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Activists who embrace nuclear power

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Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#501

Post by macspoofing »

jlevers wrote: post #485
macspoofing wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for clarification. But don't you find it misleading to amortize panel power generation across day and night? It makes it seem like you just need more panels to cover power demand in the evening and night .. when in reality, no amount of panels will ever work.

I think that if you consider storage, then you can in fact amortize panel power generation across day and night, because you need more panels during the day to create the extra power that will be used at night (when none of the panels are actively generating power).

Then you have to over-build your infrastructure, not just for daily intermittency but also seasonal intermittency. So you have to add that to your calculation. But this point is moot anyway, because there is no battery technology that is capable of that much storage.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#502

Post by EricE »

stopping wrote: post #382
macspoofing wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There is a lot of empty land in the world that isn't useful for people to live in or to grow crops due to lack of rainfall, which also makes those sites more valuable for solar energy. There is no such thing as 'empty land'. Every square meter of Earth is part of some ecosystem that is under stress due to human activity. Solar and wind compound this problem. >then reduce that to 30 to account for night-time How abou…

>How about reduce that to 0 for night-time? No, GP is averaging out across the whole day. If you get 100W during daylight and 0W during night, you can average to 50W for an entire 24-hour period. GP took 30W as a conservative estimate, which is entirely reasonable.

Where are you getting sufficient batteries in sufficient quantities to store that theoretical 50% overnight?

And on top of that were are you getting the additional batteries to provide extra capacities for when the sun is shining at less than 100% of optimal?

And then where are you getting all the materials for those batteries? And what are you doing with all the waste from those batteries once they end their serviceable lifespan?

If you seriously are concerned about the latent costs with nuclear power plants then you should do more than gloss over the storage issues with solar.

And many of your concerns about nuclear fall apart if you don't assume we would continue to build reactors with the issues you point out. There are new designs like micro molten salt reactors that address in pretty signifiant ways the concerns you note. A lot fewer construction materials, greatly simplified designs and designs that don't rely on active cooling to prevent a meltdown. Designs that if the reactor systems are interrupted, the reactors coast to a shutdown naturally.

It's not science fiction - its proven technology we've had since the 50's that was refined in the 70's but squashed because of politics and fear mongering.

Maybe after China starts eating our lunch we'll take it seriously? Ha - probably not even then, unfortunately.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#503

Post by EricE »

runarberg wrote: post #297
macspoofing wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There are plenty of sites that would happily accept more nuclear being built, but all other forms of energy have undercut the cost of nuclear. Honestly ... it isn't just about cost. Nuclear is expensive but it isn't prohibitively expensive. The big picture is we know that nuclear can power an economy, it does not emit global warming gasses, and also places a tiny footprint on the surrounding ecosystem. Solar and win…

It’s disingenuous to factor in mining requirement for solar panels but not uranium. Sure the supply chain to support the infrastructure required for 10 billion people is a lot on the environment, and we certainly could do a lot better. But these include better recycling of existing minerals (this includes solar panels), better forest management, better land use for food production, more careful road design that doesn…

We have plenty of nuclear "waste" ripe for burning if we would get politics and fear out of the way.

No need to mine or bury it. Burn it!

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#504

Post by afiori »

godelski wrote: post #497
runarberg wrote: post #449

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I get defensive when people pit nuclear as a solution to the climate disaster because I am skeptical that it is. And worse I think considering nuclear as a solution to be harmful to the effort to combat the climate emergency. It reminds me of how people would pit GMO as a solution for world hunger, when better food distribution is a better solution; or when people pit self driving cars to combat traffic co…

> It reminds me of how people would pit GMO as a solution for world hunger You lost me here. How is this not? Because Monsanto is a bad company? GMOs can be good and Monsanto can be bad at the same time. Also I stressed a lot in my comment that you don't have to use nuclear, just don't take it off the table. My comment complaining about how people are saying "only nuclear" vs "only renewables" is being replied to as…

GP was not saying that proponents of nuclear are arguing for "only-nuclear" but that arguing in favour of nuclear might be a net negative in the progress against fossil fuel.

This happens everywhere, every movement needs to be both diverse (to avoid being too close minded to the complexity of the problem at hand) and focused (to avoid wasting efforts in pipe dreams). You and GP disagree on where to apply the cut off line of this separation.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#505

Post by EricE »

epistasis wrote: post #432
mlyle wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Edit: ... Most parts of a nuclear power plant aren’t easy to recycle either, A nuclear power plant is compact compared to the energy produced, and has an exceptionally long lifetime in comparison to current "renewables". The components of a solar panel are individually recyclable, but that doesn't mean that anyone has really figured out how to recycle the actual finished panels in any kind of significant energy/res…

Nuclear power plants are absolutely massive , and don't have big wins when it comes to the amount of material needed versus, say, solar. Here's a presentation touting the AP1000, which needs ~5x less concrete than Sizewell B's design (slide 11): https://web.archive.org/web/20110722031413/http://www.nuclea... At 2500kg/m^3 of concrete, and excluding the rebar, that's roughly 4.5W/kg of material. For Sizewell B, than's…

Nuclear power plants built in the past were massive.

That doesn't mean we have to still build them. Technology marches on - we have improved designs. Micro-reactors solve a lot of issues - including transmission loss/electrical grid fragility/diversification of generation.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#506

Post by EricE »

jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #285
macspoofing wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There are plenty of sites that would happily accept more nuclear being built, but all other forms of energy have undercut the cost of nuclear. Honestly ... it isn't just about cost. Nuclear is expensive but it isn't prohibitively expensive. The big picture is we know that nuclear can power an economy, it does not emit global warming gasses, and also places a tiny footprint on the surrounding ecosystem. Solar and win…

You are vastly overstating the mineral requirements. Wind power can share land with other uses. There is a staggering amount of land out there that's not suitable for even grazing but will support utility scale solar.

>There is a staggering amount of land out there that's not suitable for even grazing but will support utility scale solar.

yes, but how much of that land is also near where the energy is needed??

Transmission loss is a thing. Also how are you handling the whole "sun doesn't shine at night" thing? We still have no economical ways of storing vast quantities of electrical energy.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#507

Post by EricE »

kragen wrote: post #363
brmgb wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People have done the math. Land availability is not a bottleneck on this. I'm sorry but people have done the maths and consider land availability to be a major bottleneck for solar and wind (with the fact that it is intermittent). That's like one of the first point put forward in the Bill Gates'book everyone seems to be talking about nowadays. Offshore capacity means it's harder to estimate the ceiling for wind pro…

I don't understand why people are screaming at each other to do the math, or referring to others who have hypothetically done the math, or accusing each other of lying, or claiming that solar panels are made out of rare earth elements (!!), instead of just doing the math themselves here in the comments. It's almost as if they're more interested in being vicious to one another than in finding out the truth. World mark…

Transmission loss? How are you getting the power generated from "empty" land to where it's actually needed?

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#508

Post by EricE »

kragen wrote: post #493
macspoofing wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>or claiming that solar panels are made out of rare earth elements (!!) I responded to so many messages and I tried my best to always refer to 'solar and wind' in tandem (because without wind as a kind of a complement, solar is completely not feasible), and the one message where I got sloppy and referenced only solar panel with a passing reference to 'rare earth minerals' and that's the only aspect that is picked up.…

(2/2) > That is an insane amount of land If any of Texas, Thailand, or Botswana can singlehandedly power the entire planet's marketed energy consumption, which is what that "insane amount of land" adds up to, there's no land shortage for solar. > If you're covering an area of 550 thousand km² with panels, there is an equivalent volume that you need to dig up somewhere else 550 thousand km² times "40 pounds" per m² is…

>One of the factors in Peabody's problems is that in the Southwest of the USA, where some of their major customers are, continuing to operate already built coal power plants like the San Juan Generating Plant and the now-defunct Navajo Generating Station is no longer economic; solar energy has driven down prices (averaging US$26.58/MWh at the Palo Verde trading hub in 02019 according to this article) well below the coal plants' operating expenses (for example, US$44.90/MWh at the San Juan Generating Plant).

And thank you for providing the context for CA's rolling blackouts.

Drive base load generation off the market for the current darling "renewables", then when the renewables that ARE NOT predictable or consistent do the inevitable and fluctuate, the base load plants are no longer available to fill the gap.

I'd be right there with you celebrating the solar win if solar was able to 100% replace the functionality of those plants. But it can't!

Eliminate the plants but don't replace the functionality and what do you get? Rolling blackouts. A common occurrence in CA. Why visit the 3rd wold when you can just bring it home?!?

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#509

Post by EricE »

kragen wrote: post #492
macspoofing wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>or claiming that solar panels are made out of rare earth elements (!!) I responded to so many messages and I tried my best to always refer to 'solar and wind' in tandem (because without wind as a kind of a complement, solar is completely not feasible), and the one message where I got sloppy and referenced only solar panel with a passing reference to 'rare earth minerals' and that's the only aspect that is picked up.…

(1/2) > without wind as a kind of a complement, solar is completely not feasible This is not correct, and there is no reason to even suspect it might be true. > the one message where I got sloppy and referenced only solar panel[sic] with a passing reference to 'rare earth minerals' It wasn't a passing reference; it accounted for the vast majority (99.9% to 99.99%) of the resource and environmental impact you attribut…

>You may need to store energy to bridge daily intermittency,

And the greatest intermittency is nighttime. Happens every day. Chemical batteries are not cost effective even if we had the resources.

But sure, continue to just hand wave that off.

Re: Activists who embrace nuclear power

#510

Post by EricE »

cycomanic wrote: post #342
macspoofing wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There are plenty of sites that would happily accept more nuclear being built, but all other forms of energy have undercut the cost of nuclear. Honestly ... it isn't just about cost. Nuclear is expensive but it isn't prohibitively expensive. The big picture is we know that nuclear can power an economy, it does not emit global warming gasses, and also places a tiny footprint on the surrounding ecosystem. Solar and win…

>>There are plenty of sites that would happily accept more nuclear being built, but all other forms of energy have undercut the cost of nuclear. >Honestly ... it isn't just about cost. Nuclear is expensive but it isn't prohibitively expensive. The big picture is we know that nuclear can power an economy, it does not emit global warming gasses, and also places a tiny footprint on the surrounding ecosystem. What do you…

>So you're including mining for solar/wind but not nuclear?

We have hundreds of years of "waste" that could be burned before we would ever need to mine anything. Only thing stopping it is a gross combination of politics and fear :p

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