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."

Comments

From the laundromat

[frog_strat]

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.

Economics

[fermion]

A rational person would have stopped when they said that economics closed nuclear power. This is the reality. In the US there has been 40 years to prove that nuclear energy is a competitive product. You can blame the government, but it is pretty much bad management of a technology that could work. You can say if the government would only subsidize the product, it would work, but why is government subsidizing a mature technology? In the US it does not seem to be a viable solution.

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%?