2 hours ago, birdguy said:

That was fixed and waste is still being brought to the site for storage.  It's the safest storage facility there is.

That's not saying much. If it's supposed to be safe for millions of years and leaks after a handful, that's not much of a track record. We have no guarantees that it won't leak or fall victim to some other complicated failure mode.

That's the challenge with nuclear. You have to be perfect, all the time, over time scales that exceed our known materials science experience - exceeding human recorded history! Then you combine that with exceptionally complicated structures and systems, and it's a recipe for guaranteed eventual failure.

2 hours ago, birdguy said:

Do you want to shut it down and let the tons of nuclear waste stored above ground remain in place?

Do you understand the purpose of the WIPP? It's designed for waste from US nuclear weapons production only. From their own web site: clothing, tools, rags, residues, debris, soil and other items contaminated with small amounts of plutonium and other man-made radioactive elements. Based on what I can tell, waste needs to be an alpha emitter (although it's not clear).

This is nothing compared to the high-grade waste coming out of reactors, which has never been destined for WIPP. Alpha radiation can be shielded by a paper bag and isn't too harmful unless Sergei and Oleg from the FSB put it in your tea (or it explodes and vaporizes, which coincidentally is what appears to have happened at WIPP). There is no disposal plan for high-level nuclear waste, nor has there been for decades.

Oh, and just to store some rags and soil, they're expecting to spend $19 billion (and you know that is only going to change in one direction). I wonder how many turbine blades you can dispose for that price? 🙂

Edited January 18, 20224 yr by Luke

Do you have a better solution for disposing of nuclear waste Luke?  Let's hear it.  The stuff is here.  What do you propose to do with it.

Noel

12 minutes ago, birdguy said:

Do you have a better solution for disposing of nuclear waste Luke?  Let's hear it.  The stuff is here.  What do you propose to do with it.

I'm reminded of a piece of homespun wisdom that you may be familiar with - If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.

Our attitude to nuclear should be evidence-based. We have no ability to create safe reactors, or safely dispose of the waste. While we might be able to create this capability in the future, it will only be based on trial and error and we will not get it right the first (or second) time.

Given these assumptions, do you still believe that nuclear fission is a viable energy source relative to the alternatives?

3 hours ago, Luke said:

Given these assumptions, do you still believe that nuclear fission is a viable energy source relative to the alternatives?

Yes I do.  I think it belongs in the mix of energy technologies.  Solar and wind and thermal and hydro alone can't meet all the demands and they are limited to locations where they are efficient.  Rivers.  Geothermal areas.  Climates that have 300+ days of sunshine a year and places where wind is reliable.  Nuclear fission plants can be placed anywhere and are not dependent climate or geographical features that other sources are dependent upon.

Like everything since the start of the industrial revolution things become safer and more efficient.  Just because the old ones were less safe doesn't mean the newer design based on what failed or was less efficient on the old ones aren't safer now or won't become safer in the in the future.

When was the last time you fixed a flat tire on the side of the road or saw someone fixing a flat.  I changed many tires and fixed many flats in my lifetime.  When was the last time you patched an innertube.   When was the las time you bought a retread?Thats very rare because they make better tires now.

My car has an automatic braking system to prevent rear-end collisions.  And it is ringed with sensors to alert me to hazards in the rear, front, and sides of my car.  

I remember driving before turn signals were invented.  You held your arm out the window to signal turns.  The first few cars I owned had no seat belts in them.  

Then came catalytic converters to reduce exhaust emissions and annual emmision and safety inspections of automobiles.  The car you drive now isn't your grandfather's car,

Products and devices improve with age as weaknesses are discovered and eliminated and improvements are made.

The same is true of nuclear power plants.  There is no reason the weaknesses in the older designs can't be reduced and eliminated in the newer designs.  And they are.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/safer-nuclear-reactors-are-on-the-way/

Noel

Edited January 19, 20224 yr by birdguy

9 hours ago, birdguy said:

Yes I do.  I think it belongs in the mix of energy technologies.

Agreed.  You probably already know this Noel, as you've been around a lot longer than me, but it's almost pointless to argue with ideologues.  Ideologues don't care about things like what is practical, or affordable, or reasonable.  They have their vision of utopia, which is invariably something unachievable unless one is willing to destroy society, and they will insist on doing things their way at all costs.  If people have to pay $10 or $20 a gallon for gasoline then so be it, as long as it moves us toward their goal of a "green" utopian future.

It is only very recently that we have the technology to produce solar panels on a large enough scale to provide power to a lot of people at a reasonable cost.  20+ years ago this was not the case.  Nevertheless, solar power is just not viable for many parts of the world right now, so people that live in those places need other forms of energy until they can pay for expensive projects that only wealthy countries can afford, like the Xlinks Morocco-UK solar power project.  

Nuclear power is indeed a viable option and should be part of the mix.  I'm not talking about 50+ year old nuclear reactor technology which is overly complex and risky.  There are several new designs which are not only much, much safer, but are able to recycle and reuse most of the nuclear waste.  I don't like having to store dangerous nuclear waste either.

The United States is a global leader in clean energy technology and its implementation.  We have wind turbines and solar power arrays all over the place now and we are building more.  Our air and water are cleaner than they have been in my lifetime and probably yours as well.  I remember back in the 70s and 80s when our rivers were polluted and our air was dirty because of companies dumping chemicals in creeks and rivers, the cars had no emissions controls, and smokestacks were spewing word not allowed into the air all over the place.  We have made tremendous progress, yet radicals act as if we have made none at all.

I've no doubt that 50 years from now, we will only be using hydrocarbons to make useful chemicals and materials and not for producing energy or propulsion.  It takes time to get there, but I believe that we will, and we'll do it without destroying the middle class, unless the radicals get their way.

Dave

 

11 hours ago, birdguy said:

Nuclear fission plants can be placed anywhere and are not dependent climate or geographical features that other sources are dependent upon.

Noel, it is very difficult to have a constructive discussion when you seem to be unaware of the engineering principles (and therefore constraints) behind nuclear fission plants.

They are thermal plants, just like fossil fuel plants. That means the operate by generating heat, converting water into steam and turning a turbine. The steam then needs to be cooled down to restart the cycle. To cool that water down, you need a reliable source of cool water, either to dump the heat into or to supply the cooling towers. If your water source gets too warm or too low, you need to throttle back or shut the plant down altogether until the necessary heat transfer capacity returns So you can't just place them anywhere - they're located on (larger) bodies of water for a reason.

If you want to have a productive conversation, perhaps you should spend some time understanding the systems at play. You are entitled to your  own opinions, but you are not entitled to your own facts.

1 hour ago, dave2013 said:

Agreed.  You probably already know this Noel, as you've been around a lot longer than me, but it's almost pointless to argue with ideologues.  Ideologues don't care about things like what is practical, or affordable, or reasonable.

 

Err... this is nothing to do with "ideologies". Luke and myself are giving you facts. "What is Practical" you say. But you seem to be ignoring the "impracticalities" that Luke has eloquently pointed out to you, and me of course, somewhat less eloquently perhaps. 🙄

1 hour ago, dave2013 said:

solar power is just not viable for many parts of the world right now, so people that live in those places need other forms of energy until they can pay for expensive projects that only wealthy countries can afford, like the Xlinks Morocco-UK solar power project.  

 

Huh... why are you focusing on solar and ignoring all of the other forms of renamable enrgy?

1 hour ago, dave2013 said:

Ideologues don't care about things like what is practical, or affordable, or reasonable.

Oddly enough, the market does. Which is why nuclear is being phased out - there's no way it is economical in a deregulated electricity market where the spot price is usually below the fixed cost of generation. If one is advocating things that don't make economic sense, who is the ideologue?

1 hour ago, dave2013 said:

so people that live in those places need other forms of energy until they can pay for expensive projects that only wealthy countries can afford, like the Xlinks Morocco-UK solar power project.

HVDC cables cost around $2m/km. For the price of Vogtle, I could build an HVDC cable half way around the world. If HVDC is unaffordable given the price is orders of magnitude less than nuclear, what is nuclear fission? And if one is advocating things that don't make economic sense, who is the ideologue?

1 hour ago, dave2013 said:

There are several new designs which are not only much, much safer, but are able to recycle and reuse most of the nuclear waste.  I don't like having to store dangerous nuclear waste either.

Breeder reactors are not new, and the cycle has been around for decades. If you look at the fuel cycle, while it reduces the volume of the waste, it does not reduce the activity. So you end up with 1% of the waste that appears to be 100x times as radioactive. It is by no means benign - it burns the actinides and long-lived wastes but does nothing to reduce many of the nasty fission products that existing fission reactors already produce. If one is advocating for things that are disproven by the physics (or in Noel's case, the basic engineering), who is the ideologue?

1 hour ago, dave2013 said:

It takes time to get there, but I believe that we will, and we'll do it without destroying the middle class, unless the radicals get their way.

If you're advocating for uneconomic power generation supported by indirect government subsidy, who is the radical?

I remember when conservatives believed in free-market economics and science - it appealed to me. I guess I'm now a dangerous radical.

Edited January 19, 20224 yr by Luke

On 1/18/2022 at 1:40 PM, G-RFRY said:

Very few solar panels have been recycled why because the industry say it`s cheaper to build new ones, so the stockpile of old panels is growing. So it`s likely the industry will hold out until governments make it worth it through a subsidy=more tax on energy bills.      

And it`s ironic that the world weather monitor that last year showed the lowest winds on record around the planet, Global Warming !!!! 

 

Not true, unless you live in the US. Only about 10% of solar panels are recycled in the US. However, in Europe regulations require 85% collection and 80% recycling. 

As for subsides, its baffles me when people complain about subsides for renewable energy but ignore the $5.9 trillion the fossil fuel industry gets each year. Or the subsides the nuclear industry gets. 

As for "lowest winds around the planet"... did you mean a month of lower winds in Europe, rather than winds plummeting for an entire year globally? 

What I meant to say, not too eliquently, was nuclear plants should be placed in places where wind and solar are not feasible.

Yes, I am a nuclear power proponent.  I am not afraid of it.  I don't panic when 1 small accident occured at the WIPP plant which has been in operation for 22 years.

I am much more afraid of the Corona virus than being the victim of a nuclear accident.

One time during my Air Force career I worked temporarily on nuclear weapons when they needed extra manpower to perform some special maintenance on those that were stored at that paticular location.  I wore a radiation badge and received what was considered an acceptable level of radiation leakage for the six weeks I was there.  No harm came to me.  That was over 60 years ago.

I still maintain that like everything else nuclear power plants can be made safer like every other thing in our society.  Sure, there will be accidents.  There will be plane crashes.  Last year over 38,000 people died in automobile accidents.  Should we do away with them?

That Scientific American article I posted with my previous reply showed how nuclear power plants can be made safer.  Any comment on that?

What do you propose for generating power where solar and are not feasible?  Coal or natural gas?

Noel

9 minutes ago, birdguy said:

What I meant to say, not too eliquently, was nuclear plants should be placed in places where wind and solar are not feasible.

What do you propose for generating power where solar and are not feasible?

Why? There's no requirement that electricity be generated where it is consumed, and in fact most is not.

It is cheaper to pick a less expensive generation method farther away and transport the power.

Well, you could cover the state of New Mexico with solar panels so there would be enough to transport power to St. Louis and Chicago and New York.  But I live in New Mexico and I like to look over the prairie and desert and see the rocks and brush and cactus and sand instead of a vast sea of solar panels.  We have one outside the city now and it's not an eyesore.  But if it were two or three or four times as large to send power out of state it would be an eyesore.

I would compare that to open pit coal mines that destroyed the flora and fauna of the local area to send coal elsewhere.

That's the attitude of, "I don't care what happens 500 or 600 or 700 miles away from where I live as long as get what I want from those locations.

To power 1/3 of the United States with the projected 2050 electrical demand would require 169 sqmi for nuclear power plants.

To power 1/3 of the Unted States with the projected 2050 electrical demand would require 4,250 sqmi of solar panels.

To power 1/3 of the United States with the projected 2050 elctrical demand would require 12,800 sqmi of wind turbines.

So to provide areas not suited for wind and solar you would be stealing that land from other states.

As far as roofs are concerned I don't want them on my roof.  I have stone masonry house with a pitched tile roof.  My house would look crappy if those tiles were covered with solar panels.

Noel

 

 

Edited January 19, 20224 yr by birdguy

1 hour ago, Luke said:

Oddly enough, the market does. Which is why nuclear is being phased out - there's no way it is economical in a deregulated electricity market where the spot price is usually below the fixed cost of generation

My power comes from a nuclear plant about 50 miles away.  I pay 14c/KWh.  That's pretty reasonable, and a lot less than most Europeans pay for their electricity.  So it is not economically unfeasible.  You talk as if nuclear power is completely unfeasible, yet there are hundreds of nuclear plants all over the world that produce reliable electricity for decades at a reasonable cost, and very few accidents that hurt people. Yes, you can point out Chernobyl, but that's like pointing out plane crashes, which are rare but devastating when they occur, and determining that the risk is too great so it's too dangerous to fly.  China is building 13 nuclear plants and about 50 total are under construction right now.  If they are so bad and uneconomical, then why are they so popular?

I don't like govt. subsidies, especially for oil and gas as those companies don't need them.  I actually agree with reasonable and limited subsidies for wind and solar as these need to be expanded.  However, I don't think it's fair to vilify subsidies for some forms of energy but not others, as solar and wind also get subsidies.

I'm not a fan of wind power because for one I'm not thrilled about seeing giant turbines all over the place, call it noise and visual pollution, plus wind is very variable and unreliable.  Again, there are areas where sufficient wind is nearly constant and not near large populations which are ideal for wind power, but I don't want turbines all over my neighborhood just to make some people feel better about not using nuclear or natural gas power.

I like solar power, but even it has its issues.  It takes a lot of land to build large scale solar farms.  This can be solved by installing them in sparsely populated desert areas and then transmitting the power to where it's needed.  Solar panels are not very efficient, about 30% right now.  I'm confident that figure will go up as technology improves.  Then there are the batteries needed for storage to provide power at night and on cloudy days.  Nuclear plants are 90% efficient. 

I keep hearing that wind and solar power are cheaper than fossil-fuel or nuclear.  I admit that I do not know if this is true or not.  I'd like to see some proof. 

Every type of energy source has its advantages and disadvantages.  That's why we need a mix.

Dave 

2 hours ago, dave2013 said:

My power comes from a nuclear plant about 50 miles away.  I pay 14c/KWh.  That's pretty reasonable, and a lot less than most Europeans pay for their electricity.  So it is not economically unfeasible.

You are confusing the retail price you pay for electricity from your local utility with the cost per kWh to generate. I can assure you they are likely rather unrelated to each other.

I can't definitively speak to electricity in Alabama, but unless it's itemized in the bill, you're paying for two separate things - the actual electricity you use and grid access. Even if you generate your own power, the fact that you can tap into the grid when needed is of significant value and part of your bill covers that distribution network. My natural gas bill here in Georgia is like that. I have two itemized charges, one for gas used and another for the infrastructure.

Your local utility is likely making a wholesale purchase agreement with Alabama Power at a set rate. The electricity markets as they deregulate are becoming more and more like the oil market and at any given time that rate may be above or below the spot price. So I don't know the wholesale price and what the spot price is at any given time, but what I do know is that as more renewables come online it can and has gone to zero or even negative on very sunny (and especially) windy days.

At some point the MBAs with their sharp pencils and spreadsheets will figure out a way to optimize their costs downwards leveraging renewables when cheaper, hedging when not. That still might not kill your two nuclear plants even if they lose a penny or so per kWh but it is certain that nothing new will get built.

This link: https://www.iea.org/reports/projected-costs-of-generating-electricity-2020 might give some perspective on actual cost to generate. They are lower than what you or I pay (I pay 11.8c/kWh - you're getting ripped off!) which makes sense given what I mentioned above.

It's actually somewhat favorable to lifecycle extensions for nuclear (which makes sense, it's high fixed, low marginal cost electricity) but I don't see an economic case for new development - I wonder if the costs include the cost to decom and dispose of the waste?