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Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

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Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#221

Post by pfdietz »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #210
mzmoen wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This assumes that you're power generation always matches demand through time. If you had a sudden spike at night that you don't usually have (like in Texas where people kicked on their heat unexpectedly) and you were using solar, the mismatch would exist and you wouldn't be able to meet the load.

Exactly. You need natgas peakers (that aren't frozen) or charged batteries to deal with this. Nuclear, wind and solar are all unsuitable for this situation.

Or turbines burning hydrogen.

Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#222

Post by pfdietz »

dispat0r wrote: post #200
DaedPsyker wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a fair comparison, coal was pretty much the only game in town and at a time when understanding of pollution only related to local level. Yes its unfair but at the end of the day its the developing countries that will be hit hardest by climate change, not the west. I do agree we should subsidise clean energy around the world though.

wind energy is so cheap why are india and china still building new coal plants?

The wind resource in India is poor. Solar is likely the answer there, with batteries and hydrogen.

Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#223

Post by i_am_proteus »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #218
i_am_proteus wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In some markets. The author of this short essay makes many assumptions that trends will remain linear.

It doesn't matter. Both HVDC and batteries are cheaper than nuclear, by a lot. The cost of solar, *including storage* is $40/MWh in Arizona *today*. Running that $40/MWh power to NY over HVDC is cheaper than a nuclear power plant. And according to the author, generating and storing the power in New York via solar or wind would be even cheaper.

This essay's math literally relies on linear continuation of current price trends for over a decade with no justification of the linear assumption in order to reach this conclusion.

Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#224

Post by evilos »

_nalply wrote: post #118
roenxi wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're comparing two neighbourhoods. One has less deaths and less robberies. It is the one with nuclear power. Chernobyl has done less damage and had less impact on those millions of people than the totally routine burning of coal. I grew up in a coal mining region; I fully expect more people suffer negative health outcomes when coal works as expected than in a Class 7 nuclear catastrophe. We just don't count the heal…

Accidents are bad but left-overs are even worse. I wish people would think more about long-term problems with spent fuel rods. I don't think that burying them is a viable solution as the Asse mine in Germany shows. https://www.dw.com/en/nuclear-waste-in-disused-german-mine-l... The salt mine was deemed to be safe for thousands of years. But then people discovered ingress of water. And salt water is corrosive. I am su…

All the nuclear waste the US has ever produced fits in a football field at a height of around 30 feet.

Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#225

Post by fsflover »

mFixman wrote: post #211
fsflover wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> when the people living near nuclear power plants have to be in constant preparation for total evacuation What are you talking about? Is there any serious unpredictable danger for people living near Chernobyl?

> Is there any serious unpredictable danger for people living near Chernobyl? The towns surrounding Chernobyl were completely evacuated. This can happen again. In Germany, the government of Aachen is giving iodine tablets and asked its people to prepare for an eventual nuclear catastrophe because of the nearby nuclear power plant behind the border with Belgium [1]. The nuclear power station was designed to run 30 yea…

> The towns surrounding Chernobyl were completely evacuated. This can happen again.

This is just FUD. There is no reasonable possibility of that.

Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#226

Post by notacoward »

DrBazza wrote: post #46
pif wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't understand the downvotes you got. You pushed may be a bit on political stereotypes, but other than that you just stated the facts.

There's a lot of anti-nuclear sentiment on HN. Anyone that's in favour of it seems to always get downvoted.

Is that due to a high prevalence of anti-nuclear sentiment, or due to a high prevalence of enthusiastic, dismissive, and possibly inauthentic pro-nuclear sentiment? Either could explain the observed effect. There are plenty of pro-nuclear comments that aren't being downvoted. I suggest you consider that others are for reasons beyond their basic premise.

Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#227

Post by hntrader »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #210
mzmoen wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This assumes that you're power generation always matches demand through time. If you had a sudden spike at night that you don't usually have (like in Texas where people kicked on their heat unexpectedly) and you were using solar, the mismatch would exist and you wouldn't be able to meet the load.

Exactly. You need natgas peakers (that aren't frozen) or charged batteries to deal with this. Nuclear, wind and solar are all unsuitable for this situation.

What do you think of the claims of user "corty" elsewhere in this thread, who seems to say that nuclear isn't unsuitable for this situation?

Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#228

Post by LargoLasskhyfv »

_nalply wrote: post #118
roenxi wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're comparing two neighbourhoods. One has less deaths and less robberies. It is the one with nuclear power. Chernobyl has done less damage and had less impact on those millions of people than the totally routine burning of coal. I grew up in a coal mining region; I fully expect more people suffer negative health outcomes when coal works as expected than in a Class 7 nuclear catastrophe. We just don't count the heal…

Accidents are bad but left-overs are even worse. I wish people would think more about long-term problems with spent fuel rods. I don't think that burying them is a viable solution as the Asse mine in Germany shows. https://www.dw.com/en/nuclear-waste-in-disused-german-mine-l... The salt mine was deemed to be safe for thousands of years. But then people discovered ingress of water. And salt water is corrosive. I am su…

The Asse is a people problem, caused by incompetence. Look who is responsible for it, if you like to ;)

Furthermore, to my knowledge there is no higly radioactive stuff stored down there, just some recklessly offloaded cans with cleaning clothes, and such. Again, incompetence and recklessness.

As of now, anything highly radioactive is stored above ground in 'Castor' either under clear skies, or light halls there, or as 'Zwischenlager' on the grounds of NPPs, maybe sometimes exported to make it a problem of other people, as usual...

Anyways, we could possibly transmutate it, like it is researched in Mol, Belgium, 'burn' its full potential in liquid-salt reactors, whatever. This whole longterm storage concept is shizophrenic thinking, because we didn't really research nuclear further, after we had working reactors based on (upscaled)military applications for economic, political, whatever reasons.

I am sure that we will experience very expensive disasters with renewable energy in the next few dozen years.

edit: Another thing regarding long term storage in 'geologic times'. If some group in 100.000 years. or later comes across this, and doesn't know how to handle it, why should I care about those stupid morons?

For all I care they discovered the curse of the atomic pharaos, and deserve it! Degraded bitches!

F-U-C-K-I-N-G-D-E-A-L-W-I-T-H-I-T!

Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#229

Post by LargoLasskhyfv »

_nalply wrote: post #217
ohgodplsno wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It took a tsunami on an unmaintained nuclear power plant to cause Fukushima. It took the russians lifting off _every single security mechanism_ to cause Chernobyl. The ojer major incidents like Three Mile Island are just "well, security measures have failed, we didn't have enough fallbacks. It's broken now. Light irradiation around but nothing major". So, no, nuclear power doesn't stop for anything but the absolute w…

The problem are the future accidents with the left-overs of nuclear. They are simply uncountable because these are in the future.

Advanced radio chemistry will produce meta-materials which will enable time travel. Problem solved! Wheeee!

Re: Why Nuclear Must Be Part Of The Energy Solution (2018)

#230

Post by LargoLasskhyfv »

mFixman wrote: post #211
fsflover wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> when the people living near nuclear power plants have to be in constant preparation for total evacuation What are you talking about? Is there any serious unpredictable danger for people living near Chernobyl?

> Is there any serious unpredictable danger for people living near Chernobyl? The towns surrounding Chernobyl were completely evacuated. This can happen again. In Germany, the government of Aachen is giving iodine tablets and asked its people to prepare for an eventual nuclear catastrophe because of the nearby nuclear power plant behind the border with Belgium [1]. The nuclear power station was designed to run 30 yea…

Did they do that when they played with the https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/AVR_(J%C3%BClich) ?
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