Why doesn't Ireland have a nuclear power plant?

Irish Slaves for Europe

Is it due to our inability to defend it from terrorist attack?

ei.sdraob

No its due to our hypocritical and conservative (in the backward sense of the word) attitude towards science and technology. long thread here.

EoghanConway

Cheap power is great but I don't want dangerous nuclear whotsits in my back yard <- Something I would not be surprised to hear

Robbo

Christy Moore doesn't like it.

ei.sdraob

EoghanConway wrote: »

Cheap power is great but I don't want dangerous nuclear whotsits in my back yard <- Something I would not be surprised to hear

Most of the population along the east coast already lives close to several plants, we also regularly import energy from UK which is partly nuclear.
Certain large coal plant on the Shannon, already produces MORE radioactive materials and mercury and inject it straight into the air we breathe.
Like I said, hypocrites.

apoeiguq3094y

Most nuclear power plants are fairly large typically each reactor is about 1000MW and you would usually see 2 or more reactors in one plant. Irelands total usage is in the 3000MW to 5000MW range depending on time of day / season etc.

That would mean if for some reason we had to shut down a 2000MW plant we would loose half our supply. The ESB favours smaller plants so it can balance the load easier and do maintenance without limiting supplies.

There are smaller reactors from a company in South Africa that uses pebbles of fuel instead of rods and can therefore work in smaller sizes.

The other side of the argument is it would cost a lot of money to develop our own nuclear agency. Especially if we were just running one plant. France has loads of power plants, so they have economies of scale - especially in waste management. Noone wants a nuclear waste storage facility in their back yard. We would also have to assure the international community that we would prevent the proliferation of nuclear materials.

In order for nuclear power to be feasible here, we would have to completely outsource the operation to the French or Russians. That would seriously impact our energy security.

I have no problems with nuclear power, but it has to be cost effective. We are ideally placed on the west of europe to harvest wind and wave energy if we make some infrastructure investments.

Whiskeyjack

Look at the uproar from some morons about fecking windmills and multiply that by eleventy billion and you'll have some idea of the kind of opposition you'd face.

later12

I'm not altogether convinced we need it. I've heard the argument that wind is cheaper and I've heard the argument that nuclear is cheaper.

Of course the real reasons why it isn't popular are, as always in Ireland, the NIMBY problem - Not In My Back Yard.
And also because of Ireland's admirable tradition of fostering children from Belarus, and of donating to their cause, there seems to be an unusually large level of fear about nuclear power throughout the country which I don't really think one finds very often elsewhere.

ei.sdraob

apoeiguq3094y wrote: »

Most nuclear power plants are fairly large typically each reactor is about 1000MW and you would usually see 2 or more reactors in one plant. Irelands total usage is in the 3000MW to 5000MW range depending on time of day / season etc.

That would mean if for some reason we had to shut down a 2000MW plant we would loose half our supply. The ESB favours smaller plants so it can balance the load easier and do maintenance without limiting supplies.

There are smaller reactors from a company in South Africa that uses pebbles of fuel instead of rods and can therefore work in smaller sizes.

The other side of the argument is it would cost a lot of money to develop our own nuclear agency. Especially if we were just running one plant. France has loads of power plants, so they have economies of scale - especially in waste management. Noone wants a nuclear waste storage facility in their back yard. We would also have to assure the international community that we would prevent the proliferation of nuclear materials.

In order for nuclear power to be feasible here, we would have to completely outsource the operation to the French or Russians. That would seriously impact our energy security.

I have no problems with nuclear power, but it has to be cost effective. We are ideally placed on the west of europe to harvest wind and wave energy if we make some infrastructure investments.

Most of those arguments are moot considering the likes of Finland with similar parameters such as economic devlopemnt/size and population to Ireland can and do use nuclear energy.

3DataModem

Whiskeyjack wrote: »

Look at the uproar from some morons about fecking windmills and multiply that by eleventeen billion and you'll have some idea of the kind of opposition you'd face.

Fixed your post.

apoeiguq3094y

ei.sdraob wrote: »

Most of those arguments are moot considering the likes of Finland with similar parameters such as economic devlopemnt/size and population to Ireland can and do use nuclear energy.

While finland has similar sized population and economy, it uses about 4 times the energy we do (probably due to climate etc). Power consumption is in the 13000MW to 15000MW range. Finland has 2 nuclear power plants, with 2 reactors each giving them 2X500MW + 2x800MW, giving them around 2500MW from nuclear sources. this would represent more than half our usage, but for finland its only about 20%

taken from http://www.stat.fi/til/ekul/2009/ekul_2009_2010-12-10_kuv_001_en.html

Finland has a wide variety or sources. If we were to use nuclear power (which i'm not against by the way) it would have to be in a similar proportion to our total usage.

Also the big elephant in the room is what we do with the waste. Ireland should be open to ALL alternatives and continue supporting research in wind, wave, solar, and new nuclear technologies.

RichardAnd

Nuclear power plants are expensive to build and once set up, require constant and careful supervision. A single mistake and the result could be a total disaster. If ever Ireland has a nuclear power plant, it would have to be run by a private enterprise from outside the country as, quite simply, the expertiese needed just isn't here.

I am in favour of nuclear power. A few plants would be able to provide the energy needs of the whole island but right now, the money just isn't there to build them.

Dublin_Gunner

We should move to nuclear or some other renewable source for 100% of our energy.

Sure, we may need back up stations in case of a supply loss or maintenance.

I actually find it quite hilarious that no-one has an issue with a massive coal burning plant, but adamantly oppose nuclear power.

Its the usual story of ignorance-derived fear.

Peopl fear what they don't understand. They think a nuclear powerstation will blow up if we get one.

We really do live in a backward community in this regard.

ei.sdraob

apoeiguq3094y wrote: »

While finland has similar sized population and economy, it uses about 4 times the energy we do (probably due to climate etc)

Cheap and reliable energy leads to more industry, more industry leads to more jobs, we need more jobs

apoeiguq3094y wrote: »

Finland has 2 nuclear power plants, with 2 reactors each giving them 2X500MW + 2x800MW

Finland are building another LARGE reactor (5th), should be completed soon with permission given for another 2 (6,7) last summer.

as for waste they factor the cost into construction, and have build a world class waste storage facility

Finland has two nuclear power plants, each with two
reactor units. The power plants are at Olkiluoto in
Eurajoki, on the Finnish west coast, and at
Hästholmen in Loviisa, on the Finnish south coast.
The combined output of the two reactors at
Teollisuuden Voima Oy’s power plant at Olkiluoto is
1,680 MW and that of the two reactors at Fortum
Power and Heat Oy’s power plant in Loviisa is 976 MW.
Finland made a decision in principle in 2002 to build
a fifth reactor unit. The new reactor unit (OL3) being
built at Olkiluoto will have an output of 1600 MW.

....

Under the Nuclear Energy Act, funds for nuclear
waste management are collected in advance in the
price of nuclear electricity and paid into the State
Nuclear Waste Management Fund. In 2005, the
Fund stood at some EUR 1400 million, which will
also be used to cover the cost of decommissioning
of the plants.
Under the Government’s decision in principle,
the spent nuclear fuel generated by Finland’s existing
nuclear power plant units and the new unit (OL3)
can be finally disposed of at Olkiluoto. A maximum
of some 6,500 tonnes of uranium will have
accumulated for disposal at Olkiluoto.

more about the facility here


its interesting how Scandinavian countries are always held as an example here on boards...

ei.sdraob

RichardAnd wrote: »

Nuclear power plants are expensive to build and once set up, require constant and careful supervision.

Full details of the 2010 Powering the Nation update can be downloaded here (PDF, 258Kb).
The following illustrations are also available:
Range of costs - all technologies (PDF, 67Kb).
Cost breakdowns - all technologies (PDF, 66Kb).

RichardAnd wrote: »

A single mistake and the result could be a total disaster.

Technology has long moved on, new generation reactors of the kind being build have passive safety systems, less parts and unlike Chernobyl have containment buildings for worst case scenarios.

RichardAnd wrote: »

If ever Ireland has a nuclear power plant, it would have to be run by a private enterprise from outside the country as, quite simply, the expertiese needed just isn't here.

Whatever happend to our well educated workforce :P

RichardAnd wrote: »

I am in favour of nuclear power. A few plants would be able to provide the energy needs of the whole island but right now, the money just isn't there to build them.

They cost less than the Wind+Gas backup direction the country is being pushed in

Eirgird have a study examining an option of adding 2GW to the mix by 2035 they used Finland's high costs for their figures, but these costs include waste disposal and building of such a facility.

RichardAnd

ei.sdraod, technology has moved on but a nuclear power plant going haywire is still a disaster. I agree about our workforce though which is why I hold to my statement that any such plant can not be run by the state. I'm not saying there aren't Irish people with the intelligence and ability to work in the nuclear industry but a nuclear plant can't be run by the ESB or any other quango/state body.

If is was, I guess we'd have something like this:

ei.sdraob

RichardAnd wrote: »

ei.sdraod, technology has moved on but a nuclear power plant going haywire is still a disaster. I agree about our workforce though which is why I hold to my statement that any such plant can not be run by the state. I'm not saying there aren't Irish people with the intelligence and ability to work in the nuclear industry but a nuclear plant can't be run by the ESB or any other quango/state body.

If is was, I guess we'd have something like this:

I worked a period in ESB Power Gen, the workers are nice and the engineers very capable Neither am I advocating a state body doing it (tho we could follow the Finnish example of state body collecting money and building a disposal facility) removing the law preventing nuclear in Ireland would be a start, if there is demand then and capital available private companies can do the rest, maybe then we can join other civilised countries like UK and France.

Tech3

The lifetime of moneypoint will reach an end in 10 years time. At the moment it is the base load for our energy in this country. It produces just over 900MW of the 5000MW we need daily. We need to decide now what will be our energy base load past 2020. It can take up to a decade to design and build a nucleur reactor plant and a waste management facility. It will have one main advantage over another coal burning plant - our C02 levels will be met if nucleur power become our base load for energy in the future. However it would be very expensive to develop and build the first one, we would need to bring in people with experience from France probably. Also we would have serious NIMBYism problems if we decide to go and build one of these. We were going to build one at Carnsmore point in Wexford during the 70's only for it to be scrapped due to consistent protests against it. Look at the Wyla plant in Wales which is only 100km from Dublin!

As regards to safety many will always bring up the disaster which happened at Chernoybl. We cant ignore what radioactive materials can potentially do but Chernoybl was a disaster which would never happen in the Western world. It was a badly thought out design which had no containment building around it, also the safety procedures were non existent to the most part. In the lead up to the fatal diaster the operators manage to turn off the safety system which would have inserted all the control rods and ramped down the reactor to a safe level. The other RMBK reactors have subsequently been shut down at the Chernoybl site.

In my own opinion I think nucleur power should be explored and cost benefit analysis should be undertaken soon rather than later. Wind and wave energy wont be enough to power the entire country but will provide power to several regions. One of the bigger wind farms produces 50-60MW nowhere near what we need for our base load.

ei.sdraob

Tech3 wrote: »

In my own opinion I think nucleur power should be explored and cost benefit analysis should be undertaken soon rather than later. Wind and wave energy wont be enough to power the entire country but will provide power to several regions. One of the bigger wind farms produces 50-60MW nowhere near what we need for our base load.

Wave and offshore wind is extremely expensive as illustrated on graph on previous page and the linked Eirgrids own document.

Onshore wind on the other hand is unreliable out of the 1500MW average installed capacity in 2010 we where on average generating only 300MW at any time from this, about 19% in fact (15% in December during the cold snap when we needed it most), the data can be downloaded from here

Considering that all these farms are spread thru the country generating only ~20% of the time is terrible.

We could triple the installed onshore wind we have and still only about manage to replace Moneypoint sized plant, never mind cope with new demand.

maninasia

apoeiguq3094y wrote: »

Most nuclear power plants are fairly large typically each reactor is about 1000MW and you would usually see 2 or more reactors in one plant. Irelands total usage is in the 3000MW to 5000MW range depending on time of day / season etc.

That would mean if for some reason we had to shut down a 2000MW plant we would loose half our supply. The ESB favours smaller plants so it can balance the load easier and do maintenance without limiting supplies.

There are smaller reactors from a company in South Africa that uses pebbles of fuel instead of rods and can therefore work in smaller sizes.

The other side of the argument is it would cost a lot of money to develop our own nuclear agency. Especially if we were just running one plant. France has loads of power plants, so they have economies of scale - especially in waste management. Noone wants a nuclear waste storage facility in their back yard. We would also have to assure the international community that we would prevent the proliferation of nuclear materials.

In order for nuclear power to be feasible here, we would have to completely outsource the operation to the French or Russians. That would seriously impact our energy security.

I have no problems with nuclear power, but it has to be cost effective. We are ideally placed on the west of europe to harvest wind and wave energy if we make some infrastructure investments.

So we don't outsource 90% of our energy raw materials already? Besides, you are talking about apples and organges here, renewables could not provide a stable baseload to power the county at any time of year. Tidal power, clutching at straws. Wind power, too unreliable. Both also have major effects on the environment, especially if you wanted to ramp up energy production.
They are not practical and you would have a severe and deserved backlash if you wanted to cover the whole island and it's coasts with these machines. Bascially one nuclear power station would pretty much do away with the need for renewables anyway. And renewables will never do away with the need for a stable power supply.

irishh_bob

Irish Slaves for Europe wrote: »

Is it due to our inability to defend it from terrorist attack?

you cant even erect a mobile phone mast without a local campaign being formed overnight and all the subsequent vomit inducing self righteous faux concern that accompanys it

Solair

Given the utter fiasco that most Irish public bodies make of almost everything, would you really want them to have nuclear power plants under their control?!?!

srsly78

RichardAnd wrote: »

ei.sdraod, technology has moved on but a nuclear power plant going haywire is still a disaster. I agree about our workforce though which is why I hold to my statement that any such plant can not be run by the state. I'm not saying there aren't Irish people with the intelligence and ability to work in the nuclear industry but a nuclear plant can't be run by the ESB or any other quango/state body.

If is was, I guess we'd have something like this:

You do realise that our ESB is highly regarded abroad when it comes to construction of thermal power stations? http://www.esbi.ie/our-businesses/our-businesses.asp

One of the few success stories in this country, go do some reading.

Nolanger

Irish Slaves for Europe wrote: »

Is it due to our inability to defend it from terrorist attack?

It's because of brainwashed Greens with peabrains who think the best way to generate power is from windmills. That's you Eamon Ryan TD - poor misguided fool.

gigino

Solair wrote: »

Given the utter fiasco that most Irish public bodies make of almost everything, would you really want them to have nuclear power plants under their control?!?!

excellent point

maninasia

I imagine the building and operation would be by a private contractor in the nuclear industry, the ESB would just have some oversight and purchasing contract responsibilities. It woudln't make sense for the ESB to take part in the running of such a facility nor would it be cost-effective.

RichardAnd

srsly78 wrote: »

You do realise that our ESB is highly regarded abroad when it comes to construction of thermal power stations? http://www.esbi.ie/our-businesses/our-businesses.asp

One of the few success stories in this country, go do some reading.

Well if you read so much, point me in the direction of some documentation that shows the ESB have experience in nuclear power?

ei.sdraob

RichardAnd wrote: »

Well if you read so much, point me in the direction of some documentation that shows the ESB have experience in nuclear power?

few things really bug me about the attack on ESB in this thread

1. who says ESB has to run such a plant, as I said remove the law preventing nuclear energy plants in Ireland and let the market do the rest if there is demand and profit to be made and if any company (such as the british or the French who have the expertise) wishes to tackle our planning/political minefield in light of the incinerator fiasco.

2. the ESB for decades have run and operated a plants + network (until recent years when it was broken up and eirgrid established) which could be highly dangerous to the public if not run professionally as they did/do. You are talking about employees who quite literary had the power to blackout the country, or blow every fuse or worst case scenario if a turbine from the likes of moneypoint breaks the bloody thing would land few dozen kilometers away

3. there was talk in ESB about nuclear power but it was about buying a plant in wales and piping it here, anwyays the ESB are being prevented from building any plant so its unlikely they ever build anything here again whether conventional or nuclear


and it might come as suprise to people but a portion of the electrons yee used to type these messages came from nuclear power imported from UK, handled by an evil state company called Eirgrid :rolleyes: /sarcasm

Eric Cartman

2 nuclear plants with 2 reactors each , CPO a f*ck load of land out the west and put up turbines and put some tidal turbines in sligo / mayo direction between all that I think it would cover 90% of Irelands energy needs and fill out the rest with natural gas burning stations placed near that pipeline that those idiots also object to , The west is sparsly populated, used a fraction of that land to build different power stations and maybee even export a bit of electricity over an interconnector

Pros : Cleaner energy than coal fired stations by a long shot , we can take the carbon tax off petrol as we'd probably be under our EU targets , jobs both temporary and permanent, use all these builders and electricians we have around the country that are jobless, Use the latest technology and become an example to the rest of europe , start an alternative / nuclear energies college course in a college in the west (UL or somewhere) as we'd have the facilities to train people in actual plants, price of electricity possibly cheaper, sustainable for the forseeable future

cons : a few people miffed and uprooted out of their homes in the west, hippys hating it , the coal mines not happy

ro09

ei.sdraob wrote: »

No its due to our hypocritical and conservative (in the backward sense of the word) attitude towards science and technology. long thread here.

Nuclear Power is in the past . in a few years to come there will be much better and safer solutions to powering the planet and we Ireland wont have any nuclear waste to clean up.

Nuclear Power is useless. Its past tense.

Sergeant

ro09 wrote: »

in a few years to come there will be much better and safer solutions to powering the planet

And they are?

RDM_83 again

I think one of the best arguments against nuclear power is the fact that there is so little private building of plants that are not backed by state guarantees (and we all know what they do) one of the largest (non state) defaults was nuclear power company in the US as plants always come in over budget

ei.sdraob

Sergeant wrote: »

And they are?

why nuclear fusion of course :P

the guy you replied to just highlighted the point i made

rumour

apoeiguq3094y wrote: »

While finland has similar sized population and economy, it uses about 4 times the energy we do (probably due to climate etc).

My guess is that they are just not using energy efficient light bulbs...like we do!!!!

Ghost Estate

On the bright side: only 4 more years and we'll have a Mr. Fusion

It has an output of at least 1.21JW as long as we keep feeding it with rubbish. On a cold winter night we might only need 4 or 5 of them to supply the whole country.

RDM_83 again

Ghost Estate wrote: »

On the bright side: only 4 more years and we'll have a Mr. Fusion

It has an output of at least 1.21JW as long as we keep feeding it with rubbish. On a cold winter night we might only need 4 or 5 of them to supply the whole country.

BS

Don't really have time to look up links but had a friend (who now works at The Joint European Torus) and in his presentations about it the break even was a lot longer than ten years away (this was few years ago), maybe if some other method is used to achieve it but at present ITER isn't even built yet

liammur

Irish Slaves for Europe wrote: »

Is it due to our inability to defend it from terrorist attack?

We'd probably blow ourselves up lol

maninasia

apoeiguq3094y wrote: »

While finland has similar sized population and economy, it uses about 4 times the energy we do (probably due to climate etc). Power consumption is in the 13000MW to 15000MW range. Finland has 2 nuclear power plants, with 2 reactors each giving them 2X500MW + 2x800MW, giving them around 2500MW from nuclear sources. this would represent more than half our usage, but for finland its only about 20%

taken from http://www.stat.fi/til/ekul/2009/ekul_2009_2010-12-10_kuv_001_en.html

Finland has a wide variety or sources. If we were to use nuclear power (which i'm not against by the way) it would have to be in a similar proportion to our total usage.

Also the big elephant in the room is what we do with the waste. Ireland should be open to ALL alternatives and continue supporting research in wind, wave, solar, and new nuclear technologies.

I'm scratching my head trying to figure out why this post got so many thanks. Ireland could supply more than it's power needs by two nuclear plants, possibly in the same location. Why would we need to follow Finland's model let alone build a whole range of power plants. Surely nuclear and an interconnector (or two) and one or two thermals would cover almost everything and THAT would be more environmental.

Measure Twice

maninasia wrote: »

I'm scratching my head trying to figure out why this post got so many thanks. Ireland could supply more than it's power needs by two nuclear plants, possibly in the same location. Why would we need to follow Finland's model let alone build a whole range of power plants. Surely nuclear and an interconnector (or two) and one or two thermals would cover almost everything and THAT would be more environmental.

Here's an extract from an Irish site that promotes considering using nuclear power in Ireland - for environmental as well as economic reasons.

"The cost of not using nuclear power - a practical example

To illustrate the long-term effects of national decisions in the energy sphere, consider the cases of Ireland and Finland. Both these countries proposed the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty in the 1960’s and were the first signatories of this treaty when it came into being in 1968. Within 12 years, Ireland had rejected nuclear power generation while Finland adopted it.

Now, Finland has a balanced portfolio of fuels in its generation mix, producing around 30% from each of nuclear, hydro and coal, with the remainder mainly coming from gas. Ireland, on the other hand, has over 60% from gas, 14% from renewables and the remainder is from coal. As a result, Finland emits only marginally more CO2 per head of population than Ireland although they use twice as much energy as we do.

Critically, Irish households pay 50% more for their electricity than the Finns and our industry pays twice as much as Finnish industry for its electricity. This is a clear and practical illustration of the economic and environmental benefits that Ireland is passing up with its current prohibition of nuclear power."

Maybe this is another Scandinavian example that we could follow to good effect?

Amhran Nua

Tech3 wrote: »

Wind and wave energy wont be enough to power the entire country but will provide power to several regions. One of the bigger wind farms produces 50-60MW nowhere near what we need for our base load.

Actually, according to SEI, wind alone could do most of it.

I'm guessing that the Eirgrid numbers don't include capital servicing costs, insurance, or health and safety features. The real cost of nuclear is usually a bit more expensive than wind, and can be a lot more expensive. Given wind is roughly $3000 per produced kW:

* February 2008 — For two new AP1000 reactors at its Turkey Point site Florida Power & Light calculated overnight capital cost from $2444 to $3582 per kW, which were grossed up to include cooling towers, site works, land costs, transmission costs and risk management for total costs of $3108 to $4540 per kilowatt. Adding in finance charges increased the overall figures to $5780 to $8071 per kW.

* March 2008 — For two new AP1000 reactors in Florida Progress Energy announced that if built within 18 months of each other, the cost for the first would be $5144 per kilowatt and the second $3376/kW - total $9.4 billion. Including land, plant components, cooling towers, financing costs, license application, regulatory fees, initial fuel for two units, owner's costs, insurance and taxes, escalation and contingencies the total would be about $14 billion.

* May 2008 — For two new AP1000 reactors at the Virgil C. Summer Nuclear Generating Station in South Carolina South Carolina Electric and Gas Co. and Santee Cooper expected to pay $9.8 billion (which includes forecast inflation and owners' costs for site preparation, contingencies and project financing).

* November 2008 — For two new AP1000 reactors at its Lee site Duke Energy Carolinas raised the cost estimate to $11 billion, excluding finance and inflation, but apparently including other owners costs.

* November 2008 — For two new AP1000 reactors at its Bellefonte site TVA updated its estimates for overnight capital cost estimates ranged to $2516 to $4649/kW for a combined construction cost of $5.6 to 10.4 billion (total costs of $9.9 to $17.5 billion).

* April 2008 — Georgia Power Company reached a contract agreement for two AP1000 reactors to be built at Vogtle,[20] at an estimated final cost of $14 billion plus $3 billion for necessary transmission upgrades.[21]

Now somewhere like China can produce them a lot cheaper, or at least claim to, since they have a command economy and don't really care about paying a living wage, or health and safety or insurance or finance or any of those trivialities.

Additionally, we can locally produce and manufacture the components for wind and tidal energy production, and ultimately export them as well as energy, creating jobs and other benefits for the country, which would have a huge domestic market right from the outset. These things aren't brain surgery, and designs from 1991 are now in the public domain. Wind also scales up very well. Having a few sites speckled here and there is very inefficient, like having a gas pipe going to every home to power a turbine in every attic. The more you build the better it gets.

Nuclear is fine as long as you haven't any other options. France for example has almost no native energy sources. Thankfully we aren't in that position, nothing at all to do with being backward.

mute101

Oil companies run the world, not governments.
They know how to get things done! (whatever cost).
I have set up a website to highlight this, especially looking at our own situation off the west coast. (Im not with any party or 'activist group' by the way), I just want people to know the facts.
Please read my website, it wont take long.
http://www.realityireland.com/

ei.sdraob

@Amhran Nua

Eirgrid figures for nuclear are based on Finland's experience which is at the expensive end of scale
and yes it includes insuraces (required by law there), decomissionining and the building of a national waste storage facility which is complete now which all have to be paid upfront there.

of course if you bother to read the document you would see that all of that is mentioned instead of pulling arguments out of your rear

alphasully

If we were to go Nuclear where would we source the fuel? We do have Uranium ore deposits on the Island so would we mine for this or import from other sources. (if we were to go nuclear and maintain energy independance)

Pete_Cavan

Amhran Nua wrote: »

Actually, according to SEI, wind alone could do most of it.

There is no way wind will ever provide our baseload energy supply. We have installed capacity of 1,379MW, one quarter of peak daily demand, yet at times this winter wind produced less than 2% of energy demanded. The capacity was there, the wind was not.

Amhran Nua wrote: »

I'm guessing that the Eirgrid numbers don't include capital servicing costs, insurance, or health and safety features. The real cost of nuclear is usually a bit more expensive than wind, and can be a lot more expensive. Given wind is roughly $3000 per produced kW:

Does that figure for wind include the necessary upgrades in the transmission network? Also with wind you have to factor in the cost of being able to provide 98% of energy demand for another source.

Amhran Nua wrote: »

Nuclear is fine as long as you haven't any other options. France for example has almost no native energy sources. Thankfully we aren't in that position, nothing at all to do with being backward.

A better way of putting it would be to say wind is fine, as long as you have lots of other options.

alphasully wrote: »

If we were to go Nuclear where would we source the fuel? We do have Uranium ore deposits on the Island so would we mine for this or import from other sources. (if we were to go nuclear and maintain energy independance)

We have reserves of thorium. Thorium produces as much energy as 200 tonnes of uranium, or 3,500,000 tonnes of coal..

Also, this is a good article;

Breeding would be unimportant were it not for the fact that uranium contains only about 0.7 percent uranium-235, the only naturally occurring fissile fuel. It takes a lot of work and energy to enrich uranium to the point where it contains enough uranium-235 to be useful for a nuclear reactor. And, the rarity of uranium-235 calls into question the longevity of the world's uranium fuel supply.

Thorium by contrast appears to be far more abundant than uranium, perhaps three times more abundant than all isotopes of uranium combined. And, it is theoretically possible to turn all of the available thorium into fissile material meaning the total supply on any human time scale is vast.

Besides availability, thorium has three additional distinct advantages over uranium fuel. First, thorium fuel elements can be designed in a way that make it difficult to recover the fissile uranium produced by breeding for bomb making. This reduces the likelihood of nuclear weapons spreading to nonnuclear nations that adopt thorium-based fuel technologies.

Second, the waste stream can be considerably smaller since unlike current reactors which often use only about 2 percent of the available fuel, thorium-fueled reactors with optimal designs could burn nearly all of the fuel. This is the main reason besides its sheer natural abundance that thorium could provide such long-lived supplies of fuel for nuclear power.

Third, the danger from the waste of the thorium fuel cycle is potentially far less long-lived. The claim is that the reprocessed waste will be no more radioactive than thorium ore after about 300 years. This claim is based on the idea that virtually all of the long-lived radioactive products of breeding will be consumed in the reactor before the final round of reprocessing takes place.

Amhran Nua

ei.sdraob wrote: »

@Amhran Nua

Eirgrid figures for nuclear are based on Finland's experience which is at the expensive end of scale
and yes it includes insuraces (required by law there), decomissionining and the building of a national waste storage facility which is complete now which all have to be paid upfront there.

of course if you bother to read the document you would see that all of that is mentioned instead of pulling arguments out of your rear

I didn't pull them out of my rear, I pulled them out of real life existing facilities, not handwavy projections.

Nuclear looks good on paper, but once you put aside the religious dedication to it, the picture as usual isn't so rosy. Its actually a lot more expensive than wind, and has a lot of other downsides, which I note you didn't address.

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

There is no way wind will ever provide our baseload energy supply. We have installed capacity of 1,379MW, one quarter of peak daily demand, yet at times this winter wind produced less than 2% of energy demanded. The capacity was there, the wind was not.

This is why I said it scales up well. Building it out patchy and piecemeal is never going to be efficient.

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

Does that figure for wind include the necessary upgrades in the transmission network? Also with wind you have to factor in the cost of being able to provide 98% of energy demand for another source.

No, you don't. The more you build the better it works. This is one of the pillars of the European supergrid concept, which is going ahead.

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

A better way of putting it would be to say wind is fine, as long as you have lots of other options.

Wind is fine as long as you have a widely installed base, which we don't.

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

We have reserves of thorium. Thorium produces as much energy as 200 tonnes of uranium, or 3,500,000 tonnes of coal..

Also, this is a good article;

I'm hearing a lot of could might and maybe from that article. Why bother, we have a good solution right here.

Amhran Nua

And a couple of notes on Finland's experience:

In Finland, Nuclear Renaissance Runs Into Trouble

The massive power plant under construction on muddy terrain on this Finnish island was supposed to be the showpiece of a nuclear renaissance. The most powerful reactor ever built, its modular design was supposed to make it faster and cheaper to build. And it was supposed to be safer, too.

But things have not gone as planned.

After four years of construction and thousands of defects and deficiencies, the reactor’s 3 billion euro price tag, about $4.2 billion, has climbed at least 50 percent. And while the reactor was originally meant to be completed this summer, Areva, the French company building it, and the utility that ordered it, are no longer willing to make certain predictions on when it will go online.

...

But early experience suggests these new reactors will be no easier or cheaper to build than the ones of a generation ago, when cost overruns — and then accidents at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl — ended the last nuclear construction boom.

In Flamanville, France, a clone of the Finnish reactor now under construction is also behind schedule and overbudget.

In the United States, Florida and Georgia have changed state laws to raise electricity rates so that consumers will foot some of the bill for new nuclear plants in advance, before construction even begins.

...

Areva promised electricity from the reactor could be generated more cheaply than from natural gas plants. Areva also said its model would deliver 1,600 megawatts, or about 10 percent of Finnish power needs.

In 2001, the Finnish parliament narrowly approved construction of a reactor at Olkiluoto, an island on the Baltic Sea. Construction began four years later.

Serious problems first arose over the vast concrete base slab for the foundation of the reactor building, which the country’s Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority found too porous and prone to corrosion. Since then, the authority has blamed Areva for allowing inexperienced subcontractors to drill holes in the wrong places on a vast steel container that seals the reactor.

In December, the authority warned Anne Lauvergeon, the chief executive of Areva, that “the attitude or lack of professional knowledge of some persons” at Areva was holding up work on safety systems.

Today, the site still teems with 4,000 workmen on round-the-clock shifts. Banners from dozens of subcontractors around Europe flutter in the breeze above temporary offices and makeshift canteens. Some 10,000 people speaking at least eight different languages have worked at the site. About 30 percent of the workforce is Polish, and communication has posed significant challenges.

Areva has acknowledged that the cost of a new reactor today would be as much as 6 billion euros, or $8 billion, double the price offered to the Finns. But Areva said it was not cutting any corners in Finland. The two sides have agreed to arbitration, where they are both claiming more than 1 billion euros in compensation. (Areva blames the Finnish authorities for impeding construction and increasing costs for work it agreed to complete at a fixed price.)

Olkiluoto 3 pilot power plant
...is a real risk now that the utility will default".[28] In August 2009 Areva announced € 550 million additional provisions for the build, taking plant costs to € 5.3 billion, and wiped out interim operating profits for the first half year of 2009.[29]

The dome of the containment structure was topped out in September 2009.[30] 90% of procurement, 80% of engineering works and 73% of civil works were completed. [31]

In June 2010 Areva announced € 400 million of further provisions, taking the cost overrun to € 2.7 billion. The timescale slipped to the end of 2012 from June 2012,[32] with operation set to start in 2013.[10]

If I was Eirgrid I'd be looking for a refund on that sales pitch masquerading as a report. It doesn't pay to take handwavy projections at face value.

Pete_Cavan

Amhran Nua wrote: »

This is why I said it scales up well. Building it out patchy and piecemeal is never going to be efficient.

No, you don't. The more you build the better it works. This is one of the pillars of the European supergrid concept, which is going ahead.

We have installed capacity for 1746.7MW of wind energy. Peak output from wind energy was 1,196MW. So, at a cost of €7-10 million for a 5MW wind farm, we have spent ~€3bn on wind turbines that have only ever operated at 68% capacity, with the average likely to be a lot less than that.

Amhran Nua wrote: »

Wind is fine as long as you have a widely installed base, which we don't.

We have 146 wind farms on-line and operational, in 25 counties on the island of Ireland , thats a pretty widely installed base on a small island like this.

Amhran Nua wrote: »

I'm hearing a lot of could might and maybe from that article. Why bother, we have a good solution right here.

A solution that has produced as little as 2% of our peak demand at times is not a "good solution" if you want a dependable and cheap supply.

Amhran Nua

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

We have installed capacity for 1746.7MW of wind energy. Peak output from wind energy was 1,196MW. So, at a cost of €7-10 million for a 5MW wind farm, we have spent ~€3bn on wind turbines that have only ever operated at 68% capacity, with the average likely to be a lot less than that.

That's why I reckoned it at three grand per kW, not the one grand install cost, estimating a 30% average efficiency, which is the norm for wind turbines.

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

We have 146 wind farms on-line and operational, in 25 counties on the island of Ireland , thats a pretty widely installed base on a small island like this.

No, it's not.

Pete_Cavan wrote: »

A solution that has produced as little as 2% of our peak demand at times is not a "good solution" if you want a dependable and cheap supply.

Only if you never build any more of them, which would be nuts. Also the interconnector plays an important role (the first of several).

Irish renewable generators will benefit from the interconnection as it will increase their available market and may make it more economically attractive to construct more large scale renewable generation.

Measure Twice

Amhran Nua wrote: »

That's why I reckoned it at three grand per kW, not the one grand install cost, estimating a 30% average efficiency, which is the norm for wind turbines.

There is no such thing as an average efficiency norm for wind turbines.

Amhran Nua wrote: »

Only if you never build any more of them, which would be nuts.

That is one of the most perplexing statements I've ever read concerning wind energy. How many wind turbines are you suggesting we install?

Amhran Nua wrote: »

Also the interconnector plays an important role (the first of several).

That is one of the most incorrect statements I've ever read concerning interconnectors. We already have interconnection and the east-west interconnector is the only one being built - it is not the first of several.

• It is acknowledged that increasing interconnection causes substantially more imports than exports.
• Imports lead to an increase in emissions as they are from the least efficient plant in the exporting country.
• Imports also lead to Irish generating plants being shut down so we lose energy security and Irish jobs to our competitors.

Think about what you are trying to achieve. Is it to reduce emissions and lower the cost of electricity? If so, how does wind power achieve any of this? And no "handwavy" replies, please.

Solair

There aren't that many OCGT generators in use in Ireland.

Combined Cycle Gas Turbine plants, CCGT, are the most popular type here.

Open cycle plants are very inefficient and thus are only used as very peak load sources.

The main reasons Ireland has no nuclear power are:

1) Lack of economies of scale. We simply do not have the demand to build reasonable size plants.
2) Lack of reprocessing facilities / fuel manufacturing facilities. Effectively we would have to be 100% dependent on the UK or France for these.
3) Security concerns : Terrorism risk, which was very real in the 1970s/80s.
4) We did not have any need for plutonium production, which was a major driver behind nuclear power development in the past. The plants produced plutonium for nuclear weapons programmes in "nuclear powers" like US, USSR, UK, France, etc. This lead to huge subsidises of the nuclear power industry in the earlier days.
5) Massive public opposition.
6) Transport - we have no way of moving waste to treatment other than by ship. Most countries do it by rail in special secure flasks.

Also, remember many of the British nuclear power plants are actually quite low output even compared to regular fossil fuel sites.
The old first generation gas-cooled MAGNOX fleet in particular, most of which is now retired, had pretty tiny generation outputs by modern standards.

Wyfla in North Wales is a huge facility, but it only outputs 980MW of power to the grid, using 2 reactors - roughly the output of ESB Poolbeg and less than the combined ESB+Bord Gais capacity in Cork at Whitegate/Aghada.

If you consider that the UK's Drax Coal fired station outputs almost 4000MW, those nukes are pretty small.

Also, you have to remember with nuclear that many calculations do not include the reprocessing and disposal costs of fuel, decommissioning and very high security and intelligence costs etc etc. Bear in mind that these plants now need rapid action military air cover !!

None of that is relevant to other forms of power plant. Decommissioning of a typical non-nuclear plant is generally pretty much like demolishing any other building. Older ones would have asbestos problems, but that's about it!

It's cheap until you start adding those in.

If Ireland had a nuclear site, it would probably be a big nationalised headache, much like the facilities in the UK which are costing billions upon billions to decommission and manage.

The private operators are only running the newer, and more efficient plants i.e. the AGRs (Advanced Gas cooled Reactors) and the PWR (pressurised water reactor).

The British state remains lumbered with the fleet of old MAGNOX reactors and their decommissioning costs.

Also, at the end of these plants lives, they're effectively handed over to a decommissioning authority and the state ends up picking up the bill too.

Many of the AGRs are now coming to the end of their lives and will be retired sooner or later.

All in all, I think Ireland had a lucky escape not going the nuclear route. We were all set to build, probably a PWR at Carnsore Point in Wexford.

It went as far as evening designing the logo for the Nuclear Energy Board (NEB) (An Bord Fuinnimh Núicléigh), linked to the ESB, which was going to operate it!



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Energy_Board


Nuclear Energy Act 1971
http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/1971/en/act/pub/0012/index.html

jackiebaron

later10 wrote: »

I'm not altogether convinced we need it. I've heard the argument that wind is cheaper and I've heard the argument that nuclear is cheaper.

Of course the real reasons why it isn't popular are, as always in Ireland, the NIMBY problem - Not In My Back Yard.
And also because of Ireland's admirable tradition of fostering children from Belarus, and of donating to their cause, there seems to be an unusually large level of fear about nuclear power throughout the country which I don't really think one finds very often elsewhere.

Can we dump the 27 tons of high level radioactive waste that a 1000 MW reactor produces each year in your back yard?