Some Cautionary Thoughts about Wind
Posted by Gail the Actuary on June 1, 2009 - 9:57am
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.
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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.
If his house is wind-powered, he either uses ordinary utility electricity and owns part of a large wind mill, in which case he ignores the variability, or he own a small wind mill and probably some big-ass lead batteries, in which case he deals with variability in a way that doesn't scale and isn't environmentally friendly at all.
That is solely and completely because you can't imagine anything other than your addiction to Big Business, Big Ag, Big Everything, thus your religion makes you blind to reality.
You can't build out nuclear in the time frames and costs needed. Period. You can keep saying it's all going to be dirt cheap, but history tells us you're full of crap.
Jeers
I can imagine other things, and that's precisely why I want BAU and more of the same! I don't have a heart of stone. I think people matter!
And history shows I'm right, if you care to look. The US could build a hundred nukes pretty fast and recent history shows us that we have come a long way since then - so it can now be build even faster and with predictable costs.
I don't have a heart of stone. I think people matter!
You've an odd, i.e. arrogant and rude, way of showing this. Also, any form of BAU is a contradiction to your statement, also. How can unsustainable ever equal not having a heart of stone or demonstrate a concern for others?
As usual, you are playing fast and loose with reality. History shows a some nukes can be done quickly and on a decent budget, but it does not show nukes can. There are reasons there are no privately funded nukes.
Because chaos is ever so predictable? Funny! (Literally.)
Cheers
Of course I'm arrogant and rude. And so are you, since you are telling me I'm arrogant and rude, which is kind of hurtful.
If some can be done quickly and on a decent budget, all can.
Yes, politics. Also, if there are any unsubsidised wind turbines out there, built by power companies, they are likely charged on the PR budget. Wind is cute, but it doesn't have the potential to replace fossil fuels. Nuclear power does, however.
Wind receives no subsidies in NZ and is being built by both public and private companies. Not charged to PR.
You're right, but NZ is a quite special. Isolated, has lots of hydro and not much else. Also perfect wind conditions. It is probably wise for them to supplement their hydro with wind, actually.
Btw, the EU has also lots of flexible power sources.
Even if interconnected wind power wouldn't provide baseload:
http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/winds/aj07_jamc.pdf
Even if wind power wouldn't produce more power during daytime:
http://www.windpower.org/en/tour/wres/variab.htm
Even if wind power wouldn't produce more power during winter time when there is less hydro and wouldn't save on water from hydro power lakes:
http://www.wind-energie.de/de/technik/netz%5Cverbundnetz/?type=97
http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssIndustryMaterialsUtilitiesNews/idUSL1...
And even if weather forecasts wouldn't exist and wind power was not predictable, the EU has still 16% flexible hydro, 22% flexible natural gas and 7% flexible fuel oil and 1% flexible biomass in its energy mix:
http://www.ewea.org/fileadmin/ewea_documents/documents/publications/stat...
The EU gets 46% of its electricity from flexible sources, so an increase of wind power in the EU will mainly reduce the consumption of the fuels (natural gas, oil and biomass) used in these power plants. Besides: The EU has many pump storage lakes which don't add up to the energy mix but increase the total power capacity of the system. And the EU can benefit from the large hydro power capacity in Non-EU countries such as Norway and Switzerland.
No, just observed.
Then, if some teachers are excellent, all teachers can be excellent. If some writers can win Pulitzers, all writers can.
This is nonsense.
Again with the arrogance.
Both produce electricity. Both (not just nuclear) *can* be built in large enough numbers to replace 100% of *some* uses of oil. Neither will be.
On the time scales we are concerned with (and I don't recall you really tackling this issue in any useful depth), i.e. less than 20 years, there is no way in flippin hell you are replacing oil with nuclear. Not just unlikely, impossible. Thousands of reactors in 20 years? You need possibly as many as 50 a month...
Good luck with that.
Cheers
"Just observed." For the umpteenth time.
You can give wind energy to every household in the US for 110 billion, and in the space of 1 - 5 years.
For 500 billion, you can have every household in the US at or near energy sufficiency, again in 1 - 5 years. Say ten just to be generous and allow for production bottlenecks on popular systems.
Nuclear cannot even come close to that. It will take 4.5 trillion and 50 years to do the same for nuclear.
You are utterly and completely full of it.
How much wind energy?
Last year wind energy provided 1.3% of U.S. electricity. Last year U.S. wind capacity grew 50%. Keep up that blistering pace for five years and assuming no increase in demand, you'd get ... 10% of U.S. electricity.
Hint: I said household. See my blog.
Cheers
You are comparing apples and oranges, my friend. Nuclear is cheaper than wind. Wind turbines can be erected faster in the really short term, but on the time frames that matter, nuclear scales faster. Also, wind doesn't really scale well at all, which this thread is all about.
No, you're just not paying attention. See my blog. Key word: build out or build-out.
CCPO
Your comments make sense,but you do not follow thru.If SOME NUKES get built on time,there are reasons the others don't.Most of them don't have anything to do with nukes per se but more to do with new tech and politics.
We pay out a couple of million in architects and engineers fees every time we build a new high school or county admin bldg,not because we need to but because we can afford to.A half dozen sets of drawings with mods made as necessary to accomodate the site would save us all huge amounts of cash.We won't standardize until we are forced into it in cars,houses,autos or nearly anything else.
When nukes are standardized as are pretty much all other heavy industrial equipment is standardized,time of construction and costs will fall dramatically.AFAICS,standardization is possible right now if the politics are toned down.
Afraid of taking responsibility into the future?
As far as we can tell,
1) there will very likely be Sunlight.
2)There will almost certainly be wind.. and
3), there will undoubtedly be undealt-with, leaking nuclear waste collections scattered about, largely unmarked- spread across the planet and dribbling into our rivers.
Who is not taking responsibility for the future?
jokuhl
Nuclear waste is remarkably leak free, but you prefer to deal in stereotypes. We can burn nuclear waste on ifrs or LFTRs, but you anti-nuclear nut cases would be horrified if we solved the nuclear waste problem, wouldn't you?
We can burn nuclear waste on ifrs or LFTRs,
Sure you can, it's only a matter of costs...
And talking about cots: The decommissioning of this nuclear plant has reached $1,400 per kW (after completing the decommission), which makes it almost as expensive as the capital costs of a new wind turbine.
http://www.secinfo.com/d11141.253.htm
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...
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.
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.
FYI
World Nuclear Association - Nuclear Power in China
Lingao phase 1 reactors are virtually replicas of adjacent Daya Bay in Guangdong province. Construction started in May 1997 and Lingao-1 started up in February 2002 entering commercial operation in May. Lingao-2 was connected to the grid about September 2002 and entered commercial operation in January 2003. The two Lingao reactors use French technology supplied by Framatome ANP, but with 30% localisation. They are now designated CPR-1000. They are reported to have cost $1800 per kilowatt.
If the Chinese can do it so can we in America; Yes We Can!
Assuming these reports are actually correct, maybe you can motivate Americans to work for the same salaries in 2009 as 30% of the Chinese did in 1997 and maybe you can get the parts and raw materials in 2009 for the same costs as the Chinese did in 1997.
Besides, in that case why should consumers pay for the capital costs of a new nuclear power plant in advance, when it can be built so cheaply?
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89169837
FYI:
China is already at 76 GW (excluding large hydro power):
http://www.unep.fr/shared/docs/publications/RE_GSR_2009_Update.pdf
And China installed 80.2% of the world's solar hot water capacity last year, while the US only installed 0.5%.
Maybe the Chinese figured that it's cheaper and quicker to heat water on ones roof than to use wasteful electric heaters in the basement powered by capital intensive nuclear power plants such as in France.
http://www.unep.fr/shared/docs/publications/RE_GSR_2009_Update.pdf
Since the world is now flat and this is the age of globalization, all the wage rates throughout the world will tend to equalize. The societies that adopt energy technology that is effective will do better; those that are backward and afraid will do worse. It’s only a matter of time.
When you use invective like this against those who disagree with you in a calm and reasoned tone, you do a dis-service to whatever cause you espouse.
'Remarkably Leak Free'
Uh huh. And 'Gullible' is no longer in the Dictionary.
Unless you mean the Marks are 'Erasable'.
Here's just one of the first on the Google hits.. and it's just how much they've admitted to so far, which is concerning enough, seeing as this is just the Royal Navy's contribution..
http://www.defencemanagement.com/news_story.asp?id=9530
Why does objecting to known poisons in the environment make me a nut? Keep trying, Charles.
Spent nuclear fuel is typically in the form of ceramic pellets that are quite non-soluble. A simple encasing, then dropping it in deep ocean would likely pose no problems. It will be covered with a thin layer of mud and then after a few hundred thousand years, under the mud will be some lead pellets. It's ok, probably even prudent, to aim for better security, but the costs shouldn't be allowed to run away like in Yucca. Final storage is quite simple, actually.
The leaks you talk about are not really worth mentioning.
Or you could not bother going to the trouble (and bad politics) of dumping it in the ocean and just seal it in a dry storage cask in a parking lot. I honestly dont know why people are so against parking lot disposal of spent fuel. Its cheap, secure, and safe. We can monitor it, and in twenty or 200 years we can decide to do something different, like process it for fission platenoids and fuel.
What I object to in the nuclear fears is the lack of sense of proportion. Orders of magnitude more die per year from coal than from nuclear. Water pollution? I've been reading about plastics pollution of the oceans. Alan Weisman's The World Without Us has an great chapter on the extent of our plastics pollution of the oceans. It is horrible. But where are the people who are worked up about it? I am. But I can find a thousand worked up about miniscule risks from nuclear for every person worked up about real pollution threats.
What really matters in terms of pollutants?
- particulates pollution.
- plastics pollution.
- assorted chemicals pollution.
- mercury pollution.
Nuclear doesn't make the list if you think rationally about it.
Thinking rationally about it starts with getting reliable information.
Chemical Pollutants and Nuclear ones BOTH have sordid histories of unclean practises and secretive responses. And Up above they're suggesting dumping it into the sea..
Frankly, we don't really know what to pin the elevated levels of cancer that are hitting our populations, young and old. We know there are carcinogens in all of the above, and the combined effects are virtually untested. But that uncertainty doesn't go to Nuclear's defense any more than it does for Coal, Phthalates, Dioxin, Cigarettes or Jetfuel.
The compounds forming in Nuclear waste are known for high level toxicity, and we've been shown a continual parade of stories of misdirected 'hot' steel and concrete, leaking reactors, subs dumping in the seas and rivers, bad valves, friable casks.. and these materials have just begun their waiting periods!!
Nuclear gets knocked off the list by people who want easy answers and don't feel any responsibility for the externalities.
I know the risks involved with nuclear power.
The simple fact is that the risks from radioactivity from nuclear power are small and contained compared to the exact same risks coming at us from other vectors.
Potassium 40 constitutes 0.012% of all potassium, has a half-life of over a billion years, and is significantly detectable in humans with a sensitive radiation detector. What ever are we going to do with this horribly contaminated supply of one of the most essential nutrients on Earth?
Have you hugged your bag of K today?
Do you have any concept of background radiation? Only 3% from man made sources, including Chernobyl and all the open-air nuclear bomb tests in the 40's and 50's.
Better living through chemistry will kill us all long before the nukes have a chance to, and many of the chemical compounds that are a danger to us are bio-stable, so they can kill people and animals again and again.
jokuhl, big deal! The 9 leaks you talk about are not even in the
United States, they do not appear to involve long term storage containers, since the one leak that received detailed mention involved the transfer of material from a British submarine. I don't think that these trivial incidents you list are making you nuts. The fact that you turn them into such a big deal says that you are nuts already.
Yes, there will be sunlight and wind, but will there be humans? I like them, you see, and I don't like them to suffer. There is a solution, an opportunity for BAU as you guys call it, and it depends on more tech, more globalisation, more wealth. Building nuclear energy is taking responsibility for this. Building wind is a diversion for those who are scared or have resigned to others being scared.
Ironically nuclear power only provides 2.1% of the world's energy needs and most humans still live quite a modern life.
http://www.stormsmith.nl/report20071013/partA.pdf
The nuclear power share in Europe went down by 33% between 1995 and 2008 and Europeans still live quite a modern life:
http://www.ewea.org/fileadmin/ewea_documents/documents/publications/stat...
But feel free to invent and build cheap nuclear power, I certainly won't stop you.
Although, personally I'd prefer if someone invented cheap rent or cheap healthcare as opposed to cheap nuclear power as the electricity costs are relatively low compared to the other living costs...
And by using nuclear for such a small fraction of our energy we are burning thru our fossil fuels reserves at a rising rate that is clearly not sustainable.
Ironically nuclear power only provides 2.1% of the world's energy needs and most humans still live quite a modern life. http://www.stormsmith.nl/report20071013/partA.pdf
Storm and Smith can't do math. Nuclear provides about 6 percent of the world's energy needs and 15 percent of its electricity needs.
Actually, insulting others may promote nuclear power (because that's what seems common among nuclear worshipers) but doesn't make your claim more credible.
In fact, Storm and Smith don't do math here but just quote data from BP (2007), which are:
Hydro production: 3040.4 TWh
Nuclear production: 2808.1 TWh
http://www.stormsmith.nl/report20071013/partA.pdf
And since according IEA hydro only covers 2.2% of world's energy needs and nuclear produces less electricity than hydro, nuclear obviously covers less than 2.2% of the world's energy needs also.
I take it you didn't even bother to read my post which explained why Storm and Smith don't know how to do math. How is it an insult when you prove they don't know how to do math?
And since according IEA hydro only covers 2.2% of world's energy needs and nuclear produces less electricity than hydro, nuclear obviously covers less than 2.2% of the world's energy needs also.
According to page 6 from the IEA, hydro provides 2.2% of the world's energy needs, nuclear is at 6.3%. If you don't understand why the numbers come out that way, read my post.
I'm confused.
The chart on page 6 is titled:
and that asterisk is:
*Excludes electricity and heat trade.
Can anyone please explain what that means?
----
Also, Page 16 shows Nuclear Production as "2,768 TWh" and "2,994 TWh" for hydro production (Page 18).
Page 24 "World Electricity Generation" also shows that hydro provides more electricity production.
The unambiguous reading of this is that hydro produced (and delivered) more electricity than nuclear.
I read your post, but I'm still in a muddle. It's not like the majority of the excess heat that nuclear drops into the rivers, lakes, oceans or air can be counted in the "world's energy needs".
(Hat tip to Gail -- this thread has become a goldmine of interesting links. Thanks!)
Coal plants are 40% efficient and gasoline engines perhaps 20% on average. But the heat contents of the fuels are what's counted anyway. Thus nuclear is calculated in the same way as coal and oil, using thermal energy.
It would be harder to calculate useful energy use, since you need to know lots of efficiencies, not just total fuel use. However, if you did such calculations, nuclear would still be 6% or more, since the energy contributions of other main sources (coal, oil, gas) will be lowered as much as nuclear or more. However, the non-thermals, hydro and wind mainly, would increase their share.
Fact is that hydro provides 2.2% of the world's energy needs and nuclear produces less electricity and thus less useful energy (energy needs) than hydro.
In fact, Storm and Smith don't do math here but just quote data from BP (2007), which are:
Hydro production: 3040.4 TWh
Nuclear production: 2808.1 TWh
http://www.stormsmith.nl/report20071013/partA.pdf
And since according IEA hydro only covers 2.2% of world's energy needs and nuclear produces less electricity than hydro, nuclear obviously covers less than 2.2% of the world's energy needs also.
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
If the public knew, that nuclear provides less than 2.2% of the world's energy needs, how can one justify the huge R&D expenditures on nuclear and how can one justify the huge governmental institutions to promote nuclear power such as EURATOM and IAEA all paid by the tax payers?
So considering this it's probably wise to claim that nuclear covers 3 times more of the world's energy needs than hydro - even if this statement is obviously false.
By the way:
www.newsweek.com/id/137501
In 2006, the global net capacity added by nuclear power was only 83 percent of that added by solar cells, 10 percent that of wind power and 3 percent that of micropower...
...nuclear expansion buys two to 10 times less climate protection per dollar, far slower than its winning competitors.
To be fair, while a lot of nuclear funding is for reactors, a lot is for weapons, and then a lot is for good science and medicine.
Ask a chemotherapy patient what they think about nuclear technology.
And for balance, ask an elderly resident of Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
There's good and bad in everything. Unfortunately, both the pro- and anti- for any particular thing are reluctant to consider this. So Charlie "my dad invented a reactor" Barton tries to tell us that radiation is good for you, Gail tries to tell us that because there's not enough power lines in Texas wind is useless, then Stuart Staniford tells us that if only we have a "global supergrid" being entirely renewable will be easy, and so on.
And of course they're all wrong, because they're all presenting just one side of the issue, picking and choosing their facts, misrepresenting other facts, and just generally being ridiculously biased.
It's only by considering all the facts with an open mind that we can decide what's good for us. What's good for us, on balance, more or less. Can't be perfect, but more or less good. To figure out that we need better articles, I think.
To be fair, while a lot of nuclear funding is for reactors, a lot is for weapons, and then a lot is for good science and medicine.
No, nuclear funding for weapons, science and medicine is not included in energy research and development.
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
If nuclear funding for weapons was included in this budget, it would be order of magnitudes higher.
If the public knew, that nuclear provides less than 2.2% of the world's energy needs, how can one justify the huge R&D expenditures on nuclear...
First, it's 6 percent not 2.2. We've already been over this and everyone else seems to understand but you.
Second, the 436 operating nuclear plants in the world AVOID about 2.5 billion metric tons of CO2 each year. This is about equal to the total CO2 emissions from the world’s gas consumption in the power generation sector (2.2 billion metric tons emitted in 2006). It's also about equal to the total CO2 emissions from the US’ fossil fuel consumption in the power generation sector (2.4 billion Mt in 2006). And it's way more than the total CO2 emissions from the OECD Europe’s fossil fuel consumption in the power generation sector (1.4 billion Mt in 2006). Source: WEO 2008. Many people believe that CO2 emissions are causing climate change (maybe even you), thus avoiding the emissions of CO2 by using nuclear plants is a pretty big justification for the R&D monies...at least in many people's opinions.
Third, let's talk about the economic benefits of a nuclear plant. A 1,000 MW nuclear plant "employs 1,400 to 1,800 people during construction (with peak employment as high as 2,400); employs 400 to 700 people long-term, at salaries typically substantially higher than the average salaries in the local area; creates economic activity that generates 400 to 700 additional jobs locally; produces approximately $430 million annually in expenditures for goods, services and labor, and through subsequent spending because of the presence of the plant and its employees; provides annual state and local tax revenue of more than $20 million, benefiting schools, roads and other state and local infrastructure; and provides annual federal tax payments of $75 million."
Those are just some of the facts on how I would justify R&D monies. Do you have something that would show how wind or solar or whatever your favorite technology is would provide greater benefits than nuclear with the R&D monies? I'm curious to see...
By the way:
www.newsweek.com/id/137501
In 2006, the global net capacity added by nuclear power was only 83 percent of that added by solar cells, 10 percent that of wind power and 3 percent that of micropower...nuclear expansion buys two to 10 times less climate protection per dollar, far slower than its winning competitors.
The author of the newsweek article, Lovins, is worse at math than Storm and Smith. We began a debate with Lovins on a study he released last year and he quit halfway through. I'd advise against referencing Lovins and Storm/Smith.
Better add me to that list of those who don't understand. The direct quote was;
Your 6% is primary energy, right? The energy that can be extracted from the nuclear fuel. I get that. But the expression "world's energy needs" is demanding that we measure somewhere further down the energy flow, closer to where the energy is 'needed', no?
I am not well enough informed to calculate those efficiency losses from the ground to end use, but it is clearly not logical to say that Nuclear provides more 'energy' to the "world's energy needs" than Hydo, when both are used mostly to generate electricity, and Hydro. Made. More.
As an aside, It also seems fair to say that Nuclear converts ~3.8% of the worlds primary energy into waste heat. That ain't bad, I've read somewhere that 88% of the energy of gasoline (Which already has losses from the ground) is wasted in moving a car.
The problem I see is by using the 'primary energy' yardstick, do we start counting the 80+ percent of the energy that hits a solar panel and is not converted to electricity as primary energy? It's lost as waste heat, just like nuclear, no? If I build a solar array with 1m^2 active area on my black roof, can I count all of the watts of heat my roof picks up as 'primary energy'? (And does it matter if Schrodinger's cat got up there?)
I really can see your point on needing to account for the efficiency losses along the way for each source of energy, but to claim "First, it's 6 percent not 2.2" is not helping make the case for nuclear.
Respectfully, Joseph Palmer
Those are just some of the facts on how I would justify R&D monies. Do you have something that would show how wind or solar or whatever your favorite technology is would provide greater benefits than nuclear with the R&D monies? I'm curious to see...
Considering the fact, that majority of R&D money has gone to nuclear research for decades and still goes and covers less of the world's energy needs than hydro which only covers 2.2% and even has tax payer institutions such as EURATOM and IAEA to promote nuclear energy and can generate revenue from their old plants, it's time for nuclear to start to learn to walk on its own feet and not to continue to receive more than half of the tax payer R&D budget for all energy research.
http://www.world-nuclear.org/sym/2001/fig-htm/frasf6-h.htm
Considering the fact that inflexible nuclear (which isn't even useful for load following) is by far not the only way to produce useful energy and that wind, biomass, PV, solar heating, small hydro, geothermal, efficiency, CSP, etc. combined grow much faster and even for less money (despite not having benefited from billions and decades of governmental R&D funding) than nuclear and can reduce CO2 emissions in less time it's a little odd, when somebody argues that the majority of the tax payer funded energy research should keep on going into nuclear and not in a more diverse pool of options which can produce more useful energy in less time and at the same time not only reduce CO2 emissions but also reduce the dependence from foreign resources.
http://www.ren21.net/pdf/RE_GSR_2009_Update.pdf
Are you also arguing that the capital costs for new plants should be paid for by the consumers?
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89169837
The author of the newsweek article, Lovins, is worse at math than Storm and Smith.
Actually insulting people doesn't make your own claims more credible. As opposed to you most people don't actually care who wrote or said what - well apart from the tabloid readers - most people are just interested in facts.
And the 3rd gentleman you insulted actually took the patience to respond to you too in detail and all without insulting you:
http://www.grist.org/article/nuclear-deterrence/
First, it's 6 percent not 2.2. We've already been over this and everyone else seems to understand but you.
Besides that others understand it the same way, it is in fact less than 2.2%:
Fact is that hydro provides 2.2% of the world's energy needs and nuclear produces less electricity and thus less useful energy (energy needs) than hydro.
In fact, Storm and Smith don't do math here but just quote data from BP (2007), which are:
Hydro production: 3040.4 TWh
Nuclear production: 2808.1 TWh
http://www.stormsmith.nl/report20071013/partA.pdf
This conversation is meaningless with you. It is clear you don't bother checking out the links I provide.
Actually insulting people doesn't make your own claims more credible. As opposed to you most people don't actually care who wrote or said what - well apart from the tabloid readers - most people are just interested in facts.
Spare me. Maybe if you actually clicked on the links I provided, you'd see a bunch of facts.
And the 3rd gentleman you insulted actually took the patience to respond to you too in detail and all without insulting you
Here's what the "3rd gentleman" said in his second response to me:
Mr. Bradish's claim ... is grossly incomplete, reflecting a primitive understanding of scale economics
I find this a bit insulting and I know others do as well. Also, if you look at the second post, the "3rd gentleman" said he'd be responding to my future posts. He didn't and we never heard from him again. I wonder what to make of that...
Considering the fact, that majority of R&D money has gone to nuclear research for decades and still goes and covers less of the world's energy needs than
Do you have a more recent graph on R&D that goes beyond 1998? I ask because the R&D dollars for nuclear are trending down starting in 1990 and renewables are trending up. I know in the US that renewables have received a slew of subsidies this decade. It might be good to argue your case with some updated facts.
Are you also arguing that the capital costs for new plants should be paid for by the consumers?
Well, if the companies are saying that "they expect it will save ratepayers collectively more than $1 billion a year" at the end of the article you provided, then why would anyone have a problem with it?
First, it's 6 percent not 2.2. We've already been over this and everyone else seems to understand but you.
Besides that others understand it the same way, it is in fact less than 2.2%:
The Energy Information Administration has nuclear at six percent (check out the table at the link: Projected International Total Primary Energy Consumption by Region and Fuel to 2030 (Reference Case)).
BP has nuclear at six percent as well (divide nuclear's primary energy supply on page 36 with the world's total energy supply on page 40).
And like I linked to earlier, IEA has nuclear at six percent. Hmmm, three independent organizations coming to the same number, or Storm and Smith who cited both BP and IEA yet came to their own number. I wonder who to believe...
Well, if the companies are saying that "they expect it will save ratepayers collectively more than $1 billion a year" at the end of the article you provided, then why would anyone have a problem with it?
The same argument can be made for any capital investment but yet renewables have to find private investors.
And since you keep on ignoring the obvious:
Fact is that hydro provides 2.2% of the world's energy needs and nuclear produces less electricity and thus less useful energy (energy needs) than hydro.
In fact, Storm and Smith don't do math here but just quote data from BP (2007), which are:
Hydro production: 3040.4 TWh
Nuclear production: 2808.1 TWh
http://www.stormsmith.nl/report20071013/partA.pdf
I really can see your point on needing to account for the efficiency losses along the way for each source of energy, but to claim "First, it's 6 percent not 2.2" is not helping make the case for nuclear.
Would you mind clarifying what you mean by not helping? Is it because the six percent is so little in the first place? I'm just being adamant about being correct with numbers, 'cause as I've tried to explain (somewhat unsuccessfully) 'anyone' is using an incorrect number to make nuclear look smaller than what it really is.
Using total primary energy numbers can be a bit confusing but I think they're worth knowing. Nuclear plants generate a tremendous amount of heat and about a third of it gets converted to useful energy (electricity). Slowly but steady, though, nuclear plants are increasing their thermal efficiencies; they're called uprates. Since 1977, US nuclear plants have increased their efficiencies to the equivalent of adding another 5,640 MW to the grid.
To me, the purpose of using total primary energy is to know how much of it gets converted to useful energies like electricity. This is important because it helps us understand how we can strive to become more efficient with our technologies, thus more useful with our resources.
RE: Not Helping.
Here's a couple of pull quotes from some of your posts in this thread.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5447#comment-507280
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it appears that you are conflating 'primary energy', and 'world's energy needs'.
The problem that I see here is that the heat losses (~66%) of nuclear are being counted against 'world energy needs' as if that extra heat was something the world really needs just now. (It's not. See Arctic Ice Cap, et.al.)
Clearly, there are energy sources (Solar, wind, hydro) which are demonstrably delivering to the 'world energy needs' which do not have these thermal losses, but that makes them look worse in the 'primary energy' column.
This has the effect in conversation of inflating nuclear's contribution to the energies that are actually delivered to the world's end use. There is a legal maxim: falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus, (false in one thing, false in all things).
You're not helping your case because it as soon as I find one 'fact' in your argument that is suspect, I begin to question them all, and the general case -- as you present it -- for nuclear is harmed.
I guess it all comes down to you being adamant about the 6% number, and I'm being adamant that 'world energy needs' does not equal 'primary energy'.
As for the reference to Storm and Smith, I have read their work, and I have read the rebuttals. The Storm and Smith papers read on the surface as more scholarly, and their points and arguments are easy to follow. They have copious outside references.
For the most part, the rebuttals have not archived that level of surface credibility, they read as shallow (One site reads like a high school science fair project), they tend to self-refer for backup and the arguments frequently leave me wondering exactly what point they have disagreement with.
That's not to say I take everything S&S writes at face value, the rebuttals have caused me to be more skeptical of their work, but the generally poor quality of the rebuttals gas not independently advanced the case for nuclear (IMHO).
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5447#comment-507400
Here's a great example of that conflation. The plain implication of this text is that nuclear provides far more of the 'worlds energy needs'.
Yes, I understand "why the numbers come out that way" It's the words I'm having trouble with. Would it not be more precise to say:
"Hydro provides 2.2% of the world's primary energy, nuclear is at 6.3%."
That's a plain, true fact. (Assuming the numbers are right ^_^; ) It's also not terribly illuminating since the details are:
a) Nuclear is used to produce electricity. (And yes, with a tiny sliver of heat used.)
b) Hydro is used to produce electricity.
c) The world produced more electricity from hydro than nuclear (2005).
I totally agree that primary energy measurement is important, and it is critical to understanding the complex world of energy flows, but there are other measurements that are equally important, and critical to making relevent energy decisions.
Respectfully yours, Joseph Palmer
Thanks for making me be more clear about the difference between saying "world's energy needs" and "primary energy." I did conflate them because I didn't think clearly enough that they could have two different meanings.
As for the reference to Storm and Smith, I have read their work, and I have read the rebuttals. The Storm and Smith papers read on the surface as more scholarly, and their points and arguments are easy to follow. They have copious outside references.
Interesting you came to this conclusion. I found their papers extremely hard to understand and follow. It's like they took everything they wanted to say and dumped it into their papers without much thought to organization...but that's just me. Have you read this study from the University of Sydney which looked critically at Storm and Smith's materials (pdf)? Page 65 has a table showing the large differences of Storm and Smith's results versus U of S's results. It's quite interesting...
I totally agree that primary energy measurement is important, and it is critical to understanding the complex world of energy flows, but there are other measurements that are equally important, and critical to making relevent energy decisions.
Totally agree. I prefer to stick with megawatts and MWh instead of Btus or MToes.
The report at http://www.isa.org.usyd.edu.au/publications/documents/ISA_Nuclear_Report... is excellent, thank you. (It's on my USB stick so I can take a long look at it later)
It's refreshing to see that they use SLS data as a source, but many cases disagree with the SLS analysis or presentation of the data. That's the way science should work.
Scanning this paper alone has done more to make me more skeptical of the Storm and Smith's analysis than the all the insults that has been tossed their way over the years in the drumbeats.
Thanks, J.
AFAIK most uprates involve burning more uranium. Slightly higher temperature and/or pressure do increase thermodynamic efficiency, but that is secondary to just running the reactor with more fission/harder.
Please note that the NRC rates the individual uprates by increased MWt (thermal energy).
For all USA uprates:
Total MWt = 16919.2
Total MWe = 5640
That is 33.33% thermodynamic efficiency for the uprates.
Alan
One overlooked fact about wind turbines.
The ones being erected today have almost zero gov't funded R&D in their lineage.
Almost all gov't R&D into wind was wasted.
The Danes came to dominate the industry with two innovations. Groups of people (say a dozen city dwellers and a farmer) could cheaply form a corporation and erect a few WTs. Over half of Danish WTs were owned by such at one time.
The Danish Gov't ran a database of performance, maintenance, etc for the ten or so manufacturers and published it, thus promoting the better WTs and punishing the not so good ones.
No massive Danish R&D.
Make of this what you will.
Alan
In addition: Denmark 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
Hydro is measured by it's electrical output, since there really is nothing else to measure. Nuclear, however, is measured by its thermal energy output, just as coal, natural gas and oil.
That's why you are wrong, again. Comparing apples to apples, nuclear does provide 6% of the world primary energy consumption.
There is no other large scale economic use for nuclear heat except electricity.
Nukes are inefficient thermodynamically. Lots of heat per MWh.
The ONLY valid measure of nuke's contribution to the world's energy supply is their electricity. Measuring thermal output just measures waste.
Hydro > nuke, and nuke does not supply 6% of the world's energy (who needs nuke waste heat ? That waste is not part of the world's energy supply).
Alan
Alan, nuclear waste heat can be used for desalinization. High temperature reactors can operate in the 50% thermal efficiency range, and new generation technologies might take that even higher. OLf course te laws of thermodynsmics prevent any technology from reaching 100% thermo efficiency.
Mythical reactors, currently supplying 0.00% of the world's energy, may get 50% thermodynamic efficiency.
Few real world nukes, supplying electricity today (from memory) get even 35% thermodynamic efficiency.
There are safety reasons to be cautious about operating nukes at higher temperatures.
I am unaware of ANY nuke, anywhere in the world, being used for desalination except for naval ship reactors.
As an aside, hydroelectric turbines commonly exceed 98% efficiency, and their generators also often exceed 98%. Water to wire efficiency (including transforming) of 95% is not unusual.
Alan
Alan it is not a myth that reactors can be coold with liquid salt, it is a demonstrated fact. Loiqid salt can be heated to 1200 C, at atmospheric pressure. High heat coupled with closed cycle gas turbines produces high levels of thermal efficiency. Edward Teller Understood this, Alan, why don't you? Of course Edward Teller was, of course a genius. You are, well you are AlanfromBigEasy, Not a genius, and not particularly well informed.
There is one liquid sodium reactor operating in the world today, (BN-600 in Russia from memory) and no liquid salt reactors.
As I stated earlier, anything endorsed by Edward Teller (or Dick Cheney) is automatically suspect. Between the two, I find Mr. Cheney has the better moral compass.
Alan
And one in Japan, but wikipedia says it's still off line: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monju
Spooky video of the walk though after the accident: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwWQLMmn0tM
Alan, so nuclear safety and AGW, both endorsed by Teller, are suspect? The guy was not always right, but he was probably right far more often than you are willing to admit.
Alan,
I want this comment addressed to you because you seem to be the most levelheaded and fair minded person commenting here right now on nuclear issues.Hope fully this strategy will cause it to be placed in the middle of this hot debate on nukes versus wind.
These comments are general in nature and not aimed at anyone in particular.
Meaningful discussion is difficult or impossible when the folks on either side keep bringing up straw men or changing the subject.A very large portion of the comments are of that sort on this occasion.
Cherry picking your data may enable you to foolJoe Six Pack or the typical voter,but it only makes you look like a bought and paid for mouth piece on a site like this one.I have a strong hunch that there is more cherry picked data right here in this comments section than any other ten typical comments sections on the OD.
When you call people names you make thier case for them.Ditto the nasty insults.
Now some business.
The anti nuke people do not seem to be willing to admit that a very large part of the costs of nukes is due to lack of a standardized design,and that once such a design is adopted,the biggest causes of cost overruns will be eliminated-mid stream change orders in specs,design work,one off manufacture of components,one off construction.
Standardized designs also enable standardized training of personell and a rapid transfer of expertise from site to site,minimizing construction time and downtime and vastly simplifying the correction of any newly discovered problems.
They do not seem to be willing to admit that anything has been learned in the last fifty years
about building safer,more dependable,easier to maintain reactors.
They do not seem to know very much about the safety record of nuclear power versus the safety record of any other energy industry,either in terms of actual deaths of workers or public health.
They seem to be as afraid of nuclear waste as my parents are of old Beelzebub himself.
Anyone who will take the time to research natural radioactivity for an evening or two ,and the pollution associated with oil and coal,will quickly realize that nuclear is benign by comparison,with the exception of high level waste-spent fuel.
Now let us run a little thought experiment.Suppose you research oil,coal,gas,and gold for awhile to learn some geology.Suppose that you learn that oil is pumped up from many thousands of feet below impermeable layers of stone that have HELD THIS OIL AND GAS TRAPPED FOR MILLIONS OF YEARS,and that nobody seems to worry much about injecting water at such depths to force the oil out,even though this water is obviously highly polluted.
Now let us JUST SUPPOSE that we could dilute and inject this high level waste in a suitable concrete slurry of some sort into such an exhausted oil field.Now just how long do you geologists with oil field expertise think it will take either plate tectonics or a volcano to bring these subsurface geological structures to the surface?
Or let us JUST SUPPOSE that we mix the wastes with glass,which decomposes veeery slowly,and bury it a few thousand feet deep in any spot ,including the forever delayed waste repository,that is dry and likely to stay that way for the forseeable future.Glass isn't very soluble,that is why you use it as containers in chemical labs.Even highly concentrated acids have very little effect on glass.
So if it does get wet ,it will leach ever so slowly,taking tens of thousands of years to dissolve even an inch of glass.
Now I believe that the oil engineers on this site will say that recovering any appreciable amounts of solids so interred in a deep well is virtually impossible-and that if it is possible ,then anyone capable of such a recovery operation is capable of worse mischief with less effort.
If that glass dissolves and some of that waste leaches,the concentration will be very low.I'm sure I wouldn't want to drink the leachate,but otoh I do believe wholeheartedly that there are many thousands of times more poisons released into our environment by our day to day use oil coal oil,lead,and other metals.
Anyone who in the present or distant future who troubles himself as an individual to disturb a high level waste depository will live long enough to regret it but not much longer.Such activity will require the use of a great deal of heavy equipment such as cranes,bulldozers,and big trucks.Therefore only tptb can engage in such activities,it cannot be done on the sly like stealing pottery fragments from a national park.
Otoh,it seems rather likely that such wastes will be recycled into useful new fuel at some not too distant time.
Meanwhile we will be experiencing volcanic eruptions,climate change,war,emerging diseases,
and maybe even invasions of little green men(just kidding,we all need to lighten up once in a while)
Common designs have common design faults (all B&W reactors went off-line after TMI#, all French N4 reactors had a common design fault that took them off-line, all UK reactors should have been taken off-line due to a common design fault, but the threat of blackouts kept them operating)
# If TMI had been a Westinghouse reactor, blackouts would likely have resulted as all Westinghouse reactors were shut down.
IMHO, the USA should build at least 4 different standardized designs, with no one type generating over 12% of all electricity in any region. So we can absorb a common design fault and not be stuck like the UK was when they discovered that common carbon steel nuts were used in their reactors, and these nuts were being weakened by radiation. Unsafe, but they could not turn them off. So they turned them down (derated).
As far as waste goes, I think that we can isolate I129 (15 million yr half life) from the biosphere, but it is not as easy as you might think.
Heavy oil is formed when the crude oil is exposed to air/water and the light fractions go away. We have lots of heavy oil. Most oil seeps out into the environment and only a small % stayed around for us to drill for it.
Best Hopes,
Alan
Sure, Alan. I dont disagree. But if we follow that chain of thought, then the world produces far less energy than the stated 15 TW, as most of the oil burned for instance is converted into waste heat in rather inefficient internal combustion engines. Same with coal in coal electric plants. We measure nuclear energy as thermal because we measure all the other energy as thermal. If we measure only work, then I would guess that nuke still supplies around 6% of worlds 'work' because so much of the other energy is thrown away as waste heat as well.
It varies.
Most of my heat comes from ventless NG room heaters; 99.9% efficient (they also add humidity, which can be good or bad).
Hot water from a tankless NG water heater, over 90% efficient (short 4.5 meter run to bathtub as well since I mounted it on the wall outside the bathroom).
Combined cycle NG plants generate electricity in the range of 60% efficiency.
OTOH, the efficiency of ICE engines is terrible.
For all steam plants, current nukes and geothermal have the lowest thermodynamic efficiency. New coal and especially combined cycle NG plants have higher efficiency.
Current stats are easy to collect, but not that useful.
SWAG is that nuke supplies about 4% of the useful energy of the world, not 6%. Note: a true SWAG :-)
Alan
Alan from the viewpoint of fighting A©W, air source heating/AC powered by nuclear is far better than natural gas, no matter what the efficiency.
Since an all nuclear grid will not happen in my lifetime (even if I live to age 90, 2043), your point has no relevance.
99.9% efficient natural gas, in a well insulated, tight home with low-E glass and heated room by room as needed, is as good as it gets# till the day when I will no longer require heating.
Alan
# I plan to add solar water heating (with NG back-up) and may get some supplemental space heating as well.
It varies.
Most of my heat comes from ventless NG room heaters; 99.9% efficient (they also add humidity, which can be good or bad).
Hot water from a tankless NG water heater, over 90% efficient (short 4.5 meter run to bathtub as well since I mounted it on the wall outside the bathroom).
Combined cycle NG plants generate electricity in the range of 60% efficiency.
OTOH, the efficiency of ICE engines is terrible.
For all steam plants, current nukes and geothermal have the lowest thermodynamic efficiency. New coal and especially combined cycle NG plants have higher efficiency.
Current stats are easy to collect, but not that useful.
SWAG is that nuke supplies about 4% of the useful energy of the world, not 6%. Note: a true SWAG :-)
Alan
It varies.
Most of my heat comes from ventless NG room heaters; 99.9% efficient (they also add humidity, which can be good or bad).
Hot water from a tankless NG water heater, over 82% efficient (short 4.5 meter run to bathtub as well since I mounted it on the wall outside the bathroom).
Combined cycle NG plants generate electricity in the range of 60% efficiency.
OTOH, the efficiency of ICE engines is terrible.
For all steam plants, current nukes and geothermal have the lowest thermodynamic efficiency. New coal and especially combined cycle NG plants have higher efficiency.
Current stats are easy to collect, but not that useful.
SWAG is that nuke supplies about 4% of the useful energy of the world, not 6%. Note: a true SWAG :-)
Alan
If you want to count only electricity from nuclear, you should count only useful energy for fossils as well, and then you get 6% for nuclear anyway. Regardless of how you count, if you do it the same way for all sources, nuclear is 6%.
But it does matter for hydro and wind share - those are in a way unfairly represented in primary energy calculations.
Actually oil, gas and wood is regularly used for heating purposes (world's energy needs) and nuclear is not (only its electricity is occasionally consumed in electric heaters and this is accounted for anyway).
Yes, fossils are sometimes used for heating, but the bulk is used for electricity generation and motion generation. Also, nuclear is sometimes used for district heating and the Russians are actively building nukes for that purpose. I would be very surprised if, on average, nuclear is used less efficiently.
Unfortunately more fossil fuels are used for heating purposes than for transportation in the US:
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/energy_in_brief/images/charts/use_by_sector_lar...
And transportation and heating combined consume more fossil fuels than the power sector.
If more heat pumps were used for heating purposes powered by electricity, this would not only reduce CO2-emissions but also leave more valuable oil for the transportation sector, where a fuel with a high energy density is of fundamental importance.
In addition, as opposed to electricity, heat can easily and cheaply be stored and heat pumps are thus very useful for load leveling purposes.
In fact this house stores solar heat produced on its roof during summer month over several month to be used in winter:
http://www.jenni.ch/picture/AktuellesBild/Baustelle51a.JPG
The heat energy is simple stored in this insulated water tank:
http://www.jenni.ch/picture/Speicher/Speichertransport8.jpg
(Assuming a temperature difference of 40C it can store approx. 10,000 kWh of heat energy. If the US had 25 Million similar tanks in residential, commercial and official buildings it could store 250,000 GWh of heat energy (one tank per 10 cars))
anyone, you are right to a certain point, but heat storage is way to expensive for financially strapped home owners, and at any rate solar home heating does not work in cloudy climates. Air source heat pumps are far more practical for converting home heating from natural gas to post-carbon electricity, and of course generation IV nuclear power would work far better than renewables in getting electricity to the heat pumps. You should not offer utopian solutions in an era of deminished expectations.
Actually the rent in that house in central Europe is lower than in many US cities and this despite the fact, that there is no heating bill.
Unfortunately, the primary energy picture is more mixed than that, and I can't draw any clear conclusions. Here is a better picture, and please read the footnotes:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/pecss_diagram.html
Heat pumps... If they are using electricity from coal, there isn't any CO2 gain, really, but you are correct it would save some oil for the Hummers out there.
The tank you present seems extreme - intuitively I don't think it is practical.
The tank is still cheaper than a Hummer and this without even consuming any oil and without generating any heating bills for decades to come and as opposed to the Hummer for several families at the time. Many houses in this region are often older than 200 years.
This tank without moving parts will most probably still be at the same place in 100 years from now and still without needing any oil to heat the house.
I doubt that many Hummers will still be operational in a 100 years from now - even if oil was still affordable.
Actually a heat pump together with an efficient coal power plant can easily generate an efficiency of over 100% (as geothermal or surrounding heat is essentially free). Besides heat pumps are also using electricity from gas, nuclear, hydro, oil, wind, biomass, CSP and PV.
I don't think operation in 100 years is very relevant in economic terms. Using a low discount of 5%, your yearly savings better be more than 5% of the investment.
This is a problem with economic discount rates, NOT with long lived useful infrastructure.
The tunnels dug by Chinese coolies for the Transcontinental railroad are still in service. I rode the Boston 1897 subway to the ASPO conference there. Grand Coulee, Hoover and Niagara will remain in service (with some improvements hopefully) for centuries yet to come.
We today benefit from all of these old investments. Even if accountants of that distant day discounted any value to us today at zero.
Best Hopes for Long Lived Energy Efficient and Energy Producing Infrastructure,
Alan
We may all be dead in the long run, but this does not mean that humanity will be !
Actually, we can't be sure whether what we build today will be very useful 30 years from now or not. Also, discount matters because if your investment can't beat the discount rate, probably something else can, and the money and effort is then more usefully invested in that.
(But if we disregard discount, nuclear beats wind even more soundly.)
This is a paradigm that I do not accept. A difference in philosophy.
Should one build a bridge cheap and reduce the upfront cost by 10% and the lifespan to 40-50 years# or build it right (few more $ today) and make it last several centuries ?
I support the "build it to last" approach, as it will benefit future generations more. Economic discount rates give a different answer.
Two similar bridges (same name even) but one built right in the early 1930s, the other build cheap just before 1940.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huey_P._Long_Bridge_(Jefferson_Parish)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huey_P._Long_Bridge_(Baton_Rouge)
Alan
The philosophy of economic discount rates is built upon an assumption of never ending growth, and what choices will speed up growth the most ?
Perhaps you can save a number of lives or do more research with the saved 10%, and then you can build two bridges in 50 years from now for the added growth from this complementary investment. "Good enough" is a quite powerful paradigm. In 40-50 years, we can always do stuff better and with less effort. Discounts help us take the future into account in a rational way. You seem to think it makes us ignore the future?
I'm not sure whether this is about philosophy or about economical insights, but I guess we might have to agree not to agree.
Perhaps you can save a number of lives or do more research with the saved 10%, and then you can build two bridges in 50 years from now for the added growth from this complementary investment.
As I noted, the endless growth paradigm. A few % today grow to cover 100+% in 40 or 50 years.
The reality is that we are having difficulty replacing the worn out Interstate highway system, and *SO* much more today. Post-Peak Oil is is likely to take more effort, more diverted consumption than to build it today.
Discounts help us take the future into account in a rational way. You seem to think it makes us ignore the future?
It depends on one's definition of rational. As we stand on the edge of the Post-Peak Oil era, building as much energy producing and energy efficient infrastructure as well built/enduring as we can, seems the best rational choice for the future.
Yes, economic discount rates make us ignore anything over 30 to 40 years in the future. If something we build lasts longer than that, it has almost no value today (net present value).
See the homes built to last just 20 years before major repairs will be required, and have fundamental flaws that will require a tear down in a half century (or less). Consumption, not capital investment.
Best Hopes for Much More Long Lived Energy Efficient and Energy Producing Infrastructure,
Alan
The new Swiss rail tunnels (15 billion Swiss francs, comparable to a half trillion $ investment by the USA) will create a flat, almost straight path between Zurich & Milan and a steeper, curvier path from Bern to Milan. Freight at 160 kph (100 mph), passengers 50% faster, up to 300 trains/day, all electrified. All very energy efficient.
The tunnels and rails, signals, switches inside the tunnels are designed for minor maintenance (1 day every 5 years, 3 days every 10 years out of service) and major maintenance every 100 years.
Likely they could have saved a couple of billion CHf by doing it cheap. And justified it with NPV calculations. Instead, they are building an enduring legacy for future generations, as past generations built for them.
I don't feel discount is that much about endless growth. It think of it more as the "externality" that an investment introduces by pushing other investments off the table (or forward in time). Also it puts a price on the risk that an investment goes bad some time in the future. However much you invest in making the stuff you build last forever, you might have forgotten something and it will break anyway, or it simply become obsolete for some other reason. Discounts won't disappear if we assume zero growth. There will still be risks, and there will still be returns on investments.
The only reason you'd be having more difficulty today is that you are making a bigger effort now, precisely because of the high demands you advocate. Otherwise it makes no sense - you are without a doubt more powerful now.
Private homes ARE liabilities and consumption, not assets or investments.
Then perhaps they made the wrong call. If the economists don't approve, chances are that future generations would have been better served by an alternate investment.
I don't think operation in 100 years is very relevant in economic terms.
I see, but operation in 60 years is very relevant in economic terms. Especially if this 60 year old investment depends on depleting natural resources...
Nuclear in the USA is too little, too late to be more than a nice supplement to what wind can do in the next dozen years.
Perhaps in the 2030s, worn out WTs will be replaced by new nukes.
Best Hopes for a Rush to Wind and an economical build out of new nukes,
Alan
I'd hope that we start replacing worn out coal plants before wind turbines.
Yes, but a ramp up of 6 + WB2 by 2020 could set up a strong nuke building rate in the 2020s. Coupled with conservation & efficiency, nukes + WTs would mean that coal could be largely displaced# by, say, 2032. Just in time to replace some retiring WTs.
# I expect coal and/or NG plants to be mothballed for 10 months/year but brought on-line for a/c demand. Insulation, reduced leaks & higher efficiency a/c will reduce that seasonal demand.
Best Hopes for MANY nukes in the 2020s,
Alan
In the U.S of A. we currently get 20% of our electricity from nuclear power...Then of course, there's the French...HOW much of their electricity comes from nukes????
As far as the EU is concerned the nuclear contribution went down from 24% in 1995 to 16% in 2008:
http://www.ewea.org/fileadmin/ewea_documents/documents/publications/stat...
With duty cycles equalized one Nuke = 10,000 windmills. To replace our 104 Nukes with windmills it will take 1,000,000 windmills. A windmill lasts for 20 years, a nuke 60 years, so that is 3,000,000 wind mills just to get to where we are now.
Chu likes wind, Chu likes consevation. With wind power, consevation is a good way to go. I hope your children like the village life. I know children don't like to conserve; ask them to give up their cell phone. In is 60 years we will all be dead and our children will be pissed.
A few points...
a) The moving parts of a nuke plant - valves, generators, etc. require ongoing maintenance, there is an ongoing cost.
b) It's a common meme here that nuke plants can produce at a high percentage of nameplate for 60 years, but that has yet to be proved.
c) The foundations, mast and interconnect infrastructure of windmills does not have to be replaced every 20 years, and are likely to last well beyond 20 years. (The Golden Gate Bridge is +70 years for example and is not scheduled for replacement)
d) Energy consumption does not equal quality of life.
e) I've been to Europe, where people live very rich lives on far less energy per capita.
f) Are we really all that happy with the US society we've built? Are we living better lives?
What happened when the Russians shut off the gas to Europe? Those Europeans liked nuclear a lot more.
We have started down the road to “The New American Poverty”. I hope you like what we are getting because more is on the way.
Did they?
So why did the nuclear power share go down in the EU by 33% between 1995 and 2008?
http://www.ewea.org/fileadmin/ewea_documents/documents/publications/stat...
14 new nukes are going up and more to come. After Germany and Italy kick coal for Nuclear, things will be even better for nuclear. Then there is England, lots of new plants there. Soon Europe will lead the world in new nuclear.
In Germany's case, that heavily depends on the outcome of the elections in the fall. Ironic that if the Greens loose some power, CO2 emissions will rise more slowly or even fall.
To replace our 104 Nukes with windmills it will take 1,000,000 windmills.
Wrong:
In 2007 the 104 US nuclear power reactors generated 806,500 GWh
New wind power in the US is exceeding capacity factors of 35%:
http://www.windpoweringamerica.gov/ne_economics_cost.asp
With a new 3 MW wind turbine at 35% capacity factor
http://www.vestas.com/en/wind-power-solutions/wind-turbines/3.0-mw.aspx
you need 0.088 Million wind turbines to generate the same amount of electricity.
In other words: per wind turbine you end up with 2863 cars.
(The US has 251 Million passenger vehicles:)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passenger_vehicles_in_the_United_States#Tot...
I know children don't like to conserve; ask them to give up their cell phone.
A cell phone consumes about 0.03 W on average. So with one single 3 MW wind turbine you can run 35 Million cell phones at a capacity factor of 35%.
Not that your comment actually had anything to do with anything I wrote. I think the point is simply that a single nuclear plant produces about 1,000 times as much energy as a single wind turbine and for 3 times as long. When you can arrange the financing and regulatory system to be accomidating, they are a much better bet than wind turbines.
This isn't allways or even often the case, which is why wind has a 25% growth rate over the past decade. It will run into serious infrastructure problems one it starts pushing up against dispatchable power systems of course, as Denmark and even France shows us.
Actual facts show this picture:
http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/5354
http://www.claverton-energy.com/is-wind-power-reliable-an-authoritative-...
This technically numerate, evidence based article, shows that wind does not need any extra back up when it is not windy, due to the blindingly obvious fact that the existing power stations can simply be started - no new ones have to be built. Why this obvious fact escapes other commentators remains a mystery.
Millborrow shows that the extra costs of spinning reserve to cope with the greater variability of wind power is around a mere £7.6/MWh, with 40% wind and no capacity credit, or £5.8/MWh without. ie 0.76p/kWh - 0.58p/kWh.)
The letter writers seemed unconcerned (or unaware) that there was also a shortage of nuclear output during the cold snap. In early January, only about 50% of nuclear capacity was online. 5000 MW was “missing” — but the electricity system continued to do its job.
Btw, the same happened in Switzerland: A nuclear power plant which provides 15% of the countries electricity failed to produce one single kWh for 6 month (ironically at about the same time this nuclear power operator was running ad campaigns, basically claiming that if Switzerland (60% hydro !) were to invest in new renewable power plants, the lights would go out.)
Interesting also, Switzerland has basically no wind power and the amount of electricity dispatched through Switzerland almost matches the entire countries electricity consumption and this has been the case since France established its huge nuclear power share.
Also, interconnected wind farms provide baseload:
http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/winds/aj07_jamc.pdf
and Wind power typically produces more power during daytime (when demand is higher):
http://www.windpower.org/en/tour/wres/variab.htm
There's more wind power during winter time when there is less hydro and wouldn't save on water from hydro power lakes:
http://www.wind-energie.de/de/technik/netz%5Cverbundnetz/?type=97
http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssIndustryMaterialsUtilitiesNews/idUSL1...
The EU gets 46% of its electricity from flexible sources, so an increase of wind power in the EU will mainly reduce the consumption of the fuels (natural gas, oil and biomass) used in these power plants. Besides: The EU has many pump storage lakes which don't add up to the energy mix but increase the total power capacity of the system. And the EU can benefit from the large hydro power capacity in Non-EU countries such as Norway and Switzerland.
Good post Alan. Let's not forget CSP and HVDC transmission lines too.
Seconded.
The main post just made me shake my head in dismay - it is full of "data" that is either wrong or selectively spun to put wind in the worst possible light.
Wind is the fastest growing source of energy out there - in Spain and Denmark it provides a very large proportion of total electricity generation on may days. There is no reason wind cannot economically provide around 30% of our (global) energy needs in the long term - maybe more if people are willing to expand the electricity grids and embed more storage into them.
I'd recommend reading Jerome's most recent post on wind once again :
http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/5354
Yes, Jerome's post is an excellent one and from a developer's/financing standpoint which makes it even better. I am using it to try to encourage our legislators and business leaders here in Michigan to give more consideration to Feed In Tariffs which will be a huge help with project financing, especially for smaller distributed renewable projects.
What did Matt Simmons suggest in his latest slide-show? That world population is out of control? Yes or no?
I get the impression many are still thinking "short term" (forty or fifty years out). I'll still be around then, hopefully, but I'm not really thinking about myself (I don't mean to suggest that others at TOD are, though some may be). I visit here purely because of my kids, crossing fingers the oncoming light has hope for them.
No doubt we'll inevitably have to begin powering down at some point, probably in a forced way. No problems there. My concern is how all this you-beaut new infrastructure - wind and solar are the only options on the table, right? - will be REPLACED in fifty or sixty years, when the recoverable crude has all gone. What's going to power the steel mills and all those diggers? Bang for buck, right? Nett return...
Can "renewables" honesty feed ten billion people in the long term? What about fifteen billion?
The scales are out of whack and we need to start there. Of course, this is the trickiest part of the problem.
Regards, Matt B
The wind turbines will. That's what in excess of 10-fold net energy return on investment implies. More to the point will be the material inputs, but in 50 years time, if energy is valuable enough for this to be a worry, then it will be valuable enough to mine the stockpile of waste left behind by the Kamikaze Century.
Kamikaze translates as "Divine Wind", so that label would best be applied to the hypothetical next century than the previous one.
I get the same feeling-- that data were selected almost intentionally to make wind look bad. While Gail raises some very good concerns, it seems the analysis overall takes the most pessimistic option from each range of possibilities and uncertainties. This is probably not intentional-- but it does fit well with the overall approach on this blog, which is to warn people that their assumptions of a bright future may not pan out.
I appreciate this approach, as long as we all take it with a grain of salt. It is the opposite extreme of the happy shiny green technological future that some portray.
Wind power is vital in my way of thinking. Eventually, in the long run, fossil fuels will not be around. If we haven't mastered fusion by then, we'll only have wind and other renewables which are likely more expensive to some degree than the cheap fuels we've gotten used to. In the short-to-medium term, things may be chaotic. The economy may make the price of fossil fuels go way up, or it may get bad enough that they fall for an extended period.
Also I take issue with the idea that just because we don't usually use the most electricity at the same time that wind produces it, that wind is not worthwhile. This assumes that business must continue as usual.
I have lived over a decade in a third-world country that got much of its electricity from hydroelectric dams. At first they were a net exporter of electricity, but within a few years there were severe shortages. It got to the point that they would shut off electricity at different times of the day, in different districts of the country or city. The schedule was published in the paper, and people learned to work around it.
My point is, that should fossil fuels get scarce enough, it's worthwhile having wind power installed, no matter what time it blows. People are more flexible and adaptable than they look, and having electricity at night is better than not having any at all.
In the meantime, they do stretch the supply of fossil fuels, and hopefully in the long run, lessen their use and impact on the climate. To me that is well worth the extra cost if there is indeed such a drastic cost spread.
Finally, with electric cars now looking more and more like a certainty, the daily usage pattern for electricity will likely shift strongly in favor of wind.
scientastic wrote
Not true. I have performed similar analyses based on case studies of wind in Texas, California, and the UK. I varied assumptions, and gave projected wind costs the benefit of the doubt even when a good case for not doing so existed. Always the result was the same. The unsubsidized cost of windmills exceeded the cost of nuclear generation facilities per kW of electrical output.
http://nucleargreen.blogspot.com/2008/10/california-green-premium-for.html
http://nucleargreen.blogspot.com/2008/10/on-cost-of-wind-reliability.html
http://nucleargreen.blogspot.com/2009/02/texas-wind-not-competitive-with...
http://nucleargreen.blogspot.com/2009/02/texas-wind-still-more-expensive...
http://nucleargreen.blogspot.com/2008/10/wind-cost-data-from-carbon-trus...
It is far more rational then to turn to nuclear power when we stop using fossil fuels, and to invest in low cost Generation iV technologies.
Tell that to the Finns.
The lesson from the Finns is that incompetence is expensive, but the Chinese seem to know what they are doing and are keeping reactor costs at or below $1.75 per nameplate watt.
OK... stop saying that. It's completely bogus. Plop that same plant down in the US and costs skyrocket. You know this. So, if you want to be honest about it, calculate the cost *here* and stop misleading people that China and the US are carbon copies of each other.
Cheers
Ironically China does have 10 times more solar heating capacity than nuclear power:
www.ren21.net/pdf/RE2007_Global_Status_Report.pdf
Even though solar heating as opposed to nuclear power is not subsidized in China.
(It's cheaper to heat water on a roof than to use wasteful electric heaters such as in France to partially deal with the inflexibility of nuclear power plants. Well at least the pump storage lakes in the Alps can benefit from the zero or negative electricity prices caused by the excess nuclear power in France).
In addition, China installed 6.3 GW of wind power in 2008 (6.3 GW in one single year) and intends to double this number during this year again:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/03/wind-power-eu
Will you guys stop shouting back and forth about your guesses/wishes/hopes for the cost of new nuclear in N America when Ontario decided which bid to accept for the next generation of nuclear plants in Ontario? (scheduled end of June, likely delayed for verification / not public until a little later) Sheeh.
The French and Japanese can also build on time and on budget. I suspect you could too, but I'm not sure. As someone said, incompetence is expensive.
The best at "on time / on budget" are Canadians (AECL). See Quinshan reactor pair, 46 to 52 months first dig to fisrt criticality.
http://www.cns-snc.ca/history/qinshan%20startup.jpg Qunishan Startup Picture
http://www.cna.ca/english/pdf/Newsletters/2004/NC0517.pdf Nuclear Canada Canadian Nuclear Association Electronic Newsletter VOLUME V MAY 14, 2004 NUMBER 17
"Mr. Policyn said AECL anticipates having standardized piping, valves and components throughout the plant, not just the nuclear reactor, to simplify spare parts and inventories. He indicated that the first unit would cost $1255 U.S./kW and a final cost of $1055 to $1075/kW for follow-on units. The first unit would take 44 months to build, with subsequent units taking 36 months to complete. Mr. Policyn said AECL would offer fixed price contracts to prospective buyers, based on the company's success in delivering projects on or ahead of schedule with its CANDU 6 program in China, Romania and South Korea."
Wrong, the currently constucted reactor in Olkiluoto Finland is designed by the French company Areva and built by a consortium of Areva and Siemens. The construction is 50% over budget both in time and money.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Finland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Areva
This is actually no surprise as extremely big constructions almost always fail to keep within those limits. Cost expectations are also often judged too low on purpose just to get the assignment. If Areva would have said upfront: "well, realistically, the construction will need twice time and budget" then it's very possible the plant wouldn't have been built.
Finnish red tape and the fact that the reactor was the first of its design bears some of the blame here.
Guys, seriously, isn't it more productive to look at successes than at failures? Or are you saying that we cannot repeat the successes reliably enough? In that case, I have to disagree - humanity has come this far because we can. Say after me: Yes we can!
Much more is to be learned from failures than successes.
Alan
I would suggest the EPR experience in Finland was very educational for Areva, and rather successful for the EPR design on the whole considering how far behind schedule and overbudget they didn't go in a foreign regulatory environment with a first of its type reactor. And the rather good schedule of the second EPR in France seems to indicate they did learn quite a bit from that effort, which gives me quite a bit of optimism for the future of the EPR globally.
Yes, but what you have "learned" seems more like trauma. That's bad learning that hinders rational action.
ccpo, there is something to be learned from the Chinese example. A key to controling nuclear costs is controling labor costs. The Chinese do that by paying workers little. In the United States we use factory automation to achieve high levels of Labor productivity. So mass production of reactors in factories would do the trick, and it is possible to so that. We match the Chinese by doing things we do best.
Fair enough. And jobs are needed. But what's the differential between Chinese and American workers? Huge. And that's throughout the supply chain. Savings, perhaps, but I'd like to see the analysis 'cause i don't think it's going to be overly significant.
Besides, the US will never build nukes that way.
Cheers
ccpo wrote
Why not, both the South Africans and the Chinese plan to. Are you saying that we Americans cannot do the things that the South Africans and the Chinese can?
I can think of a LOT of things that they do that the USA would not. Safety is one of the deltas. Compare Chinese food safety to US food safety and then think Chinese nuclear safety vs. US nuclear safety.
Alan
Same frigging designs and parts. If I'd take a guess, I'd guess the Chinese are more disciplined and less Homeresque than you guys.
Just don't check the welds, or if they are "checked", never fail them.
I talked to a vendor about the 3 Gorges hydroturbines (MAJOR project, high profile). I asked, given the delta in head during the year, why the Chinese did not install variable Hz generators and get several % more power out of 3 Gorges. (Variable Hz allows a turbine optimized for, say 100 m head to operate at the same efficiency with a 50 m head by simply slowing down; 50 Hz to 35 Hz from memory).
They recommended variable Hz to the Chinese but were told that the Chinese feared that their operators could not deal with something that sophisticated. So they went with standard turbines & generators.
Also, as part of the deal (technology transfer) about half of the turbines (same design) were to be made in China. Same design as EU turbines but the Chinese versions are more problematic.
So I would not like to live close to a Chinese nuke.
Alan
Alan are you really so brave that you would live close to an American Nuk? Actually the AP-1000's have so many back up safety features, that evwn if there was a core meltdown and a core containment failure, you would still be safe living next door.
I am quite sanguine about living next to a new US nuke, as long as it was elevated enough to make storm surge a non-issue. EPR, AP-1000, CANDU, etc.
Alan
You don't strike me as stupid. I'm curious, what causes you to pretend will never = cannot?
But to answer you anyway, under present conditions the US CANNOT provide highly skilled labor at the same costs as the Chinese. That may be rapidly changing. Don't know the labor market in SA - assuming that is "the things" you referred to. Perhaps you meant make mandoo...
Cheers
I think Gail's post encourages critical thinking rather than boosterism. We have too much boosterism. We need more reality, warts and all.
I fail to see how Gail's post is misleading. If she paired it up nuclear or natural gas hagiography then I could see your point. But she's just trying to bring people back down to Earth. Wind isn't perfect. It has problems. All energy sources do.
Its kind of a waste of time while there's stranded natural gas.
I disagree if the stranded wind is in a politically stable area, with a skilled workforce, infrastructure, etc. and a dozen miles from the end use market and the stranded NG is in Nigeria.
Food security is important to me as well. Iowa wind > Iowa ammonia > Iowa corn (and soybeans, sunflowers, etc.) > tortillas, cornbread, etc. is cycle that gives me some comfort.
Best Hopes for more wind power,
Alan
Sure, but there's just so much natural gas thats stranded that an investment in a stranded gas ammonia plant is going to be a far better return on investment than a stranded wind plant. That saves more money that can be invested in wind that actually provides electricity.
I just dont see stranded wind playing any sort of role in the next century. The comparative ROI wont ever be competitive.
Grand Inga, if built, would be 40 GW of almost run-of-the-river hydro. Basically constant for about 50.5 weeks/year.
Much of Africa could be powered by Grand Inga, but there will be surplus power (time of day, etc.). Plans call for electricity > ammonia with the surplus power.
Likewise, I can see not building transmission = to 100% of wind nameplate. Find a sink for that occasional surplus power. Ammonia seems to be a good choice (being within sight of the end user helps).
Alan
Alan, there is no surplus power. Not now, not after the project is complete. It's all used. Dams and windmills - yes, windmills - merely divert the existing power to a destination seemingly more suitable to immediate human use. "Seemingly" and "immediate" so one might contrast the dollar output of a dam with the loss of a productive species - those damn atlantic salmon I keep bringing up.
There is no surplus power. Gaia - the web of life - uses it all. What we tap directly destroys the ground on which we stand.
You wrote "Much of Africa could be powered by Grand Inga." I think that is off by at least two orders of magnitude. More likely three. No, we don't get to ignore nature. Nor am I bringing up an issue that might be important 200 years from now; it's now.
cfm, living on the surplus fat.
This is monstrously ignorant of how thermodynamics actually work, and even how ecology works. Its pseudoscience with a religious spice added.
"Much of Africa could be powered by Grand Inga." [quoting me] I think that is off by at least two orders of magnitude. More likely three.
from the CIA Factbook, electrical consumption for two of the largest consumers and a "mid-range" African nation
Nigeria - 15.85 billion kWh
South Africa - 241.4 billion kWh
Cameroon - 3.323 billion kWh
and the average annual estimated production of
Grand Inga - 340 billion kWh
Add existing and under construction hydroelectric and add some geothermal along the African Rift Valley and Africa could be 90+% renewable energy.
Alan
Until they want something like western living standards, of course.
Irrelevant. They will never have them. Energy is not the only limit we face. The West won't have Western living standards, let alone all of Africa.
Yes they will, and yes we will.
You are only talking about electrical power too, Alan. Sorry, I should have made that clear. Take something like Aswan dam for example, I'm thinking about the power that drove the agricultural cycle - gone. The share of "bioproduction" we humans take is very large; we're past the point where we can dam rivers without seriously considering the consequences.
cfm in Gray, ME
Grand Inga would be close to a "run-of-the-river" scheme (like Niagara Falls, where we extract 4+ GW).
The Congo falls have eroded into massive rapids. The river would be redirected to a nearby valley and several dozen km2 would be flooded (about as much land taken/GW as many existing nukes take) and the water would bypass the rapids.
Alan
Ammonia production is a terrible thing to do with electricity when you have natural gas anywhere. If you have surplus power, aluminium refineries will open up pretty fast to help you dispose of it.
exactly--when will tod people accept the fact that we have HUGE natural gas reserves in the world and that co2 sequestration is a more sensible near-term solution than renewables... WHY DONT PEOPLE acknowledge nat gas???
Because CO2 sequestration is a PR tool that will never be used beyond a demonstration plant. Natural gas is the prefered solution to the problem of producing chemicals that require hydrogen, not for power production.
Thats true if the power is available 24/7. What is it is only available 20% of the time? Can it be economic to build industrial infrastructure to use it then?
Yes, the demand management problem. Ammonia production is still on the bottom of the list since its essentially hydrogen electrolysis and will allways be at the bottom of the list when you can get it from natural gas more cheaply.
But copper refining would be something you could do, as its an aqueous process that doesn't freeze when the power gets shut off. The bigger problem of industrial demand management is setting up real-time pricing infrastructure for large customers and letting the market pick winners. I suspect the first big winner would be ice-making air conditioners for large buildings, and water pumps based on electricity costs.
The most likely consumer would be some neighbors that happened to have public policy so paralyzed that they only have dispatchable natural gas turbines for 'baseload' like say, Italy.
Electrolytic copper refining, the last step of the solvent extraction/electrowinning (SX/EW) method of heap leaching, is always done at the mine. Pure copper metal only is shipped, to minimize shipping costs. AFAIK, the process is normally not interrupted (runs 24 hours/day), in order to maximize return on investment (i.e., it's not economic to leave very expensive capital equipment just sitting there, not paying its way). Furthermore, I suspect that electrodes would corrode and salts would crystallize and gum up the works via electrical shorts if you tried to run the refinery from intermittent wind power. Ice making air conditioning strikes me as a far better use.
I understand that, but I was only contrasting to aluminium electrorefining in molten cryolite, where shutting down the cell is impossible. By contrast, its possible in principle to do demand management with copper refining.
And one might imagine that if power was free, but you never got to pick when, someone might run the numbers on capital vs marginal costs in copper electrorefineries to figure out how to find a sweet spot for running at partial power.
Demand management is a job that belongs to 1) air conditioning and refrigeration, as above plus icewalls between freezer and 'fridge cabinets in home appliances 2) electric personal transport (PHEV/EV autos). Exhaust those resources first, then MAYBE start looking about. BTW, Texas has just introduced mandated "smart grid" rules which mandate 15 minute interval communicating meters with data / control feed-forward into customer sites and bi-directional communication to central. Will fully enable 1) and 2)
Especially if the wind/transmission regio has multiple wind farms, the percentage of time when there is >100% isn't all that large. But, if wind gets really cheap, then it pays to overbuild it, and sell the stranded surplus at fire sale prices to whomever can make use of it. Yet another use for stranded time varying surplus could be oil lifting cost -for low EROI wells. You'd think TODers would be all over that one....
Sorry. What does this mean?
a)electricity from natural gas that is wasted for some reason?
b)natural gas that is wasted for some reason?
c)plants that generate electricity from natural gas that are wasted for some reason?
d)other.
Both b and d. Its natural gas thats too far from market to economically recover as natural gas because of transport costs. Its the stuff thats flared off of huge oil wells in the mideast and the resources that are cheap to tap but expensive to transport. Some companies have attempted to capitalize on stranded natural gas by having in-place gas liquefaction schemes. An in-place ammonia production scheme would be similar.
Stranded wind might have uses, but as long as stranded gas exists I doubt chemical production based on hydrogen production will be among them.
re: stranded gas.
Is this term well entrenched already? It seems slanted. "Stranded" has the association of a problem - being stranded on a highway, and so on. All sorts of potential "resources" are too costly to use. One can image stranded hydro, or stranded petroleum, or stranded wood. It is endless...
Is this term well entrenched already?
It seems to be. I sure didn't invent it.
Wrong questions are inevitable when one decides the conclusion before examining the facts.
If the wind generated power on the market had cost more than others, she would take that as a sign that wind was bad - "it's too expensive!" That it's cheaper and sometimes people even are paid to take it is likewise taken as a sign that wind is bad.
Just imagine the endless screams of joy from pro-nuclear people if the nuclear power was sometimes under the market rate, or people would even be paid to take it away. "See! Too cheap to meter!"
So whether it's cheap or expensive, wind will be considered bad.
The conclusion of most of her writing is simply that only fossil fuels are good, and those are running short so we're doomed. She begins with that conclusion and views every fact in that light.
Thus, a local problem with wind - as you point out, not enough grid capacity to make use of it - is made out to be a problem with wind itself. Which is rather like saying that because I took the wheels off my car the engine is no good.
Uh... what?
Nuclear is OFTEN sold at zero or negative prices here in Ontario, in fact almost every off-peak hour. Average wholesale market price total is $0.036/kwh.
http://www.theimo.com/ Ontario Independent Electricity System Operator - IESO
I wish to thank Gail for this post – I’ve been unable to stop reading this thread! I don’t have the technical expertise of many of the commenters, so I’m learning a lot about this critical issue. However, I find some of the tone directed towards Gail to be annoying and distracting – right or wrong on the details, she has really struck a nerve with this post.
Regarding the “right question”, I’m sure many of us can (and some have) raise larger issues – but, focusing on wind is very important. As Gail has mentioned, if wind is to be a useful energy component in the future, we need to get it right – all the parts and pieces, not just a subsidy for a turbine itself.
My takeaway from this tread is that wind really is a viable part of our future energy mix if we take a rational approach to developing and funding a comprehensive energy plan. Gail as expressed skepticism that this will actually happen – I can only hope for a more optimistic outcome.
Back to the “right question” – the undeniable fact is that only humans are depleting fossil fuels and contributing to GW. Even the herds of millions of Buffalos did not expel enough methane to affect the climate. The true “right question” is how to reduce the human global population from 6.7 billion to about 2 billion in a humane and peaceful manner. The solution is to debunk religious belief that humans have a special relationship with some mythical god who rewards reproduction and then proceed to support family planning as the nation’s and world’s highest priority – I can assure you this will not happen. So, looking at wind is a good second choice.
I have heard recently that the fertility rate in Iran has collapsed at an unprecedented rate. If this can happen in a religious state -as well of the more humanistic societies like Europe and Japan, I think there is at least some minor cause for hope.
I'm being pedantic here and not necissarily disagreeing, but one might want to remember that Iran is far more modern and culturally cosmopolitan of a nation than say, Pakistan or Saudi Arabia. We get a warped image of Iran in the west because the revolution was so bloody and poor relations ever since.
I agree with what Dezakin said.
Iran's fertility drop is due to its pro-contraception policies and gov't provided family planning. Most of the countries you consider "humanistic" could probably learn something from them, actually.
Enemy,
I used to think that the population problem would take care of itself eventually as the world grew more prosperous,as it has in Western Europe.
Unfortunately,it looks as if the rabbits are going to outrun the dollars,at least in the third world.
From my perspective,it appears to be almost inevitable that there will be widespread starvation in the third world,and maybe in some better developed countries as well if ff prices continue to rise for the next couple of decades at any where near the rates of the last few decades.
The only way I can see to avoid this all to likely (imo) outcome is that the more powerful and prosperous countries would have to cut thier own fuel use quite a bit at a time when things will also be tough at home in order to bail them out.
Maybe we will make the sacrifice.
Maybe they can squeeze enough money out of thier already low standards of living to pay for the fuel and fertilizer they simply must have.
It does not appear at all likely that ag tech can evolve fast enough to save the day.
Sooner or later Malthus's last laugh will roll thru the future history books, at the global scale as it has so many times already at the local and regional scale.
Reducing meat consumption will help, as well as reducing total calories (see obesity rates). At a minimum, several more decades with those two steps. Reclaiming parts of Suburbia for orchards, etc. will have some impact.
Not a long term solution,
Alan
Alan price is relevant, since there are significant social and economical benefits from low cost electricity. Economies that have access to low cost electricity have advantages to economies that rely on high priced electricity. High price electricity may mean that the poor are unable to afford electrical services. Low cost electricity is thus very desirable. If the producers cost of non-dispatchable wind is higher than the producers cost for nuclear power, then wind quickly looses the competition. There would not be a market for wind were it not for government subsidies on the building of windmills, and the production of wind generated electricity.
The cost of wind generated electricity is more expensive than the cost of nuclear generated electricity, and the addition of pumped storage and other seneregy or electrical storage systems only adds to nuclear's advantage. The cost of new and expensive transmission lines, designed to serve remote wind generators only serve to increase the cost advantage of nuclear generated electricity.
The use of wood generation facilities to back up wind, has its own CO2 penalty, adds the air pollution problem from woodsmoke, and like all biofuel solutions leads to soil depletion. What we have is again incontrovertible evidence of the extent to which so called "green" environmentalists are willing to sacrifice environmental values, in their utterly insane war on nuclear power.
We don't need to practice energy conservation with nuclear power. Nuclear power, and indeed the uranium or thorium nuclear fuel cycles can be operated without fossil fuel input.
Finally you argue that the benefits of investing in wind now when energy is cheap will be repaid when energy is expensive and the wind generators are paid for. In fact wind generators have to be replaced every 16 to 20 years, so that the investment made when energy is cheap simply has to be repeated when energy is expensive. In contrasts new reactors are expected to last 60 to 80 years. IOf the investment is made now in the development of low cost Generation IV nuclear technology, the cost of electricity will be no more expensive in the future than it is in now. Thus the choice to subsidize wind generation now at the expense of developing future low cost nuclear technology, will coust our national economy greatly in the future.
Charles,
If you are going to talk about new nuclear reactors expected life-times then also include cost of new reactor electricity and compare this to new wind turbines not those built 20 years ago. Considerable advances have been made in nuclear and wind turbine designs.
The facts are that nuclear construction is slow to increase to the levels needed in next 20 years, even in China, only 12 GW is expected to come on line between 2004 when the present expansion was announced and 2012.
The maximum completion rate in the US was about 10GW per year for a few years in mid 1970's and again in mid 1980's.
In comparison wind energy can be expanded rapidly, China added 6GW of capacity in 2008( 100% increase over 2007) and US added 8GW(50% increase on 2007 capacity). A few more years of growth like this and wind would be adding 10GW average per year in US. China plans to have wind and nuclear both providing 5% of electricity by 2020. Meanwhile we do not expect more than 10GW of new nuclear to be added in next 10 years in the US, providing all existing reactors continue to operate. Possibly after 2020 nuclear can really make a significant contribution especially Molten LiF reactors, but at least for the next 10-20 years wind and perhaps solar energy is going to have to do the heavy lifting if we are to replace CO2 polluting coal fired electricity.
The nuclear industry is saddled with some expensive reactors under construction, long delays and some very expensive past mistakes, as well as some good examples showing what can be done. To claim that new nuclear power is going to provide peak power ignores the reality that the major cost of nuclear is the considerable capital cost, so they are going to be running flat out barring any shut downs for repairs. CSP solar energy has the best hope of load following next to NG peaking plants and hydro electricity
The US use about 500 GW electricity, so 10 GW per year is an adequate rate, assuming each reactor operates for 50 years.
But those 8 GW are are not worth much more than 2 GW nuclear. Nuclear is faster to build since it is cheaper. You only have so much money for investments.
I find it hard to believe that it is cheaper to build new nuclear generation than new wind generation. Construction of a wind tower seems straight-forward. Construction of a nuclear power plant requires all kinds of documentation on the provenance of all the pipes, hangers, concrete, with very specific testing requirements, and paperwork maintenance - as reflected by the impact of a nuclear failure -endanger thousands downwind- as opposed to the impact of a wind failure -kill one deer, two squirrels, and a hawk - not to be too flip about injury to wild animals.
In addition, having a wolfpack of smaller generation units gives a flexibility of operation that having one elephant generator does not have, a la mainframe vs servers.
Maybe we could connect/disconnect wind turbines from the grid to simulate peaking generation.
I understand that the comparisons are $/MW, and that a nuclear explosion has more power than a hurricane, but my mind has a hard time accepting this notion. Oh well.
It depends. If the country has a streamlined nuclear infrastructure and licensing regime (France for instance) it can build a plant fast that produces as much energy as 1000 of the largest wind turbines in the world for at least 3 times as long. But it does take more overhead and more overnight capital and more time to build. So you have to run the numbers on the discount rate and see whats better. If you only have several tens of millions of dollars, you cant even afford to think about nuclear power plants.
LFTR's would address that, being scalable down to the tens of megawatts range and capable of being mass produced... but thats something to consider for the next decade. Today, EPRs when done right can offer significantly more affordible baseload than wind. But getting to the point where you can make them more affordable depends on lining everything up right.
Now if you own a coal mine, run an antinuclear campaign, portray wind as a savior and build some token turbines, and then build out coal as baseload confidant in the knowledge that people will want the lights on. You now have Germany.
I basically agree, although I might have phrased it differently :-)
Best Hopes for continued debate resulting in a meeting of the minds,
Alan
martingugino, Generation IV nuclear technology represents very different reactor designs, than the traditional Light Water Reactors. Parts can be manufactured inside the same factory where the Generation IV reactors are assembled. Genertation IV reactors do not have many of the safety problems of current reactors. They are far simpler, do not require miles of pipe and cables. Since they are far safer and can be factory manufactured the paper work can be simplified. Because Generation IV reactors are simple, and can be mas produced they can be produced at a low cost. Windmills are a mature technology, large scale savings duringtheir manufacture are unlikely.
jeppen,
But neither US nor China completed any nuclear in 2008 nor will they in 2009, but both will probably complete another 9,000MW wind in 2009.
That's right, but China is in nuclear ramp-up. It is to start construction of 12 more reactors during 2009 alone. Thats 13 GWe, which is worth as much as 40 GWe wind power. They seem poised to continue expansion at this rate in coming years, aiming for 250 GWe nuclear until 2030.
But we will simply have to wait and see. Nobody disputes wind globally expands far more rapidly than nuclear and while I expect this to change within a decade, I can't predict exactly when.
Neil1947 your selective recitation of facts is just so typical of renewable advocates. You claim
Why did you use 2012 as the cutoff date for china? Was it because if you had included chinese plans between 2013 and 2020 you would have looked like a fool?
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/mostread/s_575073.html
That is just Westinghouse AP=1000's .
In addition china plans to factory build 250 PBMRs in the 2020's. The Chines have plans to build a large number of their Generation II 944 MWs PWR, and a bunch of Russian and French reactors before 2020. You should be ashamed of yoursellf for this inapt coverup.
Between 1977 and 1984 France managed to complete 28 reactors, and between 1985 and 1994 they managed to complete 24 more. Clearly if Nations want to build a large number of reactors they can.
When you boast of the expantion of wind capacity, you simply ignore the fact that wind cannot supply electricity on demand. You simply ignore the pathetic capacity factor of wind. According to ERCOT on a hot Texas Summer day, a one GW reactor will feed the same amount of electricity to Texas air conditoners as 50 GWs worth of wind generators.
We need the LFTR now because the windmills, those pathetically inadequate creatures of hopelessly unrealistic minds, can't cut it in the real world of energy production.
Charles,
It's great to have aspiration objectives of 100 reactors, another thing to have approvals and contracts being let or construction actually starting. At present China has 12GW nuclear under construction, another 20GW planned to be built by 2015 and an objective to have 60GW-70GW OPERATING by 2020(5% of electricity). This is completing an average of 4-5 GW per year.
France completed 4GW per year in the two periods you quoted.
That's a terrific build rate, but China is building 80GW per year of coal fired, has 100GW of hydro UNDER CONSTRUCTION, is building 6GW wind PER YEAR.
Your description:" because the windmills, those pathetically inadequate creatures of hopelessly unrealistic minds, can't cut it in the real world of energy production."
seems to be a result of your frustration that NO new nuclear reactors have been built in US in last while, and the prospects are beak for completing more than one reactor in the next 10 years.
I am in no way opposed to nuclear energy , I would love to see 100 nuclear reactors COMPLETED per year, its great to dream, it's not going to happen in next 10 years!, but we can hope for next 20-30 years
Neil1947, my description of windmills as pathetically inadequate creatures, Simply reflects the fact that all the windmnills in Texas cannot keep the air conditioners in Amerillo running on a hot summer day. I describe anyone who has the slightest confidence in windmills after learning this fact as having a hopelessly unrealistic minds. My test of energy systems is simple. If they can keep my AC running and I can afford to pay for the juice, they pass. Windmills, PV/s and CSP fail.
"the windmills, those pathetically inadequate creatures of hopelessly unrealistic minds, can't cut it in the real world of energy production.."
Charles, you're getting a bit flighty now. Did you see how much wind went online last year? ..In the last 10? YOU seem to be stuck in some serious wishful thinking.
China wants to have 100 of Westinghouse Electric Co.'s nuclear reactors in operation or under construction by 2020
Beautiful!! That's 23% of what the US, alone, needs (being generous)! And about 1% of world supply needed!!
Yahoo!!!
If we can repeat that for the next four decades we'll REALLY be rolling with all of 4% of world demand taken care of. Err... current demand...
/sarc
Your "plans" will not be realized before 2050, if then. Massive wind generation can be built in the next decade.
Mythical 4th generation plants have to be designed, prototypes built, debugged, operating experience gained, licensing, etc. And then get several thousand reactor years of operating experience to make me comfortable with having one nearby.
You have not a clue about how the real world operates and your father's ideas should (and will be) simply ignored.
Perhaps a few hundred million for conceptual studies for the distant future. Or not. New types of nukes are NOT a priority.
Alan
But, if these ideas should be ignored because of such a belief in "how the real world operates," then your predictions of glacially slow progress, if any at all in revolutionary nuclear tech, will become self fulfilling prophesy. If there is a set of nuclear technologies that can meet the criteria for safety, sustainability, scalability, waste management, GHG emissions, especially when the technical basis has been tested already in the past with *working prototypes*, then I say to hell with your "how the real world works." We should be agitating to CHANGE HOW THE F!ING WORLD WORKS. Naive? Not a hope in hell... perhaps. But we need radical change and that begins with a fighting attitude against the status quo. If we threw a TINY fraction of the banking bailout money to all the nuclear labs in the country and established a fleet of research reactors and commercial prototypes each addressing different technical / engineering issues in parallel, stunning progress could be made in less than a decade. If the goal were to establish the basis for factory mass production of truck and rail-transportable modular reactors, we could be rolling these out like victory ships, fighter aircraft and tanks were in WWII starting in decade 2 of the effort. It could be done a LOT faster than 40-50 years. Indeed, given the climate change crisis, we can't wait that long to destroy the dominant position fossil fuels command in powering the world economy.
Nuke R&D has already spent many tens of billions (perhaps hundreds of billions in 2009 $) over a half century. Renewables have been starved for R&D funding but NOT nukes !
My basic philosophy is to not rely upon the JIT Technology Fairy for some new solution, but plan out what works today (and short term projections of existing trends in increased cost effectiveness).
There are enough mature technologies to get us through.#
*IF* some new tech comes along, and matures enough for widespread use, fine. Make a mid-course correction towards a slightly more optimum solution.
#
Electrified railroads
Urban Rail
Bicycles
Shoes (walking)
Hydroelectric
Geothermal
Biomass
Wind Turbines
PWR nukes
HV DC transmission (lite & regular)
Pumped storage
PV solar (limited, perhaps better costs ...)
Insulation
Weatherstripping
Efficient windows
CFLs and LEDs
High efficiency appliances (including HVAC)
Walkable neighborhoods/TOD
Tankless Gas water heaters
Solar water heaters
Solar clothes dryers
1950s levels of housing sq ft/capita & retail/capita
Using just the above, we can solve our economic and environmental problems for many decades to come.
Best Hopes for Mature Technology,
Alan
Alan, again you are prepetuating the oughtrightl lie of huge government spending for civilian nuclear power. Actually the Government spent about $5 billion on the development of the light water reactor for Civilian purposes. This was the only substantial government spending directed to he development of a Civilian power industry. The government spent far more for the development of military related programs. For example far more money was invested in the development of the military version of the light water reactor, than the civilian version. The military version was quite different. The government invested most of its reactor research dollars on the Liqiod Metal Fast Breeder Reactor, because the LMFBR was regarded by the military as a weapons program. In reality the government has invesated far more on solar and wind civilian power programs, and gotten far less in return. Meanwhile promising civilian nuclear technologies have been allowed language, even though they offer 24 hour a day electricity, and a low price.
Well now, my ears were burning and I see with good reason.
That this is a photo of an ethanol plant should be obvious to most here, but I found it difficult to capture this and the natural gas peaker plant tucked behind it. Even less visible are the wind turbines three miles to the west and more importantly there are sites all along this ridge that are surveyed but going begging due to a lack of transmission resources - that stranded wind stuff we keep talking about. This would appear to be the perfect storm, but it'll take a couple of weeks before we're sure.
Alan,
Good post.
Gail,
Disappointed. Not one of your best. Jerome's series is quite frankly better researched.
Charles Barton,
While I'm quite willing to listen to "thorium reactors" as part of the mix, when you start bashing wind or anything else to promote your own particular fetish I stop listening.
We need all the energy sources we can get. That includes new wind, new solar PV, new solar thermal, new hydro, new nat gas etc etc.
The problem with the Texas negative pricing is easily solved by pumped storage or by using it for something.
Why not make ammonia and then fertilizer with the excess wind? Far as I know, the price of fertilizer hasn't collapsed.
But they have no imagination it seems.
Actually we just need those, which can reduce CO2 emissions with the lowest cost in the shortest time:
www.newsweek.com/id/137501
Good Morning ~
I think this is my first comment here...although I have been a long time member/lurker... I just want to ask....
Why all of the concern about making money on wind power? How about just providing power, one house, one building at a time? I mean if every home and every mall was outfitted to provide their own power, through solar and wind, there wouldn't be any profit but there would be power...
Simplistic I know. But I think many of our issues have been created due to over complication.
*tosses two cents on the table...*
SB
All very nice in an abstract, happy-clappy sort of way. However those investing in lumps of metal or power generating capacity are in it for the RoI. Wind power only makes sense if it makes sense financially. Maybe you could make the case that governments invest for non-financial returns - but even that is a difficult case to make today. You can bet that most in the US would consider that dangerous communism.
Better to look at carbon trading and feed-in tariffs - they can rest the balance towards renewable sources. If I had to guess, I'd suggest most wind power is constructed on the assumption of such government devices. Pity the US hasn't bitten the bullet yet.
Oh, and wind power, like most things, works with economies of scale. A wind turbine per house just doesn't scale sensibly.
IMO what you are proposing is very happy-clappy.
What pray, about our current global financial system, makes any sense at all in light of what we know about the limits of resource exploitation on a finite planet with exponential population growth? I would posit that absolutely non of it. It's time to raze the current system and start doing ecological economics and accounting based on that. I don't know for sure if wind power, does or doesn't make sense but until what we currently consider financial sense, is fundamentally reassessed and realigned with physically reality your point, is what doesn't make sense.
Dangerous communism? As opposed to regular communism?
The government invests large amounts into the Department of Defense, but you surely don't think it is for financial returns.
This bumper sticker kinda says it all.
.
Especially if you have large reserves of oil.
LOL!
In 2003 I saw a bumper sticker which said 'Support our troops or go back to France'. So I did (go back to France).
You may be overly compliant. Just a thought.
Yes, it's a possibility :) Kind of got burnt out in California; now prefer Mediterranean style food, public health care and group/family versus rugged individualism. But I miss the entrepreneurial streak of the USA. Everywhere has its good points :)
Fmaygar,
I want a hundred of these bumper stickers if you know where I can get them.
Welcome SaraBeth,
Check out David MacKay's book "Renewables without hot air". The trick is small wind systems typically do not give a positive return on energy investment. The wind down low is very slow and inconsistent (and, as an urban sail boat racer, I can verify that claim with first hand experience). If a "renewable" does not have an energy return, then it is just a fossil fuel in sheep's clothing (just like Ethanol).
Better to have turbines sited on ridge tops that reach up high enough to get to the fastest and most consistent wind possible and then ship that high EROI power to the people who need it.
Wind turbines do not have to sit on ridge tops to reach the fast wind ... the MW+ wind turbines have a span of over 100ft, so if it is on a tower that bring the bottom of the blade to a safe height above ground, the top of the blade is at a substantial height.
Good thing, too, since there are precious few ridgelines to use in much of the best parts of the Northern Plains resource.
Thanks for the plug! - the book is actually called "Sustainable Energy - without the hot air", and is available free online from http://www.withouthotair.com/. Hope it helps.
David J.C. MacKay
P.S. - My 2c on wind power is that we need to accompany big increases of wind power by big increases of new easily-switch-off-and-on-able demand, for example electric vehicles and heat pumps, especially heat pumps that move heat into heat stores. Then all this whinging about wind fluctuations can be largely forgotten, as the (yet to be built) smart grid can supply the demand whenever the wind blows. There has been an example of this way of using wind on the little island of Fairisle, for several decades now, where they effectively have two grids, one of which carries a load of optional time-shiftable demand (in particular building-heaters and water heaters). They get more than half of their electricity from their two wind turbines.
Thanks for your comments.
I think one of the major messages of this post is that it doesn't make much sense to plunge headlong into building wind turbines, without adding storage to match, or making other adjustments to match supply and demand. One cannot assume that adding government subsidies to one part of the problem will fix the whole problem. Wind definitely has uses--but it has limitations as well, and one cannot just take the published EROI studies and assume that there are no conditions attached.
You also need to keep in mind that redundant power plants already exist in most places of the world, because power plants need to be maintained and electricity consumption varies significantly (up to 3 times more power consumption during day time than at night).
http://www.newsweek.com/id/137501
A nuclear power operator in Switzerland just had an add campaign running against renewable energy, claiming if there's no wind or sun, the lights would go out. Ironically the same nuclear power operator just had a nuclear power plant shut down for almost 6 month! This nuclear power plant provided 15% of the countries electricity demand and the lights didn't go out, because redundant power plants already exist.
There's definitely not one single renewable power plant providing 15% of a countries electricity and not generating any electricity at all for 6 month.
But since we can accommodate 20% wind power with additional long haul transmission infrastructure that is a fraction of the cost of the investments needed in the local and regional distribution infrastructure ... long haul transmission is not a bottleneck, and the "concern" about what happens when wind pushes to 40% or 60% or 80% ... is a bridge that we do not have to cross for over a decade.
And in the meantime we get the baseline power, the reduced GHG emissions, the improved protection from oil price shocks, and the protection from the coal price shock when China hits its domestic peak coal.
Hi Gail -- Thank you for this detailed post, which at the very least touches a nerve with folks. I had a couple of thoughts on comments thus far:
The cost numbers from DOE are wildly out of date. My information (shared in prior posts, as you noted) is likewise a bit dated (and on the high side) due to the current down cycle in fuels and commodities (like steel) that influence build costs. Sadly for energy wonks like myself, we are past the era where a planning assumption on costs has a shelf life of more than six months.
At issue is not whether wind is 6 cents/kwh or 11 cents/kwh, but its cost relative to gas- or coal-fired generation. What we saw in the last commodities price run-up, for instance, was a major unexpected increase in installed costs for coal-fired generation and for coal itself (same for nat gas plants). Good news for wind, right? Not necessarily: the same increase in price for structural steel that inflated coal plant cost estimates also pushed wind turbine costs into orbit. The shortage of boiler manufacturers that stretched lead times and funding requirements for coal was paralleled on the part of wind turbine manufacturers.
The kicker is that since wind generates less electricity per kW installed, capital cost increases hit the economics of wind harder than its fossil counterparts. If there is a link between global fuel costs and capital costs (say, energy to make steel to build plants), then we have to face the possibility that renewables will never beat fossil on cost. This is a conclusion I reach tentatively and reluctantly.
I agree that renewable energy (wind, solar, others) needs firming against better managed end-use electric load. Whatever price they are, alt energy sources need to be as flexible as possible. Equals more $$$, however.
Alan's point that least cost should not be our focus is certainly relevant. What strikes me most about renewable energy is the stability of cost compared to fossil plants. It may be that what society needs most is not so much cheap energy but energy at a stable price.
I assume that by 'never' you mean during your lifetime (this seems to be the typical definition of an infinite period of time). After all fossil fuels will be substantially depleted within a century or so, while wind will be around for a billion years or more.
As long as our primary economic goal is to maximize the total volume of economic transactions in the short term, cost stability for renewable energy seems extremely unlikely. The only real hope for cost stablity in the short to intermediate term would require a large reduction in demand for energy and other natural resources by the OECD nations. Of course such a large demand reduction would also bring down the cost of fossil fuels. Using the reprieve provided by cheaper fossil fuels to transtion to renewables could take place only if we developed the social intelligence to put the goal of long term survival ahead of the goal of selling as much sh-t as possible in the current year. Adopting such a goal implies revolutionary social and political changes. Mere technocratic policy options such as renewable energy subsidies, carbon taxes etc. are insufficient to bring about a paradigm change from an economy focused on maximizing short term wealth to one focused on creating and maintaining human welfare in the long term.
Fair point. My main contention here is that wind and solar pv (as examples) are mature from a manufacturing standpoint. While cost parity may be in sight, feedbacks in the global economy for manufacturing are such that achieving or besting parity with fossil generation may be harder than advocates think.
This is a good example of the type of feedback that makes parity so elusive. I think we agree that what is needed is a paradigm shift toward energy that is more expensive but more sustainable and hopefully more widely accessible.
I believe there is a fundamental error underlying some of the discussion here that has to do with the basic functioning of markets. I am not an economist but what little I know indicates that markets only work well if they are provided with timely, accurate, reliable information. Efforts to conceal the amounts of a particular good that is available to the market, will result in distortions that prevent the market from functioning properly. IOW in the presence of distortions markets will not balance supply and demand through price.
Ever since I became aware of Peak Oil and started reading this web site, one thing is becoming increasingly obvious, that is, there is no consensus about the reality of PO or the security of oil supplies going forward out there in the general population. Those of us who accept the reasoning of M King Hubbert and all who have succeeded him, clearly believe that PO is imminent (I suspect that includes all who come here regularly). My experience indicates that the vast majority of our fellow citizenry do not see PO anywhere on their radar screens. This includes many of the participants in the energy markets.
One of the problems at the moment is that the agencies that are looked to for providing timely, accurate and reliable information (IEA, EIA, CERA) are providing information with questionable reliability. One need look no further than the EIA/IEA forecasts of world oil production that contrast so sharply with the forecasts all of us here are so familiar with. These wildly optimistic forecasts are being used in all sorts of strategic plans and studies, including many of the studies Gail referenced for her post. Any day the concept of PO becomes widely accepted, I believe there will be a seismic shift in the market for oil. The markets will then begin to take account of the finite nature of oil supplies and the true economic value of oil. Maybe the current trend in oil prices is an indication that this is beginning to change. (Oil is above 67 as I write this)
Once this epiphany takes place among the wider population, all bets are off and all the assumptions about the future value of FF vs. renewables will go out the window.
From my island perspective, what is the point in investing in FF based electricity generation when you have no idea what fuel costs are going to be in six months, a year, five years or more importantly what the average price of fuel is likely to be over the useful life of the plant? One certainly would not be advised to turn to the IEA, EIA or CERA for advice on that so, who does one believe? I know how much renewables cost now and the wind and sun will always be free so I will kindly invest whatever resources I have in PV and/or wind, thank you very much. Sure FF power is much cheaper now but I'm betting that, it's going to get really expensive really quickly and in the long term, is going to be just plain un-affordable for all but the most critical uses in my island nation. So I'm in total agreement with this
Might I add, a somewhat predictable price seeing that the cost is largely accounted for up front with no fuel costs.
There is a tacit assumption of a great deal of BAU involved in most of the calculations involved in Gail's post. I think the main thing that is being overlooked in all this is that, Peak Oil is the greatest energy discontinuity in the history of mankind. The future of energy is going to be remarkably different than the past and it is going to have to be largely renewable. The more we invest in renewable energy now, the more energy we will have available when we can no longer rely on (afford) FF. As long as PO remains a "theory" there will be no urgency to do this and the financial arrangements will remain as they are.
In the drumbeat of May 28, I took note of this story titled IEA output forecasts are 'outside reality': peak oil proponent Having watched this online video featuring JHK on Sunday afternoon, I think it is time more people start to call the EIA, IEA et al, on their oil production forecasts. As someone who was brought up to "speak the truth and speak it ever, COST IT WHAT IT WILL", I think it is full time people stop deluding themselves and face reality so that we can get on with the massive reallocation of resources that is necessary to make things less bad than they will otherwise be.
Alan from the islands
Thanks Islandboy, a very thoughtful comment. My number one concern regarding PO is the huge amount of disinformation from parties with a vested interest in BAU. The forecasts from IEA, EAI, et al, are really dumbfounding. IEA has talked about demand going from around 85 mbd in 2008 to somewhere around 120 mbd in 2030. They suggest that 4 to 6 new discoveries that equal the KSA will provide the required supply. Did we just fall throught the Rabbit Hole?
Not only the IEA, etc. But the scientists offering climate change models, too. One group recently came up with a forecast of 7C warming by 2100... but they assume 2.5% economic growth with proportional rise in fossil fuel consumption that whole time.
I asked them about it, they directed me to here, where I saw that they assumed ultimate fossil fuel reserves of
conventional crude + tar sands = 2,310Gbbl
Gas, 13,648,663 billion cf
Coal, 985Gt
and shale oil they considered separately as some phenomenal amount...
... and assumed no constraints to production except financial ones; ie if the price is high enough, we can have 150Mbbl/day production.
... which are estimates even BP could love.
Hi Kiashu,
7C warming...hmm...
I read the book "Six Degrees" (IMHO a really good book) which trys to lay out the implications of each degree of GW up to 6C. He does not go beyond 6C because there is little evidence that humans will have a significant global population with that much warming. It was about 250 million years ago when that happened before - with most nasty consequences. Actually, the author did not spend a lot of time on 6C because that is game-over time. So, talking about 7C is kind of odd in any event.
I do worry that that we will do the BAU scenario unitl the SHTF and then use coal in every way imaginable to keep the party going. From what I read, we could push GW to 3C or so (using every type of FF) and that might be a tipping point that could release tundra methane, etc and push the planet into the 4 to 6 range even if all the FF is gone. But... I was recently in a GM showroom and noticed some fellow bipeds fawning over some macho trucks that were spruced up with sale tags. Be happy, don't worry!
I do worry that, too.
But I worry more about, and think it's a more plausible scenario, that the whole world becomes a sort of Ecotopian Third World.
Much of the Third World has a small elite living in First World conditions while the masses live in miserable poverty, effectively as slaves of the elites.
I can imagine Ecotopian gated communities or inner cities of highly-educated people tooling around in electric vehicles powered by solar and wind or biodiesel, playing with shiny electronic gadgets, eating organic produce and wearing entirely recyclable clothing, surrounded by slums of people living in miserable poverty, people who enter the gated communities during the day to be food service workers, cleaners, maids and sex workers, and who are locked out at night. Much of the world is desert or salty swamp, except for "reserves" maintained by cheap labour where the Ecotopians go to holiday. The slum dwellers eke out a living on the scraps and salvage from the Ecotopians, and the rural people manage to scratch a tonne of grain from every few hectares of dry, salty land.
I think that more plausible, and more frightening.
The solution to that is the DIY, home energy build out, growing some or all of your food, a carbon neutral, no-/low-energy home, steady-state economy, localizing... community.
If we opt out of the system, there is no system, and we can transform to something better.
Cheers
As usual, you make good points.
I didn't quote your gas number exactly (Just "less than $.030") because I figured by now, the numbers would be different, and also I wasn't sure if there was a small pipeline charge that needed to be added to make the amount your calculated comparable to the other numbers.
On oil and gas, we talk about receding horizons. When oil is $50 a barrel, a given location will be economic when oil is $70 barrel. Once the oil price gets to $70 a barrel, we discover production costs have risen too, so that it is still not economic. Some of the same issue happens with wind turbines. I think the hope is that the wind turbines will last long enough that on average, their cost will be lower.
Regarding not cheap but stable price, in a way the negative wind price when there is low demand bothers me. I would rather that prices be stable and known. Otherwise, in an economic slowdown, the amount in total the electricity producers (some of whom are utilities) producers will decrease, and some providers will go bankrupt, particularly if they are not utilities that are being watched over by regulators.
If I understand Jerome correctly, he doesn't see bankruptcy of wind turbines as an issue. If one owner goes bankrupt, certainly someone else will come along and buy the wind turbine for, say, half the previous value. At the new lower price, the wind turbine can make a return on the owner's money. Jerome is probably correct in this regard. I would not like to depend on this model for handling the pricing of wind energy.
I assume that the current peaker units, powered by natural gas, will continue to function as the primary way to match generation to load. New storage will not be required. Storage is always nice to have, since it is one way to accomplish the nice goal of minimizing excess generation capacity.
Since wind will be additional generation on the day it is put into service, it is the opposite strategy from storage, whose purpose is to minimize construction of additional generation.
This may be a flaw in Boone Picken's plan to replace natural gas generation with wind generation, and use the natural gas for transportation: natural gas generation can be quickly ramped up or down - the energy is stored in the gas until needed - but wind generation does not have this characteristic. Only the baseload gas generation can be replaced by wind, and there may not be too much of that, unless storage is built separately. Hmmm... is this what you were saying? But wind can replace coal generation.
Petroleum has been pushed aside as a generation fuel (by natural gas?) and is used only in emergency generators and as "charcoal lighter". It would be nice if natural gas could be pushed aside by storage systems and demand side management.
Yes, and that is indeed a worthy book, whose visualization style I found especially good. {David: I owe you soem detailed comments back, coming in a week or two.]
Whether the wind down low is fast or slow does not determine the energy return on investment. The generation over the life of the facility is what makes the difference. No?
The trouble with shipping the power is that it reduces people's sense of responsibility for themselves. Our current 'flick the switch 24/7' system allows people to get away with shocking levels of waste that they would not do if they were dependent on local power. Large turbines are more efficient, but which ones are more frugal?
Herman Daly emphasises that frugality will encourage efficiency, but efficiency makes frugality seem less necessary. Unless we can really come up with a perfect, clean energy source, we have to think about how much we use, and this means frugality. I suspect there will always be some sort of compromise necessary.
Problem is that post oil how are you going to make a replacement windmill. If we want a technology that individuals can make without using oil the old wooden wind mills that pumped water or ground grain are truly renewable. Once oil runs out no more super big metal windmills will be made and thus they are not renewable energy. Also for renewable energy transport think two feet or four feet on a horse, donkey or mule.
If we don't think small and move small now the crash will be much more horrendous. We are babystepping our way back and it is going to leave us with less to work with in the end. But of course given the nature of humans that is what we will do. We will endlessly debate with numbers and charts how to keep some semblance of our current lifestyle. You are on the right track SB, its just that IMO we need to take a giant step back to an even simpler lifestyle.
"Once oil runs out no more super big metal windmills will be made and thus they are not renewable energy"
We will never completely run out of oil.
"Once oil runs out no more super big metal windmills will be made and thus they are not renewable energy."
So, how did the railroads get built starting in the late 1830's as oil for an energy source was not used at all until the 1870's and not widely in the economy until around 1900? The steel was made using coal and the early railroads burned wood for boiler fuel.
As a resource oil will be around for more than another hundred years, although the price will be high and the quantity produced will be declining from now on. Priority for oil will be given to essential users like manufacture of wind turbines, making plastics for medical use, and agricultural production. First use of oil to be eliminated will be most air and auto transport. Construction of wind power, electric RR's/transit systems, and growing/transporting crops will be ensured by governments. The US government prioitized oil use in 1974 and will do it again.
Turbine blades are fiberglass (glass fibers plus epoxy resin). Durable goods made out of plastic are a relatively high-value use of petroleum and natural gas, and it's easy to imagine those uses prioritized over fuel and disposable plastic goods. There's plenty of scrap steel to recycle for towers. The gears and bearings do need precision manufacturing, but if we let our machine tools fall into disrepair, that's the end of everything. Forget about arguing over a few cents/kWh of electricity.
If you think wind or solar would work on each individual home, I suggest you sit down and work out the math for your own home. With either, you will need back-up batteries, that only last a something like 8 years. There are also issues on placement.
You can do it, but it is expensive, and it won't give you a lot of power. When the batteries wear out in 8 years (or whatever), you have the problem of trying to find replacements.
It is a solution that some, particularly in Hawaii, are trying--but they don't heat or air condition their homes. Unfortunately, the results are more limited than what most people would like, especially if they have heating/cooling needs.
I would challenge several of those assumptions, Gail.
You can certainly install Solar PV without batteries, and reap the offset to your grid-power costs, adding batteries only to whatever degree you find necessary down the line. There are a number of battery chemistrys already, and the research for new options continues apace. The Lead-Acid battery components are recyclable, and can be rebuilt from materials that will not be gone after PO.
There are other ways of storing power as well, both as heat and cold, motion, gravity and pressure, or just storing it by doing the work when the power is there, and storing the 'embodied energy' of the baked bread, the sawed wood, the messages sent.
Ultimately, your point that 'It's expensive and won't give a lot of power' is right, but avoids the PO contention that you can set yourself up to at least have your own access to some power, and that we can and must learn to have less.
Developing a moderate amount of generation from house to house will give communities a diffuse but reachable access to refrigeration, lights, communication, some tool use and transportation without the complete dependence on the umbilicals that now keep them running. Some home-generation and a lot of insulation and smart design will prove well worth the investment.
I agree it can be done. I don't think the commenter understood the degree of step-down from our current standard of living would be required, especially if he did not have capital for the huge outlays involved.
I'm sorry, but a 1k windmill can be built for as little as @$400 and certainly for $1k. I've posted the links many times. What I have yet to see is someone willing to lower the BS level and do an ROI on a $1k/1kw, DIY wind generator system... complete with battery back-up.
Or, how about a bicycle/flywheel generator? Two hours on the bike and you get 8 hours of lights and good exercise.
Etc.
The step down in standard of living has a very high percentage of perception rather than reality, imo. I think Nate has made this point often, and clearly, enough.
Cheers
I live in a urban apartment block that sort of rules out Horizontal Axis Wind Turbines (propeller type), which I suspect are the kind you say can be built for $400.
For the urban environment, Vertical Axis Wind Turbines are more suitable and the above pictured model is a small, 30cm (1ft.) tall by 30cm dia. 10W that sells for $199. You can see pictures of the same manufacturers 300W and 3kW VAWTs at their web site here. The catch is that the 300W, 1kW and 3kW models cost over $2,000, $4,000 and $10,000 which does not include installation or mounting hardware!
I am trying to figure out why these relatively simple looking machines cost as much as they do. If they could get the costs down to a quarter of what they are now, this sort of wind power could take off and become part of a large solar/wind distributed micro-generation arrangement as outlined elsewhere in this thread.
Alan from the islands
The same reason everything else does: profit, new materials, labor costs, etc. DIY the damned thing and it costs far, far less. Building this would be no different than building the HAWT. Use magnetic bearings and you should be able to get starting speeds pretty low.
The key to energy is consumption. If we drastically cut our consumption, a DIY 1kw VAWT or HAWT is absolutely sensible. But this goes for other things too.
Now, I am not Pollyanna. A DIY heat pump would be a bigger job. But, my central construct is action on neighborhood/town/city scales, not lone DIYers having to do everything. There are mechanics and engineers all over the place. That these discussions, built around **saving** energy, recycling, environmental concerns, using energy wisely, completely ignore this area just amazes me.
Cheers
Can you point me to a source of magnetic bearings I could buy for a DIY project?
LEN, DIY means that you might have to make the specialized parts yourself...
This is a neat looking one.. don't know why the author kept the diameter so narrow..
http://hackaday.com/2008/09/28/diy-vertical-axis-wind-turbine/
(there's just some mention of Magn Bearings down in the comments.. good ball-bearings are probably more than sufficient for VAWT's)
I would suggest anyone looking for free parts should go to Craigs List and Freecycle, or just the sidewalk, and find any old bikes and exercise equipment that would-be athletes are giving up on. They've usually got great structural, linking materials and bearings available to build your own stuff for VERY CHEAP!
Magnet(s) on one side, magnets on the other. All done!
;)
You'll have to engineer to taste, but that's all a magnetic bearing is. Not being an engineer, I'm guessing you'd want them on the vertical and horizontal. I also suppose there would be some efficiency losses due to more movement, so there may not be any net gain in production except for gains from low wind starts. No?
Cheers
If you are just talking about a little home wind mill, not a big electricity generating unit, it is possible you are right. I haven't checked.
If you are talking about a major wind turbine at a rating of 1kW, that is something else. Jerome is quoting a cost of 1,500 euros per kW, which would equate to something like $2,100. This is a FERC table showing comparison of base load cost (not adjusted for the different percentages of capacity that different generating types use.
A lot of stuff gets rolled into the initial cost, besides the turbines themselves--the cost of the base, transmission lines, transportation of components to the site, service contract for the first few years, consulting fees, etc.
The chart seems to claim that the cost of nuclear construction has quadrupled between 2003 and 2008. This does not seem reasonable.
As we get closer to building new nukes, the rose colored glasses are coming off.
In another thread, Dezakin (VERY pro-nuke) agreed with me that the first new US nuke will likely cost about $13 billion once all of the cost over-runs, financing charges, licensing, etc. are in.
Alan
If you are just talking about a little home wind mill, not a big electricity generating unit, it is possible you are right.
Why would I encourage anyone to build a useless turbine?
Need I point out the obvious?
Cheers
Actually with solar heating, you can not only take a warm shower and heat a house you can also cool it and tremendously reduce electricity consumption:
http://www.solarserver.de/solarmagazin/anlage_0308_e.html
Interesting fact:
Solar hot water capacity added worldwide:
China: 80.2 %
USA: 0.5 %
http://www.ren21.net/pdf/RE_GSR_2009_Update.pdf
(Maybe Americans are poorer than the Chinese who installed 160 times more solar heating but only have a 4 times bigger population?)
And there's thinfilm Photovoltaics to generate electricity, which only generates electricity during day time and thus reduces the load on the grid:
Photovoltaic modules can easily be placed on existing roofs (no need for additional area): 120,000 km2 of the US is built. If only 10% of that area has roof area, that leads to a maximum solar flux of 12,000 GW or 1,200 GW at only 10% efficiency
Btw, thinfilm photovoltaics can produce up to 30 times more energy than is needed for their production:
http://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy04osti/35489.pdf
Also, With the $180 billion spent on AIG and its bonuses, one could have financed 600 Oerlikon thinfilm photovoltaic factories, which produce 96 GW per year. That is 96 GW every single year!
http://www.oerlikon.com/ecomaXL/index.php?site=SOLAR_EN_press_releases_d...
(As a comparison all nuclear power plants in the US have a total capacity of about 100 GW).
Also, Denmark has a higher GDP per capita than the US, but uses half the energy per capita than the US. Obviously, there's no reason to forgo quality of life by wasting less energy.
Sssssh. You're upsetting the doomers.
Remember: "Change is inevitable, but change is impossible, so doom is inevitable."
Personally, my doomer stance has little to do with technical feasibility and everything to do with human stupidity.
I suspect I am not the only one.
Cheers
You aren't the only one. Just keep in mind that calling people stupid makes them less likely to follow your (technically feasible) advice. I try to smile and hope that once a critical mass sees what is happening (or what will happen), they will stop acting so stupid.
Peace
Don't be stupid, for chrissakes!
It's "stupidly," by the way.
Dummy.
;)
Cheers
That things change is inevitable, but directed change which meets our limited, linear expectations of the future is unlikely.
This stems from why am I bothering. It's all been said before. Overpopulation. Climate chaos. Energy infrastructure dependence. High psychological discount rates. Lack of common understandings, knowledge, and experience. Complexity. Oh, and peak oil.
It is normal that things die and that entire systems fail catastrophically. Nature has already figured out what to do about it. Procreation in advance, other systems take over afterward. We have children when we're alive, and other living things make use of our flesh when we're not.
On the flip side, it's certainly interesting to see how long we can keep this Frankensteinian experiment running. Too bad that as a whole we have no backup plan.
Unfortunately most thin film (or multi-junction cells) use Gallium, and/or other scarce elements. That means we can't scale production of them up to the needed scale. I am bullish on PV, but some of the best current methods cost performance-wise do not scale materials wise. OTOH silicon is a very abundant element, and will never run out.
The Oerlikon thinfilm factories mentioned above do not use Gallium or any other scarce elements - mostly window glass and a thin layer of silicon.
http://www.oerlikon.com/ecomaXL/index.php?site=SOLAR_EN_thin_film_si_sol...
..... I am still waiting for that sunny day (!) when a solar company announce that they have set up a Solar-plant in a desert (smart place - isn't it for such..?) - and informs me that all their internal productional energy is served by their HOME-MADE solar plant.
That very day , I'll pay heed to solar cells.
BTW Amorphous Solar is just silly
12W thin film amorphous silicon solar module - weight 48 kg - Dimension 385×850×26mm .
one more time ... 12 - twelve - watts - 48 kilograms -
Fixed mountet - on a sunny day :
Expect 12 W / 4 =>> 24 * 3 Watt-hours from this over 24 hrs. What is consuming 3W today?
This chunk of glass costs the same in shipping, handling and mounting as a standard PV (150 W) panel . Do you se any issues here ? I do.
a- you'll need a large parking lot to run your hous on this ..
b- in shape of a large desert-solar-array needed infrastructure and man-hours to complete this entiire thing -will kill the idea even before it hits the backside of an envelope
c- I don't see any market at all ... do you ?
Rubbish! How the heck did you find that source?
Here's a Brand New Uni-Solar PVL 136 watts Thin-Film Solar Panel listed on ebay
Dimensions: Length: 5486mm (216”), Width: 394mm (15.5”), Depth: 4mm (0.2”), 16mm (0.6”) including junction box.
Weight: 7.7 kg (17.0 lbs.).
and another, Kaneka G-SA0 60 60 Watt 48 Volt Nominal Thin-film amorphous silicon PV Module, from a different source
Dimensions 39" x 37.8" x 1.57" (990 x 960 x 40mm)
Weight 30.14 lbs. (13.7kg)
Both of the above are very accessible sources in the USA and I can find many more. It has very little to do with the technology. There are also two US based thin film producers that, are producing or on target to produce panels at a cost of less than $1 per watt.See
http://www.firstsolar.com/
http://www.nanosolar.com/
Alan from the islands
ok Gentlemen islandboy and anyone !
I admit that "my thinfilm was of the bad old and ugly sort" or rubbish if you will. But it was documented , no?
That said, my first paragraph sits well with me.
If $1 can be taken to represent a measure of the energy contained in a manufactured good as has been sugested (I don't remember where), then the two companies I linked to stand a good chance of bringing your wait to an end.
I think I read that both these companies are working feverishly with integrators to install both utility scale and rooftop solar installations, speaking of which, I think existing rooftops are an excellent location for new solar PV installations.
Alan from the islands
Even with very inexpensive PV, there are several issues:
1. Installation costs.
2. How long does the thin film really last?
3. Does manufacture require materials that are not available in large quantity.
We probably need to get these ironed out as well. The house by house installation charges are a killer.
'The house by house installation charges are a killer..'
A bit Hyperbolic, Gail.
Come on.. the labor costs of this are not unlike getting any work done on your house. New Siding, New Roof, etc.. but unlike most of the things people pay for improving in their homes, this is one that actually pays for itself. Yes, it's a long-term payback, upwards of 20 years.. but did your roof do that? The new paving on the driveway, the furnace replacment?
These costs are diffused out into the public, and they serve both as energy investments and as home-improvements. It can add to neighborhood and community security as well, when there is at least some access to power, heat and communications during storms, outages etc.
The compound benefits of diffuse energy supply need to be taught as part of 'What that big bill is paying for' .. and not just the 'Oh No!' Sticker shock warnings. I would never have tried to afford college if this was the way people talked about it to me.
Best,
Bob Fiske
Actually, a typical house roof provided with these Inventux thinfilm modules:
http://www.inventux.com/pics/products/inventux_datasheet_mc-si_en_v0008.pdf
produced on Oerlikon equipment can easily produce more power than the house requires.
http://www.oerlikon.com/solar/
Assuming the house has a roof area of 100m2, that leads to a maximum power of 8.4 kW and 12,662 kWh at 1500 sunhours per year.
(A two person household can easily live with less than 1,000 kWh electricity per year in central Europe. With 12,662 kWh a Tesla roadster can travel 115,112 km per year).
First Solar makes thin film PV out of Cadmium Telleride. Tellerium is genuinely rare. The sixth rarest element and the rarest non-platinum element. First Solar is manufacturing a gigawatt this year and lord knows how big their expansion plans are. The company assures us they have sufficient supplies of tellerium but they would, wouldn't they.
Gallium OTOH is junk metal that isn't worth refining because there's no demand for it.
It is certainly expensive, as I wrote here, but there are pros and cons. Essentially, domestic renewable energy couldn't exist without generous public subsidies. But then, neither could driving cars, eating burgers every day, hospitals and schools.
We don't need a lot of power.
In the first place, every home generating its own power does not mean every home relying on its power. So batteries don't have to be an issue. If every home, factory and commercial building had its own power generation and carefully conserved energy, the demand on our largescale coal, gas and nuclear power stations would be remarkably lower than today - not zero, but much lower, at least halved.
That does not mean that "panels on every rooftop" is the cheapest, most efficient or otherwise the best way to go for society as a whole. But it does mean it's not a terrible idea.
Secondly, replacements for batteries in 8 years is a problem why? I can see only two possible obstacles: money, and supply.
I'd say that money shouldn't be an issue. You're only putting panels or turbines up in a home you own. If you can afford a mortgage, something like $1,000-$4,000 a month for 25 years, you ought to be able to afford $2,000 for batteries every 8 years. Even if the house is owned free and clear, still in most regions there are another $2,000 or so annually of council rates, water rates and so on. If you can't afford batteries you can't afford the house anyway, so it's not an issue.
That leaves supply. Will large batteries be available in 8 or so years? I don't see why not. You are supposing a rapid collapse of our Western civilisation. But if civilisation is going to fall on its bum in the next few years, that makes it even more vital to be self-sufficient now. If batteries aren't available in 8 years, time to stock up! Sure, the spares may be dead in 20 years, but that'll be 15 more years of electricity we have compared to everyone else.
The math works for my home, as without my windmill and photovoltaic panels, I would have no electricity at all. I do much electrical work, like run the clothes washer or table saw, during sunny, breezy days, in essence, direct-drive, so storage is not much of a factor. There is no reason why my model cannot be extended to millions of other homes. Whether it costs more than grid power is irrelevant to me, as it will be soon for lots of folks.
I have a grid connected solar array on my house. PV solar doesn't have to compete with (your favorite fuel here). It competes against the retail price of electricity which is 15 to 25 cents hele in California.
People do have off grid homes. They store energy in batteries which sucks for a number of reasons. If I were a housing developer building a couple hundred home subdivision , and the grid went wonky in the future, my thoughts are to put a couple of kilowatts of PV on each house and back it up with a megawatt natural gas cogeneration plant for night.
Comparisons of costs of energy sources is prudent. We have finite resources. We should look for the most cost effective solutions. Wind is not the only solution on offer.
Alan's reaction is because he wants to solve more total problems with new generating capacity aside from simply making more electric power available. Most notably he wants to cut CO2 emissions. However, even there we have options and should compare based on costs.
Conservation - using more efficient appliances, insulation, etc - is another option with its own set of costs and benefits.
I think Gail's post is very useful because it lays out issues with wind in an informative way that hits points we should be aware of.
Thanks for the vote of support!
I think you've done a fine job too. hehe :-)
(apple)
If wind energy would be an economic substitute for cheap oil, we would only use wind power today. In this respect I agree with the answer - but it was the wrong question.
Today we face two problems:
- the end of cheap and abundant oil
- climate change
A valid economic question would be, at what price of oil does wind power break even with gas or coal fired power plants? This calculation of course has to consider that construction costs increase with the cost of coal and oil. Another valid question would be, what is the most economic way to reduce CO2 production? Both questions are not answered in that article.
The coal lobby likes to talk about carbon capture as a safeguard for their coal fired power plants. What is the price tag for carbon capture compared to wind energy? Does it make sense to take the risks involved with carbon capture (CO2 might leak) if there is a cheaper way of avoiding the production of CO2?
A valid point about wind energy is the dependance on the wind. When the wind is blowing too strong, wind turbines are switched off leaving the grid with a rapid cutoff of power. Nuclear power production if very difficult to adjust while gas fired power plants are relatively easy to regulate. So it seems to me that an ideal combination would be to pair wind tubrines with gas fired power plants. The gas fired power plants come with low investment and high fuel costs and therefore seem ideal to serve as a backup for wind energy.
IMO any comparison of the cost of a new generating source with those of fully amortized, legacy power plants is conceptually flawed. Utilities need to build new capacity in order to attract shareholder capital and generate a return on their investment. That's a basic fact of the electric utility industry. While legacy coal plants are cheap to operate, they are no longer generating a return to their shareholders. A utility that is trying to milk its 40-year-old plants for all they're worth in lieu of building replacement capacity is essentially engaging in "long liquidation," to use Henry Groppe's description of the U.S. petroleum industry. If a utility's asset base is shrinking, why would anyone want to invest money into that enterprise? Just as sharks need to keep swimming to breathe, utilities need to reinvest shareholder capital in new generation sources in order to keep their share prices from tanking. And there is absolutely no way a new coal plant or a new nuke plant can beat a new wind farm in terms of $/delivered kWh, even taking into account negative pricing incidents. For corroboration, see the latest Strategic Energy Assessment from Public Service Commission of Wisconsin (Docket 5-ES-104).
Also, there is a serious temporal disconnect with the analysis above. It assumes that coal and natural gas will be readily available 25 years from now. I would like to offer what I think is a compelling counter-argument which is taken from page 166 of Michael John Greer's book, "The Long Descent," in which he addresses the EROEI question for PV and wind.
Exactly. And this is the real situation. Gails analysis is spot on. Don't forget as oil becomes more expensive we can expect economic activity to slow. I expect that if we don't have overcapacity in electric generation now we are very close to having it.
Demand for new capacity of any form requires growth without growth all utilities will enter the long liquidation phase. As the US consumer becomes more strapped for cash he will be forced to turn off the AC. As companies shut down and the buildings are lest empty the industrial demand for electricity will decline. As the malls close the same.
As natural monopolies they can push through rate increases even as they are forced to cut down on supply. I'd not be surprised to see them get rate increases for decommissioning old coal plant coupled with a promise to expand when but only allocate a fraction of the capitol to wind. The reason is simple keeping returns high trumps all other issues.
This will probably lead to more conservation and more cuts. And if they do build out wind they will then correctly claim its more expensive to operate and force through even more rate increases well beyond the real cost of wind.
Worst case they will threaten bankruptcy and force the government to support them.
My opinion is that expecting existing utility companies to become leaders in green energy is similar to expecting horse drawn carriage manufactures to start making automobiles sure there is some obvious cross overs but if you look at history very few horse drawn coach manufactures actually transitioned.
In our case its esp difficult because the legacy infrastructure i.e the power lines are owned and operated by the utility unlike with cars and horse drawn carriages where the roads where public. Electric transmission lines are not publicly owned.
You would have to force the current utilities to allow anyone to uses their lines to transmit allowing new young alternative energy companies to leverage the existing grid to become viable even as we have plenty of generating capacity and are not near peak coal.
Note the oil industry faces the exact same problem with its own infrastructure as oil production slows there is overcapacity across the entire industry from storage tanks to ships to refineries.
In general the peak of oil and the resulting economic contraction effectively takes out all the infrastructure starting in the oil industry through power generation and then to roads and cars. All of it was geared to growth and simply cannot transition into a world of falling demand. Nor can the financial infrastructure transition.
I like the phrase long liquidation because thats exactly whats happening although I question how long it will be once the economic contraction has gone past a certain point the assets of these companies will have little value they continue because they are essential not that they have any value. I think you will find that as it becomes clear they our infrastructure companies have massive overcapacity that the liquidation will pick up the pace.
I think memmel you mean they will have low if any price as investments, not that they will have no value. Post peak very little will pay return on investment. Almost everything run under current paradigm will go into "long liquidation". The structure of finance and pensions will push that.
On the other hand, communities need power. That suggests changes along the lines of community ownership and equity financing and straight out takeovers of entities in long liquidation. I use the word "suggests" instead of writing "we should". Because we won't.
This dynamic plays out already, just two examples being the auto industry and the dairy industry. In both cases, what has to be done to keep a functioning industry is so far beyond what the existing power structure is willing to consider that it will not happen. Obama is dumping GM on the worker pension fund - I'd guess in part to destroy organized labor - and in the case of dairy, smaller local farms are being sucked down in the vortex caused by bankruptcies of larger over-leveraged industrial milk factories.
cfm in Gray, ME
Woah, slow down there, buddy, and look at what you are saying.
According to you:
Peak Oil > Financial Contraction > Less Demand for Energy > More Financial Contraction = Electric Consumption Not Needed
That don't make sense.
Oil is not needed for growth. Energy is needed for growth. (Don't believe me? Check out Japan's use of oil and their use of nat gas over the last few decades.) Right now we have an infrastructure geared towards oil. There is no reason it can't be switched to use more and more electrical power.
It is very possible that what we are seeing now will end up to be this:
Peak Oil > Financial Contraction > Less Demand for Energy > More Financial Contraction > Oil use levels off in slow decline (or declines past supply) > Much Poorer Society Slowly Switches Infrastructure Shifts to Available Electric Consumption > Return to Growth > More Electrical Capacity Installed
Or something like that. Peak Oil is not Peak Energy. Just because someone says over and over again that the economy cannot ever grow again post-Peak Oil does not make it true. Peak Oil will undoubtedly lead to contraction as prices go up, but at some point (2008?), it will become too costly to continue down the petrol road.
Edit: Let me add that I understand that at some point intrinsic limits will be reached (though that does not necessarily mean overshoot). I am not advocating this route. I just see it as likely.
I'm not saying this at all.
I am saying
1.) Expensive Oil
2.) More money/wealth spent on oil
3.) Less money spent on other goods and services.
4.) Economic contraction less manufacturing high unemployment
5.) Lower electrical demand
Or in other words exactly whats happening right now.
On the financial side its even worse as most electrical utilities would have significant spare capacity. These plants they paid millions of dollars for have no value.
And yes I mean non zero zip nada.
People will leave the air conditioner off to save money to buy gasoline. The McMansions will set empty. A 10-20% reduction in electrical usage will devastate the utility industry.
And no they won't add wind capacity.
I think a lot of people are missing that when oil gets expensive we will conserve and cut back and save to pay for gasoline leaving us with a tremendous amount of over capacity in all other industries and even in the oil industry itself outside of production.
We can expect coal prices to fall for example and NG to be on a vicious boom bust cycle. NG price volatility will add its own nasty burden.
The happy view of the future is dependent on consumption remaining constant or increasing with renewables growing in usage. If consumption instead falls as oil costs eat more wealth then we won't make it. Ironically it will be conservation that kills renewable energy.
I think you are right. As long as the cost comparison is between wind, and natural gas at a price similar to that paid early last year, wind doesn't come out too badly. As soon as one gets overcapacity in the picture, and over-leveraged utilities, and starts preaching conservation, the whole model falls apart.
The cost of new wind, compared to the cost of new natural gas at a fairly high price for natural gas, doesn't look bad. The problem is what happens when too much capacity starts a downward spiral. Who will bail out the utilities that can't pay their bondholders?
In NZ, in the 70's and 80's following the 2 oil shocks, there was a great deal of fuel substitution of natural gas for petrol. Ten percent of vehicles were ultimately converted to run on compressed natural gas - CNG. The conversion was relatively cheap, the technology is simple: $1500 and the payback period quite short, hence there was a lot of incentive to do so even with the economy in recession.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compressed_natural_gas
We had lots of gas back then and had the oil shocks lasted longer, many more vehicles would have been converted. (Far cheaper than buying a new EV today). This time round unfortunately, we don't have so much gas left - much of it has been used to make fertilizer, methanol and electricity in the last 30-35 years. And the decline from peak oil will be permanent.
The point I wish to make is:
As CNG can be a replacement fuel for petrol, and cars can be converted relatively cheaply to CNG, a short term response to rising petrol prices is likely to be substitution of CNG for petrol in many places of the world that have adequate supplies natural gas. The likely effect of the increased demand for gas would be higher prices. Hence favourable for wind.
Ultimately, gas will peak too and what will happen to all the capital sunk into gas fired electricity capacity?
I'm saying
1.) Expensive Oil
2.) More money/wealth spent on oil substitution within recessionary economic constraints to maintain economy. This is likely to be gas. (I also think that fuel efficiency (eg smaller vechicles and moreso from 4 wheels to 2) and fuel conservation will go a long way in maintaining the economy.
3.) Higher demand for gas = higher price of gas.
4.) High price of gas = high price for wind power
5.) Peak oil awakening will bring the realisation that the same will happen to gas, leading to...
6.) The economics of wind power will always be better than gas.
Chances are your NZ experience was skewed by uneven govt. taxes on petroleum vs. N Gas. Here in N America with much lower petroleum taxes, appears to be little or zero incentive to switch to CNG.
I think that is exactly how I interpreted your comments. Perhaps I went too far in detail and implied something you didn't mean, but I think that's exactly what I took from it... I was merely extrapolating your next step at the end, that more electricity doesn't make sense, which I don't agree with.
Running out of whale oil didn't cause us to not switch to petrol. You may argue that petrol is a better substitute. It was. Just like electricity will be a good substitute for many petrol applications when oil gets too expensive and scarce.
That is what is happening. Now tell me why this doesn't follow:
6.) Oil use falls in line with supply and people only use what they can sustainably afford (this WILL happen, one way or the other)
7.) Growth in substitute energy forms of any and all kinds
8.) Return to energy-driven growth (probably at a much lower and more efficient level)
People will only be stupid for so long. It takes sustained prices (or unemployment) to change behavior.
Also, mandatory rationing could go a long way to fixing this problem. If I were king of the world, I would slowly institute a ban on imports of oil until per/capita usage was near in-line with domestic production.
I simply disagree. We waste more than we "consume"... the waste is not necessary. Eventually, renewables and nuclear will power the world... conservation can pick up the slack till then. It will probably be economically painful getting started.
Why then is wind the fastest growing energy source in the US? This statement contradicts what is obviously happening in the industry, rampant growth in wind and growing conservation (mostly through economic shut-in)... you do realize that, right?
Andrew;
I agree with you that the 'Conservation Kills RE' is a strange conclusion. I think there are surely a couple of compounding problems with shrinking demand and price while people are trying to decide whether to invest in these or not, but it seems clear that people are more aware that the fluctuations and supply issues around fuels give us a compelling reason to have some generating capacity that doesn't hang on those uncertainties, while the uncertainty of 'when will it blow' is at least part of a system that isn't driven by politics or using up a wasting supply.
Of course, my error in this conversation has been to forget that the topic seemed to be framed essentially in terms of current Utility based generation. With townships, Reservations ( www.nativewind.org ) and Retirement funds, Farmers, Housing Coops etc.. getting into the action, there are investors working towards this technology who have much different viewpoints than the established Utility developers.
Bob
This is a long standing problem with all renewables; utility monopolies tend to frame generation issues from the standpoint of preserveng utility monopolies.
The utilities also assume - for many different reasons - that consumption patterns will remain very similar to consumption patterns of the past.
One thing I've noticed about growth is the end of it has been steadily moving up the economic food chain. It is at the sovereign - or government- level now. There isn't anyplace left for nogrowth to go. Where it passes it leaves bankruptcy in its wake. To business, no growth is like the shadow of death; it rides a pale horse shaped like an empty bank account.
This nongrowth phenomenon is not new. It really started in the mid- 1970s but gained force at the turn of the 21st century. The rapid increase in the price of petroleum - from $12 per barrel in the late 1990's to over $60 a barrel today - has certainly had something to do with this. Forget about the spike, the spike was a decoration intended to dstract economists! As the current consumption holds and depletion intensifies this nongrowth trend will like become entrenched. The existing financial/commercial infrastructure that relies on economies of scale will becomc completely insolvent, top to bottom.
Whatever emerges from this rubble in the area of electricity production will have to be fairly simple to create, maintain and operate. I don't see a lot in the literature about alternative distribution structures except for the 'smart grid' which is a pretty vague term - I suspect this is so because it can then mean whatever the speaker of that term wants it to mean. I can see coops and shared interconnections to balance demand and provide capital for opportunistic forms of generation. I think the national grid is on shaky financial ground. I am not an expert, but it seems that the trend is toward more local and less centralized production with localities taking back their distribution from the monopolies. I don't see much capital being available for megaprojects such as light water reactors which are infrastructure heavy and exceedingly complex.
Other kinds of reactors are an unknown quality - and quantity. Work is being done in India and China to build simpler, modular reactors, mostly solid fuel. India and China are also economically dependent on economy of scale production; because of cheap labor they are not as far along the road to insolvency as is the USA but they are certainly on that same road. Rising energy costs will soon enough end the camparative competitive advantage that cheap labor provides.
Keep in mind that cheap labor cannot purchase the products that cheap labor provides. That is the undoing of a cheap labor society. China and India can sell the US cheap reactors, maybe even LFTR's if there are funds to pay for them ... this is before China and India themselves become insolvent.
I think people are getting the hard- schooled about the limits and pitfalls of growth, technology, futurism, cowboy culture and the rest. A smaller population might not have the critical mass to attempt ambitious social engineering projects and might indeed be content to live comfortably, with little, with more art and less vanity and leave the ruin of a superhighway as a reminder. On the other hand a smaller, less costly and complex social order might not be burdened by legacy orthodoxies and take flight in some new approach; floating cities, perhaps.
In any case, I probably won't be around to see how it all turns out.
First and foremost I don't disagree that what your saying is possible I just doubt it will happen as far as wind lets see what happens with wind now that NG is cheap and financing has become difficult to get and we now have overcapacity in electrical generation.
Wind solves a problem we don't have at the moment which is electricity generation and as the economy shrinks it will become even less of a problem. I actually expect stability of electrical supplies to become a serious problem but wind does not solve this.
There have been plenty of convincing posts that we probably have enough electricity generation capacity to power a significant fleet of EV's or even more electric rail.
We are not in a electric shortage and as time goes on it will be even less probable that baseload generation is a problem. Again I stress this is different from reliability of our networks in fact I expect falling demand to destabilize the electric network significantly. Esp if we start have civil disturbances.
Nothing against wind longer term I think its important my own work in renewable is focused on the storage problem like Gail I think the real problem that has to be solved is storage not generation. Its a bit funny that Gail came to the exact same conclusion I did you have to solve the storage problem first then you can worry about generation which is not and issue. Indeed storage help the existing grid dramatically by removing peak load requirements. It a generic problem not limited to renewable energy. In a sense we get around it now by brute force using effectively jet engines to handle peak load issues.
As far as I can see over the short term wind is really solving a problem that does not exist its tilting windmills in the figurative sense.
It helps with global warming and its not a bad thing esp if we develop reliable storage but short term i.e the next 2-5 years wind is probably simply not a factor.
We face a liquids fuel crisis not a electricity generation crisis we can generate plenty of electricity.
I agree that we have a liquid fuels crisis, not a electricity crisis... yet. But I do believe that a lot of that oil usage will, with time, transition to electrical usage.
In the case of wind, yes, it makes no sense now. Neither does nuclear. IF you look on a 2-5 year timeline. But that's more than a little shortsighted.
Coal is too useful to burn when renewables would do. It can make a good feedstock for petrochemical type applications. It can be easily turned into liquid fuel for things where oil is necesssary (like airplanes). It can run simple steam engines for transport where electrical wires are cumbersome. It can be gasified to be used to smooth out intermittent power from peak usage and/or unreliable wind intermittency. In the US, it can offset fossil fuel imports from foreign countries. It can be left in the ground to prevent global warming.
I don't think windmills to offset coal are a bad investment in the mid- to long- term.
That said, I agree, storage is also a big issue. But I think, because it is such a big/critical issue, it is often made to seem more insurmountable than it really is. The tech is there for storage. And there are a lot of things that can be done with off-peak electricity. Also, there really isn't any reason that some industry can't be set to run on staggered schedules to increase night usage.
There is no storage problem for Wind up to 20% electricity consumption. And when we get to that bridge:
(1) Depending on the share of CSP electricity in the grid when we get to 20% wind, the complementarity between wind and solar may mean no storage problem until wind is 25% or 30% or more.
(2) Smartgrid support for greater demand flexibility to shift demand to when less expensive power is available is a useful application today, independent of wind, but the more there is on the grid, the less storage is required per TW wind capacity.
(3) At present we are backing volatile power sources with the existing power generation technology. However, we are also developing technologies such as direct carbon fuel cells which may be more suitable for dispatchable back up power, using fuel sources such as biocoal ... which would mean less storage is required per TW wind capacity.
The storage "crisis" is borrowing trouble from a decade or more in the future based on a straight-line projection of current technology on both the demand and supply sides, when at present we only require investment in long distance inter-grid cross haul capacity costing a small fraction of the necessary upgrades in the distribution grid.
As far as "2 to 5" year time frames ... 2 to 5 year times frames are not an option. 2 to 5 year times frames is what has placed the US in the economic position where its three choices in the decade ahead are between hyperinflation, ongoing stagnation, and serious investment in energy saving and domestic energy producing capacity.
In 10 to 20 years, we will need the electricity that wind will be able to deliver in 10 to 20 years. As we get more experience working with that capacity, the likelihood is that we will learn to make effective use of it, just as the Europeans are presently doing, and the "crisis threshold" where the system will not be able to accommodate more wind capacity will recede.
And if the threshold does not recede ... simply stop at 20%.
So as an argument against pushing toward 20% ... there's nothing there. And as far as an argument about the problems of pushing past 20% ... its a red herring.
After comentng a second ago, I visited the NY Times website and read this article by chance. I know this is only anecdotal, but that doesn't mean it isn't true or unimportant.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/31/business/31car.html?_r=1&hp
"People like Kate M. Emminger do not offer the carmakers much hope. Ms. Emminger sold her 2006 Toyota Corolla last April because she decided she could not afford her $250 monthly payment, even though she earns about $60,000 a year as a university events planner.
'It just became too expensive to have a car,' Ms. Emminger said. Now, she volunteers at City CarShare, a nonprofit organization in San Francisco, in order to earn free use of its vehicles, which normally rent to members for $5 an hour plus 40 cents a mile. Otherwise, she takes public transit."
So people, even people with jobs, will change behavior and use less gasoline. Who wants to give up their lifestyle so that they can drive an SUV? People have just gotten to where they think an SUV is their lifestyle. It's not. People are not going to go bankrupt forever just to keep big cars... you need to give people a little more credit than that.
The car companies, as they exist now, must go. If that takes a market crash to DOW 900, so be it. The DOW could crash to nothing and not disable growth in the longterm, even if it took 200 years to get back to DOW 14,000.
60k a year in SF is beggars wages. Your one step off the street making that kind of money is SF. Next she has a job where she gets a free car not sure what point that proves. How many of her coworkers ditched their cars assuming they get the same perks ?
And last but not least Boston, SF, New Orleans and New York are the US's most viable non-car cities. I actually work in downtown SF and the public transport actually is not all that fantastic despite the claims. It really depends on where your going in SF the public transport is pretty spotty in some directions. Your still looking at taking a taxi on a regular basis.
60K is a ton of money anywhere in the US. People need to get over that kind of thinking. Just my opinion. But try telling a SF barista that 60K is beggar's wages. Lots of people would kill for those beggar's wages. I would. And a lot of the price inflation in those kinds of cities is coming down.
There is no reason where that perk (which, read carefully is a ride share program, not a "free car") cannot be replicated in more jobs/places. That is the point. It is a small solution to a big problem. Applied nationally it would make more difference than all the algae in Lousiana pressed into oil.
Boston and New York are the only trully viable non-car cities in the US, not counting smaller cities like Portland, Tucson, etc... that can implement public transport more easily. Nonetheless, I don't buy that we can't get transport going. It will just take riders and effort.
Sounds like your not all that familiar with SF. Suffice it to say if your making 60k a year and trying to survive your living in and area where your life is at risk.
150k a year gets you a urine soaked apt with bums at the door and school full of hoodlums unless you can pay the 30k a year for private school.
As I said my office is in SF I refused to move to that overpriced shithole.
I hate have to go to it now.
But I digress what your missing is I think what will drive people to make these changes its a catch 22 people will only do it when forced and once forced the overall economy will shrink.
Don't disagree but what is the real price we will pay ?
Just the shrinking of a completely insane bubble is considered bad for our economy can you image what it will be like when people actually conserve because they have to ?
Its one thing to talk about how great the third world countries are because of their low oil usage but people tend to gloss over the economic model that underpins such usage. Given the chance they will live American lifestyles look at China and India.
I actually had high hopes that Gails post would flush out some new thinking that I had not considered it has not. Conservation in and of itself does not solve our problems and neither does renewable energy in fact conservation will over the short term make the situation even worse in exchange for eventual long term gain. Same for that matter renewable energy. I fail to see that a society unwilling to make any sacrifice is going to take any sort of longer term view required to transition with less pain over the long term.
1.) We have plenty of electricity as the economy contracts we have more.
2.) Conservation with declining economic outpit esp driving by high prices is not a good economic climate to foster expensive longer term investment esp in a effectively bankrupt country.
3.) We have a liquids fuel problem without a ready substitute.
People that reject Gails post reject the identity of the problems that have to be solved. Nothing wrong with what people are saying and longer term many of the ideas will result in a better society if acted on but I don't see that they solve the problems I outlined.
That'd make you a candidate for worst housing finder ever. Anyone can search craigslist and see that you're exaggerating.
Your argument hinges on the idea that growth is impossible after peak oil. I simply disagree. I think the market will force change. We still have substitutes for oil... maybe not to do ALL the things we want in the WAY we want, but that isn't needed to grow an economy.
I guess I have a longer view. The next 10-20 years will probably suck, but that isn't really that long in the scheme of things. If we don't turn shit around in 20 years, we're not trying hard enough.
Hasn't been much growth prior to peak oil. Some small strata enjoys the remaining GDP growth somewhere and the rest muct pay to support it. Not an overall good deal and not a deal at all. If growth is for the few at the expense of the many, how can this be what it claims to be?
What most people call growth is simply monetary inflation. The artifacts of growth reduce the utility of the goods and services they replace. What the current economic crisis expresses is the march of economic stasis up the enterprise food chain; starting with workers there has been no growth in real US incomes since 1982. Stasis is now at the sovereign level where the participants can print their own money ... there is noplace else to turn to for growth.
You can substitute 'entropy' for 'stasis' if you like.
There are too many amplifying feedback loops, many are undiscovered until it is too late to do anything about them.
SF is expensive, but don't exaggerate. I've supported myself here for five years on less than half that. And for most of that I had a car (albiet not one with a $200 monthly payment), and lived in a nicer part of town.
I guess you consider the tenderloin nice then is all I can say.
Heres CraigsList.
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/search/apa?query=San+Francisco&minAsk=min&ma...
Thats not cheap.
And I have three kids so less than a 3 bedroom is not easy.
Start looking at the schools and most of the cheaper ones are gone.
Or you doing private school for a few grand a kid.
This is a cheaper one dunno about the area.
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/pen/apa/1200532784.html
Not a single 3 bedroom in SF under 1500 with a simple filter.
These rents would buy a house in the 300-400k range.
Sure if your single or married no kids etc you can find cheaper places.
But I'd say most of your typical familes of four are priced out of the market.
Hmm seems a lot of people agree:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco,_California
The San Francisco median household income in 2007 was $65,519, with the median family income at $81,136.[116] Following a national trend, an out-migration of middle class families is contributing to widening income disparity[71] and has left the city with a lower proportion of children, 14.5 percent, than any other large American city.[119]
I lived in a room in Bernal Heights (nice neighborhood, no urine, 25 min from downtown on public transit) for $660 a month. If I'd been earning 60k a year I could almost have bought a condo in SF with cash by now. Comments about the Tenderloin suggest you think that when you say San Francisco one can only mean downtown. When you include what Herb Caen called the "the county" of San Francisco, the considerations are different.
Since your earlier statements didn't specify the constraints of raising a family, they remain exaggerations, especially since the article quote which started this subthread may well refer to a single woman. If your point was that few people earning 60k in SF are rich enough to afford a car, that's wrong.
Ahhhhhhh...This proved nothing!!! She lives in San Francisco!!!! This is one of the best cities in the U.S. to live WITHOUT a car...The City is SMALL...It has great public transit....Which means it goes everywhere, not on time or in comfort but EVERYWHERE...Also parking is a massive headache...Hell, if I lived there I wouldn't own a car either...You really don't NEED one there....
Again you are missing the point. People are more adaptable than they look.
People will leave the air conditioner off to save money to buy gasoline... up to a point.
At some point, they will divorce themselves from the idea that they need to be able to drive 100s of miles on a whim, and buy electric cars. It's already partially baked into the automotive roadmap.
At that point, demand for electricity will pick back up again... and mostly at night, which is ideal for wind.
Well what can I say maybe.
Certainly we are going to transition off of cars.
Back in the real world if you leave the US you find that generally this means moving to 100cc scooters and small motorcycles for most people with cars reserved for the wealthier people. Also you can do a lot with fuel economy esp in the US. I see no intrinsic reason why we can't have 60mpg small cars. If your current car get 30 mpg then doubling the mpg and cutting way back on car use would keep your expenditure on gasoline about the same well past 6 dollars or so a gallon. The small motorcycles get 100mpg.
And a lot of people can move closer to work esp if they rent. My point is its hard to guess what people will do one of the problems going forward. Everyone will take a their own path. I'll personally choose the motorcycle/bike route I doubt I do the electric car. Regardless almost all the choices imply conservation to afford transportation.
Given the projected costs of electric cars 40k seems to be a common figure financially even if they save on oil they are not going to result in significant additional cash over the short term.
My opinion is given we don't have any shipping now it would be at least ten years before electric cars are a big factor. If you notice my arguments have a lot more to do with the shorter term i.e next 2-4 years. Given the overall situation I cannot begin to even guess what the situation will be like in 5 years.
Not good to disastrous depending on how things go.
In the next 2-4 years I'd suggest that economic contraction coupled with rising oil prices will be the prime problems we have to deal with. More of the same in general.
Later at some point after that I'm sure wind something and electric something or better non fossil fuel transportation will be important however I also think however it turns out we will only know what can be done after we get through the next few years.
I'd have to think that once peak oil is obvious and if all the economic conditions result in a deep depression in 2-4 years that what happens next will depend on what decisions people make at that point. The last time the world fell into a deep depression the results where not good. I can honestly say I have no clue but I'm not holding out a lot of hope.
Way to many other issues stand between now and when people will make these types of decisions. My own best guess is electric rail. And full disclosure I'm moving to a place with significant hydroelectric power so I'm certainly betting on some sort of electric powered transportation working at the minimum in places which already have excellent hydro. Farther out in time I certainly can see wind/hydro solar etc playing a larger role and becoming important. As long as we keep a technically advanced civilization somewhere I suggest it should be obvious they will be important within 20 years. Sooner than that will depend on large and unknowable events over the next few years.
What I disagree with is that EV's is all that we need to transition. Over the short term electric generation capacity is not and issue therefore wind is really not solving and problems we have. Even your own example basically requires us to effectively be against the ropes before we finally choose EV's and wind as being viable. And here all we can do is wait and see. We can build EV's today we can build Wind power out today. If I'm wrong and they are a real solution then this should become obvious but as Gails post points out when you really look deeply into the problem its hard to see that this solution is a solution over any sort of short term time scale.
Sure once the world has finally kicked the oil habit it will out of necessity go towards electric transport and we will be forced to design for wind where it makes sense. But hopefully you can see it does not solve our problems it does mean our kids are not completely hosed they will have choices and I think they will make better ones than we did. I suspect once the world finally rejects oil they will reject partial solutions like EV's and focus on building a new civilization that we can only guess at. Thats not going to be our decision.
Good for them but it does not save us.
I think a lot of people misunderstand Gail's post and my position. Its really simple and I think Gail has the same position as you dig into the problem it becomes clear that without some sort of miraculous awakening our current system will crash. After than I'd have to guess but I think Gail sees given the need and with work where wind can become important and where many of the things that people feel will solve our problems become important as we rebuild. Things we can do to rebuild a better society after we hit the wall are not in my opinion solutions. Once the current system crumbles and esp once the financial system has finally collapsed then we can actually do something because we are finally free to labor on something that benefits us as individuals. Wind or nothing is and easy choice to make.