Re: Earth thermodynamics

[twayburn@juno.com (Thomas L Wayburn)]

On Wed, 11 Jun 97 18:28:20 EDT David Dockstader <DRDOCK00@UKCC.UKY.EDU>
writes:
> Tom,
> I have not had a chance to digest your entire post.  However, the 
> radioactive
> materials of the earth seem to be preferentialy concentrated in the 
> crust
> and volcanoes come from the crust, or indirectly from the upper 
> mantle, so
> excluding the core of the earth from a calculation will not allow you 
> to
> exclude these sources.
*******************************************************

Thanks for your input, David, but, I believe these to be non-renewable,
which violates the steady-state condition (in the sense intended by the
problem statement).  Even geothermal, of course, is non-renewable.  I do
not wish to mess with vulcanism, which, as I see it, is poorly
understood.  Also, many experts believe that nuclear power plants are
like batteries:  One has to put more availability into them than one can
ever hope to get out.   The indirect costs are what kills it.  
Currently,  nuclear energy is subsidized by fossil fuels, which are
consumed by the builders and operators on their daily commutes, for
example.  Odum says that nuclear energy is a dead loser, however he is
not particularly forthcoming with his calculations.  

In any case, computing the availability function of sunlight and junk
infra-red radiation is the intellectual challenge to the problem and I
would have to solve that problem even if the answer had no practical
application.   I am extremely frustrated at my impotence in attacking
Second Law problems (or combined First and Second Law problems) that
have radiant energy terms.  My friend Angelo Lucia told me to get a
cosmological thermodynamicist.  He suggested Stephen Hawking!!!  Stephen
Hawking's graduate student didn't even answer my letter.

Best regards / Tom

P.S. If you understand reversible thermophysics and/or statistical
mechanics, may I call you on the telephone and discuss some of the
sticking points?