MOONLAB 3 LAUNCHES FROM HORIZON SPACE CENTER

Scientific Pacifican, November 1951 Issue, P. 3

Yesterday, to little fanfare, Moonlab 3’s crewed component launched from the Horizon Space Center atop a Saturn V launch vehicle. In a few days, the four astronauts of Moonlab 3 will join the four already at Outpost Yeager, on the surface of the Sea of Tranquility, where they will test equipment for future lunar operations, evaluate proposed methods to extract lunar resources, and more fully determine the effects of lunar gravity on the human body – with the ultimate aim of developing the means by which Man can flourish on the moon.

Among the many experiments planned for Moonlab 3’s crew are food production tests (launched separately over the past few weeks).

The SCP experiment will test a newly-developed methane-consuming single cell protein-yeast vat in the harsh environment of the moon, and evaluate its suitability for lunar operations. Similar vats are already in use on-board space stations to provide astronauts with a supplemental source of protein – and remove carbon dioxide (and other processed bodily wastes) produced by astronauts.

The lunar greenhouse experiment will study the effect of the lunar environment on crop growth, and (separately) assess the suitability of lunar regolith as a base substrate for the production of synthetic soil.

The lunar chicken experiment will evaluate the behavior of chickens in the lunar environment, and explore the feasibility of livestock cultivation (and egg production) on the moon.

Scientific Pacifican wishes the crew of Moonlab 3 – and the crew of Apollo 23, when they launch later this month – the best of luck in their respective missions.

WHY A SHUTTLE?

The Pacific Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

Volume 19, Issue 2

WHY A SHUTTLE?

FOR the past year, Applied Scientific’s extremely successful Orange Heavy and Orange Light boosters have regularly flown from launch centers in the Provinces of Hainan, Ceylon, Horizon, Florida, Nicaragua, Tranquil and elsewhere, delivering tens of thousands of metric tons of materials into Low Earth Orbit. With only two mishaps during operational launches so far, an excellent vehicle recovery record, and a short whole-system turnaround time of barely two weeks (!), the Orange Heavy is a clear winner for the title of most effective launch vehicle – a title that it, in turn, won from Applied Scientific’s previous engineering triumph, the Beige Heavy.

However, since its unveiling in January, significant doubts regarding Applied Scientific’s development roadmap for the Orange Heavy have arisen in the aerospace community. Amongst the many well-received plans (including an eagerly awaited LANTR variable impulse nuclear thermal rocket burning hydrogen and oxygen, an even more eagerly awaited fully reusable second stage, and powered recovery of both LRBs and the core module onto oceanic platforms), one upgrade in particular has proven particularly controversial: the Space Shuttle.

To understand why such controversy has arisen, we must first delve into the differences and similarities between the two vehicles – and the different design philosophies involved.

The AS Orange Heavy is a three-stage booster built around the AS-6 multi-fuel dual-chamber engine, which can burn either RP-1, liquid hydrogen, or both at the same time.

The AS Orange Heavy’s first stage consists of two or four cross-feeding 5-m-diameter, 66-m-tall RP-1/LOX containing Liquid Rocket Boosters, each with a unitary AS-6a single-fuel engine. During the initial phase of the launch, RP-1 and LOX flows from these LRBs into the AS-6s of the core stage, providing the core stage with a high-thrust, low-impulse boost through the thickest parts of Earth’s atmosphere. Once empty, the LRBs separate, always in pairs, and splash down into the ocean for recovery, reprocessing and reuse within two weeks.

The four-LRB-configuration provides the Orange Heavy with a significant payload boost, increasing payload to a 500-km, 30-degree orbit from 205 metric tons to a whopping 315 metric tons.

The Orange Heavy’s second stage is its core module: a 10-m diameter LH2/LO2 tank with a non-common bulkhead, attached to five AS-6b dual-fuel rocket motors. Based off the Beige core stage (it is superficially identical to a Beige core stage increased in size by a factor of 8), the second stage imparts the payload with most of the kinetic energy needed by it to reach orbit. Once it is empty, it falls away (using its remaining fuel for retrobraking), landing in the ocean for recovery and reuse.

The third stage consists of a shortened 10-m-diameter core module attached to a unitary AS-6c upper stage engine (encased in a recovery module). Once in orbit, the AS-6c upper stage engine reenters the atmosphere after completing one or more orbits, descending into a landing zone immediately adjacent to the launch site. The upper stage’s two propellant tanks and launch shroud are then either reused in space station modules or melted down for raw materials.

In general, reconditioning of the upper stage engine takes two days, first-stage reconditioning takes nine, and reconditioning the core module takes twelve days. A launch-to-launch time of fourteen days is considered the industry gold standard, although Pacific Launch Services has repeatedly gotten it down to twelve days.

The flight trajectory of the second stage is critical to the design tradeoffs made in AS’s proposed “Space Shuttle”. The second stage has two goals a) to increase the kinetic energy of the payload by as much as possible and b) facilitate recovery close to the launch site. Unfortunately, if an optimized parabolic trajectory was utilized, the high kinetic energy of the second stage would carry it on a long-range suborbital trajectory, landing it an unacceptable distance from the launch site. In order to allow these two goals to be compatible, the Orange Heavy, like the Beige before it, flies a strongly lofted trajectory: i.e. it goes almost straight up, allowing the fall of the payload to allow it to achieve orbital speed.

Such a trajectory involves accelerations of up to five gravities, and is thus incompatible with man-rating, which limits civilian crewed vehicles to accelerations of 2.5g. Certain delicate items are also insufficiently rugged to be launched atop such vehicles.

As such, Applied Scientific thoughtfully designed the Orange Light, which flies a much flatter trajectory, providing man-rating at the expense of a higher cost-to-orbit (a proportionally larger upper stage has to be thrown away after every flight). The Orange Light, capable of lifting thirty metric tons to LEO, consists of a stretched Beige 5-m LH2/LOX second stage mated to a shortened Orange Heavy LRB.

However, with the continued expansion of human activities in space, the capacity of even Applied Scientific’s twenty-six-passenger Liberty Bell V capsules is bound to become inadequate, and it is with an eye to increasing passenger (and delicates) lift capability that Applied Scientific has designed the “Space Shuttle”.

As such, it is more suitable to compare the design for the “Space Shuttle” with Applied Scientific’s Orange Light, rather than the Orange Heavy from which it is derived.

As currently designed, the “Space Shuttle” will consist of three components:

1. A pair of Orange Heavy-derived shortened Liquid Rocket Boosters, which will cross-feed into the “Orbiter”. As with the case of the Orange Heavy, the LRBs are designed to splash down for recovery and reuse.

 

2. An “External Tank”, consisting of a modified Orange Heavy Core Module (the modifications will involve removal of the engine pod and the replacement of the cylindrical liquid oxygen tank with an ogive design, which will store propellants for use in the main engines of the “Orbiter”. Unlike the Orange Core Module, but like the Orange Heavy Upper Stage, the “External Tank” is not designed for recovery and reuse, and will instead be delivered to Low Earth Orbit for use as raw material for space factories or repurposed into a pressurized module.

 

3. A winged, airplane-like “Orbiter”. The “Orbiter”, as currently designed, will consist of a cockpit, cargo bay, and an engine block attached to cranked delta wings and a tail. The cranked delta wings will enable once-around missions (i.e. 90-minute missions which complete one orbit and return to their launch site), necessary for rapid spacecraft turnaround and amortization of costs, while the engine block will employ the AS-6d engine, an improved AS-6c. Protected by advanced composite and metallic tiles developed from the Air Force’s Dyna-Soar reconnaissance spaceplanes, the “Orbiter” will be capable of gliding from suborbital speeds to land on a runway like an aircraft.

The “Space Shuttle” will be capable of lifting to LEO 65 metric tons of cargo in the Orbiter’s 20.5-m-long, 5.5m-wide, cargo bay, or transporting 150 people in a boxy passenger module capable of fitting snugly into the Shuttle’s flat payload bay floor (differences between the actual Space Shuttle and this fictional one should be obvious). A similar mass of cargo can be returned to Earth. Turnaround time is expected to be between three and four days, with minimal replacement of the metallic/composite thermal protection system expected.

Thus, this vehicle, using virtually the same hardware as the Orange Heavy, will have a payload a mere third of the Orange Heavy’s standard payload, and a fifth of the vehicle’s maximum payload of 315 metric tons – while throwing away a fuel tank three times the size and (and expense).

The fact that Applied Scientific is planning a cargo version of this “Shuttle”, flying the same flight trajectory but with a payload of 135 metric tons (thanks to a lack of wings and cockpit) – still less than the Orange Heavy’s payload – has left some commentators even more bewildered and critical of the seeming pointlessness of the endeavor. Some have even suggested that Applied Scientific simply strap their “Shuttle” to the top of the Orange Heavy – and gain a payload boost of 100%.

All of these commentators have neglected the different trajectories employed by the “Shuttle” and the Orange Heavy. The “Shuttle” is much more suitable for humans than the Orange Heavy because of its flatter trajectory, and because of its flatter trajectory, the “Shuttle” second stage (i.e. the “External Tank”) is unsuitable for recovery. If the “External Tank” of a “Shuttle” launched from the Hainan Space Center were allowed to splash down, it would impact somewhere in West Jointland, six time zones away – resulting in a total turnaround time (together with transport back to Hainan) of over four weeks – completely negating the benefits of reusability.

Furthermore, while claims by some Applied Scientific investors that the “Shuttle” will revolutionize recovery of space products are most certainly false (given the success of Applied Scientific’s existing 15/20-m-diameter Large Cargo Capsules), and while it is true that existing on-orbit space platforms are perfectly capable of repairing satellites in Low and geosynchronous orbits, the fact remains that the Shuttle will provide companies & governments with novel capabilities.

The first such unique capability is the most obvious one: mass transport to space. The capacity of 150 passengers (for a total of 160 people in the cockpit, foredeck, and cargo bay) completely outstrips prior human transportation capability provided by reusable capsules, and will be critical for planned projects like Lunar and Martian colonization, construction of large Space Solar Power Satellites, and expansion of factories in space.

The second unique capability is repair and recovery of satellites in “unpopular” high-inclination orbits. While existing repair platforms can alter their orbital altitudes to rendezvous with satellites, they are limited to servicing satellites within a few degrees of their orbital plane. For servicing satellites more than a few degrees away from a repair station, existing ground-launched servicing missions are limited by the expense of throwing away brand-new servicing modules, which cannot be economically returned to Earth. The ground-based shuttle, on the other hand, will be able to launch directly into any orbit to service satellites, and return all unused equipment (and even the entire satellite) back to Earth afterwards.

In sum, comparisons between the Applied Scientific Shuttle under development and the extant Orange Heavy launch vehicles are flawed because of the differing roles of these two vehicles, which have resulted in greatly divergent vehicle designs, launch trajectories, and performance parameters. This author proposes that future commentary on the in-development Applied Scientific Shuttle compare it with the existing Orange Light manned launch vehicle, with which it shares many similarities.

The designs for the Pacificverse Space Shuttle, Delta-IV and Ares V-equivalent vehicles are highly optimistic (each design provides much better performance than its real-world analogue), somewhat fanciful, and probably impossible. This is a work of fiction. Please do not use this for actual work. 

END

 

 

 

 

 

 

How the Atom was Tamed (6)

ONLINE REFUELLING

The Yankee-B Nuclear Power Plant, located in Wiscasset, New England Province, was built in 1994 to replace the increasingly obsolescent Yankee-A Nuclear Power Plant by the New England Power Company.

The plant houses two Applied Scientific Liquid-Core Fast Breeder Reactors, each rated for 1200 MWe. As their name suggests, liquid-core reactors have a fuel core consisting of liquid metal, heated to a temperature of 1,700 degrees Celsius by dissolved nuclear fuel metal. The fuel core (and surrounding liquid fertile blanket) is constantly circulated in and out of the reactor core for in-stream online reprocessing, which removes neutron poisons and useful radioisotopes from the fuel stream, and adds fresh fuel. The liquid nature of the fuel and blanket greatly simplifies reprocessing, lowering the operating costs of such reactors compared with traditional solid-core breeder reactors. Such reactors are extremely flexible, and can run on uranium, plutonium, thorium, or transuranics (what, in the past, was regarded as nuclear waste). They also have extremely high burnup, removing nearly all transuranics from their (segregated) waste stream, to the extent that nuclear waste produced from such reactors is considered “safe” after a mere three centuries.

As of 2006, the plant’s reactors have been configured as breeder-burners, breeding Pu-239 (at a breeding ratio of 1.2) from spent nuclear fuel containing U-238, some Pu-239, some neutron poisons, and transuranic elements. The plant consumes nearly 3 kilograms of input fuel, and converts it to a similar mass of fission products (and some extra plutonium), every day, for a total input of approximately 1.2 metric tons of nuclear fuel a year, and an output of approximately 200 kg of plutonium and 1000kg of fission products per year.

The plant’s six 400 MWe gas turbines are fed by a tertiary CO2 coolant loop, which is in turn cooled by the plant’s 200 MWe ammonia-based combined-cycle heat recovery loop (which discharges the heat into the cold waters of the North Atlantic). For load following, the secondary molten salt coolant loop is connected to another molten salt coolant loop to drive a variable-output thermochemical H2 producer. H2 produced is directly injected into the New England Natural Gas Network, which can accommodate gas that is one-quarter hydrogen by volume. Oxygen produced by the process is liquefied and stored off-site for later removal by rail (generally to coal-fired peaking plants, the high-temperature fuel cells of which operate more efficiently with liquid oxygen). The plant is designed for efficient load following from 800 MWe to 2400 MWe.

An additional pair of reactors of identical design, which will bring the total capacity of the plant to 4,800 MWe, have been ordered by the New England Power Company. Construction of the reactors is scheduled to begin in 2008, and the reactors are expected to enter service by 2010.

 

Excerpt, Infrastructure of New England (2007 Ed)

Timeline of Soviet Space Exploration (1950-1990)

Time	Events
1951:	Sputnik 1 enters LEO… just as the Apollo program returns to flight following the aftermath of the Apollo 13 accident. The Soviet Union enters the Space Age – twenty years after JOINTGOV.
1953:	Cosmonaut Lyovkin Ivanovich enters LEO aboard a Vostok capsule. Stalin dies.
1962:	Saylut 1 is launched – to the tune of the Cuban Missile Crisis
1964:	After a protracted development program, the Soviet N1 (featuring a reusable first stage) finally gets off the ground. The N1 would provide virtually all Soviet ultra-heavy lift for the following decade, and allowed Saylut 2 and 3 to be significantly more massive – and much more capable. It served until the mid-1980s, when it was replaced completely by the Vulkan launch vehicle.
1965:	Soviets land man on moon; Soviet space station program proceeds rapidly.
1968:	Soviet space factory begins production of advanced materials for the Motherland, ending the JOINTGOV/CDO monopoly on advanced space materials.
1960s & 1970s:	The Soviet Space Program progresses rapidly, sending probes to Mars, Venus, a smattering of minor planets, and Jupiter. Primarily exercises in improving satellite subsystem reliability, since very little novel scientific data is gleaned from the probes (considering Venus and Mars have manned JOINTGOV bases on and around them by the mid-1960s).
1973:	Soviet TMK spacecraft conducts flyby of Mars – against the backdrop of a JOINTGOV economic recession and the Vietnam pull-out. It is interesting to note that the Soviets decided not to proceed with intensive colonization of space – while significantly wealthier from oil and gas exports to JOINTGOV (the Pacificverse saw oil prices double or triple of those in the real world, even before the Oil Crisis, which led to acute shortages), the Soviets saw no actual benefit from engaging in such a (difficult and expensive) program, and much benefit in investing additional funds into their military and society. The Mars missions were carried out because they were cheap; the space station hardware was built, the probes would fly anyway, and the cosmonauts were already trained. A total of three MAVR missions flew; the first in 1973, the second in 1976, and the third (with Venus flyby) in 1979. These successful (and very cheap) missions (each requiring one N1 launch) greatly enhanced the reputation of the Soviet Space Program, and greatly contributed to the impression of Soviet strength and Western weakness.
1975:	Détente – four Soviet (and four non-Soviet Eastern Bloc; and sixteen non-JOINTGOV) scientists allotted seats on Ares 7 mission (delivering crew and supplies to Mars surface and orbital installations) While Soviet participation in the 1974 Kronos 1 mission to the Jovian System was proposed (and debated internally), it was eventually decided that the Kronos missions were too expensive to risk Soviet subterfuge – and the propaganda coup for Communism too great.
1973-1975:	The Energia family of semi-reusable launchers enters service, providing the Soviets with economic surface-to-orbit capability. The first-stage Zenit boosters and the engines (and avionics) of the core stage were fully recoverable. The core stage of the less capable Energia-M booster was fully recoverable. Orbited Energia fuel tanks were mostly reprocessed by Soviet and foreign (mostly JOINTGOV) space factories for raw materials and living space. The Energia family consisted of the semi-reusable Zenit booster (15/30 mT), the Buran shuttle (36mT), the Energia booster (110mT), the Vulkan heavy-lift booster (190mT), and the Energia-M (40mT) medium launcher. The capabilities and dimensions of the boosters of the Pacificverse Energia family are slightly greater than those of the same in real life due to advanced materials (partially stolen from JOINTGOV designs) and improved engines (also partially stolen).
1980s:	Soviet Missile Defense System development program begun in response to full-scale fielding of SDI by the Carter and Reagan Coordinations. The 1984 Czech War (thankfully) does not initiate a full-blown space war; both sides keep their trigger fingers off their ASATs for fear of provoking an enemy response (JOINTGOV has more to lose, but the Soviets wish to confine the war to the European continent – for they are certain to lose if they fight anywhere else) The collapsing Soviet economy leads to massive reductions in defense spending – and aerospace spending. Soviet asteroid-mining plans cease.
1990s:	Soviet Union collapses.

How the Atom was Tamed (5)

A SODA AND THIRTY CENTS: FAST-BREEDER REACTORS

The Daily Clipper

November 17^th, 1968

Winston Press, Pine Mesa, Arid Province, Jointland

 

NEW COMMERCIAL FAST BREEDER REACTOR GOES ONLINE

 

Yesterday, the Blue Rock Nuclear Generating Station, located 10 kilometers away from the small town of Orange Fields, Arid, began providing power to the Continental Grid.

In itself, the connection of a nuclear power station to the Continental Grid is not a momentous event. On average, one brand-new nuclear reactor goes critical every day in the Joint Government. Two-thirds of generating capacity installed last year* was nuclear, and an increasing number of ocean-going vessels and large industrial plants are being built with nuclear reactors for propulsion, power and process heat.

And there is more to come. With the imminent retirement of WWII-era coal-fired power plants, approval of a slew of proliferation-proof reactor designs for export, and progressive reductions in the cost of nuclear power, JOINTGOV reactor manufacturers, including HappyAtom, Applied Scientific, Antarctic Atomics, Westinghouse, SinoNuke and Chinese Atomics have received a glut of new orders for reactors of all shapes and sizes.

The reactors of these various installations, scheduled to come online over the next decade, will differ enormously from their predecessors. They will be more efficient, running at higher temperatures and incorporating cogeneration processes; they will be more powerful, with the largest reactors expected to produce up to 2000 megawatts of electricity (MWe)**; and most importantly, they will be even safer than even today’s generation of reliable reactors, incorporating passive cooling and intrinsic safety mechanisms.

Some of them, like Blue Rock, will also produce more fuel than they consume.

Blue Rock’s four Applied Scientific 600-MWe reactors are what are known as fast-breeder reactors. Most of the uranium on Earth consists of Uranium-238, which cannot be used directly as nuclear fuel. However, using a small amount of Uranium-235, fast-breeder reactors can initiate nuclear reactions that change Uranium-238 into Plutonium-239, which can then be used as fuel by the nuclear reactor, both directly (inside the operating reactor) or indirectly, by taking the fuel rod out, melting it down, and separating the Plutonium-239 from the rest of the metal, using it to forge a new fuel rod.

This occurs in normal power plants – “burners” – as well, but less fuel is produced than consumed.

Also, in normal power plants, the step of melting down the fuel rod and extracting the Pu-239 takes place in one of the Government’s centralized nuclear fuel reprocessing facilities, requiring “large” amounts (tens of tons) of radioactive waste to be shipped around the country under heavy guard.

However, Blue Rock has a nuclear fuel reprocessing facility within its walls. Only a tiny amount of short lived actinide wastes, which make up a tiny proportion of all nuclear wastes and will be inert within four centuries, need leave the confines of the facility, and only natural uranium need enter. If the power plant operator desires, up to 80% more plutonium can be produced than used in the reactor, and the extra plutonium can be shipped to other power plants – or in the case of Blue Rock, to the nearby Mesa Space Center, where prototypes of the next generation of nuclear space rockets are being developed. This is also why Blue Rock has four reactors – to amortize the costs of the reprocessing facility over a larger number of reactors.

Since natural uranium (U-238) is about a hundred times more abundant than U-235, supplies are expected to last at least a hundred times longer; that is, for tens of thousands rather than hundreds of years.

Blue Rock possesses a number of advanced safety features in addition to extensive fail-safe mechanisms possessed by all nuclear power plants. It uses a liquid metal coolant, which operates at a low pressure and cannot boil, preventing steam explosions of the kind that disabled the Bombay-7 Pressurized Water Reactor in 1958***; the reactor slows down when it heats up, so a loss of coolant cannot cause a reactor to overheat; and in the event of a meltdown, the melting metal fuel rods will be forced upwards, away from the reactor, shutting it down.

Blue Rock’s reactor is not a completely novel design. The Government has been operating a veritable parade of fast-breeder reactor designs (including a handful of the same make and model of Blue Rock’s reactors) for the better part of a decade, mostly to produce additional uranium and plutonium to hedge against the possibility of future uranium shortages****.

The commercialization of fast-breeder reactors has mainly been delayed by fears that the dispersed nature of medium-sized fast-breeder power plants would make it difficult for the government to properly police them – possibly allowing opportunistic operators to siphon off plutonium, which is used to make nuclear bombs, to sell on the black market. These fears have mostly been allayed by additional regulations concerning fast-breeders, which most believe will be adequate to prevent such opportunism.

Currently, a total of 34 commercially-operated fast-breeder reactors are under construction, of which 20 are Applied Scientific Blue-Rock-type liquid metal fast breeders. As the first corporation to gain approval for commercial operation of its fast-breeder reactor design, Applied Scientific has acquired a commanding position in this new market. However, some analysts believe that Antarctic Atomics’ Molten Salt Thorium Breeders, with their lower projected operating costs, may give the West Antarctica-based company an advantage in the long term, while others project that demand for smaller reactors will increase, favoring HappyAtom’s smaller, modular fast-breeders.

 

*300-400 GW of new capacity per year is about what you’d expect for a state in the 1960s with over 4.5 billion people.

The author doesn’t want to get too technical, but with each reactor having a capacity factor of 85-90%, and generating 600-1000GW (high end), having 300 new power reactors a year (assuming a significant fraction are for nuclear powered ships and submarines and industrial plants) a gives you 210-240 GW of new nuclear generating capacity each year; if this is two-thirds of all new capacity, then total growth in capacity should be about 340-360 GW per year. This is reasonable for JOINTGOV, a super-state which in the 1960s had over 4.5 billion people living first-world lifestyles. Compare these figures with the real-world USA, which had 1000 GW or so of total generating capacity in 2015 (and 300 million people).

 

**Again, technology in the Pacificverse is ahead by ~10-20 or more years depending on the field.

In the Pacificverse, the Manhattan Project wasted immense amounts of resources on developing PWRs for the Navy, very-high-temperature gas-cooled (open cycle) reactors for Spaceflight Initiative (yes, even during the war) and molten salt reactors for nuclear-electric aircraft (yes, seriously), and a slew of other reactor designs (heavy water, light water, thorium, uranium, experimental breeder, boiling water, etc. all redundant with much duplication of effort) for wartime industry (including oil refining, process heat, and of course, electrical power). This, coupled with continued very high post-war spending (especially since Spaceflight Initiative had a stake in the projects) meant that JOINTGOV entered the atomic age in high gear, with a very broad technology base with which to attack applications. An extra decade or two was needed to smooth out all the bugs, but the friendly 800 MWe CANDU-equivalent ANDUT (Antarctic Deuterium Uranium Thorium) was an industry standard by the late 1950s.

The Manhattan Project engineers also came up with as many unnecessary ways of reprocessing nuclear waste as the cash-mad engineers could come up with (this is what happens when you give engineers nigh-unlimited resources and not enough managerial oversight).

Oh, and one sub-project, based in Los Alamos and blessed with good managers, managed to come up with a nuclear bomb which was actually useful in the limited timeframe (as opposed to various ideas for “hydrogen bombs” and “low-fallout nuclear mining charges” that Los Alamos was forced to give up – for the time being.

Note that the Soviets had a fast-breeder by 1973. The Pacificverse can certainly do better than that!

 

***The Pacificverse got lucky. Bombay-7’s containment building works as designed and keeps the steam in. No fatalities or panic, but a wake-up call for nuclear safety.

 

****And, of course, to manufacture nuclear warheads. What? There’s a Cold War on! We can’t let those darned dirty Commies get ahead of us! We must close the warhead gap!

ETHICS AND RECOMMENDATIONS BOARD (2)

From: Ethics and Recommendations Board, University of West Antarctica

To:      Dr. Rebecca T. Chiu, Department of Biomedical Sciences

Re:       Observational Study – pre-term mammalian fetuses

Date:   19/8/1999

 

Dr. Chiu

This board is pleased to inform you that your request for funding for your experiment entitled “Comparison of the brain activity of human and mammalian fetuses” has been granted.

You have been granted up 200 slots on the teaching hospital’s fMRI machine, and 600 slots on the Department’s internal-use fMRI.

We are pleased that someone has finally taken up our recommendation to study and compare the brain activity of fetuses and other mammals to aid the establishment of criteria to determine the loss of utility resulting from termination of human pregnancies.

Regards

Ethics and Recommendations Board

University of West Antarctica

 

*Note that this study can probably be conducted using actual data from real-life studies, and some sort of review or meta-analysis would likely achieve the goals of this study in real life. The University either has cash to spare, likes people doing replications studies, or is sponsoring an early study into this phenomenon (read the date).

ETHICS & RECOMMENDATIONS BOARD (1)

From: Ethics and Recommendations Board, University of West Antarctica

To:      Dr. Simon R. Hubbard, Department of Biomedical Sciences

Re:       Human embryo cloning experiment

Date:   19/8/2001

 

Dr. Hubbard

We are pleased to inform you that your request for permission and funding for your project titled “Investigating Developmental and Morphological Differences among Genetically Identical Human Embryos produced using Egg Cells from Different Donors” has been granted.

It is the opinion of this Board that insufficient work has been done to perfect the techniques and methods necessary for reliable and safe human cloning, and that more work needs to be done to permit human cloning to proceed as soon as legislative barriers to bringing cloned embryos to term are lifted. We believe that your work has the potential to keep this University at the forefront of this new and exciting area of research.

Nonetheless, we will take this opportunity to remind you that the current arbitrary legislative limit for growth of cloned embryos is ten weeks (i.e. development into the fetal period is not permitted), and that implantation of cloned embryos, whatever their age, into human donors is not permissible.

Regards

Ethics and Recommendations Board

University of West Antarctica

 

*This author believes that the prime objection to human cloning is the potential for social stigma towards any born human clone, as well as the potential ill-health and suffering of the clone (after being carried to term) that is likely to result from today’s primitive cloning technologies. This author is uncertain how much suffering embryos and fetuses experience in general, and recognizes the importance of this problem. Research institutions in the Joint Government have an extremely cavalier (or irresponsible, depending on your POV) attitude towards ethics and risks in general.

GULF WAR (3): COALITION-BUILDING

October 1990

Conference Room 17, National Command Center

The Ziggurat, Bureau of Defense

Atoll, Circumference District

Jointland

 

“Ladies and Gentlemen, the World Coordinator of the Joint Government.”

Flanked by Secret Service personnel, the World Coordinator of the Joint Government, George H.W. Bush, entered the room, gave everyone a once-over, and sat down, followed by World Administrator Jiang Zemin.

Across from Coordinator Wu, three cathode-ray tube televisions glowed with the faces of the Coordinators and Administrators of Jointland’s Administrative Areas – and a smattering of JOINTGOV ambassadors and representatives.

Nobody has the time to actually fly over to Atoll for physical meetings anymore…

Wu nodded, signalling Secretary Baker to begin his presentation.

“Okay. First, a quick summary of what has been done so far. Over the past month or two, we have secured the military support of Syria, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia for an offensive action to remove Iraqi forces from Kuwait and restore the legitimate government of Kuwait to power. We have also secured the diplomatic support of the Soviet Union, Morocco, and Oman – which may decide to contribute military support in the future – and are well on track to achieve our target of including an additional ten nations in any offensive military action.”

Well, of course we are. JOINTGOV may provide everyone with Solar Power Satellite Rectennas, plug-and-play thorium reactors, and solar panels, but everyone’s fuel cells and gas turbines run on good old-fashioned petroleum – 10% of which came from Kuwait. 

Saddam Hussein spooked many, many people around the world by launching his little adventure. 

General Harrison, liaison for the Collective Defense Organization – probably somewhat enthusiastic to see the CDO get a new mission after the Iron Curtain fell, even if the man hAtoated war as much as any seasoned military man – coughed once, and entered the discussion.

“Thank you, Secretary Baker. Now, onto the primary item on the agenda.”

A projector lit up, and an image of a compass filled the screen – the insignia of the Collective Defense Organization (CDO), set up forty years prior to formalize the military alliance dedicated to fighting the commies protecting JOINTGOV’s allies around the world.

“As you are no doubt aware, yesterday, the Collective Defense Council voted overwhelmingly to deploy the forces of the member nations of the Collective Defense Organization, as a unified force, in support of United Nations Resolution 660.”

“What was not publicized was that an agreement was also reached regarding the outline of  CDO forces to be deployed to the region. While a more complete list and analysis will be distributed in due course, we at the Bureau of Defense felt it would be best to give you all an overview of the situation as soon as possible.”

“The OPLAN being drafted significantly increases the offensive capabilities of the coalition being assembled in Saudi Arabia.”

Ladies and Gentlemen, we have our “offensive option”. 

The slide projector clicked, and General Harrison extended his pointer towards the screen. Across the world, in conference rooms in London, Hangzhou*, New Edinburgh**, Calcutta***, Yeager****, and Washington, lower-ranked military attaches turned on their slide projectors.

---

*Upon stepping into the power vacuum left by the fall of the Ming Dynasty, the Song-dynasty-derived Joint Government decided to reestablish the Southern Song capital at Hangzhou (primarily for logistics reasons).

**New Edinburgh, West Antarctica, Antarctic Administrative Area

***Calcutta, Indian Administrative Area (In the real world, Calcutta was the capital of the British Raj before WWI)

*****Yeager, Mare Tranquillitatis, Luna, Extraterrestrial Habitats Administrative Area (JOINTGOV is a party to the Limited Outer Space Treaty, which forbids sovereignty claims over naturally existing large solar system bodies (but if you move an asteroid into Venusian orbit, it’s yours in the same way that a space station is yours). It should be noted that the only state with enough military force and clout to enforce regulations in space is JOINTGOV).

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General Harrison began his presentation:

 

Part one: Naval forces:

All CDO naval forces operating in support of OPERATION DESERT SHIELD will be designated TASK FORCE 77.

The Republic of Korea will deploy a full naval task force, consisting of a nuclear-powered supercarrier (expected to be the nuclearized WWII-era ex-JGS Kitty Hawk), its battle group, and a flotilla of amphibious assault ships with the 2nd ROK Marines embarked.

The Japanese Republic will deploy a full naval task force, consisting of the carrier battle group of the conventionally-powered ex-JGS Monkey King.

The Republic of Manchuria will be deploying a destroyer squadron to the Persian Gulf.

The French Republic will deploy a carrier and additional escort craft.

The Kingdom of Thailand will deploy a naval task group centered on a helicopter carrier.

Hmm, so the Koreans are making a play for superpowerdom. Good for them. 

 

Part two: Air forces:

CDO member air elements from East Asia, Europe, Southeast Asia, and Central Asia have been pulled from their posts. A detailed roster has yet to be drawn up. Suffice to say that we have earmarked units from Japan, Korea, Manchuria, Thailand, Burma, France, Italy, and Spain.

Hmmm… no smaller nations? 

“Have you considered broadening the scope of participation? I don’t seem to see any smaller nations on this roster.”

General Harrison nodded.

“We are considering pulling in aircraft from Cambodia and Laos*. Tensions with the Viets have been low recently, so nobody’s going to miss a few squadrons from Allied Forces Southeast Asia. We already have an excellent C&C infrastructure for such squadrons, and we’ve trained with all CDO member states for years, so integrating them isn’t going to be a substantial problem.”

*No Khmer Rouge, no genocide. The Vietnam exit was cleaner in the Pacificverse (since the Chinese Administrative Area is right across the border, it was worth investing time to keep Southeast Asia safe and stable). 

 

Part three: Ground Forces:

The French Republic will deploy a light armored division, earmarked for Army Central Command.

The Republic of Korea* will deploy an armored division in addition to the aforementioned Marine Division in addition to their air assault brigade already in theater. The 2nd ROK Marine Division is operating under the command of Marine Forces Central Command, and will continue to do so for the duration of this operation. The 3rd ROK Armored Division has been earmarked for Army Central Command.

*Korea is unified and CDO. Manchuria is divided into North and South. 

The Republic of Manchuria will deploy a reinforced armored division and an armored cavalry brigade. The armored division has been earmarked for Army Central Command, to be deployed in the western part of the combat theater. It is expected that the armored cavalry brigade will be deployed with MARCENT.

We have an immense amount of experience operating alongside the Koreans and South Manchus in Manchuria and Mongolia, and expect this to translate across to Saudi Arabia reasonably well.

Wow, that’s something. Who needs the biggest military in the Solar System when you have allies? We do, obviously. What good is having the richest economy on Earth if you can’t protect it?

 

“While the arrangements are far from final, these will be the forces available for Operation: DESERT STORM should it ever become necessary. As for additional forces, we are hoping the Germans will garner enough public support to deploy an armored division in addition to their Air Force contribution.”

I know the Germans. They’re too touchy to deploy Panzers overseas again – for now. The Japanese, on the other hand, would have merrily sent over an armored division if we had asked. Hmm…

“Have you considered asking the Japanese for an armored division?”

“Sir, with all due respect, we did not think that would a good idea politically – there is still some resentment among the Koreans and Manchurians (not to mention our own citizens) for WWII. More importantly, the Japanese Army is kitted out with light tank destroyers, not tanks. They don’t quite have the hardware for what we need out there.”

Ahh, so that’s why we let them keep their army. 

“Of course. Is that all, General?”

 

“I have something to add.” General Sally Forth rose from her seat, with an unease that betrayed time spent in microgravity.

“Air Force Space Command has reviewed its systems, and we are confident that HELIOS will be able to completely defeat an Iraqi Scud attack of any magnitude probable.”

That didn’t happen last time, didn’t it? 

General Forth, perhaps noticing the skeptical gleam in the eye of her CIC, continued.

“While HELIOS was unable to intercept many of the Soviet’s battlefield ballistic missiles during the Czech War, one must recall that the Soviets timed their attack to occur before the completion of the High-Energy-Laser Interception Orbital System, and that the system was completely untested in combat back in 1984. We’ve come a long way since then.”

Of course you have. We give you a billion credits to upgrade the system every year. 

“Furthermore, we believe that with recent upgrades to HELIOS, we will be able to shoot down high-flying enemy aircraft. We also plan to attempt to disrupt the Iraqi IADs using the experimental particle-beam weapons we have on-orbit.”

And thus justify your latest billion-credit project. 

“Needless to say, the Iraqi possession of chemical weapons means kinetic strikes are out of the question.”

One more useless weapon the taxpayers spent money on. Too bad Science & Technology Reps will never let the Legislature pull the plug on these things – too many nerds in their constituencies. 

“Thank you, general, for your candor.”

“Now, onto the next item on the agenda…”

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END

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Notes: Relocating Polymetallic Nodule Deposits

The Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ) in the Northeast Pacific, between 0 and 20 degrees latitude and 165 and 110 degrees longitude, does not exist in the Pacificverse because the continent of Jointland is in the way.

Thankfully, according to a paper by the real-life International Seabed Authority, https://www.isa.org.jm/sites/default/files/files/documents/tstudy6.pdf, manganese nodule production is the product of the following process:

The key step, step 4, is also highly reliant on a lack of sedimentation, the result of rivers emptying into oceans, and the presence of Antarctic bottom water, which helps precipitate out soluble metal ions in the form of oxides atop nodules.

The numerous processes involved are all highly dependent on a wide variety of factors, which means that this author can say whatever this author likes on the subject of the existence of commercially viable amounts of polymetallic nodules in the central-south Pacific or West Pacific regions in a world with an extra continent in the Pacific.

Presumably, such a continent would provide an ample supply of eroded metals to the mineral-deprived western pacific and southern pacific regions, facilitating the formation of manganese nodule deposits in those regions.

Oh, and heavily eroded inactive island arcs to the south of this continent would be quite perfect for accumulation of cobalt crusts and massive sulfide deposits…

How the Atom Was Tamed (4)

Subsidies

The Daily Clipper

January 15^th, 1952

Nathaniel So, Sandblasted, Unpainted Province, JAA (Jointland Administrative Area)

 

NUCLEAR WASTE REPOSITORY COMMISSIONED; WASTE SAFE FOR TEN THOUSAND YEARS, SCIENTISTS SAY

Today, the first shipment of high-level nuclear waste arrived at the Red Hill nuclear waste repository, in a ceremony presided over by Jointland Administrator Charles Bishop and Provincial Administrator Catherine An.

Built in an abandoned deep-core salt mine, the government-owned-and-operated Red Hill nuclear waste repository will receive and store nuclear waste from nuclear power plants across the Jointland Administrative Area, and until additional regional sites are established, from across the Pacific as well.

Within the repository, the concrete casks of high-level radioactive waste – mostly spent reactor fuel rods – will be stored in former mining tunnels dug through the salt, isolating the radioactive waste from the biosphere.

Nuclear waste is generally very compact. While not massive, the Red Hill waste repository is large enough that, if all of the Pacific’s energy needs were met by nuclear energy tomorrow, there would be enough room to store a decade’s worth of waste. Regional waste repositories, two of which – Yucca Mountain in California Province and Lanzhou in Gansu Province – are already under construction, would increase this by a factor of three or more.

If they are not disturbed, the salt around the casks of nuclear waste will eventually, after several thousand years, flow into the tunnels, permanently entombing the casks of nuclear waste – probably until they are safe to open again.

That is, unless the casks are retrieved sometime in the next half-century.

The spent nuclear fuel rods produced by today’s generation of nuclear reactors contain up to 90% of their original content of Uranium-235, and large amounts of valuable Uranium-238. However, they also contain copious amounts of highly radioactive “transuranics”, “fission products” and “neutron poisons”, which prevent their continued use in nuclear reactors.

While the government can and does reprocess spent nuclear fuel to avoid waste, the current high cost of reprocessing (and relatively low cost of uranium) means that it is not economical for the government to reprocess spent fuel from every single nuclear reactor in the Joint Government. Cheaper methods of reprocessing nuclear fuel, and “fast” reactors designed to burn “transuranics” as fuel, are under development, but it is estimated that they will not become available or widespread before the 1970s.

Once cheaper methods of reprocessing and use are developed, it is expected that the concrete casks housed in the Red Hill waste repository will be retrieved from their salty tombs and reprocessed for use. In their place will appear new concrete casks, this time housing smaller quantities of short-lived radioactive wastes (mostly fission products and neutron poisons) which will remain problematic for a scant three centuries.

Some even speculate that, as applications are developed for fission products and neutron poisons, even these radioactive substances will be harnessed for their potential, and the Red Hill repository will be shut down altogether.

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Obviously, the government-sponsored nuclear waste reprocessing program serves as a de facto subsidy for the nuclear energy industry, as does the nuclear waste storage program. Relax, the moment fast breeders are introduced, measures will be taken to encourage their use by charging more for nuclear waste disposal.

Oh, and the spent fuel rods also contain plutonium, which the Joint Government needs to make bombs… ‘cause the dirty commies have ‘em too!

 

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The Daily Clipper

November 29^th, 1957

Julia Richards, Denver, Colorado Province, NAAA (North American Administrative Area)

 

GOVERNMENT WILL BUY REACTORS FOR RAILROAD ELECTRIFICATION

In a press statement today, Secretary for North American Commerce Lewis Strauss announced that the Joint Government would purchase 18 General Electric BWRs, 12 Antarctic Atomic ANDUs, 12 Applied Scientific PWRs, and 12 Westinghouse PWRs to provide electricity for the North American Railroad electrification project. Of these reactors, 16 (in 8 power stations) are scheduled to be built along the Midwestern Rail Corridor, the second-longest stretch of unelectrified major freight railroad in North America running from California to Illinois. The remaining units will variously be assigned to provide additional power to grids in Carolina, Oregon, Pacific Columbia, and Sonora, where the recent completion of intercity High-Speed-Rail links has strained the electricity grid. The reactors are expected to go online over a period of three years, from 1959 to 1961.

Besides providing power to railroads, the new nuclear power stations are also expected to provide additional baseload capacity to regional grids in the North American Midwest, and the infrastructure they will require (to handle the additional capacity) is expected to increase the robustness and reliability of the Midwest’s transmission infrastructure. The new plants are also expected to replace coal- and oil- fired power plants, reducing air pollution in the Midwest.

The decision to purchase additional reactors was lambasted by many commentators, who noted that the cost of nuclear power, while steadily falling, was still higher than that of coal, and that the uneconomical purchase of these reactors – not to mention government ownership of the reactors – was not in line with the principles of laissez-faire capitalism. Opponents of the decision also noted that both the decommissioning of numerous small coal-fired power plants and the reduction in demand for coal would lead to the loss of thousands of jobs in power plants and coal mines, harming the economies of the Midwest Provinces.

Supporters of the decision pointed to the economic and environmental benefits of railroad electrification. It is argued that electrification would stimulate the economies of the Midwest by lowering the cost and duration of freight transport by rail.

Since 1938, the Joint Government has been engaged in a strenuous railroad electrification program, constructing overhead electrical lines a standardized 6.0 meters above standard gauge tracks in order to accommodate double-decker passenger cars, and, more recently, double-stacked modular standardized transport containers. Initially begun to conserve fuel oil for use by ships and trucks, the advent of nuclear-generated electricity has expanded the objective of the railroad electrification program to reduction of air pollution from vehicles and power plants, a problem which has smothered the Pacific’s cities in smog.

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In the Pacificverse, standard gauge is precisely 1,500mm, and ISO intermodal containers measure approximately 2.5m by 2.5m by 12.5m. Electric rail transport was significantly more important in the Pacificverse than in reality, in part because of elevated gasoline prices, a product of high demand from 3-6 billion (from 1940 to 2000) first-world-lifestyle Joint Government citizens (including the populations of India, China, Jointland, North America (down to the Darien Gap), the British Isles, Australasia, and more).

The pursuit of energy security in the face of dwindling conventional oil reserves is (obviously) another major motivation for such extensive support for the nuclear industry.

Also, Global Containerization came about two decades early, and was developed by JOINTGOV in response to the massive freight needs of WWII (like CONEX, but metric). Due to the immense size of the JOINTGOV economy, and the huge numbers of CONEX Liberty Ships, it became the de facto world standard following WWII.