Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

thorconpower.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 246 posts

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#121

Post by ncmncm »

panick21_ wrote: post #105
KennyBlanken wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I hope we will, the problem currently is that this is not competitive compared to just burning natural gas. [Citation required] Grid-scale battery systems have fallen more than 70% since 2015. > nuclear would be quite competitively priced Nuclear is one of the most expensive and keeps getting more expensive; it's not competing against natural gas. It's competing against wind and solar, the two cheapest forms of gen…

> Grid-scale battery systems have fallen more than 70% since 2015. Grid-scale batteries are still tiny. Lithium batteries will not solve the grid problem anytime soon. Lithium (and co) will be strained to the max already. Every other technology has barley been deployed at all. And there is already a whole litter of energy storage startups that have died. > Nuclear is one of the most expensive and keeps getting more e…

Storage startups dying is a symptom of plummeting prices -- bad for them, very, very good for us.

There is little need, thus far, for storage, so little has been built. Right now, generating capacity is a better place to spend the money. Next year, the same storage will be much cheaper.

By the time any nuke started could be finished, even if it would have been competitive today, it would not when finished. So, it would be abandoned before completion. They would not return any of the money spent.

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#122

Post by scythe »

ncmncm wrote: post #61
scythe wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>when low-tech concentrated solar in the desert can get the job done Consider West Virginia. (Just for example.) The Senator from there, buoyed by local public opinion, has been an obstacle to climate policy. A look at the state's economy will quickly debunk the idea that coal mining revenues alone drive this opposition. Instead, West Virginia, like other places where opposition to reform holds fast, has a large manu…

There is, in fact, no need for desert to site solar arrays. Reservoirs and pasture are places where siting solar is easy, and provides side benefits of higher operating efficiency and higher agricultural yield. Resistance to renewables is nowhere technical, and always political. Disinformation is one political tool.

>Reservoirs and pasture are places where siting solar is easy

Reservoirs are deep, pastures are not relevant everywhere. Both approaches are essentially theoretical at this point due to the increased cost of construction vs. dedicated solar farms.

>nowhere technical, and always political.

You're forgetting "pragmatic". Lots of things are technically possible but not economically practical, at least not when you need them to be. Nuclear prevents disruption in the short-term; it is not necessary in the very-long-term, but the markets can remain irrational longer than you or I can remain solvent.

>Disinformation is one political tool.

I know, you replied with it. I studied a bunch of dry economic data to write the gp comment. It's not disinfo to know where money comes from.

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#123

Post by ncmncm »

panick21_ wrote: post #109
AtlasBarfed wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was a major LFTR/MSR supporter. But the emerging economics of solar/wind prevent any non-subsidized nuclear from being viable. Look at the solar/wind curves for the last decade. Yes, it is unlikely solar and wind will continue such a breakneck pace of improvement, but it doesn't matter. The point is that almost everyone will agree that solar and wind have not reached peak technology and economies of scale, and cert…

Maybe with lots of investment and buy in we can do that in the West. However for emerging economies like India, Indonesia and many others I still think reliable nuclear power close to population centers is a far better plan. The actual investment required to get a modern MSR style (doesn't have to be thorium) is not actually that much. I would at least like to see nuclear get an actual shot at it. But I agree that af…

If we cannot afford nukes, how can they? If we cannot make them reliable and safe, how can you expect them to?

Foisting nukes off on poorer, badly governed countries does people living there no favors.

Nukes are farther from viable than ever before. Subsidizing them has become indefensible.

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#124

Post by NumberWangMan »

ncmncm wrote: post #114
Joeri wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless someone can demonstrate that nuclear projects are preventing solar and wind deployments, why not do both?

Money is fungible. Each dollar spent on clean generation displaces some rate of CO2 exhaust. A dollar spent on renewables displaces much more than the same dollar spent on nukes. You cannot spend the same dollar on both. Thus, a dollar spent on nukes instead of renewables brings climate catastrophe nearer.

I think I take issue with both of your assertions:

A dollar spent on renewables displaces much more than the same dollar spent on nukes -- this project is going to provide CO2-free power at 3 cents / kWh. It's in the same ballpark, but also, nuclear's main competition is coal and gas, as they all provide baseline power. Solar with storage can do that, but adding storage drives the cost up.

And you cannot spend the same dollar on both -- while this is true, I think the fallacy is that spending a dollar on nuclear power necessarily takes a dollar away from renewables. It's possible that this will sometimes be the case, but it also will clearly be taking a lot of dollars away from coal in places where practically speaking, the choice isn't coal vs renewable, it's coal vs nothing, so if you don't spend the dollar on nuclear, it WILL be spent on coal.

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#125

Post by ncmncm »

scythe wrote: post #122
ncmncm wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is, in fact, no need for desert to site solar arrays. Reservoirs and pasture are places where siting solar is easy, and provides side benefits of higher operating efficiency and higher agricultural yield. Resistance to renewables is nowhere technical, and always political. Disinformation is one political tool.

>Reservoirs and pasture are places where siting solar is easy Reservoirs are deep, pastures are not relevant everywhere. Both approaches are essentially theoretical at this point due to the increased cost of construction vs. dedicated solar farms. >nowhere technical, and always political. You're forgetting "pragmatic". Lots of things are technically possible but not economically practical, at least not when you need…

Reservoirs have a surface.

It costs no more to site solar in pasture than in desert. It can be cheaper; you don't need to buy the land if it remains equally useful for its current use, and may be nearer market, so not need long distance transmission. Furthermore, lower operating temperature improves efficiency, and shade improves grass yield and lowers water demand.

That biggest current projects are in desert is a sign of market immaturity.

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#126

Post by NumberWangMan »

ncmncm wrote: post #123
panick21_ wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe with lots of investment and buy in we can do that in the West. However for emerging economies like India, Indonesia and many others I still think reliable nuclear power close to population centers is a far better plan. The actual investment required to get a modern MSR style (doesn't have to be thorium) is not actually that much. I would at least like to see nuclear get an actual shot at it. But I agree that af…

If we cannot afford nukes, how can they? If we cannot make them reliable and safe, how can you expect them to? Foisting nukes off on poorer, badly governed countries does people living there no favors. Nukes are farther from viable than ever before. Subsidizing them has become indefensible.

Good questions. One of the founders of ThorCon wrote a book (link to review[1]) about why we can't afford nuclear power (among other things), and it's not really anything to do with the essential cost of building a plant, it's a lot of regulations that don't really make sense and don't make anyone safer. I don't want to over-simplify regulation into the common "more vs less" scale -- some regulations make sense and others don't and you have to consider each one individually, but I think Devanney makes a good argument that the nuclear regulatory environment in the USA is pretty non-sensical and has cause far more harm than good by pushing investment back onto fossil fuels.

As for "if we cannot make them reliable and safe, how can you expect them to?" I think we can, and I think they can. There's a ton of detailed information about the ThorCon molten salt reactor designs and why they are safe, how they'd withstand e.g. a Fukushima-style event, etc.

[1] https://rootsofprogress.org/devanney-on-the-nuclear-flop

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#127

Post by scythe »

sofixa wrote: post #85
ncmncm wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Storage cost is plummeting even faster than solar or wind cost ever did. A renewable dollar is still better spent today on generating capacity, and will be for several more years, most places. Waiting, you get more storage for your money, and you then already have overcapacity to charge it from. Until the share of renewables approaches enough to destabilize the power grid, building out renewable generating capacity d…

> Storage cost is plummeting even faster than solar or wind cost ever did. About batteries, that's no longer true - lithium, nickel and cobalt prices have exploded in recent months. Furthermore they're impractical ( you need massive space, and then you have a giant fire hazard) and most importantly, needed elsewhere. EV adoption is already stifled by lack of sufficient supply of batteries, and heavy duty vehicles are…

>they're impractical ( you need massive space

This isn't even close to true. A lithium-ion battery can store roughly 1 megajoule per liter, which I'm going to use because it makes the math easier. (Other batteries are slightly less dense, but the correction factor is small). Total global energy consumption is around 1 exajoule per day. That's a trillion liters to store a day's worth of energy, or one billion cubic meters. Assuming you can stack batteries ten meters high -- which seems doable -- a battery farm to store a day's worth of energy for the whole world would take up about 100 million square meters, or 100 square kilometers, slightly smaller than San Francisco. That's less than the amount of space currently taken up by solar or wind farms.

Using zinc-bromine or other technologies will take up more space, but as you can see, a small reduction in energy density won't be that big of a deal.

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#128

Post by ncmncm »

NumberWangMan wrote: post #124
ncmncm wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Money is fungible. Each dollar spent on clean generation displaces some rate of CO2 exhaust. A dollar spent on renewables displaces much more than the same dollar spent on nukes. You cannot spend the same dollar on both. Thus, a dollar spent on nukes instead of renewables brings climate catastrophe nearer.

I think I take issue with both of your assertions: A dollar spent on renewables displaces much more than the same dollar spent on nukes -- this project is going to provide CO2-free power at 3 cents / kWh. It's in the same ballpark, but also, nuclear's main competition is coal and gas, as they all provide baseline power. Solar with storage can do that, but adding storage drives the cost up. And you cannot spend the sa…

Capital markets compete on a level field.

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#129

Post by waynecochran »

cinntaile wrote: post #16
waynecochran wrote: post #9

The fundamental flaw with wind power. Prosperous economies require reliable energy when needed, so power generation must be dispatchable on demand. Intermittent wind and solar source generators can temporarily supply low-cost electric power to the grid, but with a capacity factor of about 30%. This has created demand for redundant natural gas turbine generators to provide “back up” power when there is no wind or sun.…

Did you comment in the wrong thread? This has nothing to do with wind power, ThorCon uses a molten salt fission reactor.

My quote was directly from the article.

Re: ThorCon: Cheap, reliable, CO2-free electric power

#130

Post by scythe »

ncmncm wrote: post #125
scythe wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Reservoirs and pasture are places where siting solar is easy Reservoirs are deep, pastures are not relevant everywhere. Both approaches are essentially theoretical at this point due to the increased cost of construction vs. dedicated solar farms. >nowhere technical, and always political. You're forgetting "pragmatic". Lots of things are technically possible but not economically practical, at least not when you need…

Reservoirs have a surface. It costs no more to site solar in pasture than in desert. It can be cheaper; you don't need to buy the land if it remains equally useful for its current use, and may be nearer market, so not need long distance transmission. Furthermore, lower operating temperature improves efficiency, and shade improves grass yield and lowers water demand. That biggest current projects are in desert is a si…

>Reservoirs have a surface.

Are you suggesting floating solar panels? Surely you jest?

>It costs no more to site solar in pasture than in desert. It can be cheaper; you don't need to buy the land if it remains equally useful for its current use

You have to stop using it during construction. That's a cost. Nobody is actively using the desert. But more relevant to the original point, there are no areas of large, flat pasture in Appalachia.

Post reply on HN