > solar panel field be protected on its edges by some form of wind power..
 >
 > To many people think too narrow about how to combine the uses of land.
 >  
 > Such as only methane production for the land and nothing else..

What we call hybrid systems here in Australia.

Folks just don't seem to get it when you support the Esperence Wind
Farm, Permaculture, conservation farming and uranium mining at the same
time, and train bureaucrats, environmentalists and resource developers
all within the one scheduled professional development program.

They appear to think you must be up to something morally questionable,
not taking sides on single isolated issues . . .

Gil

Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: moroney@world.std.com (Michael Moroney)
Subject: Re: plutonium arrives in Japan
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 22:27:36 GMT

In <1993Jan7.203118.17716@nsisrv.gsfc.nasa.gov> jgacker@news.gsfc.nasa.gov (James G. Acker) writes:

>Mark Wilson (mwilson@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM) wrote:

>: For the umpteenth time.  The plutonium in question is not suitable for
>: making bombs.
>: Mark.Wilson@AtlantaGA.NCR.com

	I think the other countries believe Japan possesses the
>technological capability to reprocess the large amounts they are importing
>into weapons-grade plutonium.

It is even more difficult to extract weapons-grade Pu-239 from the other
isotopes in the plutonium they just received than it is to extract
weapons-grade U-235 from readily-available uranium ore.  

-Mike
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy)
Subject: Re: pollution from woodburning fireplace
Reply-To: jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University
	<1993Jan5.150149.18826@pmafire.inel.gov>
Date: 5 Jan 93 09:18:00

The slogan was "Split wood, not atoms."
--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
*
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.

From: alanm@hpindda.cup.hp.com (Alan McGowen)
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 01:04:57 GMT
Subject: Temperate zone habitat loss
Organization: HP Information Networks, Cupertino, CA
From: dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz)
Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.energy
Subject: Re: Nuclear Power and Climate Change
Date: 8 Jan 93 13:15:47 GMT
Organization: University of Rochester

In article <1993Jan8.022115.8137@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman) writes:

>The problem with this approach is that gas turbine plants, fuel cells,
>and the like are a lot more than "slightly higher cost" alternatives. 
>That's why they are restricted to peaking needs today. Replacing base 
>load plants with peaking technology is economic suicide for a utility
>and it's customers.

Gas turbines are not restricted to peaking needs.  At least one
utility, VEPCO, has installed a gas-fired combined cycle plant for
baseload; its overall efficiency is > 50%.  More generally, gas
turbines are used for cogeneration; these units obviously do not
run just at peak times.

The cost of these is higher, especially if the price of gas goes
up.  But they can be brought on line quickly, so there is not the
cost of carrying as much excess capacity.

	Paul F. Dietz
	dietz@cs.rochester.edu
Xref: sparky sci.environment:14429 sci.energy:6798
From: ems@michael.apple.com (E. Michael Smith)
Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.energy
Subject: Re: Nuclear Power and Climate Change
Date: 12 Jan 93 00:15:38 GMT
Organization: Circle 'C' Shellfish Ranch, Shores-of-the-Pacific, California

In article <94zr6t=@dixie.com> jgd@dixie.com (John De Armond) writes:
>ems@michael.apple.com (E. Michael Smith) writes:
>
>>>A demonstration and anything in production with a proven track record
>>>is very different.
>
>>There are also available commercial production conversion kits to
>>convert a diesel to use propane and natural gas as well.  
...
>Go ahead and post.  I hope this is something mainstream and not the 
>diesel equivalent of some of these home-shop electric car conversions.
>I'm very interested but dubious.  

They are production stuff from folks who do diesel for a living.
Not whacko back room conversion sunshine uber alles stuff..  I'll
see if I can find it in The Archives ...

>For the last year or so I've been 
>researching diesels relative to power generation because I plan on 
>co-generation for my house to get out from under our Plant-Vogtle inspired 
>electric rates using our still relatively cheap natural gas supply.  
>
>The scientific literature says basically that NG or propane can be 
>burned via intake introduction but that starting, particularly
>in adverse conditions still requires cylinder injection of a suitably
>high cetane fuel.  

You got it.  Start on diesel.  At about 25% power, begin NG induction.
Continue to full power.  You might be able to back off the diesel to less
than 25%, but I'm not sure what the lower bound would be.  I priced a
kit about 2 years ago.  It was about $2k from a company back East.

>I picked up some SAE papers in December on the
>topic.  One paper describes some recent developments on electronically
>controlled direct cylinder injection for NG but it is definitely
>still in the experimental stage.

Right again.  Direct injection of NG is a pain, at best.

If you have a small diesel available, just start it up and set the
throtle at about 25%.  Valve some propane or NG into the air intake
and see what happens.

-- 

E. Michael Smith  ems@apple.COM

'Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it.  Boldness has
 genius, power and magic in it.'  -  Goethe

I am not responsible nor is anyone else.  Everything is disclaimed.
From: jgd@dixie.com (John De Armond)
Subject: Re: Nuclear Power and Climate Change
Date: Thu, 07 Jan 93 09:56:16 GMT
Organization: Dixie Communications Public Access.  The Mouth of the South.

ems@michael.apple.com (E. Michael Smith) writes:

>Diesels can burn natural gas.  (Masters Thesis in the Berkely Engineering
>Library, I don't remember the authors name, demonstrated stationary 
>diesel plant on natural gas.)

One of the things I've done at several nuke plants is performance qualify
the standby diesel generators so I have quite a bit of experience with
these beasts.

A demonstration and anything in production with a proven track record
is very different.

>Diesels can come up almost instantly.

The typical tech spec for standby diesel generators is off-to-full-load
in 10 seconds.  They can - barely - but at a huge cost.  The coolant
and crankcase oil are kept at operating temperature all the time,
the fuel system is pressurized and a starting system capable of spinning
the engine to operating RPM prior to gating injection is provided.
The engines are run at least once a week not only to verify proper
operation but also to keep fresh fuel in the day tank and piping.
These system are high maintenance items.  OK for nuclear plants with
constant surveillance programs; not so hot for unmanned peaking sites.

>Diesels can power Very Large Ships.  (Pistons several feet in diameter,
>many per engine...)  Practical diesel generators can be Very Large...

But not VERY VERY large.  Combustion turbines of 100 MWE or larger 
are not that uncommon.  The diesel generators at Sequoyah (largest I've seen) 
were 10 MWE and required two 16 cylinder ship-type engines per generator.

John
-- 
John De Armond, WD4OQC               |Interested in high performance mobility?  
Performance Engineering Magazine(TM) | Interested in high tech and computers? 
Marietta, Ga                         | Send ur snail-mail address to 
jgd@dixie.com                        | perform@dixie.com for a free sample mag
Need Usenet public Access in Atlanta?  Write Me for info on Dixie.com.
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: andersmc@HYDRA.ROSE-HULMAN.EDU
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Wetlands as treatment
Date: 6 Jan 1993 20:02:05 GMT
Organization: Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology
Reply-To: andersmc@HYDRA.ROSE-HULMAN.EDU
NNTP-Posting-Host: hydra.rose-hulman.edu

Does anyone happen to know any good sources for information on wetlands
use as treatment of wastewater? Could someone post or mail me any
info, I'm working on a paper. Thanks

Matt Anderson
andersmc@rosevc.rose-hulman.edu
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: Desiree_Bradley@mindlink.bc.ca (Desiree Bradley)
Subject: Shetland Oil Spill
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 1993 20:20:03 GMT

The stormy weather will, I think, do more good in cleaning up that oil spill
than the cleanup efforts going on.

I remember reading that weathering was more effective than anything else in
breaking up the Valdez spill and cleaning the beaches.  The use of hoses to
spray hot water onto the rocky beaches was great asthetic effects but was
hard on the invertebrates that were between or under the stones.

Having a UBC library card, I can search the UBC library catalogue and some
databases for free.

From CNI (Canadian News Index): "Nature joins cleanup of Valdez spill"
Calgary Herald (June 30, 1989) page A5

Other information: There is an "Oil Spills - Valdez, Alaska" file in the
Science/Engineering Division (UBC Main Library).  That's where those papers I
read about effects of cleanup ought to be.  If not, I am fairly sure that the
American Petroleum Institute Oil Spill Conference for 1990 (or later) has a
lot of papers on the Valdez oil spill.

I can't get to UBC today.  Otherwise, I'd give more definite information.

Desiree Bradley
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: userDHAL@mts.ucs.UAlberta.CA (David Halliwell)
Subject: Re: averting doom
Organization: University Of Alberta, Edmonton Canada
Distribution: na
Date: Fri, 8 Jan 1993 00:40:23 GMT

scott@abyss.ATMOS.ColoState.Edu (Scott Denning) writes:

>In article <1993Jan6.195617.673@newshost.lanl.gov> u108502@beta.lanl.gov  
>(Andrew Poutiatine) writes:

>>[1.5 billion year prediction of fate of sun and earth deleted]

>[discussion of evolution of sun deleted]

>3.5 Ga).  Earth's climate is extremely sensitive to solar luminosity,
>due to the ice-albedo feedback. For example, using simple energy-balance  
>calculations, Budyko (1969) estimated that a decrease of insolation of  
>just 1.6% would cause the polar ice caps to grow to the equator.  What's

   Sellers also published a very similar model at the same time (1969)
with similar results. However, it is now felt that both of these
studies overestimated the ice-albedo feedback. They had based the
function of albedo=f(temperature) on current global averages, which
lead to them including albedo variation which was due to latitude
(zenith angle effects) rather than temperature. i.e. albedo increased
as you moved towards the poles due to both cooler temperatures and
lower sun angles/changes in cloud/ vegetation patterns, etc.

   If you correct the Budyko and Sellers models for this effect, the
ice-albedo feedback is reduced. In that case, it takes about a 4% 
reduction in solar output to cause an ice-covered earth.

   Of course, this doesn't change Scott's point that a 25% reduction
in solar output would have drastic effects, all other factors being
constant.


Dave Halliwell
Department of Geography
University of Alberta
Edmonton, Alberta