Nuke support in UK hits record high Public support for nuclear energy has reached an all-time high in the UK, less than a year after the Fukushima incident. There is an interesting gender gap, though. Pollsters Ipsos MORI, who buttonholed about 1,000 Brits last month for its survey, found that 40 per cent of the sample [PDF] now hold favourable views of nuclear …
"Nuke support in UK hits record high"
Thats not what the graph says, both 2010 and the 2011 (Dec) have 40% approval, but the 2011 (Dec) data point has a higher disapproval rating.
So although those in favour of Nuclear has recovered to the level it enjoyed before Fukushima, there are now more people who are against it.
wishy washy liberal tree huggers think the answer to our problems are windmills.
When the power cuts finally kick in a few years from now and they can't brew themselves a cup of nettle tea and watch the latest Eco documentary they may wish to ponder on their years of objections to nuclear power.
Perhaps people are waking up to the fact that nuclear is pretty much our only option - most renewables like solar and wind are unreliable and costly (and not even 'green') and the other option is keep burning carbon and emitting CO2?
The government should concentrate more on efficiency, insulation etc. - i.e. reducing consumption - but sooner or later you need more generating capacity and nuclear is the best choice.
The cheapest kWh is the one you don't have to generate. We've come a long way on energy efficiency over the years, with better insulation and low-power appliances. Of course, there's a limit to that too. Have a look at the difference in purchase cost vs running cost between an A-rated fridge-freezer and an A+++ rated one...
That's the point where you need more generation.
(Also bear in mind that in environments that need air-conditioning, solar is often a savvy option, because it generates at the time you're more likely to need that power. It's a fringe case, yes, but I'm just pointing out that solar/wind are not completely dead ducks.)
I'd prefer it if the government got out of the way completely and just left the market to get on with it. Nothing annoys me more than seeing my tax going to publicise crap insulaion schemes or, even worse, subsidising windmills.
The environment is far too important to be left to the idiots in govenment.
"Thats not what the graph says, both 2010 and the 2011 (Dec) have 40% approval, but the 2011 (Dec) data point has a higher disapproval rating."
That is not really the point - looking longer term people are (overall) more for / less against nuclear and that it has (already) recovered from the dip after Fukushima.
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"...before taxes, a kWh of 'leccy is €0.0475 in Paris, and €0.1037 in London?"
What you miss is that the €0.0475 don't include the communal costs through government subsidies and tax rebates granted to the energy industry, and also not the costs for dealing with the nuclear waste. The price for that is paid by the French through taxes.
I think the bit missed here is called a "marginal cost". That's the EXTRA cost of producing one more Watt from any point. For nuclear, it is almost zero. In essence you insert a fuel rod a little more, and watch a gauge. Nuclear fuel is "used" whether it's generating electricity or not, the decay just happens. Physics is like that. In other words it costs roughly the same to have the thing sitting idle as it does to be generating on full whack.
Consider a coal plant. If it is not being used, it's very cheap. You have to pay for labour and whatever fuel is needed to keep it ticking over. Once it needs to be used every Watt it generates needs a shovel (or whatever) of coal thrown in. The cost of the extra Watt is Very High Indeed. If a “shovel of coal” costs £1, and you sell electricity for £1.20 per “shovel equivalent” (I’ll call it a Watt to make life simple) you make a marginal profit of 20p per Watt sold. It’s not that simple though, because you have to pay all those fixed costs. Imagine they are £1million per year. To cover the costs you have to sell £1million divided by £0.20 Watts = 5 million Watts. After that, every extra Watt makes you 20p.
Now back to Nuclear. The fixed costs are higher, so let’s say £2million. Each Watt costs 1p to generate (remember, the fuel is a fixed cost, and in that £2million). So each Watt we sell makes us £1.19. We have to sell £2M/£1.19 or about 1.7million Watts to reach break even. After that, each Watt we sell makes us £1.19. At 5million Watts, where coal breaks even, we have made 3.3million Watts times £1.19 or nearly £4,000,000. Those numbers are made up, but demonstrate the point of why it’s cheap. The tipping point will be at a very different point in reality, but there will be one.
Having high fixed costs is economically risky. If there was no demand then the nuclear plant would have a £2million loss, the coal plant £1million. So the secret is to keep nuclear plants as busy as you can, selling as much electricity as you can. Enter the Interconnectors. These are links between grids, such as between France and the UK. It is almost exclusively pulling (or pushing, I dunno) electricity FROM France TO the UK, not the other way. Why? Well, it’s cheap for France to generate extra Watts to help us out, so it makes lots of money doing it. Going the other way, we with out unpredictable wind and marginally expensive coal plants can’t compete with France, so we don’t tend to sell that way. Unless there is some disaster in France or elsewhere in mainland Europe, and they need all the power they can get. This, by the way, also helps out the French tax payer and the French nukes in keeping French prices down.
That's the nuclear model, that's why it's so cheap - IT'S THE MARGINAL COST OF PRODUCTION, that far, far outweighs the hidden costs you refer to, especially as all energy sources have subsidies, and the costs of nuclear waste storage are not as expensive as you would think, in the context of the sums one is considering for power generation for a whole country.
Generating power from nuclear fission requires the splitting of atoms. This is slowed down by the presence of boron rods inserted into the fissionable material so fewer atoms are split. It therefore follows that with the rods inserted to produce less electricity, fewer atoms are split and therefore less fuel is used. Just like using the accelerator on the car, it uses a small amount of fuel when stationary but more when you increase the required output.
"Nuclear fuel is "used" whether it's generating electricity or not, the decay just happens."
That's definitely not true for nuclear reactors which are used on earth for producing electricity. In those you create a controlled chain reaction where you use neutrons to split the atom, creating more neutrons which split more atoms. (one important part about keeping a reactor running is to make sure only one neutron hits another atom at the right speed)
So if you have an unused fuel rod lying around somewhere it'll essentially do nothing. It's even only weakly radioactive. Only when you start the chain reaction you will get useful amounts of power.
What you might mean is a "Radioisotope thermoelectric generator". Those are moderately safe, but those only generate a kilowatt at most. They were used for space probes and pacemakers. Those actually run out of fuel no matter if you use the electricity or not. But that's really expensive.
To put some numbers into the discussion. When I go to my muncipal electricity company here in Germany, and ask for completely renewable energy, I'll have to pay 22,68 Eurocents per kilowatthour. That's about 0.19 pounds. And that covers the cost of not using any fossil fuel or nuclear power as well as taxes and everything until it reaches my socket.
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...is awesome.
Look at the facts. There's:
Burning coal, like your Grandad used to (and he had an outside bog too.)
Windmills, like on Camberwick Green.
Gas, like on your Mam's boring old hob.
Solar, like on the pink calculator you get laughed at for in school.
Biomass, which is just stinky, old rubbish.
Then there's SPLITTING THE FUCKING ATOM. You know, like a NUCLEAR FUCKING BOMB MAN!!!!1
You can't argue with my data.
Problem is, it's all too late. We've been pursuing a power policy based on utter fantasy for years and now the time to build new nuclear plants is too long. We need to get cracking right now, but planning consents, public consultations etc.etc. will ensure it'll take years. Nuclear is our only option at the moment and has been for years. All the alternatives pursued for the last couple of decades were so obviously flawed for a variety of reasons.
If we start getting power shortages, I just hope someone has the bottle to turn off the people who caused it first. The greens, anti-nuclear etc. Leave those of us sensible enough to see reality alone. The whole thing has been one big con for 20 years.
".....We need to get cracking right now, but planning consents, public consultations etc.etc. will ensure it'll take years....." A few years ago I had a chat with a civvie servant who said there were ways round such matters. True, this was after several beers, but his option was quite amusingly simple - government decides to have nuke-powered ships/submarines; invests in the nuke powerplant research/production (could be based on current Trident sub systems); then cancels nuke ships/subs after having produced working "engines"; announces it will save money by using the cancelled nuke powerplants as generators for UK military facilities (getting round the planning and consent bits); feeds excess power from new militray bases into the grid. Apparently, the idea came from American work in the '50s when they converted a nuke sub into a leccy powerstation.
support for nuclear power in the UK will eventually become demand, cos unfortunately we're not all willing to martyr ourselves to the renewables cause. Electricity bills can't keep rising forever without protest.
Maybe we'll get magical cheap, efficient photovoltaic cells next year. I suspect it is rather more likely that the power fairies will come power our heating systems for us.
Its a question of actual feasibility.
Renewable energy of at least the intermittent kind cant do the job alone, and there is no alternative that is feasible beyond fossil to complement it with.
There is also the mater of energy density, which is low for all renewables, and population density, which is high for the UK at least.
David Mackay estimates we consume about 5Kw per head to live as we do. The industry standard for wind power is just 2w/square meter AVERAGE. So that is 2500 square meters - 2.5 square kilometers, - per head of population to satisfy our total energy needs with renewable windmills.
Plus some kind of storage to tide us over those grey cold windless days..and nights..a lake the size of Loch Ness, and 1000 meters deep should just about keep us going..Oh... No such lake exists, or can be built.
Bummer.
Whereas with nuclear, we don't need the storage - that's taken care of in the atomic nucleus already, and storing a few decades of nuclear fuel is entirely feasible -- and the actual power density of a nuclear plant is around 2kW/sq meter. two and a half square meters of land for each and every one of our energy needs is a lot less than we need just to sleep, so suddenly we get our country and land area back for food, houses, recreation, and all the other things that make a non 'renewable' life worth living...
Those who realize that renewable energy cannot ever, has not ever and will not ever be a realistic proposition, at current population levels, are left with the potentially injurious burning of whatever fossil fuel is left, nuclear energy, or a return to medieval population levels via a massive die back in population.
The jury is still out on climate change, but not on renewable energy, amongst the modestly intelligent part of the population. The grim acceptance that nuclear power is the only practical way forward at this point in time, has arrived, and, with it, the understanding that its problems are at least susceptible to careful technological solutions, wheres those of the renewable fantasy are not - they are intrinsic to the energy sources.
I hate the way Britain has become so timid and backward looking.
In Germany they are running into all the anticipated problems right now, especially with their wind farms (surges of excess energy which are overwhealming the electricity transportation grid and can't be stored). Are they throwing their hands up in despair? No, they're getting creative and investing in the future.
The biggest upgrade of the electricity grid since it was built, is about to happen to solve the transportation problem.
But what about storage? That's the real killer. Well, there's a bloody brilliant idea which is (probably) going to be put into action relatively quickly and cheaply. The idea is to use the thousands of kilometers of underground tunnels left over after a few centuries of mining in and around the most populated areas. These extremely deep tunnels are perfect batteries for potential energy, in the same way that we use lakes for storing energy between times of peak demand.
As for Fukushima, ... trying to get insight into the Nuclear industry in the public media in the U.S. or U.K. is about as likely as having a British Newspaper explain just what the City of London is (hint, it's not at all what you think it is if you think it's just another word for "London"....).
http://www.fairewinds.com/updates - if you want hard facts about the consequences of Fukushima, the factual design inadequacies of existing nuclear powerplants, and an insight into the lazy and corrupt nature of the industry as a whole.
I'm assuming he's talking about compressed air, it's been done at a few locations around the world.
Pump air into a huge space at off peak times and release though a turbine at on peak times.
http://www.next100.com/2009/08/pge-opts-for-energy-storage.php
The thing is, because compressed air is not very energy dense you need huge enclosed spaces with a lot of structural strenght to do it , hence mines and cave systems. Its also not very efficent losing energy through heat when you compress the air - some sites use heat exchangers to take heat from the compression pump and apply it to the air being released to improve on the efficency.
"I'm assuming he's talking about compressed air, it's been done at a few locations around the world."
Perhaps the gasometer model. These are not filled with (compressed) gas but with water.
the gas enters an underground storage space and displaces the water into the extensible tanks seen above ground. Its the head of water that provides the pressure and energy storage not the compression of the gas on a fixed size container.
As these are being "retired" by varouius gas boards, these would become ideal small scale local generating facilities - especiallya s they are often located on industrial sites - next to HVAC lines.
A small genset could take low cost offpeakl leccy pump air into the old gas storage tank and during peak generate leccy. I doubt this would actually be a vaiable business model and would not sit under the governments renewables targets but it is clean simple and would "just work".
> it is clean simple and would "just work".
I'm not sure that's actually the case...
The sort of volume of water we're talking about really isn't that great; if you work out the total energy storage in a gasometer, it's going to be pretty much ineffective as an electricity supply.
Gasometers held enough energy to sustain the gas *pressure*...
Vic.
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High Voltage Alternating Current, aka high tension lines
Back to the subject, as a backdrop to the intermittent nature of renewables, you need a multi-tiered approach. The only system that I am aware of that can deal with surges in demand or drops in production on a reasonably short time scale (i.e. seconds) is hydro-electric. Open the valves at the top and a few seconds later you have power. Every other system needs time to spin up as they involve converting water (or other fluid) to high pressure superheated gas and that entire process takes time to warm up and get going.
Nuclear needs to happen because the tree-huggers won't let us burn gas, oil or coal, but they won't let us build nukes either because of the waste problems once they're past their usable life. Which leaves us with a fundamental problem with environmental groups - they think that the solution is for people to have no power for days at a time when the renewables cannot produce enough to power the grid. Until the tree-huggers realise the flaws in their demands, or the government stops pandering to them, the rest of the country will suffer.
And therein lies the problem. From my experience of them, tree huggers don't expect people to go without electricity. To them, it's simply that another solution needs to be found. They start pointing out windmills etc. and once you point out the flaws, just start on about 'another alternative has to be found.' In other words, I haven't a clue what we can use, but these are bad and shouldn't be used. It's not about them wanting us not to have electricity, or to live in caves, it simply that they know what they don't like, but are clueless to come up with an alternative that works. They tend to hold out on some future panacea that somehow will majically appear from nowhere.
There are also a lot who say windmills are the answer and yet when planning permission is sought near their home (say within eyesight), they are the first to complain!! They always want it to be someone elses problem.
I've had a look at that website and it is publishing fairy tales as fact.
20mSv/yr is the internationally accepted dose rate LIMIT for nuclear workers. Dose rates to the public have to be below 1mSv/yr or, to put it bluntly, much less than the background radiation dose you get from living.
No government in the world would allow the 20mSv dose rate for the public.
1 additional cancer for every 100 girls? I'd love to see their analysis! Internal or external dose? Ingestion, inhalation or contaminated wounds? What nuclide is giving the dose?
Like I said above, fairy tales!
Oh, have you tried to look beyond the media? Nearly everything about the nuclear industry in this country is in the public domain. Only details that compromise the security of the plant, or the country are classified.
Face it Ben, you don't know what you're talking about. (and neither does that site you linked to either)
You're trying to tell us that it is a good thing that the Germans are squandering vast amounts of money on trying to deal with the power storage issue, when they had a perfectly good nuclear power system in place already? Decomissioning those old nuke plants in response to Fukushima hysteria (seriously, how tectonically active is Germany these days?) is a colossal disservice to anyone who has to pay taxes to the German government, or buy power from German power companies.
And using underground tunnels for power storage? Hint: pumped storage systems are built at altitude for a good reason. Also have a think about exactly how polluted all those tunnels are.
If the nuclear industry is lazy and corrupt, then it needs to be fixed. Filling our country with windfarms and pumped storage schemes and vastly increasing electricity bills is not an appropriate or sustainable response.
> And using underground tunnels for power storage? Hint: pumped storage systems are built at
> altitude for a good reason. Also have a think about exactly how polluted all those tunnels are.
So turn it around. Generate power from filling the holes by gravity, and pump it back out when there's spare power. That's not the problem. (Even leakage works in your favour here.)
It won't be very efficient, but granted it's a way to store energy that's not too far out there.
Well, actually it's not surprising. Britain has lost leadership in almost any major technical sector, so it's not surprising that it does the same with renewable energy.
Nuclear power is not environmentally friendly. While it's perceived by the masses as clean, in fact it's not. Aside from the problem with the radiating waste (and no, not everything can be recycled), the mining and enrichment process is a really dirty mess, which most people never see as all that comes out of a nuclear power plant is water vapor from the cooling towers (which btw is also a contributor to climate change). And besides all that, uranium reserves are, similar to oil, not endless.
Nuclear power is also not cheap. I can't find the source right now but apparently the real price (which includes the costs for waste disposal, subsidies, grants, tax rebates and other government support) for power from a French or German nuclear power plant paid by the public is more like €1 to 1.30 *per kWh*. But the majority of this is paid indirectly through taxes, and therefore not directly visible to the customers. And it's of very high interest to the nuclear industry to keep the real costs out of our view.
Then there is the danger. I agree that another Chernobyl is unlikely but the nuclear industry has a proven track record of incompetence, negligience and untrustworthyness, with (at least borderline) criminal beahvior, which more often than not has put public safety at risk for pure cost savings and personal enrichment. It's beyond me how the public can still trust these criminals to maintain high safety standards, but the public as an entity knows jack sh*t about anything and is generally stupid as a mule, and if given the chance almost certainly always makes the wrong decisions.
Nuclear power in an outdated idea from the 60's. It may have it's use in special areas (i.e. as power source for space craft), but clinging to it as means of generating electricity is completely backward thinking. But then, most British houses are build after the same old Victorian style, and having separate taps for cold and warm water instead of a mixer tap as the rest of the world is considered to be a sign of 'character', so maybe Britain is inherently backward, and needs to be taught another lesson by another country that there are alternatives for things Brits consider there is no alternative for.
Now go away and actually do the sums on all that BS you have spourted, and when it comes back that Germany will be bankrupt and shivering in tow decades and taking all of its power from a nuclear France, then we can talk.
Germany and Denmark are way way worse at CO2 emissions per unit electricity than Switzerland (hydro + nuclear) or France (nuclear plus a bit of fossil).
Its all very fine to destroy your country by 'going renewable' for political reasons but the evidence is that it wont reduce fossil fuel consumption one iota.
Since that is its sole justification, what on earth is the point of it at all?
The correct answer is that there is no technological or climate change point: there is merely a political perception and profit motive.
It becomes, in the end, a way to get elected, for stupid people to take the moral high ground, and for energy companies to raise their prices.
"less incentive to waste as much energy"
Yeah, cos what we really need is for it to cost more to turn out ovens on and cook dinner (combined with rising food prices). And obviously the increased price will help us understand that it's OK for us and our kids to be cold.
You either have too much fucking money or are completely deficient in sense.
If this time around the public weren't duped by disguising a weapons program as a cheap power generation programme, thus allowing nuclear processes better suited to extracting ~100% of available energy from the fuel with short half life waste, to be employed then perhaps people would be less sceptical?
And yes, there's loads of it in our backyard already - France. > 78% of their power is provided by nuclear energy. Where are the Germans going to get their power from, now that they've dumped their nuclear programme? I hope the French put a tasty 'up yours' premium on the price.
If we do all we can to reduce our carbon footprint personally (insulation, minimising energy usage, electric cars etc) there comes a point where the only way to complete the process is to switch to a nationally available carbon free* power source - nuclear.
*OK it won't be 100% carbon free, but it will be a lot 'freer' than our existing power sources.
Unfortunately, the only way to institute that is to have a central (i.e. government) controlled generation process, but that's a bit too long term for any UK politician and also a bit too 'big-govermenty' for anyone right of centre.
Not sure where the attitudinal change will come from, but something's gonna have to happen soon!
"Where are the Germans going to get their power from, now that they've dumped their nuclear programme?"
Well, despite claims from the nuclear industry the switch-off of several nuclear power plants in Germany has shown that Germany is still producing excess power.
"I hope the French put a tasty 'up yours' premium on the price."
Hardly, as they are way too busy a**-ra***g their own people.
They ship dirty lignite coal to Poland, burn it there and pipe the electricity back.
The Germans get cheap power and clean air, the mining unions get to keep their subsidised jobs, the greens vote for the ruling coalition who got rid of nukes - everybody's happy.
The Poles get the shitty end of the stick - but that's what they are there for.
"These extremely deep tunnels are perfect batteries for potential energy, in the same way that we use lakes for storing energy between times of peak demand."
For what - for storing the wind?
You can't get around the fact that solar is hopeless as it is variable output during the day and nothing at night (meaning you need conventional generation anyway). Wind is almost as hopeless as again it is very variable and needs massive subsidies.
I agree schemes like hydroelectric that store energy as water behind a dam and then use excess wind power to pump the water back up (making the dam one large battery) are a nice idea but in reality are not going to supply the power requirements for the whole country.
perhaps he was eluding to using the underground tunnels to house massive flywheels. there aren't so many ways of reliably and cost effectivly storing potential energy...
... I'd hazard a guess that Fukishima has dissappeard from the public conscience, replaced by the vapid C:BB or some other such ilk.
Sorry, yes, hydroelectric storage. I didn't think I needed to make that clear.
It doesn't have to store enough for the whole country at any one moment either, it only has to store enough to smooth out the worst of the spikes.
Don't forget, Germany wanted to achieve something like 10% renewables by 2010 (if I remember correctly). The U.K. set similar targets. Commentators in the U.K. regarded that target as ridiculously optimistic back then and low and behold it is now only 4% in the U.K. but over TWENTY% in Germany. Will power has a lot to do with transforming promises into reality.
The first thing you have to realise about these figures is they talk about generating capacity. Now, for coal, gas, nuclear (especially) etc., the difference between actual production and theoretical capacity (which is what they're using) is not a lot. The different with virtually all 'green' methods is vast. Ask someone how much electricity their xMW windmill produces in a year and work out the actual production amount is. You'll find the figure is vastly different. So, the 20% quoted for Germany by hippies and greenies is utter rubbish. Theoretically, it is if it generated at theoretical capacity, but in reality, it's probably somewhere between 25 and 50% of that.
To go to renewables, any storage mechanism has to be capable of storing enough electricity to make up for the total loss of the renewables for a period of days, even weeks. Solar PV has to last all night, so maybe up to 14 hours ish. For wind, it has to potentially last for weeks. This became abundantly clear in Britiain during the last couple of cold snaps. At the point of peak demand (e.g. when cold and people using additional electric heating etc.), windmills produced damned close to nothing. Cold snaps like that are associated with calms. I don't have the figures to hand, but the figures of aound 1-5% of theoretical capacity have been shown. Unfortunately, this has to be maintained for days and potentially weeks. So, the storage has to be absolutely huge.
That's why wind power has to be subsidised and why wind power in this country has conventional generation backing it!!
Dropping water down a shaft imparts lots of energy that can be captured by a turbine, when you have excess grid capacity you pump the water back up from the lower to the higher levels. Also possible to store energy pneumatically in the same system, by pressurising the water supply.
So all you need is a really deep mine shaft, with a very large cavern at the bottom, in watertight rock, where it's geologically stable enough that dropping a billion tons of water into it won't have any effect.
I suppose there might be bits of Scottish granite mountains where you could dig one, but it's going to be quite an impressive feat of engineering.
Clever. I like it.
A couple of things that I'd like to think about - where do we store all that filthy, polluted, stinking water when we pump it back to the surface?
How efficient is it to do this? I know we do some already, and it has to be more efficient that just letting the excess power dissipate, but what's the return?
Even more disturbing - what if you've flooded a pitchblende mine? The radioactive horror of it all.
> Dropping water down a shaft imparts lots of energy
Yes, that's how you generate electricity. How do you *store* it by putting it in a mine?
> Also possible to store energy pneumatically in the same system, by pressurising the water supply.
No it isn't. Water is essentially incompressible.
Vic.
> You store it in the higher levels, release it to the lower levels as required
So the mine is essentially irrelevant to the plan; you're building a tank above the lowest point and pumping to it.
Now do the maths on how big a tank you need to be useful...
> Pneumatic refers to air, trapped above the water reservoir and compressed
So you're not pressurising the water system, you're pressurising the airgap around it.
The water significantly reduces the amount of energy you can store because it is incompressible. So if you try pressurising a tank that is full, you get no benefit whatsoever.
Vic.
> So the mine is essentially irrelevant
No, the mine is a structure that already exists that can be used to move water around and store it at different levels.
> So you're not pressurising the water system, you're pressurising the airgap around it.
Air is part of the system, water is pressurised by it - stop digging.
Oh dear.
> the mine is a structure that already exists
*How big* is that structure, compared to the size of a hydroelectric reservoir?
If you'd done the sums, you'd see how insignificant a project this would be. And that's before we go near any of the other practical problems.
> Air is part of the system, water is pressurised by it
Air is not part of a full tank. You could only pressurise something once you had already started releasing energy from the store - which you would only do when you were trying not to put any more energy into it.
> stop digging.
Why on earth do you think it is I who is digging a hole?
You've come up with an extraordinary claim. I've demonstrated a number of critical problems with it. You've yet to address any of them, nor demonstrate why no-one uses this system anywhere on the planet. Are you the smartest person who has ever lived? Or do you think, just maybe, that such ideas have been considered and rejected? Perhaps because of the fundamental problems I've highlighted in this thread?
Vic.
It'll cost an arm and a *both* legs (delays, cost overruns, test failures etc) and HMG (or rather their taxpayers) will foot the clean up bill (no change there then).
Trouble is so will *any* alternative to give that much capacity. Something around 12-15Gw.
And *all* UK generators are *addicted* to the big lump of capacity in one humungous hit.
There *are* smaller reactor designs (<250MW) but I doubt *anyone* will be looking at one of them and I suppose the generators will think a small(ish) one will take as long as a full size one so why bother. Although a smaller one *should* take less construction -> faster capacity.
Britards the clock is ticking. IIRC within 5 yrs some (all?) of the nukes that make up 20-25% of UK generation will hit their sell by date. *Maybe* some of them will have their license extended (like a pub?). Otherwise the rolling blackouts start c2017. Despite what you might think the heat output of burning an MP won't really make up the shortfall, despite the sense of satisfaction some might feel doing it.
That said, what is the *average* construction time for one of those "mass" produced French nukes?
A short missive to your elected representative expressing your support might be in order.
"A short missive to your elected representative expressing your support might be in order."
Nice idea, but there isn't a working pair of balls in the whole of the House of Commons. The only thing our current crop of MPs is good at is procrastination and blaming each other for everything.
Fo a nuclear station will be somewhere between 3-5 yrs, mostly likely the latter
However over here it will be
1 yr initial planning application
1 yr revised planning application
1 yr pause before the public inquirey
2 yrs for the public inquiry to hear the evidence
1 yr to write the report
5 mins for the government to accept the report
1 yr while green groups get a judicial review
1 yr for an appeal to the house of lords
construction begins
2 yrs to get anything on site because extremists have welded themselves to various bits of the site
6 yrs to build it
3 yrs to rebuild it because you really should'nt use the cheapest contractor for the cement
Which gives a grand total of.... who cares I've just frozen to death
Actually, the clean up bill is factored into the cost of producing the electricity from these plants.
It's a requirement from the Office for Nuclear Regulation that the plants are designed with decommissioning in mind using the technology available TODAY and costings for the decommissioning activities are factored into the overall running costs of the plant (and hence the electricity price).
> And *all* UK generators are *addicted* to the big lump of capacity in one humungous hit.
That's hardly surprising.
Look at the amount of aggro you'd have to go through to get *any* power station built - any size, any technology. There will be protests, legal challenges, you name it...
So you can either do that once for a large power station, or many times for a number of smaller ones to get to the same capacity.
Vic.
The majority of women are clueless when it comes to science and can't even spell nuclear never mind tell you anything about the risks. All they think of is poor green glowing ickle wickle baa lambs or some similar knee jerk juvenile emotional response whenever its mentioned.
And anyone who is worried about radiation should check out whats in the coal that gets used in a lot of coal fired power stations. It might be an eye opener. Funnily enough you never see spurious cancer reports about people living near the ash piles.
"You took the sad fact of gender inequality in science education and turned it into a tirade against women. I hope you're proud of yourself for discarding half of the human race in one paragraph, and of your ironic use of the word juvenile."
10/10 for keeping your right-on PC credentials intact. I'm sure all the wimmin will love you at the next feminists workshop against <insert some lame cause here>. But lets not let reality get in the way of your opinions eh?
Thorium reactors aren't magic. They work by breeding U233 in situ, they don't (generally) produce as many long lived waste isotopes but these aren't the big problem to store anyway (long lived = low activity) the real pain is dealing with massive amounts of lower level, but still paperwork-involving waste, especially when you need to shut one down.
The plant itself still has the same safety issues as any modern reactor design - the big advantage of Thorium really only comes if your country happens to be sitting on piles of the stuff but you don't have any Uranium. Since the UK doesn't have either it's no big deal.
You are wrong sir/madam. They are so!
...The plant itself still has the same safety issues as any modern reactor design...
Erm, no, that's wrong. Designs exist for which a reactor can be switched off and it will then enter a safe state even unattended.
...the big advantage of Thorium...
Is that there are so fewer atomic weapon proliferation risks. Hence, cheap energy for the whole planet. Hence a reduced need to go and steal oil from brown people.
...if your country happens to be sitting on piles of the stuff...
Ah, another advantage, almost everyone's country happens to be sitting on piles of the stuff.
Go and watch the Thoruim Remix videos if you can't bother to read. Then you'll be a nuclear expert too.
You can turn off a pebble bed reactor and will just sit there, you can pretty much turn off any negative temperature coeff design. There are still safety risks of having a big lump of glowing stuff sitting there even if it can't melt down.
I don't think the UK is going to be mining Thorium locally. If you can't economically mine coal from an existing coalfield, when you already have the mines built and the miners sitting on the dole - I don't think deep hard rock mining of Thorium is going to happen.
Proliferation isn't a big risk for the UK, we already have nukes - they MIGHT even work.
Not a mention of wave power and I don't know too much about it myself so I can't be specific. Unlike biomass and wind power though, it seems from this layman's perspective that it's pretty reliable and doesn't apparently cost an arm, a leg and your firstborn. You know, the tide comes in and then lo and behold it goes out again only to return later.
Surely that's a good thing and could be harnessed quite successfully.
There are also rivers for small water turbine power that's more or less free. The water flows one way mostly unless physics is completely messed up so that seems like a local alternative to take some of the strain. I do know that the greenies stated that we couldn't possibly have small local water based power because that would be a blight on the landscape.
I could be talking through my nether regions about the above so I'm quite happy to be educated in the finer aspects by those in the know.
Whilst it sounds good on paper, tidal power suffers from a number of issues:
- Power can only be generated when the flow is high enough. When the tide is fully in, or fully out, no power can be generated.
- There are not many places where the water flows fast enough when the tide is going in or out to harness the tidal current efficiently. Some designs of tidal generators in development are supposed to tackle this by funnelling the current, etc. but these have yet to come to fruition.
- Generators have to be designed to withstand storm conditions, or to be easy and economical to fix/replace when damaged in storms.
- The sea has a nast habit of having things in it, from bits of detritus floating about, to living things such as barnacles and sharks, all of which can damage your generator.
And neither is it particularly high in power density.
It is in fact like any other intermittent renewable source, variable in output and massive in its use of land or sea area requiring vast environment affecting constructions to extract very little, and needing to be 'backed up' ..
ALL renewable arguments start from the basic premise that we can't use fossil and there is no other alternative.
(That is why they are all so vehemently anti nuclear, because not only is it a very viable alternative, it beats renewables on every single point you care to mention).
Once you say 'what about nuclear?', the whole case for renewables - flimsy at best - collapses entirely.
Once you decide on 'some nuclear' you open the door to comparison, and there then can be seen and be proved to be absolutely no case for a single picowatt of renewable to ever be built again.
Germany has pre-empted that discussion by saying 'no nuclear at all, ever' . It is the only way they can justify the wholesale destruction of their nation at the feet of the great God of Windpower and Solar PV. (and brown coal of course, which they are building in quantity)
We can prove that intermittent renewables cannot do the job. ANY intermittent renewables. They must be co-installed with conventional generation, or hydro storage that we haven't got the space for.
The real choices are fossil with a bit of renewables on the side at very little fuel saving and massive environmental damage and cost.
Or nuclear with a bit of fossil on the side to cover short term contingencies that its not worth spending money on a low capacity factor dispatchable nuclear plant to cover - although we could. If zero emissions is deemed worth the extra expense.
(actually there are some interesting cost equations to be had by using off-peak nuclear power to synthesize hydrocarbon fuels. Its not efficient, and its not currently cost effective, but faced with ever rising prices, it might be one day).
The renewables industry reckons that development in tidal power techniques is about 11 years behind that of wind. i.e .. at the moment the effort is in developing the most efficient way to generate energy from tidal power. (my favourite is the wave buoy .. a vertical shaft with a floating ring generator pumped up and down by wave motion... impossible to describe using hand movements without the audience giggling).
The main problem is generator size... the things have to have to be small and have a very good power density (at the moment the technology can provide about 5Mw generators , aiming at 10-20Mw generators). Consider that the UK's Drax power station can produce 4000 Mw (about 7% of UK needs) and you are talking a lot of tidal/wind turbines. (Phase 1 of the London Array will generate 650Mw from 175 turbines)
It's not all doom and gloom though. One area of development is in flow batteries .. basically high capacity batteries that can store excess produced energy and restore it when demand requires. Any tidal/wind farm of the future is going to need something like this to make the farm efficient.
"what is the *average* construction time for one of those "mass" produced French nukes?"
I suspect you know as well as I do that there aren't enough results in to give a meaningful average, but based on Olkiluoto and Flamanville, it doesn't look good.
Sadly there's no realistic way of increasing the rate of delivery either because some of the critical components and skills are in short supply. E.g. Sheffield Forgemasters who do some of the critical heavy engineering. In 2010 the Millionaires Cabinet refused them an £80M *loan* to pay for new manufacturing equipment and capacity - that £80M *loan* is barely more than the Millionaire's Cabinet is proposing be *donated* for a flipping Royal Yacht.
"Energy security? The markets will sort it out", said the politicians when the industry was privatised.
"The markets won't sort it out", said the engineers before the industry was privatised.
So, who was right?
Heh! You know as well as I do who was right, and why.
What engineers call a backup, the market calls inefficiency.
Once again, politicians who have spent their entire careers singing the praises of free market economics demonstrate that they haven't the first idea of what it actually means.
Icon: The house of commons in 2017 when the lights start to go out.
"I suspect you know as well as I do that there aren't enough results in to give a meaningful average, but based on Olkiluoto and Flamanville, it doesn't look good."
True. However since the UK is fairly backward in this area I was thinking of the *previous* generation of French nukes, which AFAIU *were* built on a big enough scale that their production became "standardized" (insofar as anything this large and complex can be) and generate most of the French electricity.
"E.g. Sheffield Forgemasters who do some of the critical heavy engineering. In 2010 the Millionaires Cabinet refused them an £80M *loan* to pay for new manufacturing equipment and capacity - that £80M *loan* is barely more than the Millionaire's Cabinet is proposing be *donated* for a flipping Royal Yacht."
This did look a *lot* like one of the Dark Lord's scorched earth jobs. Promise them whatever and if we win we'll sort it out later. this was before the note from the outgoing Tresuray Sec that "There's no money." It was also before the bank bailout.
I agree that £80m is *chickenfeed* for a global resource that would be the 2nd of its kind *anywhere*. But the question has to be asked if what their (prospective) order book looked like to take to the banks and why if its *such* a good deal they did not finance it themselves?
Note I'm *very* aware that in the UK evening having a *monopoly* position on supplying a product with *unique* capabilities is not enough to getting funding from UK banks.
The problem with tidal is probably the same as for wind and solar - it is highly variable so you end up having (and paying for) conventional generation anyway. The barmy thing is some wind farms generate excess power and get paid NOT to generate.
Even with ambitious plans for renewables they are unlikely to reach 15-20% of total power requirement or perhaps not even keep pace with the increase in power requirement as the economy and population grows. That still leaves a lot of conventional power generation and the choice comes down to:
1. replace carbon burning with nuclear power stations.
2. install more carbon burners.
Anyone with a brain (sorry sun readers) knows that Japan's nuclear was a horrible set of circumstances that the UK just won't see any time soon, unless some massive unpredictable event happens. We don't get earthquakes on a scale or frequency like them and we don't get tsunamis. (If we did it would have to wipeout ireland first or come via scotland.) And assuming we didn't do what britain always does and go cheap, and built them to the same spec Japan has, we would be ok.
So most people realise that as has been said it is our only real option in the short term, until fusion or we have built tidal where we can, filled every hill with wind power and covered ever roof with solar panels. (or of course stopped everyone buying rechargable gadgets and anything that needs power)
Now if only the stupid parliament would realise this and just sign us up to start building them before we are in real poo.
It's not just Fukushima, Chernobyl, or even our own Dounreay beach that makes me wary of nuclear power. It's a simple question of Impact multiplied by Risk. On a scale of 1 to 10, the impact of a nuclear disaster is a 10. The current risk is 0, and as we all know, zero times anything is, well, zero.
Simples? Well... Expand the scope of that risk to include decommissioning of obselete power plants and maintaining nuclear waste (extrapolated over a million years). Add in a few factors such as the possibility of lack of future skills or resources, geographical instability, a malign regieme seizing power, or even simple human error. Now your risk model is looking a little less secure, the impact still 10, and the costs don't look so great either.
The other issue is the supply of the raw material. We're said to be running out of coal, but a quick Google suggests that coal supplies will probably outlast Uranium supplies.
I know there's no easy answers (unless you count hooking prisoners up to bicycles) but thought I'd chuck my $0.02 in there.
Is not ten, Its not even one.
Of all the costs and the loss of life in N Japan, the Fukushima incident has been less than a drop in the ocean.
Even Chernobyl, ha snot been a big killer...
When you consider it took an event that killed upwards of 20,000 people to reduce a nuclear power station to the level where it hasn't killed anyone at all, but has merely had to be shut down permanently and the temporary loss of less land area than any equivalent renewable installation would have PERMANENTLY rendered uninhabitable, you have to say that your arguments actually are in favour of nuclear power, not against it.
The worst that can happen is a lot less worse than not having it at all - if the AGW warmists are to be believed, anyway.
tidal isnt as phasal as solar and wind... and more importantly, its phases arnt tied in to the same things. (eg. we use a lot of power for heating... during winter and overnight when theres no sun).
the greens complain about tidal too though, because of the poor fishies, and the 'damage' it does to the aesthetics of a place. (incidently the same problem we had when we wanted to put wind turbines into our top field... its nice and high, open space, perfect for wind! oh but no, because of meeting those requirements it fails the next one - people would be able to see them.)
as for the male/female disparity.... i think its a couple of things. firstly, women *are* more nurturing and caring - thus the chance of nuclear problems has mroe of an impact. but i think the main thing is the sad state of affairs in this country that leads to most girls being discouraged from getting a scientific education, and instead studying subjects such as art and the humanities.
of course, tidal does have another problem - every time we use tiday power, we slow down the moon a bit, if we all start using it then within a few years us and the moon will crash into each other ./nod. trufax.
"of course, tidal does have another problem - every time we use tiday power, we slow down the moon a bit, if we all start using it then within a few years us and the moon will crash into each other ./nod. trufax."
True
And in a couple of *million* years it was being to become a cause for concern.
I'm sort of hoping that the human race will have come up with something else by then.
NHK has reported that the reactors were damaged BEFORE the tsunami hit.
Here's some other stuff to contemplate (NRC emails via FOIA)...
NRC email showing Iodine-131 (which has an 8 day half life) INCREASING in the USA in early April compared to March.
http://enformable.com/2011/11/april-12th-2011-i-131-sampling-results-in-us-levels-increase/
http://enformable.com/2011/09/april-2nd-2011-reactor-1-uncontrolled-depressurizationleak-dose-rate-of-27-rhr-found-radiation-level-at-reactor-2-measured-over-100-rhr/
http://enformable.com/2012/01/march-17th-2011-jsdf-helicopter-crews-report-dose-rates-of-375-rhr-300-ft-above-reactor-3/
http://enformable.com/2012/01/march-16th-2011-japan-reports-5-persons-have-received-lethal-radiation-doses/
http://enformable.com/2012/01/march-23rd-2011-suspect-3-ft-of-salt-in-bottom-of-reactor-vessel-sfp-lasted-3-days/
Lots more...
http://enformable.com/category/foia/nrc-foia/fukushima-disaster/march-2011/
At what point did I call into question NRC emails?
Read my comment again, I pointed out that using a single site for multiple sources weakens your argument. I'd imagine a lot of commentards will have done what I did;
Load enformable.com
click About Us
Quick read - hmmm short on time so can't read every link you posted. Oh look, 'About Us' admits their bias against Nuclear.
I'll aim to get around to reading the sources, but a quick scan is all I generally have time to do.
We live near Sizewell so if you want to send me on a free holiday feel free!
Oh no it wouldn't be.
I could say with more substance that windpower/wavepower/solarpower would be far too incredibly expensive (it is already too expensive) if the operators had to guarantee reliable continuous supply, such as any conventional or nuclear plant can deliver as part of its very nature.
is a stopgap, nothing more. We need it to tide us over whilst we get Fusion working reliably and safely. That said, personally I would rather have a Fission reactor next door than a Fusion reactor. One is a contained (and massively slowed down) atomic bomb, the other is a contained HYDROGEN bomb. :-)
Coal, Oil & Gas (even fracked methane) are all cheap but are CO2 producers on a massive scale.
Renewables have to be subsidised even more than the French subsidise their Nuke industry.
So, everybody has a choice. Either we go Nuclear (Fission, then Fusion) or else stop having babies! Give a woman those 2 choices and see which way she votes?
Er.....no. A fission reactor is not a slowed down atomic bomb. This is the kind of talk that causes problems. A fission reactor cannot become a bomb even if it is allowed to go uncontrolled. The Uranium within a fission reactor is at a whole different level of refinement than that used in an atomic bomb and cannot achieve the same feat. Now, a fusion reactor is, in many ways, a controlled fusion (e.g. thermonuclear) device. However, again that is scaremongering to a large extent. It's interesting how a fusion reactor is sold as being unlimited, clean and environmentally friendly etc.etc. However, what they don' tell you, is that it is a plasma being held in a magnetic field. The slightest fault in that magnetic field would result in the uncontained release of plasma. Look at the area around afterwards and you might not think it's as nice as people make out.
This depends a bit on what type of fusion reactor vessel you're talking about. Yes, the reaction stops pretty much immediately, but I wasn't talking about the contents of the torus etc. Most of the designs have interesting engineering around the central reactor vessel. For instance, some use liquid Lithium as a coolant. Now, a failure of the reactor vessel using magnetic containment could result in an explosion of the magnet. This could be contained within a building, but the liquid Lithium coolant could well be damaged. If it is damaged, a fire within this Lithium could easily occur. Do you think a fire in a significant amount of Lithium would be good for the surrounding area.
I'm not saying we shouldn't use fusion, but the common information put out is fission equals nuclear bomb, fusion equals perfectly same, lovely and green. I was just trying to say that an accident at a fusion plant would probably not be nice for the surrounding area either. Whole differerent set of issues and it depends on the reactor design, but people should stop thinking fusion is the panacea. It has safety issues as well.
That's actually a good point: who's footing the bill?
Tokamaks are run by universities and research labs, they are fascinating physics experiments one can endlessly fiddle with, and assure the funding of their department for decades.
Polywell is funded by the US Navy, interested in a compact, failsafe power source.
The only damage would be mild thermal scarring to the toroidal containment area as the plasma is not dense and in the absence of containment, rapidly cools and contracts as fusion stops. Maybe a slight breach in some cases, but not a huge show stopper. Anyone got any evidence to suggest things would be otherwise, I'd be interested to hear.
Too many years of faffing around... too many years of putting of the decision for more nuclear... too much burning gas to make electricity (which is just plain stupid)... and now the lights are going to go out!
The government knows about that they euphemistically called "unserved energy demand" and it'll hit us about 2015-ish...
Should have started building next generation nuclear generation plants 10 years ago and been bringing them online now...
I have an 11KW standby generator... have you bought yours yet?
People keep banging on about the amount of radioactive waste produced by nuclear power, maybe someone can answer a question I've had for a while - "does the nuclear industry actually "create" more radioactive material than it had to begin with"
Uranium is mined in South Africa/Russia or wherever and is extracted from thousands of tons of rock/soil, if we were to take the radioactive waste back to the place where it was mined and it was ground very fine and mixed back in to the soil extracted, would the soil be more radioactive than it was originally?
I think the problem with the waste is that it is concentrated in a small area, if it could be diluted would the area be more or less radioactive overall than before it was extracted?
Maybe we could have a ship in the center of the Pacific mixing the waste into the seawater. If it was diluted sufficiently in enough water it would probably be undetectable above the baseline radioactivity of the water.
Or maybe I'm wrong! Can someone enlighten me?
More or less radioactive material is not the only relevant information - the actual activity of the material and the kind of radiation emited are major informations.
- The half life for uranium 235 - eg. the time needed for half of it to decay to some kind of Thorium and one alpha radiation - is 700 millions years.
- The thorium 231 from the decay of the uranium is ALSO radioactive, and have a half life of about a single day, yielding some proactinium-231 and a beta ray.
- The proactinium then decay (half life of 32,760 years) to actinium 227 and 'nother alpha ray most of the times, which then decay to... etc, etc
Those decays and the overall age of the universe explains why U235 is only roughly 1% of the natural occuring uranium. Most of it is U238, which have a half life of. 4 and a half billion year.
Uranium itself is not that dangerous radiation-wise (it's still a toxic metal, same as mercury or lead), it was used for centuries for glazing yellow glass and is even sometime used as a... radiation shell against more active elements.
Fissions products, on the other hand, are significantly more active.
For example, the half life of the well known Caesium 137 is a measly 30 years. This means that Caesium is actually 230 000 times more radioactive than the uranium 235, uranium 235 which was only 1% of the extracted uranium.
Even worse, the dreaded Iodine-131 have a 8 DAYS half life... But in this case, the very short half life may also a boon - it quickly decay to stable elements and stop posing a radioactive threat...
I'm sure you can now figure why swapping 1 ton of uranium for 1 ton of highly active fission products is not that a good idea...
(NOTE : I'm not a nuclear phycisist, there is certainly some errors in this text, in which case I'ld love to have a better analysis from a professional)
To only have to read headlines for news, and ignore the governments themselves stating how horrific, and how the issue has not been resolved in Fukushima. Stick with IT tech, and stay away from hobby news, you all do not do enough research to be pushing these purely subjective opinions.
Sorry but the register is pretty useless when it comes to non-IT news, at least when using this article as an example. The complete lack of information behind the articles like this, makes the good articles that aren't IT related have a harder time standing up.
You guys do know the reactors are still criticle, right? Based on your local nuclear genius, the kinds of radiation given off is only from an exposed core melting down... and after that article last year, you all finally admitted something worse was happening, but still played it down. So there is not danger unless it melts down, and until there are signs of certain radioactive isotopes, there is no need to panic... OK we found traces of these elements, but please, don't panic... and if you even show a slight hint of worry, we will ridicule you until you either kill yourself, or give up completely. Merry Christmas.
Plutonium detected in the southern hemisphere from Fukushima, what are the implications of the detection of such a material? You know, but I'm sure there's going to be superstitious people who believe Plutonium is a freaking vitamin.
Good Luck.
What an hysterical posting.
You say criticle rather than critical and from the text obviously have no idea what 'critical' means in a nuclear fission sense.
You then criticise everyone else, in a holier than though way, complaing about people not doing enough research etc.etc. and then post a reply with absolutely no links to appropriate research or any technical information at all. The majority of your post is a ranting paragraph!!
Finally, I do know the implications of detecting Plutonium in the southern hemisphere from Fukushima, but only if you add some actual information, such as concentration etc., which is all important. At very low concentrations, it doesn't matter at all. Indeed, it is even found in nature at very low concentrations. Perhaps you would be better off understanding the Radon that appears in peoples houses and cellars and how much more dangerous that is, although most people know nothing about it.
Fail. Well obviously. Epic one might say.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JASON_reactor
Safe enough to run a little one in greenwich until 1996.
India and china will save us, they are investing in research into thorium breeder designs, once they have perfected them im sure they will be happy to come over here and build them in return for massive amounts of cash.
Why worry?
The general apathy of the public never ceases to amaze. There are several projects around the world generating clean and renewable energy from fission. OK, the Greens amongst us have a point that Pressurised Water Reactor designs of yesteryear are inherently unsafe.
However, newer Generation IV designs are built to 'Fail Safe'. Furthermore, India and China are leading the world in new Thorium reactor development. The safe, clean and abundant power these provide aside, the money that can be can be made from producing and installing these designs in other countries under licence is potentially enormous.
Plus there is a non-proliferation benefit and the possibility of 'burning' harmful actinides using these reactors that would otherwise be disposed of as harmful waste...
Fusion types play down the fact that the interior of the torus *will* become radioactive but all that teleoperated servicing gear and liner replacing hardware is *not* about keeping the vacuum intact.
An article in Science (6/1/12) says the US National Ignition Facility is looking to do a shot whose energy release will equal that consumed by the lasers IE *breakeven*, although they are running behind schedule. They claim its because they have to run more damage tests on nuclear weapons parts (the people who *fund* NIF). Others claim the "indirect drive" system adopted had found unexpected inefficiencies. The original programme called for 3 shots, with the last exceeding input by 5MW (5MJ surely?) but this is claimed to be simple *once* you get to breakeven.
This is a *major* event in fusion feasibility. Of course that still leaves how to *extract* that energy and use it. Getting here has taken c60 years. Lets hope the power scale-up/extraction problem does not take as long to so.
Meanwhile fission has been generating *power* to a national grid (somewhere) since about the same time, although possibly the best design (the molten salt thorium design) remains with *no* incentive for reactor companies to develop.
Are the Chinese better with nuclear reactor design and construction than they are with high speed rail design and construction (or even simple stuff like making safe toys) ?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-16345592 (28 Dec 2011) says
"A bullet train crash which killed 40 people in China in July was caused by design flaws and sloppy management, the Chinese government says.
Almost 200 people were injured in the crash near the south-eastern city of Wenzhou.
"Missteps" by 54 officials led to the disaster, the long-awaited official report says.
The crash led many Chinese to accuse the government of putting development and profit before safety.
It also triggered a wave of popular anger against officials who were accused of trying to cover up the seriousness, and causes, of the crash.
[snip]
The accident occurred after one train stalled following a lightning strike, and then a second high-speed train ran into it. Four carriages were thrown off a viaduct.
The report found that serious design flaws in control equipment and improper handling of the lightning strike led to the crash."
Or from the USA:
http://www.npr.org/2011/09/26/140703132/from-progress-to-problem-chinas-high-speed-trains, which includes this lovely quote:
"Developed countries have many years of experience operating these, so they can avoid risks. If this accident hadn't happened, we wouldn't have known the risks, right? It's just a small, small episode in our country's development."
Or from commie rag the Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jul/25/chinese-rail-crash-cover-up-claims
And various others.
Etc.
Or, if you prefer, trust everything they tell you about their advances in high technology.
But please don't expect others to share in your unshakeable faith in the nuclear industry.
It's already far too late for the nuclear industry to bring anything to the table for the coming crisis in the UK anyway.
When they are building to the same (give or take) design as will be built in the US and probably here as well, with oversight from the design team and inspections by the NRC (to see how they're getting on), then I don't see the Chinese CAP1000 as being a problem.
Only your unfounded hatred of the nuclear industry is blinding you to the fact that nuclear is needed and the AP1000 is the safest design yet. (Yup, flame bait. Heh!)
Flamebait noted and ignored. I'm not anti-nuclear as such, I have no problem with the technology, just with the cowboys currently (and historically) playing the game.
That "superior Western supervision" of which you speak, that's the kind of supervision that let Olkiluoto's low-cost subcontractors using inappropriately experienced staff build the reactor foundations (the containment?) with the wrong kind of concrete is it? And which had already seen relevant authorities (who hadn't done a nuclear project for decades) approve the plans in a year or so whereas the US NRC you mention would have wanted more like three years of assessment and discussion for what was effectively a world first?
Has the "superior Western supervision" discovered any other shortcomings at Olkiluoto, e.g. shortcomings which might have been introduced as a result of low cost procurement policies which are inevitable when projects like this are conducted by profit-goaled organisations? E.g. pipe welding defects?
In 2009 the Finnish regulators STUK sent contractors Areva (via the Finnish electricity supplier TVO) a "letter of protest" concerning the "defects and deficiencies in the design of the control and protection systems". Can anyone tell me whether Areva have responded yet or is the "superior Western supervision" letting the suppliers carry on regardless because fixing it is too costly?
I could go on, but what's the point.
Like I said, whether or not the underlying technology is dodgy, the commonly used business practices surely are.
http://www.stuk.fi/stuk/tiedotteet/2009/en_GB/news_550/ (control system design issues)
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,655409,00.html (general article)
So if the supervision was so bad, how are these problems being noticed?
Have you heard of the GDA process?
Ever looked at the HSE Nuclear website?
We (the UK) have one of the most rigorous inspection regimes in the world, because, instead of having to meet a standard to get a tick in the box, our regulators expect the manufacturers and operators to get the tick in the box and then justify why the tick is deserved. They then have to make the risk and consequence as low as reasonably practicable. A principle enshrined in the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.
Our nuclear regulators have the power to stop any and all operations at a nuclear site if the operations are not safe. A power they have threatened operators with on a few occasions (for an operating site, every day spent off-line means 1million in lost profit).
"So if the supervision was so bad, how are these problems being noticed?"
Expensively, and late, in general. But obviously it's better these problems are noticed before entry into service, or during service.
"Have you heard of the GDA process? Ever looked at the HSE Nuclear website?"
Yes, both, thank you, and I'm fully aware that the HSE has inherited the nuclear responsibilities of the late Nuclear Installations Inspectorate. I'm quite happy with the ALARP concept, less happy with the way it is often (in my personal experience) implemented in some industries (or not i.e. neglected). Same goes for some regulatory authorities (I've observed a few). Occasionally, there are some that are happy to analyse the detail, but frightened to admit there is an elephant in the room.
"Our nuclear regulators have the power to stop any and all operations at a nuclear site if the operations are not safe"
How often do they use it?
How often do contractors even bother with long-standing perfectly justifiable rules?
Somewhere on that HSE site used to be the long-standing pan-European regulatory policy to be considered before approving a proposal. I've read it (at least the pieces that relate to control+safety systems, which are my area of interest). I can't find my copy right now or remember the exact name (it's been a few years) but it is very very clear that at the time Olkiluoto was being built the rules for control systems required logically and physically separate systems for normal operation and for safety shutdown. Resilience by redundancy, same as you'd get on oil rig shut down systems, same as you'd get on critical aircraft systems, and lots of other places.
So what did Areva propose for Olkiluoto? An single fully integrated system in contradiction of the stated regulatory policy. Which is why the Finnish authorities got upset. And who can blame them.
So, what's being proposed for the UK? Single system? Independent dual-redundant systems? Does the difference matter?
The nuclear bit of the HSE had similar concerns to the Finns on the control and instrumentation system architecture, and also the lack of safety documentation on the subject. They were also concerned that the proposed system was based on Siemens S5 PLCs which are pretty much end of life.
Readers who care about stuff like this can read lots more (including the HSE's proposals to resolve these deficiencies), and perhaps draw their own conclusions as to why the contractors didn't address some very obvious stuff up front, at:
http://www.hse.gov.uk/newreactors/2011-gda-issues-epr.htm
Enjoy.
"Somewhere on that HSE site used to be the long-standing pan-European regulatory policy to be considered before approving a proposal."
The 2010 version of the bit that relates to software is called "Licensing of safety critical software for nuclear reactors Common position of seven European nuclear regulators and authorised technical support organisations"
and is at
http://www.hse.gov.uk/nuclear/software.pdf
... when eventually you will run out of nuclear fuel?
Seriously, it will run out eventually. You can argue when that time will be, but it will be.
Anyhow, there is a solar and wind boom going on in Germany. A large part of the farmers and companies have photovoltaic panels up their roofs. It's fairly cheap and decentralized. If you would just stop bickering about it, and just start building it, you'll be able get get things done. Much of the rest can be done by building local diesel generators which use their excess heat to warm your house.
In a nutshell, every little bit helps. Of course the situation is much more difficult in the UK, as it's an island which isn't well connected to the grid.
And perhaps you could donate some Gigabytes of electricity:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzZXnNV4SoM
Germany apparently only needs 80 Gigabytes while we produce 140 Gigabytes.
Seriously?
If we use fissile materials in better reactor designs than the current ones or learn to extract uranium from the sea (expensive but fuel is such a small expense in nuclear generation that it's still neglibible) then we can make fissile fuel last for thousands of years. Probably a lot more.
That's without even thinking about fusion.
How long will the rare materials to make Solar PV last?
Glad it's not just me, I've been googling it to see if I've missed out on an measurement!
In the end I assumed it was related to the video he linked (no Youtube from work!) - "Donate Gigabytes of storage to help us work out how to keep saying no to feasible tech whilst we work out some way of generating power that'll actually work!"
Even then, I couldn't quite work out how donating storage would help. They either want to borrow some CPU Cycles (so could feasible ask for Ghz) or he means GigaWatts. Not sure I have any GigaWatts going spare though funnily enough (especially at 16p per Kwh)
Well there is a reason why I, as a German, don't think we Germans should have nuclear power. Nuclear power requires the ability to make informed decisions on a grand scale just like having matches. If you don't have that ability, it becomes really dangerous. That's why you don't give matches to children.
Now the German government has proven that it cannot make informed decisions, by selecting the most unsuitable of the candidates for a final deposit. In fact they even put that candidate into the list after they already were busy evaluating the others. It can therefore not be trusted to make informed decisions which would be required to safely regulate nuclear power.
Why dont they did out huge underground tanks the size of lakes and fill them with acid and great big lead plates like giant car batteries. Then put windmills everywhere to charge up the giant underground lead acid batteries.
Or they could put all the solar panels out at sea and then have reams and reams of copper cable or spiralling around so that the power would take 12 hours to travel down the cables to the consumption point so the mornings power would arrive on a 12 hour delay for at night when its needed.
> Well, pump storage is in use
Yes it is, but the way in which it is implemented differs dramatically from the proposal to pour water into a mine.
> use excess electricity when available to pump water back up behind hydro-electric dam
OK, look at the salient points there:-
- The water is pumped back up along an existing water channel. This means you don't have to deal with water getting somewhere you don't want it
- The water is pumped back uphill, not downhill into a mine.
- The water tank is made up of the naturally-occurring basin and an artificial dam wall. This means that the *enormous* weight of water in the reservoir is supported by bedrock; this would not be the case if trying to create a reservoir inside a mine
- The water reservoir is *huge*. Really - just look at the size of the lake at the top of any hydroelectric project. Trying to build a reservoir of that sort of size in mine is simply a non-starter.
There are many reasons to use pumped storage alongside a hydroelectric plant. None of these make sense in a mine.
Vic.
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