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Heard an interview with Michael Lewis, author of the Big Short and MoneyBall on Preet's podcast. His newest book, The Fifth Risk, is about the Trump administrations incompetence. In the interview he mentioned the process of transition with teams of people from the Obama administration that they could catch them up on logistics and such. The day they were supposed to come no one showed up. This administration will be the poster child of how not to run government, and how an unethical, incurious, eglomanic leader attracts sycophants that share the bad traits. While Mueller's team is the opposite: loyal out of duty and respect, which allow them to have a well oiled leakproof machine.
It's a paragraph from The Fifth Risk by Michael Lewis. He's the same author who wrote The Big Short, Moneyball, Liars Poker, The Blind Side and more. I've read most of his books and enjoyed all of them so far.
That quote is from The Fifth Risk by Michael Lewis. It's a book specifically about the Trump transition team and the people he put in charge, or didn't bother putting in charge of different government agencies.
There is no inherent risk of keeping your AC on during hot days, that is what its for. The problem is when all the houses on the block crank the AC as low as it goes the electrical distribution network is going to struggle to keep up. Recommend this book if you would like to know more about the electrical grid.
Have you checked out the Absent Superpower? It's a playbook from 2010 to 2030 that explains a lot of what's going on and could potentially happen in the future.
Basically, it says that they don't. Instead, they focus on amplifying a proxy war in the middle east that disrupts fuel supply to the entire IndoChinese region and destabilizes global fuel reserves.
Super interesting opinions in there.
I'm currently reading The Grid by Gretchen Bakke, which goes into a lot of detail about our energy infrastructure and why the transition to renewables is wayyy more complicated and difficult than you might think. Would recommend!
History of a Tragedy is a great read for impact, but I really loved Manual for Survival: A Chernobyl Guide to the Future. At least I’d recommend starting here, there’s more but you need a starting foundation.
You should think about it more. Read the book (which came out before the Pandemic by the way) and then make a judgement call.
Be well.
For less messy amazon links you can extract the part after "/dp/" in
and make it:
BEEP BOP
Plz send any recommendations via PM
You are right about aiding the recovery, but you're cherry picking.
America was complicit and/or directly caused genocide in several major East and South East Asian nations. Furthermore, they helped create the current disputes in the ECS and SCS.
Aiding recovery wasn't some act of benevolence. It was a geopolitical move. Money in exchange for military control. Look at NATO and Asian military bases. One corners Russia and the Middle East. The other corners China.
Coincidence? Probably not...
http://www.amazon.com/Full-Spectrum-Dominance-Totalitarian-Democracy/dp/398132630X/
I can understand that sentiment. So let me clarify the context of the comment.
We were discussing the threat in terms of physical military attack. In that context the type of redundancy we are talking about (multiple feeds to each substation) is relevant and helpful to the resiliency of the grid as a whole under physical attack.
Now, the problems with the grid that you discuss are different on each case, so I'd like to share some thoughts on each of the examples you present.
- Texas's grid failed specifically because the combined cycle gas plants were not designed to operate at that temperature. There were some failures of transmission lines that were not designed for the ice conditions as well. Can't be redundant when all systems fail. This failure is a political one, in that the technocrats knew this was a problem a full decade before this disaster. It is also a problem that can be solved with appropriate investment.
- All but a few thousand customers had power back in 2 weeks. My opinion is that this is an incredible feat of engineering and resiliency, but you are certainly entitled to think that a 99.7% reliability rate is unacceptable.
- PREPA is a mess.
If you're interested in learning more about the grid I recommend the book below.
That's why, although I applaud the decision, I'm cautious in my optimism. Nuclear should never be rushed, especially in places that already have a tendency for rushing.
And because in our industry we are so hostage of each other, the last thing we need is another Fukushima.
“No one saw the war in Ukraine several months back.” Peter Zeihan wrote about the Ukraine war, in substantial detail, 5 years ago.
Russia’s demographics compel them act now to re-establish their historic borders, now or never. Uncanny accuracy, the guy knows his stuff. Though the Ukrainians have vastly over-achieved versus his expectations.
Zeihan’s newsletter - free - has regular updates on geopolitics, and he has a new book coming out next week.
You're absolutely correct. It was quite literally a shitshow, perfect example of a kakistocracy. I had read this book earlier in 2019, about what happens when the people in charge don't know/care how systems are supposed to work.
It was bad enough with idiots and grifters at the helm, then they politicized it.
Pas de découverte en science "fondamentale", et encore moins en lien avec la fusion.
Par contre, ça a forcé à développer des domaines jusqu'alors négligés: facteurs organisationnels et humains, interface homme-machine, études probabilistes. (pour aller plus loin)
Je te laisse juger si c'est une "découverte importante" que (alors que Fukushima en a poussé beaucoup à se passer du nucléaire pour lutter contre le changement climatique), il a fallu TMI, Chernobyl puis Fukushima pour que l'OMS "découvre" que, si ça se trouve: "c'est pas l'impact des radiations qui fait le plus de mal"
Oui, moi aussi j'aurais peur d'un retour de balancier avec un optimisme aveugle et les maires et communes se battant entre elles pour accueillir des centrales.
Pour ce qui est de la France, on a L'ASN qui sait rester très froide même face à EDF ou les gouvernements, c'est pas des sondages d'opinion qui influenceront leur décisions (parfois au grand dam de certains, comme lorsqu'ils jugent fessenheim bon pour le service).
D'autre part, le nucléaire a ceci de particulier, le principe de "otages les uns des autres". Qui est très fort et pousse à une surveillance mutuelle qu'il serait souhaitable de répliquer dans beaucoup de domaine.
> gérés par des boites différentes et en concurrence. Mécaniquement les risques d'erreurs humaines vont augmenter.
Aux US aussi, entre autres, il ya plein de concepteur et plein d'exploitants différents. TMI a mis ce point en exergue, depuis, c'est pas certain que le modèle centraliser est forcément mieux.
Est-ce que Trabant était moins human-error-proof, que Volvo+Peugeot+BMW+... ?
Pour ce qui est de l'erreur humaine, le côté "passif" est quasi imposé pour les SMR. Ca veut aussi dire idiot-proof.
> Donc c'est particulièrement con pour le marché FR.
Oui, mais si c'est les seuls que l'électorat est près à envisager de construire ...
> Le manque de transparence de l'industrie nucléaire, ce n'est pas de la science dure.
Tu apprécieras sûrement une étude de Stanford qui, après les crises financières, a regardé les problèmes de transparence, gestion du risque et regulatory capture entre le nucléaire et la finance.
Ca cite entre autre un bouquin: "Hostage of each other".
TL;PL: aucune rafinerie Total n'a fermé à cause d'une fuite chez BP; aucune usine Honda n'a fermé après un scandale chez Peugot, aucun projet Gasprom n'a été abandonné à cause d'AZF. Le nucléaire est la seule industrie ou un accident au Japon fait abandonner une industrie entière d'un coup de crayon à des pays à l'autre bout de la planète. Les industriels en sont très conscient (un peu depuis TMI, surtout après Chernobyl) et se surveillent mutuellement, mais bien sûr, tu n'entendras jamais parler aux info de WANO, INPO, EPRI, WENRA, etc.
On en regrette presque que les autres industries ne soient pas logées à la même enseigne.
Transmission Line Engineer here, The Grid is a great read if you're interested in learning more about the U.S. Electrical Infrastructure
I understand if you don't trust trump so I'll use Obama. Under Obama's EPA, there were no environment fuck ups by the fracking industry.
The other evidence I'll give is that it is more economical now for companies to use/reuse their own water rather than the ground water. Ground water can have anything in it where as their own water is the right composition they want.
Lastly, a lot of fracking companies have moved to using only chemicals useable in food. The reason they do this is for PR and because it turns out the food industry has a lot of the chemicals they need.
Now if you think the EPA is just not doing its job, do you have some source that shows frackers are poisoning places?
This is a great comment. The average person has very little understanding of all the things government does. Many get executed so well people take them for granted.
The premise of this book
https://www.amazon.com/Fifth-Risk-Michael-Lewis/dp/1324002646
Is that people can only think of 4 disasters off the top of thrir head before they need to start really thinking about it and is why government is so important in considering other things that may take place 30 years down the line.
As an example there was a nuclear storage site leaking waste into the ground water and slowly working it's way to a major river. The clean up came in like 15 years ahead of schedule and hundreds of millions under budget and hardly anyone heard a thing about it.
You should realize the problem pretty much goes all the way to the top.
https://www.amazon.com/Fifth-Risk-Michael-Lewis/dp/1324002646/ref=nodl_
This lack of ability to handle the pandemic is well characterized as the fifth risk. Local governments are not as capable of pandemic responses and we neutered ourselves a few years ago by cutting the pandemic response team. We did this to ourselves by choosing a poor president whose initiative was to allow government to rust.
The world is changing in ways most of us find incomprehensible. Terrorism spills out of the Middle East into Europe. Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, China and Japan vie to see who can be most aggressive. Financial breakdown in Asia and Europe guts growth, challenging hard-won political stability.
Yet for the Americans, these changes are fantastic. Alone among the world's powers, only the United States is geographically wealthy, demographically robust, and energy secure. That last piece -- American energy security -- is rapidly emerging as the most critical piece of the global picture.
The American shale revolution does more than sever the largest of the remaining ties that bind America's fate to the wider world. It re-industrializes the United States, accelerates the global order's breakdown, and triggers a series of wide ranging military conflicts that will shape the next two decades. The common theme? Just as the global economy tips into chaos, just as global energy becomes dangerous, just as the world really needs the Americans to be engaged, the United States will be...absent.
In 2014's The Accidental Superpower, geopolitical strategist Peter Zeihan made the case that geographic, demographic and energy trends were unravelling the global system. Zeihan takes the story a step further in The Absent Superpower, mapping out the threats and opportunities as the world descends into Disorder.
This has happened in every major agency throughout the US. All those nerds in offices working tirelessly for decades to make sure the problems they grapple with never come to your attention? They're all gone.
See The Fifth Risk by Michael Lewis. This book describes in great detail many of the hugely important things the government does that just aren't happening since Trump evicted all the scientists. You know how someone out there is supposed to be making sure the power grid stays operational, the nuclear arsenal doesn't have a nuclear accident, a pandemic doesn't reach our shores, and that you get advance warning if severe weather is on the way? Those people are mostly gone, or have been otherwise hamstrung by Trump himself.
If you think that a legislator who hired and employed Gregory Jaczko—an admitted nuclear saboteur—is giving nuclear a fair shot, then may I suggest you're being insufficiently cynical.
Similarly, if you think a politician is being fair to nuclear simply because they say they are, then you are being credulous.
Finally, if you believe that Sen Markey is going to do more to reduce carbon emissions that Joe Kennedy, I welcome you to show me the evidence.
Because the industry self regulates and does it badly, there is also the cost of dealing with waste that lies with the government. Great book about these issues: https://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Nuclear-Regulator-Gregory-Jaczko/dp/1476755760
https://www.amazon.com/Fifth-Risk-Michael-Lewis/dp/1324002646
This is a really good book by the author of Moneyball, The Big Short, Liar's Poker and others. It details just how different the incoming Trump Administration was from the prior Obama and Bush Administrations, and how dangerous that level of incompetence continues to be.
I should have recommended The Absent Superpower The Shale Revolution and a World Without America, which after 4 minutes of watching this is inline with the video.
You misunderstand what peak demand means. Peak demand is simply the time of greatest electricity usage. So it is when the usage reaches a maximum. For a source I will simply reference logic. If demand is not always constant then there will be times of lesser and greater usage. The time of greatest usage is the peak. If you want to learn more about what peak demand is and why it is important go read this book -> https://www.amazon.com/Grid-Fraying-Between-Americans-Energy/dp/1608196100