erentz

Well if you want to consider motives, what I said makes a clear motive IF Russia did it, for them to leave one of the NS2 pipes untouched doesn't it. Because the history was of Russia trying to blackmail Germany and get Germany to turn on NS2.

But I didn't claim Russia did it. You know you can suspect the US did it but that doesn't mean you need to promote fake made up stories that defy scrutiny to believe it. You can still search for the actual truth and want to see actual facts presented rather than fiction.

It’s interesting to me that dang overrode community moderation of this story [1] yesterday. Without having first even read it. A story that was based on an unverified anonymous source, by a discredited journalist, and which as we see now contained provably made up parts.

Because dang overrode moderation, that literal fake news (fake as in actually made up) was allowed to hover on the front page for a long time and given a legitimacy it didn’t deserve. It was able to be seen by a very large audience over a very long time.

Sadly an article that counters to that fake news makes it to the front page for a brief moment and after 3 hours is no on the 5th page.

So many of those people that saw the first will never see the second and get the wrong idea. It’s the old story about a lie can travel halfway around the world before the truth puts on its shoes. Sadly to me that it was Hacker News that decided to actively help spread the lie.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34707305

We are discussing nuclear waste in this thread.

I said "stored well and safely without issue".

You find 2 dead workers from an industrial accident over a 70 year history that was not actually about nuclear waste but was a fuel processing and fabrication facility making fuel for experimental reactors. Not civilian power reactors. [1]

Even if you included it (which clearly it's not related to waste so shouldn't) it would still be the safest and best managed waste of anything we have!

The exclusion zone is not nuclear waste. It is interesting though because a lot of research after the event seems to show that the evacuation and such a large exclusion zone was a mistake and we should evacuate less in such events. But in the moment I get everyone was scared and didn't have a good idea of what to do.

[1] https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/safety-and-sec...

Russia had stopped gas flows on NordStream 1 26 days prior to the explosion [1].

This was after a series of reductions, stops, and restarts where they reduced flows and tried to get Germany to break sanctions to send parts. That they then ultimately rejected and wouldn't receive. E.g. [2].

When Germany offered the parts. They refused them, stopped NS1 entirely and offered to activate NS2 with Germany. [3] Germany refused and resisted the blackmail attempt.

Then the explosion happened a couple of weeks later. After that Russia again offered to activate NS2 with Germany. [4]

In this context, the US going ahead with the plan to demolish NS1, and leave NS2 50% operation makes zero sense.

[1]: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1331710/nord-stream-phys... [2]: https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/kremlin-says-gazprom... [3]: https://www.rferl.org/a/putin-nord-stream-closed-energy-cris... [4]: https://www.dw.com/en/putin-offers-europe-gas-through-nord-s...

Let me also add these point that everyone seems to want to ignore:

NordStream 2 was never put into service. Germany halted it due to the invasion. This was considered a very big deal.

At the time of the explosion on 26 Sep there had been no gas flowing on NordStream 1 at all. None! Flows on NS1 were shutdown by Russia on 31 Aug. This came after a series of declining flows from Russia accompanied by various efforts by Russia to get Germany to violate sanctions and persuade other countries to reduce sanctions. It culminated in complete shut off of NS1 and an offer to instead activate NS2 before the explosion (one of those pipes was suspiciously left undamaged).

Russia had been trying the blackmail that everyone feared, and Germany resisted it. I've bashed Germany a lot for it's response to the war but the fact is Germany got off Russian gas at huge costs and resisted the blackmail threat.

Folks who don't believe this can go view the data in graph form here: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1331710/nord-stream-phys...

Or Grab the raw data if you want: https://www.nord-stream.info/

Germany gas imports from Russia: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1332783/german-gas-impor...

> Fukushima Daiichi. In case those two words aren't enough to jog your memory:

Yes, I get that nuclear power scares people, which is why we should put aside our emotions on the subject and just deal with the facts. We've had decades of empirical evidence about nuclear safety at this point.

Zero radio-logical related deaths from Fukushima. And zero deaths in all history from all other civilian nuclear waste.

> "the Japanese government approved the dumping of radioactive water of this power plant into the Pacific Ocean over the course of 30 years."

It sounds scary. "Radioactive water!" But it's not an issue. How many will die or have shortened lifespan from this? Let me know and we can add it to the zero above.

It actually seems to be a case study that empirically proves the opposite. Hundreds of thousands dead in the Russian invasion of Ukraine so far, untold injuries. Incredible amounts of destruction of cities and civilian infrastructure. But yet none from an exploding nuclear power plant. Why? Because its not really possible and it serves very little point. If the goal is to terrorize people and inflict damage there are much better ways as has been demonstrated.

> power plant workers fleeing

That is an argument for no power plants with workers anywhere.

In WW2 dams were attacked causing lots of damage. I haven't seen anyone using that as an argument that we should demolish all hydro dams lest they become targets in a future war. Strangely this kind of thinking only applies to nuclear power.

You may find this bit of history interesting: https://www.rferl.org/a/european-remembrance-day-ukraine-lit...

We are talking about 32 countries with civilian nuclear power operating for several decades. With oversight by an international body that tracks every bit of nuclear material. Using processes that differ from what was done at Hanford, producing waste different from Hanford. That has been working well, stored well and safely without issue. The military didn't start from that position, it started from "Joe just throw that shit in a pit over there, don't even bother keeping records." Hanford has no resemblance to civilian nuclear power. I think the onus is on those who keep saying it does (despite the evidence to the contrary) to demonstrate it.

I think this part stems from a common response you see from anti-nuclear folks, who frequently point to the issues at Hanford as a reason to be against civilian nuclear power. She's trying to make clear the difference between civilian nuclear power and waste management and historical waste from military nuclear weapons programs. Remembering also Hanford waste issues date as far back as the Manhattan Project during WW2.

(1): See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34713247

(2): Then why blow the other three?

So for the US angle to work here what is the motivation?

At the outset of the war Germany stopped NS2 activation plans and started diversifying its energy away from Russia.

Leading up to the explosion Russia had been trying to blackmail Germany by reducing the supplies of gas. And gas was fully turned off at the time of the explosion. Russia was also playing games with Germany to try to get propaganda wins over the subject of gas by cutting gas supplies on NS1 and saying it was because Germany needed to ship it a turbine. Then Russia was claiming it couldn't receive the turbine from Germany because of the sanctions imposed by other countries. Russia was also saying, well pity that we can't supply enough gas because we don't have the turbine, but we could activate NS2 with you instead. [1]

So the clear motivation for the US could be that they did not want Germany to capitulate to Russian blackmail and give Russia some kind of political or sanction relief. That's actually somewhat reasonable as a theory if you believe Germany was susceptible to it (was it?), and assume all the other levers that the US and other EU allies had wouldn't be enough to keep Germany on the team.

The risk is that doing this and being caught would be a huge breach of trust. The claim of Hersh is that these explosives sat on the pipeline for three months.

The US even warned Germany about potential attacks on the pipeline. [2]

So now if that is the motivation, in this context leaving one of the newer, larger NordStream 2 pipelines untouched would make absolutely no sense. As you leave open the possibility for Germany to still capitulate and worse give Russia a massive propaganda win by forcing Germany to reverse its position and activate NS2.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/03/business/germany-russia-g... [2] https://www.reuters.com/world/cia-warned-berlin-about-possib...

He claims SOCOM covert military operations have to be reported to Gang of Eight but if you use regular Navy forces to do the covert operation you somehow do not. That seems beyond extremely suspect.

> There was a vital bureaucratic reason for relying on the graduates of the center’s hardcore diving school in Panama City. The divers were Navy only, and not members of America’s Special Operations Command, whose covert operations must be reported to Congress and briefed in advance to the Senate and House leadership—the so-called Gang of Eight. The Biden Administration was doing everything possible to avoid leaks as the planning took place late in 2021 and into the first months of 2022.

Start from the beginning.[1] The point is there is no good reason for the US to leave one operational, defeating the whole purpose suggested by those claiming the US did it, and worse, leaving open the possibility of a major political victory for Russia. This is a big hole in the theory that the US did it. There may be good reasons for other parties to leave one operational though. You can speculate.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34712780

For an elaborate operation like this as described in Hersh's story, would you rig just one? Or would you have multiple redundancies? Is it likely that all of the redundancies failed on the same pipeline, that is also the new pipeline?

Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 are not just two pipelines. It's four total. The two pipelines of Nord Stream 1 were demolished. But only one of the pipelines of Nord Stream 2 was demolished, the second was untouched.

https://www.dw.com/en/putin-offers-europe-gas-through-nord-s...

Claims and sources are supposed verified in journalism. In the case of anonymous sources a journalist can't just bring to his manager a quote and say he's anonymous because that journalist (as many have over the years) might have just made it up. The manager has to know the identity of the source. If the journalist won't share the identity then it won't fly. So if someone else brought this story to NY Times, they would have to give the identity of the source, the manager would need to verify that this source was in a position (time, place, job, what have you) to know the things claimed. And would usually want to hunt down another source that corroborates what this anonymous source says to give it some weight.

Why leave one of the brand new, larger pipelines undamaged, so that Russia could then offer after the event to work with Germany to activate it? Which naturally they did.

This pipeline had been completed but activation was stopped due to the start of the war. If Germany had capitulated and activated it with Russia that would be a major political win for Russia and blow for the suggested goals of the US and other allies. To me this seems to be the biggest hole in the theory that the US was responsible.

He's lost his credibility over the years. Which is likely why this didn't get published by NY Times.

It's long but after reading this ask why you would believe this man who, in this new article, is making plenty of assertions all based on quotes from a single anonymous source.

https://www.vox.com/2015/5/11/8584473/seymour-hersh-osama-bi...

I grant you it's long, but it's not just about bin Laden. Give that article a read to start. Then ask yourself why you think assertions from this person should now be believed first, disproven later, rather than corroborated and proven first like journalism is supposed to be done.

It would be very counter to the suggested goals of the US for it to demolish just 3 of the 4 pipelines. Leaving one of the brand new, larger pipelines untouched. A pipeline that had just been completed but the activation of which had been put on hold due to the start of the war. Only so that Russia could turn around after the event and offer to jointly activate this new pipeline with Germany. An act that had Germany capitulated would be a major political win for Russia, and blow to the suggested US goals.

Seymour Hersh is not credible anymore. This is all based on a single anonymous source, that hasn't been supported by any other sources or evidence. He is known to have just made stuff up to suit, which is probably why the NY Times and other papers passed on this and he had to put it on a new substack.

https://www.vox.com/2015/5/11/8584473/seymour-hersh-osama-bi...

Here's a map with many of the locations and routes:

https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1FdGZI6DDRPe3Y9-dtpLG...

It was a term invented by a Wall Street analyst that had no meaning except to identify some emerging market countries. That it somehow got turned into a weird idea of a political block for a set of countries which have very little in common politically or socially and survives to this day is kind of hilarious.

This is really weird. FTA: "These gauges are designed to be robust and to be used in industrial settings where they may be exposed to weather and vibration,” Dr. Robertson said at a news conference on Saturday, “so it is unusual for a gauge to come apart like this one has."

See also this [1] article with a picture of an example gauge. Again making the point that this is really weird: "Radiation Services WA general manager Lauren Steen said it was a “highly unlikely” scenario, due to the safety measures typically in place for the transit of radioactive materials."

New material for a future Plainly Difficult episode once the investigation is complete.

[1] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-28/radioactive-capsule-s...

> I got my Master's in the US in the late 2000s and was gainfully employed there for a few years... > > Ideally, I would prefer to go back to the US...because I actually was happy there.

There's a lot of really helpful replies here that I can't add to but this stood out to me. I think maybe you should focus on what you can do in Germany or remaining closer by in Europe. Life was easier in the late 2000s in the US than today, and you may be looking back with some rose tinted glasses thinking if you can just go back to that place in the past when you were happier things will resolve themselves. But it may not work out that way, and it may add a lot of extra complication and work to try to make it happen (especially during this economic downturn), that will take time away from you doing other things, only to potentially end up quite disappointed.

Right. But if you want to look at 12 months (fair enough) then 50% being dirty electricity generation is nothing to be proud of is it? It's still one of the dirtiest grids in the planet with an average >500gCO2/kWh. And it's average coal production over that time appears to be 21.2GW. So if over a 12 month period then if Germany had retained it's nuclear it would replace MORE than half of it's fossil fuel produced electricity. Even better.

Yes that's the point right. It's gone and decommissioned for really bad reasons. A political deal that satisfied those who were more anti-nuclear than anti-pollution. In an alliance with those who were more pro-fossil-gas than pro-climate. And now Germany pollutes many times more than it otherwise would. We should absolutely take a lesson from this.

As mentioned taken from a snapshot at the time of Electricity Maps, check it out: https://app.electricitymaps.com/map

Why do you say nuclear is as clean as diesel? That is clearly not true.

CO2 emissions equivalent to wind and solar (actually slightly better). Safety (deaths per kWh) also equivalent to wind and solar. And land use much much better. Waste is tiny for the energy produced and easily contained unlike other industries, which is why no one has died from waste.

So basically you're rejecting the safest power source with the least environmental impact, and the only source along with hydro that has actually empirically (in the real world) accomplished deep decarbonization of an electricity grid (e.g. Ontario, France, Sweden).

https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy https://ourworldindata.org/land-use-per-energy-source

This is untrue. 20GW of nuclear shut down over the past 20 years. That is almost as much as the coal that is being burned at the moment. Coal and gas are currently providing 66% of demand (40GW). Wind+solar only 7%. If that 20GW of nuclear were still available it would replace half of the coal and gas currently burning at this very moment. You can follow along at electricity maps anytime you’re curious to see just how dirty and broken the German grid is in reality.

Looking at electricity maps: Currently burning 28GW of very dirty coal, 46% of demand, 72% of emissions. 12GW of gas, 19% of demand, 17% of emissions. Wind+Solar combined is only supplying 7% of demand.

They decommissioned ~20GW of clean nuclear power over the past 20 years. Whatever way you cut it that’s a huge mistake for the climate (not to mention economy). That replaces most of the coal in that picture. Or replaces all of the gas and then some in that picture.