First New Nuclear Reactor In a Decade On Track

dusty writes "Plans to bring online the first new US nuclear plant since 1995 are on track, on time, and on budget according to the Tennessee Valley Authority. TVA had one major accident with a coal ash spill of late, and one minor one. The agency has plans and workers in place to have Unit 2 at Watts Bar, near Knoxville, online by 2012. Currently over 1,800 workers are doing construction at the plant. Watts Bar #1 is the only new nuclear reactor added to the grid in the last 25 years. From the article: 'TVA estimates the Watts Bar Unit 2 reactor every year will avoid the emission of about 60 million metric tons of greenhouse emissions linked with global warming. ... TVA began construction of Watts Bar in 1973, but work was suspended in 1988 when TVA's growth in power sales declined. After mothballing the unit for 19 years, TVA's board decided in 2007 to finish the reactor because it is projected to provide cheaper, no carbon-emitting power compared with the existing coal plants or purchased power it may help replace.'"

Comments

Less radioactive waste, too

[AJWM]

A nuclear plant also produces less radioactive waste than does a corresponding coal plant. Of course since the latter doesn't fall under the authority of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the radioactive substances in coal ash (like thorium) just get dispersed into the environment along with the stuff that stays toxic forever like arsenic and mercury.

Re:Less radioactive waste, too

[QuantumRiff]

I've often wondered what would happen if they changed that.. A recent Newsweek article was talking about how at the very end of the Clinton Administration, they ruled Fly Ash a hazardous waste, but it was via Executive order (just like we complained that bush did the last few weeks of office) and was undone by the next administration. I wonder what would have happened if that designation was passed "properly" and allowed to stand the last 9 years or so.

Re:Just Takes One

[clarkkent09]

I guess nobody in power to stop these things never takes into account that one nuclear accident could render a majority of the US inhabitable.

I think the keyword here is could. I can imagine many disasters that could cause enormous damage too, but the question is how likely they are to happen. What is more likely, a meteor strike, or an accident in a nuclear power station of such a magnitude as to render US uninhabitable? I don't know, but lets say they are comparable. If so, we should be willing to spend as much money on protection against meteors as we are on not using nuclear power, including, arguably, the cost of our military operations in the middle east, the increased danger of terrorism (potentially nuclear too) etc. Either way it's a cost/benefit analysis and you have to look at both sides of the equation.

Re:I enjoy nuclear power

[QuantumRiff]

Couldn't agree more.. The best way to defend against a "dirty bomb" is to start refining the low level waste for recycling. I wish the terrorists luck assembling dirty bombs made of Plutonium. In reality, a very large portion of our current nuclear fuel comes from "recycled' warheads from Russia. I can't help but smile at the fact that the cold war is powering my AC on a hot day ;).

Re:Finally

[torkus]

Are there GW level reactor designs based on materials available in sufficient quantity?

A 2MW reactor using air cooling or a 800MW design that requires 1000 tons of ... meter-long nano-tubes (etc.) isn't going to help replace that 1GW coal plant any time soon.

The general problem is still thermal sinks. A nuclear plant has a thermal efficiency somewhere around 33% so twice as much energy has to go somewhere other than the power substation. Let's take a moderately small plant with an output of 500MW ... which implies 1GW (thermal) has to be dissipated. Roughly you're looking at something like 12 million cubic meters per hour of airflow...assuming a 250C change in air inlet to output temp.

Not meant to flame...i'm curious how the math makes large scale (non-evaporative) air-cooled thermal plants possible.

Re:Finally

[ender8282]

That article isn't even consistent. Elsewhere It says that the total solar energy reaching earth is 3.8 YJ/year. The earth uses 500 Exa J /year. That means that the entire surface of the earth only produces about 1900x the power we need. If you factor out the oceans as 2/3 the earth's surface you are down to 633x our current power needs. (That doesn't even take into account that the south pole is a pretty lousy place to get solar energy because the sun's rays are never normal to it). Lets also assume that you don't want to kill forests. 30% of the earth's land is covered by forest [www.earth-policy.org/indicators/Forest/2006.htm]. That takes up down to 422x total energy needs. Take out for farmland it there will be less. And the worst part is that forestland and farmland are highly concentrated around places that have good sunlight. You don't see many trees in Antarctica. We probably could get enough energy but it isn't quite as large is you suggest.