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San Onofre's Closure: What Was Missed
Lasrick writes "John Mecklin explores the context that was missed when the LA Times and the San Diego Union Tribune reported on the closing of the remaining two San Onofre nuclear reactors: 'U-T San Diego published a similar flurry of well-reported stories that covered the basics of the reasons for the closure, as well as the impact on consumers, workers, and the electricity supply. At both papers, coverage included infographics that effectively explained the problem that forced the plant to close—vibration that caused wear in tubes for the plant's steam generators. (The Times's tick-tock takeout on the history of the steam generator snafu, published in July, is especially comprehensive.) The specifics of the San Onofre closing were covered well and thoroughly. The context within which those basics reside, however, was far less well-examined, and the two major newspapers closest to the San Onofre plant both therefore missed a real opportunity to inform readers about the major energy choices California and the country will need to make in the coming decade.' Excellent work at the Columbia Journalism Review."
An article that decries all the valuable, important stuff that could have been brought up, but then doesn't bother to bring them up and/or discuss them in any detail?
This article was a waste of my time. I wish Slashdot had a thumbs up/down on articles.
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
I live quite close to this reactor. I met a guy at the laundromat that said he was working on the reactor. He said they expected vibration along one axis but were seeing it on another, and that was the source of the corrosion. He felt ultimately it was a political move to shut it down. He also wouldn't be surprised if the decision were reversed, when people realize what the shutdown would do to electricity rates (double them).
In the local stories I have read that there are suspicions about contamination in the ground water under the reactor (it is on a beach FWIW). And there are 3 million pounds of spent fuel there, so hot, that no repository in the US is allowed to take it. I just imagine transporting all that waste by train through the many residential neighborhoods along the track.
A kayak competition is held very near the reactor where people row out, fall out of the kayak, get back in and row back. A friend took his new underwater camera case to the area, and it is full of small sharks, perhaps there is warm water attracting them.
Paywalls are a relatively new development for Internet, revealing itself to the public some 10 years ago.
It's effect was often ignore, until this case, that is.
The article the former Nuclear Regulatory Commissioner Peter Bradford wrote for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists earlier this year is locked behind a paywall, an article that could have contained vital information for the public to make up their correct judge regarding the use of Nuclear Energy to generate electricity for the United States of America.
The more articles being locked behind paywalls, the less informed the public are going to become.
The less informed the public are, the more power the elite 0.1% is going to garner, for the public will have no cause to oppose whatever they propose, as vital information locked up, so that a few could make some money, while the masses lose.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
As long as natural gas and coal can emit CO2 without any penalty to the real cost of that emission, nuclear plants will continue to close. It is funny that every time that nuclear power is brought up that people shake their fists demand that it is able to pay its entire costs, while they never mention the tragedy of commons that is going on with fossil fuel derived power. It is a pity that our ability to do risk analysis and balance alternatives is weighted on whether it can blow up in a scary fashion and release a radioactive plume versus causing irreversible destruction to the entire planet (but slow enough that only your grandchildren will care).
Further north, in California you can find a lot of wind turbines, including Shiloh II. I was by the San Luis Reservoir (Pump and Store engergy/water resource) and noticed more turbines are being erected near there (a very windy place.) These 1.5 megawatt turbines are turning up in some amazing places, even solo installations in a rightly situated location, where a land owner can use some power and sell the rest at a tidy profit.
With all the talk of Santa Ana Winds I think there's an opportunity to build some of these wind farms in SoCal.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Yes coal is a major source of electricity, about 40%, and it is going to get harder with new regulation. But again, like nuclear, the reason we building more coal plants it dogma. People believe it is the best solution. It is certainly a profitable solution. There are tens of thousands of people who are willing to dig coal for a middle class income in working conditions that keep the overall costs low. So we have the job argument, the argument that we can't live without electricity, and the argument that technology will make it cleaner. But that technology is funded by the taxpayer, and maybe we want to do something new that will help us long term, not just keep established corporations in power.
In any case, the short term future is natural gas, and the long term future is wind, solar, and conservation. This is where the technology is. Building more efficient electronics. Building better turbines and solar cells. Building superconducting batteries, storing energy in elevated mass, flywheels, etc so that we are not generating for peak capacity 24 hours a day, and then throwing away a quarter of it. It is not something that your C level executive understands, it is not something your coal miner wants to go to school to learn, it is not something that is going to transfer millions of dollars of tax payers money directly into the pockets of investors, but it is something that will build the intellectual and long term economic wealth of the country.
And I mentions conservation. These plants supplied one millions homes in a state of 38 million. That is 2% reduction in capacity. The big thing we need to realize is that energy is neither free nor infinate. We can go and buy a 60" TV that us going to use almost 400KWh in a year, or one that uses under 200. We can browse on our 120 watt computer, or on our 5W tablet. We can turn on the lights in the middle of the day, or not. How much would we need to do to save 2% of the electricity? Who much would be need to do to save 10%?
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
With all the talk of Santa Ana Winds I think there's an opportunity to build some of these wind farms in SoCal.
There's quite a bit of wind and solar plants being built right now to accomate the renewable energy mandate in California.
The utilities in the state have until 2020 to increase renewable energy production to 33% of total energy production and they aren't half-way there yet.
Anyone with money pays.
I just received a chatty letter from SDG&E, mostly blather about how they are saving money at the SDG&E office by cutting down on energy and water use, reducing paper use, updating their vehicle fleet, etc... BLAH BLAH BLAH...
The gist of the letter is "about a quarter of our customers will see a noticeable increase in their bills in September..." (due to the San Onofre shutdown).
How much? "If your bill is typically around $100... about $15" -- "If your bill is usually about $250... about $75". (and I am sure it goes higher - see the non-linear trend? 2.5x bill - 5x extra cost... bearing in mind the bill itself is already tiered.
Meh, what's another $1000 a year to live in the Golden State. Guess I need to fire some more of my household staff to make up the difference (as if - but seriously, middle income folks who haven't had a raise in a few years do tend to cut back on stuff like gardeners and house cleaners to make up for new taxes and other stuff like this... cancel the gym membership, do my own gardening. Net same cost to me, two businesses lose out on my patronage and the economy shrinks a bit more.)
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
The Santa Anas are the wrong kind of wind for power generation because they blow only part of the time but very strongly when they are blowing. That means you need to build the turbines to be very strong to resist the peak winds, but you won't get to benefit from that strength most of the time. The ideal winds for power generation are more or less constant speed.
That said, there is a fair amount of wind power generation in Southern California. There are large wind farms built to take advantage of the wind funnel effects of the San Gorgonio and Tehachapi passes.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
Not to mention that California did have retail caps on the price of energy, and the way they implemented that ("soft caps") was part of the problem of their energy crisis. Once they became an importer of energy (while allowing exports!), all those nonsensical regulations became a weapon to be used against them.
The regulation apologists want you to think that the crisis was a manufactured financial one, rather than a over-regulated supply one. In reality it was both, with one enabling the other.
"His name was James Damore."
My half-brother is a sound guy. Lived in Nashville for years, and one day he had to put a lavalier mic on Dolly. He was a little timid at first, until Dolly told him "Don't worry, son, they don't bite."
Pre or post melt-down?
I can't imagine anything more "geeky" or "stuff that matters" than talking about the effects of shutting down nuclear power around the world. Building nuclear power plants is the ultimate in nerd culture, where nuclear engineering used to be the hot college major that everybody with half a brain would try to enroll into and where you would find all of the math nerds who wanted to make money.
As for the consequences of nuclear power, it really doesn't matter what your political leanings might be, this is pretty interesting stuff and something that really does have a long-term impact upon human society. You might be at odds about the approach that should be taken and if shutting down all of these nuclear power plants is a good or bad thing to do, but it really matters to very ordinary people who receive the electrical power from these plants. It certainly has a major impact upon your day to day activities and your monthly utility bills, not to mention just about every other aspect of your daily life in the 21st Century.
That is also sort of the point of the article, that a bunch of people who should know better are missing an important story that is not currently a part of the national or international forum of ideas. It really does matter.
It was screwy half-hearted deregulation where in many ways the worst parts were deregulated but the parts that really would spur on competition were kept heavily in regulations. It still is near impossible for a neighborhood to build a bunch of solar cell panels and small wind turbines as a neighborhood power co-op and sell the excess power on the grid (possible, but very difficult and full of regulations). That is the kind of thing that needs to happen.
It really is so weird that to go through the California regulations on power needs a full time team of lawyers (not just a single lawyer) even for a small neighborhood group, much less a private individual. The big power companies have those teams, which is why those kind of regulations stay in place. The de-regulation was simply that once the lawyers figured out how to weasel their way through the regulations and required forms, that the state couldn't stop them from any subsequent actions.
middle income folks who haven't had a raise in a few years do tend to cut back on stuff like gardeners and house cleaners to make up for new taxes and other stuff like this...
Hmm.. middle income must mean something completely different in the Golden State.
Here in the midwest, it surely doesn't correspond to gardeners and house maids.
Of course Enron didn't have all that much to say about the CA power pool. Being outsiders and all they were more or less ignored.
Also note: The lack of new plants, which was the fundamental problem, was under ratebase.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Of course it is by design. That is where those who want to see more government regulations "to help protect the little guy" end up being mere pawns in the grand games of these big companies and end up screwing "the little guy" far more than if they simply kept their trap shut.
The best way to cut down on bribery is to simply make the situation so elected officials can't do anything... because the government can't do anything. Nobody cares to lobby a government official who is on a committee with no responsibilities.... or at least only in charge of a budget so small that the lobbying amounts to be nothing more than advertisements in the Sunday newspaper. The problem is when you have officials in charge of trillion dollar budgets, spending a couple hundred million is just pocket change on any project you might be working on.