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6 Comments
David Summers wrote:
Actually, this type of thing is a common problem in investing, especially overseas - government risk. (Scarily enough, China has surpassed the US in low government risk to commerce...)
The classic way of dealing with it is to have the government "post bail". The government loans the money to do the development to the company, at market rates. This is not an investment in the company, it merely means that if the government kills the project they get nothing back. Often, the loan is not really used to work on the project - it is just a loan with terms in it that say "if the government interferes, the money does not need to be repaid".
It doesn't matter if the public wants something. A single person can sue and bankrupt a powerplant that has the approval of millions. There has to be recourse for interference, and when dealing with a government that means you better start with the money (they can decide not to honor their obligations), preferably in a foreign bank.
ken anthony wrote:
This article is the science education kids should have been getting in grade school since the seventies rather than the absurdity of global warming.
The only nit I have to pick is...
Engineers are now talking about drilling down 10 miles (the deepest oil wells are only five miles) to tap [Geothermal] energy. Here's a better idea: Bring the source of this heat -- the uranium -- to the surface
Seems to me that drilling a hole is a lot easier than extraction? Plus the public doesn't think of this as nuclear power so a company may avoid the idiot lawsuits they might otherwise have to face. Of course, whatever radioactive minerals we do extract aught to be used.
Those people that think we should drop radioactive waste into the sun should be laughed off the planet.
K wrote:
The problem with acceptance of nuclear energy isn't just the propaganda it's been subject to. The public just doesn't seem to like the notion of extremely low risk of a very large scale catastrosphe. Which is where AGW comes in. Now they can balance a "small" risk of a large scale disaster against a "very tiny" risk of a smaller scale disaster.
Josh Reiter wrote:
I came across the The Police complete box set and laughed at some of the references to 'Da Bomb' in the lyrics. I forgot how freaked people were about nukes and the Cold War and how it pervaded our art and culture. I suppose that movie by Meryl Streep, Silkwood didn't help people's perception of nuclear materials either. Especially, when the evil corpo-gub'ment wants to wash our naughty bits in a chemical bath and then cover it up. It is bound to happen to us all if we build more reactors -- I'm sure. [/snark]
JP Gibb wrote:
Don't you know? Nukes are old technology (Scroll down to the last two letters) and "The future lies with solar thermal, photovoltaic, wind, ocean thermal, geothermal, tidal, wave and biomass power."
Oh, and you've all been duped into thinking too big about energy production, when "We need to take personal responsibily for our energy use."
Paul F. Dietz wrote:
Yep, biomass is so much more modern than nuclear fission.
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About this Entry
This page contains a single entry by Rand Simberg published on July 21, 2008 9:48 AM.
Actually, this type of thing is a common problem in investing, especially overseas - government risk. (Scarily enough, China has surpassed the US in low government risk to commerce...)
The classic way of dealing with it is to have the government "post bail". The government loans the money to do the development to the company, at market rates. This is not an investment in the company, it merely means that if the government kills the project they get nothing back. Often, the loan is not really used to work on the project - it is just a loan with terms in it that say "if the government interferes, the money does not need to be repaid".
It doesn't matter if the public wants something. A single person can sue and bankrupt a powerplant that has the approval of millions. There has to be recourse for interference, and when dealing with a government that means you better start with the money (they can decide not to honor their obligations), preferably in a foreign bank.
This article is the science education kids should have been getting in grade school since the seventies rather than the absurdity of global warming.
The only nit I have to pick is...
Engineers are now talking about drilling down 10 miles (the deepest oil wells are only five miles) to tap [Geothermal] energy. Here's a better idea: Bring the source of this heat -- the uranium -- to the surface
Seems to me that drilling a hole is a lot easier than extraction? Plus the public doesn't think of this as nuclear power so a company may avoid the idiot lawsuits they might otherwise have to face. Of course, whatever radioactive minerals we do extract aught to be used.
Those people that think we should drop radioactive waste into the sun should be laughed off the planet.
The problem with acceptance of nuclear energy isn't just the propaganda it's been subject to. The public just doesn't seem to like the notion of extremely low risk of a very large scale catastrosphe. Which is where AGW comes in. Now they can balance a "small" risk of a large scale disaster against a "very tiny" risk of a smaller scale disaster.
I came across the The Police complete box set and laughed at some of the references to 'Da Bomb' in the lyrics. I forgot how freaked people were about nukes and the Cold War and how it pervaded our art and culture. I suppose that movie by Meryl Streep, Silkwood didn't help people's perception of nuclear materials either. Especially, when the evil corpo-gub'ment wants to wash our naughty bits in a chemical bath and then cover it up. It is bound to happen to us all if we build more reactors -- I'm sure. [/snark]
Don't you know? Nukes are old technology (Scroll down to the last two letters) and "The future lies with solar thermal, photovoltaic, wind, ocean thermal, geothermal, tidal, wave and biomass power."
Oh, and you've all been duped into thinking too big about energy production, when "We need to take personal responsibily for our energy use."
Yep, biomass is so much more modern than nuclear fission.
>.>