How would you use the Propeller chip to handle a nuclear disaster?
ElectricAye
Posts: 4,561
I've got a crazy idea:
Super freeze a solution of water and boric acid into long solid tubes, mount a GPS-guided, Propeller-operated tailfin system (see JDAM below) on the upper end of each tube, and slide them out of high-flying C-17 cargo airplanes.
Maybe add a little polymer to it so it doesn't shatter and scatter when it hits.
It would be the most expensive ice delivery in history.... but with FUBAR as the imminent alternative, who the heck cares?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Direct_Attack_Munition
Super freeze a solution of water and boric acid into long solid tubes, mount a GPS-guided, Propeller-operated tailfin system (see JDAM below) on the upper end of each tube, and slide them out of high-flying C-17 cargo airplanes.
Maybe add a little polymer to it so it doesn't shatter and scatter when it hits.
It would be the most expensive ice delivery in history.... but with FUBAR as the imminent alternative, who the heck cares?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Direct_Attack_Munition
Comments
Come on, guys, I was expecting better than this. Where are all you robotics people? I was expecting answers involving 50-meter tall Propeller-controlled eutectodraulic robots hauling hoses from the ocean and up to the reactors.... or some sort of herd of little Propeller-based self-assembler bots that would scramble up to the reactors by the tens of thousands and build new containment vessels army-ant style.
Have all those potassium iodine pills killed your creativity?
No amount of Propellers is going to help and we should not make light of it.
And you said it right as well.
On the topic of long term, seriously redundant, self-maintaining robotics, I was visiting Hanford recently. It's a waste depot, and the engineering challenges are significant. The various holding areas in the depot are excavated under ground, then go through various serious reinforcements. When complete, humans inspect the area for the last time. No human can enter that area again, and live for 1000 years or more. Robotic systems are installed to handle and monitor the waste, as well as monitor the containment structures and systems.
Once everything is installed, the systems have a lot of redundancy. There is only so much area, and once things are put into the containment area, they may not be removed, because the waste radiation levels contaminate them quickly. Spares are present, as well as primary systems, secondary, and repair systems. The level of planning is stunning, just for scale, if nothing else. There are serious and hard constraints, combined with a time frame that's just epic.
Standards and advanced materials science plays a big part in the overall deployment, and of course, everything is remote controlled, with literally no field service options, other than to bring a new piece of gear in, which may have to be designed to deal with the existing failure, and equipment as well as perform the standard task.
It really hits home on this stuff, after talking with some of those guys. It's long term, seriously long term. I sure hope we can come to some resolution on this, so those people don't have to surrender where they live, or have to die.
The wind caried the cloud as far as us, here in the UK. It must have been far worse for Heater.
Actually in 1986 I was still in Oxford, England. I did not get to Helsinki until 1996. Seems that here the effects of the direct radiation from Chernobyl were negligible here and the effects from any fall out may never be statistically distinguishable.
Meanwhile back in Britain there are still restrictions on the activities of a lot of farms due to the fall out from Chernobyl that made it's way over there. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/may/12/farmers-restricted-chernobyl-disaster
Perhaps Oxford was not the safest place to be after all.
Thank you, Heater, for saying what I was a bit too angry to say without triggering internet filters! I don't know who this "Electric Eye" character is, or why they're such a coward not to use their real name, but it's obvious they have some growing up to do.
Years ago what got a lot of kids involved with technology were visions of a cool future: space travel, undersea explorations, etc. Nowadays.... well, you take what you can get I suppose. And if thinking about real-world mega-problems can get kids energized enough to stray away from video games for a few minutes, then why not toss this topic up for discussion? Kids see this stuff on TV and they might get a sense that people are helpless to do anything about it, which is a state of mind I think is unhealthy.
As for my original idea of dropping GGBAIBs (GPS-Guided Boric Acid Ice Bombs) into the reactors, I'm wide open to criticism of any kind. I don't see why the Propeller couldn't handle such a guidance task. From what I've seen on the news, tossing liquid water on the reactors from helicopters looks a little inefficient.
Personally, I might just dust off my Propeller-based scintillation counter and see if the background radiation goes up these next few weeks. How funny is that?
Then I guess there are a lot of cowards on this forum?
In my many years of desperately needing some growing up to do, I've noticed one thing about people in extremely difficult circumstances: if they don't possess or maintain a sense of humor, they fall apart at the seams. Thank you Martin Hodge for correcting my misperceptions.
That may be true but at the moment one problem is cooling and putting lots of water on the reactors, this is what they are doing with helicopters and the idea behind the thread.
The idea that the thread trivialises the loss of human life is a stretch.
I do think it is irrelevant to the propeller forum.
Graham
Graham,
point well taken. If the moderators want to move this or dump it completely, I'm cool with that.
While I agree that this thread should not be seen to contribute to the current situation in Japan, This does not invalidate the topic, what would have been the response to the same topic if there were no nuclear power disaster in the world at this time? I feel that this topic is well worth discussion, just DO NOT associate it with the current events.
I agree that we shouldn't take this crisis lightly, but we shouldn't be tearing each other up either. I almost cried when i saw some of those poor people having their entire livelihood ripped right out of their hands...But now isn't the time to weep. It is time for them to roll up their sleeves and do what they do best. The Japanese people have always amazed me by how calm and thoughtful they stay after a disaster. They didn't push and shove and they didn't start looting or killing one another. They have managed to rebuild so many times and this will be no exception.... If you guys really want to help, why not donate some money or volunteer some time?
@Martin...BTW, My real name is Bryant Harrison Saunders Jr:)
At the risk of irritating some forum members out there, I've taken the liberty to do some rough calculations on performing boric acid ice drops from a C-17. My apologies if this is rubbing more salt into the wounds.
Maximum payload of the C-17 is 170,900 lbs.
1 gallon of water weighs about 8.5 pounds.
170900/8.5 = 20105 gallons.
Each helicopter load is 2000 gallons of water.
So each C-17 could deliver 10 helicopter loads in one shot.
But let's just say a single C-17 can deliver only half that much because of space constraints, or 5 helicopter loads per airplane. Maybe that's not so much.
But consider this: with a guidance package like a JDAM, those columns of ice could land inside those buildings with maybe 90% accuracy. The helicopter water drops, on the other hand, seem to be scattered far and wide by the wind. Line up 10 C-17's in a row and bomb the reactors with ice and maybe it would buy people enough time to rush inside the buildings and set up some proper cooling equipment.
Again, my sincere apologies for making such a heartless suggestion.
Not to get to fare OT but it is related.
Then the last person leaving could turn on the water...
-dan
That's a pretty good idea. But had they been thinking that far ahead, maybe they would have never built reactors that close to earthquake zones to start with. I think the industry's attitude toward meltdowns was: don't worry about them, they will never happen. And I'm sure the new attitude will be: don't worry about them, with our latest designs that could never happen.
I'm guessing that the ice could be engineered with components to make it less like glass and more like gelatin, and if shaped in a long column, it could be equipped with a rubbery nose cone. In any case, I doubt the mechanical scatter of radioactive debris would compare to the heat-driven air-injecting mechanisms going on right now. And major damage to the reactor, etc. has already happened so I presume it's a semi-melted heap of metal at this point.
Back in the Gulf War circa 1991, the US did not have any "bunker buster" bombs to start with. IIRC, a few people within the span of a few weeks, cobbled together some kind of naval canon, packed it end to end with explosives, bolted onto its tail an off-the-shelf guidance package, and used a very simple shock switch to detonate it when it came to a halt within the ground. It seems to me some sort of ice bomb or water bag system could be kluged together now to give those ground workers some sort of a chance. I'm guessing the flight dynamics of a naval canon and an ice column are roughly the same, tweaked for density, of course.
Humanoido.... what can I say? You never disappoint me with your flights of.... of... (give me a moment, I'm still trying to find the word)...
The Japanese have always been fascinated by robots and no doubt this disaster is going to make interest in such technologies grow like never before.
What you're doing is very interesting. As my first project with the Propeller, I built a PMT coincidence counter a couple years ago for photon counting purposes, thanks to the help of so many people on this forum. I think the parallel processing helps a lot with this sort of application. After/during this ongoing tragedy, many people are going to want to make their own radiation detectors. Please consider starting a blog detailing your efforts, and there are a lot of people on here who can help you if and when you get stuck on a problem.
http://www.seeedstudio.com/blog/2011/03/16/radiation-detector-help-needed/
http://www.amazon.com/Radiation-Detection-Measurement-Glenn-Knoll/dp/0471073385
Another good text that is free and is downloadable can be found here. There are several different types of detectors and instruments. This text only deals with a handful of them.
http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/n/n1/panda/index.shtml
I can see using the propeller in detection instrumentation such as signal processing, automated scanners, human interface, remote detectors, GPS apps, etc.
I don’t think I could use a propeller to stop these reactors at this point but I could use one to help mitigate the effects of the disaster.