7 ms·

The abounding skeptics don't seem to have any specific criticisms. Overall it seems like a good idea to reuse the heat-to-electricity machinery and grid connect

by tlb 5y ago

The abounding skeptics don't seem to have any specific criticisms. Overall it seems like a good idea to reuse the heat-to-electricity machinery and grid connection of existing coal plants, since that's a good fraction of the capital required.

Retric 5y ago
Coal power plants operate at different temperatures than nuclear reactors, so it’s going to be less efficient to try an reuse that infrastructure. Cost wise, it’s unclear how much actual savings will take place.
KennyBlanken 5y ago
The "good fraction of the capital required" is for the nuclear part and nuclear plants also have stratospheric operating costs, which this doesn't address. This also doesn't really address the fact that nukes require a fuckton of power to bring up that coal plants don't; nukes also require that fuckton of power when they're not generating, because reactors have to be cooled continuously, even when not "on". Or the lack of qualified labor to run the plants. Or geological stability to assure the plant, and its waste storage, are safe. Nuclear has the highest opex of any electrical generation method; it's also estimated by some to have a greenhouse gas impact worse than natural gas. Wind costs a fraction of any other electricity generation method, solar isn't far behind, and continuing to drop around 10% a year. This is why you see wind and solar replacing decommissioned nukes at a ratio of 6:1 (not including commercial or residential capacity) in the US and growing, and coal plants being decommissioned. There are now multiple technologies for recycling turbine blades, and solar panels are recycleable (or just resellable in the secondhand market where people don't care that they've lost 20% of their capacity.) Storage is also plunging in cost, and additional technologies are already in commercial use (iron flow, for example.) HVDC transmission is spreading, with higher capacity, lower cost, and higher efficiency for moving electricity greater distances (in other words, it's less of a deal if it's really windy in one spot and not in another, and ideally-suited wind sites can be further from where electricity is needed.) Fanboys who think it's as simple as "if only we could work past the NIMBY issue" are ignoring the fact that nuclear power has not been economically viable for three quarters of a century (it has only been viable because of the military applications of nuclear power), while wind and solar keep getting more economically viable, and our grid keeps leaning more and more toward being distributed. Nobody needs the slow-reacting, base load generation nuclear provides. Wind and solar are as distributable and scaleable as you want. Wind and solar have significantly simpler supply chains, regulations, and maintenance/repair/inspection needs. You don't need to worry about geological stability with wind and solar. Wind and solar don't require tens or hundreds of megawatts of cold-start / post-operation (cooling) power. Wind and solar have little/no security concerns nor do you need to worry about area social/political/economic stability. Wind/solar don't generate waste that is weaponizeable. You don't need a highly trained workforce to install, operate, repair, and decommission wind/solar.
- ClumsyPilot 5y ago
  'it's also estimated by some to have a greenhouse gas impact worse than natural gas' I would expect such outrageous claims to be heavilly substantiated > You don't need to worry about geological stability with wind Really? Almost 1,000 feet tall, top heavy structure under huge windload does not need geologican stability? 'require tens or hundreds of megawatts of cold-start / post-operation (cooling) power.' How or why is this ever relevant, they operate at >90 capacity factor for 2 years at a time
- lillecarl 5y ago
  Your comment loses it's value when you're trying to poke all the holes. > Storage is also plunging in cost, and additional technologies are already in commercial use (iron flow, for example.) > HVDC transmission is spreading, with higher capacity, lower cost, and higher efficiency for moving electricity greater distances (in other words, it's less of a deal if it's really windy in one spot and not in another, and ideally-suited wind sites can be further from where electricity is needed.) How do you transform DC up and down? By converting it to AC. Running it through a transformer and converting it back, HVDC isn't gonna take over the world, certain stretches might be HVDC where beneficial but not all over the world. The difference with nuclear is that anyone can build and operate next-gen storage, so you're commercial right out the door. I could hook my UPS up to the grid and feed back, commercial success! > Wind and solar are as distributable and scaleable as you want. Not without storage, which is harder to scale than production of other kinds. > You don't need to worry about geological stability with wind and solar. I don't see the USP, there are plenty of geologically stable areas in most countries. > Wind and solar don't require tens or hundreds of megawatts of cold-start / post-operation (cooling) power. They have the added downside of only producing power when the weather guy says so. > Wind/solar don't generate waste that is weaponizeable. Good point, for now. > You don't need a highly trained workforce to install, operate, repair, and decommission wind/solar. No, you need a disposable workforce that can die from workforce accidents without anyone batting an eye. Bill Gates is a good example of someone with a bit of time around the smartest people on earth asking for advice where he can make a difference, here's a TED talk where he explains that we'll need all solutions to come together rather than one single silver bullet: https://youtu.be/JaF-fq2Zn7I https://youtu.be/JaF-fq2Zn7I Does it sound reasonable that we should use all good tech we have? To me it does, and it includes all energy sources in different amounts and situations.
epistasis 5y ago
> reuse the heat-to-electricity machinery and grid connection of existing coal plants, since that's a good fraction of the capital required. Compare the cost of a coal build to a nuclear build and you will see this is not the case. Nonetheless, the transmission infrastructure is super valuable, and super expensive, as that is a huge fraction of the cost of electricity in the US, something like 40% on average. Reusing these sites for batteries is probably a good idea.
- ncmncm 5y ago
  Or other storage: Underground hydrogen. Underground liquified hydrogen. Anhydrous ammonia. Underground heat. Underground compressed air.
  - epistasis 5y ago
    Underground storage requires specific geography that is unlikely to be near to existing coal burners. Big industry, such as green ammonia production from electrolyzed hydrogen, could be good though. But I bet those will likely be powered by massive amounts of solar plus batteries, as is being planned in places such as Spain right now. For at least the next generation of electrolyzer tech, energy costs will be dwarfed by the capital costs of electrolyzers, and the electrolyzers will need to be run nearly continuously. It remains to be seen if the tech curve of electrolyzers will decrease more quickly than the cost or batteries and solar do.
    - parkingrift 5y ago
      Why can’t we use enhanced geothermal at these sites?
      - ineedasername 5y ago
        EGS also required highly specific geological conditions, so each site would have to be evaluated for suitability. That's not an argument against considering it, but it does mean that EGS isn't a drop-in replacement for every site. For those where it would work? Sure, let's do it.
ncmncm 5y ago
The overarching criticism is that nukes cost way more than any other power source currently under consideration. Solar and wind cost way, way less. Geothermal costs somewhat less. If you want to repurpose your steam turbines, geothermal is a better choice. Now that we know how to bore very deep holes electrically, geothermal is practical in many more places than before.
- iso8859-1 5y ago
  What is the price of fossil fuels contributing to climate change? Has that been factored into the calculation?
  - hetspookjee 5y ago
    As if that has ever been the case. Cruise ships would be prohibitively expensive, and flying would be too. Almost all products would be twice or thrice the price, if not more, except for a lot of manually laboured locally crafted stuff. Sometimes I wouldn’t be surprised if wooden ships would be coming back again, especially now with all the modern technology.
    - shlurpy 5y ago
      Why not make the sailboats out of modern materials?
  - pydry 5y ago
    Why would it make a difference if you're comparing solar/wind/battery/pumped storage to nuclear?
    - dTal 5y ago
      You can't directly compare them, because taken individually none of those can replace "base load" fossil fuels by themselves. How much does a solar installation that can reliably output a gigawatt of power, night and day, rain or shine cost? Can't do pumped storage everywhere either - how many batteries do you need? Nuclear starts to look cheap.

by tlb 5y ago

Retric 5y ago

Coal power plants operate at different temperatures than nuclear reactors, so it’s going to be less efficient to try an reuse that infrastructure. Cost wise, it’s unclear how much actual savings will take place.

KennyBlanken 5y ago

The "good fraction of the capital required" is for the nuclear part and nuclear plants also have stratospheric operating costs, which this doesn't address. This also doesn't really address the fact that nukes require a fuckton of power to bring up that coal plants don't; nukes also require that fuckton of power when they're not generating, because reactors have to be cooled continuously, even when not "on". Or the lack of qualified labor to run the plants. Or geological stability to assure the plant, and its waste storage, are safe. Nuclear has the highest opex of any electrical generation method; it's also estimated by some to have a greenhouse gas impact worse than natural gas. Wind costs a fraction of any other electricity generation method, solar isn't far behind, and continuing to drop around 10% a year. This is why you see wind and solar replacing decommissioned nukes at a ratio of 6:1 (not including commercial or residential capacity) in the US and growing, and coal plants being decommissioned. There are now multiple technologies for recycling turbine blades, and solar panels are recycleable (or just resellable in the secondhand market where people don't care that they've lost 20% of their capacity.) Storage is also plunging in cost, and additional technologies are already in commercial use (iron flow, for example.) HVDC transmission is spreading, with higher capacity, lower cost, and higher efficiency for moving electricity greater distances (in other words, it's less of a deal if it's really windy in one spot and not in another, and ideally-suited wind sites can be further from where electricity is needed.) Fanboys who think it's as simple as "if only we could work past the NIMBY issue" are ignoring the fact that nuclear power has not been economically viable for three quarters of a century (it has only been viable because of the military applications of nuclear power), while wind and solar keep getting more economically viable, and our grid keeps leaning more and more toward being distributed. Nobody needs the slow-reacting, base load generation nuclear provides. Wind and solar are as distributable and scaleable as you want. Wind and solar have significantly simpler supply chains, regulations, and maintenance/repair/inspection needs. You don't need to worry about geological stability with wind and solar. Wind and solar don't require tens or hundreds of megawatts of cold-start / post-operation (cooling) power. Wind and solar have little/no security concerns nor do you need to worry about area social/political/economic stability. Wind/solar don't generate waste that is weaponizeable. You don't need a highly trained workforce to install, operate, repair, and decommission wind/solar.

ClumsyPilot 5y ago
'it's also estimated by some to have a greenhouse gas impact worse than natural gas' I would expect such outrageous claims to be heavilly substantiated > You don't need to worry about geological stability with wind Really? Almost 1,000 feet tall, top heavy structure under huge windload does not need geologican stability? 'require tens or hundreds of megawatts of cold-start / post-operation (cooling) power.' How or why is this ever relevant, they operate at >90 capacity factor for 2 years at a time
lillecarl 5y ago
Your comment loses it's value when you're trying to poke all the holes. > Storage is also plunging in cost, and additional technologies are already in commercial use (iron flow, for example.) > HVDC transmission is spreading, with higher capacity, lower cost, and higher efficiency for moving electricity greater distances (in other words, it's less of a deal if it's really windy in one spot and not in another, and ideally-suited wind sites can be further from where electricity is needed.) How do you transform DC up and down? By converting it to AC. Running it through a transformer and converting it back, HVDC isn't gonna take over the world, certain stretches might be HVDC where beneficial but not all over the world. The difference with nuclear is that anyone can build and operate next-gen storage, so you're commercial right out the door. I could hook my UPS up to the grid and feed back, commercial success! > Wind and solar are as distributable and scaleable as you want. Not without storage, which is harder to scale than production of other kinds. > You don't need to worry about geological stability with wind and solar. I don't see the USP, there are plenty of geologically stable areas in most countries. > Wind and solar don't require tens or hundreds of megawatts of cold-start / post-operation (cooling) power. They have the added downside of only producing power when the weather guy says so. > Wind/solar don't generate waste that is weaponizeable. Good point, for now. > You don't need a highly trained workforce to install, operate, repair, and decommission wind/solar. No, you need a disposable workforce that can die from workforce accidents without anyone batting an eye. Bill Gates is a good example of someone with a bit of time around the smartest people on earth asking for advice where he can make a difference, here's a TED talk where he explains that we'll need all solutions to come together rather than one single silver bullet: https://youtu.be/JaF-fq2Zn7I https://youtu.be/JaF-fq2Zn7I Does it sound reasonable that we should use all good tech we have? To me it does, and it includes all energy sources in different amounts and situations.

epistasis 5y ago

> reuse the heat-to-electricity machinery and grid connection of existing coal plants, since that's a good fraction of the capital required. Compare the cost of a coal build to a nuclear build and you will see this is not the case. Nonetheless, the transmission infrastructure is super valuable, and super expensive, as that is a huge fraction of the cost of electricity in the US, something like 40% on average. Reusing these sites for batteries is probably a good idea.

ncmncm 5y ago
Or other storage: Underground hydrogen. Underground liquified hydrogen. Anhydrous ammonia. Underground heat. Underground compressed air.
- epistasis 5y ago
  Underground storage requires specific geography that is unlikely to be near to existing coal burners. Big industry, such as green ammonia production from electrolyzed hydrogen, could be good though. But I bet those will likely be powered by massive amounts of solar plus batteries, as is being planned in places such as Spain right now. For at least the next generation of electrolyzer tech, energy costs will be dwarfed by the capital costs of electrolyzers, and the electrolyzers will need to be run nearly continuously. It remains to be seen if the tech curve of electrolyzers will decrease more quickly than the cost or batteries and solar do.
  - parkingrift 5y ago
    Why can’t we use enhanced geothermal at these sites?
    - ineedasername 5y ago
      EGS also required highly specific geological conditions, so each site would have to be evaluated for suitability. That's not an argument against considering it, but it does mean that EGS isn't a drop-in replacement for every site. For those where it would work? Sure, let's do it.

ncmncm 5y ago

The overarching criticism is that nukes cost way more than any other power source currently under consideration. Solar and wind cost way, way less. Geothermal costs somewhat less. If you want to repurpose your steam turbines, geothermal is a better choice. Now that we know how to bore very deep holes electrically, geothermal is practical in many more places than before.

iso8859-1 5y ago
What is the price of fossil fuels contributing to climate change? Has that been factored into the calculation?
- hetspookjee 5y ago
  As if that has ever been the case. Cruise ships would be prohibitively expensive, and flying would be too. Almost all products would be twice or thrice the price, if not more, except for a lot of manually laboured locally crafted stuff. Sometimes I wouldn’t be surprised if wooden ships would be coming back again, especially now with all the modern technology.
  - shlurpy 5y ago
    Why not make the sailboats out of modern materials?
- pydry 5y ago
  Why would it make a difference if you're comparing solar/wind/battery/pumped storage to nuclear?
  - dTal 5y ago
    You can't directly compare them, because taken individually none of those can replace "base load" fossil fuels by themselves. How much does a solar installation that can reliably output a gigawatt of power, night and day, rain or shine cost? Can't do pumped storage everywhere either - how many batteries do you need? Nuclear starts to look cheap.