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The Forum > Article Comments > Lobbyists debate responses to the nuclear power crisis > Comments

Lobbyists debate responses to the nuclear power crisis : Comments

By Jim Green, published 27/3/2017

Small or large reactors, consolidation or innovation, conventional reactors or Generation IV pipe-dreams ... it's not clear that the nuclear industry will be able to recover however it responds to its current crisis.

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In the next decade there should be a vivid demonstration of the need for baseload power without expensive and dwindling gas supplies, billions of dollars of batteries or the distastefulness of replacing old coal stations with new coal stations. Germany by the way has no qualms about the latter with a new coal station going online in 2018 despite spending €25 bn a year on renewables subsidies. Germany says it will close its last nuke in 2022 which could be why they along with Japan are going back to coal.

In this time SA and perhaps Victoria will have blackouts and power price rises while China forges ahead. Incidentally the cooling pond, transmission facilities and skilled workforce at Hazelwood would suit a nuclear power plant.

I suspect Westinghouse will be bought by Chinese or South Korean interests. Engie (coincidentally the owners of Hazelwood) want to build several AP1000 reactors in the UK. The US is now starting to worry about the future price of gas, now cheaper than it was a decade ago but for how long. Gas backup and subsides/quotas is what makes intermittent wind and commercial solar viable but again for how long. NuScale the maker of a new small reactor thinks it can sell dozens of modules a year so the US could get back in the nuclear game.
Posted by Taswegian, Monday, 27 March 2017 10:17:50 AM
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Thanks to Jim Green for setting out comprehensively the economic plight of the nuclear industry. It's a sad reflection on the nuclear lobby, who, like Monty Python's Black Knight, keep on fighting for their cause, despite near-terminal injuries.

Sadder still, because from any humane point of view, the fewer nuclear facilities, the safer. Apart from their intrinsic problems of radiation danger, and no solution to the accumulating radioactive trash, there is also the connection between nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons. The lobbyists with throw up their hands in horror at this suggestion - but - there are no nuclear weapons without nuclear reactors, which is probably why places like Saudi Arabia want to get nuclear reactors.

Sadder again - because the huge funds, energy, skill that go into the nuclear industry would be so much better spent on developing energy efficiency and clean renewable energy.
Posted by ChristinaMac1, Monday, 27 March 2017 10:35:13 AM
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It isn't only the nuclear power industry that is heading for a crisis. The same scenario applies to the coal fired industry as well. Hazellwood is just the start of the shutdown of major aging power stations. Unfortunately, because of the technical nature of power distribution, a subject which seems to be beyond the comprehension of the greens, we really need to embrace nuclear as the only large scale source of non- polluting base load power. It is about time governments of all persuasions got their heads out of the sand and started to do something about it. They can build as many storage facilities as they like, but you cannot, repeat cannot have a stable distribution system without a considerable percentage of stable frequency, voltage, and phase, base load stations, and they must be built by government whatever the cost.
David
Posted by VK3AUU, Tuesday, 28 March 2017 10:37:20 AM
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Looks like this article fairly shafts the Engineer-Man SMR and Thorium spruikers. Let's risk $Billions of public money on 20 years of studies, research, production, Court Appeals, subsidies, anti-protester security and pro-nuclear laws.

Not to mention your Nuclear-good, four legs bad, salaries.
Posted by plantagenet, Tuesday, 28 March 2017 12:10:29 PM
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And what, pray tell, is your solution to our inevitable power problems, Planty.

David
Posted by VK3AUU, Tuesday, 28 March 2017 2:42:48 PM
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The solutions include a 4 stage plan that will remove the need to build/develop/trial/error nuclear reactors over 2 decades.

ie.

1. 1 to 2 years - Mass battery storage of renewables in South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania.

2. 7 years - Snowy 2.0

3. 7-10 years - 2 or 3 strategically placed gas-fired power stations

4. serious examination of the latest technology, high efficiency, low carbon, Japanese designed power stations

Pete
http://gentleseas.blogspot.com.au/2017/03/australias-electricity-crisis-rapidly.html
Posted by plantagenet, Tuesday, 28 March 2017 3:37:41 PM
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Ya gotta luv it!
Posted by Luciferase, Tuesday, 28 March 2017 5:06:35 PM
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Batteries and other forms of storage do not produce power, so items 1 and 2 can be discounted. The Snowy scheme will only increase the size of the dams, but won't significantly increase the actual generating capacity.
Unless the Victorian government changes its policy on gas production, reliance on gas will be problematic.
Our current brown coal stations in the Latrobe Valley are almost as efficient as they can be and in any case, improvements will only be of marginal benefit.
The Hazelwood pondage is ideally situated to run a nuclear power station. Whatever solution is attempted, the generation of base load power is going to be in the hands of the state because cheaper renewables make any other course commercially unviable.
David
Posted by VK3AUU, Tuesday, 28 March 2017 5:07:44 PM
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How much mass battery storage, and how much more wind and solar generation to keep it charged under all contingencies, is needed to maintain dispatchable electricity 24/7/365? What would it be just for SA, say, let alone Vic, Tas, the world? What would it cost? Fossil-fueled facilities must remain maintained to completely guarantee supply, and the more it is used the less effectively AGW is countered.

Beside the cost, the emissions created in manufacturing this absolutely humongous (IMO) generation and storage infrastructure before any abatement it might achieve, and its maintenance, is a massive setback in countering AGW.
Posted by Luciferase, Wednesday, 29 March 2017 12:09:48 AM
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..in the time we have.
Posted by Luciferase, Wednesday, 29 March 2017 12:36:25 AM
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More pixie dust, unicorn inspired, engineering solutions by Arts graduates. God help us.
Posted by McCackie, Thursday, 30 March 2017 7:42:03 AM
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McCackie. Who might these "Arts Graduates" be.

David
Posted by VK3AUU, Thursday, 30 March 2017 8:14:22 AM
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McCackie made me laugh. Can't be the same McCackie that I knew as a child (Roy Rene).
Anyway, thanks McCackie. I forgot that only nuclear physicists and nuclear engineers can have valid opinions about nuclear power. (And that's excluding Arnie Gunderson and any other nuclear physicist idiots who actually comprehend stuff about economics, environment, radiation biology, and the time factor in climate change.)

Yes, proper nuclear physicists are the only ones who can give sensible advice about nuclear power. It's the same with God - only the Pope and archbishops can advise us on whether or not God exists.
Posted by ChristinaMac1, Thursday, 30 March 2017 9:32:58 AM
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