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Rising Sea Level Could Put East Coast Nuclear Plants At Risk
mdsolar (1045926) writes with news that global warming may make it more difficult to use modern power sources that rely upon being near large bodies of water for cooling. From the article: "During the 1970s and 1980s, when many nuclear reactors were first built, most operators estimated that seas would rise at a slow, constant rate. ... But the seas are now rising much faster than they did in the past ... Sea levels rose an average of 8 inches between 1880 and 2009, or about 0.06 inches per year. But in the last 20 years, sea levels have risen an average of 0.13 inches per year... NOAA) has laid out four different projections for estimated sea level rise by 2100. Even the agency's best-case scenario assumes that sea levels will rise at least 8.4 inches by the end of this century. NOAA's worst-case scenario, meanwhile, predicts that the oceans will rise nearly 7 feet in the next 86 years. But most nuclear power facilities were built well before scientists understood just how high sea levels might rise in the future. And for power plants, the most serious threat is likely to come from surges during storms. Higher sea levels mean that flooding will travel farther inland, creating potential hazards in areas that may have previously been considered safe."
The article has charts comparing the current elevation of various plants with their estimated elevations under the various NOAA sea level rise estimates.
The biggest reason that guys don't have HUGE CUM LOADS is that they jack off too much. If you cut back of your fapping, you'll find you unleash a much bigger torrent of sticky white baby batter...
What is the data? How was the data gathered? What technical difficulties are there in gathering the data? What assumptions were made when extrapolating from the data?
If you think about it a seven-foot rise in water is not very reasonable to predict - it has to come from somewhere and there is just not that much water locked up in ice anymore.
They are talking about four-five centuries for a massive ice wall in the arctic to melt to MAYBE bring us to four feet of rise. There is other talk of a whole anoretic ice sheet melting and giving us a few inches per century or rise.
Will those nuclear plants still be around in 400 years when a 2-4 foot rise might start to get closer to impacting them? Or will we be laughing at the water from our hover boards as beings of translucent energy ourselves?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Standpoint, I don't code sUharing sure that I've empire in decline, long time FreeBSD said. 'Screaming the official GAY
water also expands as it warms.
How can anyone expect to move anything in only 86 years?
That says it all right there.
This is like the military drawing up plans for kaiju attacks and zombiepocalypses.
"If we detonated every nuclear bomb on the planet over the poles to heat them into water, the seas could rise X-much and we'd all be royally boned."
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Rush told me climate change is a myth!
rid us of the Nomenklatura who are spreading this propaganda. ;)
Enough with the "climate change" tomfoolery
but the deniers that are desperate for any excuse to avoid admitting the obvious.
The idea that these nuclear power plants are still relevant in 86 years should scare people more than any sea level rise. All those nuclear power plants are completely obsolete. If they need to be torn down and rebuilt elsewhere with new, safer, more efficient technology, we're all better off.
LA-LA-LA. I can't hear you, now take your facts and go away before I hold my breath.
I am a fan of both Anthony Watts' site Watts Up With That *AND* John Cook's Skeptical Science... both are run by real people who go the extra distance find the best links to their sources (not some blog chain) and both are considerate of the reader.
Here's a small research journey: Direct CO2 rise causes temperature rise (CO2drivesT)? YES or NO?
There has been a demonstrated correlation between CO2 and temperature shown by Antarctic ice core data (within ~800-1000y). If a rise of CO2 in this data should consistently lag behind rises in temperature then CO2drivesT is not ruled out (both may be responding to some other factor but at different rates) BUT CO2drivesT has fallen down a notch... it now requires more extraordinary proof.
Even though human-driven global CO2 has risen 'terrifyingly fast' to 400ppm -- empirically speaking I am not terrified -- because the temperature rise that should accompany such a SHOCK by any reasonable interpretation of CO2drivesT, and to any reasonable extent, has not arisen. The effects of this 'causation' are missing.
Which is to say the historical correlation is broken.
That is not necessarily a bad thing. It's a thing,
Something we should be concerned about.
The rise to 400ppm is definitely humans' fault. It is 'massive'.
Temperature has not risen.
So such a causation, if any may exist, is unlikely to be significant.
We'd see it by now.
For example, head for Skeptical Science [SS] [SS] CO2 lags temperature - what does it mean which acknowledges that CO2 lags behind temperature but introduces 'CO2 amplification' which asserts a feedback where "the increased CO2 in the atmosphere amplifies the original warming.". This in itself is another extraordinary claim. While such a feedback might certainly exist I cannot just swallow it as a flat-fact when pursuing a simple answer to the CO2drivesT question. Where are the computer models incorporating this feedback that match observed temperature?
There is a stir these days among CO2drivesT proponents that some mechanism must exist that is hiding or delaying the warming that the models predict. Immature 'skeptics' jeer at this, implying that it is all about protecting the sacred forced-feedback hypothesis at any cost. Immature CO2drivesT proponents accuse them of attempting to derail the scientific method. There is a germ of truth in both. I think everyone should grow up a little.
Aside from the modern lack of warming, one thing seemed odd about amplification. In the Vostok ice core CO2+T graph clearly at ~75,000YA there is a massive injection of CO2 (~225-230ppm) that I think is Toba era volcanism. If such amplification exists and is significant, that would have been a fine time for CO2 feedback to jump in and 'save the day' with a slowing or a plateau of the declining temperature trend. Or even a rise? But 6,000 years after its onset -- on the Vostok graph at ~220ppm temperature and CO2 are once again in lock-step, both in steep decline. After some six millennia of 'higher' CO2 and 'lower' temperature. Plenty of time for particulates to settle and 'amplification' to occur. If it does. Did it?
But never mind, it's all changed, that [SS] Lag, what does it mean? page also said something astounding: "In fact, about 90% of the global warming followed the CO2 increase." 90%... is that a fact.
Since when?
Which led me to the next step where the game-changer is supposed to be [SS] Shakun et al. Clarify th
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
The US areas that are in trouble are mostly the Gulf coast, especially the Mississippi River flood plain and Florida. Florida is just barely above sea level now, and is very flat.
Slight rises in sea level cause problems all along the Mississippi. Hurricane and storm driven flooding are already getting worse.
The West Coast isn't so bad off, because there are cliffs along most of it. SF, LA and San Diego do have low spots, but they're a few miles long, and seawalls could be built. It might be necessary to dam the SF bay, with something like the Thames Barrage at the Golden Gate.
With more water on Earth, comes more clouds, and more rainfall inland. Warmer temperatures allow for longer growing seasons. Can you imagine if the reverse were true? Would you prefer an ice age? Who needs to grow food? Stay warm? WTF cares about sea level rise? Here's a thought, pick up and move. No one said your land 2 inches above sea level in Florida was gonna stay above sea level. New Orleans? Why yes, by all means, we'll keep the ocean out. Lemme get my pail. We are humans, and to sit here and throw a fit and panic over such stupidity is just absurd. Deal with it. If the Earth froze over, then yes, we'd have a problem. Damn hard to feed 10 billion people on ice cubes.
Floating nuclear power plant technology will resolve this issue long before it even becomes a problem; there are already prototypes in production. There are far more pressing issues brought about by rising sea levels... All the more reason to join the Seasteading movement and be among the first to migrate to a floating city!
Because it's not for them? NOBODY CARES WHAT THE DENIERS ARE DOING. THis is for people who have the brains to taka facts as facts. Sea levels have risen more than estimated. This is measured data. They are not going to protect the nuclear plants by reversing global warming or whatever, but by elevating the ground, or building floodwalls, or something. If someone wants to deny rising sea levels please sell them flat land by the shoreline. They can then deny there all they want.
OK. So we pick sites with higher natural elevations for the 3rd generation reactors that are about to begin construction. Similar story for the 4th generation reactors when they go commercial in 30 years. 1st and 2nd generation reactors at risk can be take off line and the waste stored on these sites can be transferred to the 4th gen reactors to be used as fuel (a nice benefit of 4th gen, consuming old waste).
The at risk 1st and 2nd gen reactors can be replaced, taken off line and their sites cleaned up many decades before we get near that 7 foot increase in 86 years.
It seems as if at risk reactors will be phased out via their normal life cycle, no mounds, walls, etc are needed.
If only (Holland) some country (Holland) could come up with a way (Holland) so that areas (60% of the population of Holland) could remain viable (half of Holland's land area) in the face of (dikes in Holland) rising sea levels (Holland) so that we didn't (Holland) have to worry about this (Holland).
Doesn't the necessary (Holland) expertise (Holland) exist anywhere on Earth (Holland)?
You claim that both are run by real people who go the extra distance find the best links to their sources, and blatantly they're not.
It is well known in climate circles for being written by a former TV weatherman, and regularly "falls" for basic mistakes like muddying weather and climate, shifting the goalposts, referring to "climategate" despite the fact that the results have been vindicated again and again. And politics, don't forget money and politics: if the statistics don't go your way, cherry pick the data, prey on people's fear of taxation, the UN, Al Gore and what not. That way, they won't bother listening to the actual scientists and their data (which is all too complicated - let me simplify that for you: conspiracy!).
You make it sound like this is valid source of information on climate science, when the vast majority of climate scientists have moved on from the false "debate" they claim to be having. Like, 10 years ago or more.
TODO: 753) write sig.
Panic!
It has worked well so far, why stop now?
What does this have to do with nuclear? Nothing. Here's news.....sea rise will impact solar installations that are on the coast. It will also affect donut shops.
Is the solar lobby really this desperate? Why are the stupidest articles with desperate attempts to twist reality to make some kind of statement about nuclear energy generally posted by the same person?
Is it still so fucking cute for you all to keep pumping out kids?
The difference is that nuclear is often situated at the coast to get access to plenty of cooling water, as well as limiting risk of radiation exposure over land.
If, in 86 years, these nuclear plants are at risk, I think I would be more concerned about the fact that they're in operation for a length of time that is approximately 3x what they were initially supposed to be used for more so than them getting flooded.
"Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
There are plenty of inland plants. Yes, some coastal plant could affected in decades if waters rise at the worst predicted rates, but the point is that everything else on the coast will also be affected. Its not a nuclear issue.
BTW, plants are not sited on the coast to "limit the risk of radiation exposure over land".
It's not like there will be no risk for the next 85 years, and then all of a sudden they'll be exposed to flood risk. Rather, the risk will gradually increase as the sea level rises, depending on their exact location and many other factors.
They don't have to still be operating 86 years from now for there to still be significant risk. The decommissioning plans for a nuclear power plant extends into decades, and there are risks and vulnerabilities all during that time. The plans call for leaving the spent fuel there for years or decades after the operational lifetime of the plant. At the rate the U.S. is dealing with the problem of radioactive waste (that is, not at all), I wouldn't be surprised if some decommissioned plants still had spent fuel hanging around 86 years from now. Any nuclear facility that hasn't been decommissioned back to a green field state, and gets inundated in a flood, presents a risk that's worth looking into.
It is not as though the intervening 85 years are free from risk, either - rising sea level and a serious storm could flood a nuclear plant in the next decade. There is a risk today, and the risk will increase gradually and inexorably for decades.
South Florida has a population of greater than 6 million. Not only do we have nukes right on the beach we also have garbage mountains, graveyards that go back 150 years, chemical wells, and every other pollutant that a city tends to have. All of this is less than five feet above sea level. Most of it may be only two feet above sea level. The topography is such that the area will flood from the Atlantic all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. The region will not be habitable inland or on the coasts. Keep in mind we get high tides, spring tides, and hurricanes with surges as well as very tall waves. In other words a house on stilts would not help. Houseboats would have about a two year life span as tropical storms are common. So what you may say. Who gives a hoot about South Florida? the catch is that the pollution that would take place may well be enough to destroy the Atlantic ocean completely. South Florida also produces fruit and vegetables even in winter and there is no other part of the continental US that does that. On top of that the investment and mortgage value of south Florida is on a scale large enough to completely destroy the US economy if we go under.
Sea level rise - kind of like the hockey stick model.... kind of like a hockey puck or just plain bull hockey....
Yea, no big news, this is the latest roll out of old news to supplement the new global wierding narrative the administration is pushing.
This was known and predicted in 1999.
And the collapse of the ice will be ....in 300 -1000 years !
I think we have time to adapt.
Also, the sealevel rise quoted is not accurate...
"... Sea levels rose an average of 8 inches between 1880 and 2009, or about 0.06 inches per year. But in the last 20 years, sea levels have risen an average of 0.13 inches per year... "
Check out http://sealevel.colorado.edu/
No acceleration in the rise, they quote 3.2mm/year which is 0.11 inches/year, and this is on top of their "adjustments" added of 0.3mm/year.
The NRC is responding to a court order to show that the nuclear waste issue is under control. They are trying to claim that it can be stored for a long long time at nuclear power plants. It seems pretty clear that climate change makes that claim false in some cases.
One of the most severely affected plants is Turkey Point, yet Florida just approved and expansions. http://www.pennenergy.com/arti... Why new power would be needed when the customer base is eroding hard to fathom. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05...
Yea, no big news, this is the latest roll out of old news to supplement the new global wierding narrative the administration is pushing.
Which administration are you talking about? You are aware that the authors of the SAM papers are from: (1) British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environment Research Council, Cambridge CB3 0ET, United Kingdom, (2) Research School of Earth Sciences, Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory , Australia, (3) Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, Laboratoire HydroSciences Montpellier et Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l’Environment, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France, and (4) Climate Change Research Centre and ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia?
So unless this is an administration of Australia, France and the UK, you're mistaken.
This was known and predicted in 1999.
There are new findings about the relationship between the Southern Annular Mode (the winds around Antarctica's latitude and speed), and the ice mass loss. And there are new proxy data for this SAM, showing the current effect the strongest in the past 1000 years. So mass loss acceleration is expected.
No acceleration in the rise
The acceleration is more visible in the data here: http://www.cmar.csiro.au/seale...
This is the most interesting one. What is threatened is the artificial cooling pond. Wave action at the base of the levy used to hold the pond may undermine it. A design decision to avoid the perilous coast and its storms has been overcome by the coast coming to the power plant.
Dont worry about what is going to happen in the next 86 years or 100 years. They have plans to destroy humanity well before that.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Just don't be stupid and sell them flood insurance.
Or really, really stupid an give government subsidies for flood insurance.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
What's up with all the climate alarmism on Slashdot. Next, we'll have horoscopes and astrological papers.
They really can't seem to nail it down, can they?
As a serious question, how much longer does everyone think we are going to keep using our current 30-40 year-old reactors? If, as the best estimate suggests, the water rises about 8 inches by the year 2100, do we still plan on running 1970's reactors?
Ken
MDSolar is. Shill of Shills.
NOAA's "predictions" are based on Obama's Nigerian Bring-Our-Black-Girls-Back politics.
On January 22 2017, Obama will be evicted from the White House, many of his cronies will be arrested, many of his "mandates an executive orders" will be void and NOAA's "predictions" will be dead and soon forgotten.
That gives as Shelf Life of 32 months. And the light-water reactors will be safe.
Ha ha
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Then we can just dump the water somewhere it is needed like D.C. or the Sahara.
LFTRs would take up less space, be more efficient, and rather than consuming water for cooling they could use low-grade leftover process heat to desalinate water. So, instead of being a massive freshwater sink it would be a freshwater source for piping inland (or, depending on the site, a river could be reversed for that task?)
...horribly in searing pain!
Sea levels are expected to eventually cover the entire state of Florida. Of course this would put various power plants, dwellings, etc. at risk. Cherry picking Nuclear Power Plants out of an affected area that could include literally everything may be whats required to bring attention to their issue, but I would question the authors real agenda here as this should be more about the dangers of global warming (as opposed to the dangers of nuclear power.)
Sea level fell during 2010-11 at a rate three times that which global warmists claim it rises annually:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/20/climate_change_made_sea_levels_fall_in_2010_and_2011/
So much for global warmism pseudo-science!!
Failed hypothesis is a failed hypothesis is a failed hypothesis. Suck it you neo-pagan psychopaths!
Oh yeah........why did Al "high priest of global warmism religion" Gore buy a house right on the beach for millions and millions of dollars if its going to be completely flooded in a few years like he's been screeching? You global warmists religious nuts are completely irrational.
FWIW, all the plants listed were above predicted storm surges in the worst case scenario. Probably they should have their protection improved, dikes with pumps to keep them dry, protected electrical generators, etc., but even without that failure isn't really to be expected from that cause.
FWIW, I'd be more worried about the Hanford plant on the Columbia. And not because of rising sea levels.
THAT said, these plants are all nearing, or beyond, their designed end of life. That they have been given extensions to continue operation is more due to politics than to safety. It would be expensive to replace them, nobody has properly budgeted to decommission them. (*That's* an expensive process.) And there's no agreed upon location to dispose of nuclear waste. Whoops!
Yeah, there are problems with these plants, but I don't expect rising sea level to be a major one. There are too many other problems.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
They're intentionally missing that point.
Water rising by 1-2c is not going to rise as much as you seem to be expecting. Would you care to give us all figures as to how much expansion a few hundred meters of water undergoes with a 1c rise in temperature?
Source data is at http://sealevel.colorado.edu/ The graph shows an average rise of 3.2 mm / year. You can download the data in ASCII format, suitable for plotting at http://sealevel.colorado.edu/f...
Note that this includes a fudge-factor called GIS (Glacial Isostatic Adjustment). They give a long-winded explanation. tl;dr they've added a 10% fudge factor. From http://sealevel.colorado.edu/c...
> We apply a correction for GIA because we want our sea level time series
> to reflect purely oceanographic phenomena. In essence, we would like
> our GMSL time series to be a proxy for ocean water volume changes.
> This is what is needed for comparisons to global climate models, for
> example, and other oceanographic datasets.
So they talk out of one side of their mouths about how much sea level is rising. Out of the other side of their mouth, they admit that their numbers aren't really sea level rise.
Another question... what type of effing idiot approves nuclear reactors located such that a sealevel rise of a few inches, let alone a few feet, would cause problems? Anybody ever heard of tsunamis (like at Fukushima)? They're rarer in the Atlantic, but they do happen.
I'm not repeating myself
I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user
What's the risk! Just think of all the free salt water coolant!
Then we can set up the mind controlled laser sharks as guards.
Tracy Johnson
Old fashioned text games hosted below:
http://empire.openmpe.com/
BT
By the way all scientific theories require predictions. So to all who think that CO2 controls the climate I ask the following question:
How long with rising CO2 and flat or falling temperatures before you admit CO2 does not control the climate? 20 years? 30? 50? Never?
For some accurate predictions that have withstood the test of time check out Dr Libby's prediction from the 1970s (3+ decades of accuracy), Dr Easterbrook's (12 years), Dr Abdussamatov (8 years). They all have correctly called for a cooling period of varying depths and lengths. So far they have been correct and the IPCC models wrong.
So now I'm supposed to be worried about centimeters of ocean rise when a landslide in the Canary Islands could wipe out the entire northeastern seaboard with a wave 100-200 feet high?
They need to move the nuclear power plants here to North Carolina. In it's infinite wisdom the legislature passed a law last year that climate change isn't proven, and you cannot take into account projected sea level increases.
So it's against the law for the sea to rise here, come on down y'all!