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Just as another question if you wrapped the reactor building, in huge sheets of gold leaf and lead leaf how many leafs would you need to stop any radioactivity comming out?Could using the two together, not add to there abilities?
Quote from: Wiybit on 24/03/2011 23:46:53Just as another question if you wrapped the reactor building, in huge sheets of gold leaf and lead leaf how many leafs would you need to stop any radioactivity comming out?Could using the two together, not add to there abilities?Your increasingly silly ideas suggest that you are trolling.But, in case you are serious, roughly how many layers of gold leaf are there to an inch thick shield?
Quote from: Bored chemist on 25/03/2011 07:17:40Quote from: Wiybit on 24/03/2011 23:46:53Just as another question if you wrapped the reactor building, in huge sheets of gold leaf and lead leaf how many leafs would you need to stop any radioactivity comming out?Could using the two together, not add to there abilities?Your increasingly silly ideas suggest that you are trolling.But, in case you are serious, roughly how many layers of gold leaf are there to an inch thick shield?Sir Sir - I know this one - about 200,000 layers of gold leaf per inch. I think there may be better ways of preventing contamination/radiation than covering a large area with one of the most expensive metals.
*facepalm*Wiybit you seem to have missed or ignored the posts where both Bored Chemist and rosy said that it would take inches of lead to be anywhere near effective against gamma radiation, and would therefore be impossible to put in a suit.
A thin layer won't do anything. And no, combining lead and gold won't have some magical effect. The only factor is mass. Lead and gold are efficient space-wise because they are dense.
Argh! You may not be trolling, but you don't appear to be reading for content.. which can make you come across as such. You've made a number of suggestions which may, as a non-scientist (I know you said somewhere that you're not a scientist) seem quite sensible to you, but to someone who knows anything about the behaviour of different types of radiation, or of radioactive materials, are quite clearly non-sensical.
That you persist with these ideas, when you have been told in no uncertain terms that they will not work as well as other,"
easier-to-implement schemes (the cost is a red herring, although to suggest it's wholly irrelevant is naive in the extreme), results in a certain amount of understandable frustration. The issue is clearly a serious one, it's still not entirely clear how serious in the long term..
because it's not clear how much of the radioactive substances released are the sort that lose all their radioactivity in a matter of hours/days, the bulk of the steam emissions will, at least in the best case scenario, fall into this class, and in any case the alternative to releasing the pressure of the steam might well be a catastrophic explosion which would almost certainly result in the release of quantities of much longer-lasting radioactive materials. However, your complaints that the issue is not being taken seriously are, I think, the result of your conflating "the issue" with "your suggested solutions".
All the posters I've seen on this issue take the natural catastrophe in Japan and the dangerous and worrying situation it has caused at Fukushima extremely seriously. They are not, however, all taking your posts entirely seriously, because you appear not to be reading the explanations of why various of your proposals could serve no useful purpose, and thus your rather grandiloquent declaration that you want to contribute something to help the situation at Fukushima seems faintly ludicrous,
given that there are thousands of experts in the field who will be acting on just the same impulse and will have suggestions worth (in a time critical situation) attending to. Moreover your accusations that other posters are suggesting the workers should just be left to die, when they have said nothing of the sort, are deeply offensive and certainly won't win you either friends or respect here.
Abandon ship?
Bourd Chemist did actually say that while gold or lend paint would'nt prevent radiation, it would suppress the radioactive dust.
QuoteThat you persist with these ideas, when you have been told in no uncertain terms that they will not work as well as other,"What others? No one has suggested another idea.
Quote because it's not clear how much of the radioactive substances released are the sort that lose all their radioactivity in a matter of hours/days, the bulk of the steam emissions will, at least in the best case scenario, fall into this class, and in any case the alternative to releasing the pressure of the steam might well be a catastrophic explosion which would almost certainly result in the release of quantities of much longer-lasting radioactive materials. However, your complaints that the issue is not being taken seriously are, I think, the result of your conflating "the issue" with "your suggested solutions".Not at all, again going back to cost and time, if preventing particals moving provides an added amount of safety for people, then covering the reactor building and painting could cheepy hopefully achieve something.
Quote All the posters I've seen on this issue take the natural catastrophe in Japan and the dangerous and worrying situation it has caused at Fukushima extremely seriously. They are not, however, all taking your posts entirely seriously, because you appear not to be reading the explanations of why various of your proposals could serve no useful purpose, and thus your rather grandiloquent declaration that you want to contribute something to help the situation at Fukushima seems faintly ludicrous,Well maybe that's more an expression of scientific arrogance, while my scientific knowledge might be limited, I am certainly serious about trying to help, it appears that actually many scientists seem to say "If you do not just except my opinion(and it is) then your ludicrous"
Quote given that there are thousands of experts in the field who will be acting on just the same impulse and will have suggestions worth (in a time critical situation) attending to. Moreover your accusations that other posters are suggesting the workers should just be left to die, when they have said nothing of the sort, are deeply offensive and certainly won't win you either friends or respect here. No offence, but the first reply I got was along those lines. Quote from: grizelda on 23/03/2011 07:42:02Abandon ship?
QuoteBourd Chemist did actually say that while gold or lend paint would'nt prevent radiation, it would suppress the radioactive dust. QuoteQuoteThat you persist with these ideas, when you have been told in no uncertain terms that they will not work as well as other,"What others? No one has suggested another idea.Nonsense. What BC said was that whilst lead/gold would not serve a useful purpose in stopping gamma radiation at the kinds of thickness it could be applied to people, and would moreover poison them, using ordinary (wet/tacky) paint might have a helpful effect in collecting any (radioactive) dust so that the amount present as particulates in the atmosphere being breathed in by the workers on site might be reduced (in the same way sticky floor mats are used to collect shoe dust on entry to clean rooms, or indeed analogously to fly-papers.
QuoteQuote because it's not clear how much of the radioactive substances released are the sort that lose all their radioactivity in a matter of hours/days, the bulk of the steam emissions will, at least in the best case scenario, fall into this class, and in any case the alternative to releasing the pressure of the steam might well be a catastrophic explosion which would almost certainly result in the release of quantities of much longer-lasting radioactive materials. However, your complaints that the issue is not being taken seriously are, I think, the result of your conflating "the issue" with "your suggested solutions".Not at all, again going back to cost and time, if preventing particals moving provides an added amount of safety for people, then covering the reactor building and painting could cheepy hopefully achieve something.Yes. Except that the amount of time that people would have to spend near the reactor building applying the paint, especially given that it would have to be tacky to work, would result in a far higher dose of radioactivity than if they just went in, did the job, and came out again.
QuoteQuote All the posters I've seen on this issue take the natural catastrophe in Japan and the dangerous and worrying situation it has caused at Fukushima extremely seriously. They are not, however, all taking your posts entirely seriously, because you appear not to be reading the explanations of why various of your proposals could serve no useful purpose, and thus your rather grandiloquent declaration that you want to contribute something to help the situation at Fukushima seems faintly ludicrous,Well maybe that's more an expression of scientific arrogance, while my scientific knowledge might be limited, I am certainly serious about trying to help, it appears that actually many scientists seem to say "If you do not just except my opinion(and it is) then your ludicrous" Maybe, maybe not. But I really don't think that what people are saying is "just accept my opinion". They've explained why they think it wouldn't work, and your responses to date haven't shown any evidence of having taken those explanations on board. They've said that to wear lead shielding would require too much lead to carry to even halve the gamma ray exposure, and you've continued to harp on about layering gold with lead rather than either (1) asking for an explanation or (2) going away and looking up the thicknesses of lead and gold needed to significantly attenuate gamma radiation.
For a given thickness, gold is a rather better gamma ray shield than lead- and it's non toxic.
If people had just said "haha! your idea is nonsense!" I would be entirely sympathetic, but that's not what's happened. You're not obliged to agree with anyone else posting here, but this is a discussion forum, the whole point is that someone suggests an idea or asks a question and other people try to answer the question or to critically appraise the idea. Unfortunately, in this instance, the critical appraisal is fairly critical. The correct response, in that case, is to either embark on a discussion of why it won't work, or to suggest an alternative approach.
Or, if you think that people in this thread are arrogant and incorrect and are standing in the way of your splendid suggestion for saving the workers of Fukushima, you could try going somewhere else to find a more receptive audience.
QuoteQuote given that there are thousands of experts in the field who will be acting on just the same impulse and will have suggestions worth (in a time critical situation) attending to. Moreover your accusations that other posters are suggesting the workers should just be left to die, when they have said nothing of the sort, are deeply offensive and certainly won't win you either friends or respect here. No offence, but the first reply I got was along those lines. Quote from: grizelda on 23/03/2011 07:42:02Abandon ship?Good heavens. You took that as a joke?
Well, maybe it could, at a stretch, be described as black humour, but I took it as an acknowledgement that the poster felt she had nothing particularly useful to contribute in terms of suggestions but was acknowledging that it was a difficult problem. On the other hand, before I leapt to conclusions I took the trouble to look at a few of that poster's previous posts. May I suggest that before leaping to the most un-charitable conclusion available to you, you do the same?
You could use planes and spray, you could use spray machines on the ground time in and out rather quick, leaving it far safer for the workers to get on with the job. Personally I think it would be better to be done when the majority of the systems were up and running.
Not the case, I have been looking into it, proton cont is what causes a materail to be a good protector and Lead is better than Gold, Bored Chemist suggested the opposite earlier.
Are you asking me leave?
No I didn't take it as a joke, I don't think this issue, is one to Joke about!Always prepared to give people the benefit of the doubt, but just walking away is neither funny or helpful as a suggestion.
Quote from: Madidus_Scientia on 25/03/2011 13:09:46*facepalm*Wiybit you seem to have missed or ignored the posts where both Bored Chemist and rosy said that it would take inches of lead to be anywhere near effective against gamma radiation, and would therefore be impossible to put in a suit. Does it matter? Bored Chemist thinks he is a comedian or something.Quote from: Madidus_Scientia on 25/03/2011 13:09:46A thin layer won't do anything. And no, combining lead and gold won't have some magical effect. The only factor is mass. Lead and gold are efficient space-wise because they are dense. Yes and Lead is actually more dense then Gold. The more you use the less passes.The doctor in the video I posted claims his suit stops gamma and it's not a thick suit, so he is either lying or found some way to do so.
QuoteYou could use planes and spray, you could use spray machines on the ground time in and out rather quick, leaving it far safer for the workers to get on with the job. Personally I think it would be better to be done when the majority of the systems were up and running.Not really, if you were spraying paint you'd leave a whole lot of sprayed paint in the atmosphere, and would have to consider, quantitatively, its toxicity. If it were lead paint, the toxicity would be very high. The workers would have to wear breathing apparatus to exclude particulate paint... which would also exclude particulate radioactive material. Back, more or less, to square one, I would think.
QuoteNot the case, I have been looking into it, proton cont is what causes a materail to be a good protector and Lead is better than Gold, Bored Chemist suggested the opposite earlier. I think, although I may be wrong, that although lead is a better shield weight-for-weight, gold has a much higher density (more atoms, and therefore more atomic mass per unit volume) and therefore works better thickness-for-thickness. So it depends what you're interested in. I would agree that in the hypothetical situation of wearable shields weight-for-weight is probably more important.Then again, I'm not sure how much beta radiation there is at Fukushima.. lead is good against gamma rays, but I have an idea it sometimes just slows down beta particles so they can do more damage (that's going back to A-level, and I forget what the effect was called, so haven't managed to google it). QuoteAre you asking me leave? Not at all, just pointing out that you are behaving as if you think you're going to achieve something here,
beyond an intellectual discussion of the science (and engineering), and that this is unrealistic. There may be places elsewhere on the internet where that's at least hypothetically possible, but we do not have enough access to enough information about what is going on at Fukushima, how much of what radioactive isotopes have been released how far, what technology is already in use, what has been or is soon going to be attempted, etc etc,
to make any meaningful suggestions as to what ought to happen next on a timetable that could conceivably serve a practical purpose and, that being so, berating individuals for suggesting not only idea that could be put into practice within hours to help in Japan but also ideas that they think might be useful to deal with (please no!) an equivalent event in the future is only going to lead to bad feeling. QuoteNo I didn't take it as a joke, I don't think this issue, is one to Joke about!Always prepared to give people the benefit of the doubt, but just walking away is neither funny or helpful as a suggestion.Oh good grief!The world is a pretty bloody place. Nature doesn't care about people.
The physical world around us is completely oblivious to what goes on on the tiny shell of this tiny planet, to our lives, loves, joys, tragedies, and to how and why and when we die. The only available alternative to despair are goodwill, love, practical action, and, yes, laughter. There are jokes in good taste, jokes in poor taste, and jokes which (in a particular social setting) are unacceptable. The boundaries move, and from what I hear there are very few taboo subjects in foxholes. Sometimes something is so wretched that a bitter laugh (and where appropriate a bank transfer to medecins sans frontieres) is the only non-disabling option (hysterical weeping is a serious bar to practical action). But the idea that anything is "not a subject for jokes" is just smug.
Quote from: Wiybit on 25/03/2011 13:37:00Quote from: Madidus_Scientia on 25/03/2011 13:09:46*facepalm*Wiybit you seem to have missed or ignored the posts where both Bored Chemist and rosy said that it would take inches of lead to be anywhere near effective against gamma radiation, and would therefore be impossible to put in a suit. Does it matter? Bored Chemist thinks he is a comedian or something.Quote from: Madidus_Scientia on 25/03/2011 13:09:46A thin layer won't do anything. And no, combining lead and gold won't have some magical effect. The only factor is mass. Lead and gold are efficient space-wise because they are dense. Yes and Lead is actually more dense then Gold. The more you use the less passes.The doctor in the video I posted claims his suit stops gamma and it's not a thick suit, so he is either lying or found some way to do so.I don't think I'm the one how is being laughed at here.Gold is nearly twice as dense as lead (so, unsurprisingly, you are just plain wrong)The idea that " a video on the web says..." is evidence is, at best, rather naive.By far the most important suggestion I made was don't waste time on things that will never work because they would breach the laws of physics.
How is gold morer dense than lead when lead has a higher atomic number. It's the density of the protons in the atomic structure, that prevents radiation passing through.
QuoteHow is gold morer dense than lead when lead has a higher atomic number. It's the density of the protons in the atomic structure, that prevents radiation passing through.Fewer protons per nucleus, sure, but more nuclei per unit volume. Gold weighs around 19300 kg per cubic metre, lead only about 11300. That means, to a reasonable approximation, that gold must have about 50 % more nucleons than lead per unit volume. Simple. What, if any, are the effects of the individual nuclei being smaller and more numerous I don't know. I imagine someone's done the research, however.
Quote from: rosy on 25/03/2011 19:32:46QuoteHow is gold morer dense than lead when lead has a higher atomic number. It's the density of the protons in the atomic structure, that prevents radiation passing through.Fewer protons per nucleus, sure, but more nuclei per unit volume. Gold weighs around 19300 kg per cubic metre, lead only about 11300. That means, to a reasonable approximation, that gold must have about 50 % more nucleons than lead per unit volume. Simple. What, if any, are the effects of the individual nuclei being smaller and more numerous I don't know. I imagine someone's done the research, however.Right. It's a question of how densely packed the atoms are. The atomic weight of gold is less than lead, but gold atoms assemble into a smaller volume, so the density is greater.However, ignoring density and only worrying about weight (which would likely be the most important aspect of protective clothing) a certain weight of lead does a better job than the same weight of gold.