Cheap, Simple, Small, Safe Nuclear Power...

Molten-salt fission reactor technology sounds compelling to me, the more so every new time I read about it.  In a rational world (that would be some other planet, most likely in some other space-time continuum), environmentalists would be demanding the use of technology like this in place of coal- or gas-fired electrical generation.  I've only seen them railing in mostly mindless opposition, though...

Power Excitement...

We had a bit of an unusual occurrence here today: SDG&E needed to replace a utility pole, and they did it with a helicopter.  The pole in question was an old wooden pole carrying a “pole pig” (one of the big, cylindrical things you see on lots of poles out in the sticks; the things weigh about 250 pounds).  This particular one supplies the 120VAC to my neighbor's house, but it's actually located within our property line (on an SDG&E easement) – but nowhere near any roads.  It is a hard-to-access piece of dense chaparral.  The SDG&E workers could barely hike to the old pole; they weren't too excited at the thought of carting a new one up there, with a new pole pig, and then hauling the old pole pig out.

You can see them working on the first step above right: they're disconnecting the old pole pig.  After they did that, they lowered it to the ground.  But they didn't start on this until they'd disconnected power from my neighbor's house – and unfortunately for us, that meant our power went off as well.  Apparently they had already dug the hole for the new pole, because just after they finished this step, they started the fun part with the helicopter.  At left you can see the helicopter “parked” and being rigged up to the new steel pole.  This is about a quarter mile from my house.  The bottom of the new pole is toward the right side of the photo, with some men working on it.  In the background, between the helicopter and the pole, you can see the new pole pig all ready to be hauled up there.  A little to the left of that, you can see a red gadget of some kind.  I only figured out what that was after watching them work.  Once the helicopter had dropped the new pole into the hole, the pilot dipped it a few feet to put some slack in the cable holding the pole, then triggered something that caused that red gadget to disconnect from the pole.  It was very slick; just left a loop of cable attached to the pole, and the helicopter was free to depart.

Once the pole was all rigged to the helicopter, I walked back up to my yard to watch the action.  Shortly after I got back, the helicopter roared up from where it was parked, dangling the big steel pole beneath it (at right).  On the way to the new pole's location, they went right over my head, about 50 feet above me.  This was mildly disconcerting :-)

Then the pilot swooped over and down, and dropped it right in the hole with a minimum of fuss (at left).  A couple of men on the ground guided it in, but the pilot was darned close right from the start.  I clocked it: it was 2 minutes, 40 seconds from the time the pilot flew over my head until the time he disconnected from the pole and left.

Once the pole was in the ground, there was still more work for the helicopter.  The next step was to haul that nice, shiny new pole pig up to the new pole to install it.  After that, the helicopter hauled the old pole pig back down to the SDG&E trucks.  Then the helicopter's work was done, and the pilot flew off into the sunset.  Well, not really, but you know what I mean.  Speaking of the pilot, in the photo below (taken as he was lowering the pole) you can see him leaning quite a long way out of his window.  This is all so he could see directly below him.  If you know anything about flying a helicopter, you'll know that it takes two hands to fly one: on your left is the collective, and between your legs is the cyclic.  To hover generally takes constant manipulation of both.  It's a mystery to me how that pilot was able to fly while hanging halfway out the cockpit window!

But the rest of the SDG&E crew wasn't nearly finished yet.  They had to move all the wires (both power and telephone) from the old pole to the new one.  Then they had to connect the new pole pig.  Finally, last step: they had to go back to a different pole (this one was reachable by truck) and reconnect power to my neighbor and us.  Total time for the job: 5 hours, 34 minutes. 

One more mystery remains for me.  The crew was up on the new pole working away within a few minutes of the helicopter dropping it off.  Normally for a pole like that you'd need some concrete poured around it – and you'd have to wait for it to cure.  No waiting here!  I'm wondering what magic they used to make that pole safe and secure in such a hurry...

Computing Trend...

The graph at right (click to enlarge) shows computations/kilowatt-hour on the vertical axis (logarithmic), and time on the horizontal.  When I got started in computing, one could do about 10 million (10^7) computations with a kilowatt-hour of power.  Today one can do about 1 quadrillion (10^15) computations with that same power.  In other words, one can do 100 million (10^8) times as many computations today for a given amount of power as could be done in 1970.  100 million!

This trend shows no signs of slowing down, much less stopping.  Feynman's calculation of theoretical limits, so many years ago, says that we've just scratched the surface.  The theory and the track record both lend credence to the trend continuing for a long time – and that leads to some interesting things...

Piss Power...

This reminds me strongly of an episode in Neil Stephenson's trilogy...

Kissinger, Now and Then...

I just finished reading this adaptation from Henry Kissinger's upcoming book, On China.  I have several independent reactions to it, but to understand them, you'll need a bit of context. 

Kissinger has had a huge and quite direct impact on my life.  I was in the U.S. Navy from '71 through '77, which includes the tail end of the Vietnam War, Nixon's famous visit to China, and Nixon's ignomious resignation.  The photo at right is from '76, and that visage is how I remember him.  Kissinger played an important role in all three of these events, but to me personally the most important role of his was in the “peace negotiations” with the North Vietnamese.

Probably more than any other event in my youth, this awakened my interest in politics and history.  Contemporaneously, very little was publicized about the inner workings of those negotiations; it took decades for it all to leak out.  My image of Kissinger is of an extremely bright, motivated, and sincere man – but capable of arrogance and ruthlessness even on large issues that affect millions of people.  His advocacy of Realpolitik I found profoundly un-American.  He frightened me when he was in power.

One reaction I had to reading the adaptation is that it reads a bit like an insider's historical account, and even if only for that reason I will read the book.  I don't know enough about modern China to assess his thoughts about it. 

Another reaction I had is a superficial one: to his contemporaneous photograph.  I haven't seen a photo of him for quite some time, so I was surprised and shocked by how much he has aged.  In the '70s, he was often seen with a beautiful woman on his arm, generally much younger than he.  His most famous quote (“Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac”) seemed quite consistent with his public persona.  He's now nearly 90 years old, so I really shouldn't have been surprised by the photo.  But I was.

The last reaction I had was to be a bit surprised at myself, mainly for not having thought about Dr. Henry Kissinger for quite a long time.  In the '70s and '80s, he and Zbigniew Brzezinski were frequent targets of my reading and thinking.  Other than as historical figures (!), neither has been top-of-mind for many years. 

Power and influence are fleeting things, usually...

Obama Announces Reactor Financing...

Obama is now supporting power generation by nuclear power plants.  Not said in this article (though it's certainly implied by the jobs timetable): whether he's also going to direct his Department of Energy to fast-track the plant's licensing.  This is quite a turnaround in Obama's green positioning, and it's sure to piss off some of this greenie friends...