Re: Chernobyl " population will continue to slide toward extinction "

["Christoph Hofmeyr" <Christoph_Hofmeyr@nnr.co.za>]

RADSAFERS,

Somehow this theme has taken the more interesting sidetrack of the great

CO2 debate.  Ted is right,   "There is no point in debating this - someone

somewhere MUST know the numbers!!".

I have a slightly dated summary, which should get the order of magnitude

right. The big energy moguls have defined  a rather large unit 1Q = 10^21

Joule.  Solar insolation is pretty abundant:  14Q hits the earth per day.

Worldwide energy consumption is only 0.3Q approx per year (OK, that was 20

years ago, so let us presume 0.5Q).  That is rather insignificant (one

ten-thousandth). So the whole debate actually turns around a balance.  If

the earth does not get rid of the 14Q (plus the radioactive decay heat

(figure?)) per day, it would tend to heat up, and the so-called greenhouse

gases like CO2 and methane (actually orders more effective) and others come

into play, upsetting the very fine balance just a bit.  That is

(human-assisted) global warming by SOLAR (sorry, Greens).  Other

interesting stats: total estimated coal reserves worldwide were given as

300Q, oil only 12Q.  If used in inefficient thermal reactors (the present

types) one million tonnes of U3O8 is apparently good for only 1Q!

Chris Hofmeyr

chofmeyr@nnr.co.za



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