Black beach, rocks and jetties. Black sea. Black. No, not the Gulf of Mexico. Rather the Yellow Sea of northeast China.  Greenpeace China's images of the devastation are graphic. An oil spill--as the issuance from a ruptured underwater pipeline is so inappropriately termed--spreads 165 square miles outward from the port city of Dalian, China's most liveable city.

Some 400,000 gallons of the half solid, half liquid, sticky-as-asphalt crude oil inks the sea and beaches. Big. Very big. And in a nation poorly equipped to handle it. Is any nation really equipped to do so? Forced to rely as it is on fishing boats for help. Floating 21-square-foot straw mats across the water to soak up the oil. While on the shores people with plastic gloves and whatever implements thought to be of potential use, struggle with clean up. And somewhat ironically it strikes me, according to the press, it is the government's plan to have the task 'done in five days'.

Bad. Really bad. But nothing compared to the Gulf of Mexico BP spill now estimated at between 94 and 184 million gallons--and therefore two to four hundred times as large.

But the real reason I sat to write today is that yesterday hearings on the Indian Point "once-through" cooling system happened in Cortland Manor, NY. The results at this time remain unknown to me. But under debate was the question of whether or not Entergy was willing to minimize the negative affects on the environment of the Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant by installing a closed-loop cooling system there. If done, the State would be willing to re-commission the plant past 2014 and 2015 when its different units' licenses expire.

The Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant's current system reportedly draws some 2.5 billion gallons of water from the Hudson River each day only to spill it back with its temperature significantly higher, killing millions of fish and other water forms.  

But the Point's owner, Entergy, says the new cooling towers required by the closed system, at a cost of 1.1 bilion, would be too expensive. 

Entergy went so far as to launch an advertising campaign to suggest that they have another method, a wedge-wire one, that will protect acquatic life at less financial cost.

I guess Entergy thinks this wedge-wire screen will catch and burp back unharmed all the estimated 1.2 billion aquatic organisms the Indian Point Plant currently kills annually.

Nice job! Burb! Here come the larvae! Burp! Now the fish eggs! Whoops! I forgot. And here are the fish! A little warmer perhaps, but not quite cooked, burp!--back into the Hudson you go!

Swim, said the little fishy, swim if you can . . .

Poor Entergy. What with Vermont voting on 2/24/10 to shut down its Vermont Yankee plant in 2012--just because radioactive materials likeTritium and bone grabbing Strontium-90 were spilling--and continue to spill--from its leaks into the Connecticut River! (Not to mention the four other isotopes seeping from underground pipes--pipes first reported as non-existant, only to be identified as existant following the finding of four other radioactive isotopes in the soil around the VT Yankee.)

Is it any wonder the State of Vermont is now seeking to close the Vermont Yankee earlier than at the date its license expires? (No wonder, earlier in the year, Entergy threw around discussion of moving the VT Yankee and Indian Point to Enexus. When I heard it, I jumped for joy. I wondered where Enexus was. Wrong. I'd misunderstood. Entergy meant moving the plants on paper to a new company to be named Enexus. But I think even they became confused by their own obsfuscation and the idea of the move was soon abandoned.)

And now we have talk of hydro fracking in the Catskills. And scuttlebutt suggests even into the Adirondacks. Can you imagine?!! First our rivers, next our coastline, and now even our inland drinking water! So the issue is bigger than to close this plant or that. Or to drill off shore or not. Or to sell our soul for methane gas or oil. No. The issue, I'm afraid, dear Watson, comes down to that of survival, for without enough potable water, surely we shall perish.

RMR in Po-Town, Stunned by the largess of it all, but awake

I never became a smoker; "Don't do as I do," my parents had cautioned me, "do as I say".  And so I did. But now it's now my turn.

Given all my talk of the importance of preparedness, when the power went down last night here in my run-away home in Port Henry, I couldn't find a flashlight; so in the dark, I crept down the cellar stairs and checked out the breakers in the electrical box. The main one seemed loose, so I locked it into the left. No lights.  

But was the Main really in the ON position? Anyone's guess.

Come daylight, I confirmed that the phones with a direct line to the jack worked. I searched the number for National Grid. When I dialed it, I learned that several towns would be without electricity for an hour or so more. The list included Port Henry. 

Hmm. It remained dark in the cellar, but I had to know. Had I set the Main to ON? 

Stewart's was also without power. No coffee, but I picked up a flashlight and batteries. On my return to the house, once I'd assembled the light, I descended the stairs to the cellar. When I observed I'd set the Main breaker to OFF, I reset it to ON. A nearby dehumidifier whirred. I crossed the cellar to the switch beside the playroom door. I flipped it and the cellar illuminated. 

The only thing I did right this morning was by happenstance: I'd enough cash on me to purchase the flashlight without the use of the charge card machine. 

So to borrow a quote from my parents, . . .

RMR on the Shores of Lake Champlain, Feelin' Better