Tonn Nua wind farm ("the Waterford Coast one")

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122121803#Comment_122121803

..as others have pointed out, using such terms isnt actually helpful in the arguments for, the push back over nuclear is completely understandable, and if we are to ever convince people of the benefits, we must consider their concerns, insults wont work!

as groups such as 18 for 0 have pointed out, this is deeply embedded into our polices, so much so, its currently impossible for us to even consider this option, and these polices will need to be changed if we are to…..

the two polices 18 for 0 believe are preventing us from moving forward, 1999 Electricity Regulation Act and 2006 Strategic Infrastructure Act, these are clearly very fundamental polices that were clearly implemented following Chernobyl….

https://www.18for0.ie/

this is far more complicated than you say, far more….

JohnC.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122121099#Comment_122121099

Nuclear has a lot of costs which are shuffled into places other than the price per kWh. Just look at the state of Hinkley Point C.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122123622#Comment_122123622

setup costs are off the walls alright, particularly for countries that dont have any history of its use, so all the basic infrastructure needed would need to be created, i.e. extremely expensive….

Deiseen

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122123622#Comment_122123622

And the wind may be blowing a gale in the middle of the night when you don't need it and not blowing at all when you do need it.

People quite rightly debate the downsides of other of other sources of power generation but quite often give a pass to renewables because they are convinced it is the right thing to do.

As for costs, the hope would be that these could be dramatically reduced with modular reactors.

Deiseen

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122123077#Comment_122123077

Hold on, you did a quick search and couldn't find any benefits? None at all? Sounds like you are ideologically opposed to nuclear and nothing will change your mind.

They cut down on two of the biggest problems with Nuclear - construction time and cost.

In relation to the fuel. Every method of power generation has it's downsides. The amount of waste is actually quite small. All the nuclear waste in the USA from one year would fit on a soccer pitch up to a height of about 3 metres. For what Ireland requires, it would even generate that much waste in 20 years.

On balance nuclear is the best off all generation methods.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122123692#Comment_122123692

renewables are really the only game in town for countries such as ours, i.e. countries that dont have a history of the usage of sources such as nuclear, again its not just a cost problem, its actually the fact nuclear simply isnt widely accepted here as a possibility, most would object to its introduction here, best of luck with trying to get the production of a reactor here, it currently simply wouldnt happen, it would just be knocked about in debates and possibly in the courts, with nothing actually happening on the ground. again the policies previously mentioned completely block state bodies from even considering this source, so the state cant even look into it at present, not even at the most basic levels…..

Deiseen

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122123736#Comment_122123736

Well then the Irish people should just accept some of the most expensive electricity prices in Europe and masses of wind turbines off the coast. Last time I checked, we are third most expensive in Europe despite people thinking renewables would make electricity cheaper. If people want to include battery storage in this (this is genuinely laughable due to the costs involved) then costs will sky rocket further.

We can't have our cake and eat it. That is a fact in all walks of life, especially when it comes to electricity generation.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122123833#Comment_122123833

..i do think we re moving into a more expensive era in energy, largely due to the sheer physics involved, fossil fuels are simply more energy dense than others, excluding nuclear, im not convinced renewables will reduce our energy bills, yes im aware costs have been falling in regards to renewables, but…..

humans nearly always want our cake, we re just wired that way, this will help to keep pushing prices down, but…..

…but i do think its critical we become as energy independent as possible, as i suspect getting access to energy is gonna become very complicated, and those complications could very well be far more dangerous than anything else…

…and at the moment, the only way to truly do that is renewables, with all their faults and issues….

Cabaal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122121099#Comment_122121099

I love how you've completely ignored my comments about solar and its place in Ireland.

On cheaper electric claim, back of a packet maths,
UK is only 6c cheaper per KW then Ireland, not exactly ground breaking stuff and the avg UK person wouldn't consider it relatively cheap. Avg in EU is around 30c mark or slightly below (after taxes).

Where do you propose Ireland disposes of nuclear waste?

Cusp of small modular reactors, great. So 20-30 years from now you'll see them on a commercial basis. Thats too late. We have to shift away from fossil fuel now, not 5 years from now, not 10 not 20. Now.

Honestly, given your attack on wind and your ignoring of comments about solar its clear you just have an agenda against wind generation. wind generation has its place in Ireland, we'd be stupid not to use this natural and renewable resource.

Asdfgh2020

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122123729#Comment_122123729

yeah would be fundamentally against nuclear power generation bar ‘cold fusion’ or some other type of ‘fusion’.. any advantages of ‘nuclear fission’ are outweighed by the treatment of the ‘waste’….and the risk of it getting into the wrong hands…..rouge dictators etc etc

Cabaal

On the subject of Nuclear in Ireland, lets look to our nearest neighbours who started Hinkley Point in 2017 to see how things are going, they are after all experienced with nuclear power.

After delay, after delay, after delay and numerous cost overruns its pegged to be operation in 2028.

It was supposed to cost just under 13billion, but its now projected to be 25-26billion….with some projects being over 40billion.

Ireland doing nuclear would make the national childrens hospital build cost look like a serious bargain!



On the subject of those modular reactors, it seems there's a fair few issues with them.

"The Royal Institution of Australia is a national non-profit hub for science communication, publishing the science magazine Cosmos four times a year.

This month they argued that small modular nuclear reactors "don't add up as a viable energy source."Proponents assert that SMRs would cost less to build and thus be more
affordable. https://cosmosmagazine.com/science/engineering/small-reactors-dont-add-up/

However, when evaluated on the basis of cost per unit of
power capacity, SMRs will actually be more expensive than large reactors. This 'diseconomy of scale' was demonstrated by the now-terminated proposal to build six NuScale Power SMRs (77 megawatts each) in Idaho in the
United States. The final cost estimate of the project per megawatt was
around 250 percent more than the initial per megawatt cost for the 2,200 megawatts Vogtle nuclear power plant being built in Georgia, US. Previous small reactors built in various parts of America also shut down because they were uneconomical.

The cost was four to six times the cost of the same electricity from wind and solar photovoltaic plants, according to estimates from the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research
Organisation and the Australian Energy Market Operator.
"The money invested in nuclear energy would save far more carbon dioxide if it were
instead invested in renewables," the article agues:Small reactors also raise all of the usual concerns associated with nuclear power, including the risk of severe accidents, the linkage to nuclear weapons proliferation, and the production of radioactive waste that has no demonstrated solution because of technical and social challenges. One 2022 study calculated that various radioactive waste streams from SMRs would be larger than the corresponding waste streams from existing light water
reactors...

Nuclear energy itself has been declining in importance as a source of
power: the fraction of the world's electricity supplied by nuclear
reactors has declined from a maximum of 17.5 percent in 1996 down to 9.2 percent in 2022.
All indications suggest that the trend will continue if not accelerate.
The decline in the global share of nuclear power is driven by poor
economics: generating power with nuclear reactors is costly compared to other low-carbon, renewable sources of energy and the difference between these costs is widening.

"

"

Asdfgh2020

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122129729#Comment_122129729

I’m sure Deiseen will came back with a strong rebuttal of your research

Dunmoreroader

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122123120#Comment_122123120

So if you're all finished discussing Nuclear, may I redirect back to the subject of this thread and the issues raised by Dum Dum 2;

1. It's too close to shore considering how large turbines are getting year on year, the visual impact will be devastating and detrimental to local tourism, to mention just one negative, and
2. all the economic benefits will land in Cork https://www.irishexaminer.com/business/companies/arid-41393908.html despite Port of Waterford showing capability in handling wind turbines and plans for expansion to facilitate greater capacity https://www.irishexaminer.com/business/companies/arid-41340200.html

So is this another iteration of Waterford getting screwed by Cork and its flag flyers in Government? They get the economic benefit in Cork Port whilst being able to sail their yachts out of Crosshaven without having to look at the big ugly yokes foisted on the usual suckers in the Southeast with their 2nd-class Uni and no-flights airport?

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122132352#Comment_122132352

…are humans truly put off by such things, would it truly have a detrimental effect on tourism, and other economic activities?

im some how seriously doubt it, as such supplies of energy are clearly gradually become the norm around the world….

i think this visual hysteria is a bit over played….

Asdfgh2020

The ‘L@ngers’ will end up with wind turbines off their coast also eventually…..also why da eff are the local roundabouts on the n25 bypass getting amended….? Answer……to enable the onward transport of the massive wind turbines coming into waterford port….!

Cabaal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122132352#Comment_122132352

I find the points unusual, surely point 1 trumps point 2?
In which case why are you arguing about any loss to Waterford Port? Isin't point 1 a big enough reason to be against them on its own?

If Waterford Port benefitted would you suddenly ignore your first point?

Just seems odd you've made two points which are somewhat counter to eachother.

Dunmoreroader

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122135291#Comment_122135291

No, I'm all for Offshore wind energy being exploited but not at the expense of our costal visual amenity being degraded. The more I read up on this, the more convinced I am that no way they should be starting at just 12km out. The technology is evolving rapidly and the floating turbines can be anchored in 1km+ deep waters which are much further out.

There should be a sliding scale height restriction based on how for offshore they are into a minimum 25km offshore, which seems to be the industry standard now.

I'd have no problem with Cork Port getting all the business if the Southeast ports were incapable of servicing this sector but that clearly isn't the case but will the business get routed there due to biased government ministers ensuring it so. Like that never happened before.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122136497#Comment_122136497

you ve good arguments, but the reality is, are we truly willing to pay more for our energy, id imagine there are good studies out there on the costs involved in moving further out to sea, do you know of any?

Iwastimthe

https://www.irishexaminer.com/business/companies/arid-41390926.html

Things may not necessarily be going all Corks way!

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122136752#Comment_122136752

…not that surprised, it sounds like its very difficult to actually make money outta this industry, higher interest rates seem to hurt the industry really badly, i was at a talk about this a few months ago, tricky stuff…

Dunmoreroader

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122136518#Comment_122136518

Depends which sources you read;

https://windenergyireland.com/images/files/20210818-updated-distance-from-shore-paper.pdf

https://www.bluehorizon.ie/offshore-wind-ireland/#:~:text=This%2C%20together%20with%20the%20introduction,25%20km%20from%20the%20shore.

https://assets.gov.ie/228585/0d8d1a3f-67b4-4f8b-abb1-f05273af2dca.pdf

Everyone's got an agenda, right? I'm just a citizen who loves the idea of wind energy, if done right, but yes it's all a trade off of competing interests, agendas and energy sources. But I don't want to be looking out at a mistake when I do the Dunmore Cliff walk, and my children & grandchildren after me.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122136805#Comment_122136805

thank you, i do appreciate the issues regarding the visual effects, but im far more concerned about your kids and grand kids health and general well being in regards energy, if we dont act now, theyre basically screwed, we all clearly have a far better understanding of the environmental effects of fossil fuels, but if we dont crack on with renewables now, they truly are screwed, i think we have to plough on now, or…..

the more obstacles we put in place in regards the change over, the more trouble future generations will be in, unfortunately yes all sorts of interest groups will and have gotten involved, but the reality is….

i personally dont mind seeing turbines at all out at sea, its a very visual reminder, we re really damn trying to do our best here, of course there are and will be all sorts of negatives from such, not just the visual effects, but other negatives, but thats the price to pay, we cant delay this any longer, as we ve been doing that for decades now….

Dunmoreroader

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122136856#Comment_122136856

Well yes, if the choice is extinction or turbines too close to shore, I'd live with it too.

Luckily we have more choices.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122136895#Comment_122136895

…and if its extinction, it wont be a quick one, it would more than likely be truly awful, and possibly for your own kids and grand kids, we cant allow that to happen to them

…its actually very likely we d descend into serious conflict and wars if we cant meet our energy needs, we cant allow this to happen to your kids and grandkids either…

the longer we play this game, the less options we actually have, and since we re truly unwilling/unable to pay higher taxes, and pay higher prices for our energy, the more we re squeezing ourselves….

im not convinced renewables are actually gonna reduce the price of energy, we ve spent centuries perfecting the use of fossil fuels, this could of course also occur with renewables, but im still not convinced, hopefully im wrong….

lostinsuperfunk

All generation gets cheaper as the scale goes up: fossil fuel thermal plants, hydro, wind turbines & wind farms, solar farms (to a lesser extent). It's very hard to believe that nuclear thermal plant costs would somehow scale the other way around.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122142386#Comment_122142386

yea its hard to tell, but some countries that have embraced it, do experience relatively lower prices in time, but i wouldnt overly worry about it, it ll be a hell of a long time before its implemented here, if ever…..