New York's $6 Billion Plan For Offshore Wind Shows That Oil Drilling Really Is On the Way Out (businessinsider.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Business Insider: Governor Andrew Cuomo unveiled a plan earlier this month to develop $6 billion of offshore wind projects off the southern coast of Long Island by 2028 and predicted that the industry would bring 5,000 jobs to the state. The plan calls for developing 2.4 gigawatts -- enough to power 1.2 million homes -- by 2030. It's all part of New York's Clean Energy Standard, which requires 50% of the state's electricity come from renewable sources like solar and wind. The move comes as President Donald Trump earlier this month announced a five-year plan to open up areas of the East Coast to offshore drilling.

"While the federal government continues to turn its back on protecting natural resources and plots to open up our coastline to drilling, New York is doubling down on our commitment to renewable energy and the industries of tomorrow," Cuomo said in a statement. Cuomo has asked Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke for an exemption from the drilling plan, saying in an open letter that the plan "undermines New York's efforts to combat climate change by shifting from greenhouse gas emitting fossil energy sources to renewable sources, such as offshore wind." The report identifies a 1 million acre site approximately 20 miles south of Long Island that would best support the wind turbines, and "ensure that, for the vast majority of the time, turbines would have no discernible or visible impact from the casual viewer on the shore." The report also notes that New Jersey announced a similar plan last Wednesday to develop 3.5 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity off its coast.

Comments

Eletrical grid Energy doesn't come from oil

[JDAustin]

Oil is not used in the generating of energy for the electrical grid so how does a subsidized wind project show that oil is on the way out. Oil is used in heating via heating oil, but the alternative is natural gas which is far more efficient then electric heating. Natural gas is whats used (along with coal, nuclear, etc) in generating electricity...but natural gas != oil.

Finally...what happens when the wind is not blowing? The electrical grid requires a base level going through it and when its a calm night, you have no solar or wind power going into the grid.

Re:Eletrical grid Energy doesn't come from oil

[rjnagle]

I don't know about the fuel mix in the state of New York (and maybe the headline is a mistake), but one explanation is that there are 2 ways to use the offshore area: 1) for producing wind power and 2) to drill for oil for cars. Cuomo's decision may pre-empt using the land for oil exploration and drilling. That's my two cents anyway.

Marc Jacobson has done a lot of research into the viability of renewables. (Indeed, he presented this very idea to NY a few years ago. https://news.stanford.edu/news... ) He found that using solar and wind are complementary. Wind tends to be highest at night; solar by day.

Re:Eletrical grid Energy doesn't come from oil

[ShanghaiBill]

maybe the headline is a mistake

The headline accurately reports what Gov Cuomo is claiming. It is Cuomo that is spouting nonsense.

one explanation is that there are 2 ways to use the offshore area: 1) for producing wind power and 2) to drill for oil for cars.

That is technically implausible and from a legal standpoint, very unlikely. The states control out to 3 nautical miles, and the feds control from 3 miles to 200 miles. So the jurisdictions don't overlap.

( https://news.stanford.edu/news... ) He found that using solar and wind are complementary. Wind tends to be highest at night; solar by day.

This is true for on-shore wind. Offshore, the wind patterns are different, and offshore winds are stronger and rarely stop at the latitude of NY (~40N). This is why it is worth the extra expense of building offshore. It costs three times as much to install and maintain an offshore turbine ... but the better power production more than makes up for it.

Re:Eletrical grid Energy doesn't come from oil

[blindseer]

Oil is used in heating via heating oil, but the alternative is natural gas which is far more efficient then electric heating.

Natural gas is not always an alternative to oil. My brother lived out in Indiana, and my sister out in North Carolina, neither had natural gas available to them. Natural gas is only viable for heating if it is possible to bury the gas lines. In places where running underground pipes would run into bedrock it's not economical to run gas lines. This is a common problem in northeast USA. These people then have to heat with oil, propane, wood, or electricity (hopefully a heat pump and not resistance).

I'll also dispute your claim that natural gas is more efficient than electric heat. There's too many variables to make this true in all cases. It also depends on how you define "efficient". Natural gas may be more practical in most cases, but not always more "efficient".

Finally...what happens when the wind is not blowing?

Then we'd die.

Oh, wait, that's not what we'd do. What we'd do is burn natural gas or coal. Maybe have some nuclear power or hydro. Wind power only works as an energy source if it has another source to back it up. Which is just another way of saying it doesn't work.

I know someone will want to bring up storage as a solution, like pumped hydro or batteries. Do you know what also stores energy? Oil, coal, natural gas, wood, and uranium. That is energy already stored for us and all we have to do is release it when we need it. Natural gas is storage, and we've been using it as a storage means for wind power for a long time now. The problem with using wind is that we have to account for the intermittent nature of wind and use inefficient turbines instead of efficient boilers. If the concern is reducing CO2 output then we'd stop with wind and use more natural gas boilers and nuclear power.

Re:Eletrical grid Energy doesn't come from oil

[MrL0G1C]

I don't think you get how this science stuff works, confirmation bias is for people who read conspiracy sites, partisanship if for politicians, science is not about these things, science is about having good method, good sources and being peer reviewed. This isn't the first study to show that we can achieve 100% renewables with storage and it won't be the last because it has been shown to be possible.

The bias, preconceptions partisanship are yours, the anti-intellectualism is coming from you, go look in a mirror.

Re:Eletrical grid Energy doesn't come from oil

[blindseer]

I don't know about the fuel mix in the state of New York (and maybe the headline is a mistake)

I won't claim to be an expert either but I in places like New York oil for heating is still quite common. Here's a somewhat old source on this, and likely still quite relevant:
https://www.eia.gov/todayinene...

I still think that Gov. Cuomo is an idiot but he may have been not too far from the truth, likely by accident. Oil heating is on the decline with electric heating in many cases replacing it. Heat pumps are more practical now than they used to be. What's perhaps ironic on this is that the electricity being used to power these heat pumps is increasingly natural gas. If we assume that burning natural gas for electricity is 60% efficient, and a heat pump can produce 3 times the heat energy than the electric energy consumed, then we'll still come out ahead compared to even the most efficient natural gas furnaces. Even using less efficient natural gas turbines, with something like 25% efficiency, and heat pumps still compare well with a furnace in converting natural gas to heat.

Marc Jacobson has done a lot of research into the viability of renewables. He found that using solar and wind are complementary. Wind tends to be highest at night; solar by day.

Jacobson is also an idiot. Maybe he stumbled on some truth by accident but this is not anything near a viable energy plan. Wind and solar take 10x more resources per MW than nuclear, coal, or natural gas. Maybe with access to enough hydro, strong winds, sunlight, and such, a place like New York could have an electric grid that's inexpensive, low carbon, and reliable. This is only going to work until energy demands outgrow the availability of hydro storage. One bad drought during a hot summer can make this all fall apart quickly, and badly. This is also unique to New York. Some other state that lacks access to so much hydro is not going to be able to replicate this plan.

If New York wants to see their economy grow (and with people like Cuomo in charge I'm not sure they do) then they will need nuclear power at some point. And lots of it.

Re:Eletrical grid Energy doesn't come from oil

[Entrope]

Oil heating is on the decline with electric heating in many cases replacing it. Heat pumps are more practical now than they used to be.

Heat pumps work terribly when the outside temperature is low, which is the common condition for winter in New York. The coefficient of (heating) performance for a heat pump drops from 4 or more when heating is barely needed to about 1.5 when the outside temperature is below 0 degrees Fahrenheit. Oil furnaces are about 85% efficient, because they generate enough exhaust gases that some heat escapes out the chimney; natural gas furnaces can be up to 98% efficient, which is better than you can get with your 60% efficiency estimate and a COP of 1.5.

(A few winters ago, my house's 40-year-old fuel oil furnace failed. After doing a lot of research and investigation, I replaced it with a hybrid heat pump/oil system. Most of the time, the heat pump works well, but winters still get cold enough often enough that a furnace is more cost-effective. There are no natural gas distribution lines in my neighborhood, so natural gas was not an option, and a geothermal system would have cost about $40,000 more, which is decades worth of heating oil and electricity bills.)

Underpants gnomes reasoning ?

[Crashmarik]

1. New York Builds Windfarm for electricity
2. ....
3. Oil for liquid fuel, Feedstocks, plastics and lubricants on the way out ?

Re:Underpants gnomes reasoning ?

[Freischutz]

1. New York Builds Windfarm for electricity 2. .... 3. Oil for liquid fuel, Feedstocks, plastics and lubricants on the way out ?

~48% of oil is used to make gasoline.
~23% is used to make diesel and heating oil.
~10 % is used to make jet fuel.
~5% is used to make asphalt.

The vast majority of oil is used for transportation. Feedstocks, plastics and lubricants fit somewhere into the remaining ~15% of oil that isn't used for transportation. Wind and solar are getting cheaper than oil and gas, oil extraction costs are only increasing, the cost of wind and solar is still on a downwards trend and will stay there for a while. Finally, electric vehicles are starting to take over the transportation sector and not just cars, people are even working on electrically powered ships and thinking about electric aircraft on short haul flights. All of this collectively means that the bottom is going to slowly fall out of the fossil fuel market over the next two or three decades and I don't think feedstocks, plastics and lubricants are going to sustain the oil industry in the long term at it's current levels of production. There is a reason the oil companies are starting to have trouble recruiting young people for the industry and it isn't just because all 'Millennials' and 'Generation Z' is a bunch of lib-tard tree huggers, they just see this coming.

Re:Underpants gnomes reasoning ?

[fatwilbur]

There is a reason the oil companies are starting to have trouble recruiting young people for the industry

I work in the energy industry (side note: "oil" companies don't exist anymore, they're all rebranded as energy companies, and what you think of as oil companies are actually the largest investors in renewable energy, far more than whoever you think is your saviour) and this isn't the case at all. Hydrocarbons are still where all the big $$ is however. Energy companies are usually some of the best employers in the world in terms of benefits, compensation, and job enjoyment. Take your lies elsewhere.

Let's move into the modern era...

[Frosty Piss]

Wind is great, wind is awesome. But wind alone will never be able to meet all of societies demands for power. There is only one real solution: Nuclear. Not your grandfather's nuclear, TODAY'S nuclear.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[JoshuaZ]

I agree that in the long-term nuclear is a pretty good idea. But right now, isn't practically an option; the politics of building new nuclear plants are extreme and it can end up taking a decade or two to build them. We need carbon neutral power sources now. Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[Anonymous Coward]

Today's nuclear SUCKS. it costs TOO MUCH. solar beat it years ago. with battery it probably also beats it today. Nuclear will take at least 5 years at best to build but more likely 10 years. It will cost a ton and the fuel is NOT cheap or plentiful. All that next gen BS is always 5 years away for the last 20 years; only gradual progress has been made to grandfather's nuclear - the next gen stuff still has not happened.

Better off dumping 1 billion into more fusion research for 10 years instead of 1 more nuclear plant. Yeah, it's over a billion per plant. That is not including all the free government services nuclear power gets at our tax paying expense (which is worse than solar by a lot.)

Spend 1 billion to make a massive battery and in less than 10 years we'll have it. without the long term upkeep costs too.

I am puzzled why people arguing FOR nuclear always get into government and political dysfunction when that is a HUGE reason to never do nuclear. We can't competently do it and private management is even worse... only the military handles it well (and cheaply.) If you argued the government should build it (which they'd fund and insure it anyway) and have the military own and run it then I'd be more open on that aspect of the argument. secure energy is a national security issue; more so than so much idiotic stuff we have them doing.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[LynnwoodRooster]

The politics of building offshore wind isn't much better. There will ALWAYS be people fighting any new development, and slowing (or, in the case of Cape Wind, killing) deployment of new power sources. So you might as well go "for the best" because going to a lower-grade solution won't relax the difficulties in the first place.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[Nostalgia4Infinity]

Solar could do it for about 101 square miles.

https://inovateus.com/2017/08/...

Elon Musk: “If you wanted to power the entire United States with solar panels, it would take a fairly small corner of Nevada or Texas or Utah. You only need about 100 miles by 100 miles of solar panels to power the entire United States. The batteries you [would] need to store the energy, so you have 24/7 power, is 1 mile by 1 mile. One square-mile.”

Even if he's off by 100% 200 square miles IMO is a good price for relatively clean renewable energy. Add wind farms, hydro, etc I don't see the need for the risk of nuclear. Unless you want to go (far) into space.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[SoftwareArtist]

Completely and totally false. http://www.pnas.org/content/10.... From the abstract:

The analysis indicates that a network of land-based 2.5-megawatt (MW) turbines restricted to nonforested, ice-free, nonurban areas operating at as little as 20% of their rated capacity could supply >40 times current worldwide consumption of electricity, >5 times total global use of energy in all forms.

Re: Let's move into the modern era...

[vux984]

"10000 square miles is still nothing."

Sure, lets just build a single structure the size of New York City, LA, Chicago, Miami, and Washington DC... combined. no sweat.

10,000 sq mi of panels funded over a period years spread over 1,000,000 separate projects sure... its absolutely doable. Perhaps it is even inevitable. But as a single project its a mega project the likes of which the world has never seen.

I wouldn't call it 'nothing'.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[kenh]

NY wind farm will be on line in 10 year, because massive state-funded municipal project always finish on-time, under-budget, and exceed everyone's expectations...

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[MrKaos]

Not your grandfather's nuclear, TODAY'S nuclear.

Grandfather's waste is pretty bad. No one want's to be near grandfathers spent fuel, even Dad thinks it's toxic.

Re: Let's move into the modern era...

[nonBORG]

too bad when the whole country is depending on your solar array and battery and you get a week of cloud cover. Just some simple calcs to help. Solar costs about $175/sq meter. However due to scale lets say $100. So with a simple conversion of 2.6 million square meters per square mile the cost is 260 million/ square mile. Then times by 10,000 and we get $2.6 trillion for the solar panels. Now add the batteries so just say cost is doubled $5 trillion. Also various infrastructure probably add 20% so now 6 trillion. I am happy to get started next week just send the first trillion deposit to my account. No guarantee about cloud cover also we need free land as in no cost and we probably need to add another 10% for the approval process and at least 10 years delay. Just to set your mind at ease the batteries are guaranteed for 5 years and the panels for 10. expected life of the batteries is 10 years and panels 20 before total replacement.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[blindseer]

I won't dispute the math that it is possible to provide all of our energy from wind but I'd like someone to tell me how much it costs. I have a paper here on my desk from Morgan Stanley that gives me some idea.

Wind takes ten times the steel and concrete per installed megawatt compared to nuclear, coal, or natural gas. To meet current demand and replace existing electric supply we'd have to build 1200 windmills every week for 50 years, assuming 1.65 MW rated output and 35% capacity factor. Then after 50 years we'd start over and do it all again, assuming those windmills last that long.

For comparison we have nuclear power. We'd have to build 1 per week for 50 years, assuming 900 MW rated output and 90% capacity factor. Sounds like a lot? Well, it takes no more materials than the current steel and concrete we use now to build our coal and gas power plants. I know we can do this because we already are dong this. Just stop putting those resources into coal and gas and put it into nuclear. Oh, and like the windmills we'd have to start over again in 50 years because by then those nuclear power plants would have also reached end of life. This also assumes no new technology. With technology that's in development now we could easily cut these resource requirements in half, if not far less.

We can't switch to wind power, not any time soon, because doing so would require many times more steel and concrete than is currently produced in the world. We could divert all of our steel to windmill towers, and all of our concrete to windmill anchors, and fall very short in getting enough energy from wind.

Wind power will not power the world. Solar power won't either as the resource requirements are similar to wind, we can currently produce only 1/10th of the materials we need for solar to replace coal and gas.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[blindseer]

There's having caution and being so concerned on details that we're rearranging the deck chairs as the ship sinks. We have too many cooks and not enough indians... or something.

We can't put up the windmills because it might kill some birds. We can't have hydro because it might kill some fish. We can't have solar because it might disturb the mating habits of some turtle. We can't have "nukular" because of "deh rad-ee-ah-shun".

Okay, genius, what is the "cautious approach" here? If it's a choice between humanity and busting up some bird beaks then I choose humanity. It seems kind of pointless to "save the planet" if there's no people around to enjoy it. The planet is going to be fine, save the people. People seem so concerned about "the environment" as if humans are outside of it. We are part of the cycle of life as much as those turtles that can't seem to fuck in the shade of a solar collector.

It seems that there are "environmentalists" that want to live outside of the environment, like it's something that we visit in a zoo or park. Then there are "conservationists" that view the world as something we must live in, manage properly, and be a part of. Hunters have done far more to preserve wildlife than some fourth level vegan.

It's only "caution" if there is an action after thinking it over. If the thinking never ends, or no action after the thought, then it's worse than nothing at all.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[blindseer]

All that next gen BS is always 5 years away for the last 20 years

And it will remain that way unless we start building nuclear reactors.

It's quite amazing this hypocrisy on nuclear power vs. solar and wind. We'll see the government dump all kinds of money into wind and solar. They'll issue permits to build solar collectors. Set aside land for windmills. And they do this because, so they say, that if we don't build these things then it will never get cheap enough to compete with coal.

How do they treat nuclear power? Well we can't waste money on this expensive energy. We need to "know" it's cheaper than coal first. But no one can "know" this until we try. We'll likely fail the first few tries, just like we've been failing to get cheaper than coal with wind and solar for so long. Maybe it will never be cheaper than coal. But we can't know that until we try.

Better off dumping 1 billion into more fusion research for 10 years instead of 1 more nuclear plant.

Right, let's just ignore that there are currently over 400 nuclear power reactors working on the planet right now. Let's just dump more money into that pit so... we can "feel good"? Facts don't care about your feelings. As much emotion you express on this we have in fact proven nuclear power as viable and safe.

Let's just dump more money into research until the lights go out and we all freeze and starve. That's how we can all feel good about saving the planet or something.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[geekmux]

Start a nuclear plant today and it won't come online for 20 years if ever.

If you can't get a nuclear plant online in less than 20 years, you have a corruption problem, not a design problem.

Same goes for wind, solar, hydro, or anything else that Trumps the energy mafia. And yeah, that fucking shit gets old. Once again, Greed stands in the way of progress, to the detriment of all.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[Viol8]

"the fuel is NOT cheap or plentiful"

It doesn't need to be given how little of it is used in comparison to fossil fuels for the same number of joules of energy produced.

"Better off dumping 1 billion into more fusion research for 10 years instead of 1 more nuclear plant"

Fusion research has been going on since at least the 80s and is still nowhere. Right now its a money pit whereas fission is tested and proven.

"Yeah, it's over a billion per plant."

And? How much do you think a wind farm that had the same average power output would cost?

"Spend 1 billion to make a massive battery and in less than 10 years we'll have it."

Great - and what charges the battery? Solar? Yeah, right, that'll work well in northern latitudes in winter. Idiot.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[drinkypoo]

There is only one real solution: Nuclear.

[citation needed]

Not your grandfather's nuclear, TODAY'S nuclear.

I'm looking around, but I don't actually see any of today's nuclear. But what I do see actually being installed today is wind and solar. We should have been ramping up solar in the 1970s, since even the PV panels of those days would repay their energy investment in less than seven years, and most of those panels would still be functioning today. But people like you fought that tooth and nail, and now here we are today, with people like you clamoring for something which doesn't exist: safe nuclear power. There is no such thing, which is why the private sector can not and will not ever insure one. Decommissioning costs are always multiples of estimates and we still have no viable plan for dealing with nuclear waste. Even reprocessed fuel leaves waste behind, and the waste from that is spectacularly nasty. The solution for nuclear waste isn't to double down and produce worse nuclear waste. It's to stop producing it at all, because it's wholly unnecessary.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[drinkypoo]

So you might as well go "for the best" because going to a lower-grade solution won't relax the difficulties in the first place.

Right, that's why stopgaps with nuclear are stupid. There is more than enough excess solar energy to cover all of our needs. We could be building solar power satellites with little to no new technology, and here we are arguing over what kind of baroque arrangements of steam turbines you would like to build here on earth. What year is it?

Re: Let's move into the modern era...

[drinkypoo]

Sure, lets just build a single structure the size of New York City, LA, Chicago, Miami, and Washington DC... combined. no sweat.

Sure, if you start with ridiculous, unfounded assumptions, you can make it seem unreasonable. Only, no one is proposing doing that. Solar not only can be distributed with zero drawbacks, but in fact it actually works better when it is distributed. One of the things that's great about solar power is that it can be installed near the point of consumption. Consumption is distributed; solar power is distributed. What's not to like? Just that it makes you look dumb because you've been backing the wrong horse all along?

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[drinkypoo]

Okay, genius, what is the "cautious approach" here? If it's a choice between humanity and busting up some bird beaks then I choose humanity.

That's a false dichotomy. It's actually a choice between humanity and not busting up some bird beaks, or no humans and no birds either.

The environment that we enjoy here on this planet is a fragile, temporary condition. Throughout most of the planet's history, it's been unlivable by things like us. And we are on track to return it to that state.

People seem so concerned about "the environment" as if humans are outside of it.

No, my sweet summer child. People are concerned about "the environment" because that's where we "live".

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[Viol8]

"You're failing to take into account how many acres are strip-mined because uranium is literally the least concentrated ore we mine. The environmental impact of nuclear is all out of proportion to the amount of material used for this reason."

Clearly you've never seen an open cast coal mine.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[TheRaven64]

Nuclear power plants need to be big, which means that you're never going to get the same kinds of economies of scale as wind turbines, where a wind 'farm' is a load of identical turbines that can be the same as the identical turbines in the next one.

Nuclear also has a really awkward risk profile. About the worst thing that can happen with a wind turbine is that the blades break and spin off at very high speed. The worst thing that can happen with a nuclear power plant is that it vents nuclear material and makes a large area uninhabitable for a long time. The failure mode for a wind turbine is far more likely, but that actually makes the insurance easier: a fairly likely risk that will probably happen to someone is much easier to deal with than an insanely expensive risk that has a very low chance of happening to anyone. This means that you end up with the government carrying most of the risk, because private insurers aren't willing and able to issue a policy that will almost certainly be a cash cow but will bankrupt them if there's a claim.

This risk profile also means that everything in a nuclear power plant needs to be very tightly regulated. You don't want a contractor cutting corners in a nuclear power plant. If they do in a wind turbine, the risks are fairly low and they're mostly risks to the owner of the plant (i.e. it stops working, it doesn't cause widespread damage). This pushes up the costs a lot, because everything needs to be redundant and independently checked. It's also not something that we're good at: all of the large nuclear accidents to date have been caused by factors that people identified as a problem before they happened, but which were not addressed.

Nuclear also comes with a load of security concerns. Access to things like uranium and plutonium is strictly controlled, for good reason. This adds security to the costs and also has some knock-on effects. For example, the US still doesn't reprocess fuel rods because of proliferation concerns (which, these days, means that they ship the spent fuel to France, where it is reprocessed and shipped back).

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[judoguy]

I'm looking around, but I don't actually see any of today's nuclear.

Try naval nuclear. Reactor design has been forging ahead over the years. We just don't get to use it because of fear.

I'm not even saying current military design is the best since it must be portable but I have to assume that current engineering practice, unencumbered by politics, can build pretty good reactors.

Re: Let's move into the modern era...

[vux984]

The issue with that is that you don't get any economy of scale. And the maintenance cost will be through the roof.

A 100x100 sq mile array would have a supply warehouse adjacent and a full time team handling maintenance.

"spread it accross every single roof that can take a panel and attach a battery to each panel" and it you've created a whole service industry just to maintain, troubleshoot and repair it. And another whole service industry for distribution. Great for jobs,but it'll up the maintenance cost about 1000 times what a big site needs.

Its the same reason we have data centers, instead of putting a server in every corner and closet that will take one. Consider the cost of replacing a failed drive in a data center - one guy can deal with dozens if not even hundreds of drive replacements in a day. compared to dell's next day onsite service calls -- he manages what... 4 to 8, plus shipping and travel time, having to coordinate access to each computer he works on, etc, etc. A distributed solution is vastly more expensive to maintain.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[MobyDisk]

Can you post sources for any of these numbers? In particular, the materials information is interesting.

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[TheSync]

I'm looking around, but I don't actually see any of today's nuclear.

Unit 2 of the Sanmen nuclear power plant in China's Zhejiang province has successfully completed pre-operational testing. Sanmen 1 is expected to be the first Westinghouse AP1000 to begin operating later this year, with Sanmen 2 also set to start up in 2018. (source)

Construction of China's 600 MWe demonstration Fast neutron reactors at Xiapu, Fujian province, has officially begun. The reactor is scheduled to begin commercial operation by 2023. The Xiapu reactor will be a demonstration of that sodium-cooled pool-type fast reactor design. (Source)

Re:Let's move into the modern era...

[drinkypoo]

Unit 2 of the Sanmen nuclear power plant in China's Zhejiang province has successfully completed pre-operational testing. Sanmen 1 is expected to be the first Westinghouse AP1000 to begin operating later this year, with Sanmen 2 also set to start up in 2018.

The AP1000 is not a great design. It's not a spectacularly new design, either; all but the most minor details of the design are over twenty years old. Sodium-cooled reactors are only adding additional hazard, and anyone championing them is batshit crazy.

Oil will only go out of style when...

[Paleolibertarian]

the energy density of batteries approaches that of diesel fuel.

Re:Oil will only go out of style when...

[skids]

Minus the weight of the deisel, plus that of a genset, because power-to-weight ratio of the motor matters too. Also vehicle weight is only one factor in total cost of ownership.

Re:Oil will only go out of style when...

[kamapuaa]

Gas currently has 100 times the energy density of a battery but go nowhere near 100 times as far. If a Tesla's batteries stored 100 times as much energy, the car would go like 30,000 miles between charge-ups.

Basically, the point you made is stupid and you should feel bad.

Re:Oil will only go out of style when...

[drinkypoo]

the energy density of batteries approaches that of diesel fuel.

When will ICE efficiency approach that of batteries? (never) When will ICEs permit regeneration? (never)

Sounds to me more like on a technical level, ICEs will never be competitive with EVs, not the other way around

Re:Oil will only go out of style when...

[angel'o'sphere]

Most numbers you have are wrong.
Gasoline ICE, below 20% ... only rare cases are above.
Coal and gas plants have the same efficiency, around 42%-45%, exception are combined cycle gas plants which reach 60%.
Battery charging is about 95% - 99% ... no idea why on /. people always claim it is lower.
Electric engines are 99.999 (add as much 9 as you want) % efficient. Sine nearly 100 years ...

Re:Oil will only go out of style when...

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

People who actually own electric cars, especially pure electrics say they get used to starting with full charge every day, and gets used to thinking about their trip and a little planning. After that when they get into the other car with half empty tank or suddenly forced to look for gas station, they find it irritating.

I usually drive my cars to death, taking 12 years per car with very little maintenance. Otherwise I will be speaking from my personal experience. My 2006 Prius is still going strong, on the original battery. My cousin's 2004 Prius and my brothers 2005 Prius are all going strong. We are the Skinflints :-). So it is unlikely I will buy a car soon. But when I do it will be an electric. pure plug in electric. Chevy Bolt looks promising.

Re:Oil and coal are technically renewable

[Paleolibertarian]

Actually, hydrocarbon fuel can be synthesized from CO2 and water with enough energy input. And it's GREEN!

The only problem I can see is if the demand for hydrocarbon fuel becomes great enough to deplete CO2 in the atmosphere which will cause plant life to die. Then we die. OOPS!

your full of base load

[Anonymous Coward]

Stop throwing your "base load" from your pants at everybody!

Niagara Falls is used already. Solar and Wind can meet all their needs if combined with storage. Ocean WIND is much better than land. Battery storage as well as LONG DISTANCE TRANSMISSION works far better than people realize. It's so stupid to say the same stupid obvious stuff about the sun, moon, wind, while ignoring the less obvious power storage and distribution!

This plan a step forward.

OIL is something they don't want off their coast; even if it's used in their cars and heating. Electric cars are moving forward so fast that 10 years ago today's shift would seem like a joke. This is a long term plan and by the time it finishes electric cars will have progressed further than they have over the whole last decade. So it is smart to realize this will impact oil demand. It's not built tomorrow; when it is, it will be part of the combustion car solution.

Heating. That will need some more planning. building standards etc can help. best thing would be to put together a war-chest like it's WW3 and seriously retrofit everything we can. I've rebuilt walls on 50s houses to double width and more than 2x R value. It wasn't horribly expensive or difficult. I can even replace the roof while living in the house.

But more seriously, they can get into burning the crazy amount of trash they output. Geothermal is another option (and electric.) oil burners I've seen are extremely wasteful heaters. they need to migrate to natural gas.

Re: your full of base load

[Anonymous Coward]

battery technology has not advanced significantly in 10 years.

Battery tech has been seeing a 5%-8% increase in storage density year-over-year. I guess a ~60%-200% increase is not a significant advancement? And that's a very conservative estimate. Someone announced in 2017 they've managed to increase storage density about 2.5x and about a 30x increase in the rate of charging. Working fine in the lab, just need to mass produce. Estimate we'll see these new batteries in the next 5 years. Not that it's far outside the current norm of advancement. Even if this one particular tech doesn't see the light of day, it doesn't matter because so many companies are constantly announcing and actually delivering advancements every year.

Re: your full of base load

[naughtynaughty]

Over 1 million EVs sold worldwide in 2017, huge growth rate

In the 4th quarter of 2007 Apple only sold a bit over 1 million iPhones. Clearly a loser product, just like EVs.

Re: your full of base load

[naughtynaughty]

Nice, compare the range on a small, lightweight roadster with a Model S. Even nicer that you couldn't bother to look up the range of the Model S. It's 315 miles for the 100D and about the same for the smaller, lighter Model 3 with a battery that is 20% smaller.

Current growth rate in the US is 25%. Project that out 20 years. Growth rate is likely to accelerate as prices decline and range and performance increase. but even 20 years at 25% growth rate completely replaces gas cars.

Worldwide, growth rate is even higher.

Strange that you would say an additional 2.5GW of power coming online "won't help with additional load". Power to recharge EVs is pretty low, roughly the same as three 100W light bulbs kept on 24/7.

Re: your full of base load

[krygny]

... when New York is losing industry it will turn back to oil.

No it won't. NY will simply continue to make doing business in the State as impractical as it has since Prince Andrew's father, King Mario was in charge. Ever notice all of the ghost towns in Upstate NY? IBM, Corning, Kodak, GE, and dozens of smaller company towns never really came back during any of the market upturns in the past 30 years. They just continue to decline further during each recession.

Re:Good luck with that.

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

>> Hard to believe the Navy can't just steer around it when in the neighborhood.

The Navy has traditionally test-fired missles from a point nearby, and continues to operate a naval air base there too. Not all naval operations are "steering ships around the neighborhood." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Missile_Test_Center

$2.5M per megawatt

[guruevi]

That's a hefty pricetag. Even solar would be significantly cheaper, why not offshoring some solar panels?

Re:$2.5M per megawatt

[nonBORG]

Also Solar and wind are good companions but not so much mutually elusive. For all the talk of wonderful batteries if you have Solar and no sun for a few days due to cloud cover then batteries are flat and you wish you had Nuke power. However it sometimes happens that there is wind when there is no Sun.

Obligatory Back To The Future reference...

[BigBlockMopar]

2.4 gigawatts

Yeah, that's only two time-traveling Deloreans.

Nuclear is the way to go. There are risks, for sure, but they can be mitigated until we invent Mr. Fusion.

Awesome

[DogDude]

Awesome! I think it's too bad that the federal government won't be doing any large scale, forward-thinking, society-improving things for the immediate future, so I'm thrilled that the Big Blue states are picking up the slack. Go, New York and California! Better late than never!

Re:Ugly Eyesores

[VeryFluffyBunny]

Nothing says protecting nature like 100 windmills on your ocean front view.

Or 100 dead ospreys on your beach.

Tall glass buildings kill waaay more birds than wind turbines. Why don't you start with those ugly eyesores. Also, birds and other animals going extinct because of climate change is far uglier in my opinion.

Re: Electrical grid Energy - Will come from a mix.

[az-saguaro]

In the transition from where we are to where we will be with respect to energy, the idea of an "energy portfolio" is crucial. Societies will mix and match sources to accommodate geography, locale, weather, seasons, time of day, and available resources as well as user load. Transition from one portfolio mix to another will take decades, and will depend on exisiting and projected infrastructure and engineering projects, the economy, public policy, and political will. "Wind is a blowin' in, and oil is a burnin' out" - you are correct, one project does not the case make. But look at this in context of other current news. Wind installations are no longer just incidental odd job projects, and this one is being sponsored by a whole State. Solar is advancing rapidly. Nuclear is being discussed again. Energy recycling and repurposing is getting serious discussion (e.g. using ventilation from data centers to heat houses). Energy storage has always been a central issue, but Tesla has hit the news in recent weeks for its major battery projects such as in Australia. Electric cars have developed traction almost overnight. Need more proof that the idea of a new energy economy is trenchant? Saudi Arabia has been in the news of late, looking to diversify its economy in recognition that the oil genie might not grant wishes forever. One wind project by itself does not "show that oil is on the way out", but it is another high profile indicator that that is true. "On the way out" is not instant gratification - it might be 50 or 100 years before we achieve a globally respectable degree of sustainable and eco-friendly energy production. This project though is another welcome indicator that the concept has taken hold, and that society just might be on a committed pathway to reduce petroleum use.

Re: Electrical grid Energy - Will come from a mix.

[blindseer]

Electric cars have developed traction almost overnight.

How old are you? To make that kind of statement means a level of ignorance that can almost only come from youth.

Electric cars have been trying to compete with internal combustion for over a century. Oddly enough the final nail in the electric car coffin was the electric starter. Before then the operation of a gasoline engine was a very complicated and physically demanding process, but electric cars were push button operated. We might have electric starters, electric drive trains, and all kinds of other electric devices on a car but the primary source of the power is still gasoline. If something should change that in the future then it would be far from an "overnight success".

This project though is another welcome indicator that the concept has taken hold, and that society just might be on a committed pathway to reduce petroleum use.

We didn't go to the moon on wind power and a trip to Mars won't be powered by wind either. The future will be very energy intensive, and wind is not going to be enough. That does not mean we use petroleum, it just means that we won't be using wind power. Wind power used to rule the seas, and if we go back to wind power for our travels then we've seriously screwed up somewhere.

Saudi Arabia has been in the news of late, looking to diversify its economy in recognition that the oil genie might not grant wishes forever.

I've read the news too. Saudi Arabia has plans to build dozens of nuclear power plants in the coming decades. They see a growing need for domestic energy and the more oil and natural gas they burn for that electricity is the less they can export. Sure, they will invest in solar power too but, as you point out, they will diversify.

Hello!? This Is NY/NJ We're Talking About!

[BlueStrat]

I expect any projects of this magnitude in NY/NJ to have immense constructions cost overruns, constant delays, labor union disputes, slowdowns, strikes, and lawsuits, along with massive corruption and embezzlement. If I were a betting man, I'd lay odds that at least some of these projects will be virtually forever "under construction" and will be sucking the citizens dry of money for decades beyond the original planned completion date.

Strat

Re: Electrical grid Energy - Will come from a mix.

[Smidge204]

Electric cars have been trying to compete with internal combustion for over a century.

They really haven't, though. At least the majority of the 20th Century saw little competition in that area; The existence of electric vehicles is not the same as competition.

By your metric, steam powered cars have also been "trying to compete" with internal combustion, because once upon a time steam powered cars were a thing.

It wasn't really until circa 2009 with the Nissan LEAF that all-electric highway vehicles became a viable mainstream option.

We didn't go to the moon on wind power and a trip to Mars won't be powered by wind either. The future will be very energy intensive, and wind is not going to be enough.

Oddly, the trip *itself* might not be wind powered but using wind power once you get to Mars is actually a viable option. There's no lack of wind on Mars, solar is much less effective, and even though the atmospheric pressure is lower the mostly CO2 atmosphere is a lot denser, so wind turbines are still a pretty good choice.

But maybe the trip itself can, in fact, be renewables-powered in a sense. We can manufacture hydrocarbon fuels using CO2 and input energy... which could come from things like wind power. And of course there's always hydrogen+oxygen fuel which is readily made from electricity.
=Smidge=

Re:Ugly Eyesores

[idji]

Have a look at the ugly view off the coast of Los Angeles at the oil platforms. Why aren't you complaining about those polluting eyesores.

Re: Electrical grid Energy - Will come from a mix.

[Smidge204]

People still try with electric, and they'd fail too if the government wasn't propping them up.

Great concept; Let's remove all the subsidies, handouts and special considerations the petroleum industry gets and see what happens!

I don't think you considered your tired, bruised argument very well...

It took people over 100 years of trying and I still can't find an electric vehicle that won't get stuck in a little snow.

Maybe get your head out of your ass, then? :D They typical EV's extra weight often gives them an advantage in snow over gasoline vehicles of the same size class.
=Smidge=

Okay

[Locke2005]

I'm all in favor of this on one condition: the first oil wells and wind turbines need to be located within a golf ball's flight distance of Mar-a-largo!