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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)

#141

Post by koide »

sovnade wrote: post #108
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.

It can, according to some, here are a couple of sources:

https://e360.yale.edu/features/three-myths-about-renewable-e...

https://medium.com/enrique-dans/can-we-put-the-solar-and-win...

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

#142

Post by mlindner »

Joeri wrote: post #109
mlindner wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 i…

Texas of all places are building tremendous numbers of wind turbines primarily driven by market forces.

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

#143

Post by BlueTemplar »

wolfram74 wrote: post #39
ArtWomb wrote: post #18

"nothing like this will be built again" ITER / DEMO / PROTO plants planned to eclipse everything previous in scale. And with nuclear fission now classified as green tech by the EU, maybe the political will is finally here ;) https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220109-europe-nuclea...

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 :/

I don't see why - assuming that we actually manage to make power-positive fusion, there's no question that it would be much "greener" than nuclear fission, without the need to deal with spent fuel and without the accident contamination risks.

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

#145

Post by hkt »

navaati wrote: post #133
bayesian_horse wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

France begs to differ. We basically replace fossil fuel with nuclear here (we only have small peaker gas plants, our baseload is all nuclear and some of our variable load is hydro) and there is no particular scale problem, no accidents (incidents yes, but they don't become accidents, the system works), a few pools of waste but whatever, no trouble to procure the fuel...

The fuel is an interesting point - I gather it comes from former French colonies, mostly. Do you know if this is true? And if so, what are the conditions of the workers and the impact on the economies of countries where the extraction happens?

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

#146

Post by hkt »

pfdietz wrote: post #122
schnitzelstoat wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is also true for solar panels too though - they require rare earth materials. And large scale wind farms can have accidents and fires and harm wildlife. Doing anything at scale is difficult.

Solar panels do not require rare earth materials.

Wind turbines do though - neodynium, if memory serves.

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

#147

Post by nolta »

sovnade wrote: post #126
tda wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Except you lose a lot of that power through attenuation. You can't really send electricity from the sahara to europe efficiently. Even over relatively short distances (a few dozen miles), you're losing up to 10-15% of your overall energy. A thousand miles or more...and I can't even find numbers on that because nobody does it.

1000+ mile links exist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-voltage_direct_current

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

#148

Post by notreallyserio »

sovnade wrote: post #126
tda wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Except you lose a lot of that power through attenuation. You can't really send electricity from the sahara to europe efficiently. Even over relatively short distances (a few dozen miles), you're losing up to 10-15% of your overall energy. A thousand miles or more...and I can't even find numbers on that because nobody does it.

Is there some way to site manufacturing that requires lots of electricity (aluminum?) nearby? Maybe electricity could be exported by way of material.

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

#149

Post by ttul »

tda wrote: post #107
konschubert wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Why not do both? Solar power works really well in the Sahara, but not so well in Northern Alberta. While the Sahara's emptiness is penetrated with limitless sunlight, Northern Alberta features vast, rolling plains where waste heat from nuclear plants could be used to heat homes for people escaping the burning wastes of California and BC, while generating carbon-free energy for the North American grid. Waste heat can also facilitate the chemical processes needed to extract CO2 directly from the atmosphere. You can also use nuclear waste heat to replace natural gas heating when extracting bitumen from oil sands -- arguably an activity that we ought not to be pursuing anymore, but tell that to the companies and people making their livelihood from it.

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

#150

Post by pdpi »

Spooky23 wrote: post #86
bocytron wrote: post #21

French power grid agency RTE made a report[0] forecasting 2050 France energy mix, and because of loss of knowledge and increased security measures, even with strong political will, France won't be able to maintain its 70% nuclear power electricity share. Most nuclear-intensive scenario in this report is max 50% nuclear energy. [0] https://assets.rte-france.com/prod/public/2021-12/Futurs-Ene... in french

It’s funny when I read the Foundation novels, it seemed silly to me that people could lose track of technology and fall backwards. Then you read something like this and realize Asimov had a point!

The key insight is that data is not knowledge.

We probably still have all the papers and journals and schematics and whatnot. What we don't have, however, is people with the appropriate training to make sense of those things. Without those people - without actual working knowledge of the technology - all that data is useless.

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