In Newsletter #48 I presented a list of questions I feel have been left unanswered by the pro-nuclear Cassini factions.
Jim Spellman Jr., President - California Space Development Council and Executive Director - NSS/Western Spaceport Chapter passed the list of questions around and got some answers together. He presented these to us, and this is my answer to those rebuttals of my comments.
This series originally was done through email, but it has grown so large and complicated that a switch to the more capable HTML format became necessary (it would have been posted eventually, anyway).
In the following document three sets of text appear.
The light text indicates my original comments each of which has been reproduced here.
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*** Some questions still left unanswered by the pro-nuclear Cassini side:
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I fielded these questions out to individuals for their comment. The
following are answers received to date.
Why did the EXPECTED PLUTONIUM RELEASE AMOUNT change from 33% to about 3% from June 1995 to June 1997 for an inadvertent flyby reentry, while at the same time NASA claims the RTGs are an incredibly reliable and stable and well researched technology and that RTGs have 12, 25, and 37 years of technological experience put into them? (the numbers are different depending on which page of NASA reports, or which spokesperson you get the number from.)
As to the continued testing and analysis, which part was testing and which part was analysis? Because -- as I am sure the author knows as well as I do -- NASA has NOT TESTED the RTGs at 30,000 mph, or at 42,300 mph, ever. It is all theoretical and absolutely UNTESTED.
Furthermore the possible variance from 33% is +67% or -33%. Thus the
maximum failure rate is roughly double the expected failure rate.
The possible variance from 3% is +97% or -3%. Here, the maximum
failure rate is about 32 times the expected failure rate. How
sure is NASA that their "new" number -- 3% -- is accurate?
In any event, it is just an average failure rate -- and not,
once again, any sort of true "worst case" scenario.
NASA spokespeople have repeatedly made such misleading statements to the
public and to members of Congress. There is NO basis in fact for such a
statement, yet they continue to make these ridiculous claims.
If it's not true, why do they say it? Who is afraid of the truth,
who is afraid the public cannot understand the truth, and who
is afraid that the public will rightfully be afraid when they
hear the truth?
The FSEIS was written in 1997 and the segments I referred to where the
7000 figure was used (pages E-48
and E-50) were published in the
June 1997 SEIS in response to my comments which I submitted to
NASA in April, 1997. So the 7000 figure has to have been produced
in mid-1997, and yet it references indisputably the 1989 figure.
By the way, to see the difference between the kind of "testing and analysis"
NASA has done on the RTGs versus REAL testing, one need look no further
than at a comparison of the 1989 and 1995 Space Debris reports.
In
Newsletter #24 I did an extensive comparison of these two reports.
The numeric differences were as follows:
Report year: 1989 ---- 1995
Source: Table 2 of each report.
The differences between the 1989 figures and the 1995 figures were largely the result of NASA leaving something called a Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF) in space for nearly six years, then hauling it back to Earth and hand-counting the impact craters. There were about 32,000 of them that were visible to the unaided eye, the largest was 0.5 centimeters in diameter, which was probably made by an object so small as to be barely visible.
Note that the really important increase is not the 7000 figure at all, or the fact that it became 8000 in the next report. Those numbers just prove which report NASA used. But in truth, even to talk about either of those numbers in this context is in fact an obfuscation of the facts! The value -- 7000 or 8000 -- is merely the objects which are large enough to be tracked (somewhat inaccurately) with current technology. The rest are utterly invisible. It's a crap shoot.
The important figures are the second and third ones, because objects far smaller than 10 cm in diameter can cause structural damage to Cassini due to the kinetic energy available at the relative speeds these objects travel at.
For objects 1 cm or larger, notice the figure increased from an ESTIMATED 17,500 to a TESTED 110,000! For objects from .01 cm to 1 cm the figures changed by about an order of magnitude, from 3,524,500 to 35,117,000.
The 1995 Interagency Report on Space Debris states that objects of .1 cm or larger are capable of causing "structural damage" to a satellite (page 8). For Cassini, traveling about twice as fast as Earth-orbiting satellites, one can reasonably suppose that objects even smaller than .1 cm can destroy the spacecraft. That is a very small object!
10 cm or greater: 7000 ---- 8000
1 to 10 cm: 17,500 ---- 110,000
.01-1 cm: 3,524,500 ---- 35,117,000
Total kg: 3,000,000 ---- 2,000,000
Referring specifically to the "ceramic form of the plutonium", aside from the fact that an unknown amount (33%, 3%?) might be incinerated in a "normal" reentry accident, also any collision with any piece of space debris bigger than about the size of a pinhead (or perhaps even smaller than that) would destroy the containment system if that is where the impact occurred. These effects can be cumulative, in other words, an Earth-impacting space probe can ALSO be struck with space debris as it falls to Earth, which is the sort of reason why NASA is obliged to indicate the effects of a FULL release ANYWHERE on the planet. Such an event is possible and we risk it merely for haste, not for progress.
The RTG containment technology is clearly designed to release it's plutonium at high altitude or not at all, unless it lands or rock or some other hard surface. High altitude releases are EXPECTED in both the 1995 and the 1997 reports, as discussed above. The effect of vaporization at high altitude is multifaceted. Large particles will fall to Earth in the approximate area where the vaporization takes place, presenting a health hazard as they fall and afterwards as they enter the food chain. Smaller particles will drift more with the wind and take longer to descend to the surface of the Earth, and are more easily stirred up again after first alighting upon our once fair garden's floor. The drifting particles will come down in concentrated areas due to rainfall and due as well to the complex and largely unpredictable dynamics of atmospheric winds, and not to mention the effects of gravity, which I mention because NSS documents seem to forget about it (more on that in a future document).
But perhaps the most important effect of a high altitude release is that it will be impossible to prove who died from what, whether it was Cassini or SNAP-9A or weapons testing or a thousand other things, because the deaths will be spread all around the globe, and modern science cannot tell you which little microparticle came from where, or even if that is what caused a cancer or leukemia in the first place! Yet NASA claims it knows so much!
Essentially nowhere will NASA's nice little average dispersal be the ACTUAL dispersal. Everywhere will have either more, or less, but for all intents and purposes, nowhere will the dispersal actually be "average." Therefore, the actual exposures will not be "average" at all either.
As to Biosphere, you have to talk to the folks at Oracle, AZ, or the University of Pittsburg that's now in charge. As to the Moon, ask Congress why we have't been back since Dec. '72. As to "in orbit somewhere" let's see what happens after first element of ISS is launched next year.
That is why I liked the Lewis satellite. Its purpose was to study THIS environment, the one we most need to learn about, and quickly before we no longer are around to ponder the question of how life formed.
Far more important right now is, how will life end? Or rather, how can we make the most use of the available souls and supplies on board "Spaceship Earth" to have a better educated, less violent and thriving society without war, famine, pestilence or greed, without lies and without political maneuvering over scientific issues? How can we build a society based on making the most of the brainpower on board this ship to solve the problems we face? About the only problem Spaceship Earth does not face that an offworld traveling outpost would face is -- we don't need navigators. But we sure need to solve some problems here on Earth if THIS spaceship is going to get anywhere exciting!
NASA's guiding mission is to help mankind gain knowledge. Mankind needs help. Our world is polluted and choking. People are starving, sickening, and dying. We know one very important thing about every other planet in our solar system: None are at all hospitable. Earth is, but we're losing it as well. NASA needs to show more concern for the biosphere.
Cassini will have about 270 billion potential lethal doses of plutonium 238 on board if you spread them all out and count them all up, give or take at most perhaps an order of magnitude either way, depending on who you get a guesstimate from.
Such an amount of plutonium 238, spread in a closed biosphere about 25000 miles in circumference with nearly 6 billion people on it, as Cassini can do, would be a disaster, and should not be risked. The fact that NASA cannot visualize the potential size of the disaster is proof enough that NASA should not be allowed to proceed. Perhaps if NASA could bring itself to express the true potential of a Cassini accident, perhaps then people could believe that NASA knew what it was doing when they say it's safe anyway. But when NASA cannot even admit to the possibility, let alone actually publish a detailed description of what a true worst-case scenario would mean to the health of the planet, how can we trust NASA to make a reasonable cost/benefit analysis?
It is really shocking that NASA doesn't seem to care about such a terrific global pollution, and doesn't seem to understand the nature of its potential effect on our closed ecosystem, because after all, it was they who first showed us the whole system in one heavenly view.
But he will not discuss what a significant dose might be, for those of us who question NASA's assurances about how much will be released. Why not? It is clear that Dr. Raabe is not an expert in RTG plutonium containment systems; he is an accredited expert on plutonium dangers. Why won't he simply tell us what he thinks the effects of plutonium dispersal could be? He need not fall back on ANY NASA STATEMENT to offer a professional opinion about the hazards of plutonium. How big a dose of plutonium 238 would Dr. Raabe be willing to give everyone on the planet and still believe in his heart that no one will be harmed? How big a dose does he think it would take, of vaporized plutonium, to cause cancer in 50% of the people who inhale that dose? Dr. Raabe should let the opposition argue whether NASA can contain the plutonium, and should offer a professional opinion on what the effects of a release might be, not whether or not there will be a release.
And lastly note that Dr. Raabe's professional opinion that an even dispersal would be harmless is disputed by Dr. John Gofman, Dr. Horst Poehler, Dr. Michio Kaku and others, including Dr. Karl Z. Morgan, founder of the field of Health Physics.
NASA's loss is their own fault. Scientists could have spoken up from within and objected to their experiments being powered with the absurd RTG solution but they either chose not to or perhaps did speak, but were not listened to.
Signorini's optimism turned out to be premature, however. Studies by NASA and ESA have found that to provide Cassini's instruments with power from the sun, the solar arrays would have to be large -- about as large as tennis courts. Cassini would never even get off the ground. "Our desire is not to fly nuclear power sources just because they're there," states Richard Spehalski, program manager for Cassini at Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). "Our desire is to get the maximum amount of scientific information with the available resources ... We haven't found a way to do that with solar."
At least a partial
Cassini mission could have been flown today had it been designed
as a solar mission from the start. A full mission could be
flown soon, if not now, considering all the progress being made both
in solar technology, and in reducing the power requirements of the
science experiments themselves, an inevitable accomplishment
given today's technological progress. (In part from work done
at NASA, of course. I expect that work to continue.)
Considering how much money COULD have been put into
Concentrated Solar Arrays, it is a shame that it was instead
foolishly dumped into the nuclear dead end. Hence we have to
rely on the European Space Agency for ANY solar solutions! If
there is a more clear proof of America being, just as with
Sputnik 40 years ago, behind other countries in the vital
technologies of the day, I do not know it. WHY is America
not the world leader in solar technology?
Whoever wrote this comment needs to go back to NASA's books and see for themselves what NASA did. This is discussed in depth in section 2-12(e) of my rebuttal to NASA's rebuttal of my comments on the DSEIS, at this URL:
http://www.animatedsoftware.com/cassini/dsei9707.htm
I still am hoping to get a Next-Day Air package from NASA sometime before launch, rebutting that document... and section 2-12(e) in particular. If they have answers, let's hear them.
I believe that my own fight is to educate the public. If the public understands what NASA has risked, and for what gain and against what alternatives, I do not believe the public would buy into this folly. . .The people do not want this monstrosity now that they know about it.
If you then asked those who knew that plutonium would be aboard
Cassini, what type of plutonium it would be, I bet not 1% of those
who knew there was ANY plutonium on board, knew it was Pu 238 not Pu 239,
or could describe the important differences. At best they might be able
to tell you it's "non-weapons grade plutonium" because NASA has repeatedly
stated this, while the proper answer is "Pu 238 releases about 280 times
more alpha decay particles (for equal units of mass and equal periods
of time) than Pu 239, making it about 280 times more capable of causing
a cancer or other health effect when inhaled or ingested."
And of those 60 people who would be left, out of your 600,000, of the 60
or whatever who knew all those hidden facts (and were still willing to
sign on, of course!), I wonder how many of them also were aware (as
Louis Friedman was not, for example, but he WAS surely one of those
60) of the stature and respect, let alone the names, of the
scientists who oppose this
madness on PURELY SCIENTIFIC GROUNDS, such as Dr. John W. Gofman,
whose awesome biography is given in newsletters #24 and #25:
http://www.animatedsoftware.com/cassini/nltrs/nltr0024.htm
http://www.animatedsoftware.com/cassini/nltrs/nltr0025.htm
No no, Louis Friedman, Executive Director of The Planetary Society and
a vocal proponent of the nuclear space program, thought it was just
"a small group of activists" who oppose Cassini. He STILL (last I checked
the document, a few weeks ago) does not have the courtesy or common
sense -- at the very least -- to describe the opposition properly, that is,
as "a highly respected group of scientists."
Every weak argument his organization has presented for Cassini is
further weakened by his refusal to admit that respected scientists oppose
Cassini on scientific principal.
What did these signators you claim are on your side know of
all this, yet you would claim they are an informed group who support
NASA's latest folly? If there are masses of informed supporters, or
even masses of uninformed supporters, they hardly showed up last Sunday
to support their cause, did they?
But so what? It's not about politics. It's about science. NASA
science is incomplete and NASA makes unfair and dangerous assertions
about things NASA actually knows little or nothing about.
NASA needs to be called to testify before Congressional Hearings, giving sworn testimony, and explain what their agenda is for using RTGs, and why they are unable to wait for a solar option, and why they are suddenly so sure they need to launch as soon as possible, even though all the launch window data they printed up until they realized they have a real fight on their hands some time over the summer, says they would get a satisfactory science return through 1999. So surely we can delay long enough to hold hearings, can we not? There is still time! Even if the hearings started October 6th, or October 13th, or any day before launch, there is STILL TIME! The first launch date is not a "must launch date" at all, it is a first launch opportunity, that's all! So launch after -- and if -- honest hearings produce an honest groundswell of public support! But if NASA launches now, it will be in the face of widespread worldwide open pubic displeasure.
IF NASA IS SURE THEY ARE RIGHT, THEY SHOULD WELCOME THE OPPORTUNITY TO PROVE IT IN SWORN TESTIMONY BEFORE THE LAUNCH.
I call for Congressional Hearings, and so should NASA, and so should everyone on both sides of the debate.
The so-called "proven" technology has a sordid history of lies and deceit as outlined by Karl Grossman and myself and countless others. NASA successes are all mixed with failures. The failure rate is far higher than we can permit for plutonium launches such as Cassini. NASA scientists are not superhuman, and should stop pretending they are.
When they can admit that about themselves, the world may once again decide to trust their judgement without so much oversight. But looking back, historically, every decade so far, something serious has gone wrong for the U.S. Space Program. In the 40's it was the V2 rockets for which we had no equal. In the 50's it was Sputnik. In the 60's it was a deadly fire. In the 70's it was
Apollo 13. In the 80's it was Challenger. As they say in the brokerage business, past performance does not guarantee future returns, but the trend is nevertheless disturbing. In the 90's, perhaps NASA will get lucky, but perhaps not. (Delta II and Titan IV launch vehicle explosions and Lewis satellites and so on notwithstanding; as I write this we have NOT seen a major U.S. Space failure in the 1990's.)
And anyway, if we continue plutonium launches, sooner or later the
pellets of poison are going to be dispersed. It is inevitable. If
not Cassini, another probe. There is no known or anticipated, or even
properly postulated technological solution to this problem. The Space
Debris aspect alone makes it a crap-shoot. And for what? There is
a very simple, elegant and logical solution and NASA could have
chosen it. That they did not do so is regrettable, but is not a
reason to let them proceed with this foolish launch.
By the way, in ten years, the Earth Orbital Debris problem will probably be at least ten times worse than it is right now. I challenge ANYONE to go on record denying that!
Considering the potential costs of cleanup, considering also the costs
to our democracy of proceeding in the face of unresolved lies and
misstatements, the cost of stopping for full hearings would be
minuscule in comparison. NASA does not want to avoid this fight
because they are afraid of the cost of hearings. Not at all.
NASA wishes to avoid this fight because their facts are weak and
would not be able to survive such public scrutiny.
Sincerely,
Russell Hoffman
rhoffman@animatedsoftware.com
