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vox_mundi

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1400 on: October 02, 2020, 02:39:28 AM »
US Military Developing Nuclear Thermal Rocket for Missions in Earth-Moon Space
https://newatlas.com/space/gryphon-technologies-nuclear-rocket-engine-darpa/
https://www.space.com/darpa-nuclear-thermal-rocket-for-moon-contract



DARPA has awarded a US$14-million contract to the Gryphon Technologies engineering firm to develop and demonstrate a nuclear rocket engine for the agency's Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO) program. The High-Assay Low Enriched Uranium (HALEU) Nuclear Thermal Propulsion (NTP) system will allow the US military to carry out missions in cislunar space.

For the DRACO program, DARPA is looking at Nuclear Thermal Propulsion (NTP) to power spacecraft beyond the Earth's atmosphere out to just beyond the orbit of the Moon. The idea is that a nuclear reactor would heat a propellant, such as hydrogen, to extreme temperatures, resulting in thrust that would be 10,000 times that of an electric engine and up to five times the efficiency of a chemical rocket.

https://www.darpa.mil/program/demonstration-rocket-for-agile-cislunar-operations

According to DARPA, DRACO is being moved forward on two tracks. Track A is to develop the reactor design and track B is to produce an operational system. For the present contract, Gryphon will look at developing a HALEU propulsion system that uses nuclear fuel made from recycled civilian reactor fuel that has been reprocessed and enriched to between five and 20 percent – greater than that of civilian reactors and less than that of naval reactors.

https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/what-high-assay-low-enriched-uranium-haleu

The result will be a reactor core that will be small, produces less waste, have a longer core life and greater efficiency, making it more suitable for use in space than previous designs.

https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/game_changing_development/Nuclear_Thermal_Propulsion_Deep_Space_Exploration

-----------------------------------------

.... as a memory jog see also:

https://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,776.msg220708.html#msg220708
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gerontocrat

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1401 on: October 02, 2020, 08:26:10 PM »
US Military Developing Nuclear Thermal Rocket for Missions in Earth-Moon Space
https://newatlas.com/space/gryphon-technologies-nuclear-rocket-engine-darpa/
https://www.space.com/darpa-nuclear-thermal-rocket-for-moon-contract



DARPA has awarded a US$14-million contract to the Gryphon Technologies engineering firm to develop and demonstrate a nuclear rocket engine for the agency's Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO) program. The High-Assay Low Enriched Uranium (HALEU) Nuclear Thermal Propulsion (NTP) system will allow the US military to carry out missions in cislunar space.
Nuclear reactor, H2 at extreme temperatures. I mean, what could possibly go wrong?
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kassy

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1402 on: October 02, 2020, 09:36:21 PM »
It could come in over budget?   ::)
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vox_mundi

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1403 on: October 05, 2020, 07:56:03 PM »
Nuclear and Renewables Don't Mix
https://techxplore.com/news/2020-10-crowd-nuclear-renewables-dont.html

If countries want to lower emissions as substantially, rapidly and cost-effectively as possible, they should prioritize support for renewables, rather than nuclear power.

That's the finding of new analysis of 123 countries over 25 years by the University of Sussex Business School and the ISM International School of Management which reveals that nuclear energy programs around the world tend not to deliver sufficient carbon emission reductions and so should not be considered an effective low carbon energy source.

Researchers found that unlike renewables, countries around the world with larger scale national nuclear attachments do not tend to show significantly lower carbon emissions—and in poorer countries nuclear programs actually tend to associate with relatively higher emissions.

Published today in Nature Energy, the study reveals that nuclear and renewable energy programs do not tend to co-exist well together in national low-carbon energy systems but instead crowd each other out and limit effectiveness. ... Countries planning large-scale investments in new nuclear power are risking suppression of greater climate benefits from alternative renewable energy investments."

Differences in carbon emissions reduction between countries pursuing renewable electricity versus nuclear power, Nature Energy (2020)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41560-020-00696-3
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Insensible before the wave so soon released by callous fate. Affected most, they understand the least, and understanding, when it comes, invariably arrives too late

longwalks1

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1404 on: October 06, 2020, 05:00:07 AM »
Went looking for the possible rocket fuel leak, found this @ Bellona.   

https://bellona.org/news/nuclear-issues/2020-10-cracked-coolant-system-pipe-causes-downtime-for-reactor-at-russias-rostov-plant

Quote
Yet early public statements on the shutdown from the plant were incomplete and came days after the fault was discovered. It was only when speaking with Bellona that officials from Russia’s nuclear utility specifically acknowledged the problem with the emergency cooling system.

On September 29, the plant put out its first statement about the shutdown, saying Rostov’s No 4 reactor had been disconnected from the electricity grid for routine maintenance on thermal and mechanical equipment. The statement, which was published on the plant’s official website, indicated the shutdown had occurred on September 26, three days earlier.

Awful young to get a leak.   Early 2018 is date I have for starting up via their website.  Of course as Mr. AllThingsNuclear Dave Lochbaum used to say, you get the most problems early on and then another batch down the road.   
https://www.rosenergoatom.ru/en/npp/rostov-npp/

vox_mundi

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1405 on: October 07, 2020, 05:40:25 PM »
Duke Nuclear Plant Demolition Timeline Cut From Half-Century to 7 Years
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/duke-nuclear-plant-demolition-timeline-cut-from-half-century-to-7-years/ar-BB19MJ7t

Duke’s 890-megawatt reactor near Crystal River at the Gulf of Mexico has been out of commission since 2009, when a construction accident crippled the containment building. In 2015, facing a projected demolition cost of more than $1 billion, Duke was prepared to let the plant remain for 60 years before removing it.

But with the aging of nuclear power around the world and competitive advances in demolition technology, Duke is proceeding with a fixed contract of $540 million to remove the plant. That cost is to be covered by a trust fund of $717 million already paid for by the utility’s customers.

.... The Crystal River nuclear plant cost $410 million, or about $2.7 billion in current dollars, with construction starting in 1968 and generation of electricity beginning in 1977. Orlando Utilities Commission and other smaller utilities owned small fractions of the plant.

In 2009, a major effort to extend the life of the the reactor damaged the reactor-containment building’s 3-foot-thick wall. After botched repair attempts, the plant was declared economically beyond repair.

The additional cost that customers had to absorb for the attempted upgrade and trying to fix the containment building was an estimated $1.7 billion, according to the Florida Office of Public Counsel, a legislatively created agency that serves as an advocate for utility customers.

Other lost nuclear costs would arise from Duke’s move to build a $22 billion plant in Levy County. That initiative was announced in 2006 but abandoned within a decade, resulting in costs that customers had to absorb of more than $870 million .

... Charles Rehwinkel of the Office of Public Counsel said Duke’s contract with Accelerated Decommissioning Partners should have included better protections in case of demolition or financial problems.

“We remained concerned that this process, which is fairly new, could have a problem down the road,” Rehwinkel said. “The problems we would be concerned about would be cost overruns and if they get part way through the process in an area where there is still contaminated metal components and there is a bankruptcy or some halt that leaves them in the position of Duke having to get somebody else to come in.”

... Duke’s fixed-price contract with the joint venture leaves little flexibility for dealing with unexpected challenges.
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Sebastian Jones

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1406 on: October 08, 2020, 01:04:47 AM »
Poland has been a notable laggard among its E.U. peers when it comes to carbon emission reductions.
It has finally concluded that action is required but has chosen a particularly dumb and expensive route to getting off coal.
It plans to spend $40B in building the first of a series of 1-1.6GW nuclear plants.
It will also spend slightly less on 8-11GW of offshore wind.
The least expensive, easiest, quickest sources of renewable energy- onshore wind and PV are not included in the plan.
https://www.reuters.com/article/poland-coal/update-1-poland-to-accelerate-coal-phase-out-spend-billions-on-renewable-and-nuclear-energy-idUKL8N2G51U6

NeilT

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1407 on: October 09, 2020, 12:49:53 PM »
Poland passed a law which required that wind turbines be set back, ten times the height, from buildings or forests.  This is for land based and offshore turbines.

They also enacted a law which can significantly increase taxes on renewable power.

For Solar I found that.

Quote
Polish grid operator Polskie Sieci Elektroenergetyczne (PSE) says the country reached 2,261.3 MW of installed solar capacity at the end of July.

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2020/08/10/polands-pv-capacity-reaches-2-26-gw/

and

Quote
Poland to tender 3.2 GW of solar by end of next year

https://www.pv-magazine.com/2020/08/24/poland-to-tender-3-2-gw-of-solar-by-end-of-next-year/

Poland is heavily invested in Coal and so doesn't have a strong gas infrastructure.  Even if they did decide to go to gas for their fast reacting power needs, in a renewable world, then they would build a dependency on Russian gas.  Something which, as you can imagine, is not highly popular in Poland.  Right now they are 75% self sufficient with electricity due to their in country coal mining.  With Wind, Solar and gas fired power, they could find themselves constantly less than 50% self sufficient.

Putting in a floor of Nuclear would give Poland a solid base for their power structure, consistent for 40 to 60 years.  Yes it has environmental issues with recycling etc, but it solves a big problem for them.

The UK has 24GW of installed wind, both onshore and offshore.  The UK suffers significant periods where our installed 24GW only delivers under 1GW of power.  It has _never_ delivered more than 16GW of power for the 24GW installed and that was during a series of storms.

UK generating output tends to max at around 42GW.  With 24GW of nameplate wind, 13gw of nameplate solar and 10GW of nameplate Nuclear.  The UK gas (CCGT), generation is rarely less than 10GW and regularly over 15GW.  When wind and solar are low, CCGT is often at or over 20GW.

This variance is a really big problem for any country.  Poland is a northern latitude country which means solar is less efficient than for most of Europe.  I would expect solar farms to be mainly in the south of the country, rather than on the Baltic sea given that the lowest point of Poland is around 49deg latitude and 40deg latitude is considered good, decreasing after that.

Just talking about how Wind will solve their problems, given the economic and social structure of Poland doesn't cut it.  Actually understanding how a northern latitude country solves its carbon emitting power problems requires a lot more understanding.

If you want to make your case you have to explain why, when the UK has 37GW of installed solar and wind, out of 42GW total daily generating output, why the vast majority of power generated, all year, is Nuclear and CCGT?




Which leads us onto analysis which claims:

Quote
UK needs 100GW more solar & wind to hit 2050 target

https://www.pv-tech.org/news/report-uk-needs-100gw-more-solar-wind-by-2050-to-hit-net-zero-target

Quote
According to the document, the UK needs to swell its wind and solar capacity four-fold to 140GW in 2050 from 33GW today in order to meet the climate goal set by outgoing Prime Minister Theresa May in June. 30GW of new nuclear and 3GW of carbon capture storage will also be required.

As you can see, the document is using slightly out of date figures.  The UK is already at 37GW of solar and wind installed capacity.  But it is hard to knock these figures when 37GW of installed capacity produces less than half of the 42GW daily max output.  That is MAX, half the daily output.  there are times when it is less than 10%.  Look at that peak in late Jan 2019.

Note the document talks about 30GW of Nuclear, that is to replace the CCGT when renewables are low.  I would have said that 15GW would probably do it, but 20GW would provide a buffer.  But that's my uninformed thinking.

When talking about renewables, what they do for a country and whether or not it is worthwhile to build a nuclear capacity, it is worthwhile looking at what actually happens, on a daily basis, with large installed renewable installations (the UK is large based on the total use).
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blu_ice

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1408 on: October 09, 2020, 01:11:29 PM »
Poland also has colder winters than most of Western Europe. A blocking high in mid-winter with cold Arctic air from NE Russia, very little wind power available and zero solar. Gas is not an option for Poland and it is, after all, a fossil fuel.

oren

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1409 on: October 09, 2020, 04:18:09 PM »
Quote
If you want to make your case you have to explain why, when the UK has 37GW of installed solar and wind, out of 42GW total daily generating output, why the vast majority of power generated, all year, is Nuclear and CCGT?
NeilT, why should it matter what the nameplate capacity is? It's just a number. What matters is its combination with the capacity factor and the intermittency pattern, which determine actual production - the physical parameter that matters. As long as wind and solar don't generate more than the total demand, there is no problem increasing them further, and with storage of several hours yet further. The more they generate, the less the existing gas facilities will generate, greatly cutting the use of fossil fuels.
Nuclear is a different story, in that an existing plant is mostly carbon free and mostly paid off, except for the huge decommissioning costs. However building a new nuclear plant will be much more costly than new solar and wind infrastructure, when comparing produced MWh and even when accounting for storage. As long as gas backup is available, I really don't see any reason to build crazily expensive nuclear, and all the reasons to continue rolling out new PV and wind.
It's true that the higher the latitude the less efficient the solar, and the higher the need for heating. This should be considered on a case by case basis, but seeing that the northerly UK has managed to do quite well, I would expect Poland would also find it doable. And don't forget the possibility of interconnects to more southerly and sunny locations, which for Poland should not be that difficult.
Of course, if a country doesn't care about GHG emissions, then sure go for coal.

NeilT

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1410 on: October 09, 2020, 05:24:44 PM »
Oren, I don't want them to go for coal.  But I also don't want them to stop delivering Carbon free (at point of use), electricity generation.

The problem with nameplate power is this.  Poland has 33GW generating capacity now and the delivery is about 95% of nameplate power.  To replace this with baseload power in wind and solar might require 200GW or 300GW of wind with maybe 100GW of Solar.  Nameplate power.

Wind and solar costs are not given for operating power, usable power or average generation ability.  They are given on Nameplate power.  So if Poland, for instance, only gets 25% utilisation from Wind NamePlate power with significant intermittency, Nuclear could eventually wind up being a value add.

Yes you have to calculate in decommissioning costs.  But castigating someone for assuring their power supply is never going to get them off coal.  Poland has not signed up to the 2050 carbon free goal and for good reason.

If they decide to split their energy generating infrastructure between wind, solar and Nuclear, allowing them to move forward, why should we criticise them.  Especially as the up front costs of the wind farms may be far, far, higher than other countries anticipate.

Right now the electricity generating in Poland is rock solid.  Renewables will make that more fragile. They want to reduce that fragility and supply a foundation of power that is not coal.

Have a better solution, I'm way open to it.  But it actually has to be always on baseload power.  Not intermittent renewable.
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Tor Bejnar

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1411 on: October 09, 2020, 06:23:44 PM »
I once spent a week in December in Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir, India.  Due to the presence of Dal Lake, and continual heavy overcast, the temperature was a near constant 3°C (or close to that - I actually never saw a thermometer).  There was no breeze whatsoever. 

On the bus trip south, there was a long tunnel leaving the state of Jammu and Kashmir.  Upon exiting the tunnel the sky was bright blue, and everybody (all Indians except 2 of us) on the packed bus cheered.  (I trust it was due to their not having seen 'blue' in weeks, and not because of how dangerous the tunnel is nor the politics of the region.)

I'd hate to have to rely on solar or wind power there!

Geothermal?
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Sciguy

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1412 on: October 09, 2020, 08:06:51 PM »
I'm not sure where NeilT's chart comes from or what it's trying to show.  Electricity generation for the UK is measured in the terawatt hours (TWh), his chart shows gigawatts (GW).

Here is an article about the UK's changing electrical generation mix.

https://theconversation.com/britains-electricity-since-2010-wind-surges-to-second-place-coal-collapses-and-fossil-fuel-use-nearly-halves-129346

Quote
Britain’s electricity since 2010: wind surges to second place, coal collapses and fossil fuel use nearly halves
January 6, 2020

In 2010, Great Britain generated 75% of its electricity from coal and natural gas. But by the end of the decade*, these fossil fuels accounted for just 40%, with coal generation collapsing from the decade’s peak of 41% in 2012 to under 2% in 2019.

The near disappearance of coal power – the second most prevalent source in 2010 – underpinned a remarkable transformation of Britain’s electricity generation over the last decade, meaning Britain now has the cleanest electrical supply it has ever had. Second place now belongs to wind power, which supplied almost 21% of the country’s electrical demand in 2019, up from 3% in 2010. As at the start of the decade, natural gas provided the largest share of Britain’s electricity in 2019 at 38%, compared with 47% in 2010.



Quote
Besides the reduction in carbon emissions, there was another remarkable shift in Britain’s electrical system during the 2010s. The amount of electricity consumed fell by nearly 15% between 2010 and 2019, with the economy using 50 terawatt hours (TWh) less electricity in 2019 than it did in 2010. That’s enough electricity to power half of Britain’s cars and taxis, if they were all electric vehicles.

Quote
Since August 2018, renewables have produced more electricity than nuclear power for 17 months straight. Nuclear fell to less than a fifth of electricity generation in 2019, its lowest level since 2008 due to extended maintenance periods at six nuclear power stations. This helped the annual output of wind energy to surpass nuclear for the first time in 2019.



BeeKnees

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1413 on: October 10, 2020, 12:35:42 AM »
Oren, I don't want them to go for coal.  But I also don't want them to stop delivering Carbon free (at point of use), electricity generation.

The problem with nameplate power is this.  Poland has 33GW generating capacity now and the delivery is about 95% of nameplate power.  To replace this with baseload power in wind and solar might require 200GW or 300GW of wind with maybe 100GW of Solar.  Nameplate power.
Where are you getting these numbers from?
The capacity factors for offshore wind being built today are 50-60%. Onshore 30% and solar 10-15% at this latitude.

The idea that 400GW renewables to replace 33GW fossil fuel seems easy OTT. 
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Sciguy

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1414 on: October 10, 2020, 01:35:23 AM »
NeilT's capacity factors for fossil fuel plants are laughable.  Coal might get to 60% and natural gas combined cycle 55%.  In the US, nuclear gets 90+% but that's because many of the powerplants received retrofits to improve their capacity.  Globally, nuclear averages 80% capacity factors.

Capacity factors for renewables are highly dependent on where they're installed.  In the US, the national average for solar is around 25% and for wind 35%.  New offshore wind turbines can reach 60% due to being placed in areas that have consistent wind and the ability to build very large structures.

Additionally, supply and demand of electricity can lead to curtailment of some sources when supply exceeds demand.  Since the sun and wind are free, it's the fossil fuel plants that get curtailed.

Here's a webpage that explains it.

https://www.powermag.com/electric-power-generation-coal-is-currently-a-vital-component/

Quote
Table 2 presents the annual capacity factors for various sources of U.S. power generation. Capacity factor is the ratio of the electrical energy produced by a generating unit over a period of time considered to the electrical energy that could have been produced at continuous full-power operation during the same period. With the price of natural gas for power generation at historically low levels for several years, coal plants have experienced a decrease in capacity factors, resulting in increased cycling, while combined cycle and simple cycle natural gas generation has increased. The nuclear power fleet has maintained a fairly constant capacity factor of about 91% during this period. Table 2 also presents the national average annual price of natural gas used in power generation. There is a direct correlation between the decrease in installed capacity and capacity factors for coal-fired units, and the price of natural gas.



NeilT

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1415 on: October 10, 2020, 10:48:03 AM »
You are right Ken, I used Ccgt/Nuclear instead of coal.  My mistake.

But it does not matter.

Go back and look at that trace I posted then liik at the legend.  That is Daily average output. Wind was 2% of nameplate power, Average, over the whole day.

Average capacity factors for wind include the fact that, during a storm, wind can reach 80% or more of nameplate power.

This is totally useless for grid stability because it cannot, today, be stored and the cost of storage is higher than enough Nuclear stations to run the entire grid.

These are Facts and until we get storage, commensurate with surplus power, they will remain.

So my 400GW stands.  2% of 400gw is 8GW.  With planning, solar, storage and other renewables, a 33gw infrastructure could certainly survive a week of being becalmed.

Until we answer the storage problem, this remains and just because Nuclear power is despised or carries enormous decommissioning costs, today, does not mean we can dismiss it out of hand.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1416 on: October 10, 2020, 11:45:00 PM »
The storage problem is not a problem until the grid gets to higher concentrations of renewables. When renewables get to 60-80% is when more than 4 hr storage is needed. Almost all new pv projects in california include this much storage. Very few grids are anywhere close to that high % of renewable. So we can continue to expand renewables at a faster rate for years before long term storage becomes an issue. By that time cheap iron flow batteries or some other long term storage should be ready. Solar is about a factor of 10x cheaper lcoe than estimated nuclear costs which always end up substantially over budget. Until we get close to high levels of renewable saturation long term storage is not required.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1417 on: October 10, 2020, 11:57:17 PM »
In most western countries new nuclear is dead on arrival. Some of those countries are looking to phase it out completely.

oren

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1418 on: October 11, 2020, 01:04:26 AM »
To complement an intermittent but very cheap source you need a dispatchable source that can withstand a low capacity factor for a reasonable cost. For that dreaded week of being becalmed, natural gas plants are the ideal solution, along with cross-border interconnects. Later, large scale storage will be the solution to get rid of the last gas plants. Nuclear is the worst solution possible, as it is non dispatchable, prohibitively expensive even when assumed to be running constantly, and suffers outages of several months for maintenance which could just coincide with that dreaded week.

kassy

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1419 on: October 11, 2020, 01:37:45 AM »
It is kind of stupid to have these EU countries all working out a strategy when together we could plan for so much more.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1420 on: October 11, 2020, 01:53:51 PM »
The Poles also need consider their energy security, not just cost. Heating must be available in the dead of winter or people start freezing to death. Therefore generating capacity must match peak demand. Unlike in warm southern countries demand changes are seasonal not diurnal. Solar generates nothing in winter, wind may or may not be available. Energy storage in scale that covers their countrywide demand for weeks or months does not exist. Significant surplus electricity in Europe doesn’t exist in mid-winter.

Nuclear is slow and expensive to build but there are no easy options available. Heating with heat pumps saves energy but increases electricity use. Poland will never switch a domestic fossil fuel (coal) to an imported one (gas). And they shouldn’t because investing in gas infrastructure would create a fossil fuel dependency for decades to come.

NeilT

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1421 on: October 11, 2020, 03:02:42 PM »
The UK did not get becalmed for 4 hours, it was becalmed for more than a day.  As more and more of the traditional power is phased out, our >25GW of fast reacting gas will also diminish.

The UK already has more than 50% capacity in wind and Solar. Nameplate capacity that is.   If we were to turn off the Nuclear and gas, the grid would collapse in 6 months.

Personally I do not want natural gas as the backup, we can't afford it climate wise.  I want a solution which allows us to turn off all FF consuming generation.

Fusion is the obvious answer but it appears to be as far away as ever.

Meantime we talk about the climate emergency but then say gas is better than Nuclear.  It doesn't resonate.

Kassy, your statement is true for mainland EU but does not follow for the islands.  On the mainland any one country can be interconnected with three or more others simply by extending over land a bit. On the islands we would need up to 30GW of interconnect over the sea.

Just another reason why EU group think doesn't work for the UK.  But that is a personal view.

If you want to interconnect, how do you intend to do it? Germany, today, can't interconnect enough power north to south to avoid burning coal. That is one country.

How, if half of the EU is becalmed, will the interconnects and the grids, handle enough power to share with the other half of the EU when wind and solar fail?

Already Germany is distorting Cross border interconnects due to massive peaks of wind and solar.

Finally, is every country going to install 10 times the generating power they need in order to share it when generating conditions are low? Where are they going to send this power when generating conditions are high?

Country based our grids and generation are designed to meet local supply needs. The UK, in winter, with up to 2/3 power generation on Gas, with coal and 2gw sucked over from France, in winter, is hitting 99% utilisation.

That is with 37GW of installed wind and Solar for an average peak power draw of ~40GW, daily.

If you take away the gas and the Nuclear, who is going to transmit the 30GW and how.  Do we need to install 1TW wind to have a hope in hell of meeting demand?  I was not joking when I set out. My. Case.

I'm OK with not building Nuclear and not keeping the existing running.  But there Must be a viable, secure, alternative that is FF free. That has not been presented yet.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1422 on: October 11, 2020, 06:17:36 PM »
You paint a dire picture but it's unjustified. Solar and wind can be increased incrementally far higher. Nuclear and gas have not been shut down and why should they? The goal should be to decrease gas usage as much as possible, while continuing renewable buildout and increasing storage capacity as much as possible. Eventually gas will be delegated to backup status, and when gravity-based long term storage solutions are available gas can be let go. But that is far into the future.
In any case this will all be much cheaper than new nuclear. And economics play a large role in the transition, so ignoring costs leads nowhere.
Extra renewable capacity that needs to be curtailed at peak times can be used for dispatchable loads such as pumped-up hydro and EV charging, as well as export to other countries. But even curtailment is not a dirty word, as long as the economics still work.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1423 on: October 11, 2020, 06:51:54 PM »
Quote
In any case this will all be much cheaper than new nuclear. And economics play a large role in the transition, so ignoring costs leads nowhere.
Costs are going in opposite directions.
Nuclear is well known for massive cost blowouts .
It takes fifteen years at best to build nuclear by which time renewable energy will approximately  half in cost it is now. Energy  storage cost is also falling quickly.
I would say it is fifty fifty that Poland will abandon its nuclear dreams before the first fuel is loaded in the first new plant .
« Last Edit: October 11, 2020, 07:39:50 PM by KiwiGriff »
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1424 on: October 11, 2020, 11:08:09 PM »
As much as I am not a fan of renewable hydrogen because I fear  in the short term natural gas may be used. It solves this problem today. Certain geological formations can store large volumes of hydrogen gas. They use this to store natural gas today so nothing new. Years into the future when renewables overproduce at times this energy can be stored as hydrogen. They are building a full size plant right now in Utah to do this. So their are a many better and cheaper ways to deal with seasonal storage than nuclear.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1425 on: October 12, 2020, 12:04:47 AM »
All valid points.  But, today, Poland would be facing the requirement to store a potential 960GW of power to give them a 20gw per hour for a 2 day period.

Even at the postulated $50 per kWh for the new Tesla battery, that is $1.5tn.  You can build, run and decommission a lot of nuclear for $1.5tn.

The problem with storage is the sheer scale when you get to grid level and we are only talking 2 days here of 2/3 of the Polish grid.

Gravity is fine, but did anyone calculate out what several TW/h would look like in real size?  Also it is still not here yet.

Hydrogen is another good possibility.  Except the volume would require refilling gas field sized caverns.

The problem with dismissing the known is that planners need an alternate known to replace it with.  It also needs worst case scenario planning too when lives are at stake.

Oren, your statement on tapering and gas backup is fine in logical terms if it were not for a growing trend of demanding we desist, like now, but we also ditch nuclear.

Getting rid of Polish coal is a worthy goal, but replacing it with something that doesn't reduce emissions totally and damages Polish energy independence is an impossible sell.

This is all I am pointing out.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1426 on: October 12, 2020, 04:39:38 AM »
Interconnections
The more we build out grid connection across national borders this less problems we have with renewables intermitency.
This would cost less than nations seeking to have energy independence
The wind always blows the sun always shines somewhere
Transporting electricity across distance has less loss than any known storage method.
This takes a paradigm change in thinking.


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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1427 on: October 12, 2020, 04:56:57 AM »
Neil, you do bring up some good points. Ditching existing nuclear (as Germany did post Fukushima) is wrong, when considering climate risks. Switching Poland from coal to gas could cause problematic reliance on imports, and it's probably better for the Poles to keep coal as (a less ideal) backup instead. Volume taken up by storage solutions is indeed a concern.
However, it seems your main point is wrong, assuming I got the math correct. 20GW stored for two days is indeed 960 GWh, but the cost of which would be $48B under your $50/KWh assumption. The $1.5Tn figure appears to have some wrong factor in it. I think this changes the whole argument, from impossible to doable, bearing in mind storing two days of 2/3 of the grid demand is a future requirement over a decade or two, not a present one.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1428 on: October 12, 2020, 10:53:18 AM »
Mobile phones Oren.  Hard to get a good view of numbers when using one.  Apologies for the shift in 000's.

OK so we are talking $48bn for a couple of days backup.  With a theoretical price which may not arrive for quite a while.  Flow batteries will help and Gravity is becoming something which is, perhaps, possible.

But the scale is incredible.  For Gravity it might need to go offshore just to reduce the land footprint.  I know that the US has vast swathes of open space, but Europe is not so lucky.  High population density and high land utilisation is the norm.

My concern is the knee jerk reaction to Nuclear.  It is a NO because of "unknown costs" and it's dangerous you know.

Yes, I know that, but we have already calculated the cost of not reducing FF emissions.  It is more than any amount of Nuclear decommissioning, it is the collapse of the world economies, mass starvation and war.  Yet we forge forward with pre-set ideas which rule out one of our best sources of baseload power.  Yes it is expensive, yes it is hard to decommission, but Yes it also doesn't take a constant input of fossil fuel to run and it emits no CO2 at the point of use.

There is talk of pumped storage.  let me level set the scale of pumped storage.  The three gorges dam produces 22GW of power.  Just where would we pump it and store it before flowing it out? I was talking 20GW for ONE country and not the largest in the EU at that.  This is the sheer scale of grid power backup needed if you go to wind and solar only.

It is hard to imagine; pumping the sheer volume of water to run a turbine set the size of the three gorges boggles the mind.  You might as well talk about digging a tunnel through the isthmus of Panama and use the sea level difference between the pacific and Atlantic to generate power.

I'm not trying to negate the benefits of renewable power.  I just want to stop these throw away remarks about how we can just get rid of coal and nuclear then run on wind and solar and just continue with life the way we do today. 

Simply put, you cant unless you plan for it and if you are going to plan for it, then you are going to have to accept the cost of it.

As Germany has already found, the cost of putting up massive wind farms is only one part of the equation. The cost of upgrading the Entire in country transmission grid will, in the end, be significantly more.

It is useful to remember that although we have in country grids and long distance power transmission, most of the heavy usage of power is generated relatively locally.  To expect that this transmission grid would allow very high power draw from one end of the country to the other, let alone then out to multiple other countries, is simply not in line with todays reality.

Worse is that countries with multiple edge connections to other countries have no in country hub and spoke to interconnect. For instance Germany is a major European interconnect hub and borders 8 countries.  Yet Germany doesn't even have a North/South in-country interconnect to supply Solar North and Wind south.  Then we have to ask, who is going to pay for these interconnects?  If Netherlands wind power in the North Sea is being sold to Poland or Denmark, through Germany, who gets paid what and how does it pay for the German interconnect grid.

Every time I hear "we should not use Nuclear", I also hear "we can just".  Actually we can't unless we plan, cost and pay.

Even when all that is said and done, I'm not against ruling out Nuclear.  I just want to hear a viable alternative which is deliverable today and doesn't have a backlash which might just drive the ordinary person in the street against carbon mitigation.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1429 on: October 12, 2020, 01:18:03 PM »

I get what you are saying Neil but if they go all out building renewables now with 4 hr storage by the time the actually need the long term storage it will be available for cheaper than nuclear.
If they build nuclear now they will start paying today and won't get any reduction in CO2 for a decade and they will be locked into current fission technology for 50+years.
If they put the same money into renewables they get cheaper power now and a reduction in CO2 now. Most of the cost of lithium batteries is the materials. Iron is dirt cheap most of the cost of iron flow batteries is the research and low volume of batteries made.  That 30-50 dollar / MWh is possible now on low volume production. If you ordered 1gwh of storage today I bet you could get it much cheaper. More storage is mostly about bigger tanks. I bet it can get to less than 1 dollar / MWh with volume production.


As you say heating in winter is important. Poland has significant geothermal resources for heating. If much of the heating switches to geothermal this would reduce storage needs. They are working on geothermal electricity as well but low well temperatures make that a challenge right now. If the focus is on doing what you can today other options will continue to open up before the first step is completed.


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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1430 on: October 12, 2020, 01:36:48 PM »


Hydrogen is another good possibility.  Except the volume would require refilling gas field sized caverns.


There's lots of methane storage that'll be redundant, which is the way the UK is heading at the moment for industrial gas. Refit the methane infrastructure for hydrogen.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1431 on: October 12, 2020, 01:54:02 PM »
For perspective $50/kWh is 0.5c per kWh over a 10000 cycle lifetime of the battery.

In the UK new Nuclear is 10p/kWh versus 6p for new offshore wind, so more storage and wind would be more cost effective.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1432 on: October 12, 2020, 03:03:28 PM »

I get what you are saying Neil but if they go all out building renewables now with 4 hr storage by the time the actually need the long term storage it will be available for cheaper than nuclear.
If they build nuclear now they will start paying today and won't get any reduction in CO2 for a decade and they will be locked into current fission technology for 50+years.

I'm not sure about the timelines.  Hinckley Point C had nearly 5 years of analysis, what if planning and general surveying to understand the land and define the parameters to be secure.  All of that work was stored and put into a model to be re-enacted within 6 months the next time.  Also lessons were learned on the construction.  It doesn't have to take a decade.

The other point on Storage is that 4 hours is no good.  It simply won't do and that needs to be faced up front.  There needs to be a minimum 12 hours storage for every utility put in if corresponding fixed power is to be removed from the grid.  In the UK we may have almost totally removed coal, but we have done it by reducing power demand.  We have a new CCGT plant going in that will be the largest in Europe.  We're not building it because we think it's a fun thing to do, we're building it to get us through when the wind doesn't blow.

I've already highlighted the size of infrastructure that would be required to back Poland for even 2 days.  Yes you can build it incrementally, but if you want to get rid of the existing power plants you need enough backup to count.  Wind can drop for a week.  Yes you get some, every day, but not enough to count.  Storage and other power has to be up to filling in.

 
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1433 on: October 12, 2020, 03:13:24 PM »


Hydrogen is another good possibility.  Except the volume would require refilling gas field sized caverns.


There's lots of methane storage that'll be redundant, which is the way the UK is heading at the moment for industrial gas. Refit the methane infrastructure for hydrogen.

Have to define lots Richard.  From what I can calculate my postulated 20GWh for a 2 day stoppage in Poland would require 56 cubic Kilometres of natural gas.  Granted you could compress it and hydrogen is compressible, but then you would need high pressure storage and that is expensive.

All assuming that we can over capacity renewables to a sufficient factor to crack 56 cubic km of hydrogen and be able to store it without loss until we need it.

All of these solutions cost and grid scale makes everything astronomical.

Not impossible, they just bring the huge costs of nuclear into focus.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1434 on: October 12, 2020, 04:54:21 PM »
Quote
The other point on Storage is that 4 hours is no good.  It simply won't do and that needs to be faced up front.  There needs to be a minimum 12 hours storage for every utility put in if corresponding fixed power is to be removed from the grid. 
You are mixing the timelines. 4 hour storage can do a world of good and make solar and wind even more useful and cheaper than they already are. Removing power from the grid is one or two decades away, when  statistics are much better known and storage much increased. You shoot down the idea because it's not all ready on day one. But why would anyone shut down the backup generators before the solution is ready?

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1435 on: October 12, 2020, 05:43:43 PM »
Hydrogen could be stored in depleted gas wells, that's where the CH3 came from, no shortage of space and infrastructure in place.

Not so sure that would be suitable for high purity H2 for fuel cells, as there would be some CH3 in the mix. A separator column might do it - take the lighter pure H2 from the top.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1436 on: October 12, 2020, 06:47:44 PM »


Hydrogen is another good possibility.  Except the volume would require refilling gas field sized caverns.


There's lots of methane storage that'll be redundant, which is the way the UK is heading at the moment for industrial gas. Refit the methane infrastructure for hydrogen.

Have to define lots Richard.
whatever it takes, which in Feb 2019 was 2.5 billion m3 for 12 days supply, but I imagine it may well go up as the piles of coal cease to be a reserve.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1437 on: October 12, 2020, 08:52:06 PM »
That's the point though isn't it.  Whatever it takes.  We all have a different view on what that is.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1438 on: October 12, 2020, 10:50:52 PM »
To me this is an unnecessarily negative view.

Wind power is never zero, newer offshore provide power for longer periods.
Solar is about to transition to multilayer perovskite which will have a similar impact. 
Storage is growing at an ever increasing rate so there is every reason to beleive it will go through the same acceleration as other renewables.
The mid range storage of CAES, LAES and flow batteries are a step behind but they are being built commercially and are not just pipe dreams.
Biogas from farm and sewage waste is another source of longer term fuel that has seen major growth
Many countries are investing in hydrogen from excess renewables.
Interconnectors are already helping share supply to where the demand is not being met, with several GW being built for the UK right now.

All these combine to shrink both the period when renewables can't meet demand and how far short they fall.  Even comparing today with January 2019 is false as three major offshore wind farms have been built since which would've had an impact.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1439 on: October 12, 2020, 11:11:00 PM »
Ignoring cheaper and better solutions that can be deployed today for a more expensive solution that won't yield any power for close to a decade does not make any sense to me. I am not against new nuclear if that is what it takes to solve this crises. Unless you have enough money to build all that new infrastructure today it makes more sense to start with the better solutions first. Geothermal heating makes economic sense in Poland but the financing isn't there. The argument for new nuclear just does not add up using financial or environmental concerns. The only way it truly makes sense is as a back door to nuclear weapons.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1440 on: October 13, 2020, 02:51:05 PM »
To me this is an unnecessarily negative view.

Wind power is never zero, newer offshore provide power for longer periods.


So when I post a real statistic of a Wind capacity which is installed at 24GW, but produces much less than 1GW, over a two day period, you call it unnecessarily negative?

I'm not talking supposition, I'm not talking theory, I'm talking recorded history of a Wind system which has a nameplate power of over half of a countries average daily power draw.

It doesn't matter how good your solar is after the sun goes down.  If the sun goes down and the wind doesn't blow, what do you do?

If the sun comes up again, wind is still <1gw and your storage is running down, what do you do then?

If your generating capacity utilisation is 95%, how do you charge your storage to survive the next  time your wind environment decides to drop to 50% of average, let alone 1%?

These are very real questions to answer.  The UK grid is 37GW of wind and solar, installed power.  The UK grid almost never reaches 50% renewables and often drops to <5% renewables.

If you are going to dismiss Nuclear (the UK grid has around 18% realistic Nuclear power), then you have to come up with a better answer than "wind is rarely 0%).

Because you have to answer just how much wind you need in order to replace that Nuclear baseline power.  So if 5% is your "rarely 0", then we need to mitigate that.  in the UK that would be 20 times installed wind/solar to bring 5% up to viable levels.  In the UK that would be 740GW.

If you have better figures please present them.  But at least 740GW, running at the average 40% we see in the UK, would provide power in the normal times to provide both all the power we need and the storage and power to sell to others who don't have so much wind or solar at that time.

Yes, it is extreme.  But extremes are required when you wilfully refuse to accept other solutions.

It is right that people who have power today demand that you supply the same power with your transition to renewables.  If that means crazy oversupply, then crazy oversupply it is.

At least they would be hearing the truth.  But that would make Nuclear look more attractive wouldn't it?

So who is being disingenuous?  The person who says "look it's never 0", or the person who says "I need more than 5%, what are you going to do about it"?

My only stance here is one where you don't sell your aspirations as fact when the reality impacts real lives of real people.  Because if you do that, you can forget moving off FF forever.  Because they will never believe you again and there are more of them than there are of us.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1441 on: October 13, 2020, 06:07:44 PM »
We are going in full circles.
Initially FF and short term storage will serve as backup, along with long range interconnects, then larger storage and some capacity overbuild. Expensive and non-dispatchable nuclear is the worst possible source to complement cheap and intermittent renewables.
With that, I'll let this debate be.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1442 on: October 13, 2020, 10:41:08 PM »
The question becomes what is your goal. Is it to reduce co2 emissions as quickly and inexpensively as possible or is it to justify building nuclear? You keep insisting we worry about the last percentages of decarbonization first. There are solutions for the last percentages today and they will get better before Poland needs them.

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1443 on: October 13, 2020, 11:16:46 PM »

So when I post a real statistic of a Wind capacity which is installed at 24GW, but produces much less than 1GW, over a two day period, you call it unnecessarily negative?

I'm not talking supposition, I'm not talking theory, I'm talking recorded history of a Wind system which has a nameplate power of over half of a countries average daily power draw.

In short yes.
The offshore wind farms built since Jan 2019 and currently planned to be built before 2025 have significantly higher capacity factors than the largely onshore wind power you are comparing them to.  They can and will provide more power as a proportion of nameplate for a longer period of time.  There was about 5.5GW offshore wind in Jan 2019, by 2025 it will be 18GW which should be capable of providing and average of 10-12GWh, I really think you are not fully appreciating the scale of change we are seeing, it's like comparing an old nokia to the latest iPhone.

You are comparing oranges to apples to make your claim. There is no such thing as the wind not blowing, it's always blowing somewhere and as the wind generation spreads over a larger area and interconnectors help spread that generation then the proportion of wind farms becalmed reduces.

Nuclear isnt the answer, it fails to meet peak and exceeds low demand, in Frances case they import and use FF at peak and export during the night and at low demand, and it isnt cheap.  The answer is to continue wiping out FF with renewables and then harness the excess periods to load shift. 
It is not me who is refusing to accept other solutions here, we will soon reach a point where we must significantly curtail renewables just so nuclear can continue to generate power that isnt needed just so it can provide 6GW of the 40-45GW needed at peak.  I'd rather see that investment wipe out more FF throughout the year and then use it to whittle down the remaining short periods when renewables and storage cannot meet demand.  Unless you are prepared to aim the same argument at Nuclear as wind and say UK must build 40+ GW Nuclear to cover peak demand and then it is a waste and still fails to deliver.




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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1444 on: October 14, 2020, 10:47:41 AM »
Right at the beginning of this discussion there was some derision that Poland was going with offshore when onshore was quicker to deliver at lower cost.  Therefore I find the Apples and Oranges point a bit thin.

You are both correct and incorrect.  UK wind farm is split 10GW offshore and 14GW onshore.

Average load factors, over 5 years was

Quote
The load factor is the actual output of a turbine benchmarked against its theoretical maximum output in a year. The load factor is calculated by RenewableUK as a rolling average of the past five years using data (on an Unchanged Configuration Basis) from the Digest of UK Energy Statistics published by the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. Using stats 2015-2019 (released in July 2020):
onshore wind: 26.62%
offshore wind: 38.86%

https://www.renewableuk.com/page/UKWEDExplained#:~:text=The%20load%20factor%20is%20calculated,onshore%20wind%3A%2026.62%25

Now go back and look at the legend I posted.  It was Daily Averages.  <0.7GW for ALL wind.

Reality, when the wind doesn't blow, it doesn't matter whether your wind turbine is onshore or offshore, the wind is not blowing.  The fact that 10GW of offshore (likely), delivered the 0.7GW of actual power into the grid is irrelevant.  Because it is still only 7% of the nameplate power.  Meaning the UK would still need 600GW of deployed wind to gain energy security, at night, in winter, when the wind is minimal.

Those are Offshore facts from recorded data.  One over 5 years, the other from a snapshot of actual performance over an average day.  In fact the UK has had this kind of weather for a week before.

So I'm not comparing apples with oranges.  I'm pointing out that assertions that variable energy generation will fulfil baseload power is incorrect.

With that glaring fact, I'm explaining why countries may feel that their only available recourse, given the alternatives, may be to build a foundation of Nuclear on which to stand.

Like oren, I think it's done.  People who think Nuclear has no place in the energy mix will not change their minds.  There are options, they are not cheap, they are also not immediate (offshore wind averages 6 years to build out), alternatives with storage change every year.

 
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1445 on: October 14, 2020, 12:09:05 PM »
“So when I post a real statistic of a Wind capacity which is installed at 24GW, but produces much less than 1GW, over a two day period, you call it unnecessarily negative?”

I think it is, a bit.

Output is proportional to the cube of windspeed, so no one expects them to produce at max nameplate 24/7/365

Also to square of diameter. Higher capacity factors are achieved by oversizing the blades then turning side on to the wind when max generator OP is reached.

Looking at Nuclear *only* we would have to build enough capacity for UK winter peak, with 20/60 GW unused during summer.

V.expensive as the monetary and CO2 cost is in the construction, not the fuel
Or
Enough storage to take summer surplus and discharge for 3 months in winter.

V^(silly) expensive and not a good use of resources - a battery capable of 10,000 cycles being used once per year.
Wind blows more in winter when demand is highest.

The plant has to pay back the CO2 from first pour of concrete (1kg concrete = 1 kg CO2) to final commissioning AND undo the warming affect all the CO2 had during that time.

It’s paying back with “interest” which is tiny for other renewables, because time to commissioning is so short. Nuclear is typ. 5-10 years, all going well.
Also the kg CO2/kWh intensity on the grid is reducing with adoption of renewables, so Nuclear’s “currency” to pay back it’s carbon debt is devalued.

Nuclear’s only practical use is to contribute to baseload (which any other source can) so it’s a one trick pony and of very limited use.

“I'm pointing out that assertions that variable energy generation will fulfil baseload power is incorrect.”

Not individually, but a mix of variable sources can. Scotland is nearly 100% *net* renewable electricity, mostly onshore wind.  More offshore wind planned and we’re just starting on marine, CCS, hydrogen….
« Last Edit: October 14, 2020, 12:25:28 PM by Iain »
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1446 on: October 14, 2020, 01:13:43 PM »
Also worth looking at how much storage there will be in car batteries in the future

Say UK’s 40m cars have 90kWh each, 10 kWh used for daily commute, range useful for weekend trips

Check my numbers:
40E6 x 80E3 = 3.2E12 Wh
Winter demand is c. 32E9 W
So there is 100 h or 4+ days’ winter demand available in the cars.
That makes intermittency much easier to manage.

Also how much despatchable (hydro, biomas, H2, interconnector) is needed to cover 32GW if there was a renewables outage

Not 32 GW.

If the 24h renewables outage was known about 24h in advance, which is credible, only half.
16GW during the period of the outage, 16GW for the 24hs prior to charge up.

Even less if the forecast was 2 or 3 days in advance which is realistic.
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BeeKnees

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1447 on: October 14, 2020, 02:52:56 PM »
Average load factors, over 5 years was

Quote
The load factor is the actual output of a turbine benchmarked against its theoretical maximum output in a year. The load factor is calculated by RenewableUK as a rolling average of the past five years using data (on an Unchanged Configuration Basis) from the Digest of UK Energy Statistics published by the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. Using stats 2015-2019 (released in July 2020):
onshore wind: 26.62%
offshore wind: 38.86%

I will try one last time to explain

Capacity factor of offshore wind farms compared by age.

Scroby Sands 30.6% capacity factor over its 15 year life so far
Lynn 34% over 10 years
Greater Gabbard 40% over 6 years
Walney extension 49%  over 2 year life.
Hywind  55% over 2 years. 
Dogger Bank 60% expected.

So yes I think that using figures that include offshore wind that was largely below 40% as a measure of what the wind farms being installed today can achieve is a misrepresentation.

Quote
Reality, when the wind doesn't blow, it doesn't matter whether your wind turbine is onshore or offshore, the wind is not blowing.  The fact that 10GW of offshore (likely), delivered the 0.7GW of actual power into the grid is irrelevant.  Because it is still only 7% of the nameplate power.  Meaning the UK would still need 600GW of deployed wind to gain energy security, at night, in winter, when the wind is minimal.

This is simply false.  Because the wind speeds are low in the north sea doesn't mean the wind isn't blowing on the Atlantic coast of ireland.  Offshore dramatically increases the area over which wind generation is spread by a very significant distance, you are expanding beyond the size of a weather system so basing your understanding on what has to date been a largely onshore fleet leads to a false assumption.
« Last Edit: October 14, 2020, 09:21:38 PM by BeeKnees »
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Iain

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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1448 on: October 14, 2020, 03:34:09 PM »
Good, so Capacity Factors are improving as we go.
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Re: Nuclear Power
« Reply #1449 on: October 14, 2020, 09:12:47 PM »
Neil there are many ways to deal with intermittency many of which have been expressed here. You have not responded to them. The conversation goes stale when you do not engage it. Alcohol based geothermal could also be used to generate electricity. District heating with geothermal reduces electricity demand significantly In winter. Some batteries, some hydrogen, some hydro. The hydro potential alone could supply a major portion of demand. The main reoccurring theme I read for big projects in Poland is a lack of funding. Nuclear is expensive and the money would be better spent elsewhere.