Some Cautionary Thoughts about Wind
Posted by Gail the Actuary on June 1, 2009 - 9:57am
Topic: Alternative energy
Tags: electricity, eroi, wind, wind generated electricity [list all tags]
This story has been edited to make it clearer that the analysis relates to US wind rather than European wind and to clarify the problem with excess generation at night. I also added an Item 10.
I think we think we know more about wind-power than we do. These are a few things that I have recently discovered about wind that make me think that plunging headlong into electricity is not necessarily a good idea. At this point, we don't seem to have a plan that does much more than address wind turbines themselves.
I should make it clear that this discussion relates to US wind power, not European wind power. Many of the issues directly or indirectly relate to the fact the US is facing a multi-faceted problem--lack of wind turbines, needed grid upgrades, and lack of electrical storage. In a time of financial problems, the price of such a big change makes it difficult to tackle all these problems on the necessary scale at once. If we only add wind turbines, and make minimal upgrades in storage and transmission, the change is still likely to still be expensive and will likely leave us with the need for large subsidies. Without extensive grid upgrades and electrical storage changes, wind generated electricity will continue to play only a supporting role, acting mostly as a fuel substitute.
Europe has been dealing with this issue longer and has better addressed the wind transmission and storage issue, so it is in better shape in this regard. Jerome Guillet has prepared a write-up focusing more on the European perspective.
1. Without mandates or feed-in tariffs, the selling price for wind is generally lower than that for other wholesale electricity.
A Department of Energy publication shows this graphic:
The red dots indicate that on average, the selling price for wind had been between $35 and $40 per MWk. (This is equivalent to $.035 to $.040 per kWh, while the band of wholesale prices of electricity has floated above it).
2. Sometimes the selling price of wind is even negative.
There are times when there is an oversupply of electricity. Often, this is as night, because usage is lower at that time, and base generation is not easily reduced. Adding wind can provide at night can provide more electricity than is needed.
When there is an over-supply, there is a question of what to do with it. According to this article, the usual procedure in the past in West Texas was for grid operator to ask the wind farms to reduce production, to balance supply with demand. The wind farms objected to this procedure, and requested an economic solution.
The solution was negative rates. Wind farms are now paying for the privilege of dumping the wind-generated electricity on the grid. This occurred for 23% of the hours in April.
3. Wind substitutes not for electricity, but for the fuels that power electrical generation (coal and natural gas).
Chris Namoviz, who is in charge of renewable energy forecasting at the EIA, recently told me the following:
Because of its relatively low “capacity value” (a result of usually not blowing very regularly during peak load hours), wind largely competes as a “fuel saver” resource, and can generally be compared against the fuel cost of what ever mix of fuel it is displacing (whether from existing capacity or from alternative investments in future capacity). In the U.S., this is typically some mix of relatively inexpensive coal and somewhat expensive natural gas, depending on the location of the wind plant, and the resulting seasonal/daily wind and load profiles (note that nuclear has relatively low operating costs, and typically does not act as a “marginal” or price-setting fuel). In gas-dominated regions like Texas, wind is relatively more competitive than in coal-dominated regions like the Mid-west, although recent growth patterns in the U.S. suggest a large role for state and Federal mandates and incentives as well.
The savings in fuel costs will vary. For 2008, the average cost of coal for electricity generation, including delivery costs, was $.022 per kWh, based on a calculation I made using EIA data. The average cost of delivered natural gas was $.082 per kWh in 2008, also based on EIA data. This year, natural gas prices are way down. One calculation by Oil Drum reader Steve Piper suggests that at current natural gas prices, the price of natural gas for electrical production may be under $.030 per kWh.
4. Currently, wind generated electricity, in the absence of subsidies, is much more expensive than the fossil fuels it is replacing.
According to this chart prepared by the Institute for Energy Reserach based on EIA forecasts, the expected levelized cost of wind in 2016 is expected to be about $.130 per kWh for onshore wind, and about $.220 per kWh for offshore wind. The amounts are in 2007 dollars, and without subsidies. I would expect costs of new production begun now would be not too different from this, because EIA is unlikely to be forecasting an increase in costs apart from inflation. (More likely, they are forecasting that costs will decrease, as we learn better to make wind turbines.)
The problem is that the price of wind is vastly higher than the price of the fuel it is replacing. With delivered coal and natural gas in the $.020 to $.030 range, while the cost of new wind production is $.130 to $.220 per kWh, new wind production is four to ten times as expensive as the cost of the fuel it is replacing.
5. At this time, it is not entirely clear that we need any new electrical production capacity.
Since mid 2008, the use of electricity in the US has been decreasing, but electric utilities made plans for new capacity, as if demand would be increasing. A similar situation is being reported around the world.
It is easy to think that a decrease in oil use could be offset by an increase in electricity use, but a pretty good argument can be also made in the other direction: a reduction in oil use may have such a squeezing impact on the economy, that electricity use declines as well. If fewer factories are operating, they use less electricity. If people are moving in with relatives, they use less electricity in the combined quarters. If they also are replacing light bulbs with CFLs, this reduces electrical use further.
The lack of growth in the use of electricity is another reason that the cost of new wind production is really comparable, at least in the short term, to the cost of the fuels it replaces.
6. The combination of low selling prices for wind and high cost of generation means that wind is likely to need large subsidies for years in the future.
Wind will be expensive, not just now, but when the price of fuel is several times what it is today. It is even possible that the price of fuel can completely bring down the economy, before wind-generated electricity becomes competitive with the fuel it replaces.
7. The cost of wind turbines depends a great deal on the financing available. Because of the lack of cheap debt, the cost of wind may even be higher than what the EIA is forecasting.
Per hour of electricity generated, the up-front cost of wind is more expensive than the cost of nuclear energy. The following are approximate cost estimates per hour of annual electricity generated. These amounts are for 1 kW of generation throughout a year which equals 8,760 kWh:
Nuclear: Costs about 3,000 to 4,000 euros per kW of capacity; operates at 90% of capacity; cost for 1.1 kW capacity would be 3,300 - 4,400 euros
Onshore wind: Costs about 1,500 euros per kW of capacity; operates at 30% of capacity; cost for 3.3 kW capacity would be 5,000 euros
Offshore wind: Costs about 3,000 euros per kW of capacity; operates at 40% of capacity; cost for 2.5 kW capacity would be 7,500 euros
Financing these big amounts up front will be difficult, if debt financing is less available. Companies are not likely to want to part with equity for returns of 5% to 10%.
8. There are a lot of reasons that the EROI calculations may be misleadingly high.
Having looked at a few EROI calculations, I can see several issues:
a. When coal is transformed to electricity, there is a quality factor (of three to five) that the amount of energy is multiplied by to reflect the transformation to the higher quality fuel. In the wind EROI calculations, an "electricity in" -- "electricity out" calculation is used. I would argue that there should be a step-down factor, to correspond to the fact that the electricity from wind that is generated is of much lower quality than the electricity that went in. In fact, we are talking using wind-generated electricity as a substitute for coal.
b. There is a great deal of problem with the representations of manufacturers regarding how much wind turbines will generate, as a percentage of capacity, being vastly overstated. This is the abstract of a paper published this month in Energy Policy:
Capacity factor of wind power realized values vs. estimates
Nicolas Boccard, Departament d’Economia, Universitat de Girona, 17071 Girona, Spain
For two decades now, the capacity factor of wind power measuring the average energy delivered has been assumed in the 30–35% range of the name plate capacity. Yet, the mean realized value for Europe over the last five years is below 21%; accordingly private cost is two-third higher and the reduction of carbon emissions is 40% less than previously expected. We document this discrepancy and offer rationalizations that emphasize the long term variations of wind speeds, the behavior of the wind power industry, political interference and the mode of finance. We conclude with the consequences of the capacity factor miscalculation and some policy recommendations.
c. Wind turbines evaluated in EROI studies are not necessarily representative of what one might find in this country. For example, if a wind turbine is manufactured in Brazil using electricity generated by burning sugar cane bagasse and by hydroelectric power, the EROI will be very high, because the sources of electricity use little fossil fuel. This is not representative of wind turbines being manufactured in the United States or Europe, however.
There are other issues as well. How does one handle the excess generating capacity at night (and some other times), when there is no use for it? It seems to me that if all of these issues are sorted out, EROIs for US and European produced wind turbines are likely under 10, and quite possibly under 5.
9. Wind-generated electricity cannot be used on a stand-alone basis to substitute for fossil fuel-generated electricity, without a lot of electrical storage.
Wind on a stand-alone basis does have uses. It can be used to pump water and probably to make nitrogen fertilizer. It can also be used to operate desalination plants.
I think some people have the idea in the backs of their minds that if other electrical generation fails, wind can substitute. This might be the case if a lot of electrical storage is built, and a lot of transmission lines, but I don't see it to be the case otherwise. Wind-generated electricity is just too variable. I don't think that the electrical transformers could stand having the electricity supply constantly turned on and off for very long. I am not sure our electrical appliances in homes and businesses would work very well either. If we really want an idea like this to work, we would need to plan for it very specifically, not just let it fall out accidentally as a by-product.
10. If we want to follow the European model, and upgrade the grid and add more storage, wind-generated electricity will act more like other electricity, but it will be a very big undertaking.
In a time of financial difficulty, it will be difficult to do whole job that would be needed. In many ways, this would be the ideal, but with limited resources, it is not clear that all of these things can be done simultaneously.
If all of these changes were made, one might argue that EROI calculations would not need a step down. But it seems like some of the energy expenditures related to the additional infrastructure should be charged back to wind in the EROI calculation.
Wrong questions result in bad answers.
More later.
Alan
One assumption by Gail is that the goal should be the lowest cost electricity possible in the near future. Wrong goal.
First, I reject the analysis by Gail. Wrong questions and much of what she observes is transitory.
The negative prices are for West Texas only, where wind is stranded. There are 3 apparent solutions to stranded wind.
1) Increase transmission capacity to the rest of Texas (ERCOT is directing investment of $3 billion over 5 years in new transmission, with accepting 10 GW of wind as a primary goal). Ten year plan still under development).
Some background
http://www.seco.cpa.state.tx.us/re_wind-transmission.htm
2) Pumped storage in West Texas, to shift power to time when needed locally and/or when transmission grid is not at capacity. Buying better than free power is a powerful inducement to build pumped storage (*IF* one expects this to last, see #1)
3) Use stranded wind for ammonia synthesis (see Neal Rauhauser and
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5396#more
4) Time of day pricing for users. Lubbock office buildings and rural schools make ice when electricity is free and use it for a/c during the day. Electric water heaters have adjustable thermostats (hotter when electricity is cheap/free), etc. etc.
-----------
Is the lowest price for electricity in, say 2012 or 2014, a worthwhile goal ?
I think the answer is VERY clearly NO !
1) Price does not reflect (absent carbon taxes) the climate impact for the next 500 to 1,000 years of the carbon emitted by natural gas or coal fired electrical generation.
2) Low prices discourage conservation (I am currently in Kentucky helping with my ill mother. CHEAP coal fired electricity and they cannot even imagine how to conserve. WASTE ! WASTE ! WASTE ! everywhere). Use half as much electricity at twice the price to perform the same function and there is NO economic impact (except greater investment in long lived conservation).
See McMansions in Suburbia & Exurbia for another example of useless waste.
3) Peak Oil seems not to have played any role in your analysis. We erect more wind turbines in 2009 to 2014, as many as possible. Build a couple more pumped storage plants and more transmission lines.
Post-Peak Oil hits and mining and transporting coal becomes a priority that competes with agriculture, health care, etc. for the limited oil available. The less coal fired generation we have, the more oil we have left for other priority needs.
Wind takes almost no oil to keep running after the initial investment. Coal takes quite a bit of oil (from coal miners commuting to work, making, repairing and operating coal mining equipment to hauling coal over non-electrified railroads or on barges).
Wind is a capital investment that we can make now, when oil & energy are cheap, and benefit from later, post-Peak Oil. Feeding coal & NG fired plants will be a continuing burden on a strained society post-Peak Oil.
More Later,
Best Hopes for a Rush to Wind and an economic build-out of new nukes,
Alan
Austin Energy signed a $2.3 billion deal for wood waste fired electricity for peak power (20 years, 100 MW). This helps balance out their wind portfolio.
http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.display/id/16674
Austin Energy is also planning to not build 700 MW of new generation with enhanced conservation and efficiency (see HereinHalifax and his efforts).
I didn't read this as Gail proposing what should be but more observing what is.
cfm in Gray, ME
Gail sez:
This is the real problem, under current conditions any price schedule is probably wild speculation/guessing. All the energy cost/ energy cost- and other downstream effects cats are long gone out of the bag.
What Gail is suggesting is that large investments in wind power is a tremendous gamble. We might not be able to recover our investment and be stuck with a lot of relatively useless - and very expensive - wind turbines. This is a very real outcome, probably more likely than not.
My own thought is does this really matter, long term?
Here in our glorious post- peak world, the usual modeling approaches don't work. All economic assumptions have to be considered false on their face. The only way to find out if a wind regime will work is to build out and see.
If the wind regime fails ecnomically the turbines will still produce electricity when the wind blows. Coal, NG and nuclear will have higher hurdles to leap if they fail economically, for theirs are far longer and more money/energy sensitive supply chains.
My gut feeling is that wind electricity answers the issue of bottomline electricity availability. Compared to nuclear or PV, even very large wind turbines are relaitively simple to make and install. They can be made with craft labor from recycled materials. Wind power is intermittant, but so is rain. We've lived with intermittant rain for millenia so living with intermittant electric is an adjustment that can be made. In the power- down future, wind would be very useful and reassuring.
I can foresee a time where the difference between having power and not having power at all will be the transformative social/cultural issue. The current ecoomic 'structure' of measuring costs relative to each other over different times and places is a distorting lens. The bottom line here is to have 'leeedership' (whatever that is) and take the gamble. $100 billion would make a lot of wind turbines ... how many AIG's is that?
The vast majority of the population of the world already use a very small fraction of the energy consumed in OECD countries, they already know how to live that way - I suspect the paradigm shift will be the minority re-learning to live like the majority, watch and see how they do it, visit museums to see how we did things not so long ago.
That means almost no intensive agriculture (bye bye flush toilets), little travel away from where you live (so, little need for cars, trains, aeroplanes etc), few long distance supply chains (you will need to live near where your food is produced), intermittent power (get used to it, it just needs a bit of planning), if you live in a hot place you will feel hot and uncomfortable, in a cold place cold and uncomfortable.
Yes. This is the issue that never gets considered. Every flippin article - here and elsewhere - is at BAU standard.
How do we replace the energy use we have now? As Alan said, this is starting from exactly the wrong question. What's needed is an analysis of how much energy we would need - right now - if all extraneous use was cut. THAT should be the baseline. THAT is what we need to build. THAT is what we need to replace.
I'd be willing to bet that number might be as low as 1/3 of what we (USA) use right now. And that is without any transition of any kind; it's just cutting all the fat. Walking to the store if it's within a couple of miles, hanging out around home and neighborhood instead of driving to the mall to see a movie. Using light only when you really can't see what you need to see. (The most recent research I recall on reading in low light found no deleterious affect on eyesight, e.g.), etc., etc.
So, let's calculate the absolute lowest need under current conditions and make that a first target for needed generation. Then, as we actually start to build out, continually revise for actual effects of transition, future population, etc.
Cheers
I looked into this a while back, in ecotechnic-style energy use, and ecotechnia and social justice.
First I looked at how we could be more efficient. Basically, we could halve our current energy use without compromising anyone's quality of life at all.
Second, though, we want everyone to have a good quality of life, not just those who have one now. It's senseless to have (say) the UK go all ecotechnic and efficient if (say) Vietnam is just going to take all their second-hand coal-fired stations. But the Vietnamese deserve a good quality of life, too. That turns out to happen with around 2kW of electricity per person.
So the energy use which was halved gets doubled again, to 2kW.
And then of course by the time all this could be achieved, around 2050, the world's population will have peaked at 9-10 billion. So that's another 40-50% total energy we need.
2kW x 9-10 billion people = 18-20,000GW of renewables.
That's a very big ask, but is doable. It's no crazier than having a billion cars in the world. It'd take a dedicated effort, not the half-arsed stuff we're doing now because we're worried that someone will complain it's too expensive, or too cheap, or too black, or too white, or any nonsense like that. But it's doable.
How does that # compare to current use? How much of the current capacity can we keep and still meet emissions targets (CO2 350)?
Cheers
Personal note: I checked out that link and found it quite interesting. There are substantial differences with what I am advocating in that they want to create *new* ecovillages that are basically off-the-shelf. However, the machine shop part of what they are doing fits perfectly with my plan for areas with little or no industrial capacity.
18-20 TW is somewhat more than the current 16 TW, of which renewables (mostly large hydro) account for about 9%.
A recent estimate found potential for 72,000 GW of wind power alone, worldwide.
That is 2100+ quadrillion BTU of electricity (not fuel) per year. Humanity currently uses about 400 quadrillion BTU of energy from all sources. That should tell you how much headroom we have.
(I'm going to regret entering this massive thread so late. I think I would have regretted it, period.)
Sure, the potential is great. But I guess we still need to address the variability issue and get portable fuel. We could solve it by electrolysis and ammonia production, but what would it cost?
From 55 kWh, you get a kg of hydrogen, and then I guess you need some more to go to ammonia, say 70 kWh in total to get 140 MJ ammonia. Gasoline is 32 MJ/litre, so you'd need 16 kWh for one litre of gasoline equivalent, or 60 kWh for one gallon equivalent. I guess this would be somewhat acceptable, at least to Europeans. However, nuclear and HTE would make this cheaper and more efficient.
Redundancy. Overbuild. The wind is always blowing somewhere. With climate going crazy, it'd be stupid not to have a massively distributed and robust energy system.
But, then, we don't appear to be any smarter than yeast.
Cheers
Pumped storage.
As I've mentioned to before, it's a mature, reliable, efficient, simple technology that's already widely deployed to smooth out mismatches in supply and demand of electricity. Storage needs are surprisingly low - a few days - so existing reservoirs could be retrofitted with more generator turbines and lower catchment areas to quickly provide enormous amounts of pumped storage capacity.
Moreover, modest overbuilding of capacity allows a small amount of storage - about 5 days - to reliably provide a region's electricity supply (at least for the case of Ontario, given hourly supply and demand data for 2007). The technical aspects of this aren't a particularly hard problem.
Wind combined with pumped storage is more expensive than nuclear.
Nuclear is already combined with pumped storage and gas power plants.
Read the articles I wrote :)
Our current energy use is about 15,500GW. Electricity is 2,000GW of that, very little of it renewable, and the renewable chunk mostly hydro with little capacity for expansion.
The current fossil fuel electricity generation has to all go. I mean, just deforestation contributes 18% or so of all greenhouse gases, and we need to drop to 10% of current emissions by 2050 to avoid whacking past 350ppm CO2e (more or less, depending which recent paper you believe). There's just no room in that emissions budget for burning coal to warm supermarkets which are being cooled by open fridges, and stuff like that.
Any serious mitigation plan requires that we abolish burning fossil fuels for electricity.
How do you end up with 2 kW?
In central Europe a 2 person household can easily live with less than 1000 kWh electricity per year (using efficient lamps, efficient fridges etc.).
That's 0.057 kW per person.
If you chose a Tesla roadster for transportation (no public transportation, which would more efficient) you'd need 0.11 kWh/km or 2200 kWh to travel 20,000 km per year.
That's 0.25 kW per person.
As far as heating and hot water is concerned: It's been shown numerous times that a well insulated house using its roof to heat the building doesn't require any additional energy for heating and hot water purposes.
Here's an example of multifamily house that provides 100% (including snowy winter) of its heating needs and hot water with its roof area alone in central Europe:
http://www.jenni.ch/picture/AktuellesBild/Baustelle51a.JPG
And all buildings actually need roofs anyway.
The International Monetary Fund says losses from the global financial crisis are set to rise to more than $US4 trillion:
http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/1016299/Financial-crisis-to-cost-four...
With $4 Trillion just lost in one year, one can actually finance over 13'000 thinfilm photovoltaic factories from Oerlikon, which would produce 2,133 GW of PV per year:
That's 87,466 GW by 2050.
http://www.oerlikon.com/ecomaXL/index.php?site=SOLAR_EN_press_releases_d...
Kudos to [anyone]'s post above.
A problem I see in many above is failing to account for capacity factors. 5 TW of wind or solar generation won't give you 5 x 8,760 hr/yr kwh/yr of electricity, but more likely 5 x (8,760 * .25) kwh/yr.
Rather than kudos, you should try reading the articles I linked to. Load factor's discussed at some length.
Is that relevant? You can probably remove most energy needs in any small specific location by importing stuff with lots of sunk energy in them. Kiashu talked about total energy needs per capita, not just electricty in our homes.
Only $2000/kW nameplate PV? That's nice, but with lower capacity factor than wind at similar costs per kW, what's the use?
PV may not be particularly attractive for utilities.
But it is certainly attractive for homeowners and building owners, who want to reduce their electricity bill. Especially once it reaches costs below $1000 per kW.
http://lsheet.blogspot.com/2007/05/innovation-key-to-solar-cost-reductio...
I am hopeful for the day a regular person can purchase a 'turnkey' 1kW system for US$1000.
Currently, the typical selling price I see is about US$900 for a 200w solar panel, and about US$200 for an enphase (micro grid-tie inverter). Being vary simplistic, works out to cost about US$1100*5=US$5500 for a kW (peak), not including sales tax,installation, getting it inspected/approved to connect to grid power, support structures, etc.
If things could evolve to the point that there was a modular 1kw turnkey kit for about US$2000/each, that did not require inspection to be installed (currently another hurdle) then it could maybe be imagined to be a moderately expensive household purchase, such as a new refridgerator, air-conditioning unit, or high-end stove.
It would not be a complete solution, but I think it would help things move forward.
At least the manufacturing costs of the thinfilm solar modules are close to $1000 per kW:
http://www.solarplaza.com/article/solar-module-sales-price-of-1-per-watt...
But since the manufacturer and reseller still make a significant profit and are not interested in selling small volumes, it might take a while until you can actually buy modules for this price.
Remember that only around one-third of electricity use is for domestic purposes. The other two-thirds is factories, streetlights, food processing, heart-lung machines, computers in libraries, and so on.
Presumably we'll want something beyond our own homes. Assuming all our energy use is renewable, and assuming we seek out efficiencies wherever we can find them, 2kW may be enough for a decent lifestyle.
You should have a good look at all the things which use electricity today, and all the things which use fossil fuels, and then imagine making all the fossil fuel use into renewable energy instead - it's a big deal.
Doable, but not easy.
For context, 2kW is roughly 18,000kWh/yr, which is about 50% more than current US electricity consumption, around 3x the consumption of older EU members (UK, etc.), and around 6x the consumption of newer EU members (e.g., Poland).
Germany consumes 180Mbtu/person, or 52,000kWh/yr, which is 6kW. However, of their 14.5 quads of primary energy consumption, 3.5 quads are coal, 3.5 quads natural gas, and 5.5 quads oil. Coal/NG are predominantly used for electricity at ~3:1 efficiency, or for heating (for which electric heat pumps are about 3x more efficient), meaning that they're equivalent to 1.2 quads of electricity each. Oil is mostly used for transportation, for which electric cars are ~6x more efficient and for which electric rail is 3x more efficient (than diesel rail, >10x more than trucks). Accordingly, those 5.5 quads of energy are equivalent to roughly 1-1.5 quads of electricity (assuming electric vehicles).
Hence, Germany is using the electricity-equivalent of about 6.5 quads of energy, or about 2.5kW per capita. Based on that, it seems like 2kW is likely to be an overestimate of what's needed for a good quality of life.
It seems like you're using a 2:1 factor to convert from primary energy to electricity; however, a more typical factor is 3:1 (that's a typical power plant efficiency, and the factor BP uses in their analyses), suggesting a figure of about 1.5kW. That's before any kinds of efficiency improvements other than converting to electricity, though, suggesting the actual value is likely to be lower still. Moreover, you don't seem to be taking into account at all the fact that roughly half of world primary energy consumption (most coal and natural gas, plus a significant amount of oil) is burned at about 30% efficiency to make electricity.
So 2kW is not a terrible figure, but it's very likely too high. If you're going to assume quite a few efficiency increases - and you seem to - then 1kW is probably a better estimate, and 2kW represents a luxurious lifestyle. Electricity is astonishingly more useful than thermal energy.
Yes, it's more electricity use than most countries currently have. But bear in mind that it's also electricity in place of other energies. Worldwide, we use 15.5TW of energy generally, but only 2TW of that is electrical. So in fact I'm suggesting a decline in overall energy use to 2kW per person, and a large increase in electricity use. That's worldwide; the picture for individual countries will of course be different.
I'm using no arbitrary ratios, as you'll see from the original articles I referred to above. I know some people don't like clicking links and reading articles off a particular site, but it seems better to link and then assume people read the article than to reproduce the entire article in full in a comment.
Of course there's a lot of room to move in these sorts of estimates. I've no doubt that if 2,000kW were available to people, they'd find ways to use it up; likewise, if we had 0.5kW, we'd manage to live tolerable lives. However, what's clear is that if we want to have an entirely renewable society, that's going to be a big build-out and take some time. We'll need more renewables than we have all electricity now, and we'll need lots of other things built, too - railways and so on.
The expense doesn't worry me, because we build things all the time. Often in these discussions the billions for renewables or rail or whatever are presented on their own, so they look very expensive. But we're always tearing up old power stations and roads and power lines and so on, and building new ones in their place. To take examples from Australia, it could be $55 million/km highways to carry 2,000 people an hour (EastLink), or $13 million/km railways to carry 20,000 people an hour (Perth).
Look at $13 million/km on its own, it looks terrible. Compared with $55 million/km, not so bad. Add in that it carries ten times as many people, and it looks really good. But someone who wanted to ensure no railways were built would focus on the $13 million/km. This is the sort of thing Gail has done here with wind turbines, focusing on the costs without comparing them to other costly things, and without considering the relative benefits.
So the question is not whether we'll build things, but what we'll build.
Is wind power more expensive than coal or gas? Sometimes yes, sometimes no - let's say it's more expensive. But wind power will still have "fuel" for itself twenty years from now, coal and gas, maybe not. So then the extra you pay for the wind looks not so bad. But wind is intermittent? Well, that's why we have a grid, and why we have solar, geothermal and so on.
If you want to make a thing look bad, talk about its cost, talk about it in isolation, and never speak of its benefits. You can do this with wind, coal, nuclear, solar, whatever. It's more honest and decent to look for a more balanced overview of things.
We can build all these renewables, but we have to decide to do it, and keep the resolve across many countries and through changes of government in each of those countries. It'll never be perfect. But then, the current fossil fuel system isn't perfect, either. Large chunks of the world population are without powered transport or electricity. Luckily, it doesn't have to be perfect, just overall in the right direction.
And that's another trick played by those against something - point out it can never be perfect, hold it to higher standards than anything they support is held to, and once it's shown it's imperfect, condemn it utterly.
My kudos
Best Hopes for Realistic POVs,
Alan
Going from 0kw to 1kw certainly improves one's lot more than going from 1kw to 2kw.
If we do start using very much less energy, the question becomes: do we need to add a lot of wind turbines to what we have now, or would be better off just using less of what we have now?
Each wind turbine built has a significant cost associated with it. This cost could be used for other things, such as building simple tools that can be used in a non-electric society. Would we be better off spending the money on such things? Or do we really have enough money to do both?
Consider the following situation. We are getting all of our energy from a single source with fixed costs and a fixed yearly flow rate. We know however that this energy source is going to be exhausted in a few decades time and that all of the available alternatives are substantially more expensive. In spite of the fact that investing in energy production from one or more of these new sources is going going to make us poorer in the short term, we still ought to start doing so even before the cheaper energy source has been exhausted. I am assuming, of course, that the productivity gain from these alternative energy sources is positive even though it is smaller than that of our current energy source.
Admittedly planning an energy descent is a very difficult business, and I think that you are right to question whether our current renewables policy has much long term intelligence behind it. If grid strengthening and large scale storage are required to make wind energy useful in the absence of fossil fuels we should be funding these things today. Unfortunately energy descent cannot be planned if we remain committed to stock market growth as the only possible definition of economic health.
Or do we really have enough money to do both?
Yes.
The funds used during the last 8 years expanding Suburbia with homes 2.5x larger than 1950 (for smaller families), 10x the retail space/capita of 1950, and associated highways, roads, parking spaces, sewers, water systems, new distribution electrical grid can easily finance both if redirected.
To paraphrase Kunstler, this has been the greatest misallocation of resources in the history of humanity. Directed towards useful and productive investments (which can provide additional capital through production), there is more than enough capital.
The question becomes: do we need to add a lot of wind turbines to what we have now, or would be better off just using less of what we have now?
The answer is we need to add a lot of wind turbines to what we have now, AND we would be better off just using less of what we have now.
It is AND when dealing with positive investments.
Conservation & efficiency investments should be made in parallel with massive renewable energy investments.
I install a gas tankless hot water heater and use less NG for heating water. I install better windows, caulk and seal openings and add more insulation > use less NG for winter heating and less electricity for summer air conditioning. I install a mix of CFLs & LEDs and use less electricity for lighting. I install a more efficient a/c and save some more electricity. I buy an Apple MacMini (33 watts) and and efficient LED screen (say 55 watts) and save some power that way.
All good (none of above reduces my quality of life). I rent out two rooms and save even more/capita (my life is affected + or - depending).
The capital investment to more than halve my domestic energy consumption is trivial and pays for itself in a handful of years (rent from roommates MORE than pays for all). On a macro scale, no national limitation on investment capital for installing more WTs.
Scrap coal fired plants early, before they are fully depreciated. Take the burden of coal off the post-Peak Oil economy and the environment.
Alan
The former. Firstly, because if we wanted to avoid catastrophic climate change, yet at the same time insisted on getting most of our energy from fossil fuels, we'd have to use about 10-15% as much energy as we do today. That's 10-15% of the worldwide energy consumption, which - if we all reduce to the same consumption - means India doesn't reduce at all, and the West reduces to 2-5%. That seems difficult, both technically and politically.
Secondly, because reducing consumption still doesn't deal with the problem of a depleting resource. It just puts off the problem. It's like getting an extension on your credit card and cutting your spending so it's only 150% of your income instead of 1,000% your income. It's definitely an improvement, but you're still in over your head and will eventually drown. So we have our fossil fuel crisis in 2070 instead of 2030 or whenever. We're exporting our problems to the future.
According to the Department of Energy the costs of wind power are between 3 and 6.4 cents per kWh:
http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy07osti/41435.pdf
The feed in tariffs for wind power in Germany are actually between 5 and 9 eurocents per kWh.
http://www.wind-energie.de/de/statistiken/strompreisverguetung/
Since the private builder of windfarms in Germany still make a profit, the actual wind energy costs are obviously lower than the feed in tariffs otherwise no windfarms would ever have been built in Germany.
In addition, wind power actually does lower electricity prices in Germany (the consumers pay less for the feed in tariffs than what wind power lowers electricity prices):
http://www.tagesspiegel.de/wirtschaft/art271,2147183
http://www.wind-energie.de/fileadmin/dokumente/Themen_A-Z/Kosten/Eon-Uni...
New nuclear on the other hand has reached costs between 25 cents and 30 cents per kWh:
http://climateprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nuclear-costs-2009...
The capital costs of new nuclear has already reached $8000 per kW according to Florida Light and Power:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89169837
Needless to say that new nuclear power requires 10 years to be built while a windfarm can be built within months.
And foreign uranium is not free and the ultimate repository is not free either. According to the Department of energy the Yucca mountain adventure has reached costs of $96.2 billion.
Interesting also:
Industrial electricity prices before tax (2007):
Denmark (20% wind power): 7.06 cents/kWh
Belgium (55% nuclear power): 9.69 cents/kWh
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_OFFPUB/KS-DK-07-001/EN/KS-DK-...
More importantly: Denmark still exports over 90% of its wind turbines with profit in a market with a double digit growth (as opposed to nuclear power which does neither).
http://uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt/idUKLV55678920081231
And interconnected Windfarms provide baseload:
http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/winds/aj07_jamc.pdf
In addition, as opposed to nuclear power, wind typically produces more power during day time, when electricity demand is significantly higher.
http://www.windpower.org/en/tour/wres/variab.htm
http://www.wind-energie.de/de/technik/netz%5Cverbundnetz/?type=97
Every night and every weekend, tremendous excess, unflexible nuclear power is pumped up the European pump storage lakes.
These pumps do not actually care, whether they are powered by nuclear or wind power...
Thanks for all of the links. I haven't had time to go through them all yet, but will. I see the report you link to first is a year-earlier version of the report I got the first graph out of.
Feed in tariffs of 5 to 9 eurocents equates 7 to 13 US cents.
A big piece of both nuclear and wind costs is how these are financed. Also, as you point out, on nuclear, tying up this capital for up to 10 years, without getting a return.
I am interested in the links showing the relationship between wind production differences between night and day. I wonder if these differ in different parts of the world. It is easy for rumors (or evidence from one small area) to start getting passed around without verification.
My impression is that Europe has done a better job of planning for electrical storage than the US. We have a little, but my impression is that it is not a whole lot, and probably not well distributed around the US. The US has a lot of nuclear, and are talking about adding more. We also have a lot of coal. Both nuclear and coal provide a lot of power at night (although coal production can be reduced at night). It may be that even adding a little power at night is difficult to do in parts of the US--although areas with base load gas generation should not have a problem.
The sun heats the land mass in less time than the water mass.
This temperature difference typically generates wind in coastal areas and typically peaks in the afternoon.
If you, for example, ever spend time at the Mediterranean sea you will notice this repeating wind pattern.
There may be locations where there is more wind at night, but this is a rather untypical scenario and I'd be surprised if more than 10% of all locations with lots of wind have more wind at night than during day time.
Also, nuclear power does need energy storage or back up plants (for peak demands) just like wind does.
Btw, here's the report regarding the costs of new nuclear:
http://climateprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nuclear-costs-2009...
(Link above is broken)
anyone
I have repeatedly demonstrated on Nuclear Green that Low cost generation IV Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors, can be used in back up/peak generation capacities, Critics charge that the methodology of the report you site (see the comment section to the climate progress posting) is flawed.
http://www.ecoworld.com/features/2008/10/03/the-case-against-nukes/#comm...
To quote Rod Adams:
Coal (48.5%) - 2.47
Gas (21.8%) - 6.78
Nuclear (19.4%) - 1.76
Petroleum (1.6%) - 10.26
(note: taken together, wind, solar and geothermal produced about 1.1% of the US electricity supply in 2007. )
(The costs are from Global Energy Decisions, the market share portions come from the DOE’s Energy Information Agency (Table 1.1. Net Generation by Energy Source: Total (All Sectors), 1994 through May 2008. To break out details for “other renewables” I used table 1.1A)
Wind and solar are intermittent and diffuse. They require enormous collectors, reliable back-up power systems, new transmission corridors through scenic area, continuous subsidies, and mandated utility purchases through a back-door subsidy program called the Renewable Portfolio Standard. We all pay the excess costs NOW.
The Production Tax Credit by itself costs taxpayers more for each kilowatt-hour generated (2 cents) by wind or solar than EVERYTHING a nuclear kilowatt hour costs electric utilities to produce. The wind and solar industries just got an 8 year extension on this subsidy, and the beneficiaries are such tiny little companies as GE (largest wind turbine manufacturer in the US), BP (formerly known as British Petroleum and one of the largest solar panel makers in the world), and BP Capital (that is Boone Pickens’s venture capital fund and is not associated with British Petroleum.)
The “renewables” industry’s lobby group has been working for years to get that extension passed. Its expenditures in that area make those of the nuclear power industry look tiny.
Excellent idea:
We just invest in renewables until the low cost generation IV reactors are finally available.
And by the way this reactor development should be paid by the nuclear industry and not the tax payer.
Interesting fact: The Austrian tax payer has to pay $40 Million Euro per year to support EURATOM even though Austria doesn't have any nuclear power plants. Austrian wind power on the other hand which already provides 18% of the Austrian households with wind energy only receives $24 Million Euro per year.
http://www.igwindkraft.at/index.php?mdoc_id=1009697
Electricity consumers in Florida are forced to pay for new nuclear power plants in advance, regardless whether they ever generate power:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89169837
It would certainly be better, if they waited for the low cost generation IV reactors...
And nuclear power is in fact pumped up European mountains every single night and every single weekend.
Despite the notion of nuclear advocates: These pumps don't actually care whether they are powered by nuclear or wind power.
"And by the way this reactor development should be paid by the nuclear industry and not the tax payer."
Fine ..
Same rule for wind, PV, CSP, tidal, gas and coal .. OK ??
I'm all for wind ..
But I've gotten used to the lights coming on
when I flip the switch ..
I'd prefer to see it stay that way ..
Nuclear fission is the most energy dense technology we
have .. pretty foolish not to use it ..
Triff ..
Households? Perhaps, if you count domestic use only. 4% of Austria's total consumption is a more relevant figure.
So, when businesses want to expand, you prefer that they don't do it with their own money (collected from selling stuff to customers)? You'd rather see that they borrow the money?
No, but it matters that the storage volume needed to balance wind would be much, much, *much* larger.
No, but it matters that the storage volume needed to balance wind would be much, much, *much* larger.
BS !!
For high percentage nuke vs. high percentage wind grids (continent wide, HV DC connected), the numbers for pumped storage for wind would be larger, but not dramatically so.
*IF* the French did not export electricity and run their nukes uneconomically (take many off-line in spring & fall), they would need far more than the 4.3 GW of pumped storage (plus 1 GW in Luxembourg) that they have.
Best Hopes for a Rush to Wind and a steady, economic build-out of nukes (of well proven designs),
Alan
I neither believe in high percentage well distributed wind nor ridiculously expanded grids. I think it is easier for you yanks to build nukes than agree on continent-wide infrastructure and balancing. But we will see.
Germany has 6.7 GW of pumped storage.
Switzerland has 2 GW of pumped storage and 8 GW of hydro power (the turbines stop, when there is excess nuclear power from France).
Only 6.7 GW of pumped storage in Germany, and 23 GW wind. The wind capacity growth has been weak in Germany for several years; it seems their pumped storage and increased reliance on Russian natural gas isn't enough.
Actually German wind power not only has reduced the natural gas consumption, but for the same reason also reduced the electricity prices for the consumers, because there's typically more wind when the electricity demand is higher:
www.tagesspiegel.de/wirtschaft/art271,2147183
http://www.windpower.org/en/tour/wres/variab.htm
http://www.wind-energie.de/de/technik/netz%5Cverbundnetz/?type=97
Germany has a real problem. They have lots of really bad brown coal, which they would like to stop using for obvious reasons, and they have powerful greens who hate nuclear power, and they have little hydro. So what options do they have? Russian natural gas and some wind power. Scheisse.
Without the excuse of wind power, they would have to solve the problem, i.e. start building more nukes. This is the real problem of wind power - that it looks like a solution but ain't, but since politicians are concerned more with perception than reality, wind paralyzes politics.
Even if it was only 4% of the total electricity consumption
4% for €24 Million with wind power is still significantly better than
0% for €40 Million with nuclear power.
Actually the wind power operators also have borrow the money and cannot force the electricity consumers to pay for their new wind turbines and yet new wind power is still significantly less costly than new nuclear power.
According to the Department of Energy the costs of wind power are between 3 and 6.4 cents per kWh (2006):
http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy07osti/41435.pdf
New nuclear on the other hand has reached costs between 25 cents and 30 cents per kWh:
http://climateprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nuclear-costs-2009...
Maybe there is also an economic reasons why wind power is number 1 in new generation capacity in the US and not nuclear power, despite the $50 billion tax payer safety net for new nuclear power.
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15545418
No, but it matters that the storage volume needed to balance wind would be much, much, *much* larger.
You wish: Switzerland just had a nuclear power plant providing 15% of the consumption in the country and this power plant didn't produce one single kWh for almost 6 month. There's not one single wind farm which didn't produce for 6 month (requiring a storage volume of 6 month) in the world and provides 15% of a countries electricity supply.
Besides interconnected wind farms do provide baseload:
www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/winds/aj07_jamc.pdf
(Of course, holy nuclear power can be interconnected, but evil wind power must not...)
You are making an ass of yourself, quoting that 25-30 cents per kWh for nuclear. But that is ok, please go on.
As I said, total costs for wind are about twice that for nuclear.
Fortunately, Switzerland is integrated into the European grid, so that doesn't matter much.
Yes, 33% of average power. That's not much.
You are making an ass of yourself, quoting that 25-30 cents per kWh for nuclear. But that is ok, please go on.
Actually you didn't quote anything you just insulted. And your insult is not a valid argument, it just hints that you are running out of it.
New nuclear has indeed reached costs between 25 cents and 30 cents per kWh according to this elaborate study:
http://climateprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nuclear-costs-2009...
The decommissioning costs of a nuclear power plant has already reached $1100 per kW , which is already close to the capital costs of a new wind turbine:
http://www.webwire.com/ViewPressRel.asp?aId=55119
The ultimate repository at Yucca mountain has already reached costs close to $1000 per kW and nuclear power plant:
http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2008/aug/27/nuclear_surge_needs_waste...
Needless to say that Uranium has to be imported, processed, enriched and homegrown Wind is actually free.
And as opposed to nuclear power Wind power doesn't actually require cooling water.
So maybe there are economic reasons why new wind power is number one and new nuclear power is not.
Fortunately, Switzerland is integrated into the European grid, so that doesn't matter much.
I see, holy nuclear power is allowed to be interconnected internationally, but if evil wind power dared to be interconnected too...
A fallacy. I could insult you all day and still have an abundance of valid arguments. You, however, are parroting incorrect information even though I have corrected you. (Is this deliberate?)
The quote of 25-30 cents per kWh is still making an ass out of you. Everybody here (I would assume) knows that that estimate is far, far, FAR off mainstream thought on the subject. This means I don't even have to point you to other sources; I simply point out that you are cherry-picking crazy stuff instead of trying to find and present credible info.
This I corrected earlier today with the correct $433 per kW from the link you quoted.
... doesn't have linear costs. Old costs are irrelevant. Marginal costs are everything.
Yes, and these economic reasons are spelled "subsidies" and you know it.
Replacing coal plants with nuclear plants doesn't seem to require any major grid enhancements, but many of you wind proponents talk about criss-crossing the US continent with HDVC and making the grid "smart" to help enable high wind penetration. So you'll have to accept the extra cost on the wind account.
This I corrected earlier today with the correct $433 per kW from the link you quoted.
Actually the article said between $900 and $1100 Million in costs.
But you're right I should have used an example where the plant has already been decommissioned, because these cost are typically higher than originally estimated.
The decommissioning of this nuclear plant has reached $1,400 per kW (after finishing the decommission), which makes almost as expensive as the capital costs of a new wind turbine.
http://www.secinfo.com/d11141.253.htm
... doesn't have linear costs. Old costs are irrelevant. Marginal costs are everything.
Facts show that the Yucca mountain costs have already reached 96.2 billion dollars which leads to costs of almost $1000 per kW nuclear power in the US for the ultimate repository only, which is of course anything but marginal.
And fact is also that the ultimate repository won't be cheaper if you increase its size.
The capital costs of new nuclear has already reached $8000 per kW according to Florida Light and Power:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89169837
Needless to say that new nuclear power requires 10 years to be built while a windfarm can be built within months.
Besides Uranium has to be imported, processed, enriched and homegrown Wind is actually free.
And as opposed to nuclear power Wind power doesn't actually require cooling water.
Interesting also:
Industrial electricity prices before tax (2007):
Denmark (20% wind power): 7.06 cents/kWh
Belgium (55% nuclear power): 9.69 cents/kWh
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_OFFPUB/KS-DK-07-001/EN/KS-DK-...
More importantly: Denmark still exports over 90% of its wind turbines with profit in a market with a double digit growth (as opposed to nuclear power which does neither).
http://uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt/idUKLV55678920081231
but many of you wind proponents talk about criss-crossing the US continent with HDVC and making the grid "smart" to help enable high wind penetration.
Besides that new nuclear power is incredibly expensive:
http://climateprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nuclear-costs-2009...
Grid improvements are not:
http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/5354
Yes, and these economic reasons are spelled "subsidies" and you know it.
Besides the fact that consumers actually pay less with wind power:
www.tagesspiegel.de/wirtschaft/art271,2147183
You mean the subsidies in Austria, where Austrian consumers have to pay €40 Million per year to Euratom without getting any nuclear power plants in return while paying only €24 Million to windpower and got 995 MW of Windpower in return?
www.igwindkraft.at/index.php?mdoc_id=1009697
I could insult you all day and still have an abundance of valid arguments.
Actually, apart from insulting me, you haven't presented one single fact, that new nuclear power is cost effective and built quickly.
The utilities have been funding Yucca Mountain and most of the money they've paid so far hasn't been spent
anyone:
The MIT study says 8.4 ¢/kW·h:
http://neinuclearnotes.blogspot.com/2009/05/2009-update-to-mits-2003-fut...
Hah. Try building a wind farm in months. Cape Wind has been trying for most of a decade already without getting turbine #1 in place. That's extreme but getting permits for a large wind farm takes years, and transmission may take more years. Just like nuclear. I suspect you were thinking of just the construction time, which is less. And should be, since wind farms produce a small fraction of the power of a nuclear plant.
The MIT study says 8.4 ¢/kW·h:
The MIT assumes capital costs of $3000 per kW, while Florida Light and Power announced capital costs of $8000 per kW:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89169837
Try building a wind farm in months.
In the first 3 month of this year 2,800 MW of new Wind power was built in the US, while at same time only 0 MW of new nuclear power was built in the US:
http://awea.org/newsroom/releases/AWEA_first_quarter_market_report_04280...
The MIT assumes capital costs of $3000 per kW, while Florida Light and Power announced capital costs of $8000 per kW
No. FPL assumes a total overnight cost of between $3,108-$4,540/kW for nuclear. Check out the second to last page in their Petition to Florida's PSC to build two new reactors (pdf).
MIT actually assumes $4,000/kW in overnight costs for nuclear (not $3,000 like you said). Anyways, FPL and MIT assumed nearly identical overnight costs and MIT calculated that the levelized costs were 8.4 cents/kWh. This is hardly close to the 25-30 cents/kWh figure Climate Progress stated in the junk report you keep citing.
Actually this report assumes capital overnight costs of $4050 per kW and just includes typical cost overruns:
http://climateprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nuclear-costs-2009...
Typical cost overruns like this:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/business/energy-environment/29nuke.html
http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=561&fArticleId=4023210
And this apparent "junk" gentleman even addressed David Bradish:
http://climateprogress.org/2009/01/08/nuclear-cost-study-3-responding-to...
David Bradish has suggested I should have assumed a higher initial cost/kWh for amortizing the capital costs, by assuming a shorter amortization period. He argues that once the power plants are finally paid off, the costs levied on ratepayers will decrease. Is this an advantage for nuclear, or is this a basic fact for all types of power plants? In other words, its ok for my family to buy a $2 million house, and its even better if I pay it off with a 15 year mortgage instead of a 30 year mortgage — because if I can just get past those 15 years, it will be a lot cheaper after that? Another example — a new movie house design is so expensive you will have to charge $50 a movie ticket, but that’s ok because you’ll only have to do that for the first 20 years?
Anyway, even though nuclear power is apparently so cheap, it's interesting that wind was number one last year in the US even during the Bush administration.
http://www.awea.org/newsroom/releases/us_and_china_race_to_top_of_wind_e...
Maybe all the tax payer research funding, which went into nuclear were not enough?
Nuclear power has dominated government spending on energy research and development, accounting for over US$159 billion between 1974 and 1998. Although its share has fallen, it still accounts for 51% of the OECD energy R&D budget:
http://www.world-nuclear.org/sym/2001/fig-htm/frasf6-h.htm
Or maybe having taxpayer dependent organizations such as EURATOM and IAEA to promote nuclear power for decades were not enough?
Or having taxpayer backed loan guarantees for nuclear power were not enough?
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15545418
Or having laws forcing consumers to pay for the capital costs of new nuclear power plants in advance were not enough?
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89169837
Before you came along, I've been impressed with the accuracy of TOD commenters. But almost every figure you present is dead wrong, and the few you've got right are either atypical or irrelevant.
anyone:
Wrongo. 2,800 MW came online, the last of the big push to get stuff built last year when it wasn't certain the tax credit would be renewed. Part of that was the 57 MW (19 MW average) Stetson Wind project in Maine, which was constructed over the course of 2008, after being in the works since at least 2006.
Cape Wind is an anomaly (see Sen. Kennedy). Rule of thumb is 24 to 30 months from financial OK to generation for add-on to existing wind farm; 36 to 42 months for all new wind farm.
ERCOT Texas is in midst of transmission upgrade designed to accept 10 GW of wind. Completion in 5 years. Build transmission in anticipation of WTs.
Alan
That is actually pretty impressive. If you think of 2GW as a nuclear site, that is equivalent to one new nuke a year for five years in a row. Can they keep that up? Oh - but that is nameplate capacity. Actual generation will be 30% of that... No?
Still kind of good, but not as amazing.
Oh, and that is modifying the grid, not building the wind farms. Well.... I don't know what that means, then.
I've proved you wrong several times. You are neither serious nor sincere. I hope people see your arguments for what they are - I'll try to waste no more time on you.
Actually, insulting people is not proving someone wrong.
You know I have proved you wrong. Your comment is just another testament to your lack of honesty.
I thought you won't respond to me anymore?
Besides the fact that you did insult me and others and an entire industry. You mean this one here:
This I corrected earlier today with the correct $433 per kW from the link you quoted.
Actually the article said between $900 and $1100 Million in costs.
But you're right I should have used an example where the plant has already been decommissioned, because these cost are usually higher than originally estimated:
The decommissioning of this nuclear plant has reached $1,400 per kW (after finishing the decommission), which makes almost as expensive as the capital costs of a new wind turbine.
http://www.secinfo.com/d11141.253.htm
Yes, this was one of the post that I have proven wrong. There have been more, and others have also proven you wrong in several instances.
And no, the article didn't say between $900 and $1100 million. It said the cost became $900 million, as the operator signed a contract with another company for that amount. And this was for TWO (2!) 1040 MW reactors, so $433 per KW where you claimed $1100 per kW.
Nonsense. The operators costs of the former example, $433/kWe has been determined. The actual costs will probably be lower, as the contractor needs a tidy profit and a risk premium.
Since the plant was old and small (the per-reactor costs are almost the same regardless of size) and there was breached contracts and stuff which seems to have essentially doubled the cost. As usual, you have cherry-picked the worst example you could find and tries to sell it as the typical case.
Yes, but a nuclear power plant will generate ten times the energy of a wind farm with the same nameplate capacity during their respective operating life times. (More than three times the lifespan and three times the availability.)
There have been more, and others have also proven you wrong in several instances.
No you haven't.
The actual costs will probably be lower, as the contractor needs a tidy profit and a risk premium.
You mean examples of other cost overruns in the nuclear power industry like this:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/business/energy-environment/29nuke.html
http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=561&fArticleId=4023210
http://www.lvrj.com/news/26330394.html
http://www.secinfo.com/d11141.253.htm
Actually, wishful thinking nor arrogance is a fact.
As usual, you have cherry-picked the worst example you could find and tries to sell it as the typical case.
As usual I have presented a number of examples and you haven't presented us any facts at all - just your own wishful thinking.
Yes, but a nuclear power plant will generate ten times the energy of a wind farm with the same nameplate capacity during their respective operating life times.
Wind turbines or parts of wind turbines in a windfarm will be replaced when necessary. There's no need to abolish a hydro power plant just because a generator needed to be replaced. A wind farm can thus have lifetime of over 100 years.
The average age of the 119 nuclear power plants that have already been shutdown is 22 years - which is about the same as the lifetime of a wind turbine.
http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/reports/2008-world-nuclear-indust...
Just because you dream of a rosy nuclear future with nuclear power plants reaching all 60 years of age, doesn't actually mean that this will be the case.
I pity you if you don't understand it. But I believe you just won't acknowledge it, since you do change your spamming slightly when people show you're wrong.
Can you show that cost overruns are less frequent for wind farms than for nuclear plants?
That's also a lie.
If you replace parts as soon as they break down, there is infinite life, of course.
Well, it seems many were closed for political reasons. In Sweden, we have closed two perfectly good modern reactors. Others around the world were closed because they were so small that you didn't get economies of scale enough to warrant the paperwork of license extension or complete refurbishments. Here is a nice list of reactor numbers and power by age:
http://www.iaea.org/cgi-bin/db.page.pl/pris.reaopag.htm
I guess the oldest there are ripe for closing too - 217 MW is not that exciting. However, older reactors were designed for 30 years life. Nowadays they are designed for 40-60 years.
The average age of the 430-something reactors that is still in operation is 24 years.
What is the average life time of decommissioned or completely replaced wind turbines, then? I'd guess a few years or so.
Old nukes were quite one-of-a-kind-ish. Now standardised designs such as AP1000 seems poised to get mass produced, and they are much simpler and more streamlined than older ones, and so are easier and cheaper to maintain and (re-)certify. From a technical and economical perspective, then, it makes sense that they would have a much longer life than older plants.
Actually, the only one lying here is obviously you.
And as opposed to you I have presented references all the time and you know it!
Like these in the post above:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/business/energy-environment/29nuke.html
http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=561&fArticleId=4023210
http://www.lvrj.com/news/26330394.html
http://www.secinfo.com/d11141.253.htm
You are parroting the same links over and over again, yes, but you are still presenting info that is wrong, unrepresentative or irrelevant, and I have exposed that with the amount of arguments and facts necessary to do the job.
No you haven't and you know it.
There's obviously a reason why you fail to back up your false claims with references.
(Damn, you're fast. I guess there must be some RSS subscription opportunities I have missed here, else you are watching this thread like an obsessed hawk.)
If I had made a mistake such as the one you did about decommissioning, I'd simply admit it and move on. But you didn't. Instead, you searched for the worst other example you could find, which gave about the same false impression as your previous error. You have done the same maneuver several times when proven wrong, never admitting mistakes. You don't seek the truth, you seek to misrepresent.
Actually you make false claims on purpose and don't admit it - even if you are proven wrong with a variety of backed up references.
You just keep on repeating the same false claims.
A wind farm can thus have lifetime of over 100 years.
This is a reasonable economic life estimate for much of the infrastructure. Towers and grid improvements. Actual grid components will likely be replaced after 50 or so years.
If a nuke is designed with a 60 year life in mind, fine. (I was involved with a hydro plant with a 400 year design life, some items will need to be replaced because they could not be made to last 400 years, but some parts should last that long/ All were designed to be replaced).
However, taking a 40 year design life and running it for 80 years (2x design) will likely (IMO) expose unintended and unexpected design flaws. Not so good for nukes !
Alan
Old nukes such as TMI did contain the radioactive core even at meltdown. Modern nukes are better and should be robust enough to handle "unintended and unexpected" design flaws. If they aren't, we will notice and it won't be worse than the consequences of a day of global road traffic. (I think proportions are often missing when it comes to nuclear safety. We are too scared of dramatic stuff such as flight accidents or nuclear accidents, and too little scared of the everyday silent killers such as traffic and air pollution.)
Pardon me if I do *NOT* want to live next to one of those nukes that can concentrate the death toll (world wide) of cars for a day in my neighborhood.
Such cavalier attitudes towards nuclear accidents are why nuke advocates need to be kept put of decision making.
And you have made the case stronger that, after 60 years, all existing nukes should be scrapped. They will be well past their design lifetimes.
Alan
Not scrapped. Recycled. Too much good stuff in a nuclear reactor to waste.
The containments should be built to last, so they could be reused for the next reactor model.
And on the death statistics, you have got to be kidding. I have asked for anyone to show mortality or morbidity statistics that are related to nuclear power outside of Chernobyl and nobody has stepped up with them.
Mildly irradiated steel can be used for new reactors, but there are few other applications (concrete rebar in dams & tunnels ?).
Reactor vessels are subject to radiation embrittlement and should not be re-used. The containment structures make it problematic to remove the old reactor and build the new one. The extra labor to reuse > the cost to scrap.
And reusing only delays the day of waste disposal. One day, fusion will supplant fission and no new new nukes will be built.
Over 60 years, I can guarantee that nukes designs will change and a 2020 reactor will simply NOT fit a 2084 design. LWR will probably be passe by then.
Alan
We can only hope that fusion comes through. The odds don't look so hot right now.
Since radiation embrittlement is a crystalline and material change effect, the actual material of former reactor vessels can be reused, most likely for nuclear power-related activities due to the political exposure.
LWR designs have held up nicely for quite a few decades now, they have certain safety advantages for passive and semi-passive fail-safes. Not the most efficient possible design, but I suspect there are tradeoffs that advocates of a lot of other designs miss.
As far as "mildly irradiated steel" goes, I'd say it goes back into the cycle. The only potential issue would be with small amounts of Cobalt 60 that decays with 2 gammas. The Fe60-Co60 path is a beta (electron) decay, and Fe59-> Co59 is also. Co 59 is stable. Betas trapped in the iron (which most would be) would flow back to the new Cobalt by normal conduction.
I'd want to keep any significantly contaminated steel out of bridges and skyscrapers, but it would be a wonderful choice for ordinary rebar and other less critical applications.
"Anyone" please send me an eMail. Link to my name.
Thanks
Alan_Drake at Juno dott comm
anyone:
Oh, they do have one; they just haven't gotten around to turning it on.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zwentendorf_Nuclear_Power_Plant
So why do they still need to fund EURATOM with significantly more taxmoney than their own power producing windfarms, 31 years after they built their nuclear power plant which was never turned on?
I think you are in need of a might, should, ought to... This thing doesn't even exist, if I'm not mistaken.
Cheers
Liquid Fluoride reactors certainly have existed, and the principles of breeding thorium in them is well understood.
As I said...
When you present the possible as fact, you make yourself look like a biased shill. I'm just suggesting your language reflect reality to keep a wider audience.
Cheers
Except when the possibility was endorsed by Eugene Wigner, Alvin Weinberg and Edward Teller. Then it becomes something more than a speculative concept..
Something becomes "more than speculative" only when it becomes a concrete reality, not because various personalities, no matter how luminous, endorse it. Ccpo's criticism (of your failure to use words according to their ordinary meaning) is very apt, at least in my opinion.
No it does not. I am certainly negatively impressed by anything supported by Edward Teller. His world view and judgment are anathema to me. ANYTHING he thinks is good, I automatically suspect as being bad.
It is, at best, a speculative concept.
Given the stages of technical maturation and experience required, your 4th generation reactors are QUITE unlikely to reach the levels you propose before 2050, if then.
I am quite sanguine about building a new Areva EPR, or Toshiba-Westinghouse AP-1000 near me. I would be on the streets opposing a sodium cooled fast reactor in Louisiana or Mississippi.
Basically, until a new type reactor has several thousand reactor years of safe operation, I AM A NIMBY !
Alan
Sure, fine. But LFTRs aren't the least bit related to LMFBRs. LWR's are closer to sodium cooled reactors than either are to LFTRs, and the sodium cooled reactor was a terrible idea that had the politics of the day, not least of which liquid metal fast breeder reactors are better at producing weapons material.
Before you disparage a technology that has been researched and prototyped decades ago, check up on it a bit. The LFTR well worth looking into as being safer, cheaper, more reliable and more scalable than light water reactors. Getting from here to production lines of LFTRs is an exercise, certainly, but not one to be dismissed out of hand.
I agree that Liquid Sodium is a poor choice, and I picked that technology to illustrate my point.
There are a number of better technology nukes (hypothetically), but only PWR and BWR have the operating (and build/maintain) experience.
I see the stages of tech development and ANY new reactor type starts out at a severe disadvantage, regardless of technical superiority. One starts counting the steps, and the years for each step, and new reactor types are not "THE" solution much before 2050, unfortunately.
Alan
Sure, which is why I'm not advocating abandoning LWR development. I do advocate abandoning all other next generation reactor development however like LMFBRs and PBMRs however, because I feel its a waste of resources that fail to significantly improve on the LWR in terms of cost and safety.
Sure; The LFTR has one thing going for it that might speed development up however, and thats scalability. It can be constructed much smaller than LWRs, in the tens of megawatt range that might be far more amenable for low capital investment investagtions as well as potentially leveraging assembly line economies a la Boeing. I wouldn't suggest that we will see many of them inside a decade, but beyond that maybe they have a chance of being prototyped and assembled quite quickly.
Before dismissing it, come over to Kirks site and poke around a bit at some of the concepts. LFTRs deserve quite a bit of advocacy because they can make a difference. LWRs will have to do untill they're ready, and wind can do well where financing and management of nuclear isn't mature yet. But LFTRs are potentially much cheaper than coal.
come over to Kirks site
Link ?
I am not against developing new technology, I am against counting on the JIT Technology Fairy saving us.
Although nukes have gotten the lion's share of energy R&D since the day I was born, perhaps there is a worthwhile direction that needs a few billion.
I do fear that there are a minority of people will take any excuse from taking action in the crucial next dozen years. And over the top advocates out of touch with reality like Mr. Barton will just feed those people with excuses on doing nothing.
Best Hopes,
Alan
http://thoriumenergy.blogspot.com/
Alan it would help if the critics of nuclear power who are really critics of LWRs would support funding for LFTR R&D. The LfTR would answer all rational criticisms of LWRs. The fact that nuclear critics do not support advanced nuclear technology tells me that they want to play silly games, and are not serious about fighting global warming.
As I have stated many times, I support an economic build-out of nukes in the USA.
My best judgment is that would be 6 new nukes (EPR, AP-1000, etc). plus completing Watts Bar 2 by 2020. After 2020, the pace could be picked up.
I have no real problems with PWRs or BWR's (including CANDUs).
As Dezakin will attest, I am antagonistic to nuke supporters who are, IMO, out of touch with reality in their boosterism. I have debated both nuke advocates and anti-nuke advocates from a middle position, grounded in the reality that I see.
Solutions good for 2050 are of little interest to me because I see mature tech solutions that can be implemented *MUCH* sooner. Although I admit that the calendar will one day roll over to that year.
Alan
Alan, I am hardly a booster, I have been criticized by other pronuclear bloggers, because I see LWRs as being to big, expensive and limited technologically. I support them because they are the best we can get now, but far from the best possible. You recite far too many anti-nuclear myths however. There has never been a large government subsidy for conventional nuclear power as you claim. I checked the energy budget going back 50 years. Very little of what was spent on nuclear technology, could actually be be seen as a subsidy for civilian nuclear power. If you want to be seen as open minded on nuclear get your facts streight.
That's not what World Nuclear says:
Nuclear power has dominated government spending on energy research and development, accounting for over US$159 billion between 1974 and 1998. Although its share has fallen, it still accounts for 51% of the OECD energy R&D budget:
http://www.world-nuclear.org/sym/2001/fig-htm/frasf6-h.htm
i countrd the dollars. Very little of that $159 actually contributed to that civilian nuclear technology. Most of the DoE budget went to military programs, and to cleanup of world War II and Cold war nuclear facilities that were involved in military programs.
It's true that much nuclear power research was done for the military, but a lot of that was done by companies like GE that took it back into the civilian sector as well.
Exactly.
Wrong.
The military is not included in this budget:
Nuclear power has dominated government spending on ENERGY research and development, accounting for over US$159 billion between 1974 and 1998. Although its share has fallen, it still accounts for 51% of the OECD energy R&D budget:
http://www.world-nuclear.org/sym/2001/fig-htm/frasf6-h.htm
Besides the military received way more.
Anyone, you can consult these farmore detaiked sources.
http://www.misi-net.com/publications/2008energyincentives.pdf
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/servicerpt/subsidy2/pdf/subsidy08.pdf
I discusss here:
http://nucleargreen.blogspot.com/2008/09/energy-subsidies-again.html
Quote: only 6% ($1.68 Billion) of Federal nuclear research dollars since 1976 have been spent on Light Water Reactor research, despite the fact thatr Light Water Reactors provide 20% of power in the United States. Another $3 Billion was spent on reactor waste management research, but most of that money cannot be considered as a subsidy for the civilian nuclear industry, because that industry continues to manage and store its own waste in temporary local storage facilities at its own own facilities despited the contractual obligation of the Federal Government to provide waste storage facilities. . . . . .
Most energy technologies have received more money from the Federal Government than they have paid to it. The one exception is the civilian nuclear industry, which has paid $14 billion more to the Government that it has received. The imbalance came about because the Federal Government has failed to provide waste management services to the nuclear industry, which nuclear plants owners are paying for. Thus fat from receiving subsidy from the Federal Government, the civilian nuclear industry has in fact subsidized the Federal Government, and the net value of that subsidy is far greater than the value of all of the benefits that the civilian power industry has received through the Federal Government. If we subtract the $5.8 of R & D expenditures on Light Water Reactors paid by the Federal Government, we find that the Civilian Power Reactor Industry has given the government a net subsidy of $8.2 Billion. In addition unlike other energy technologies including renewables, the civilian nuclear power industry pays 100% of its tax obligations.
Payments into the the nuclear waste fund, have not had their value adjusted for inflation, nor does the government pay interest on the fund's balance. The inflation adjusted value of the fund, the value of the interest on the fund the fund and the value of future contributions on the fund, makes the nuclear electrical industries contribution much bigger than is stated by nuclear critics.
Besides the fact that this is not OECD data but US data and partially funded by the nuclear industry, why would one spend $1.68 billion taxpayer dollars on a design that is - according to you - obsolescent?
Maybe the taxpayer has to fund R&D for waste management, because temporary storage facilities are actually temporary.
See my comment to Alan. The government cheated the reactor lowners, took billions of dollars for services it did not perform. The R&D money was no subsidy and was in fact wasted.
most of that money [to manage nuclear waste] cannot be considered as a subsidy for the civilian nuclear industry
Yes it can, and I do. As should any reasonable person.
The VAST bulk of nuclear waste in the USA is from civilian reactors, which require more than a temporary ad hoc solution (on site storage in pools and then dry cask). Reprocessing or permanent geological storage.
There was also research on safety > also civilian and more
I now assume that EVERY supposed fact quoted by Mr. Barton to be "uncertain".
Alan
A subsidy requires someone who benefits. If you break your agreement there is no benefit and if the federal government reniged on its agreement with reactor owners, they certainly get no benefit. Alan how can the government cheat reactor owners and that be considered a subsidy? Is that the way they think in Big Easy, or are you just crazy? The vast amount of nuclear waste would be enough to fill hundreds and hundreds of land fills. Right? Mountains of nuclear waste over 10,000 feet. Right? Huge. Enormous amount. Airplanes have to fly around the nuclear waste, don't they?
Alan, a tax isn't a subsidy. Especially when that tax is never spent on any services that were promised.
Sure, fine. In 500 years we can decide what to do with dry storage casks. We don't need any kind of permanant storage. We aren't going away, and if we are it isn't our problem anymore.
The changes that are possible/likely in society and social functioning over the next 100 years make waiting that long imprudent. 500 years is irresponsible to the extreme !
Going back 500 years takes us to the Inquisition in Spain, religious wars, social control by the Catholic Church in many kingdoms, slavery, witch burning, etc. Iraq was depopulated by the Mongols, etc.
The pace of social evolution appears to have speeded up, not slowed down in the last 5 centuries.
I submit that the world (at least the EU world) of 1509, was completely unfit to deal with nuclear waste, even if they had the technology to do so, because of the values of their society and the way decisions were made.
How can you simply assume that the world of 2509 will do any better than the world of 1509 ?
BTW: I forgot the isotopes, but their are some long lived ones (order 1 million years half life) that is released into the biosphere will create a long lived increase in background radiation. That % increase will increase over time, and as the # of reactors increase.
We have screwed the world for 10,000+ years with Carbon 14 from nuke tests. Best not to do it for a million years !
Alan
# I could see a despised group being forced to break open the nuke waste and till it into their farm land, as punishment. One possible permutation.
I submit that if the world in 2509 is less capable of avoiding concrete casks with big signs indicating why deconstruction is dangerous, then there are far more pressing problems than spent fuel.
When you consider how vastly common naturally occuring K-40 is and the energy it releases, this is worrying about increasing the salinity of the ocean because of the salt shakers on the Titanic. Seriously.
It would be about less effective than tilling farmland with lead or methyl mercury, except theres a whole lot more lead and methyl mercury. It would work if you're using lots and lots of C-60; Anything with a longer half life doesnt have enough radiotoxicity to compete with ordinary chemical toxins. I mean hell, we allready salt our fields with phosphate fertilizers that have enough radiotoxicity such that most lung cancers are caused by polonium stuck on tabacco leaves.
Interesting theory on lung cancer. Lots of chemical carcinogens too.
Non smoking tobacco farmers (my grandfather raised 100,000 lb annual crops) have only slightly elevated lung cancer rates. During November & December they would be in tobacco barns hand stripping tobacco. I can personally attest that tobacco dust is heavy in the air. Nicotine poisoning is a greater threat than lung cancer to them.
I wish I could remember the two isotopes that are produced in large quantities, have long half lives and are biologically active. They would raise background radiation by several % for humans if all already existing waste was released into the biosphere. Add future waste and the numbers grow significantly :-(
I see the increased C14 in our background radiation as a tragedy that we should not bequeath to future generations (I feel the same way about mercury from coal and MUCH more strongly about CO2).
At a minimum, increased birth defects and cancers from the C14 (largely from atomic bomb tests). But in 20,000 years (!!) the effects will be much less.
I think I129 is one of my worries (half life 15 million years, humans selectively and efficiently scavenge whatever Iodine we come across). Increasing the global biosphere total of I129 by even 100 tonnes is *NOT* a good thing ! What right do we have to condemn future generations (and even future species) to even modestly increased background radiation ?
You dismiss a 3% increase in background radiation as "nothing". I do not. The decisions of one generation impact 1,000 generations.
I think Tc99 (half life 211,000 years) is my other "big concern".
So I do *NOT* take as benign a view of nuke waste as you do ! It is a major, long lived problem.
Geological sequestration and irradiation of refined isotopes are the only viable means I see to deal with these "baddies".
Alan
I'll take the 3% background radiation issue:
It isn't nothing, but it does include the results of dozens of open-air nuclear weapon tests as well as Chernobyl. I am not sure if that calculation includes coal-ash distribution, but I would expect it to if the methodology was at all complete.
I get the impression that you are simply misinformed about radiotoxicity and isotopic distribution Alan. Most C-14 for instance is produced in the upper troposphere, and even during the open air nuclear testing era of the 1960's it at most doubled the atmospheric C-14:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon-14
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Radiocarbon_bomb_spike.svg
After only several decades it dropped back down to baseline, and has had almost no effect on the total amount of C-14 avaliable given how vast it is.
Then for any effect to be present, you must subscribe to the LNT hypothesis, which at these levels is drowned out by statistical noise. Finally, even assuming the LNT hypothesis, the amount of C-14 and radiotoxicity is insignificant compared to the vast amount of K-40 naturally present.
Its a very similar situation with I-129. K-40 will allways represent a far more immidiate radiation hazard than C-14. If you are that worried about radiation, avoid bananas at all cost, and certainly avoid sleeping with anyone, as their bones are radioactive. Perhaps suggesting removing your own bones goes a bit far, but you get the idea.
Your worries are simply misguided. There are far more important things to worry about. Specifically with respect to spent fuel, we shouldn't devote resources to disposal today when we can do better tomarrow, especially when it diverts resources from more pressing concerns today such as disposal of much larger volumes of more immidiately dangerous chemical wastes. We dont have infinite resources and have to allocate them wisely.
Your insignificant is VERY significant to me !
I do not have a New Present Value for birth defects. A radiation induced mutation deforming a child 2,000 years from now is as bad as one born 2 years ago. And C14 can, and does, do that. (C is part of the information structure of DNA, AFAIK K is not, it is used in the backbone of DNA so one could suspect that C14 is more mutagenic than K40 but ?)
Per your link, total body (as opposed to DNA) C-14 radiation is 1/39th of K40. That is *NOT* insignificant !
And the C14 in the biosphere has *NOT* declined to background levels, it is still 15% higher than 1955 levels (i.e. after numerous atomic bomb tests)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Radiocarbon_bomb_spike.svg
When one sums up the mutagenic effects over multiple half lives of man-made C14, it is significant. A 0.1% effect for one generation you may claim is tolerable. But when viewed from the perspective of 1,000 generations affected (997 of which get no benefit from nuclear power today), it is not. Especially since birth defects can be cumulative.
I know of no mechanism by which wind power and pumped storage can cause birth defects and cancer. I can think of numerous pathways for nuclear power.
And this is one reason why I see renewable power as preferred and nuclear power as the lessor of evils, certainly better than coal but not "good".
Nuke advocates ignore the damage that they do, and may do, to future generations. The economics of today matter little even 200 years from now. The environmental damage of today will matter.
When I think of adding Tc99 (half life 211,000) and I129 (15 million years !!) to the biosphere and the million years effects from that. Man-made I129 may well negatively affect the intelligent species that replaces us !
I see the cost to future generations, but not the benefit. We are quite literally crapping in their food, and the morality of that is bad.
And, BTW, until dis-proven, I assume LNT. It makes sense (unlike the radiation is good for you hypothesis).
And the body regulates K levels quite efficiently. The excess potassium from eating a banana has a half life of hours.
Best Hopes for A Rush to Wind and an Economic build-out of nuke to replace coal,
Alan
Open air nuclear weapon testing != nuclear power, and it's a good thing too.
In addition, especially in the case of C14, fossil fuels are a much more likely culprit for expanding the raw quantity of naturally occurring radioisotopes in the environment. Just by sheer volume if nothing else.
Think Alan, you have demonstrated keen insight, look at the Natural Abundance numbers for C14, K41, and similar radioisotopes, do the math *volume mined+pumped.
I worry more about the CO2, then mercury, then other heavy metals before I worry about radioisotopes from FF (especially coal).
Science does not yet fully understand (AFAIK, 20 yr old info) why there is any C14 in fossil fuels, but there are traces. Less than in the pre-1945 biosphere though, so FF burning dilutes C14 and reduces it's concentration slightly.
Coal burning puts uranium in the air (one of the heavy metals), NORM (naturally occurring radioactive material) is an issue with some oil & gas wells but not enough to have much impact.
The existing world stockpile of Tc99 and I129 from nuke power is a problem, it should not, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES be allowed into the biosphere ! And that stockpile grows every day.
If safely sequestering or trans-mutating these and other radioisotopes doubles or triples the cost of nuclear power, fine. Money well spent.
We do not have the moral right to leave an environmental disaster behind for *ALL* future history, likely to the extinction of our species.
That we WILL leave a disaster behind does not make it morally right to do so.
Best Hopes for Minimizing the Damage,
Alan
I think you and I are largely in agreement here.
No surprise, really. Though I am somewhat embarrassed about not double checking the characteristics of C14 before I posted.
The radioactive Iodine is definitely a potential problem, I would hope that a consumptive use can be found for it before the problem actualizes.
if the world in 2509 is less capable of avoiding concrete casks with big signs indicating why deconstruction is dangerous, then there are far more pressing problems than spent fuel.
This phase may only last for 200 or 300 years. The world of 2809 may be the utopia we dream of, and the state religion may not be ancestor worship (like all other examples in history) but ancestor cursing for the terrible mess we left them !
The graves of those that could be identified as saying "nuke waste was not a problem" and "coal burning is OK, it is cheaper" and other crimes against the future could be turned into shrines for ritual defecation and urination. Citizens would be encouraged to eat certain foods that would increase the odor after their ritual deposit.
Alan
The future is unknowable. Be VERY careful about making assumptions.
Your bias is *SO* extreme, and judgment so poor, that I do not accept ANY fact on the basis of your claim alone. And I do not have the time (or respect) for your claims to spend the effort to research anything I do not have stored in memory.
DoE research on recycling and/or deposing of nuclear fuel certainly counts as support for civilian nuclear power. Yucca Mt alone is more than your claimed $5 billion in support for civilian nukes.
The military nuke program feed DIRECTLY into the civilian program. Naval nukes were built by the same companies that built civie nukes.
So much for that bogus claim.
Alan
It seems to me that, in fact, what we have been doing is using natural gas as backup for nuclear. We also use it as backup for wind.
It seems to me that with more wind, we are likely to use more natural gas, if it is available, rather than building storage. (I know quite a few people thought that the reason T. Boone Pickens was so interested in wind was that it would increase natural gas use.) If natural gas moves up to the price range it has been historically, adding more natural gas use will raise utility bills.
This statement is nonsense! (in a steady state of electricity supply)
Just say a system had 1000kWh generation over a period all generated by gas. Add 500kWh of variable wind to the system over the same period and what happens to the gas usage? It would go down of course!!! Only 500kWh of gas generation would be needed. And only 500kWh of gas generated electricity would be produced. Gas is a natural store of energy. It should be used wisely as the store can't be recharged as in pumped hydro.
This is the reason why the largest natural gas generation company in NZ (Contact Energy) is now planning at a large (540MW) wind farm near Auckland. It will save them gas, which will protect their gas generation assets as gas becomes scarcer in NZ.
You are correct that wind added to a generation system with 100% natural gas cannot increase gas use. However, the displacement of gas might be substantially less than Nameplate Capacity × Capacity Factor. For one thing, since gas is supplying a much lower fraction of base load capacity the gas burned per kWh provided will be higher (peaking plants are less efficient than base load plants). Also if total wind power exceeds demand (This situation is easily possible with 50% wind energy penetration) then power will have to be dumped.
On the other hand if wind is displacing coal in a coal/natural gas system then it might be possible that natural gas use will increase, since the need for load balancing plants will be increased. At least I have not yet seen any analysis which clearly indicates the contrary.
My argument is about the displacement of the fuel and energy production not nameplate capacity.
Capacity factors in NZ:
Geothermal: 83%
Natural Gas: 63%
Coal: 51-71% (max 71% was in 2006)
Hydro: Approx 50% (varies due to rainfall)
Wind: 42% (New Makara wind farm is 47%)
Diesel/Fuel Oil: <1%
For the wind power to exceed total demand would be a hugely massive expansion in wind. Currently in NZ is similar to the States with 2.5% of electrical energy delivered. I don't see such a large expansion happening. (to 50% though 20% in NZ is definitely doable, though this is very long term).
All electrical systems have baseload and peaking. In a coal/gas system, coal provides baseload, gas can provide baseload and peaking. You're never going to get a 100% coal system as it can't provide the peaking needed. So would wind replace coal or gas in a coal/gas system?
Firstly it would replace any peaking gas during the day. (result = saving gas).
Secondly it would replace any gas used for baseload at night (result = saving gas).
Finally it would result in replacing any coal at night. (result = saving coal). Remember also that forecasts today are very accurate and the amount of power coming from wind can be accurately forecast days ahead. And power from baseload coal adjusted as such.
I found Jerome's article highly informative and recommend it to everyone.
How do you reach these conclusions? If wind power is variable how can it replace any peaking gas, any baseload gas at night, and any coal at night? I am not anti-wind. Quite the contrary. But I am pro-reality, and I see no connection of your thought process the same.
I think you might be confusing energy with power. I'm talking about energy = kWh's....not power...kW. This is what the original post referred to.
Wind is variable and so is gas. The only difference is that gas generation can be controlled. If you have a cooperative gas/wind system as Contact Energy (above) is planning then:
When the wind blows during the day peaking hours in Contact's planned 540MW wind farm at the current NZ average 42% capacity factor for say 12 hours, this would produce for Contact Energy 540MW x 0.42 x 12 = 2712.6 MWh of energy. Over the same period of time Contact Energy would reduce it's output from it's gas fired stations by an equivalent amount (balance the load), thus saving the gas that would have gone into producing the 2712.6MWh of electrical energy now produced by wind. Contact knows that this is a good long term investment as over the long term, natural gas will have more value than at present, meaning that keeping it in the ground and using wind whenever available is a good investment.
The second and third follow the same logic as the first.
If you add 500 kWh variable wind to a system with 1000 kWh demand, a lot of that wind will be stranded, since the top wind production will be 50% higher than average demand.
Also, you are starting with 100% gas, which is an unlikely scenario. Start with 100% coal instead and add 50% wind. Then you would get perhaps 30% wind (the rest would be stranded) and you would need 70% gas to balance. The coal plants you would have to close.
Gas is a variable generation which is why it is used for peaking. It is controllable, unlike wind, but added to the same system there will be absolutely no stranding! Any wind added to the system will offset any gas not used.
100% coal (or 100% nuclear for that matter...) is an impossible start due to peaking required.
100% gas is possible, but of course unlikely. However, this is not relevant to the argument of saving fuel or using more gas by increasing wind. For a coal/gas system, see my reply above.
Wind will never replace baseload. Nuclear can do that in the States.
It is hard enough to replace baseload with wind, but you suggest replacing peaking effect with wind. That is harder, if you aren't gonna turn the turbines away from the wind as soon as base load is sufficient.
If you are going to have significant wind in the grid, it must offset some baseload and then you need to balance with twice the amount of gas (or hydro).
Interconnected Windfarms provide baseload:
http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/winds/aj07_jamc.pdf
In addition, as opposed to nuclear power, wind typically produces more power during day time, when electricity demand is significantly higher.
http://www.windpower.org/en/tour/wres/variab.htm
http://www.wind-energie.de/de/technik/netz%5Cverbundnetz/?type=97
http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/5354
Every night and every weekend, tremendous excess, unflexible nuclear power (France has 75% nuclear baseload, but not baseload consumers) is pumped up the European pump storage lakes.
These pumps do not actually care, whether they are powered by nuclear or wind power...
http://www.energiestiftung.ch/files/downloads/energiethemen-atomenergie/...
France also has some of the lowest electricity rates in europe as well as very low per capita CO2 emissions. Contrast with renewable friendly Germany where coal intrests are kept alive to replace nuclear baseload capacity. Contrast denmark where the enormous wind capacity is backed by scandinavian hydro. I'm not against wind, but nuclear has a very significant place in generating capacity that shouldn't be dismissed. Unless you're own a coal mine I suppose.
Yeap, but France is now heavily investing in wind - new wind capacity represented about 60% of all new capacity added in 2008. They're now the fourth largest in terms of capacity in Europe. The reason is because of the baseload problems mentioned above, with wind able to offset some of the peaking required. Also during the heatwave of 2003, nuclear become unusable as the cooling rivers got too hot and in the end France's rivers had to pay the price.
I think nuclear is good for baseload compared with coal, but in the case of France, this is way too much.
I'm not against wind, but nuclear has a very significant place in generating capacity that shouldn't be dismissed.
I strongly agree.
It is entirely possible that the installed WT capacity could shrink in the early 2030s as large numbers of new nukes come on-line and old WTs are retired and replaced by large numbers of new nukes. Pumped storage works with nukes & wind.
Alan
France also has some of the lowest electricity rates in europe
Besides the fact, that France doesn't have the lowest electricity rates in Europe and tax payer paid for the capital costs of these plants:
Industrial electricity prices before tax (2007):
Denmark (20% wind power): 7.06 cents/kWh
Belgium (55% nuclear power): 9.69 cents/kWh
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_OFFPUB/KS-DK-07-001/EN/KS-DK-...
More importantly: Denmark still exports over 90% of its wind turbines with profit in a market with a double digit growth (as opposed to nuclear power which does neither).
http://uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt/idUKLV55678920081231
The question should be: Which solution can generate the highest CO2 reduction with the least cost in the least time:
www.newsweek.com/id/137501
I think it exports more like 99.9% of its wind turbines, since Denmark has expanded its wind capacity by a net 44 MW (about 15 turbines) since 2005. It seems they can't expand past 20%, and were able to acheive that only with the help of resourceful and larger neighbours who absorbs excess and helps balance the wind with hydro and gas.
No, the time schedule isn't that tight - we are talking several decades here. Since nuclear investments are about half the cost of wind, the same money in nuclear will obviously lead to less carbon in the atmosphere by 2050, even if wind would win a race to 2020. It's the longer time frame that's important for AGW - wind would be a sub-optimization.
The Stanford study is too small. We need a multi-year study with many more sites. I'm still looking for such a study on how much long distance transmission lines can help wind contribute to baseload.
Also, in the Stanford study note just how much of average output goes to baseload: about a third. Well, that's not a third of nameplate. That's a third of average. So that really puts limits on how big wind can get.
Just when does wind peak depends on where you are:
Coastal areas are smaller than inland areas. Wind in the plains states peak in the winter at night.
I question if there is much of a day/night delta in West Texas wind.
The power sources are the Arctic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico (with just a barbed wire fence in between). Not much of a daily cycle to that.
Fall, winter and spring should also all have good wind with only summer being a major fall-off.
Alan
I think you're also confusing energy and power as I've said above. Wind delivers energy (but can't totally be relied on for power), gas can be controlled to balance power. Wind blows when it does, and contrary to what Gail says this is more often during the afternoon peak electricity requirement. Therefore it does replace energy delivered in this timeframe. (peak period).
Again every current system has baseload and peaking, right now. This exists already! The capacity is there! One doesn't need to add more power capacity of gas when one builds a wind farm. One simply reduces the capacity factor of the gas generation by varying the amount fuel being consumed due to the energy being provided by the wind.
Take gas generation in NZ, with a current capacity factor of 63%. When, wind is added, less gas will be used overall, hence the capacity factor will drop. All the plant and machinery is still there, able to respond to power demand when needed. And peaking power is a lucrative market. The gas can be saved for when it is most highly valued - during peak times when there is no wind.
This makes a lot of economic sense.
Looking at the capacity factor in NZ of diesel/fuel oil of <1%, it's obvious why this is so low. Only in extreme cases does it currently make economic sense to burn liquids for electrical generation. The capacity is all there (about 500MW) however but was last used a couple of years ago during winter in a dry year. As the value of gas increases, the capacity factor for gas generation will follow a similar downward trend.
Significant wind would offset some baseload generation, but would not offset baseload capacity. Forecasting can be accurately used to predict any reduced generation needed. But significant wind is a long way away!
I disagree. If your minimum demand is 60 and the maximum demand is 100, you may have 60 baseload coal and 40 gas capacity for peaking. Now introduce 10 (average) wind and don't change baseload or peaking capacity. What will happen?
Well, if peak demand and peak wind coincide, you'll have 60 coal, 30 wind and 10 gas. Perfect - that's what you want! But what if you have minimum demand and peak wind? 60 coal, 30 stranded wind. Not so perfect!
What do you need to do to avoid any stranded wind? Well, you need to reduce baseload coal to 30, because then at minimum demand (60) and maximum wind you'll have 30 coal and 30 wind. But you need to increase peaking gas to 70, to cover the case of maximum demand and minimum wind.
While this reasoning is a bit simplified, it still shows that if we don't have excess dispatchable power in our grid in the first place, we need to draw down baseload a lot and increase peaking power as much. At least if we want to avoid stranding our wind resources.
Also note that introducing a measly 10% wind creates a BIG impact in the dispatchable-to-baseload ratio needed.
The range varies from plant to plant, but "many" coal fired plants can very between 30% of nameplate and 100% with acceptable losses in heat rate (efficiency). Like 10% to 15% more fuel/MWh at 30% than at 100%.
Coal plants make good load followers.
Alan
I've seen you say that before, but I have also seen it disputed. If coal could load follow well enough to balance wind, then we would have no problem at wind penetrations below 30% or some such, but we clearly do and you guys talk about large grid enhancements to fix this. To me, it doesn't add up, although I admit I know little about coal plants.
Forecasts these days are very accurate over the timescales needed for coal to be able to follow load. But from where things are at the moment with the penetration of wind, this doesn't even need to be considered. Gas will follow the load. Maybe in the distant future with greater penetration and dwindling gas, it will need to. But, wind will certainly make the gas go further, thus pushing the horizon out.
In terms of capacity, if you start with 60% coal, 40% gas and then add 10% wind, the gas capacity doesn't automatically disappear. None of the capacity disappears. You now have a system with 110% of the capacity what it was previously. Which is my argument.
No you just don't get it! You don't reduce baseload capacity! Just baseload generation at that particular point in time, which generally is not that frequent anyway.
eg. If you have 1000MW baseload coal like in Huntly NZ, running 4 x 250MW generators, you just switch one of them off. That simple!!! You can of course switch it back on again. No big deal, even in a high wind scenario with longer term accurate wind forecasting requiring this more frequently. The capacity factor for Huntly is currently about 50%. This means that the generators are running only half the time anyway. Fits in with this perfectly.
Firstly, I've said that every system has dispatchable power already, because that's the way they work anyway.
Secondly, I don't think that your reasoning has shown any need to draw down baseload capacity. You've just stated this with no real life examples to show how it would. And even the numbers given don't add up. Adding 10% wind gives 30% wind...?
There is no simply need to reduce baseload capacity. The capacity is needed when the wind doesn't blow.
Actually 100-130% of the capacity, since minimum wind is zero and maximum wind is three times average wind. (This hopefully answers your question about my numbers not adding up.)
Then there is no difference between baseload and peaking load. Sweet!
How fast do you draw down the fuel use, in this case, and how fast do you ramp up again? If you can respond quickly to wind and load variations, it is peaking power, right? You wouldn't need expensive natural gas.
Yes, but wind quickly overwhelms that capacity, as I explained. If you have 3% excess peaking capacity, you can add 1% wind (3% nameplate) and decommission 1% baseload.
My argument was that using the same baseload capacity, wind would get stranded at low demand/high wind. I still believe that, because I don't really buy that baseload capacity is interchangeable with peaking capacity.
No. Capacity is always 'nameplate' capacity. Add 100MW of wind to a system with 600MW coal and 400MW gas, then the total is 1100MW. That is the maximum capacity of the system. Your numbers definitely do not add up!
I'm not saying this at all. What I've above is that:
Firstly wind would replace any peaking gas during the day. (result = saving gas).
Secondly wind would replace any gas used for baseload at night (result = saving gas).
Finally it would result in replacing any coal at night. (result = saving coal). Remember also that forecasts today are very accurate and the amount of power coming from wind can be accurately forecast days ahead. And power from baseload coal adjusted as such.
If you can argue against that, then please do. You're presenting the last option, which is the last thing which wind replaces as 'the problem'. As Jerome pointed out in his analysis, wind doesn't impact the price of baseload generation during the night. I am saying however that with a high wind penetration, accurate wind forecasting means that coal will be able to follow general load. But it is a long way away, and adding wind incrementally as it is done is not going to affect this for a long while yet.
Right now wind is all about saving gas and that is why the largest gas generator in NZ is investing in wind.
Gas does this and in your scenario with originally 40% gas, it will continue to do this. Sudden variations in generation caused by changes in wind speed are not great. The control system in a wind turbine will automatically adjust the turbine to prevent surges in electricity output if wind speed increase suddenly. As turbines are arranged over a large area in a wind farm, often stretching several kilometres, a shift in wind speeds won’t affect all of the turbines at the same time. For example, generation will ramp up over the period of time it takes a gust to pass through a wind farm.
You're still thinking that the wind will somehow replace the capacity of the gas generation. No it will still all be there to respond to the short term changes in your scenario. In your scenario, the wind capacity is less than the gas, so in every situation there would be absolutely no need for coal to be replaced anyway.
If the capacity of the wind is less than the capacity of the gas as in you scenario, then no wind will ever be 'stranded' and no baseload coal would be affected.
Just to add to this, I think the problems with baseload is in it's (relative) inflexibility, though it can be adjusted if necessary within the timeframes given by wind forecasting. However, a better solution lies in the fact that thermal energy is easy to store via molten salts and thus be able to provide some peaking power. It makes a lot more sense for baseload thermal generators to be able to provide some dispatchable power. I don't know the economics of retro fitting, but any new thermal plant should look at the economics of this. It would go a long way to solving much of its inflexibility.
You refuse to understand because I used average capacity instead of nameplate? Are you always that inflexible?
Ok then, assuming I buy that coal can be adjusted fast enough, then the "only" problem at low wind penetrations would be lower utilization and less efficiency for other kinds of electricity production - which means a higher average production cost for them. This cost is generally not attributed to wind expansion. For high wind penetrations - above 20% - wind will get increasingly stranded anyway.
In your scenario, the wind capacity is less than the gas, so in every situation there would be absolutely no need for coal to be replaced anyway.
Que? Only coal was used at low demand. Then you introduce wind, so either it is stranded or you reduce coal generation. The gas generation capacity is irrelevant.
No. You are confusing capacity available and capacity utilized.
I'm pretty sure that I understand the difference between energy and power. It's not about being inflexible, it's about being logical. When you start talking about averages, you're talking energy, not power. Every generation source has a capacity factor, be it wind, coal, gas whatever. To talk about average capacity is rather meaningless without knowing the real capacity and capacity factors of the mix of generation.
When you say
you are talking about capacity being removed. When I say no baseload coal will be affected, I'm talking about baseload coal capacity - not generation. Throughout my arguments I think I have made this exceedingly clear. I still don't have a simple, logically backed rebuttal from you to my argument.
Firstly it would replace any peaking gas during the day. (result = saving gas).
Secondly it would replace any gas used for baseload at night (result = saving gas).
Finally it would result in replacing any coal at night. (result = saving coal).
See there (result = saving coal). There I say it. It reduces the capacity factor of coal generation. And when does it do it? Well when electricity costs a pittance anyway, in the middle of the night. So what is your point?
I'm not confusing anything. And I've said all along that this will reduce coal consumption. Look back over what I've said. You've been saying it will cause coal plants to close. Causing coal plants to close is reducing 'available' capacity. Using less coal is reducing the capacity factor (utilisation) of coal plants.
I'm pretty sure I do too.
That's what inflexible guys tend to say. As a computer science nerd (with a MSc in the field), I'm all for logic, but I don't refuse to understand people who are using natural languages.
No shit?
I assumed the basics were known to the TOD dwellers, and what I meant was quite clear from the context and my arguments.
My understanding was that coal wouldn't be able to follow wind variations well enough. You claim it can due to weather forecasts, and since no-one has challenged that, I'm willing to accept it for now. Then my original reasoning falls - we won't need to expand natural gas capacity.
Thanks for admitting that.
The thing is, the scenario you present is pretty far from the reality. From your numbers you assume a 100% capacity factor for coal providing all the baseload with nothing else providing any. If you use more real life capacity factors for coal (50-70%), then the impact of adding wind is not nearly as great as you make out. If you add a bit of gas to the baseload, the the impact is even less.
Even if coal couldn't follow general load, and the load had to be dumped when the price is a pittance in the middle of the night, why do you assume coal capacity would have to close? It still makes a lot of money during peak hours during the day. There is in fact never any need to expand natural gas capacity unless there is an increase in peak demand.
I guess if the coal capacity factor is 50-70% today, and wind depresses that even further, at some point we would want to close capacity to get the capacity factor up for the rest of the plants. But it might be unrealistic to assume wind penetration would get that high.
Another thing against your low demand/high wind argument is just plain economics. This situation would generally happen in the depths of night when power price is very low....hence as Jerome has shown, adding wind power is of little value then and doesn't affect the price. But since the price of power is so low, what does it matter anyway? Certainly, not sufficiently to cause "Coal Plants to close" thus reducing capacity as you make out.
A similar analogy sometimes occurs with our hydro in NZ. Sometimes we have dry years. Sometimes we have wet years and sometimes very wet years like this one and for the first time in 5 years have been spilling water through the Waitaki hydro system (began in January) and the first time in 11 years that it is happening in May (winter approaching = high demand) http://www.odt.co.nz/the-regions/north-otago/56565/video-benmore-dam-spi...
The price of electricity was almost zero - $0.03MWh at the time/off peak. But normally off peak is so cheap anyway, and it does approach this amount. Have a look at the NZ market price at night http://www.em6live.co.nz/PlanningRegion.aspx?planningregion=USI
So, everyone had cheap power and it didn't affect the baseload generators economically. Yes, we had to throw the water away cause it was of no economic value. The planners of the system know that this will sometimes happen. But it's not the norm. And it was free to throw away anyway.
What you are saying is that the wind is effectively stranded at low demand/high wind anyway, since it isn't worth anything. Actually, the higher wind penetrations you've got and the more the wind blows, the lower price you will get. So wind expansion doesn't only diminish the efficiency and utilization of other energy generation, it also diminishes the worth of previous wind investments (and more so than investments in baseload hurts old baseload investments).
No, in real life there is a mix of generation and the logical place to put wind is where there is lots of gas (or other stored energy) rather than lots of coal. ie. Some gas provides baseload. The wind would replace this first. From memory, there is little wind in high coal areas in the states.
But even so, coal utlisation here runs at 50% anyway, so being able to plan this around accurate long range forecasts, I don't see as a big issue. Weather systems stay around for days remember. The amount of power that would be generated over this period can easily be calculated and coal thermal turned on or off to adjust the general baseload needed. This saves coal and GHG emissions. It's not huge sudden changes one is talking here. They may be large but it can be planned for. Smaller variation in output from wind can be met by gas and ultimately the frequency keeper.
If you haven't already read Jerome's article, I suggest you do, as it explains this situation very well. When the wind blows it provides its real value. And the value it provides by blowing during peak hours during the day, more than offsets the low value at night. So yes, I agree that adding more wind lowers the price of electricity for consumers and as Jerome show's this price reduction is more than the value of the feed in tariff. Do you see low bills as a problem?
Efficiency?? Where does it do this?
Utilisation of other generation will go down. Capacity factors do go down. Yes, and saving gas (and sometimes coal)is a good idea. Less GHG too. Why do you see this as a problem?
Wind generators are adding more wind. Why would they do so if your argument was true?
And, to add to this, I think your arguments are not based of baseload alone, rather the type of baseload that is very inflexible, namely nuclear. Not coal as we have been talking about here. Coal can generally follow load.
I think that the only thing that will be 'stranded' are pipe dreams of a large expansion in nuclear. It will certainly be a part of the mix, but large expansion would require a large expansion in storage. The French have been there and done that, and that is why they are now heavily investing in wind.
Sure, but you yourself said capacity of other generation will be unchanged while utilization would be lower. That diminishes the worth of capital investments in gas and coal, and lower utilization means lower efficiency.
For low penetrations. And this disregards seasonal variations, where wind generally blows the least when it's needed the most.
Coal and ng plants, as far as I know, get lower efficiency at lower utilization.
Why do you think I do?
Because penetration is still so low, and/or subsidies so high. For higher penetrations, extra wind will cannibalize on old wind as it will blow in tandem and further depress spot prices at high wind.
Because wind = storage? Where's the logic in that? And the French are absolutely NOT heavily investing in wind.
60% of all new generation capacity installed in 2008 in France was wind. http://www.gwec.net/index.php?id=128 It is the fourth largest market in Europe in terms of yearly and total capacity. Nuclear = 0. It now has more wind capacity than Denmark.
The French are adding wind because it can offset peak energy requirements, thus saving gas. In 2003, during the heatwave, much of French nuclear became unusable under normal operating conditions as the the rivers heated and dried up. With GW, this scenario is likely to be played out more in the future.
from: http://www.grid.unep.ch/product/publication/download/ew_heat_wave.en.pdf
"The heat wave spelled trouble for France's nuclear reactors, many of
which are cooled by river water. The plants return cooling water to
the rivers, but only after it has cooled down to reduce the impact on
the environment. In some regions, river water levels dropped so low
that cooling process became impossible and plants had to shut
down, while elsewhere the water temperatures after the
cooling process exceeded environmental safety levels. An
exceptional exemption from the legal requirements was
granted to six nuclear reactors and a number of conventional
power stations: The nuclear power plants of Saint-Alban
(Isère), Golfech (Tarn-et-Garonne), Cruas (Ardèche),
Nogent-sur-Seine (Aube), Tricastin (Drôme) et Bugey (Ain)
continued functioning, although the upper legal limits were
exceeded.
Moreover, demand for electricity soared as the population
turned up air conditioning and refrigerators, but nuclear
power stations, which generate around 75% of France's
electricity, operated at a much reduced capacity."
The same has happened with coal (Victoria) in Australia as well as here, with the Waikato overheating. Here they shut it down rather than dumping hot water into the environment.
Not in the long run. Take Contact Energy mentioned above. The largest gas generator in NZ. Why would they invest in wind if it reduces their capital investment? Actually it saves their investment, because it saves them gas. Maui, the largest gas field here is due to be depleted in 2011. There is a smaller field keeping things ticking over (til 2017), but some estimates show a need for LNG imports by 2011. Ultimately, the gas is running down. And what happens when there is nothing left...well, their entire investmest is worthless or dependent on a huge investment in an LNG facility and expensive gas imports.
With peak oil, the price of coal will also go up as mining is heavily oil dependent. Saving coal fuel. Lower utilisation doesn't mean lower energy efficiency. It may mean a slower return on investment.
There are no subsidies here in NZ for wind. Wind has by far the most planned capacity in the pipeline including the most planned capacity by gas generators. (over 2000MW is planned).
I agree, France is in the process of building a substantial wind component.
2.45 GW on-line in 2007 and 3.4 GW in 2008 are not trivial. Together these two years worth of wind will generate about as much as one EPR.
It seems likely that the period from the start of construction of the first French EPR (Flamanville ?) to the completion of the second EPR, France will see substantially more power from new wind than from the two EPRs.
So even as France builds new nukes, she builds even more new wind.
Alan
And new nukes post 2020 are a part of a decommissioning and replacement program
From http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf19.html
"In August 2005 EdF announced that it plans to replace its 58 present reactors with EPR nuclear reactors from 2020, at the rate of about one 1650 MWe unit per year"
I'm not wholly optimistic about French wind in the future. France has a problem that they're rather short on dispatchable power allready given their large dependance on nuclear. I see opportunities for wind where there are large amounts of dispatchable power allready, specifically those places overreliant on natural gas or coal. Like China and the US. France will fall short on their projections for wind because of infrastructure issues.
France gets 10% of it's electricity from hydro and has 4.3 GW of pumped storage already built (I am unsure of future pumped storage plans).
The wind can stretch out the hydro over a longer period.
My SWAG is that 10% hydro and ~6% of peak demand in pumped storage will allow 7% of total MWh in wind without major issues. Trading power will increase that number.
Alan
Yes, my point is they allready use their hydro for dispatch power because of the complete lack of dispatchability of nuclear, so their dispatchable power is allready stretched thin. The problem for wind in France is they have been too successful at replacing fossil production if anything.
Building pumped storage could ameliorate that, but its unneccisary. Wind is unneccisary in France because it has a very successful and streamlined nuclear infrastructure, so new power is more cheaply provided by adding nuclear capacity. Any new wind capacity will be more costly (for France) than new nuclear because of their structure. They could build more pumped storage and transmission infrastructure for power trading, but this isn't free... Given they allready export significant electricity from their current capacity, I cant see that this presents a truely good market for wind
However, I would guess that the prospects for wind are very good in say, Italy or UK. Their nuclear industries are currently paralyzed (in UK) or nonexistant (in Italy) and so at a price disadvantage as well had being heavily reliant on natural gas means they have significant amounts of dispatchable power to back variance.
You conclude that "wind is unnecessary in France", yet the French are making massive investments in wind (more than in nukes).
The French pride themselves on being logical.
A disconnect between observed reality and your logical deduction.
May I suggest a change in your thinking.
Some possibilities:
Wind does extend the hydro & pumped storage, and increases, rather than decreases, their dispatchable power (up to a low limit like 6% of MWh from wind). I 6think this is the answer.
The French were scared by heat wave and the weakness demonstrated by their nukes.
Corsica and French overseas departments (as French as Hawaii is American) have no nukes and wind is good for them. (Details show that most wind is going to mainland France though).
Wind reduces the residual FF burned in France.
Wind can be built faster than nukes and the French think that they can export wind at a profit. The profile of wind (seasons and daily cycle) may generate higher revenues than the nuke profile.
If they can sell wind generated electricity at a profit for the next 20 or so years, then build it !
Alan
Also, because of excess French nuclear power the pump storage lakes in Switzerland can often times run on free electricity at night and on weekends. And since this is a lucrative business, Swiss power operators are currently planning or already building between 3.6 and 4.2 GW of new pump storage:
cms.webofsections.ch/fileadmin/data/wwf_be/Alpen/0712_KSU_Pumpspeicherung_def_Version.pdf
Wind does already stretch out hydro in Spain:
http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssIndustryMaterialsUtilitiesNews/idUSL1...
Wind power has done much to fill the gap recently and has set new generation records by providing as much as 24 percent of total demand in a given day.
Please give a better link to Swiss plans for pumped storage. I am preparing a report for a possible developer of pumped storage.
Alan
New pump storage currently being built or in planning (in most cases it's actually an increase of power on existing hydro power plants):
* Tierfehd (capacity of 110 MW) (this project might actually just have been accomplished):
http://www.raonline.ch/pages/edu/nw/power01a4a1.html#nestil
* Linth Limmern (capacity of 1000 MW):
www.axpo.ch/internet/nok/de/medien/bestellen.-Slot1-0009-File.File.FileR...
* Nant de Drance (capacity of 600 MW):
www.nant-de-drance.ch/flash/images/d/ct.pdf
* Illsee (capacity of 180 MW):
http://www.rz-online.ch/rz-archiv/rz-ausgaben/2007.php?5_articleid=1-cx&...
* Grimsel 3 (capacity of 370 MW):
http://www.eawag.ch/organisation/abteilungen/surf/teaching/management_as...
* Innertkirchen 3 (capacity of 700 MW (turbine only)):
http://www.eawag.ch/organisation/abteilungen/surf/teaching/management_as...
* Puschlav (capacity of 1000 MW):
http://www.repower.com/it/nc/print/ch/il-gruppo-raetia-energie/sala-stampa/comunicati-stampa/it-detailmedienmitteilung/article/erfolgreiche-gespraeche-umweltvertraeglichere-loesung-mit-1000-mw-pumpspeicherkraftwerk-im-obere/?tx_ttnews[backPid]=1616&cHash=a1cfa451b0
* Val d'ambra (details have not been released yet):
http://www.valdambra.ch/stampa/teszei9.2.07.pdf
This list is not complete.
This statement just shows a complete misunderstanding between capacity and utilisation. Actually coal utilisation goes down yes. The capacity factor drops, but not the capacity. Hence you don't need to build more gas. The statement is total nonsense.
The misunderstanding is yours - I have complete understanding when it comes to capacity, utilization, energy and power. My statement makes perfect sense if coal can't be adjusted to balance wind. (You claim it can, and I tentatively accept that.) I'm still not sure if you are deliberately misunderstanding or not. Please, discussions are much more fruitful if we use the principle of charity.
The ability to load follow varies from plant to plant (French coal plants are good load followers).
Wind (especially from a geographically disbursed group of wind farms) is significantly less dynamic than some loads (Thunderstorm hits New Orleans on a hot August afternoon and our a/c load plummets in a few minutes, or not, depending on characteristics of rainfall)
The ultimate load followers are hydro (some) and pumped storage.
Good rule of thumb, if a coal plant can load follow today, it can balance out the vagaries of wind generation tomorrow.
Alan
I am not sure what you are thinking here. The Electric Company would put the 30 wind generation on the grid, and would tell the coal plants to run at half capacity, using cheaper lower BTU coal, or by using less coal. Your description of coal generation seems to be that it always runs all-out. If that is what you think, that isn't so. Generation levels from coal fired units can be changed, resulting in savings, and that is currently done routinely.
Natural gas units are the peaker units, but coal-fired units can be adjusted up or down.
Wind causes problems. Inject a lot of wind into a system by using tax credits. What happens? Wind gets sold at a loss and causes baseload to not get sold. This increases the cost of baseload plants.
Wind increases the demand for peaking natural gas. One problem: peaking natural gas is less efficient than baseload natural gas. Peaking plants aren't as capital intensive. So the average efficiency level of natural gas burning for electricity generation goes down when you have more wind.
Most, but not all, peakers actually used are combined cycle. Only loss is heating up the steam side on a daily basis.
There is a significant delta from peak to baseload everyday (2:1 is normal). Adding wind into the mix does not seem to make things any worse. Adding pumped storage is a great improvement.
Alan
Increased demand from peaking generators due to increased customer demand is far easier to model and predict than increased demand needed due to variable winds.
Peaker loss: Natural gas burned in a peaking plant is not converted into electricity as efficiently as natural gas burned in a baseload plant. The baseload plant is much more capital intensive. Do you dispute this?
A plant that runs all the time justifies a bigger capital expenditure per MW than one that runs only part of the time.
I say this results in happy customers, who pay less for power!. This is what Jerome is saying in his analysis. The amount of subsidy paid is less than the savings passed on to customers. It's win/win, except if you happen to be a baseload generator. I suggest reading his analysis.
I think I've explained quite adequately above, this an if you can disagree with the points made, please present them. The only thing that will lead to the additional need for capacity is an increase in peak demand!
huh??? How about some numbers to back you up.
I think I agree. I mean that the two sources could be linked - possibly even designed to work together, like a hybrid wind/gas electric generator. Not sure.
Gail,
This video on the LFTR might be useful, if you haven't seen it already.
The Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor: What Fusion Wanted To Be - Dr. Joe Bonometti
Cheers
I'm so tired of people comparing a wind tower/turbine's overnight costs without transmission with the costs of the first American nuclear reactor for decades including capital costs, transmission upgrades and everything else. But you manage to do far less honest comparisons than that. Congratulations.
Nuclear is cheaper, better and far more scaleable than wind. Also, if you're not in doomer panic mode, nuclear is also faster, since it is cheaper. And no, I will refuse to support these facts with an impressive set of links, since you have just shown how worthless that is. I'm appalled.
The decommissioning costs of a nuclear power plant has already reached $1100 per kW , which is already close to the capital costs of a new wind turbine:
http://www.webwire.com/ViewPressRel.asp?aId=55119
The ultimate repository at Yucca mountain has already reached costs close to $1000 per kW and nuclear power plant:
http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2008/aug/27/nuclear_surge_needs_waste...
Needless to say that Uranium has to be imported, processed, enriched and homegrown Wind is actually free.
And as opposed to nuclear power Wind power doesn't actually require cooling water.
First, you can't count. The article says $900 million in costs and the plant is rated at 2*1040 MW, so it is $433 per kW. Second, the word "already" is disengenious as the price per kW will be lower for new plants due to bigger size, simpler and more standardized designs and more decommissioning experience.
That comparison is irrelevant, flawed and disengenious, because, among other things, a wind kW, at best, produce a third of a nuclear kW. Also, discount matters. Capital costs are important. Costs taken 80 years laters are not so important.
You don't actually believe waste storage costs will scale linearly with the amount of waste, do you?
Yes, from evil Canada or Australia, at fractions of a cent per kWh. Fuel costs for your domestic coal is far, far higher, so you are better off buying uranium.
Which doesn't offset the other costs associated with wind, such as backup, storage, grid, construction, capital costs and so on which add up to twice the cost of nuclear power. And this is for low penetrations. Wind won't be used for high penetrations since the costs would sky-rocket.
So?
First, you can't count. The article says $900 million in costs and the plant is rated at 2*1040 MW, so it is $433 per kW.
Actually the article said between $900 and $1100 Million in costs.
But you're right I should have used an example where the plant has already been decommissioned, because these cost are typically higher than originally estimated.
The decommissioning of this nuclear plant has reached $1,400 per kW (after finishing the decommission), which makes almost as expensive as the capital costs of a new wind turbine.
http://www.secinfo.com/d11141.253.htm
You don't actually believe waste storage costs will scale linearly with the amount of waste, do you?
Who cares what I believe (fortunately we don't discuss any Religion)? Facts show that the Yucca mountain costs have already reached 96.2 billion dollars which leads to costs of almost $1000 per kW nuclear power in the US for the ultimate repository only.
And fact is also that the ultimate repository won't be cheaper if you increase its size.
Btw, if wind doesn't require cooling water, it doesn't require a river and doesn't need reduce its power in dry hot summers.
To make it clear--I am not saying we should jump into nuclear reactors, either. Handling the waste material at the end becomes a real problem, if the world is less well off.
Just that one shouldn't think that costs of wind turbines are insignificant.
Actually, the problem of handling the waste material seems to grow proportionally to the wealth of the country doing it. The more money you have, the more you over-design the programs to try to appease public opinion and whiny politicians. (Unfortunately, it has the opposite effect by confirming their nuke fears and by creating an economic counter-argument, but that's another story.)
What you say is very true. Look at Yucca Mountain. Harry Reid manages to kill it off after $9 billion spent. More waste. A poorer country wouldn't allow such waste.
If you can supply the the name of the author and place of publication I would love to read a piece that explains in some detail exactly where all this money goes when it is spent on decommissioning an old nuke.Written in layman's terms of course.Accessible free preferably.
It seems to me that the priests of the (fundamentalist )Church of the Worshippers of Mother Nature and Hot Air have captured the high ground long since and so poisoned the nuclear debate that most of us(meaning the public) who think of ourselves as reasonably well informed have absolutely no coherent idea what the facts are,either in the small window(actual risks of radiation poisoning here and now or later)or the bigger window -the environmental and political costs of burning the coal and oil displaced by nukes.
For the life of me, I cannot but conclude that the costs of decommissioning a nuke are inflated to a preposterous extent by an absolute insistence on cleaning up old nukes as if they were terminator movie versions of automated small pox factories..-words fail me.Can anyone here remember looking at cheap women's magazines(not that there aren"t men's mags that are worse,but this example comes to mind)that used to publish articles about home health risks such as the danger of catching some horrid disease from parrot droppings DIRECTLY opposite a full page cigarette ad?
Cleaning up a nuke in a way that costs five billions or more is like calling in the fire department,OSHA,the national gaurd,the EPA,a couple of big Washington law firms and the press to clean up a gallon of spilled motor oil,so far as I can see.
People here in the states like to make fun of the French,but in many ways they are considerably ahead of us.They don't have any problems getting rid of thier waste,and least one of the world's foremost environmentalists has endorsed thier approach,given the alternatives.
If we don't survive the next century,the question of nuclear cleanup is irrevelant.I suggest that we take our chances with the nukes and worry about the cleanup later.Pour the dead ones full of concrete.Spend the money on something that might help prevent world war III,or worse.
If oil goes to 200 dollars plus and stays there,millions-tens of millions of people are going to starve NOW -MEANING IN THE NEXT DECADE or two.Any body who understands the costs of industrial agriculture and lack of purchasing power of the poor countries(producing ,importing,or both) already hooked on bau industrial ag can come to no other conclusion.If the ACC people are correct,a significant fraction of the global population will be forced to migrate within the next century,and huge expanses of our best farmland will be next to worthless. Some of it maybe even under water.Out of the subset of readers of this site who have read at least a dozen books of world history,I would bet that more than half would put the odds of a war between major powers on a scale of low, medium, or high at either medium or high given these scenarios-which seem to be accepted as facts-to-be by many of the people who are so dead set against nuclear power. We can divert a huge quantity of natural gas from electricity generation to fertilizer production and truck fuel with nukes.
If the grid is still capable of getting the juice to a major city, one nuke can keep the water flowing and the refrigerators and supermarkets running if nothing else.So could one coal mine,one rail road,and one big coal fired powerplant.I suggest that the one nuke is a safer bet,given the existing high level of security around nukes.How would you like to be in LA or NYC 48 hours after the power goes off?If the nuke needs refueling,assuming the fuel is available,one truck convoy protected by a small military detachment can deliver it.No more deliveries will be necessary for over a year.It can run another year at reduced output if necessary .
I suggest that that year might be necessary to deal with whatever caused the power to fail.
Alternatively,if the total construction,operating, and decommissioning costs of one hundred nukes totals two trillion or more,how does that compare to the total cleanup and remediation cost of burning enough coal to generate an amount of electricity eqivalent to the lifetime output of the one hundred nukes?
Lets be fair and hold coal to the same standards as the nukes.
I believe that we could build the nukes,but I doubt if we could build enough wind and solar to take thier place.Remember that the wind operates at 30 to 35 percent of capacity,and nukes operate at 90 percent.Remember that the nukes can be built on the average a lot closer to the population centers where the power is needed,meaning the grid expansion necessary to superscale wind will be largely unnecessary.
I am in favor of wind,believe it or not,and solar,and geothermal,and anything else that can be proven to work,and built in the real world,if it will help reduce the risk of a catastrophic crash.
I just happen to believe that nukes offer more bang for the buck in reducing the risk than any other currently available option.
I could be wrong.I'd rather be wrong erring on the side of caution than otherwise.Remember that I am just a crabby old farmer and not to be taken too seriously-unless the subject is ag.
Thank you. I am so sick of the nuclear waste fears. There was an article in the DB a while back which revealed that we are currently trying to certify that waste storage be safe for one million years.
That's a Hyperbolic example.. we're seeing storage that's under 50 years old leaking now.. to paint it as if the opponents just want outrageous safeguards is a decoy argument to distract from the fact that we don't have any clear way of holding this stuff, or that the ways that have some promise are so expensive that massive amounts of hot materials will be dumped illegally. It's already happening.
You think you're sick now..
It happened 50 years ago as part of the weapons development programs, not civilian power. Spent fuel is stored in cooling ponds then dry storage casks after cooling. It doesn't leak because its not liquid. It cant.
There is some justification for "nuclear waste fears". Humans have taken an element that exists in certain locations in varying concentrations, concentrated it and processed it to produce nuclear fuel. Both the fuel and the spent fuel produce dangerous radiation that is way above the level that most (all?) living organisms can tolerate. A quick internet search brought up this Wikipedia article on Radioactive Waste that includes the following:
AFAIK nuclear waste cannot be processed to make it less hazardous. It is a fundamentally different kind of hazard. One can be exposed to dangerous levels of nuclear radiation and not even know it. Thats why radioactive items have big warning label on them. I would think these issues indicate that the use of large scale uranium/plutonium nuclear technology is only suited to more developed, stable and disciplined societies. It would be interesting to see how many nuclear advocates would like to live anywhere near a nuclear waste processing or storage facility.
Alan from the islands
islandboy, the relative level of risk which human beings face from so called nuclear waste is far less than the risks we face from natural sources. For example there is a high probability that the Yellowstone supervolcano will erupt during the next 160,000 years. A yellowstone erruption would have the potential to kill millions of people and create magjor economic disruption on a global scale. On the other hand the likelyfood that there would be even a single casualty from nuclear waste during the same time frame is very low. Hence the so called danger of nuclear waste belongs in the sky if falling catregory of risk. Research had demonstrated that nuclear waste can be successfully buried in rock for a period exceeding one billion years, with virtuallly no movement during that time. The evidence that nuclear waste can be burried for long periods of time is very powerful.
People who fear nuclear waste cannot be sucessfully disposed of are extreme and irrational cowards.
You could also say, "the relative level of risk which human beings face from" lead poisoning from car batteries, "is far less than the risks we face from natural sources". I live in a country where backyard recycling of lead from car batteries was stopped by the authorities. This after children from the communities where this was being done started turning up at hospitals and clinics suffering from lead poisoning. The people who were doing this were poor and uneducated and their children may end up paying the price of their folly for the rest of their lives. Also in my country, scrap metal dealers (thieves) were known to remove guard rails from roads and bridges and attempt to cut up working industrial machinery. I would not like to see nuclear material anywhere near people like this especially when there is a likelihood that we are going to have a hard time maintaining the state regulatory apparatus post peak.
Alan from the islands
Alan the is an attitude toward life that imagins that life can be lived without taking any risks. This attitude is called cowarduss, and people who seek a risk free life are cowards. The truth is that there are some risks involved in nuclear power, but compaired to the risks involved with other forms of power the nuclear risks are less. Lets consider what some of those risks are. Since 1950 over 100,000 have been killed in accidents involving hydro electric facilities. this is many times more than the number who has died as the result of all nuclear accident. The number of fatalities connected to the wind industry accidents in the United States is larger than the number of fatalities caused by nuclear industry accidents. The environmental pollution problems associated with the P:V industry is far worse, the number of people who have been sickened isfar higher, and the number of associated deathsh are far greater. We don't know the exact number because the P.V. industry is involved in a conspiracy with the Chinese government and Chinese industries to keep the casualty figures hidden. An estimated 500,000 people a year in china die from respetory problems cause byl pollution from coal fired power plants.
It is estimated that 20,000 people die every year in the United States due to causes related the operation of coal fired power plants. Another estimated 10,000 people die of radiation exposure from radioactive gases that are carried by natural gas pipelines, into homes and workplaces.
Thus far from posing a risk, nuclear power isthe safest means of generating el;ectricity. So not only are you a coward in you Chicken lLittle "the sky is falling" attitude toward nuclear power, you are also an utter hypocrite too.
This comment is worth flagging as inappropriate (and insulting). Such comments make banning Mr. Barton an appropriate choice.
Alan
Hey Alan, You had previously demanded that I too should be banned (merely for raising "~inappropriate~" questions and evidence concerning a commenters' statements about Nazi gas chambers). I respectfully suggest it's your own demands for bans that are inappropriate. Though I wouldn't propose banning yourself as you do endeavour to make useful contributions.
Charles's comment here is one of his less insane ones. He takes the trouble to assemble some relevant info which no-one has challenged. He does include some pathetic ad homs but I don't think he makes a habit of wantonly generating bad feeling, and in this case was probably frustrated at his previous reasonable comment being challenged.
I find Charles's defective comments to be generally an irritating nuisance, whereas the "inappropriate" flag was introduced for tackling posts that are grossly inappropropriate misuse the space, to the extent of being a real problem, rather than people just expressing how they see the other commenters. Long, spammy, advertising, totally insane, etc. So cool off please, Alan!
I am a little puzzled by the harshness of this post. Some time ago there was a discussion about thorium reactors that Charles contributed to and I was intrigued by. I was so impressed that I asked, if this technology is so great, why don't we see it being implemented already? I remain optimistic and hopeful that something really useful will come out of this technology.
I am surprised that on the strength of a few comments in this thread, Charles has been able to asses my character and proclaim on it. I have not been one of the people attacking Charles and his ideas, just expressing my reservations about something I perceive to be fairly complicated and inaccessible or inappropriate for many countries or regions on this planet.
I must admit, I live in a small country and think of things on small scales but, that is precisely why I liked the idea of the thorium reactor. A a case in point, the smallest current technology nuclear power plant would supply just about all of my countries electrical needs at peak load (about 1000MW), while it was my impression that thorium reactors could be scaled down to the point where multiple units could be configured to supply a portion of our base load.
I also happen to like the idea of individual or community electrical power production at the expense of large scale centralized power providers, especially when the fuel costs are free (micro-wind, solar, micro-hydro). I guess that based on that, I will be called a communist or a hippie next.
As for Chicken Little, everybody who agrees with alot of the basic ideas espoused on this web site, has a certain amount of "Chicken Litle" in them.
Alan from the islands
No worries! We'll always know exactly where it is!
https://www.thetrickery.com/ama/med/acmeportablehole.jpg
Cheers
Replace 'nuclear waste' with 'arsenic' or any other toxic heavy metal. Except they stay dangerous forever. We can bury the thousands of tonnes of nuclear waste under the tens of billions of tonnes of chemical waste that no one cares about if you like. Theres a serious crisis of perspective here. Managing a refrigerator sized canister of several tens of tonnes of solid mass that just sits there is a solved problem. You seal it in concrete and put it in a parking lot. Talk about it again in 100 years if you think you have a better idea or can recycle the gunk in it without making more of a mess than is allready there.
I would. I know how dry storage casks work and how damned durable they are. You could put the thing in my basement if you want.
You are quite simply ignoring what all nuclear cheerleaders do:
* accidents happen.
** bizarre, unexpected accidents happen.
* In a thousand years, and likely a fraction of that, nobody will know where this waste is, which makes it entirely possible something really dangerous will happen, like a photon torpedo blasting Yucca Mountain to hell and back and all that radiated stuff going into the environment.
You can't predict or control the future. Your refusal to accept this is as irrational as anything you cheerleaders accuse others of.
Cheers
I think of the security issues in other respects. Like, national security.
Iran or North Korea wants nuclear power, the world comes to the brink of war. Even with a magic perfectly safe reactor and waste cycle, if a Tomahawk missile comes down the pipe, it's glow time in downtown.
So then you have to spend all this money on Yakhont surface-to-ship missiles, and radar systems, and big armies, and so on. Basically, it's a big pain in the bum.
Nobody ever threatened to invade anyone because they built a wind turbine.
If the US doesn't build more nuclear reactors, do you think that will make North Korea or Iran abstain from persuing nuclear tech for civilian and/or military purposes?
The genie is out of the bottle. We have nuclear power, we have nuclear waste. We might as well expand it a bit.
Do you worry about the salt shakers on the titanic increasing the oceans salinity?
Right now I'm more concerned with asinine analogies.
I would if the salt in them were concentrated enough to over-salinate vast stretches of the ocean. (Did you know there's an aquifer under Yucca Mountain?)
You might find that you're arguing from a position of ignorance... That comment, while probably meaningless to you was incredibly illuminating to me on the position many people argue from.
No. I dont care either since I dont support any geologic disposal of spent fuel and feel that all attempts at geologic disposal will be abandoned when people realize how valuable the spent fuel rods are.
It's pretty simple. Unfortunately, you are wanting to play at seeming profoundly enlightened on this topic, yet, cannot seem to follow a simple flow of logic:
You don't know the future. You don't have any idea where the waste will end up in the future. What it might or might not poison is not known to you. What is known is that anything as lethal as nuclear waste has, and will continue to, damaged lives. The question is, is the worst that could occur worth the risk?
Sadly, far too many of the nuclear cheerleaders refuse to grasp that this is a legitimate concern.
Like Alan, I support limited and necessary nuclear power. But I also am sick and tired of this ridiculous cheer leading, and outright lying at times, about what nuclear can do, will do and how much it will *not* cost.
I guarantee you here and now there will be no massive nuclear build-out over the next 40 years. Not only will it *not* happen, it *can't* happen. The economics alone scream this to anyone with half a brain and even slightly open eyes, ears and mind.
So, keep at it. Keep wasting time and energy discussing pipe dreams and puppy farts.
Cheers
Right, we can't predict or control the distant future. But nuclear waste is not a big risk compared to everything else. Nuclear power helps us preserve and enhance our civilisation. If the human civilisation crashes, nothing matters anyway.
Besides the fact that nuclear power just produces electricity and covers less than 15% of the world's electricity needs and is currently losing its market share. And besides the fact, that commercial airliners, commercial trucks and commercial ships don't run on nuclear power either:
If Belgium is - according to your definition - so much more civilized than Denmark, why does it produce more CO2/capita and has a lower GDP/capita than Denmark?
Belgium has 55.1 % nuclear power:
and 13.66 t of CO2/capita
and $47,617 GDP/capita
Denmark has 0% nuclear power and 20% wind power:
and 10.94 t of CO2/capita
and $67,387 GDP/capita
http://www.iaea.org/inisnkm/nkm/aws/eedrb/data/BE-npsh.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita
Yes, that's right, nuclear is losing market share. From 1997 to 2007, nuclear grew by only 1.1% per year, while hydro grew by 1.9%, fossil electricity by 4.3% and wind by 30%. Total generation grew by 3.5% per year.
If this trend continues, wind will surpass nuclear in 2018, with each standing at about 11%. If the "nuclear renaissance" dies off, this scenario is likely, even. But I believe that somewhere around here, if not sooner, wind growth will abate. I did this little graph from information about individual countries' wind growth in wikipedia:
Wind lovers seemed to feel that this data wasn't significant, but I think it illustrates what we will keep seeing. So, we may lose another decade, blinded by the wind power's extraordinary growth. Then growth will grind to a halt and we will wake up and realise we can't scale wind further. Then we may lose another decade while continent-wide back-bones, smart grids and storage solutions enables a few extra percentage points. Then perhaps we will find another excuse for not doing the rational thing. But eventually, I think we will see reason.
(Regarding your "civilized" argument, I don't know what you are talking about, but, as usual, you are cherry-picking irrelevant data to make flawed points.)
jeppen, Wind subsidies have a great deal to do with wind's growth. But even the subsidies cannot carry wind past the 20% penetration point. Past 20% you have to start investing in energy storage, and energy storage will bump up the price of wind substantially past the cost of conventional nuclear.
You mean subsidies like this?
Nuclear power has dominated government spending on energy research and development, accounting for over US$159 billion between 1974 and 1998. Although its share has fallen, it still accounts for 51% of the OECD energy R&D budget:
http://www.world-nuclear.org/sym/2001/fig-htm/frasf6-h.htm
Anyway, even though nuclear power is apparently so cheap, it's interesting that wind was number one last year in the US even during the nuclear supporting Bush administration - where no new reactor came online.
Maybe all the tax payer research funding, which went into nuclear were and are not enough?
Or maybe having taxpayer dependent organizations such as EURATOM and IAEA to promote nuclear power for decades are not enough?
Or having taxpayer backed loan guarantees for nuclear power are not enough?
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15545418
Or having laws forcing consumers to pay for the capital costs of new nuclear power plants in advance were not enough?
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89169837
Or having taxpayer paying for decommissioning of nuclear power plants are not enough?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/10/nuclear.nuclearpower?gusrc=r...
Or having taxpayer partially paying for depositories are not enough?
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/aug2008/2008-08-05-091.asp
Or what about bonuses?
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/utilitie...
What are you still whining about? Go ahead and build your rosy nuclear future - after all you have been getting are still getting a great deal of support from the international taxpayer.
The tragic part of all the money that the US has invested in nuclear power; it is the French that are reaping the rewards…big rewards. They build reactors in China, and England, in northern Europe, and even in the USA. They even buy into US nuclear utilities.
I wonder if this will happen to all the money being invested in wind and solar. Will the US turn a profit on the investment or will the Germens reap the rewards of the US R&D.
Are Americans foolish…well some are. Anyone can be foolish.
Actually, the French nuclear power plant manufacturer generates loss:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=aolZmT1zo2PE&refer=e...
The referenced article says that Areva is doing so much business they find it difficult to complete the Finnish reactor.
Business is so good that
The French government is weighing options for the nuclear maker, as the company needs funds to expand. Options include selling shares to the public and a merger with French turbine maker Alstom SA. Lauvergeon opposes a merger with Alstom, she has said repeatedly.
You don’t expand when business is bad.
Other than building one reactor for itself/EdF (another planned), one in Finland, two ordered in China, and various "birds in the bush" in the USA, Italy, India and UK (actual construction is not assured for any of the birds in the bush), what business is there ?
I do not see it.
MOUs are nice, but they are NOT firm orders BTW.
Alan
I think you are the one whining here. Nothing of what you claim is relevant. On a level playing field (unsubsidised or equally subsidised), nuclear is simply cheaper than wind, and unlike wind, nuclear can reach more than 20% penetration.
Besides the fact that wind power has been built without subsidies and your arrogance has nothing to do with facts, the data available clearly states the opposite:
http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy07osti/41435.pdf
http://climateprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nuclear-costs-2009...
But if nuclear is apparently so cheap, even though facts tell the opposite, why does it need:
* Taxpayer dependent R&D funding:
Nuclear power has dominated government spending on energy research and development, accounting for over US$159 billion between 1974 and 1998. Although its share has fallen, it still accounts for 51% of the OECD energy R&D budget:
http://www.world-nuclear.org/sym/2001/fig-htm/frasf6-h.htm
* Taxpayer dependent organizations such as EURATOM and IAEA.
* Taxpayer backed loan guarantees for nuclear power:
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15545418
* Having laws forcing consumers to pay for the capital costs of a new nuclear power plants in advance:
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89169837
* Taxpayer paying for decommissioning of nuclear power plants:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/10/nuclear.nuclearpower?gusrc=r...
* Taxpayer partially paying for depositories:
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/aug2008/2008-08-05-091.asp
Anyway, even though nuclear power is apparently so cheap despite depending on all this taxpayer support, it's interesting that wind was number one last year in the US even during the nuclear supporting Bush administration - where not one single new reactor came online.
http://www.awea.org/newsroom/releases/us_and_china_race_to_top_of_wind_e...
It is interesting that you are allowed to spam this thread with the same inane chatter time and time again. Do you think what you say becomes truth or even relevant if you repeat it often enough?
I thought the comment, about subsidies for nuclear, was relevant and interesting.
Well, but the picture he paints is quite false, and he repeats the same links over and over again.
Actually, as opposed to you I back up my claims with references, and don't repeat personal dreams with a rosy nuclear future with deliberate false claims as well as repeatably badmouth renewable options with deliberate false claims.
Definitely not all. Do a quick search on a remarkable microbe called Deinococcus radiodurans...
Cheaper, Better far more Scalable.
The insistence of looking to Nuclear through such rosy glasses IS 'Doomer-Panic Mode' ..
There are solid solutions far below this on the complexity scale. The number of potential and inevitable bottlenecks this puts in our path in terms of Specialized Materials and Labor, Investment and Insurance makes it far from the 'No-brainer' that the current batch of Nuclear Boosters makes it out to be.
Nuclear isn't that complex and no, unfortunately there are no "solid solutions far below this in the complexity scale". Wind and solar are mere diversions for those afraid of taking responsibility for the future.
The messianic absolutism of the nuclear proponents is disturbing to non-believers. As I sit in my passive-solar heated, wind-powered house, I read that "wind and solar are mere diversions". For me they are present day reality, and when someone denies reality in the service of any belief, I question the belief, rather than reality.
Some immerse themselves in diversions more than others. But it is still a diversion.
What is the diversion, Jeppen?
That TommyV has diverted his energy needs away from the Subscription Program that the Utility-minded are desperate that we keep ourselves suckling on? Sounds like a good diversion.