Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation? • Hacker News Board

Re: Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

#611

Post by AtlasBarfed » Sun, Oct 04, 2020, 6:45 PM UTC

Aachen wrote: post #336

AtlasBarfed wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10 years ago? It's 2020, wind/solar have dropped by significant percentages every year since then. Wind/solar are cheaper (LCOE) than everything except natural gas, which it is on parity with right now, and shortly will pass even for installed generation (meaning it will be worth it for electric companies to invest in replacing the natural gas generators)

Yes renewables have gotten cheaper but nuclear isn't outlandishly expensive either. If it doesn't match expectations and the price doesn't significantly drop further from today (seems unlikely), going nuclear would be a good decision. If renewable continues to drop, we have a bit more expensive power depending on the percentage of nuclear to renewable power. However, if we don't build nuclear, I'm really not sure how…

I'm a very enthusiastic LFTR stan that wondered why we weren't full on into Thorium reactor research at the beginning of the Obama administration.

But wind/solar have just changed the face of energy generation.

I agree that in theory, nuclear can provide cheap and plentiful energy in a large number of applications. But in practice it has not, and the regulatory structures and entrenched interests (fuel rod reprocessor companies, US military wanting weapons grade isotopes, NIMBY) simply make it really really hard to do a new reactor.

I think small scale reactors that fit in a shipping container or pallet box is what should be pursued. A "disposable" reactor that can simply be sent back for recycling is the way to go.

As someone else has noted, a new nuclear project is a five year lead time. Look at the improvement curves in solar/wind EROEI / LCOE. Five years will be another annualized 10-20% savings in panels / rotors / batteries. Nuclear won't be able to compete.

When the main curves for solar / wind finally stabilize, then nuclear can probably target something that might be competitive.

Re: Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

#612

Post by Lutzb » Mon, Oct 05, 2020, 3:03 PM UTC

BjoernKW wrote: post #240

Lutzb wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Germany the concept of "Ewigkeitskosten" ist factored in for coal and nuclear.

The concept exists but it’s not exactly transparent how those costs translate into actual energy prices because coal mining has been heavily subsidised. There are estimates, however, saying that those costs will exceed the overall benefits in the next few years, i.e. in the end it‘ll have been a negative-sum game.

I am sure that you are right. Factoring _all_ costs is near impossible and as such the Ewigkeitskosten will not cover all the environmental impact ever.

What I meant is, that there is a concept to factor in such costs at all. Is it "complete" - surely not. Is it at least a concept that could be applied when talking about incurring costs for future generations? IMHO absolutely.

Re: Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

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Post by Lutzb » Mon, Oct 05, 2020, 3:04 PM UTC

adrianN wrote: post #268

Lutzb wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Germany the concept of "Ewigkeitskosten" ist factored in for coal and nuclear.

That is a fairly bold claim. There are laws around it, but it's far from clear whether all the costs are accounted for. There is for example continuous conflict over flooding old mines. That saves a lot of money, but it also risks contaminating ground water with e.g. PCBs.

Sorry, my comment was not meant to imply that _all_ future costs are covered by this. Just that there is a concept to factor in costs that would impact future generations.

This amount factored in will always be political in nature.

Re: Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

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Post by dv_dt » Tue, Oct 06, 2020, 8:02 PM UTC

VBprogrammer wrote: post #583

dv_dt wrote: post #558

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Until it gets too hot and they have to ironically shut down the plants during heat waves.

The same would be true of any thermoelectric power station. They all need cooling of the condenser.

But not true of photovoltaic or wind power stations...

Re: Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

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Post by pfdietz » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 10:42 AM UTC

johnmorrison wrote: post #609

pfdietz wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear is possibly cheaper if your power plant was gifted to you by the Nuclear Fairy. If you have to pay to have it built, and then service the debt, not so much.

They're extremely cheap to build by LCOE if you take away the extra regulatatory fees. Fission has several orders of magnitude less levelized material throughput per unit power than any other source of electricity. If the world got to the point where corporations could successfully scale up mass production of reactors, this could drop by a further order or two of magnitude.

Regulatory fees? Nonsense. You mean cost of work required by regulation? Tell me how we make NPPs safe without regulation, or how we find sufficiently omniscient Regulator Philosopher Kings who can tell the necessary from unnecessary regulations beforehand.

Re: Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

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Post by moneytide1 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 7:41 PM UTC

Manfredo_1 wrote: post #220

moneytide1 wrote: post #184

"Just Have A Think" put out a video about geothermal energy today. Iceland and California both have large faults they use for short distance access (3km) to the >200 Celsius available at an average depth of ~40km everywhere else in the world. I'm not sure of the implications of drilling that deep, but since horizontal drilling is required for steam return - could it ever be an avenue down which to deploy drilling ass…

The problem with geothermal power is that it's only feasible in a few areas. California already generates about 5% of its electricity from geothermal power: https://ww2.energy.ca.gov/almanac/renewables_data/geothermal... .

Yeah because of the fault line bringing mantle temperature closer. I think they have drilled 3km to tap into this heat, whereas the deepest hole ever dug so far is in Russia at a depth of around 10km (small diameter). Drilling was limited at this distance because of increasing heat.

If we could figure out how to drill a large enough hole at those ~43km crust lengths, wouldn't tectonic activity shift shafts out of alignment?

Metallurgy, abrasives, and durable gearing are to conventional drills (Howard Hughes Sr) as perhaps focused optics would be to future drilling as depicted in lots of sci fi. Either way - tunneling itself is so much the challenge as would be removing the aggregate.

How hilarious would it be to have drilled so far deep vertically to access the mantle that you'd have to use rockets to remove the ore. Space elevator/launch concept also has massive material penalty.

Re: Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

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Post by Manfredo_1 » Sat, Oct 10, 2020, 6:56 AM UTC

reitzensteinm wrote: post #574

Manfredo_1 wrote: post #573

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup, the price of oil was a steady $20/barrel from 1880 through the 1960s. Now it's $100/barrel. Now imagine what is going to happen if the demand for batteries increases one thousand fold (which is what is necessary to make grid storage possible) over the course of a decade or two.

But you said it increased! It did not. So why will scaling up battery demand a thousand fold over the course of a decade or two make it explode in price, but scaling up nuclear plant construction five hundred fold (from two to a thousand) not do the same? You are putting your thumb on the scales. I think we're done here.

Price is a function of supply and demand. Demand for oil was largely flat for most of the period from 1900 to 1970. It took 15 years to double from 1925 to 1940 [1]. And then another 10 years to double by 1950. It increased by a factor of 5 from 1960 to 1970, but in 1970 demand finally caught up with supply. And guess what? The price surged to over $100 a barrel.

Understand that even just 1 hour of energy storage for the US exceeds global battery production. If we try to use batteries for gird storage we're going to experience a battery shock in the same vein as the oil shock. That'll be terrible, because it will stunt electric vehicle adoption. There are much better uses for batteries than grid storage.

We're both putting our thumb on the scale: You're claiming that we're going to see a 10x decrease in battery cost, despite surging demand for batteries. I'm explaining that nuclear built at scale will likely cost 4-5x less than current nuclear projects.

The difference is I have historical precedence to justify this statement. We did build nuclear at a much larger scale during the 1970s, and it did cost 4-5x less on average.

Will battery production scale up like oil production did over the course of 1900 to 1970? Maybe, but that's an entirely speculative claim. The reality is that if countries start attempting to purchase grid scale batteries, we're going to experience a battery shock in the same vein as the oil shock following the Arab oil embargo. If the US tries the purchase 1 hour worth of battery storage the price for that amount of batteries is infinite. Or undefined. Because 1 hour of battery storage for the US is greater the the total amount of battery production in the entire world. The mismatch between supply and demand is that large.

Increase in demand, leads to an increase in cost, which in turn incentivizes increased production. The production of batteries is forecasted to increase substantially, but it's still well below what's required for grid storage.

1. https://www.researchgate.net/figure/World-crude-oil-producti...

Re: Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

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Post by swilliamsio » Sat, Oct 10, 2020, 10:58 AM UTC

de_watcher wrote: post #486

swilliamsio wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Western as in democratic, high income, economically prosperous, broadly supportive of human rights, etc.

Another chilling moment when I realise that I'm way too old and can perceive slow changes of things (like the meanings of words). Please don't do that.

I highly doubt you are old enough that western did not always have that meaning for the majority of your life. It's a holdover from the Cold War, after all.

Re: Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

#619

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Oct 11, 2020, 1:16 AM UTC

adrianN wrote: post #577

Manfredo_1 wrote: post #546

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're making yourself perfectly clear, you're just wrong about the claim that smart grids will improve heating: * With my normal thermostat I set my home to be heated to 68 degrees Fahrenheit. When it falls below 68 degrees it gets heated. * With a smart thermostat I set my home to be heated to 68 degrees. When it falls below that, it gets heated. There is zero difference between the behavior of a "smart" thermostat…

No you don't understand. The power company can heat your home warmer than 68°F when the electricity is plentiful so that it can wait longer with heating when the electricity is scare.

[deleted]