the NUCLEAR option

[just-some-guy]

i am watching CNBC. a show comes on about nuclear power. lots of good arguements for it.
me, i am all for it. this country would be foolish to NOT go for it. it isn't 1970 any more.

but what i found funny : at the end of the first segment, they show a factoid =
CNBC is owned by a company that makes nuclear power plant components.

biased i'd say.

just say'n

 

[markw]

Interesting. While we're at it...

Here's a link to a charted listing of what media (and other) companies are owned by whom. It's an interesting read.

...just sayin'

 

[highfigh]

I have a friend whose company does updates/upgrades on nuke power plants and in his opinion, there's no reason to not build them, other than making some people happy. They could build them underground, with a containment area for any emissions/leaks. The problem with underground has to do with ground water. If anything gets into an aquifer, it wouldn't be any different from just putting radioactive material in a water reservoir or at a treatment plant.

 

[JerryLove]

I would think a partial list of reasons to not build them (and I like nuclear power) include:

Security of radioactive material useful in "dirty bombs".
Fuel enrichment can also be turned into weapon enrichment (nuclear bombs).
Fire or explosion emitting tremendous amounts of radioactive debris (Chenobyl).
Partial melt-down emitting radio-active gasses (Three Mile Island).
Contamination of water. (in addition to contamination via melt-down: water is used as a coolant.. why nuclear plants are near rivers.
No solution yet vetted for Nuclear waste.
High cost.

 

[majorloser]

Here's a link to a charted listing of what media (and other) companies are owned by whom. It's an interesting read.

...just sayin'

In the show I saw earlier this year, NBC brought this fact up themselves.

I'm 100% behind more nuclear power plants. Florida already has three operational plants. I would love for us to be totally nuclear powered.

 

[Davemcc]

All power generation has trade-offs. With Ontario's "investment" in wind and solar at up to 10x the current rate, I'll take all the nuclear we can get.

http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorialopinion/article/896369--ontario-s-power-problem

 

[Nestor]

In the show I saw earlier this year, NBC brought this fact up themselves.

I'm 100% behind more nuclear power plants. Florida already has three operational plants. I would love for us to be totally nuclear powered.

Though I am for nuclear, it cannot easily respond to the dynamic changes of an electrical grid. Coal or gas are needed as well.

Disclosure: I'm a control technician at a nuke plant.

 

[Nestor]

All power generation has trade-offs. With Ontario's "investment" in wind and solar at up to 10x the current rate, I'll take all the nuclear we can get.

http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorialopinion/article/896369--ontario-s-power-problem

Agreed. Ontario's current system is insane. Power prices have actually gone negative during low demand, forcing baseload utilities to pay for the power they sell. One doesn't need to be an MBA to figure out that business model is headed for the cliff.

 

[Midwesthonky]

My wife's cousin's husband works for a local utility in Minnesota where the state has mandated a minimum 20% of renewable energy. That means wind power up there at more than 2x the cost of coal-fired electricity. Also, the wind power is only when the wind blows withing the required parameters with no way to "store" any surplus power. So they are not happy as the citizen's bills have gone up accordingly.

Nuclear isn't cheap (capital cost) and uses a lot of water for cooling, but it doesn't pollute like coal or gas. It is also steady-state unlike wind. A properly run nuclear plant is as safe as any other power source. Again, properly run.

As a side note/disclaimer: I have been trained to run nuclear reactors and have operated them in my past so I am comfortable with them.

Chernobl was a design disaster. Those engineers that designed it should have been shot for gross negligence.

 

[highfigh]

My wife's cousin's husband works for a local utility in Minnesota where the state has mandated a minimum 20% of renewable energy. That means wind power up there at more than 2x the cost of coal-fired electricity. Also, the wind power is only when the wind blows withing the required parameters with no way to "store" any surplus power. So they are not happy as the citizen's bills have gone up accordingly.

Nuclear isn't cheap (capital cost) and uses a lot of water for cooling, but it doesn't pollute like coal or gas. It is also steady-state unlike wind. A properly run nuclear plant is as safe as any other power source. Again, properly run.

As a side note/disclaimer: I have been trained to run nuclear reactors and have operated them in my past so I am comfortable with them.

Chernobl was a design disaster. Those engineers that designed it should have been shot for gross negligence.

Nuclear uses a lot of water for cooling but it can be recirculated and cooled using geothermal coils. Granted, it will still take up a bunch of real estate but it would work.

 

[Nestor]

My wife's cousin's husband works for a local utility in Minnesota where the state has mandated a minimum 20% of renewable energy. That means wind power up there at more than 2x the cost of coal-fired electricity. Also, the wind power is only when the wind blows withing the required parameters with no way to "store" any surplus power. So they are not happy as the citizen's bills have gone up accordingly.

Nuclear isn't cheap (capital cost) and uses a lot of water for cooling, but it doesn't pollute like coal or gas. It is also steady-state unlike wind. A properly run nuclear plant is as safe as any other power source. Again, properly run.

As a side note/disclaimer: I have been trained to run nuclear reactors and have operated them in my past so I am comfortable with them.

Chernobl was a design disaster. Those engineers that designed it should have been shot for gross negligence.

Combine instability at low power levels with a shut down system that momentarily introduces positive reactivity and you have a disaster in the making.

 

[majorloser]

Though I am for nuclear, it cannot easily respond to the dynamic changes of an electrical grid. Coal or gas are needed as well.

Disclosure: I'm a control technician at a nuke plant.

I believe Florida still sells a large amount of it's power up north during the winter or they take generators off line for maintenance during the winter. Our big demand time is during the summer months. If it meant we could sell more power and lower my bill, put a nuke in my back yard.

Coal and oil are still a big part of our power supply, too. Gas turbines are used at most of the plants for extra power during the big demands. There is also a few smaller garbage burning plants.

 

[highfigh]

WE Energies is the power utility for a large part of Wisconsin, comprised of the old Wisconsin Gas Company and Wisconsin Electric. They merged and guess who supplies the natural gas to the electric company, supposedly at a discount? Guess who keeps charging its customers more on a regular basis, due to potential, not actual, cost increases? Guess who decided to build a coal-fired plant on the south side of Milwaukee, even though the local residents didn't want it in their back yard, the EPA wanted to operate more cleanly (WE Energies was fined heavily because the EPA wanted more scrubbers for the smoke)? Guess which coal-fired power plant has never run at full capacity and apparently isn't able to, cost far more than they projected and, based on their comments that demand wasn't as high as they thought it would be, is being used as the reason for another rate increase?

We have three nuclear plants in Wisconsin but in our case, I would rather have a different power utility.

 

[Nestor]

If you're gonna have a monopoly, make it a publicly owned one.

 

[highfigh]

If you're gonna have a monopoly, make it a publicly owned one.

Their devotion to the shareholders makes it impossible to avoid being reamed every year, even when their costs decrease.

Re: that coal-fired plant- they raised their rates because they needed to finance it, they raised their rates after they sold a nuclear plant for well over $900M and after the coal plant went online (at reduced capacity) and they found that demand didn't match their expectations, they raised the rates again. They even raised the rates after being fined by the EPA, even though the Public Service Commission mandated that no rate increases should occur when the utility is penalized for something. My rates have approximately tripled in the last 10 years, even though my house is much more energy-efficient now vs then.

The local governments often make it difficult to go off the grid or augment power needs, too. If solar panels can be seen from the street, it's usually not going to be approved but with so many houses on the North side of the street, that's a problem.

 

[Midwesthonky]

WE Energies is the power utility for a large part of Wisconsin, comprised of the old Wisconsin Gas Company and Wisconsin Electric. They merged and guess who supplies the natural gas to the electric company, supposedly at a discount? Guess who keeps charging its customers more on a regular basis, due to potential, not actual, cost increases? Guess who decided to build a coal-fired plant on the south side of Milwaukee, even though the local residents didn't want it in their back yard, the EPA wanted to operate more cleanly (WE Energies was fined heavily because the EPA wanted more scrubbers for the smoke)? Guess which coal-fired power plant has never run at full capacity and apparently isn't able to, cost far more than they projected and, based on their comments that demand wasn't as high as they thought it would be, is being used as the reason for another rate increase?

We have three nuclear plants in Wisconsin but in our case, I would rather have a different power utility.

I can't disagree. I hate WE Energies. Their latest push is to put your AC unit on reserve power for a discount of up to $50 per YEAR. Not month, but year. So I sweat my butt off in summer and I get enough of a credit to offset some of their rate hike. Ugh! Plus on their options for the reserve power system are not even explained. On one option, they state "off up to 4 hours at a time..." So does that mean 4 hours off, 1 minute on, 4 hours off???

Yeah WE Energies is a monopoly and not a well run one at that.

 

[Nestor]

Their devotion to the shareholders makes it impossible to avoid being reamed every year, even when their costs decrease.

Re: that coal-fired plant- they raised their rates because they needed to finance it, they raised their rates after they sold a nuclear plant for well over $900M and after the coal plant went online (at reduced capacity) and they found that demand didn't match their expectations, they raised the rates again. They even raised the rates after being fined by the EPA, even though the Public Service Commission mandated that no rate increases should occur when the utility is penalized for something. My rates have approximately tripled in the last 10 years, even though my house is much more energy-efficient now vs then.

The local governments often make it difficult to go off the grid or augment power needs, too. If solar panels can be seen from the street, it's usually not going to be approved but with so many houses on the North side of the street, that's a problem.

Was actually hinting at a state-owned utility. Electricity simply doesn't lend itself to a for-profit venture. Look at what deregulation in California did.

Going off the grid has its own set of problems. People who install windmills and solar panels rarely, truly go off the grid. They still stay connected for those days they can't generate power. Grid operators have no control over these small-time players, who usually have a deal with the govt. to buy whatever power they put back on the grid at ridiculously high prices. This creates instability as it forces large utilities to scale back power. Also, line maintenance isn't free, and they still have to be maintained no matter which way the power flows. Large utilities have to pay these fees, but Ma 'n' Pa Power and Light usually don't. A few people on the grid isn't usually a big deal, but govt incentives to "go green" will create a huge mess for utilities.

People want to make their own govt. subsidized electricity and sell it back to the grid, but want the big players there when the wind isn't blowing or sun isn't shining.

A disatrous business model in the making.

 

[Rickster71]

The average person doesn't realize how good we have it, or how cheap electricity really is.
http://www.thespec.com/opinion/editorial/article/279801--power-politics
Wait until they see the real cost of 'free' solar and wind per kwh.

 

[rnatalli]

Most people seem fine with Nuclear power until someone plans to build a plant in their backyard or plans to store the waste in their state.

 

[majorloser]

Most people seem fine with Nuclear power until someone plans to build a plant in their backyard or plans to store the waste in their state.

Dude, give me free electricity and they can store the crap in my garage.