Useful references on Nuclear v Renewables

These sources may be of interest for those interested to learn about nuclear power, and especially the cost comparisons with renewables and fossil fuel:

Renewable Limits http://bravenewclimate.com/renewable-limits/

Sustainable Nuclear http://bravenewclimate.com/integral-fast-reactor-ifr-nuclear-power/

Why renewables are not sustainable:
John Morgan, ‘Catch 22 of Energy Storage’: http://bravenewclimate.com/renewable-limits/

John Morgan’s response to serious critiques: http://bravenewclimate.com/2014/08/22/catch-22-of-energy-storage/#comment-350520

Unlimited transport fuels from sea water: http://bravenewclimate.com/2013/01/16/zero-emission-synfuel-from-seawater/

David Mackay, ‘Sustainable Energy without the hot air’: http://www.withouthotair.com/

BREE, AETA reports and models: http://industry.gov.au/industry/Office-of-the-Chief-Economist/Publications/Pages/Australian-energy-technology-assessments.aspx

CSIRO eFuture: http://efuture.csiro.au/#scenarios

CSIRO MyPower: http://www.csiro.au/Outcomes/Energy/MyPower.aspx

System costs for renewables v nuclear:
OECD/NEA ‘System Effects in Low-carbon Electricity Systems’ http://www.oecd-nea.org/ndd/reports/2012/system-effects-exec-sum.pdf

Martin Nicholson and Barry Brook, 2013, ‘Counting the hidden costs of energy’ http://www.energyinachangingclimate.info/Counting%20the%20hidden%20costs%20of%20energy.pdf

‘Zero Carbon Australia – Stationary Energy Plan – critique’: http://bravenewclimate.com/2010/08/12/zca2020-critique/

‘100% renewables for Australia – the cost’ (see summary in Figure 6, and download the spreadsheet to run your own scenarios and sensitivity analyses): http://bravenewclimate.com/2012/02/09/100-renewable-electricity-for-australia-the-cost/

‘Renewables or Nuclear Electricity for Australia – the costs’ (See summary in Figure 6): http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.363.7838&rep=rep1&type=pdf

‘Solar power realities – supply-demand, storage and costs’: http://bravenewclimate.com/2009/08/16/solar-power-realities-supply-demand-storage-and-costs/

‘Solar realities and transmission costs – addendum’: http://bravenewclimate.com/2009/09/10/solar-realities-and-transmission-costs-addendum/

Graham Palmer, 2013, 'Household Solar Photovoltaics: Supplier of Marginal Abatement, or Primary Source of Low-Emission Power?': http://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/5/4/1406

Myths and realities of renewable energy: http://judithcurry.com/2014/10/22/myths-and-realities-of-renewable-energy/

More renewables? Watch out for the Duck Curve: http://judithcurry.com/2014/11/05/more-renewables-watch-out-for-the-duck-curve/

All megawatts are not equal: http://judithcurry.com/2014/12/11/all-megawatts-are-not-equal/

The case for baseload: http://mydigimag.rrd.com/display_article.php?id=500086

Scientific American: Renewable Energy’s Hidden Costs: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/renewable-energys-hidden-costs/

Nuclear is the safest way to generate electricity (10 times safer than rooftop PV, 4 times safer than wind):

Forbes: ‘Deaths by energy source’: http://nextbigfuture.com/2012/06/deaths-by-energy-source-in-forbes.html

Allowable radiation levels are set too low:
http://home.comcast.net/~robert.hargraves/public_html/RadiationSafety26SixPage.pdf

Video by Wade Allison, Oxford Uni Professor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZ6aL3wv4v0

Wade Allison, OLO, ‘Nuclear Radiation is Relatively Harmless’: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=15900&page=0

Regulatory Ratcheting increased the cost of nuclear power by a factor of four by 1990: Bernard Cohen, 1991, ‘Costs of nuclear power plants – what went wrong’: http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/chapter9.html

Slide 10 compares the price of electricity versus the CO2 emissions intensity of electricity for selected countries with high proportions of nuclear or high proportions of renewable energy. Notice the irony in Slide 14:
http://canadianenergyissues.com/2014/01/29/how-much-does-it-cost-to-reduce-carbon-emissions-a-primer-on-electricity-infrastructure-planning-in-the-age-of-climate-change/

The Wade Alison YouTube video deals with the science beautifully. He moves onto the political aspect from just after 41 min onwards, pointing out that not only Greens maintain the fear of nuclear.

The campaign against the fear must get a head of steam in Australia ASAP, but with Greens, Big Oil and Big Coal in cahoots it is difficult. The Greens must break free to champion the only real solution to AGW, and stop luxuriating in the wishful thinking that is unshared by their Big mates. That's me dreaming!

Peter, your post on Sunday evening contains multiple comments suggesting that I have made propositions which I simply have not. Therefore, I will not respond until you reconsider what questions you wish to ask me.

Regarding your subsequent posts, the challenge as Luciferase has pointed out is the difficulty of implementing Nuclear in Australia. If I may add to this, getting multiple parties to change their position, regardless of the validity of Nuclear as you state, boarders on impossible.

If Labor or the Liberal Party start advocating for Nuclear the other will undoubtedly use that for political purposes.

The phenomenon on countries retreating from Nuclear in areas that Nuclear has worked well is a demonstration of the inability for the political system to enable Nuclear here. It is simply politically and publically unpopular.

You have made some compelling arguments, but this does not defeat the fact that Nuclear will not play a role in Australia's energy mix, be it anytime soon, or permanently.

Therefore, I am forced to work within the confines of possibility.

I do wish you the best of luck as I can see that you are passionate. However, I do not wish to debate renewables vs Nuclear in Australia. I am critical of renewables in Australia, and this is unhelpful as although we argue differently, we come to the same conclusion that renewables have several disadvantages.

Spencer Wright,

Such an agreement brings more money into the economy. Temporarily, but the aggregate of them is effectively permanent. And it isn't just the open repurchase agreements – there's also the long dated open market operations. See http://www.rba.gov.au/mkt-operations/resources/tech-notes/open-market-operations.html#s2

Regarding what you wrote in the original article, it's not usually a problem that large scale renewables are efficient. They may employ fewer people, but providing the economy is competently run (which admittedly is not something we can rely on) that frees up the opportunity for those people to do something more valuable. Having said that, not all large scale renewable energy is that efficient in terms of staffing, and employing more people can be seen as an advantage in a depressed area such as Port Augusta. Unfortunately that advantage is one economists have difficulty quantifying.

Either way, investing in renewables in Australia makes far more sense for Australia than investing in renewables overseas.

Peter Lang, why, when you keep posting that intellectual honesty link, do you persist in displaying intellectual dishonesty by claiming that "An ERoEI of around 7 to 14 is needed to support modern society" when I've previously explained why that's false?

And do you understand that the costs in the CSIRO ‘MyPower’ calculator are based on assumptions, and by changing those assumptions there can be a substantial change in the results?

Spencer,

You did not answer my question @ 17 May 8:41 pm: So I am trying to educate you.

Your idea cannot succeed. My comments and references on Sunday provide background to understand why nuclear power has to be a major component of reducing global emissions.

Here's how to get there (in two comments):

Nuclear power will have to be a major part of the solution to significantly reduce global GHG emissions. It seems it will have to reach about 75% share of electricity generation (similar to where France has been for the past 30 years) and electricity will have to be a significantly larger proportion of total energy than it is now to reduce global GHG emission significantly.

To achieve that, the cost of electricity from nuclear power will have to become cheaper than from fossil fuels.

Here’s my suggested way to get to nuclear cheaper than fossil fuels:

1. The next US Administration takes the lead to persuade the US citizens nuclear is about as safe as or safer than any other electricity source. US can gain enormously by leading the world on developing new, small modular nuclear power plants; allowing and encouraging innovation and competition; thus unleashing the US’s ability to innovate and compete to produce and supply the products the various world markets want.

2. The next US President uses his influence with the leaders of the other countries that are most influential in the IAEA to get their IAEA representatives to support a process to re-examine the justification for the allowable radiation limits – as the US recently announced it is to do over the next 18 months.
a. WNN 20/1/15. Radiation health effects http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Safety-and-Security/Radiation-and-Health/Nuclear-Radiation-and-Health-Effects/

3. Once the IAEA starts increasing the allowable radiation limits for the public this should be the catalyst to reducing the cost of nuclear energy

a. it will mean radiation leaks are understood to be less dangerous than most non experts believe > less people will need to be evacuated from accident effected zones > the cost of accidents will decline > accident insurance cost will decline