Can Any Country Achieve Net Zero Without Nuclear?

[bhobba]

...and replaced it with natural gas plants killing roughly 45 New Yorkers per year, not including the potential global warming impacts to a city with a network of road and subway tunnels a hundred feet below sea level.

Yes. I think gas generator backup (or nuclear) is necessary to ensure the grid is 100% reliable, but it is rarely used. Of course, nuclear could be used all the time. As you said, 99.5% is as good as 100%, but people don't like blackouts even .5% of the time. Every time we have one, the shite hits the fan.

Thanks
Bill

 

[gmax137]

Google says that Australians use about the energy equivalent of about 5500 kg of oil per year. It also tells me that oil is about 12 kWhr per kg. So an Australian needs roughly 66,000 kWhr of energy per year.

Can you provide a link or source for this? It is not clear to me what is included here. 66,000 kW-hr per year is an average of about 7.5 kW (66000/365/24) per Aussie. US home electric use is ~0.75 kW per dwelling. So there's a lot more in that 66,000 than just that. What's included and what conversion efficiency is assumed?

So it takes a fairly large reservoir to hold a decent amount of energy. The cost is pretty low though. Some concrete reservoir construction on a mountain, and some pipes and pumps/generators.

I think you are trivializing the effort required. Take a look at TVA's Raccoon Mt facility.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raccoon_Mountain_Pumped-Storage_Plant
Completed in 1978 at a cost of $310 million (USD). That's around $1.5 billion today. Not a low cost project, considering it is a "battery," it doesn't generate power.

TVA is looking to build another similar facility. You can't put these things just anywhere, the topography is key to success.

 

[votingmachine]

Can you provide a link or source for this? It is not clear to me what is included here. 66,000 kW-hr per year is an average of about 7.5 kW (66000/365/24) per Aussie. US home electric use is ~0.75 kW per dwelling. So there's a lot more in that 66,000 than just that. What's included and what conversion efficiency is assumed?I think you are trivializing the effort required. Take a look at TVA's Raccoon Mt facility.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raccoon_Mountain_Pumped-Storage_Plant
Completed in 1978 at a cost of $310 million (USD). That's around $1.5 billion today. Not a low cost project, considering it is a "battery," it doesn't generate power.

TVA is looking to build another similar facility. You can't put these things just anywhere, the topography is key to success.

I assume the per capita energy use includes industrial and commercial use, which dwarf home use.
I googled: australia per capita energy consumption
The "answer" in my search results is putatively from the World Bank. (5,483.82 kg of oil equivalent (2015)).

Commercial power use HAS to be included in any National energy consideration. I also assume transportation is included. Anyone driving knows they use a LOT of liters of refined gasoline per year.

I don't know the efficiency ... I simply googled. Here is a new google result: https://www.unitconverters.net/energy/fuel-oil-equivalent-kiloliter-to-kilowatt-hour.htm

I'm not trivializing the effort or cost. I am simply mentioning that energy storage alternatives to batteries exist. I do recognize there are many limits on pumped hydro energy storage. I did not mean to imply it was free and perfect.

Energy infrastructure is expensive in almost any form. The Raccoon Mountain Facility you point to has a 1.6 megawatt capacity for 22 hours. It is economically viable energy storage ... but not trivial.

My back-of-the-envelope calculations were to determine if it was a pipe dream or not. The simple calculation is that there is adequate solar energy potential to meet Australian energy demand in aggregate. If there is a factor missing to get more accurate calculation ... definitely include that.

The "US per capita energy consumption" search result is 6804 kg of oil equivalent.

 

[gmax137]

I assume the per capita energy use includes industrial and commercial use, which dwarf home use.
I googled: australia per capita energy consumption
The "answer" in my search results is putatively from the World Bank. (5,483.82 kg of oil equivalent (2015)).

Commercial power use HAS to be included in any National energy consideration. I also assume transportation is included. Anyone driving knows they use a LOT of liters of refined gasoline per year.

Yes, of course these have to be considered. I just don't like the "oil equivalent" units. We have perfectly good units for power: watts, BTU/hr, ft-pounds/sec, etc. To me the "oil equiv" is like giving a height as "thirteen statue of liberties tall" or "social distancing - keep one cow apart!"

 

[votingmachine]

Yes, of course these have to be considered. I just don't like the "oil equivalent" units. We have perfectly good units for power: watts, BTU/hr, ft-pounds/sec, etc. To me the "oil equiv" is like giving a height as "thirteen statue of liberties tall" or "social distancing - keep one cow apart!"

Fair enough. I saw the question "can Australia remove fire from their energy mix, if they've eliminated nuclear from the non-fire options?" and did not think it was being answered. I compared their aggregate energy demand to a single energy resource and that single resource appears far in excess.

I did not bother with finding the best answer to aggregate energy demand ... I could back-of-the-envelope get to a reasonable approximation.

The question is adequately answered to me. They have abundant energy resources that they could develop infrastructure to exploit, and meet their needs without nuclear power plants.

I'm not Australian and it is not my group project. They should be applauded for the goal of eliminating combustible fuels. I personally think the risks of nuclear power plants and spent fuel storage are manageable, but again, it isn't my National project.

Fire is a wonderful energy. Finding combustible fuel in the ground was a wonderful thing. But the greenhouse gas emissions have to be eliminated. The costs of that energy replacement are definitely non-trivial.

Reducing the heat retention of the earth's atmospheric blanket is a planetary group project that we need to all take whatever bite we can from. It never helps to micromanage someone else's plan. Australia may have a bad plan, but it is theirs, and they are working towards the right goal.

It is lamentable how poorly humans work together in group projects. It gets even worse when outsiders tell you how to "fix" your plan.

 

[russ_watters]

As you said, 99.5% is as good as 100%, but people don't like blackouts even .5% of the time.

Naah, when it comes to reliability, that doesn't apply/it's inverted: tiny fractions of a percent matter. 1% is 10x worse than 0.1%.

 

[harborsparrow]

I opposed nuclear power for decades but have recently begun to hope countries would consider using some of the newer, smaller nuclear reactor designs that were designed from the ground up with more attention to safety, transport and disposal. However, so far, most increases in nuclear power generation have come from reopening older designs that are not very safe. Quite a lot of information about the newer design options (as yet unused in the U.S.) has been gathered at https://citizendium.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_reconsidered

My biggest beef with wind power is bird kill. There are things that can be done to minimize this but are not usually being done by its implementers, such as avoiding placement in migration corridors and tipping the third rotor with black paint.

Google, for all its foibles, has led the way in powering its server farms with solar by automatically closing down farms when the sun goes down and shifting traffic to a farm where there is sunlight. It's a kind of global cooperation that a big corporation might achieve but governments have more trouble achieving because, well, humanity. Neighbors don't always agree to cooperate even when everyone's survival is at stake.

 

[Vanadium 50]

...and replaced it with natural gas plants killing roughly 45 New Yorkers per year, not including the potential global warming impacts

Well, if you want an omelette you have to break a few eggs. This is simply the price we have to pay to avoid dangerous power plants.

I guess.

 

[bhobba]

I'm not trivializing the effort or cost. I am simply mentioning that energy storage alternatives to batteries exist. I do recognize there are many limits on pumped hydro energy storage. I did not mean to imply it was free and perfect.

They certainly do and pumped hydro is often used. There are a number planned for the Australian grid when it is completed. The best known one is Snowy 2. But it has run into construction problems:

https://www.theguardian.com/austral...billion-cost-blowout-kosciuszko-national-park

Interestingly, because they have such a long lifespan, even with the large overruns, it is still worthwhile, even without the transition to renewables. But it is vital for such a transition.

Australia in general does not have a lot of hydro except in one place - Tasmania. Part of the renewable plan is build a connection between Tasmania and the mainland to supply power when required. But there is, understandably, opposition from environmentalists to increasing the hydro in Tasmania. Again we will need to see how that plays out.

Thanks
Bill

 

[bhobba]

I guess.

The trouble is of course, as people that frequent this site generally know, the dangers of modern nuclear power plants are wildly exaggerated by some. As I mentioned about the Lucas Heights reactor; likely most people do not even know it exists - for them it is a 'green' suburb.

I have to say one thing the discussion about nuclear here in Aus is it is starting to chip away at the irrational fear many Australians have about it. I was just speaking to my sister yesterday and she had no idea we even had a nuclear reactor in Australia. She asked me are they really that safe. My response was if we had one of the new modular ones in our backyard (we live on the mythical quarter acre block that is part of th Australian dream) I would have no issue with one being built here. Likely though if they were in widespread use it would be in the many parks we have in residential areas in a lot of Australia. There are a number near where I live. There were three close to where I grew up - and that was just in easy walking distance - there were many more if you wanted to travel further.

Thanks
Bill

 

[Vanadium 50]

When I was but a wee lad, an oil refinery 30 miles away blew up. Killed a bunch of people, and we lived in a plume of black smoke for almost a week. Which also killed a bunch of people.

This was generally viewed as a tragedy, but an unavoidable one. These things happen, and anyway the workers knew the risk. The others who died? Mostly the sick, and hey, they were on their way out anyway.

One could impose the same safety requirements on fossil energy as nuclear, including 100% sequestration of waste. The cost analysis will strongly favor nuclear.

 

[Astronuc]

disposal.

The ultimate disposition of spent fuel remains indeterminate, at least in the US. Reprocessing remains off the table; once-through is still the rule, yet there is no final repository for spent fuel, which accumulates in dry storage casks because plants were designed with limited spent fuel pools based on the assumption the federal government would recycle the fuel and dispose of the radioactive water (aka fission products). The US was supposed to be recycling Pu and unused U, but that is technically challenging and expensive. France, UK and Russia do have considerable experience with recycled Pu or reprocessed U. Germany and Japan have limited experience.

There are downsides to any energy system. The so-called 'green energy' is perhaps not so green when one considers the entire supply chain. One still needs to convert minerals to alloys or some organic composite, i.e., some structural material the will survive long enough in sometimes aggressive environments, as it is used to convert mechanical energy into electricity.

I was reading the following article on a large 16 MW wind turbine.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/weather/t...ding-amount-of-power-amid-typhoon/ar-AA1hQi1C

I wonder how long that turbine will survive, and how often it will achieve full capacity.

I was reading some other articles on the mining of rare earth elements, and the challenges associated with extracting the minerals (no one wants a mine in the neighborhood, especially where mine tailings are dumped in piles upstream) or processing the minerals (separation can be a dirty business, but there is a lot of R&D on a clean processes). However, those are separate topics for another thread.
A recent and ongoing effort in Montana (Sheep Creek, US Critical Materials) - https://www.fs.usda.gov/detail/bitterroot/news-events/?cid=FSEPRD1111076. Similarly, with battery technology.

Back to nuclear, it is interesting that the Australian public has what appears to be an irrational bias toward nuclear considering Australia has supplied a lot of uranium and zirconium to the global nuclear market. On the other hand, I suspect the legacy of Maralinga and Montebello Islands, and the accidents such as Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima are unnerving to some/many.

Folks are finding that any new power plant (including nuclear) is quite expensive to construct, and many folks do not want a power plant in their neighborhood, nor do they necessarily want wind turbines.

 

[gmax137]

I assume the per capita energy use includes industrial and commercial use, which dwarf home use.
I googled: australia per capita energy consumption
The "answer" in my search results is putatively from the World Bank. (5,483.82 kg of oil equivalent (2015)).

Commercial power use HAS to be included in any National energy consideration. I also assume transportation is included. Anyone driving knows they use a LOT of liters of refined gasoline per year.

I like to see the data on energy production and use, and I find this format to be very interesting. It's worth studying, IMO. And the units (Quads) are 10E15 BTU (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quad_(unit)). Using heat units (BTU) is informative since this encompasses the thermodynamic losses associated with electricity generation (note the "Rejected Energy" in grey).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quad_(unit)

 

[gleem]

There is no way that the world can achieve the 2030 goal of a 50% reduction in the use of fossil fuels. The result of this failure will probably become evident in a few years. The petroleum industry employs over 10 M persons. On top of the money to be made in this industry, it is not surprising that it is taking so long for decisions to be made to decrease the use of fossil fuels. It is not clear how many of these people can be absorbed by the nuclear industry when it is revitalized as it must but I suspect many will be lost.

The US will need about 300 additional 1100 MW reactors to replace the current fossil-fueled power plants costing about $3T at the current cost. I don't think cost will be the problem, the construction timeline will be. The transition to nuclear power must begin immediately since dozens of reactors will have to go online yearly.

 

[gmax137]

Here's the 2022 chart
https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/

 

[gleem]

Some good news is that 18.6 GW from coal-fired and older steam generator gas plants are being shut down this year. They will be replaced by 16 (8.4GW) combined cycle gas plants which are supposedly 50% more efficient. A projected number to produce another 32.3 GW is expected by 2026 The better news is that about 32 GW of solar is expected to have been added this year up 50% from last year. This still leaves the issues associated with storage and distribution.

 

[gmax137]

@gleem are those GW changes in Aussie, US, or world-wide?

 

[gleem]

US

 

[Vanadium 50]

There is no way that the world can achieve the 2030 goal of a 50% reduction in the use of fossil fuels.

While I agree with that, I don't agree the problem is displacing 10M workers. Whole industries have collapsed: when was the last time you saw a telephone operator? A lamplighter? A milkman? A punch-card operator?

No, I think the real reason these targets will not be met by 2030 is that it's 2024 (almost) now.

 

[gmax137]

It's not the 10 million workers, it's the 200 million customers...

 

[gleem]

The Institute of Progress (IFP) has a report discussing the reasons for the great cost escalation of nuclear power plant construction. It is a bit long but informative. Interestingly it offers the US navy as a model for reducing/controlling costs.

 

[Vanadium 50]

There is no way that the world can achieve the 2030 goal of a 50% reduction in the use of fossil fuels.

The US has 10% nuclear, 12% renewables and the remainder fossils. Half of the renewables are from hydroelectric, which is largely tapped out. So the 6% non-hydro renewables needs to grow to 39% in six years. That's 37% relative growth every year.

That's just not going to happen.

 

[Vanadium 50]

The so-called 'green energy' is perhaps not so green when one considers the entire supply chain.

While I agree that the only proper comparison is full life cycle costs, this is not so easy.

The number of fatalities in coal mining (which vastly exceeds the number of fatalities from nuclear) is about 100x higher per kwhr in China than in the US. In the US, there are strict safety regulations and workers can always quit if they feel things are unsafe - in China, the CCP has decreed that mining is safe enough, and anyone who complains will meet with an unfortunate end. So how do you compare?

 

[russ_watters]

The US will need about 300 additional 1100 MW reactors to replace the current fossil-fueled power plants costing about $3T at the current cost.

Yeah, by comparison the US spent about $5T in 2 years on COVID stimulus. We could do it if we wanted to.

 

[gleem]

The public is going to have to make some hard choices in the upcoming years/decades as the continued use of fossil fuels becomes untenable. It seems the electric power storage problem will be as problematic as ever and power rationing might be required if nuclear power is not made available. Public concern for radiation exposure has been exacerbated by the NRC's ALARA (As Low As Reasonably Achievable) program which stresses the importance of reducing radiation exposure. Maybe a little more radiation is OK if we can have electric power on demand.

 

[Rive]

They certainly do and pumped hydro is often used. There are a number planned for the Australian grid when it is completed.

Just checked on the 'under construction' list of wiki about pumped hydro
Tells a tale

Once I had a session around the economy of pumped hydro. The basis is simple: arbitrating between low and high price periods of available electricity.
Sadly, only the basis is simple. As an investment, it's just as tricky as nuclear (in general).

 

[bhobba]

The public is going to have to make some hard choices in the upcoming years/decades as the continued use of fossil fuels becomes untenable.

Yes, they are. I believe net zero is possible at a cost the public will accept. The only issue is the technology mix. We will see how it plays out. I posted the Australian government's plan. For an alternative plan, see:



It will be interesting to see what happens.

Thanks
Bill

 

[gleem]

It will be interesting to see what happens.

This sounds as if we are observing what will happen from the moon. I think it will be the greatest S#!& show the world has ever seen and we will all be in it. The question is, is there anything the average person can or should do now or will it not make any difference? At best it will be miserable for decades and at worst well...
Sorry about the gloomy outlook but can anybody see a rainbow?

 

[Rive]

Sorry about the gloomy outlook but can anybody see a rainbow?

No. The 'average person' is stuck between the apparently insufficient activity of insincere politics and established dogmas of 'green', with already feeling the hot breath of climate change on the neck.

I expect to see a decade of confusion till both expires, and I see no way for this to be nice.

 

[gmax137]

anybody see a rainbow?

No. But I think most people will muddle along. Low-lying islands and some coastal regions will feel the brunt. Until we hit a tipping point where the Gulf Steam flow stops, or something like that.

 

[Astronuc]

While I agree that the only proper comparison is full life cycle costs, this is not so easy.

No, it isn't.

So how do you compare?

It would have to be done on a country-by-country basis, and in each case, one would need details (raw data) from the corresponding government, industry or corporations, and that information/data would probably be considered state secret or trade secret/proprietary, since is likely no interest by the parties as to their practices.

Back when I tracked nuclear fuel performance on behalf of industry in as many LWRs as possible, I'd ask utility contacts about number of fuel assemblies discharged and when (at shutdown (SD) for refueling). On utility manager claimed he could not provide that information, since it would tip off other utilities when their unit(s) would be offline, and other utilities (competitors) could raise wholesale prices for electricity needed as 'replacement power'. I found alternative sources for the information, or I could guess based on the beginning of cycle date. Ultimately, I could find that through the NRC since utilities eventually report it. I only used the SD date to bin the fuel assemblies in use over a trailing two year period. We had a compilation of fuel failures by cause (either confirmed through inspection or by best estimate), and those numbers would be divided by the total number of fuel assemblies operating in the two year period ending at the point when we did the calculation; this was a fuel reliability number, in terms of fraction of failures per fuel rods (and assemblies) operated and operating. Confirmation of failures would usually occur after shutdown during a poolside inspection (offgas sipping (for Xe,Kr)) and/or ultrasonic inspection (and possibly visual inspection). Some utilities were reluctant to provide details, and sometime deferred to the fuel suppliers (manufacturers), who would provide their own statistics. The information that I collected was only shared with participant utilities and EPRI.

 

[bhobba]

“Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future." Niels Bohr.

I am reasonably confident net zero can be achieved without the cost of energy being prohibitive, by which I mean most people will not say - forget this (rude word). I don't care about net zero - I want the life I had before.

As to how it plays out - pass the popcorn.

As to what we, as individuals, can do, I am sure people here will not fall for the trap of gluing themselves to the main road, etc. All that does is get the average person offside. For me, if I am asked or see a thread I think I should contribute to, etc, I will give my opinion, which, as you probably have guessed, is along the lines of the video I posted. That may change as things develop.

Thanks
Bill

 

[Vanadium 50]

Sorry about the gloomy outlook but can anybody see a rainbow?

I don't see objections to nuclear power being that firm. So long as people have light and heat and jobs, they are willing to complain about it. But faced with rolling brownouts and $1/kwhr electricity, you will see the resistance (no pun intended) evaporate.

 

[Vanadium 50]

And if there were any doubt of the degree of the public's understanding, there was a famous comment: "Why do we need nuclear power? Why can't we just use electricity?"

 

[gleem]

The problem is when will they realize( accept) that nuclear is the answer? Then how long will it take for that realization to be realized.? And when will industry magnates relent in their quest for the profits of fossil fuel?
Even now proponents of internal combustion engines are offering "solutions" in the form of opposing piston engines and electric turbochargers to offer hope of the viability of ICEs as a partial solution to global warming and we love ICEs. How long will it take for people to be weaned away from fossil fuels, "we want to cook with gas"? What about this apparent rejection of heat pumps in the UK and Germany?

 

[bhobba]

I don't see objections to nuclear power being that firm.

That is exactly what happened in Australia. A few years ago, most thought the idea was nutty. Now, 63% want it. It is not in the current government plan. But they promised a $250 reduction in people's power bills. Instead, some people report it increasing 400%. Countering this, the government is giving generous handouts for solar on the roof, and for those that take up the offer, it has dropped by much more than $250. In my case, it went from about $500 to the last bill of $100. Battery storage is getting cheaper, which will also lower costs. The big issue is manufacturing. That needs cheap power 24/7. I see modular reactors playing a role there. But the person in the video I posted is not so sure. He thinks large nuclear reactors are the way to go. We will see.

Thanks
Bill

 

[Astronuc]

He thinks large nuclear reactors are the way to go. We will see.

Or a mix. Small local (near consumer), and large base load regionally (in the outback, where there are few neighbors)..

 

[bhobba]

Or a mix. Small local (near consumer), and large base load regionally (in the outback, where there are few neighbors)..

Actually, that would be my prediction. We will end up with a mixture of all different technologies.

We just need to let engineers and engineering economists figure it out. That is not happening now, but hopefully eventually will.

Thanks
Bill

 

[Vanadium 50]

I don't think the size of reactors is an issue. We don't have a single size with fossuls, or hydro, or geothermal or wind.

I have some reservations about "We just need to let engineers and engineering economists figure it out." First it has the word "just" which always raises a red flag with me. But it also says that political decisions should be made by technocracy, not democracy, and there has been a backlash against this in recent decades. (Pauline Hanson, anyone?). Indeed, one can argue this fuels (no pun intended) the anti-nuclear rules: "I have no say in this, other than the ability to stop it. So that's what I want."

While I think it is likely that the public will choose nuclear power over brownouts, it is not a foregone conclusion. There are those arguing "The only thing more dangerous than climate change is nuclear power" and that argument might well prevail.

One decision that I do not want to leave to the technocrats is "some day, it will be cheaper to reprocess existing waste than to refine fresh uranium. What do we do then?" I think that should be addressed sooner rather than later.

 

[gleem]

There were a lot of new regs when 9/11 occurred for new security requirements. While I am pro nuc I feel that hundreds of reactors spread out across the country do present significant security issues. You blow up a conventional power plant and you sweep up the rubble and build another. You blow up a reactor even a small one and you cordon off the surrounding area indefinitely. Many small reactors clustered in one area might be easier to protect even though they might take up a lot of real estate. Thoughts?

 

[Vanadium 50]

You blow up a reactor even a small one and you cordon off the surrounding area indefinitely.

Yes, but is this rational?

Bhopal killed many more people than Chernobyl. Bhopal is growing, and Chernobyl was evacuated.

 

[PeterDonis]

You blow up a reactor even a small one and you cordon off the surrounding area indefinitely.

If you're thinking of Chernobyl, that is not a good proxy for any possible accident with reactors now in service or planned. Chernobyl was, first, an insane design by an insane regime (the Soviet Union), and was operated in an insane way in order to cause the accident that happened there.

I think a better reasonable worst case would be Three Mile Island, which AFAIK did not harm any member of the general public, and which did not result in the surrounding area being cordoned off indefinitely. And even a TMI-style accident is basically impossible with newer reactor designs that have passive safety features that eliminate whole classes of operator errors like those that occurred at TMI.

 

[Vanadium 50]

If you're thinking of Chernobyl, that is not a good proxy for any possible accident with reactors now in service or planned. Chernobyl was, first, an insane design by an insane regime (the Soviet Union), and was operated in an insane way in order to cause the accident that happened there.

You could also add an insane response by the authorities.

Estimating Chernobyl fatalities is tricky, but to put in in some context, it's about the same as five months of coal mining in China alone.

 

[bhobba]

(Pauline Hanson, anyone?)

I am surprised anyone outside Australia knows about her. Those that dont might find reading about her on Wikipedia interesting.

Nice post, though.

Thanks
Bill

 

[Vanadium 50]

Just because I am a foreigner doesn't mean I am a barbarian.

 

[Astronuc]

There were a lot of new regs when 9/11 occurred for new security requirements. While I am pro nuc I feel that hundreds of reactors spread out across the country do present significant security issues.

Increased security preceded 9/11/2001 and actually began in the mid-90s after truck bombings in Africa and World Trade Center (NY City). I visited several plant sites in the mid to late 1990s, and we underwent screening. We had to arrange our visits in advance; cars were checked for bombs and weapons, and we got scanned for weapons. At one site, sitting down the road was a checkpoint with a guard holding an AR-15. Security was well armed, and we had to drive around multiple barriers to get near the reactor building. It was a lot more security than the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Safeguards also requires new reactor building to be resistant to commercial jet aircraft, notably the shaft of the jet engine. No penetration allowed.

 

[gleem]

Westinghouse is now developing a microreactor 5 MWe /13MWth that it calls eVinci. https://www.westinghousenuclear.com/canada/technology/evinci-microreactor



The first is going to Canada and the Saskatchewan Research Council to be completed in 2029.

https://info.westinghousenuclear.co...evinci-microreactor-targeted-for-saskatchewan

 

[Vanadium 50]

Interesting. 5 MW is tiny. I wonder what they are using to generate the electricity - presumably they don't use a full-sized turbine. That would be silly.

(And in a Saskatchewan winter 5 MW might be needed just to keep your house warm!)

 

[gmax137]

There were a lot of new regs when 9/11 occurred for new security requirements.

There were a lot of changes beyond security, much of which was not really made public. One chabge that was widely known is the "aircraft impact rule" (10CFR50.150). The NRC imposed this rule on the Westinghouse AP1000 design, which is why the Vogtle 3 & 4 and Summer 2 & 3 shield buildings look different than the Sanmen and Haiyang units in China. The re-design of the shield building was one (of many) contributors to the construction delay and failure of the Summer project.

On security, the US plants all have large security departments typically run by contractors such as Pinkerton or Wackenhut (G4S). When I first worked in the plants (1980s) the security guys were Barney Fifes with revolvers; today they look like SWAT. I've been told the security department is by far the biggest fraction of the plant payroll.

While I am pro nuc I feel that hundreds of reactors spread out across the country do present significant security issues. You blow up a conventional power plant and you sweep up the rubble and build another. You blow up a reactor even a small one and you cordon off the surrounding area indefinitely. Many small reactors clustered in one area might be easier to protect even though they might take up a lot of real estate. Thoughts?

Thoughts: If you assign the responsibility for protecting the plant against acts of war to the power company, you may as well kiss nuclear power goodbye. Do we do that to any other industry/facility?

As to clustering the units, I used to think this was a great idea:

Since the earthquake/tsunami at Fukushima, I think distributing the plants in different locations is a wiser choice.

 

[russ_watters]

Estimating Chernobyl fatalities is tricky, but to put in in some context, it's about the same as five months of coal mining in China alone.

More direct: Every coal power plant* is Chernobyling about 6x a year, based on the initial death toll for Chernobyl.

Or if we use the long-term death projection of about 4,000 people for Chernobyl we can simply say that every coal power plant* is Chernobyl.

And that's just the air pollution deaths - it doesn't include the impact of global warming.

*of similar power output to Chernobyl