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Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

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Re: Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

#101

Post by konschubert »

tda wrote: post #97

I bet the Fukushima backup power system would have fit this explanation perfectly: > in addition to the grid connection, there are four twelve megawatt diesel generator stations spaced around each corner of the plant -- each with two generators, any one of which is able to provide operating power to keep the reactor's safety systems working. Unfortunately for Fukushima, all generators were flooded by a single Tsunami…

I agree with your risk assessment, but I have to say that given the choice between a climate apocalypse and a nuclear power buildout, I would choose the latter.

Re: Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

#102

Post by caoilte »

eggfriedrice wrote: post #75

I went on a tour round Torness a couple of years ago and it's a fantastic engineering marvel to mosey around. A few things stand out, like the old-tech ring binders and Windows 95 screensavers on CRTs. The safety focus was clear. Nothing was done without a risk assessment, and the young apprentice who was helping with our tour was given a telling off by the tour staff as he wasn't holding the handrails - as had clear…

windfarms need someone to check any migrating birds aren't near and someone to man the control room (can and is job shared with other windfarms).

So one and a tiny bit people. Plus occasional inspections i suppose.

Re: Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

#103

Post by caoilte »

foobiekr wrote: post #72
mdorazio wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One would hope that by 2050 energy storage and/or long-range transmission will be a non-issue for renewables, rendering this argument moot.

Given the latency for big projects we’d likely have at least a somewhat clear idea of what that storage would be approximately now. Do we?

wind/solar/battery projects are very fast to spin up. That's another thing which makes them attractive over nuclear.

Re: Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

#105

Post by lcvw »

mlindner wrote: post #90
Joeri wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The long term vision is for those gas plants to be hydrogen-powered, with the hydrogen generated by the surplus of wind and solar during peak times. Pumped hydro for power storage is also something that will become viable. You lose a lot in conversion, but excess wind power is very cheap.

Honest question, but do people actually believe that? It sounds like a tactic by oil companies to sucker in gullible people in order to punt a problem down the road. It also acts as a great excuse by politicians to avoid having to deal with a problem. IMO, the reality is that these plants will never convert to anything other than natural gas and will eventually be shut down, still running on natural gas. Hydrogen is…

I seem to remember that you can’t even pump hydrogen through existing natural gas infrastructure because the smaller hydrogen molecules are more prone to leaking. I would imagine the equipment at a plant has a similar problem and combine that with lower efficiency from burning a fuel that the plant wasn’t designed for, and the abysmal efficiency from converting electric energy to hydrogen and it seems like pure snake oil.

Edit: the problem I am remembering is that hydrogen actually degrades the metals used in pipelines (https://www.hollandsentinel.com/story/opinion/columns/2021/0...) so I don’t see how any of this infrastructure is useful at all for hydrogen.

Re: Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

#106

Post by akiselev »

mikepurvis wrote: post #61
tonyarkles wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I spent some time at an active petroleum refinery a few years ago and one of the safety things that surprised me a little was that every vehicle inside the complex must have the keys in the ignition at all times. Not turned on, but in the event of an evacuation they didn't want anyone to have to futz around looking for keys.

I think part of what's wild about that for me is just imagining the risk analysis that would lead to that kind of thing. Like, obviously not an explosion that's over in seconds, but everyone would be dead anyway. And not a normal fire because then you'd just evacuate as usual and carpool if you can't find your keys. But there's a class of refinery-specific disasters where I guess you have tens of seconds to get out,…

A refinery can leak explosive gasses that form a plume in or around the refinery that rises off the ground. Once detected, there's a fairly high chance that one small spark will set it off but it could be many seconds or minutes until it's ignited and it could take multiple smaller explosions to mix in enough oxygen to cause the big one. This gives the staff "plenty" of time to evacuate but it's still an emergency situation where arguing about carpools or knocking things down frantically looking for keys (causing that spark) will eventually get people killed for no benefit.

Re: Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

#107

Post by tda »

konschubert wrote: post #101
tda wrote: post #97

I bet the Fukushima backup power system would have fit this explanation perfectly: > in addition to the grid connection, there are four twelve megawatt diesel generator stations spaced around each corner of the plant -- each with two generators, any one of which is able to provide operating power to keep the reactor's safety systems working. Unfortunately for Fukushima, all generators were flooded by a single Tsunami…

I agree with your risk assessment, but I have to say that given the choice between a climate apocalypse and a nuclear power buildout, I would choose the latter.

If only it was a conscious choice... I fear significant climate has happened already, and even if we stop burning fossil fuels tomorrow will continue for a long time to come. Putting up a few km2 of solar in e.g. the Sahara now is surely less effort than decommissioning dozens of nuclear plants in 50 years.

Re: Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

#108

Post by sovnade »

tda wrote: post #97

I bet the Fukushima backup power system would have fit this explanation perfectly: > in addition to the grid connection, there are four twelve megawatt diesel generator stations spaced around each corner of the plant -- each with two generators, any one of which is able to provide operating power to keep the reactor's safety systems working. Unfortunately for Fukushima, all generators were flooded by a single Tsunami…

And we're putting in wind and solar at record rates, but that still doesn't cover us at night or when there's no wind. Batteries or other energy storage cannot meet the demand yet. Nuclear is still the best option for continuous weather-independent power among all the low-polluting options.

Re: Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

#109

Post by Joeri »

mlindner wrote: post #90
Joeri wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The long term vision is for those gas plants to be hydrogen-powered, with the hydrogen generated by the surplus of wind and solar during peak times. Pumped hydro for power storage is also something that will become viable. You lose a lot in conversion, but excess wind power is very cheap.

Honest question, but do people actually believe that? It sounds like a tactic by oil companies to sucker in gullible people in order to punt a problem down the road. It also acts as a great excuse by politicians to avoid having to deal with a problem. IMO, the reality is that these plants will never convert to anything other than natural gas and will eventually be shut down, still running on natural gas. Hydrogen is…

Well, any plan for green energy has major holes in it. If it was easy someone would have already done it. The EU is taking this very seriously however as part of their climate plans.

The big problem with the hydrogen economy is not the conversion of the gas plants, it is having enough wind to generate the hydrogen in the first place. You need excess wind capacity to make hydrogen, and no private venture will invest into wind turbines that aren’t needed. Without a strong government hand shaping this market it will not happen.

If you are looking for a skeptical take, here’s a good one: https://cleantechnica.com/2021/12/06/new-eu-hydrogen-policy-...

Re: Nothing like this will be built again (2002)

#110

Post by wolfram74 »

bayesian_horse wrote: post #66
wolfram74 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact fission is classified as green /might/ impact fusion's future classification, but who knows. I was listening to a podcast and a disillusioned engineer said "environmentalists favorite nuclear power plant is always one that doesn't exist, as soon as it's ready to be built it's ready to be protested". Probably an instance of many groups under one label acting disparately, but I get the sentiment :/

Nuclear reactors are just bigger pains than even the coal plants they might replace. Especially to replace enough fossil fuel one would have to scale up the problems with mining, waste disposal, and risks of accidents or malicious interference. I know this isn't a popular idea here, but there also lots of physicists who don't believe in nuclear fission as a mid-term or near-long-term solution.

I'm not one of those physicists, mind you. I think keeping all the problems substantively in liquid or solid phase gives us a better chance than automatically pumping them in gas form into the atmosphere. not to mention the transport efforts go from a daily coal train per powerplant to a single semi every 18 months. All the logistics up stream similarly impacted. I'll grant it's not as straight forward as disassembling and then burning a mountain in west virginia every few years, but the over all footprints way smaller.

The radioactive problems as they are, they're still better than the chemical ones from coal plants, if we'd decided to change history in the 40's and replace all the nuclear plants with coal ones we'd have killed millions[0] more people more subtly.

[0]https://e360.yale.edu/digest/nuclear_power_has_prevented_184...

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