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Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

building.co.uk

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Re: Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

#41

Post by davedx »

dageshi wrote: post #17
anovikov wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is storage for that, which is now finally, available, inexpensive and safe. Plus, it's long since proven that with moderate losses, renewable electricity system that combines solar, wind, and hydro, does not need any storage at all, or very moderate amounts of storage to achieve no or almost no losses.

Is there? What storage?

https://www.energy-storage.news/massive-growth-potential-con...

> The energy storage market in the UK is currently experiencing substantial growth, as evidenced by the current operational capacity of 4.6GW/5.9GWh, projected to increase to 7.4GW/11.6GWh by the end of 2024.

Re: Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

#42

Post by davedx »

lupusreal wrote: post #30
anovikov wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is storage for that, which is now finally, available, inexpensive and safe. Plus, it's long since proven that with moderate losses, renewable electricity system that combines solar, wind, and hydro, does not need any storage at all, or very moderate amounts of storage to achieve no or almost no losses.

> There is storage for that There literally isn't, it doesn't exist.

https://www.energy-storage.news/massive-growth-potential-con...

> current operational capacity of 4.6GW/5.9GWh

Perhaps do some research before you speak of things you have no idea about

Re: Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

#43

Post by pfdietz »

chickenbig wrote: post #29
defrost wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each phase will have an installed generation capacity of 1.2GW and represents a multi-billion pound investment. Combined, they will have an installed capacity of 3.6GW and will be capable of powering up to 6 million homes annually. ~ https://doggerbank.com/ Sounds about right in scale .. how many homes in the UK in total?

The obligatory "what's the capacity factor" discussion should happen here; 40% to 50% might be reasonable, with highly correlated availability. Additionally the wind farm requires backup (CCGT or OCGT), which cost money to sit there. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6556027d046ed... (take it with a pinch of salt) gives a figure of £80/kW/year for an H class CCGT; that's £250M/year (2015 prices). Another…

The capex per watt of gas backup is vastly lower than a nuclear plant. Like, by a factor of 10 to 20.

Re: Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

#44

Post by pfdietz »

ben_w wrote: post #35
defrost wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each phase will have an installed generation capacity of 1.2GW and represents a multi-billion pound investment. Combined, they will have an installed capacity of 3.6GW and will be capable of powering up to 6 million homes annually. ~ https://doggerbank.com/ Sounds about right in scale .. how many homes in the UK in total?

> installed capacity of 3.6GW I'm not aware what the capacity factor for wind is in the north sea, I think it's about 25% globally. > how many homes in the UK in total? About 25 million. (But also: ongoing political issue is that this isn't enough and housing is too exaggerated vs. vested interests in housing being expensive).

25% would be for onshore wind. I've seen claims as high as 69% for very large offshore wind turbines.

Re: Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

#45

Post by rapnie »

myrmidon wrote: post #37
blitzar wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dogger Bank Wind Farm

Thats a very good comparison-- to be fair though, 3.2GW nuclear are comparable to pretty much the whole Dogger Bank (including Sofia/South) at ~8GW (nameplate power), because offshore capacity factor is about ~40% in the UK. Total cost for the wind farm is probably around 20-ish billion $, but the lifetime is likely shorter than the reactor (possibly less than half!). It's surprising to me that the reactor at $35bill…

Does the $35billion also include decommissioning the nuclear reactor and storing the nuclear waste for the duration at which it is considered harmful? If not, then what amount are we talking approximately if that was accounted for as well?

Re: Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

#46

Post by pfdietz »

davedx wrote: post #36
griffzhowl wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OTOH if I understand it right the French "taxpayer", i.e. govt, will be the beneficiary of the above-market price for electricity produced by the plant that the UK has guaranteed, presumably for the lifespan of the plant, which is 60 years. So I presume that will be a net gain for France, otherwise there would be no sense in continuing with the project.

Weren’t those agreements made way back before the giant cost overuns?

Yes. Huge mistake for France, that.

Fixed price contracts in the nuclear industry have rarely if ever worked out well for the suppliers. Contrast this with renewables which typically come in within 10% of the contracted price.

Re: Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

#48

Post by phkamp »

anovikov wrote: post #11

It will produce annually, about as much electricity as UK produces now from solar. Which is installed at a much faster clip than these two sad reactors are built, even if UK is one of the worst countries for solar in the civilised world due to expensive land and terrible weather. What's even the point? Maybe this reactor is a live testament to the observation that "any new nuclear starting construction today will be…

One of the points is that if you have a nuclear powered navy, there needs to be a career path for disembarking reactor-techs.

This is in no small part the reason why the countries with nuclear powered navies are most eager to build new nuclear power reactors.

Re: Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

#49

Post by Moldoteck »

davedx wrote: post #41
dageshi wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there? What storage?

https://www.energy-storage.news/massive-growth-potential-con... > The energy storage market in the UK is currently experiencing substantial growth, as evidenced by the current operational capacity of 4.6GW/5.9GWh, projected to increase to 7.4GW/11.6GWh by the end of 2024.

"4.6GW" - that means that after 1h the 4.6GW are gone?

Re: Hinkley Point C: Building Britain's first nuclear reactor in 30 years

#50

Post by jillesvangurp »

The budget overruns are predictable. To the point where you can confidently predict that neither year nor the budget will stay as they are currently predicting. Honestly, it sounds more like wishful thinking at this point. I would say late 2030s at probably > 40 billion is realistic. They'll find a way to make it worse. Maybe they'll get lucky and only overrun only a few billion. Every year it overruns will cost billions.

The reasons listed in the article dance around the real underlying reasons and causes which relate to nuclear plants being a once in a generation kind of thing at this point. Most of the people executing these projects are on their first nuclear project. And they have to re-learn a lot of the things that make these projects complicated. There is no learning effect between projects. And in so far there is, it seems to be a negative one. And by the time they are done, there's a new generation that needs to build the next one.

The timescale doesn't help either because lots of things change and assumptions get broken. For example the relationship with China looks a lot less cozy than it did ten years ago. And that might change substantially again in the next ten. So them being a major partner in this project complicates things. In the same way, the relationship with Russia changed so relying on them for supplying the fuel rods might not be as good as an idea as it was back when Finland started planning its plant (the predecessor to this one). It's hard to predict these things on a multi decade scale. So, we're talking major changes with suppliers, project participants, and probably technology as well. And the competition.

The reason renewables are running circles around everything else is because planning cycles are short (Hinkley point C is about 3.4 GW of energy. Not nothing. But the UK has added a multitude in wind and solar since planning started and will add another multitude of energy by its completion (whenever that is). It's not even going to be close. Coal had a major market share when planning started (more than nuclear). The last coal plant in the UK closed last month. By the time this nuclear plant opens that will be ancient history and most of the grid in the UK will be wind, solar, batteries, imported power from abroad (cables), and a few gas plants. The good news would be getting rid of those remaining gas plants.

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