Relation between Nuclear deal & Crude oil price!

[Ulf Dittmer]

Tell me one thing, if we trace how any or all the nukes were built, can you with conviction claim there was no proliferation involved.

Why would I claim that? Of course there was proliferation. That doesn't mean that the world should not try to stop it. The NPT is a useful means to this end.

As for the bolded part, can you tell what part of the thread do you think is false?

The part where you state that "we all know that nuclear non proliferation does not exist", and then go on to explain that "we" means everybody reading this thread. I do not know that, so this statement is false.

I suppose you could now state that what you meant was "0% proliferation" -which I granted above did no exist-, but the term "nonproliferation" is most often used to mean all such efforts. Such efforts do exist, and they do contain the spreading of nuclear material and technology. Furthermore, the cases you mention would have been (or were) illegal under the NPT. So it's possible that both of us have been saying the same thing.

[Devesh H Rao]

Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:


Why would I claim that? Of course there was proliferation. That doesn't mean that the world should not try to stop it. The NPT is a useful means to this end.

Some countries are allowed to hold onto their stockpile of arsenal, how is that in principle right. That list contains countries which are known prolifirators how is that in principle right. India faces(or has faced) teritorial aggression from countries allowed to keep nukes under NPT while we are supposed to do away with them, how is that in principle right.

If NPT was complete disarmament and was proposed to do away with all nukes, i do not think indians would have a problem with it.

Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:


The part where you state that "we all know that nuclear non proliferation does not exist", and then go on to explain that "we" means everybody reading this thread. I do not know that, so this statement is false.

Fine, i will not debate on semantics, so my statement is false.

Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:


I suppose you could now state that what you meant was "0% proliferation" -which I granted above did no exist-, but the term "nonproliferation" is most often used to mean all such efforts. Such efforts do exist, and they do contain the spreading of nuclear material and technology

I would state no such thing, the point being you saw my pov and I see your pov and it suffices my interest.

Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:

Furthermore, the cases you mention would have been (or were) illegal under the NPT. So it's possible that both of us have been saying the same thing.

So how come NPT is not retrospective and only is in effect for parties post 1968

Not wanting to get into if�s and buts, from India�s point of view, NPT is not robust enough to cover our security needs and I hope our politicians do not sell out and sign NPT in the present format sometime in the near future.

India has a voluntary moratorium on further testing and I think that suffices concerns, If it is a matter of trust and countries say we do not trust India�s voluntary moratorium, they anyways would not trust us even if we signed the NPT so it does not make a difference either ways.

[Ulf Dittmer]

I don't think there's a lack of trust (apart from the fact that the IAEA doesn't trust any country, by default), nor do I think that the objections are anyway about India in particular (which after all is a more stable and transparent country than some other nuclear powers).
The question is more about how the world community should deal with proliferation, and consensus had it that the NPT was the way to do that. If now the USA is in effect saying it's OK to do nuclear business with a non-signatory country, that substantially weakens its moral position to pursue non-compliance with signatory countries like Iran and North Korea who can now rightly wonder what value that treaty still has. According to today's news, that's how Australia (and possibly other countries) sees it as well.

As an aside, I doubt that India would be required to give up nuclear weapons if it were to join the NPT; so I'm not sure how that would substantially impact the country's security.

[Devesh H Rao]

Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:
As an aside, I doubt that India would be required to give up nuclear weapons if it were to join the NPT; so I'm not sure how that would substantially impact the country's security.

Only the 5 countries(US,UK,France,China, USSR(and now Russia)) which were declared nuclear power when NPT was drafted in 1968 can continue holding nukes, the rest of the countries have to disarm under the treaty.
[ September 08, 2008: Message edited by: Devesh H Rao ]

[Ulf Dittmer]

Yes, I know. I nonetheless think India wouldn't be required to give them up if it were to negotiate entry into the NPT. I think that from the viewpoint of the world community it would be more desirable to have an IAEA-monitored nuclear India within the NPT than to circumvent the NPT like is happening now.

[Devesh H Rao]

Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:
According to today's news, that's how Australia (and possibly other countries) sees it as well.
.

I think we have not had differences with aussies, unless when they beat us at cricket .

Not selling uranium is a purely political decision (they sell to the chinese don't they, so you would not want to antagonize a client by selling to a military rival do you).

Uranium is anyways a stop gap option, thorium based FBR's is what india would be aiming for and the waiver from NSG is for nuclear commerce and commerce is two ways. Till now we could not buy anything from the world market but at the same time could not sell as well.

Not being able to sell was not an issue till now as indian's did not have anything to show for the window shopper's. FBR's should change that opinion and that is when the NSG waiver fall in place. I appreciate it more because it gives us the ability to sell (by the way thorium based plants are cleaner than the others) rather than buy.

[Mandar Khire]

Accepted that nuclear power is not bad compare to ecological destruction by coal burning; however as & when non conventional energy like solar/wind/etc can be captured on practical & economical grounds,creation of nuclear energy which is having potential of huge hazards & wars(weapons),be slowly or rapidly decreased.
However, it's true that due to availability of energy from sources other than oil,in large quantity, oil prices are bound to fall. Hence there must be such relation between nuclear power generation & oil prices.But i do not agree with the option that global population will decrease due to plague or war. It may happen due to natural hazards like earthquakes/floods/ets.
Also, there are many occasions when rise/fall of stock prices is artificial & not as per actual demand & supply, therefore, we cannot conclude that whatever rise/fall is observed, it is due to actual demand/supply chain(eg, about 120$-150$)
We should find a way to compare various types of energy consumption like oil/coal/nuclear/hydro/solar/wind/etc on same platform/ground base on certain weight age to affecting factors like cost/natural availability(quantity)/cost required to alter present energy consumption systems(like vehicles, cooking foods etc) & feasibility.
What i wanted to stress that there must be some some relation in nuclear power generation & oil prices, but since i am not aware about all factors affecting, as regards to cost & quantities on practical ground, i could not say anything firmly i, therefore, choosen to use this forum.
I expect to get way out for comparison between all sorts of energy related to present consumptions & it's total availability along with cost factor. There is no need to deviate from basic purpose by means of unwanted discussions on population growth/Chernobyl/proliferation etc.
Apart from intricacies involved in nuclear deals & such deviations, may i expect to evolve certain method to comparing various energy sources on same practical ground, scientifically?

[Pat Farrell]

Originally posted by Mandar Khire:
Accepted that nuclear power is not bad compare to ecological destruction by coal burning;

therefore, we cannot conclude that whatever rise/fall is observed, it is due to actual demand/supply chain(eg, about 120$-150$)

Agree, coal is bad in so many ways. Burning it is bad, mining it may be worse.

Current price of oil, at 1610 Eastern US time is

Dated Brent Spot$101.46

well below your $120 number.

The use of "nuclear" for both the bombs and the power plants was a huge political mistake, the population gets the idea that they are related, and that power plants are likely to go up in mushroom cloud. That's not going to happen.

Nuclear bombs (fission or fusion) are bad. Nuclear power plants are much better than coal fired plants.

[Mandar Khire]

Pat say's well below your $120 number.

I use this $120-$150 example from 6th reply from Frank Silbermann to this question. I am not particularly fix the amount, when i write reply yesterday i know actual price which you say(i am watching always http://oil-price.net. Might be this amount more fall!
[ September 09, 2008: Message edited by: Mandar Khire ]

[tapeshwar sharma]

Ulf said:

The question is more about how the world community should deal with proliferation, and consensus had it that the NPT was the way to do that.

Consensus between whom? The 5 countries that had nukes before 1968.
I am apalled that you don't find it hypocritical.
By the way, the concerns raised for Nuclear Proliferation by India are totally unfounded. India has never transferred the technology to another nation, rogue or friendly, stable or unstable or otherwise.
As Devesh said, some countries amongst the original 5 have a record bad enough to be evicted from the club, but I guess "might is right" overules every other rule.

[Pat Farrell]

Originally posted by prashant bhardwaj:
Consensus between whom? The 5 countries that had nukes before 1968.
I am apalled that you don't find it hypocritical

I'm not Ulf, but its easy for me to say its fine, after all, I live in one of the "have" countries.
:-)

Seriously, its appallingly insular. For a long time, the US politicians acted as if the rest of the world was too stupid to make bombs. This is also appallingly stupid and insulting, there are millions of folks in Russia, India, Israel, China, and probably dozens of other countries that are more than smart enough to build a bomb.

As mentioned upthread, nuke bombs have proliferated. Get used to it.

[Ulf Dittmer]

Consensus between whom? The 5 countries that had nukes before 1968.

Hardly. I think there are about 180 signatories to the treaty who also seem to think that it's the right way to proceed (including a couple of bad apples). Plus, I'm not aware of a serious effort to replace it with some other regime. So I see this wide consensus still holding up today.

[Devesh H Rao]

Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:

Hardly. I think there are about 180 signatories to the treaty who also seem to think that it's the right way to proceed (including a couple of bad apples). Plus, I'm not aware of a serious effort to replace it with some other regime. So I see this wide consensus still holding up today.

I do not think our issue is with NPT, let the 180 countries make merry. I hope india choses to stay out of the party though.

[Rambo Prasad]

I do not think our issue is with NPT, let the 180 countries make merry. I hope india choses to stay out of the party though.

I agree.India should neither fall into the trap of NPT or CTBT

[Jules Bach]

If all countries in the world replaced their coal fired plant with nuclear plants - we have roughly enough uranium for about 12 years (perhaps more if only the 'rich' countries used nuclear energy)...we also leave a mountain of highly toxic waste for the next generation to deal with - in addition to leaving them with our current unsolved energy crisis...

Our three options:

coal = unsustainable
nuclear = unsustainable
renewables = sustainable...but wait...it's an EYESORE!..who wants a windfarm or a solar panel near their house?!

tough choice huh?

Also - mining uranium, plant construction, fuel refinement, security, plant maintenance, and eventual decommission - then the *growing* waste management costs of nuclear power plants, continue to contribute a significant amount of CO2 into our atmosphere...it ain't green..sorry.

did i mention the waste for the next generation?

As already mentioned, Denmark get 20% of it's electricity from renewables..the more we invest in renewables - the better they will get in terms of technology and price. Are we doing that? Not really - everyone seems to want to jump in bed with nuclear power plants!

Investing in nuclear power (or weapons) is not the answer..

[Frank Silbermann]

Originally posted by Jules Bach:


Our three options:

coal = unsustainable
nuclear = unsustainable
renewables = sustainable...but wait...it's an EYESORE!..who wants a windfarm or a solar panel near their house?!

tough choice huh?

What I don't understand is why people think windmill farms are eyesores. I mean, compared to Newark, New Jersey as shown in the opening of the HBO show "The Sopranos" I think they look pretty nice.

Ten year old boys used to decorate their rooms with model airplanes, which in the old days used to have propellers. That's all a windmill is -- a big propeller. I wonder whether the medieval Dutch complained about their windmills being eyesores (and we hang paintings of them and put up little models of Dutch windmills on the mantle for a homey touch).

What we need is nuclear in the short term as industrial nations switch to electric automobiles, switching to renewables as they become economical, with 3rd world peoples postponing development and growth in energy useage until the renewable sources become economic for them (or at least until the developed countries no longer need so much patroleum). This plan is both good for rich westerners and good for the world (and hence, indirectly, good even for poor countries).

[Pat Farrell]

Originally posted by Frank Silbermann:
What we need is nuclear in the short term as industrial nations switch to electric automobiles, switching to renewables as they become economical, with 3rd world peoples postponing development and growth in energy useage until the renewable sources become economic for them (or at least until the developed countries no longer need so much patroleum).

I'm not going to begin to tell some poor country that their poor can't progress so I can have electricity. Not a good plan :-)

I agree that fission power is relatively short term, say 50 years. During that time, we can have the smart scientists and engineer get to work.

One thing for sure, the politicians are not going to help. They only care for the next election, and this is a big problem that will take decades.

[tapeshwar sharma]

What we need is nuclear in the short term as industrial nations switch to electric automobiles, switching to renewables as they become economical, with 3rd world peoples postponing development and growth in energy useage until the renewable sources become economic for them...

I must say that this is an elitist comment in a election year
Man, I'll not vote for you should you run for the presidency.

The selfish tone of this comment besides the human tendency of taking everything for granted is precisely the reason that Global Warming has become a grave problem.
Perhaps it is time to respect life in every form of it(third world or otherwise) and being judicious while using the resources of the earth.

We have to take steps to reduce our Carbon footprint at individual level.

This is not giving clean chit to the developing world; they have to take drastic steps of not committing the same mistakes that the developed world did in their path to development.
I remember my childhood in India when we used to take cloth bags for groceries instead of plastic bags,reuse ball point pens with refills,public transport etc. before everything was taken over by a wave of consumerism.
Developing nations need to desist from blindly following everything western.

However,at this point of time there surely are far more things for the "1st world" to take care of than the so called 3rd world.

[Jules Bach]

I must say that this is an elitist comment in a election year
Man, I'll not vote for you should you run for the presidency.

The selfish tone of this comment besides the human tendency of taking everything for granted is precisely the reason that Global Warming has become a grave problem.
Perhaps it is time to respect life in every form of it(third world or otherwise) and being judicious while using the resources of the earth.

We have to take steps to reduce our Carbon footprint at individual level.

Selfish tone? What's the alternative? Business as usual? Eventual economic melt-down? Planet eco-death?

I would have thought "respecting life in all its forms" goes hand in hand with respecting the environment - somethings which coal (and nuclear) energy production don't do. Or did you mean respecting only human life?

I agree that it's the so called 'first world' that needs to lead the way with renewables..

Personally, I think business as usual, or the endless pursuit of 'economic growth', regardless of which country you live in, is the selfish option. I'd like some kind of reasonable future for our next generation!
[ September 11, 2008: Message edited by: Jules Bach ]

[tapeshwar sharma]

Personally, I think business as usual, or the endless pursuit of 'economic growth', regardless of which country you live in, is the selfish option.

Yeah, right. So the developing nations should stop making economic progress and remain poor.
To make you see the point, I'll give you an equally extremist view :
How about developed nations giving up all the progress they've made?
After all, its been a while enjoying all the good things in life,let others enjoy it now.

This is certainly what I stand for, but just trying to make my point.

[Jules Bach]

You can have prosperity without causing irreparable harm to the planet - perhaps in dollar terms not as much.

but hey - you'll have a planet to live on..you win some, you lose some.

Surely, economic wellbeing of a country is less important that the planet's ability to sustain the human race?

Global climate change is painting a pretty scary scenario for everyone...and that's irrespective of economic disparity or social injustice.

How about developed nations giving up all the progress they've made?
After all, its been a while enjoying all the good things in life,let others enjoy it now.

Well..yeah..sure! In principle I agree! there certainly needs to be a much fairer distribution of wealth in the world! Higher taxes for more foreign aid and development - sounds good to me! Currently in NZ - we spend about $426,000,000 in foreign aid - might sound lots (it's odd but plenty of crazy people complain it's too much) - but that is *only* 27c in every hundred dollars we earn.

Absolutely - the wealth needs to be shared fairly.

One way or another, the era of cheap energy we have been enjoying is coming to an end...and either we plan for it now, or we wait until it comes to us.

All I have been advocating is that we all do this with renewables - and the 'developed countries' need to bear the initial cost of this.

Aiming for a small personal carbon footprints is nice. However - as an individual you don't have much choice in where your electricity comes from. The greenest greenie in the world will still use energy from a coal plant if that's what their government has chosen.
[ September 11, 2008: Message edited by: Jules Bach ]

[tapeshwar sharma]

Correction:

This is certainly what I stand for, but just trying to make my point.

This is certainly not what I stand for, but just trying to make my point.

[tapeshwar sharma]

Well..yeah..sure! In principle I agree! I agree! there certainly needs to be a much fairer distribution of wealth in the world! Higher taxes for more foreign aid and development - sounds good to me!

Well, this is very altruistic and one must respect the sentiment.
However, I wonder if there are many people willing to do that.
A bad economy is already constraining people, more taxes on top of that is not going to be palatable.

[Sri Anand]

Last few centuries have been more fruitful in science and technolgy.The fruits of the experiments have not been weighed agaist the health of planet to the extent they should have been,eg: fuel from coal etc., and we dont know what more is to be found out , we dont know the long term impact of waves and satelite signals we are releasing into earth how is the atmosphere effected.
definately economic,social value is making every one over look the harms,As long of oil is in reach, investment in other renewable sources will be slower.

[Pat Farrell]

Originally posted by Jules Bach:
The greenest greenie in the world will still use energy from a coal plant if that's what their government has chosen.

That is not a 'dedicated' greenie. True dedication means living off grid if your politicians are bad. For example, ExtremeTech.com's Loyd Case put a large solar electrical array on his roof, and cut his monthly electrical bill from ~$300 to ~$10.

And he writes for a PC magazine/website, and has tons of computers. Without them, he'd probably have a negative electrical bill.

[Frank Silbermann]

Originally posted by Raghunandan Mamidala:
Last few centuries have been more fruitful in science and technolgy.The fruits of the experiments have not been weighed agaist the health of planet to the extent they should have been,eg: fuel from coal etc., and we dont know what more is to be found out , we dont know the long term impact of waves and satelite signals we are releasing into earth how is the atmosphere effected.
definately economic,social value is making every one over look the harms,As long of oil is in reach, investment in other renewable sources will be slower.

Actually, we cannot even imagine the devastation the planet would receive if today's population relied upon the technology of three hundred years ago. Every tree would have long been cut down and burned, every field would be producing hay for horses.

The key is that we wouldn't have today's population with 17th century technology -- we would have had a much higher death rate over the last 150 years.

[tapeshwar sharma]

For example, ExtremeTech.com's Loyd Case put a large solar electrical array on his roof, and cut his monthly electrical bill from ~$300 to ~$10.

Great!.
I am getting a wild thought that may be we are going back to doing things by ourselves...just like before division of labor was introduced by man's desire to own everything.You know, it will not be surprising that tomorrow someone...may be from Arizona or Texas (I heard there's a lot of land there), who is irked by the rising food prices and pollution by tractors starts farming in his backyard.
Do you see the African Bushman laughing at us?

[tapeshwar sharma]

Correction:

I am getting a wild thought that may be we are going back to doing things by ourselves

I am getting a wild thought that may be we should go back to try doing things by ourselves

[Pat Farrell]

Originally posted by prashant bhardwaj:
may be from Arizona or Texas (I heard there's a lot of land there)

There is a lot of land on AZ, TX and Nevada. In much of the US West, the largest landowner is the US government. And they will sell you land fairly cheaply.

There is one small problem. all of the "good" land was claimed in the 1800s. (or stolen from the Indians (aka native americans)). This includes any land that had any water, any land that you could get to without being an eagle, etc. The Government owns it because is such bad land, so worthless that even the Indians didn't want it.

There is also a huge amount of land in Alaska. They give it to US citizens. Up there, they usually have water. Only its solid 9 months a year, and the heating bills can be a tad expensive.

I earn my living writing software for computers. I need computers, electricity and communications. There are many places where I could live and stave.

[tapeshwar sharma]

I earn my living writing software for computers. I need computers, electricity and communications. There are many places where I could live and stave.

Hey, I was never serious about it, man. It was more as a jibe upon ourselves that may be we thought we did a smart thing by industrializing, but actually the more we try to control and own things, the more complex life gets and presents bigger problems than ever.Even the Bushman example is in that context only.

[Pat Farrell]

Originally posted by prashant bhardwaj:
Hey, I was never serious about it, man. ....Even the Bushman example is in that context only.

Have you seen the movie "the gods must be crazy"? Its about a bushman, its one of the funniest movies ever made.

Current price of oil: Nymex Crude Future$101.18/bbl
I expect it will be under $100 next week.

Still no reason to waste it, but it will take a lot of the panic out of the search for alternatives.

At least in the US, there has never been an oil shortage, just a lack of cheap oil.

[Rambo Prasad]

I read this somewhere..

Chinese companies were under strict governmental orders not to permit any sort of fuel shortage during the Olympics. As a result, Chinese imports of crude oil jumped 11.0% during the first half of this year.

The oil imports into China in June was a big reason for the run-up in global crude prices as well. So now that the torch has been extinguished perhaps prices will extend their decline
[ September 13, 2008: Message edited by: Rambo Prasad ]

[Pat Farrell]

Originally posted by Rambo Prasad:
So now that the torch has been extinguished perhaps prices will extend their decline

Highly likely they will decline further, unless they stay the same or go up.

The OPEC folks have strong incentives to keep the price low enough that the rest of the world stays stupid. If they raise the price too much, we'll invent alternatives, and then OPEC will stop being rich.

I think $70 or so per barrel is optimal for OPEC, high enough to keep them rich, low enough to keep the US, Indian and Chinese engineers working on facebook instead of energy

[Ulf Dittmer]

Highly likely they will decline further, unless they stay the same or go up.

That's Pulitzer material. I'm not sure if it'd be for fiction or non-fiction, though...

[Pat Farrell]

Originally posted by Ulf Dittmer:
That's Pulitzer material. I'm not sure if it'd be for fiction or non-fiction, though...

You heard it here first, a Pulitzer right here in Meanless Drivel.

My wish is that the US taxes go way up, where European taxes are, to provide the incentive to get the engineers working without give all our money to the thugs and dictators in the Middle East.

Again, maybe that is bad, as our politicians are sure to waste it anyway.

[tapeshwar sharma]

I think Obama did say something very similar...like taxing the higher income earners to fund research in green technologies.
Except that he didn't risk lowering his ratings by proposing to giving away that money to developing nations (and thus putting the cost on the public exchequer).
The latter part of this idea, though beautiful, is not practical anyways.
We'l be lucky if we can get the former done.

[Ulf Dittmer]

Except that he didn't risk lowering his ratings by proposing to giving away that money to developing nations (and thus putting the cost on the public exchequer).

Why would he do that? He's running for president of the USA, not for president of the world.

[tapeshwar sharma]

Why would he do that? He's running for president of the USA, not for president of the world.

I have this one problem with javaranch(a site that is otherwise a previlidge to be in) :
In their excitement to reply,people, even the moderators, do not read the sequence for the posts, and loose the context.
Let me do the job for you:
A gentle man from NZ proposed a very noble idea about raising taxes in the developed nations for the benefit of the entire world.
He said that money thus raised be given in part to the developing world in lieu of stopping industrialization and the other part for investing in green technologies by developed countries.
It is in this context that Pat was telling about the "Pullitzer prize" (or so I believe) to which I replied.

Now can you see where I am coming from?

Certainly, I do not expect Obama to commit political suicide by proposing something like giving away money to developing nations when the economy is in a bad shape and especially when he's running for president.
Even if this weren't about Obama, the idea is not practical.

[Ulf Dittmer]

Now can you see where I am coming from?

Actually, I don't. What is the connection between an election campaign in the USA and the approval in a post here -which I did read, by the way- to raising taxes for more development aid? You mentioned yourself that the tax hike Mr Obama proposes is meant for the development of green technologies (and thus not for the aid of other countries). If this is just wishful thinking on your part, then I don't understand what you object to in my post.

[tapeshwar sharma]

What is the connection between an election campaign in the USA and the approval in a post here -which I did read, by the way- to raising taxes for more development aid?
[/quote

The original idea in whole is to raise taxes for :
Part 1 : invest in Green technologies
Part 2: give to developing nations in lieu of stopping industrialization

The 1st part is similar to Obama's solution.Hence the connection.