Interestingly a year after fusion worked
Fusion has worked since 1952, just not in power plants.
First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
171–180 of 1001 posts
Re: First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
#172Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good point. Could it be that Georgia already generates a lot of power from its existing nuclear reactors, and has been doing that for a few decades?
I mean, all that data is also from when California and New York both had operational reactors. In 2013, CA generated 17 out of 200 GW from nuclear. GA generated 32/120 GW. NY generated 44/136GW. So at least in the case of New York, it generated more power from nuclear as a percentage than GA, and had higher electricity prices, so there doesn't seem to be a correlation. https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/state/ It p…
This is how your link describes deregulation in California:
"very limited and is conducted by a lottery system called DirectAcccess"
There was a semi-deregulation in 1996, but it was largely rolled back in 2001. So any price data post data 2001 should be bucketed in regulated.
Re: First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
#173Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nuclear power seems like a good option for non-military boats too, like container ships and oil tankers. It's already a very well proven maritime technology.
That was tried, nuclear reactors on civilian ships, and found to be a stupid idea. Too expensive and no real benefit over ship engines. By the way, tha vast majority of military ships and boats are not nuclear powered.
Isn't this "technically accurate", but also misleading? The list of ships (1) isn't that long, and almost all of them had random other issues that made using them as a 1:1 comparison not really that useful.
1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_marine_propulsion#Civi...
Re: First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
#174Earlier quoted context omitted.
One kilogram of uranium-235 (50 cm^3) can theoretically produce about 20 terajoules of energy. One square kilometer of solar panels can theoretically produce the same amount (as 50cm^3 U235) in a day. I'll take this bet. Edit: Tried to edit the edit but somehow deleted the rest of the edit. It was something to the tune of how a big problem with renewables is the fact that peak solar production does not match peak ene…
Nuclear is baseload and is the exact opposite of "instantly fired up". Best tech for that is gas or battery.
There is a line of reasoning that baseload is a billing and profit construction, an artifice of the needs of coal-fired and nuclear power.
There is nothing innately wrong with over building renewable and storage, and a transmission network.
It's an argument about economics, not physics.
Re: First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
#175Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would take that bet. Nuclear tech will also continue to improve.
Nuclear has only ever gotten more cost inefficient. What makes you think that will change?
Nuclear was cheaper when more of it was built [1]. Economies of scale make things cheaper. A production run of 40 steam generators is a lot cheaper than 4 steam generators.
Proponents of a primarily solar + wind grid are betting on a breakthrough in energy storage. If that breakthrough does not transpire, we'll either have to give up on stopping carbon emissions or use nuclear power.
1. https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Overnight-Construction-C...
Re: First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
#176Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would take that bet. Nuclear tech will also continue to improve.
For that to happen in the US, (1) we need to focus on more numerous, smaller modular reactors, (2) the NRC needs certification timeliness requirements forced on it (and more funding if there's an actual lack of resources), and (3) specific project requirements need to be frozen before construction (no more up-requiring mid-construction). Modular reactors are the solution to not having enough capital or a long enough…
> NRC needs certification timeliness requirements forced on it
That's going to be tough: What happens if the day comes and they don't yet know? They can't just approve it, so just deny it?
Re: First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
#177Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nuclear is baseload and is the exact opposite of "instantly fired up". Best tech for that is gas or battery.
Cant control rods can be lifted or inserted to meet demand?
> Cant control rods can be lifted or inserted to meet demand?
Thermally it is difficult to dial a reactor up and down. Generally the way nuclear power is modified is by not-sending the steam to generators through a by-pass and quenching their heat in some fashion.
So thermal generation stays at 100% (or whatever), but electrical generation output can be dropped.
Re: First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
#178Earlier quoted context omitted.
Damn, if only we didn't have to build them safely we could make them so cheaply.
Safety and bureaucracy are orthogonal. Bureaucracy is a slowing force, which is sold as being correlated with safety. The more layers of abstraction needlessly added, the more likely there will be systems engineering failures.
>more layers of abstraction needlessly added
I think you're betraying your bias here with the added term "needlessly". There is some (maybe even most) bureaucracy that is inefficiently applied, for sure. But it is meant to address some risk. Maybe it's a risk that you (personally) don't care about, or aren't even cognizant of, and that's when it becomes easy to declare it "needless." We should be looking to streamline our risk mitigation and align it with risks that the public cares about, not throw it out altogether.
Re: First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
#179Seems to me the people saying solar and battery only future do not live in areas that can be cloudy for multiple weeks. I didn’t run the math but I’m guessing it’s not feasible to build a battery pack large enough to ride out winter in some areas. The SF Bay Area, sure, but I suspect blackouts will be common in solar+battery only areas. A preferred solution would be a mix of both with nuclear handling disruptions due…
Batteries are not for riding out winter, they're for evening out the daily load. You have to overbuild renewables to handle seasonal variation, as well as make long-distance interconnects. Pumped hydro is also extremely interesting for obvious reasons. Nuclear as it exists today is not cost competitive. But that's mostly an artificial problem caused by regulation. Can we solve that without sacrificing safety? Can we…
You can't solve the variability of wind by overbuilding. Output can go down to <5% for more than a week several times a year. So the only way is storage. On a massive scale. Or having another source that makes sense to modulate. LNG is one (though carbon based).
Re: First new U.S. nuclear reactor since 2016 is now in operation
#180Earlier quoted context omitted.
When nuclear takes off in China but not the USA, we'll figure it out. But not until then.
Why hasn't nuclear taken off in China? I keep hearing that it's not cost effective anymore, to slow etc. but if it's actually mostly regulation that's hindering the built out (regardless of the risks) shouldn't China with their impressive portfolio of warpspeed megaprojects have been an ideal example of scaling the next generation of this tech?
prc is hedging their bets by building some new reactors, but it's not competitive with pv and wind (which they are building far more of), even at the dismal capacity factors they've achieved so far for reasons I'm unclear on (possibly a shortage of hvdc transmission capacity)