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Monday, July 18, 2005

This is progress?

Over at the Wall Street Journal's Opinion Journal website, there is an entry about "three weeks' good news from Iraq". Included in the long list (mostly about foreign countries committing money or resources to Iraq), is this item:
Baghdad airport, meanwhile, will soon benefit from another project:
Work is nearing completion on a project that will allow Baghdad International Airport (BIAP) to achieve 100 percent electrical self-sufficiency. The BIAP electrical system has an generation output design range of 18 to 22.3 MW and consists of three 33kV power transformers, 11kV and 400 V distribution systems, five diesel generators, and numerous smaller emergency generators.
That's like saying the French are making progress at Dien Bien Phu because they're getting all their supplies airdropped and therefore aren't dependent on deliveries by truck.



3 comments

See - I told you this would happen if you liberals didn't clap loud enough.

By Anonymous Anonymous, at 7/18/2005 5:45 PM  

As the right becomes more and more desperate, look for more and more such up-is-down nonsense. Although, to be fair, this sort of thing has a long and dishonorable history with Bush's Iraq adventure. Many of us recall how, two years ago, Bush was running around the country explaining that the increasing ferocity of the attacks showed how "desperate" the insurgents had become--in effect, that was Bush's version of Cheney's more recent "last throes" comment.

Thus, we can expect to see more of this crap. I'm waiting for the report telling us how the issuance of barrels for collecting rain water is a sign of progress. That fact that Iraq is a desert country will not enter into that discussion--only the fact that, if it ever does rain, people will be able to collect the run-off for washing and drinking.

Derelict

By Anonymous Anonymous, at 7/19/2005 6:56 AM  

"Baghdad airport, meanwhile, will soon benefit from another project:
Work is nearing completion on a project that will allow Baghdad International Airport (BIAP) to achieve 100 percent electrical self-sufficiency. The BIAP electrical system has an generation output design range of 18 to 22.3 MW and consists of three 33kV power transformers, 11kV and 400 V distribution systems, five diesel generators, and numerous smaller emergency generators."

So, does anyone add up the power sources and come up with quite a different number than the "output design range"?

Perhaps when they said, "numerous smaller emergency generators", what they meant was "millions of 4K portable generators", for instance.

and, of course, "five diesel generators" equal "18 to 22.3 MW", equivalent to (at a 100% conversion ratio) of 24, 138 horsepower, requiring each diesel generator be capable of almost 5000 horsepower.

and, of course.

Why does someone feel they _need_ to be "self-sufficient"?

By Anonymous Anonymous, at 7/19/2005 11:28 AM  

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