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First Nuclear Power Plant Planned In Jordan
jones_supa writes Jordan has signed an agreement with Russia's state-owned nuclear power giant Rosatom, that sets the legal basis for building the kingdom's first nuclear power plant with a total capacity of 2,000 MW. The agreement is worth $10 billion and it envisages the construction of a two-unit power plant at Amra in the north of the kingdom by 2022. The deal provides for a feasibility study, site evaluation process and an environmental impact assessment. Currently Jordan imports nearly 98% of its energy from oil products and crude and is struggling to meet electricity demand, which is growing by more than 7% annually due to a rising population and industrial expansion. The kingdom hopes that eventually nuclear power could provide almost 40% of its total electricity generating capacity.
Could someone fill me in on the economics of nuclear power generation? I'd like to know what the usual payback period for a plant is, and how much it costs to operate a plant over that period.
Just doing some napkin figuring here, if the plant ran 24/7 at full capacity for a 20 year payback period, and assuming that operational costs are about the same as initial construction costs (i.e. using the $10 billion number from the summary, so $20 billion for construction and operation), that gives me a figure of about 5.7 cents per kilowatt-hour. Obviously the plant wouldn't run at full capacity for 20 years straight, but that does put something of a lower bound on the price of power generation, and it seems like a reasonable number given US electricity prices.
I'd also like to know how this compares to hydro, gas, coal, solar, wind, tidal, and any other generation method currently in use.
Cyrano de Maniac
According to Wikipedia, they are. Target of 500MW renewable energy, about 14% of total capacity, by the end of 2015.
Seems to me cooling might be an issue in an already water poor area of the world.
Why ... dont they just put up a load of solar panels... $10 Billion will buy you a LOT of them.
because solar panels dont generate weapons-grade plutonium?
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
That means the uranium is mined in Jordan, but it can be shipped elsewhere for enriching (France, US, Russia or other)
>> because solar panels dont generate weapons-grade plutonium?
Yep, that's an argument.
Although, nuke plants don't generate weapon grade Pu. They just generate Pu.
aaaaaaa
Not to to mention that the 'glowing lump' in Ukraine was the result of stupid testing combined with poor design, not lack of maintenance.
Arguably the glowing lump in Japan would be a better example, in that they didn't install recommended upgrades - a system to handle hydrogen generation in an overheat event and at least a few generators in a waterproof location.
I don't read AC A human right
Not all plant designs require enriched Uranium. No idea if they're using it.
I don't read AC A human right
It depends if there's a production line for large components and a guaranteed market for future orders. The Chinese are rolling out 1GW reactors from breaking ground to grid connection over a period of about five years or so but they've got predictable orders of the large components needed for a reactor and teams of engineers who move from one site to the next as their particular tasks (pouring the basemat, building the containment, installing the reactor vessel etc.) on a given construction site are completed, they don't have to learn how to do it again from scratch every time. Rosatom is in the same position, building a number of reactors of similar design in Russia and around the world but also leveraging a turnkey operation capability, supplying fuel and taking away spent fuel for reprocessing and waste disposal which is very attractive to countries like Vietnam, Jordan and other Arab nations.
Ningde 3, a 1GW reactor on the central coast of China started construction with first concrete in January 2010 and achieved grid connection a couple of days ago, about 63 months later. Two more Chinese reactors of similar capacity are expected to come on line this year.
GenIIa reactors like the Russian VVER-1200 and the uprated French M310 designs can swing their output by 30% in fifteen minutes or so, given modern control systems and a few decades of experience in running such PWRs and BWRs. It doesn't happen often because nuclear fuel is so cheap and reducing power output doesn't save much money.
That's an infitnite liability problem, not a nuclear power problem. In a world where anyone can sue anyone for anything, real, imaginary, legal or illegal, nuclear power is the ultimate source of income for lawyers. Roughly a quarter of the cost of nuclear power in the US stems directly or indirectly from paying lawyers to go away. Think about that, they've made billions extorting everyone involved in nuclear power, and you're paying for it in every power bill, and your children are paying for It in every degree of climate change and cm of sea level rise.
Jordan, being a benevolent dictatorship, is in a much more viable position to use nuclear power than any country in a lawyer-controlled oligarchy. Note how many MPs and American senators are lawyers.
Sorry but Jordan has sand storms, they're hell on wind turbines.
Because they don't work at night? You would need to buy an awful lot of batteries to keep a country running after dark.
Why is it okay for Jordan to build a Nuclear Power Plant but not okay for Iran?
Be seeing you...
That's an infitnite liability problem, not a nuclear power problem.
If nuclear power has an infinite liability problem, then that is a nuclear power problem.
I don't object to sensibly done nuclear power, I do object to private companies making a profit out of it at the expense of taxpayers who have to fund the downstream decomissioning and storage costs and pick up the bill in case of any unfortunate accidents.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it