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Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

nationalinterest.org

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Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#131

Post by bottlepalm »

kulahan wrote: post #15
bitwize wrote: post #7

Renewables are cheap and far less risk-prone. Not going all in on renewables is a footgun for industrial societies.

Renewables are absolutely not less risk-prone. Per kw generated, nuclear energy is the safest and it's not even kinda close. Renewables also cannot output a steady amount of energy. Maybe there's a massive drought upstream. Maybe there's no wind today. Maybe it's a cloudy day. Nuclear is THE ONLY SOLUTION. We would need such a hilarious, painful amount of renewable energy sources just to survive, let alone thrive. Or…

Renewables aren't going to fail in a way that makes an entire city uninhabitable for decades.

If you want proof that renewables are the solution, look at California's power supply for yesterday. Just 2x the wind/solar/batteries of what's installed now could easily replace all fossil fuel and nuclear.

https://www.caiso.com/TodaysOutlook/Pages/supply.html

Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#132

Post by mdp2021 »

runarberg wrote: post #54
Krasnol wrote: post #4

The authors profile is even more hilarious than the article: https://nationalinterest.org/profile/todd-royal

Some relevant quotes from the same author: > The United States under a Biden administration, similar to the British, would move towards an unsustainable, and national security risk by eliminating fossil fuels, and killing people who need electricity and global security the West provides. > The weather and climate are dynamic and ever-changing. Thus, this hysteria is a giant ploy to deprive people of freedom and liber…

> Googling the author

It is at the bottom of the page, explicit.

> Todd Royal is the Senior Project Analyst for E4 Carolinas, a non-profit energy advocacy firm located in Charlotte, North Carolina, where he is working on a three-year grant for the U.S. Department of Commerce's Economic Development Administration focusing on a value chain study for the advanced nuclear technology sector (Generation IV reactors, SMRs, and advanced reactors). Todd lives outside of Dallas, Texas

Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#133

Post by formerly_proven »

polishdude20 wrote: post #84
illiarian wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- "one of the plant regularly leaks radioactive material" - "Look for the Tricastin plant I don't know enough to answer precisely but it has leaked recently and a few years ago. Of course it doesn't leak uranium" So, your original statement was an untruth. Or "alternative facts" > of micro-breaches caused by maintenance decades ago. That's actually a sign of proper management, but a counter-argument to reliability. S…

This thread is a great example of how the meanings of words can be taken differently by different people. "Unreliable" is less of a description and more of a flag. Either it is or isn't. But the original commenter's threshold for unreliable = true is much much lower than most people's as illuminated in this discussion. It seems like this is a daily occurrence online and in person.

I'm guessing "micro breaches" refers to hydrogen-induced cracks. Media likes to talk about it in bigly, threatening terms such as "THOUSANDS OF CRACKS FOUND IN REACTOR VESSEL" - of course anyone with half a brain starts to wonder "aren't these PWRs?". Much like people like to write headlines such as "HUNDREDS OF NUCLEAR INCIDENTS AT NPP XYZ", where "nuclear incident" means "reported event", which includes such dramatic incidents as "a backup valve in some secondary circuit had to be replaced because it was stuck" or "a bird flew into the transformer, tripping protection and taking a block offline".

Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#134

Post by ben_w »

illiarian wrote: post #63
ben_w wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> nuclear infrastructure projects were over budget by 49% on average, Ahem.

Let me fix that quote for you: "Almost three-quarters of hydropower, water, coal and nuclear infrastructure projects were over budget by 49% on average,". ALL OF THEM. Not just nuclear.

You're the one promoting nuclear as if it's better than the rest in this regard.

Nuclear is… just another mega project, just like the rest.

You don't get to use that quote to say everything else is more expense when it's everything including your darling.

Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#135

Post by 7952 »

illiarian wrote: post #41
Krasnol wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wind alone produces ~20% of the recent years electricity in Germany. Nuclear produced only half of that in recent years. The whole renewable energy production covers ~40% of all the energy produced. Despite 16 years of almost full stop of expansion. https://www.destatis.de/DE/Themen/Branchen-Unternehmen/Energ...

> Wind alone produces ~20% of the recent years electricity in Germany. Yearly production means nothing on the night when it produces single-digit percentages of its installed capacity, does it?

Yes absolutely, if the goal is co2 reduction.

Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#136

Post by zackees »

haweemwho wrote: post #81

> Only nuclear power is carbon-free [...] You can stop reading right there as this immediately identifies this piece as disingenuous at best, more likely though propaganda. The whole process is definitely not "carbon-free". Uranium extraction, transport and processing produce emissions. Building the plants and maintaining them does. Eventually demolishing does. Transporting the used fuel as well as building and maint…

The same thing can be said of solar panels and wind turbines.

The truth is that the once the power plant is built it generates clean power for decades. That power can then be used to power things like building new power plants.

Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#137

Post by llsf »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #97
illiarian wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> nuclear plants are very unreliable You mean, they are the most reliable base load and load-following power sources we know. > References are easy to find if you want confirmation It's just as easy to find confirmation that all the problems you listed are the result of neglect and politics of the past 20-30 years. > it has to be done properly and safely, which is certainly not the case around here. As in: France has…

Nuclear proponents when trying to sell nuclear love to shout about how successful France is. Someone from France is telling you that actually, it's really not that great...and now France's nuclear program is terrible and the result of 20-30 years of neglect and politics? Also, which part of "nuclear plants are sensitive to environmental changes" didn't you get? If there's no cooling water, or the water is too hot, th…

Yes, intermittent (sun/wind) only could work with enough storage. Do you know if/when we could get enough safe storage ? My understanding is batteries is not possible at the scale we would need. Pumping water where it is possible would be nice, but not sure if it would be enough. Do we know the storage capacity than US for instance would need, if only using solar and wind ?

Note that the cooling argument would be the same for coal or gas power plant. They work the same way. So, until enough storage is in place, we might need some base production, and it would require access to cold source (river or ocean). France had to reduce the activity of some nuclear power plants last summer because they have rules when it comes to river temperature. The next 8 reactors that France is planning to build would likely be build on the ocean's shore for that reason.

The cost of nuclear electricity is mostly impacted by the cost of money. That is why the cost of electricity from a UK nuclear power plant is more expensive than from France nuclear power plant. The UK used private capital (higher interest) when France use gov funds (lower interest). It is correct that it takes time to build a plant, and it requires expertise. But it is also true that a power plant can run for decades (US and France pushing to 80 years) as anything in a plant can be upgraded over time (except the pool).

Until there is an efficient storage technology that can be deployed at large scale, we might need to run some nuclear power plants. No idea for how long ?

Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#138

Post by throwbadubadu »

MikeCapone wrote: post #117
eric-burel wrote: post #12

As a French not expert in the matter but living near nuclear plants: - one of the plant regularly leaks radioactive material - rivers are getting too hot to cool down nuclear plants correctly - nuclear plants are very unreliable, we almost got out of power this winter and next winter will be equally tough (only an abnormally hot winter avoid cuts...) - the government wants to simplify control organism and laws around…

France has been mismanaging its fleet and signally for years that they want to move away from it, under-investing in it, etc. It's not the technology's fault. Germany had some of the best managed plants in the world -- until they decided to shut them down, leading to more coal being burned and more dependence on other countries like Russia...

Did you had a look at what Europe didn't stop importing from Russia due to lacking alternatives... cough cough.

I also don't get how an article can claim a global solution if nuclear currently is at 10% and we cannot keep up with supply and plants and and and.. this wont scale to 100%, not even 50 or even 20% of future global needs, would deplete cheap enough enable resources too quick... and what also is always forgotten: our world will likely have more, not less conflicts, unfortunately. Have fun managing this plants with wars all around and rivers going empty.

Yeah yeah all the issues happening and brought up again is just stupid people, mismanagement, etcetc.. But that unfortunately is humanity :/

Just no :/ especially as there are good enough and more sustainable other alternatives.

> Germany had some of the best managed plant

Better than France, likely agrees.. but still awful and that sentence is a joke. If that is your bar, good night. German infrastructure is currently rotting at record pace, happy we got those plants out there.

Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#139

Post by matsemann »

cschwarm wrote: post #25

Question(s) to the nuclear supporters here: 1. Are you talking about global electricity? Or just the West? 2. How much nuclear power do you want? 20%, 50%, 70%, or 100%? Or something else? 3. What nuclear technology? Traditional, Molten Salt, SMRs, or something else? 4. What institutional setting do you image for your nuclear power plants? Private ownership, or nationalized plants like in France? Just curious...

Most of them don't really want nuclear, they just push it as an excuse to do nothing right now (at least here in Norway). Yes, more nuclear is probably good. But planning, permissions, building and getting a reactor up and running probably is 15+ years most places. We need power before then. So we can't stop building wind farms, solar etc. in the meantime. Which is really what they want to achieve where I live: avoid wind farms, so grasping at everything.

Re: Nuclear Power Is the Answer to Global and Environmental Energy Woes

#140

Post by bumby »

7952 wrote: post #124
illiarian wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> nuclear plants are very unreliable You mean, they are the most reliable base load and load-following power sources we know. > References are easy to find if you want confirmation It's just as easy to find confirmation that all the problems you listed are the result of neglect and politics of the past 20-30 years. > it has to be done properly and safely, which is certainly not the case around here. As in: France has…

Blaming things on neglect or politics just isn't useful. We need power sources that have some resilience to those things.

Exactly. Humans are part of the system, so human factors matter to reliability.
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