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Power Company Kills Nuclear Plant, Plans $6 Billion In Solar, Battery Investment (arstechnica.com)
Socguy writes: After being unable to complete the Levy County Nuclear Plant a few years ago, Duke energy abandoned it, leaving rate payers on the hook. Duke is now in the process of settling legal action as a result. As part of the settlement Duke will construct or acquire 700MW of solar capacity over four years in the western Florida area, construct 50MW of battery storage, undertake grid modernizations and install 530 electric car charging stations. "The Levy nuclear plant was proposed in 2008 and ran into hurdles early on," reports Ars Technica. "With cheap natural gas in 2013, Duke Energy Florida became nervous that it might not recuperate costs spent on the nuclear plant, especially with regulatory delays. The company cancelled its engineering and construction agreements in 2013 but said that it was holding open the possibility of returning to Levy someday. Over nine years, about $800 million had been spent on preparatory work for the plant. With Tuesday's announcement, those costs are sunk costs now. But overall, the changes will save residential customers future nuclear-related rate increases. Those customers will see a cost reduction of $2.50 per megawatt-hour (MWh) 'through the removal of unrecovered Levy Nuclear Project costs,' the utility said. The 700MW of solar won't exactly cover the nameplate capacity of the Levy plant, which was supposed to deliver 2.2 gigawatts to the region. But the Tampa Bay Times wrote that Duke 'is effectively giving up its long-held belief that nuclear power is a key component to its Florida future and, instead, making a dramatic shift toward more solar power.'"
75% of Duke's generation mix is coal or natural gas. So, rather than offset any of that base load with a 2.2 GW nuclear facility, they'll supplement demand growth and cover peaks with solar and keep burning the coal and gas. It's cheaper and they get to wave the green flag etc.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
Until a hurricane rolls over it and sends the solar panels out to sea in many small chunks, maybe....
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
In this thread /. "nuclear experts" will decry just how costly all this solar stuff is and how great and awesome and cheap nuclear power is.
/. in order to save their project.
All that on a story about how a multi billion dollar energy company couldn't get a nuclear power plant off the ground even after $800 million dollars. I'm sure all Duke needed to do was consult such expert
Fukishama was a result of 2 things; a management that cut corners by doing the least possible, AND a major slowdown in building new reactors that are much safer.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
When this plant was proposed in 2006 nuclear was the most cost effective energy out there. Fracking drove the cost of natural gas into the basement and has remained there ever since. So nuclear is no longer the best bag for your buck in the energy industry and it comes with the NIMBY stigma associated with radiation. Duke probably ran the numbers and decided it was cheaper to take the hit and pay a fine rather than complete the project and be straddled with it for years to come.
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
Do not make the error of comparing nameplate capacities ignoring capacity factors (i.e. how much of the nominal power is actually produced). Capacity factor for nuclear tend to be around 90%, for solar it's location-dependent but in California it may go as high as 25%.
If you take that into consideration then the difference between 2200 MV nuclear and 700 MW solar is almost ten-fold.
Real life is overrated.
With a spreadsheet in the boardroom.
You would think. But...
We would likely have a solar adoption rate higher than all but a few other states if it wasn't for whacked laws put in place to defend the utilities. A homeowner here can't sell energy back to the utility. Only those who can produce 24 hours a day on-demand can do so. Because of this, our solar penetration is lower than many northeastern states.
Until we either get a change in the law or the cost of battery storage drops enough to make solar + battery much less than utility provided electric, Florida will lag the developed world in solar (and some of the third world).
Unless of course the solar has an energy storage system then combined capacity rates are near 60-70% and present a power prices that's 1/3rd nuclear's cost.
I like nuclear as much as you but the simple fact is it's been priced out of the market and that's not likely to change without massive tax payer subsidies. Solar costs have fallen 99.99% since 1970. You can now purchase solar panels at a price that's orders of magnitudes smaller than other sources and the only reason it's not taken over completely is the storage issue. Once the storage problem is solved Wind and Solar will be the only two power sources as wind will be cheaper than dirt cheap gas without subsidy by 2020 at current price trends. Solar is following the same track but is a little bit more expensive upfront but has lower maintenance costs long term.
I like how you try to make it sound saner to have stuck with the original plan to build another nuclear power plant in the middle of hurricane territory instead.
You can't imagine how much wildlife has been displaced by the solar panels on my roof. Christ I haven't seen a single deer walking around on my roof!! I tell you it's a travesty of wasted wildlife access.
Yeah, it's not like the peak demand is close the same time that solar panels produce peak output. Oh, wait, it is.
Most of the USA experiences peak demand mid-afternoon, when A/C units are cranking away.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Until a hurricane rolls over it and sends the solar panels out to sea in many small chunks, maybe....
The irony that this is the reason that Duke cites Levy being cancelled. Westinghouse couldn't make an AP1000 that can pass NRC hurricane regulations, here is a transcript of the radio program.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
Only if it's a PV based solar farm. Thermal solar plants continue to produce power when the sun goes down.
No they do not. Molten salt is just a big battery. They can only produce what has been put into them (minus a little which is lost in the process). This doesn't change the maths behind the solar generation capacity of a plant in any way, it does however provide storage if you can generate enough so that you don't suffer as badly from the intermittent nature of Solar.
It's the other way around: nuclear/coal power plants need base-load customers, not the other way around, because those power plants are cheap per kWh delivered, but cannot adapt to demand.
Power sources should really be categorized in one of three classes: 1. Flexible on-demand (natural gas, hydro, battery storage); 2. Base load (nuclear, coal); 3. Uncontrolled generation power (wind, solar).
If you add #3 to the net, you should add #1 to balance. Or do cross-continental balancing of #3 to make it behave like #2, but it requires expensive investments in long-distance transmission capacity.
Avantslash: low-bandwidth mobile slashdot.
From TFS: "With cheap natural gas in 2013, Duke Energy Florida became nervous that it might not recuperate costs spent on the nuclear plant"
Cheap gas, the expectation that renewables and batteries will keep getting cheaper... It doesn't make economic sense to build, operate and decomission a nuclear plant now.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
It works out fine until over a third of homes have panels. This is because power usage is also higher during the day.
I don't read AC A human right
Oh, and the average PV capacity factor in the US is 27,2%. A 700MW PV plant at average capacity factor is equivalent to 206MW of nuclear. So yes, there is a 10x difference in total generation; however, it more closely follows the demand curve, meaning that you can wholesale the power for significantly more per MWh, and the price you get for your power is the figure that really matters, not the total generation. Nuclear plants spend half their time generating dirt-cheap nighttime power.
Also it's worth noting that Duke's pricing on this solar plant is abnormally expensive; new plants in the desert southwest are coming in as low as $1,50/W (half as much). Florida's insolation is worse, but I'm not sure that fully explains the difference.
He's just being nice so my real father won't freeze him in carbonite and sell him for spice.
Have you actually tried to read what you have posted?
"A prototype was scheduled for manufacture in 2015. However its development seems to have ended."
That's the problem with you atomic fanbois - you don't know much about the topic you wank on.
The Soviets have built a couple of these (TES-3 mobile nuclear power plant), but even they have recognised that the idea is not as great as it appears to be.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
And by "messed up", you mean "being provided energy near the places of consumption, avoiding load on the transmission infrastructure"? I doubt that utilities don't want that.
Ezekiel 23:20