Editor's note citation: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste&page=2

Just because something is radioactive doesn't mean it is useful and able to be used to produce uranium. Yes, nuclear waste is very radioactive, per kg of waste, and fly ash is not very radioactive, per kg of waste. When compared to kWh of generated power, however, fly ash contains more decaying atoms than the waste from a nuclear reactor that produced the same kWh of generated power.

Power plants typically take the heat generated by their fuel, which must then be converted into electrical energy, generally by heating water to steam to turn turbines. With that considered, the kWh below is of the heat output. Conversion to electricity is within the usual turbine efficiencies.

• 1kg of uranium can generate 24,000,000 kWh
• 1kg of coal can generate 8 kWh
• 3,000,000kg of coal can generate 24,000,000 kWh
• Which is to say, 1kg uranium = 3,000,000 kg coal

Then there's the fly ash problem. Fly ash can be 100 times as radioactive as nuclear waste, per kWh generated, and much of it goes up a flue. Nuclear waste is entirely contained unless there's a spill, and spills are tightly monitored. A coal plant produces about 8% of the input's weight as fly ash. Therefore, that 3,000,000kg of coal produces 240,000kg of fly ash. The coal industry desperately wants you to believe that fly ash is harmless, but it contains numerous toxins and if used near water sources will leach heavy metals into the water supply. Nuclear waste, by contrast, is well contained and small. Nuclear plants produce a bit more waste in output relative to input, because the radiation gets into the surrounding materials which then have to be managed as well as the fuel, but we're talking an input of 1kg of fuel generating perhaps 2-10kg of waste, versus coal's 240,000kg of waste for the same kWh of fuel.

Like.

Would it? While we couldn't readily eliminate the electoral college without a constitutional amendment, I don't recall anywhere in the constitution where the specific method of voting is prescribed. Isn't that delegated to the states? They should be free to switch to another system, like a preferential voting system.

I get the feeling that it was the kind of line that should have been expounded on, but for fear that it would become that much more transparent. A more full line might have read...

"How on earth could I, a junior analyst, possibly believe I could change the world for the better over the decisions of those with the proper authority? I divulged sensitive information to a third party with insufficient regard for the impact of that information. That information could have led to the deaths of Americans, leaving only negative impact. To make a positive change in the world it would have had to be seen by Americans. Those Americans would have had to petition our government to stop the atrocities revealed in the documents. Maybe even to have inspired another individual to turn "treasonous" and blow the whistle on even deeper secrets, surveillance penetrating the core of the American way. Going all the way to the top, until the President himself has to go on television and make a speech about reviewing our programs. How on earth could I, a junior analyst, possibly believe I could change the world for the better..."

While I don't approve of capital punishment, due to the errors that have been made in identifying the guilty party, the excessive cost when compared to life incarceration, and the fact that it just doesn't deter crime, this has to be the least of my concerns. If we're only considering lethal injection, then of the several drugs that are administered, the first is to put the sentenced to sleep. Once effectively drugged into sleep, the rest of the drugs merely terminate all the functions of the body that keep it alive. There probably isn't much left to experience that last surge of brain activity.

As it happens, though, if someone is sentenced to death I don't think 30 seconds of pure terror is really relevant. Ultimately, we're killing them, and they've been dealing with their impending death for years.

What could possibly go wrong?

"I called for a thorough review of our surveillance operations before Mr. Snowden made these leaks. My preference - and I think the American people's preference - would have been for a lawful, orderly examination of these laws; a thoughtful, fact-based debate." - Obama

Mr. President, how are we supposed to have a thoughtful, fact based debate about programs which are so secret nobody knew about them until a whistle blower revealed them directly to the public. About a court who's orders are so secret that entire companies shut down when the thread of an order looms, and they can't even say what the threat was.

Without transparency, there can be no debate. Without Snowden, there would be no transparency on this issue.

Perhaps the spec could be augmented by allowing a randomized MAC address that is not tied to the device. Define the first octet so manufacturers don't assign anything to it, and leave the remaining bits as completely random. Make the next part of the packet the public half of a key pair that the device expects responses to come back to. Allow the same random MAC address scheme to be used by either side of the connection. Only accept packets that can be properly decoded with the private key of the key pair, which eliminates the problem of random MAC address collisions. As a part of negotiating the secured connection, when exchanging the private key also exchange the real MAC address only after the secured connection is complete. Or, never use the real MAC address and retain the random MAC address for the duration of the connection.

Actually .5% is a hundred times more than 5 thousandths of a percent.

Which means we're both wrong, because it is .05%.

1/2048 ~= .0005 = .05%

I should have said 5 hundredths of a percent, I misspoke in the original. (My math was correct, but I saw .05 as thousanths not hundredths.)