vxbush 7/30/2026 6:00:55 AM

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vxbush 7/30/2026 6:16:18 AM

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vxbush 7/30/2026 6:23:06 AM

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This came out almost a week ago, but I don't recall seeing it anywhere: 356 billion short tons [of coal --vxb] in the lower 48, led by Wyoming, and at least 140 billion short tons in Alaska – enough to last 600 years

This is based on "current rate of consumption", which is probably lower than it would have been because of a fixation on wind farms and solar panels. So we need to see a recalculation of how long it would last if both those technologies went kaput.

JCM 7/30/2026 7:20:52 AM

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Reposting... 'cause I think it important.

AI Book Burning? Companies Are Destroying Millions of Books to Feed Chatbots

In brief

AI companies are anonymously buying physical books in bulk and destroying them after scanning them for AI training.

Booksellers say demand for obscure and out-of-print titles has surged, raising fears that rare books are disappearing.

A federal judge ruled that destructive scanning of legally purchased books can qualify as fair use, even as separate copyright litigation continues.

After the only source for a text is AI, who validates the accuracy of the digitized text?

Orwell looms large!

JCM 7/30/2026 7:30:35 AM

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Reply to vxbush in 3:

Eat coal dust Erlich.

250 + years of oil, peak oil my ass.

130 + years of recoverable natural gas, I lot more as technology improves, another 100 years offshore.

What do we have the "least" off? The minerals that go into solar.

Uranium for reactors is also measured in decades.

If we could put the envirowhackos to work in the mines we'd have more.

JCM 7/30/2026 7:39:48 AM

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Reply to JCM in 5:

There is no renewable energy, wind, solar, water power all require tools to collect. Those tools are all mined at the source. The fiberglass in a wind turbine blade? Oil based. The solar cell? Silicon and rare earth. Dams, tons of minerals, gravel and metal.

Renewable is snake oil.

JCM 7/30/2026 7:47:32 AM

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Reply to JCM in 5:

Thorium? A millennium. 

We know how to do thorium. Thorium reactors are fail safe.

Any talk about energy that does not include thorium... is not serious.

Bottom line, scarcity means control.

vxbush 7/30/2026 8:18:15 AM

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In #4 JCM said: AI Book Burning? Companies Are Destroying Millions of Books to Feed Chatbots

Yes, this is Orwell on steroids. Imagine what he could have written if he had known.

Kosh's Shadow 7/30/2026 8:23:11 AM

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I remember when "nuclear engineer" Jimmy Carter canceled the breeder reactor program. That was shortly after I was in a summer program at Argonne National Lab, and one of the tours was of a test reactor for the breeder reactor program. ZPR-9 (Zero Power Reactor)

It was small - maybe 3-5' diameter or so and had a grid to allow testing different fuel rod layouts. Top was open and I was fairly close to it.

But I never glowed in the dark, nor, unfortunately, did it give me super powers./

JCM 7/30/2026 8:37:38 AM

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When I was at UW Seattle... there was a anti-nuke protest. I asked them why they were protesting at the NUCLEAR REACTOR?

What reactor?

The reactor in that glass building next the Student building! You can look in and see the concrete blocks around the reactor.

Off they went.

vxbush 7/30/2026 8:53:07 AM

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In #9 Kosh's Shadow said: But I never glowed in the dark, nor, unfortunately, did it give me super powers./

You just need to put a few spiders around that reactor, and let one bite you. Problem solved. 

vxbush 7/30/2026 8:53:51 AM

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In #10 JCM said: When I was at UW Seattle... there was a anti-nuke protest. I asked them why they were protesting at the NUCLEAR REACTOR? What reactor? The reactor in that glass building next the Student building! You can look in and see the concrete blocks around the reactor. Off they went.

ROTFLMAO. Oh, I love this level of stupidity. 

JCM 7/30/2026 8:55:05 AM

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Reply to vxbush in 8:

It is the Memory Hole becoming reality.

No, permeant physical source, all digital, all capable of being instantly updated to the new version of events.

Kosh's Shadow 7/30/2026 10:11:20 AM

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Reply to JCM in 10:

I remember anti-nuke protesters at a college, at a granite building.

Granite contains radium or some radiactive material.

When I was in the Argonne program, some people had dosimeters that you could read (everyone at the accelerator had a film badge but those had to be read in a lab)

The dosimeter would show more exposure in the granite dorm that person was staying in than from the accelerator.

JCM 7/30/2026 10:17:26 AM

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Reply to Kosh's Shadow in 14:

During a radiation incident training course at my fire dept. We found the peanut butter in the kitchen before the hidden radiation source we were supposed to.

vxbush 7/30/2026 10:33:41 AM

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In #15 JCM said: During a radiation incident training course at my fire dept. We found the peanut butter in the kitchen before the hidden radiation source we were supposed to.

You just have to love how the media has done a fabulous job at keeping us stupid. I'm imagining some 20-something news reporter from a local TV station hearing that story and freaking out.  🙄

Kosh's Shadow 7/30/2026 10:49:08 AM

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Reply to JCM in 15:

The whole radon problem was found because of a nuclear power plant worker who set off the radiation detectors on his way IN. His house had high levels of radon.