The truth of the matter is that Left of centre means ideology, not fact based, and social justice oriented, not pragmatic.
People of the left are either emotionally attached to its narrative (Plowperson), or cynically manipulating the narrative for their own ends (Blair/Corbyn).
Science is not an emotional narrative, It is a logical and rational narrative, therefore it is the enemy of those who promulgate emotional narratives.
I have to admit I was quite shocked by that! Plenty of reports here
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Bentonite is an extremely fine clay mineral, with a very high specific surface area (760 m^2/g IIRC), and a very high absorptive capacity, so ideal for soaking up nasties such as cat pee on the one hand or leaks from containers of nuclear waste, on the other. It's often mentioned when nuclear waste depositories are being discussed, for example at the Finnish site on the island of Olkiluoto
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But that someone somewhere should have specified 'cat litter', or even just used the words, rather than 'bentonite' specifically, opens the door to the sort of mistake that was made at Los Alamos, as 'cat litter' can be a whole range of things. It's not as though bentonite is scarce: Wyoming is full of the stuff!
You have to wonder how they could get something as prosaic as bentonite/cat litter wrong (I know it wasn't WIPP to blame, but contractors at Los Alamos responsible for packing the waste into barrels before transportation to WIPP)
Speaking of Los Alamos, this is an interesting read:
Americans are famously literal, so when the contractors ran short, someone probably nipped down to Wal-Mart and picked up a few bags of the stuff. And the rest is history :)
A few years ago, Sellafield did a trial to find the most effective cleaners for removing contamination from surfaces. Along with the long established specialist products like the Decon range of detergent solutions, they tested domestic cleaners. Cillit Bang came out better than anything.
I wrote the above with tongue firmly in cheek, but it looks like it wasn't so far off the mark.
"Investigators also discovered the trigger of the "thermal runaway event," also known as an "explosion": a dangerous combination of nitric acid and salts, triethanolamine, and "sWheat Scoop" organic kitty litter"
"The "organic" part of the kitty litter in question is crucial.
"That's because wheat, which makes up the pee-absorbing bulk of organic kitty litter, contains plant cellulose that can burn. Standard kitty litter, meanwhile, is inorganic, since it's primarily made of clay"
"So when drum-packing workers at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) followed instructions to add an organic variety to soak up radioactive fluids, they were unknowingly packing up what Sarah Zhang at Gizmodo called "the ingredients of a bomb""
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