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Pacific Northwest Relying On Nuclear Energy During Cold Snap (forbes.com)
Slashdot reader Lije Baley writes: As the unusually long cold snap in the Pacific Northwest has both increased electric demand while decreasing snow melt and stream flows needed for hydroelectric generation, local power companies are asking their customers to conserve energy. Meanwhile, the region's last remaining nuclear plant has been a critical low-carbon resource for keeping the lights and heat on, as Forbes reports. "As reported by Annette Cary of the Tri-City Herald, the Bonneville Power Administration, which markets the electricity produced at the nuclear plant near Richland, asked Energy Northwest, the operator of the power plant, not to do anything that would prevent the plant from producing 100% power at all times during an unusually cold February across the state that increased the demand for electricity â" no maintenance activities, even on its turbine generator and in the transformer yard," reports Forbes. "Don't do anything that would stop the reliable and constant power output of nuclear."
"'No Touch' is requested by BPA when unusually hot or cold weather increases the demand for electricity, notes Mike Paoli, spokesman for Energy Northwest," the report adds. "Many regional transmission and system operators across the United States ask nuclear plants to keep running during extreme weather because nuclear plants are the least affected by bad weather. Columbia Generating Station has the capability to produce 1,207 MW, which is enough energy to power Seattle. And it is usually putting out all of this power at all times. Energy Northwest already has a diverse mix of non-fossil fuel generating systems that, in aggregate, produce over 10 billion kWhs of electricity each year while emitting less than 20 gCO2/kWh. The No Touch order at the Columbia Generating Station is expected to be lifted soon, although continued cold weather could require it to keep producing max power."
"'No Touch' is requested by BPA when unusually hot or cold weather increases the demand for electricity, notes Mike Paoli, spokesman for Energy Northwest," the report adds. "Many regional transmission and system operators across the United States ask nuclear plants to keep running during extreme weather because nuclear plants are the least affected by bad weather. Columbia Generating Station has the capability to produce 1,207 MW, which is enough energy to power Seattle. And it is usually putting out all of this power at all times. Energy Northwest already has a diverse mix of non-fossil fuel generating systems that, in aggregate, produce over 10 billion kWhs of electricity each year while emitting less than 20 gCO2/kWh. The No Touch order at the Columbia Generating Station is expected to be lifted soon, although continued cold weather could require it to keep producing max power."
Is 1,207 megawatts sufficiently close to 1.21 to say
1.21 JIGGAWATTS!
?
We should be building more nuclear power plants, not cowarding out and shutting older ones down without replacement.
Dude. You wanna be EPA chief? I know a guy..
Here in Seattle we have our own hydroelectric dam, and I get 100 percent green energy from wind turbines (near the Gorge) and from solar panels here in the city (I own six of them, at the Aquarium, the Zoo, and at Capitol Hill Low Income Housing).
It's the rest of the PNW that might be using nuclear. We export energy. Heck, our Governor just had his launch for President at a solar power manufacturing plant that I can see from my window. This county literally builds a lot of US solar and wind infrastructure.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
We should send all the solar power we've been generating here in Southern California during the last few weeks of rain and clouds... Oh wait...
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
All your GREEN energy can't hold a candle to one nuke plant. The problem with your solar/wind crap, is that you can't "spool up" like you can with a nuke plant when demand goes up.
Your non-plan plan needs that as a 20-years-ago-still-waiting-for-it requisite, and no, Yucca is not good enough.
Ever seen the lines at Home Depot or Lowes prior to a hurricane? Ever seen how desparate people can become when the power goes out? Rest assured, when it goes dark, checkbooks open up and requisites get approved really fucking quick.
Face it anytime, nuclear power done right - the only way we can afford to do it, really - is Socialism.
Socialism is your answer?
Clearly it's up to the rest of us to prevent history from repeating itself. Obviously some idiots never learn.
Uh, just use the "waste" in lower-yield reactors.
It's "dangerous" because it's still active. It's "waste" because it's not fully utilized.
The concept of "nuclear waste" simply is not a problem for modern reactor designs.
By the way, there's no long-term waste storage yet.
Still better that the long-term waste storage for fossil fuels, our atmosphere.
mr burns sun blocker 2.0!
Somewhere, Scotty is saying "The engines canna take much more!"
Have gnu, will travel.
Again, Seattle owns the Tolt River watershed, and the hydroelectric dam that is on it. You're confusing the purchase and export of electric power from Seattle City Light to the other cities in this and nearby counties. The dam is literally ours, and so is the water, which we sell at cost to Seattle residents and at a surcharge to nearby areas.
If you cross Lake Washington, which you might incorrectly think is part of Seattle (it's not, ask Mercer Island, or Lake City), then your power mix includes a larger portion of coal power and nuclear, because that part is a net importer of energy (part of Greater Seattle, kind of like how Vancouver is part of Greater Vancouver).
Sources: UW CEI, Seattle City Light, google it yourself you lazy ... coder.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
No - a mixture of socialism and capitalism works best.
Seattle owns outright hydroelectric generating plants equivalent to about 75% of its peak demand. Here and here are two of their major hydroelectric projects. So, yeah. They do have, in a meaningful sense, their own hydroelectric dams.
Have gnu, will travel.
"'No Touch' is requested by BPA when unusually hot or cold weather increases the demand for electricity, notes Mike Paoli, spokesman for Energy Northwest," the report adds. "Many regional transmission and system operators across the United States ask nuclear plants to keep running during extreme weather because nuclear plants are the least affected by bad weather.
Erm...Europe’s heatwave is forcing nuclear power plants to shut down
US drought causes nuclear power station to shutdown
That's a lot of land - and maintenance costs will only increase for each year of use. What do we do at night, or does this 256 square miles form a continuous band around the earth?
All of those countries tend to be mixtures of capitalism and socialism, not pure capitalism.
" Ever seen how desparate people can become when the power goes out? " - Nope. I have solar panels and a backup propane system should shit blow up. Next?
And that means something to an entire grid how? Although your tiny little grid is a good microcosm of the CA grid. Solar for hope and natural gas for the actual power. Which is why in both CA and Germany, from 2010 till now despite a record amount of wind and solar deployed we have more CO2 emissions than before we deployed all those solar panels and wind turbines. That's because of all the natural gas plants kept fired up to provide power should a cloud or still period occur. So this wind and solar only policy has been tried, in very favorable conditions and it resulted in increased CO2, higher energy prices and a less reliable grid. This is only good for energy traders but bad for everyone else including PG&E. But do go on and tell us how since you hooked up an inverter and a backup propane system at your home, that means that somehow the entire grid will be powered by unicorns and fairies instead of natural gas. So you ever feel back being such a huge hypocrite or does wallowing in your own ignorance feel that good?
"Those that start by burning books, will end by burning men."
CFCs reduce Ozone, not cloud cover. Nor do they fix the tilt of the earth to reduce that pesky little thing called "winter".
Nuclear power is fantastic. We're just too obsessed with spent fuel and fear-mongoring to do it right. Nuclear power plants now-a-days are built with a positive coefficient. The nuclear power plants you have to worry about at night are the plants built with 50+ year old designs with negative coefficient properties.
The bigger challenge is the overly difficult task of licensing them. It costs billions to license a plant, and the licenses expire. If you can't guarantee you can operate your plant in year 21, it's not worth the investment. SONGS was shut down and dismantled because the repair costs of a mal/formed component exceeded the potential profit on the remaining license (energy prices are regulated), and the state wouldn't grant a license extension if the repairs were made.
We need to build better, newer plants. We need to make them more cost-effective to operate, and we need to do it now. What electric cars will do to the grid in the next decade will exasperate the problem. Imagine all the energy in petroleum to cars having to be shifted onto our grid. There isn't enough power.
More than half of the generated energy is wasted to heating the environment in order to cool the reactor. Imagine if it were used to heat homes instead. New York City has the correct design by using steam lines to transfer the heat from the power plant to heat buildings instead of using electricity or natural gas lines that are just as if not more risky than steam lines.
... a 256 sq mile desert solar facility, for single example. You lose.
Actually you lose. Try to build that and you will get tied up in lawsuits just like the nuke industry when they want to build. That desert terrain will be habitat to some endangered tortoise, squirrel, rat, etc.
http://www.startribune.com/dee...
The brutal cold gripping Minnesota made itself felt in tens of thousands of living rooms Wednesday as Xcel Energy resorted to asking customers to turn their thermostats down to 63 degrees to conserve natural gas.
https://www.americanexperiment...
The screenshot below is from Electricity Map. It’s a fun app that tells you how your electricity is being generated at any given moment in time. Turns out wind is producing only four percent of electricity in the MISO region, of which Minnesota is a part.
While that’s not good, what’s worse is wind is only utilizing 24 percent of it’s installed capacity, and who knows how this will fluctuate throughout the course of
It's a real shame that turning on the lights doesn't make the wind blow.
No - a mixture of socialism and capitalism works best.
When north sea oil/gas production subsidizes your socialism.
WTF are you talking about?
Hey neighbor, plug in your Leaf so I can charge my Tesla. Thanks.
Nuclear power plants now-a-days are built with a positive coefficient. The nuclear power plants you have to worry about at night are the plants built with 50+ year old designs with negative coefficient properties.
One quibble...you mean newer plants have negative void coefficients. The older ones (like CANDU reactors in Canada and the RBMKs in Russia) have positive void coefficients and that's what you have to worry about. Also, licensing isn't really that hard and there is no real reason it should cost billions to license a plant, you just have to actually do it and its the politics that fucks that up. Otherwise I completely agree...
"Those that start by burning books, will end by burning men."
What socialist economy is working well? Certainly not the Nordic countries, given they are a free market, capitalist economic system. The Government just happens to invest in a big social safety net as well. Perhaps Cuba? Venezuela? North Korea? Mao's China? Stalin's Russia?
When it comes to economic models, socialism is, in fact, always a bad thing. You can argue about how big a social net you wish to add around the market, but from an economic standpoint - capitalism, free market enterprise - always wins.
Did you just get pulled out of a cryogenics chamber where you were put to sleep in 1951 during some weird ass cold ware experiment? Stalin's Russia does not exist anymore, nor does Mao's China. As for Cuba, Venezuela and North Korea they are not that much more fucked up than some of the places where the US propped up homicidal dictators for the better part of the last century such as Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador to name but a few. In fact I'm pretty sure that Iraq for example has been every bit as fucked up as N-Korea, first during the Hussein dictatorship (that staunch US friend and ally) and then during the last 20 years after the US got upset over their old friends Kuwait adventure, had him hanged, and then started exporting democracy to Iraq.
More like, plug in your Tesla to power my fridge while I drive my Jeep through the snow to buy more beer to put in the fridge.
Lol, thanks, sucker.
Nuclear power is great! Right up until it goes Fukushima on you. Then it sucks ass. Unwipable ass at that.
Electric cars have the potential to solve problems. They are just giant batteries, you know. If they were allowed to back feed into the grid during high demand periods like right now, it would smooth out demand quite nicely. Wind and solar can become much more useful when there is sufficient energy storage capacity available.
The reactors the GP refers to can't meltdown (like Chernobyl) and don't use water as a coolants so they don't make Hydrogen gas like Fukushima or 3 mi Island. Also, the entire world's output of Li-ion batteries couldn't backup even the CA grid for 4 hours, so the world's entire supply for 20 years is enough to backups CA's grid but Li-ion batteries don't last 20 years so you couldn't even make just CA 100% renewable. Also CA's grid is about 1% of the size of global energy usage. I like EVs and have 2 of them but please don't get confused. We haven't even dented CO2 production and continuing to ignore nuclear is only making the problem worse while we wait for folks like you to figure out solar and wind aren't a real solution.
"Those that start by burning books, will end by burning men."
"'No Touch' is requested by BPA when unusually hot or cold weather increases the demand for electricity, notes Mike Paoli, spokesman for Energy Northwest," the report adds. "Many regional transmission and system operators across the United States ask nuclear plants to keep running during extreme weather because nuclear plants are the least affected by bad weather.
Erm...Europe’s heatwave is forcing nuclear power plants to shut down
US drought causes nuclear power station to shutdown
Those shutdowns were because of a lack of water to cool the plant. Also, all power plants, nuclear or not have to use water for dumping excess heat. Its why power plants of all types are so often put by large bodies of water. Those heatwave shutdowns had nothing to do with the nuclear aspect of those plants.
"Those that start by burning books, will end by burning men."
Tesla makes the PowerWall. They did a huge installation in Australia.
Thanks for the info. I like when people have a good grasp of the big picture and put things in perspective. A huge problem in today's society is partial information, including (maybe especially) by the news media. I think wind and solar are helping, but I trust you that they won't solve all energy needs. I've put in a few PV systems and I know a reasonably sized system makes as much power as a typical house uses, so in my mind if we put PV on houses and shopping centers, we can cover a lot of the need, but big industries will use more than PV can reasonably generate, and skyscrapers might be difficult to achieve anything close to net zero.
I've been a huge proponent of nuclear power for a very long time, but with the provision that 1) it's done well with true safety thought out, and 2) much better design and efficiency. I'm not a nuclear engineer but I've been working on a project that deals with system safety and monitoring and that's all I'll say for now, and that it's cool and I'm proud to help / contribute to better and safer nuclear power.
https://transmission.bpa.gov/b...
If you look at the web page, you will see the wind hasn't blown in several days. And although we are almost back to 12 hours of sunlight it has been quite cloudy lately. So, your batteries would now be completely discharged.
How about you just burn the fuel completely instead of chucking it at 90% capacity worrying about someone potentially building a nuke with it, as North Korea and Iran shows, fuel ain't hard to get but a functioning rocket program is.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
In 2017, hydro-produced electricity used by California totaled nearly 43,333 gigawatt-hours (GWh)
What about 2015? It was only 15,256 GWh. 2011? 43,623 GWh. The usable hydro power is swinging up and down by a factor of 300% over periods of just 2 years. What is making up such enormous differences in power production during the years of drought I wonder?
https://www.energy.ca.gov/alma...
Better known as 318230.
If you like Big picture stuff, think about how much coal power the six reactors of fukushima displaced. Gigawatts over your, for about fifty years... 8,000+ hours per year...
That's 400,000 GWH each. Now consider how much toxic filth, heavy metals and radioactive material goes into the coal ash ponds, or even up the smokestack.
Coal caused more cancer over the last seventy odd years, _just from radiation related sources_ than every man made nuclear accident plus the two atomic bombs (including instakills) put together.
Coal ash is just nasty, nasty stuff, and it leaks into our drinking water and food chain whenever it rains a half inch more than expected.
Crap you are right, I totally switch-arooo'd that. Brain fart. My bad. Yes, negative = x; positive = negative, b = positive. Thanks for the correction.
I think the licensure is mis-guided today. I'll elaborate.
Making sure the plants are safe is obviously a goal. But licensing them at the costs of billions, and making the licenses hard to get only increases the price, and stunts growth.
The right solution in my opinion is for power companies with loads of assets to be the direct owner of the power station. That way, you can't spin up a corporation and use a liability shield to protect the Fortune 1000 entity from liability.
So a simple law that says "To build a NPS, the owners of a majority in interest and control must have assets > $10 billion". Now every power station opens up all those companies to risk. Companies hate risk. They will avoid it, and build the plants safely. If a disaster occurs, the operators will have to prove it was unavoidable or be subject to severe restitution.
I suppose you would have called for an end to all airplanes when Thomas Selfridge died in the first fatal airline crash in 1908. Or, perhaps you would have called for an end to all heavier than air transport back in 1896 when Otto Lilienthal died piloting a glider?
And I assume you would have eliminated all software or hardware control of medical treatment devices after the Therac-25 radiation therapy device killed three patients back in the mid 80's?
I assume you also, personally, eschew all forms of motorized transport as they are not yet perfect and kill tens of thousands of people in the US alone every year?
Fukushima was a very expensive accident. However, it was not a very dangerous one in terms of human life.
Nothing is completely safe, but we learn from each failure and improve, rather than abandon, technology.
Nuclear power is almost essential if we are going to provide reliable power without spewing CO2 into the air that our ancestors will curse us for.
I find it interesting seeing the mix used in power generation over in the States - I'd always assumed nuclear would have played a much bigger role. I'm also surprised at just how much energy is put out by hydro power, albeit that site only refers to a chunk of the USA rather than the entirety.
As I write this, the majority of the power in the National Grid in the UK is being supplied by wind - but that's not surprising as it's presently windy across much of the country. That's one of the perks of being a small island nation, there's plenty of wind around!
http://gridwatch.co.uk/ shows the stats.
I'm truly weary of the "looky how cool I am" USA bashers (not accusing you!) but I have to be a bit of one: the problem here (USA) is complicated by lots of competing politics, greed and money control, safety fear by the public, laziness which leads to huge cost overruns (we need more money!) which spooks others who might otherwise have started new nuclear projects. The Three Mile Island incident didn't help, and then there was Chernobyl which really sullied nuclear power for us. It's a mess. We're too competitive, and as such we lack cohesion. I think nuclear can and should be done more, but people have to want to do it, rather than see it as a "cash cow"; a collective cohesive determination.
Yes, I've been super-impressed by all of Europe's (and UK!) investment in and progress toward clean power.
I'm doing my little part to help keep the reactors running safely.
Norway. A country completely subsidized by the rest of the world, particularly the US, since it's industry mix is oil/gas, shipping, fishing, and various military supplies. They use all this money to fund immense social programs(they flirt with the line of nanny state), keep themselves fairly closed off to immigration, are rampant consumers(their labor is mostly Baltic imported), then put on an incredible air of superiority, even though they are essentially white Saudi Arabia.
They are a funny people.
-This signature is strictly to prevent comments ending with questions or propositions.-
Those countries have mixed economies. In practice no country with pure socialism or pure free market capitalism has a decent economy.
There is a decent argument that natural monopolies are better off being owned by the state than being made private. Roads are one example.
"nuclear plants are the least affected by bad weather"
Unless the river they get their cooling water from is frozen in winter or in summer if it is too low or already too hot.
China. Still today, the banking system (that is the "capital" of capitalism) is firmly under the control of the state, that is the Communist Party.
As for having success, modern India and modern China at their birth, at the beginning of the '50s were pretty equal (well, India was actually in a better position, with a somewhat greater gdp) and similar (very large pre-industrial, agricultural societies etc.). Nowadays it is clear that Communist China surpassed in every conceivable way Capitalist India.
That's a pretty big success story to me.
Sweden also has huge income taxes and value added tax. With regards to wages, while there is no global minimum wage, wages are decided sector by sector between the trade unions and the corporate organizations. You know trade unions, that thing the US thinks is evil. Also, the employer has to pay nationally agreed upon wages between the unions and the corporations regardless if the worker is actually a union member of not.
Education is mandatory between ages 6 and 16. With regards to private, for profit, schools those only became a thing in 1992 and are controversial in Sweden. Like 10% of students attend these for profit schools and they are generally considered to offer poor quality education. Higher education (i.e. college) is tuition free of charge in Sweden since 2011.
Similar deal with Denmark.
But sure, continue eating what reason.com spouts out without criticism.
For the hard-earned money you pay for something that costs us practically nothing.. you're welcome, ass-hat.
http://fortune.com/2019/01/31/...
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
CFCs reduce Ozone, not cloud cover.
They are also highly potent greenhouse gases.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
You forgot Deep Freeze Spawns Rare Frazil Ice That Hobbles Nuclear Reactor - and that happened just a month ago (and not in regulated Europe).
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
"'No Touch' is requested by BPA when unusually hot or cold weather increases the demand for electricity,
Those shutdowns were because of a lack of water to cool the plant. Also, all power plants, nuclear or not have to use water for dumping excess heat. Its why power plants of all types are so often put by large bodies of water. Those heatwave shutdowns had nothing to do with the nuclear aspect of those plants.
That's exactly his point: when NPPs are just as susceptible to shutdowns during extremely cold or hot weather as other plants, they are just as useless to rely on to provide emergency power under those conditions. Just more costly.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
Norway. A country completely subsidized by the rest of the world, particularly the US, since it's industry mix is oil/gas, shipping, fishing, and various military supplies. They use all this money to fund immense social programs(they flirt with the line of nanny state), keep themselves fairly closed off to immigration, are rampant consumers(their labor is mostly Baltic imported), then put on an incredible air of superiority, even though they are essentially white Saudi Arabia.
They are a funny people.
For one thing, I don't think Norway is in the Pacific North West. For another, there are plenty of countries operating on a mixture of democratic socialist and centre right principles in the world that are doing just fine, Canada, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, The Baltic Republics, Germany, France, ... the list goes on and none of them are floating on an ocean of oil even if a few of them have some kind of fossil fuel mining industry. Germany and Denmark have swapped significant portions of their energy generation over to wind and solar and they haven't financed it with petro-dollars. But what the hell does any of this have to do with the Pacific North West? Seems to me somebody pulled one hell of a Conway by pivoting off the original topic to practically equating any country with a social Democratic Party with Norway to try and make the case that Social Democracy cannot work without petro-dollars which is quite frankly a stupid and demonstrably false point to try and make.
Sounds like yours will be the first house looted next time there is a major power disruption.
Yeah, I can see the looters taking his power home.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
When there are a group of 10 smaller nuke plants with 4 reactors each, one doesn't need to worry when one takes "MONTHS" (omgchickenlittlebutt!!) to get back online.
And, with an interconnected grid with (OMGFREAKYOUT) nice robust long distance transmission lines to other areas exist, you can help one another out.
Don't you want to help one another out?
You are right, NIMBYs aren't the problem, YOU are the problem.
As a percentage of cost, nuclear receives far fewer government handouts than so-called "green" energy programs.
Nearly 100% of the cost of solar and wind is subsidized by government, because there is literally no way the free market is going to pay the true cost of them.
If you dig deeper into the UK, at least, we have some ageing nuclear reactors and a real reluctance to build new ones (it seems we have to import the know-how and nukes have a real image problem).
It's a pity: one of the fads we have now is importing "biomass" (i.e. bits of chopped-down Canadian trees) by boat, then burning it. That counts as "renewable", but it's clearly not in the same league as wind, solar and hydro. I'd far rather see another nuclear plant or two built and leave the trees for the Canadians, it seems most wasteful shipping them a third of the way around the world to be burnt.
Gas isn't too good either, but it at least beats coal... that has been very much in the minority now.
I'm assuming the USA doesn't have to go to France (or China!) to get their nuclear reactors as we do.
If you aren't capable of using a screen name, then I discount posts because, you ARE a coward.
Anyone who's protested nuclear power should be prohibited from receiving it.
-Styopa
China absolutely controls the banking industry - and the telecom, automotive, transportation, and steel industries too! But China's far from a "successful" economy. Don't know if you've been over there or not (I lived there for 6 years), but their entire economy is pretty much window dressing - the the point they have real estate bubbles 10 times as big as we've ever had, and their stock markets took a 40% dive last year - in the midst of their "most successful economic year" ever. Their GDP growth is in actual recession state for them, they have a massively aging population and (thanks to a few decades of one child rule) nowhere near enough young to pay for everything. Successful? Well, a nice shiny veneer looks that way, but the reality is FAR from different.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Precisely. And natural gas and nuclear are about 60% of our electricity generation - and we're ignoring all the gasoline/diesel used for transportation (which dwarfs electric consumption). "GND worshippers" love to focus on renewable generation of just electricity, which is a small sliver of our total energy use.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
A small positive void coefficient like what you see in the CANDU plants is fine when paired with passive safety systems. The reaction build-up is slow and small enough that it'll never present a significant threat. The issue with the RBMK design was that it had a huge positive void coefficient coupled with virtually no passive safety mechanism. Everything had to be turned on and operating correctly or the reaction would very quickly run out of control. The obvious difference being that with a CANDU plant (and they've made continuous iterative design improvements for the CANDU series over decades), a total plant failure will result in the plant running for a while before shutting itself down with some minor damage to the equipment, fuel, etc. With the RBMK series - at least, pre-retrofit - a total plant failure was an immediate meltdown and massive explosions, with loss of containment and long term ecological damage. However, after Chernobyl, all existing RBMK plants were modified to make them far safer. And any modern design - CANDU or otherwise - is going to be incredibly safe and effective.
Personally, I think the CANDU series is fantastic and should be mass produced throughout the world. Here in the US, we need to change the law barring fuel reprocessing. That will help quite a bit with the spent fuel storage problem as well. The CANDU series is passively safe, highly efficient, resistant to fuel weaponization, and incredibly flexible. There's potential there for a cost-effective thorium cycle. And at that point, there's no more concern over conflict-zone mining or ever running out of fuel.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
The RBMK was also designed in an idiotic manner -- the control rods were designed so they increased reactivity at first when inserted... kind of like a brake pedal in a car making a car accelerate for a minute before it starts slowing down.
The test they ran on the day of the Chernobyl accident was the equivalent of driving a car full throttle with stuck brakes, then wondering why the car suddenly accelerates and hits a tree when the stuck brakes burn up.
Stupidity all around.
Also, did you fail to recognise a Back to the Future reference?
Particularly seeing as the story was posted on Marty Gras.
But now it's Ash Wednesday, and people have Pokémon and The Addams Family on the brain instead.
By the way, there's no long-term waste storage yet.
Still better that the long-term waste storage for fossil fuels, our atmosphere.
For those who think Yucca Mountain isn't safe enough, take a look at what's already there.
Go to Google Earth. Search for "Sedan Crater". Scan south.
That's what's already there, has been there for decades, with no containment whatsoever, just (mostly) in a hole underground.
It's almost like there's an inverse correlation between water availability and operation of an industrial facility built to generate shitloads of heat for boiling water.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
When your nuclear plant is situated along the Columbia River, which drains about 1/4 of North America into the Pacific, you aren't likely to run out of water any time soon.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Nearly a fifth of it's time out of action?
How about 91.9% uptime in 2015, which by far leads the way among generation sources: https://www.power-eng.com/arti...
You are full of shit. Go lie somewhere else, or make up lies that are far harder to immediately disprove with 2 seconds of looking on Google. Literally the first link of my search.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
If only it was that easy. Can you please point to the $100B nuclear fuel reprocessing facility that exists somewhere in the US that would allow removing the neutron poisons from "spent" fuel assemblies to allow them to be loaded back into reactors and used more efficiently?
I'm pro-nuclear, but you're not doing anyone any service when you minimize real problems and pretend they aren't problems.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
I don't know who you are nor where you are, but you're confusing what the news media says, with what actual American's say and believe. Only SHITHEAD IDIOTS believe the first thing they hear without fact-checking, especially if it comes from the too-often proven liars in the news media.
Wow, very interesting. For much of my life I've had great admiration for UK and your technical prowess. I often think every Brit owns a soldering iron and can build a simple radio without plans. You did great things in RADAR development in WW2, computing, codebreaking, etc. Everyone wants a British electric guitar amp, and being an audio buff, when I did some research for an EE college audio project, I found the UK stuff to be the best and I learned a lot. I assumed you designed and built your reactors.
Rally the troupes! Design better reactors! Build some! Tally Ho!
Build several smallish ones: https://www.power-technology.com/features/featurethe-worlds-smallest-nuclear-reactors-4144463/
Don't cut corners. Enforce good project management. Fire lazy / inattentive people who prefer to drag their feet, inflate costs, cut corners, etc. Streamline the oversight / review process. Make it agile.
I don't want to say too much, but I'm working on a small project that's part of the reactor monitoring system. Frankly I see some errors in the design, which is 40 years old and went through years of a very expensive design review and approval process. I'm not allowed to change anything, even though there are some errors. Don't let any such bureaucracy drag you down. Agile development. Design reviews. Collaboration. I can easily justify any and all of my designs and proposed changes. Inspire people to want to do better design / construction. Find those who care and have enthusiasm. Some of us do!
Oops, my soapbox is needed elsewhere.
Minneapolis is the one place I've seen a dual-fuel boiler used for demand-limiting gas consumption.
Is anecdotal. It may be true, or it may not be, but either way it's purely subjective.
Fact is when the weather is cold and the wind doesn't blow they need other power sources, this is objective and verifiable. The sameis true of the fact California has to import power to meet it's clean power goals.
Here's a hint, there's an entire state, and a lot of the population doesn't live in Seattle, or even King County.
I stand by my statement. I was just at Gov Inslee's forum on national security and energy policy. Even the Admirals agree with my statement.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
make heavy use of Nukes. They can work when needed, without pollution.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
God I fucking hate ACs, but, I am curious. Exactly HOW will you generate electricity during the monsoons, july-sept, when clouds really block the sun? Or when Yellowstone or one of California's volcanoes blow, wich will block more than 50% of the sun for many months. How then will you deal with it?
BTW, France is over 95% clean on their electricity. Germany with similar energy usage, is at around 35-40% clean energy. Yet, oddly, France spent a FRACTION of the money that Germany did.
So, please, explain to us how this will work. Because I KNOW that p51d007 approach WILL work.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Germany/France have proven otherwise.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
good lord. With arguments by ACs, it is no wonder that /. has become trash.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Wow, and your work, local doctor, hospital, fire service, police service all work on those solar panels and propane tanks too?!
Wow, what a forward thinking country you come from!
When your nuclear plant is situated along the Columbia River, which drains about 1/4 of North America into the Pacific, you aren't likely to run out of water any time soon.
You can still have trouble with ice floes, or other debris or plain flooding.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.