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Alva Press, Inc.
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Sunday, May 2, 2010
Muddling through Our Energy Priorities
It's so difficult keeping the priorities straight. Let's see:
If we burn coal, wood, and oil, we pollute the air.
Wind, water, solar, and geothermal power are clean, but we need more.
Nuclear power is temporarily clean(er?) until we try to figure out what
to do with the spent nuclear fuel (SNF).
(Yucca Mountain is off limits---full.
Do I want it in my
backyard? No. How about your backyard. Hmm.
Now some nuclear isotopes are not radioactive, but the half life of
the radioactive isotope U-233 is 160,000 years and its long term activity curve is about a million years. How many
generations is that?
If we must, I think I'd rather you keep it in your backyard.)
Oh. Now I got it.
We chug along with coal, wood, and oil and just stop building nuclear power plants until we can develop more clean energy.
Sounds good!
Until Obama okays off-shore drilling in the Atlantic. Hmm.
And then the news
arrives that the U. S. Coast Guard is putting out oil-absorbent containment booms and doing a controlled burn
to take care of the 42,000 gallons of oil spewing forth daily from the site of the wrecked oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico
as the pelicans do their dance of death to avoid the crude oil slick that laps the shores from the Mississippi Delta
and Louisiana to Florida.
The question is complex and probably easier to decide on the basis of emotions and
immediate personal priorities than on reason.
Nonetheless, for now, I'm hoping that no off-shore drilling
is begun in the Atlantic; that Vermont Yankee actually does close completely; and that no new nuclear plants
are being proposed or built.
Meantime, let's: celebrate the proposal for a new water-powered power plant in
Middlebury, VT; thank the citizens of Cape Cod, Nantucket, and Martha's Vineyard for learning to live with wind turbines;
and join me as I replace my light bulbs with the more energy efficient curly kind.
RMR
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Roberta M. Roy incorporated Alva Press www.alvapressinc.com on October 5, 2004. The express purpose of Alva Press, Inc., was to ensure a safe venue for
the publication of her works and those with similar focus. As such, upon the completion of the science
fiction novel Jolt: a rural noir, Alva would immediately publish it. Further Alva Press, Inc., would offer a
venue for Roy to publish her children's books, including Yell'n'Tell. (At this point Yell'n'Tell needs
only design as the watercolor illustrations by Dan Dyen are complete and the text fully edited. But then there is also Wedding
Ready, complete, but in need of an illustrator talented in the art of drawing forest animals. But all that anon.)
Currently, until the soft cover version of Jolt's Library of Congress Number
is in, Jolt waits to go to press. Usually the LCN takes but a few days after which will become available in hard cover
at $24.95 and Trade paper at $14.95 (plus $5.50 mailing).
Jolt
was some five years in the writing; its research took longer. It's scientific basis for nuclear survival has been
carefully reviewed by oncologists and experts in the effects of ionizing radiation for accuracy of representation. Jolt
is a fast-paced novel that spans two years in the lives of a group of diverse urban, suburban, and rural residents brought
together in an imaginary part of the northern United States. There in Locklee, the small town to which those who are forced
emigrants flee, they become mutually caught up in the necessities associated with post-nuclear survival.
Check www.alvapressinc.com for a more thorough review of Jolt as well as the most recent updates on its publication
and availability. And should you be so inclined and care to help defray the last payment of its first printing, a check
in the mail to Alva Press for your very own pre-publication autographed copy of Jolt: a rural noir would be a
great help.
Thinking of self-publishing? Emergency response? Send your questions, comments or ideas to RobertaMRoy@alvapressinc.com With your permission, we may choose
to publish on this web site, questions posed of particular interest to the community with your or our
answers. |
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If you
haven't ordered your prepublication copy of Jolt: a rural noir, now is the time to do. Go to www.alvapressinc.com
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1) If you walk out uninjured from a nuclear event, you probably will survive. 2)
The
bywords to survival from
a nuclear event are TDS: Time,
Distance, Shielding. 3) Use regular soap and water to decontaminate from fallout.Strip and shower or cleanse as best you can. Use bread. 4) Nuclear fallout contaminates open water and plants.If there is fallout (ashes),use bottled water and canned goods. 5) Babies as well as adults can take Potassium Iodide (KI) to protectthe thyroid against ionizing radiation. 6) There is no plume with a nuclear power plant meltdown. 7) A large event may seem ‘over there’ if you can’t define its impact.Ionizing radiation is invisible. 8) A family needs an escape plan. 9) A community can respond as a team to mass events. 10) After a mass event, a communitymay heal changed but well.
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Alva Press, Inc., PO Box 2089, Poughkeepsie, New York, USA Telephone (919) 239-3791 Phone/Fax (845) 454-5200
http://alvapressinc.com/id50.html
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