Nuclear Energy for Ireland?

jimmy5694

I can recall a time when politicians, perhaps even representatives from the ESB, discussed the prospect of constructing a nuclear power station, possibly in Wexford. The topic received extensive coverage on RTE and local radio stations for weeks, yet the idea was swiftly dismissed, citing safety concerns. This occurred about 10-15 years ago. I'm aware similar attempts were made in the 1980s, and in 1999, legislation was enacted to unequivocally prohibit the introduction of nuclear energy.

I've been closely following developments in our energy landscape, from the rise of renewables such as wind turbines and solar power to the transition towards gas-powered stations. Despite discussions between the ESB and the government last year, it appears that enthusiasm for nuclear energy remains subdued. Understandably, nuclear energy is often associated with weapons proliferation and accidents. However, advancements in science suggest that nuclear power is now safer and more efficient than ever, particularly with the advent of Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) and microreactors.

The ongoing debate surrounding wind and solar energy centers on their costliness. Non-recyclable components such as turbine blades and photovoltaic panels pose environmental challenges, while the intermittent nature of wind and sunlight means that energy production can fluctuate significantly. This places undue strain on gas-powered stations during periods of low renewable energy output, despite their contribution to the grid when operational. Nevertheless, the narrative surrounding nuclear energy has evolved in recent years, thanks in part to the emergence of SMRs and microreactors.

What are your thoughts?

Sam Russell

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lostinsuperfunk

I used to be agnostic on nuclear (fission) energy, but now I think its time has passed. We will have renewables to get us through the next few decades when the climate crisis is peaking. After then, if fusion hasn't arrived, it might be time to look at it again.

SMRs and microreactors haven't emerged , they are still at concept or early development stage, apart from a couple of reactors in Russia . Even at full scale nuclear is expensive compared to fossils and renewables, and it would be much more expensive at small scale, if it is ever commercialised. End-of-life issues are far more problematic - and expensive - than for wind or solar.

Granted, it's good for baseload, although I think the whole concept of baseload in a diversified generation mix is less useful than it once was.

However, all operating fission reactors should be kept going provided there are no cheaper local low-carbon alternatives available. I think Germany made a mistake by decommissioning its fleet early. There may be some locations in the world with low renewable resources and poor interconnection where nuclear might have some role to play.

PommieBast

Ireland has no existing nuclear industry (i.e. lack of know-how and skill-sets) so it would have costs and delays on top of places like the UK that at least have some existing infrastructure. At a push might get reactors online by 2040 but by then fusion may be on the horizon.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122146387#Comment_122146387

…not a chance this century, currently impossible to convince the public at large, we d have to radically change some policies to even consider it, so….

worth checking out on the matter….

https://www.18for0.ie/

Red Silurian

Good luck getting planning permission for a Nuclear power plant anywhere in Ireland. There's currently an appeal to a solar farm near clonmel which is currently gone to An Bord Pleanalla. Could you imagine the objections against a nuclear plant?

Capt'n Midnight

Any realistic timescale of nuclear from planning to commissioning is longer than the payback time of renewables.

Technically and politically it's so dead in the water that you'd suspect anyone in power associated with it to be taking backhanders.

In 2001 nuclear produced 1% more energy than in 2022. It doesn't deliver.

To accommodate nuclear on our grid we'd need LOTS of backup which would make it trivial to add lots of renewables whose prices keep falling in real terms.

Besides the cost overruns typical of nuclear there's also the cost of burning fossil fuel while you are waiting and the interest payments on nuclear construction are eye watering.

All the nuclear projects in the US and Western Europe this century have had costs spiral and massive delays.

Decommissioning and waste repository costs can be insane. EDF offered new reactors for a similar price to that which they are charging to get rid of old ones.

Nuclear power plants would require lots of pylons which will upset landowners especially if their neighbours get compo, or the extra expense of an undersea interconnector which also limits ramp up times.

The cost of solar panels drops 40% each time global output doubles, which in turn increases demand. If they can commercialise tandem cells then output goes up 42% for the same size panel. The future costs of nuclear can't compete with that.

Ireland has good wind resources too especially in winter. Weather predictions are getting better, soon we will have 10 minute data at a resolution of 500m from satellite. Overall we get a day's improvement in forecasts every 10 years.

After 2030 we have until 2050 to reduce emissions from 20% to 0% so we can use gas as a backup until 2050 , and even then gas could be biomethane or hydrogen.

Our grid will be able to handle 95% non-synchronous generators, that leaves 5% guaranteed baseload for hydro/tidal and thermal such as biomass and CHP and gas and geothermal, and nuclear can have whatever is left over.

Nuclear doesn't reduce emissions as much as claimed.

Changing from old-coal to CCGT leads to a 75% reduction in carbon emissions. Overall gas usage reduced emissions by far more than nuclear did. Only France got to 75% nuclear. But during the Russian gas shortage France lost 50% nuclear output and had to import from the neighbours because nuclear simply isn't as reliable as claimed. (Don't get me started)

Nuclear produces 9.2% of global electricity vs 15% that incandescent bulbs used to use. Changing to energy efficient lights saved more power than nuclear produced, so light bulbs have a better emissions reduction record than nuclear power.

Here we'd save the equivalent of a nuclear plant in winter by retro fitting insulation everywhere.

clearz

Ireland has always suffered from a naive self-righteousness that has always held us back as a country. It's only through random luck such as geographical position/ speaking English/ American companies parked here that we aren't a complete backwater anymore. It's certainly not from intelligent/realist policy decisions. Nuclear power or the lack thereof is a prime example of this.

lostinsuperfunk

There seems to be two misconceptions at large regarding nuclear power in Ireland.

1. Irish electricity is expensive - demonstrably true. Solution: build nuclear, the most expensive electricity generation type of all (apart from some niche ideas like wave energy).
2. All electricity generation has been observed to reduce in cost with increased scale and commercial maturity. Yet we are supposed to believe the opposite for nuclear: that small, unproven reactors will somehow be cheaper than large, proven ones.

https://www.lazard.com/media/2ozoovyg/lazards-lcoeplus-april-2023.pdf

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122172251#Comment_122172251

'Nuclear doesn't reduce emissions as much as claimed.'

What is the claimed amount you are claiming to be incorrect? Nuclear reduces CO2 emissions far more than any other energy source.

https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/annual-direct-co2-emissions-avoided-per-1-gw-of-installed-capacity-by-technology-and-displaced-fuel

The planning argument timescale thing is an absolute nonsense as the system is totally stuffed and needs replacing anyway, with several voices arguing the current plan to roll out renewables is unfeasible due to the planning system being dysfunctional. No future energy generation scheme is currently feasible without fixing the planning problem.

With renewables, you need planning for hundreds of sites and then you need planning for the many km of power lines to connect them and then you need another slew of planning imbroglios for all the interconnectors, and so on. That's even before you start on hydrogen or whatever else you think is workable to make unreliable renewables a substitute for reliable base-load.

If you wanted to power the country with nuclear you would probably need no more than 3 NPP sites, located as replacements for existing fossil fuel power stations, leveraging existing grid infrastructure. This is exactly what Poland are doing with their NPP plan; siting their NPPs to replace coal fired power stations.

Your CO2 during construction argument is BS. Over 20 years, building a NPP would result in 42% less CO2 generation than if you built OSW.

Renewables necessitate CO2 emissions given the complete absence of viable or proven grid scale storage. If you build an offshore wind farm, it's going to have a capacity factor of about 47%, meaning if your grid needs 2 GW of capcity, and you build 2 GW of OSW, you are also going to need to build or run 1.06 GW worth of gas turbines.

Solar is far worse, with a capcity factor of just 11% in Ireland, A 2 GW solar farm would necessitate 1.78 GW of gas turbine capacity to fill that gaping 89% fail hole.

The sensible option in nuclear is South Korean built nuclear reactors, which have a 96% capacity factor, requiring just 0.08 GW of gas turbines to compensate.

The only country to achieve a net zero CO2 energy grid is France, and they managed it via nuclear energy, not renewables.

Chinas solar panels are built using slave labour, that's in part why the price has been dropping. Great source of cheap energy for a tiny fraction of the time you need it, just ignore the moral element, this country is, after all, a world leader in sweeping unpleasant things under carpets and pretending it has a developed moral conscience.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122175022#Comment_122175022

Yes, nuclear is expensive if your yardstick is limited to nuclear failures, which so many people love to use, but if you look at the recent nuclear low cost successes, namely S Korean built APR-1400 based NPPs, then the cost of nuclear is a quarter that of offshore wind, or lower, using recent UK OSW project costs as the metric. (at least 6, possibly 8, APR-1400 reactors have been built in recent years)

The APR-1400 pricing proves that nuclear reactors built to a standard design in multiple instances does deliver scaling efficiences, just as it does with any other industrial process. It doesn't need re-proving, as this is exactly how France got to the enviable position it is currently in. They built multiple reactors of the same design and type in the 70's and so achieved significant cost and time benefits resulting in the world's only net zero CO2 power grid.

So it's a proven that even large scale reactors achieve efficiences of scale so it is very likely SMRs would also, but likely with even more significant cost reductions. Rolls-Royce estimate that their planned industrial scale SMR factory would be able to complete an SMR every six months.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122174934#Comment_122174934

The IDA would like a word. We don't have much in the way of natural resources but went from a backward country to producing something like 90% of all European computers at one point. Pharma is another feather in our cap.

Stuff that's high value compared to the costs of transport. We could have probably survived in the middle of nowhere. See also Taiwan.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122175115#Comment_122175115

Perfect is the enemy of good.

Nuclear needs backup and spinning reserve. Which means fossil fuel here because unlike Sweden or France we don't have lots of hydro. You can't get to 100% emissions reduction using nuclear in Ireland.

Here the difference between day and night is roughly 1GW as is the difference between winter and summer. Our winter day demand is twice that of summer nights. That's either a lot of expensive nuclear plant idling or lots of fossil fuel.

BTW You keep ignoring the capacity factor of Japanese reactors since 2011. Oh please, please explain why they haven't restarted plants that were completely unaffected. Please tell us about the Korean plants shut down because of scandals. Or how French nuclear failed miserably during the recent energy crisis. Even with dozens of reactors nuclear isn't reliable.

The sensible option in nuclear is South Korean built nuclear reactors,
which have a 96% capacity factor, requiring just 0.08 GW of gas turbines
to compensate.

How many times do I have to explain to you that our grid rules say that if a 1.6GW reactor goes offline you'd have just FIVE SECONDS to provide 1.2GW from somewhere.

That's 15 of your 0.08GW gas turbines running flat out 24/7 in case there's a transformer fault or automatic SCRAM etc. Then you have another 85 seconds to restore the rest of the missing 1.6GW and given that it takes about 8 minutes to fire up gas turbines from a cold start you'd actually need 20 of those 0.08GW running while the reactor was grid connected.

Politics is the art of the possible. You can't ignore physics though. It's not possible to accommodate large reactors on the Irish grid without massive grid upgrades - yes you could built another five Turlough Hill's but then they could provide the guts of night time demand in summer which makes solar uncatchable for much of the year.

Capt'n Midnight

Politics is why Japan hasn't restarted it's reactors.

It's why Germany and Italy abandoned nuclear.

What's Sinn Fein's policy on nuclear, given that all the companies are foreign ?

Red Silurian

There's a plan to build huge offshore wind farms all around the country. Combined with Battery storage there's no real need for nuclear

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058351703/nuclear-energy-for-ireland

There is no such thing as a commercial SMR or micro reactor. It's unlikely there ever will be a commercially viable SMR. They do not represent a solution to Irish energy needs.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122190032#Comment_122190032

Only four times more expensive, at least, so yeah, no need, money grows on trees.

PommieBast

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122190073#Comment_122190073

I can't think of any solution that is both politically acceptable and viable at the scale required.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122190935#Comment_122190935

Other countries are already at near 100% renewables with the slack taken up with gas, reducing their carbon footprint by over 70%. The much maligned German model is producing so much renewables that electricity pricing has entered negative territory.

Ireland has the same sort of advantages with regard to wind on our doorstep - we just need to get serious and start building out our potential.

What is absolutely certain is that nuclear cannot meet Ireland's needs in any useful timescale (remember that the whole point of this is to reduce emissions) so waiting 20 years to bring a nuclear power plant on stream just isn't useful.

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122190883#Comment_122190883

4 times more expensive to build, fuel is free, no byproduct and actually building it won't land you in much trouble with planning permissions. Probably works much cheaper in the long run

PommieBast

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122191007#Comment_122191007

The gas bit is the problem. Some days the slack it takes up is circa 80% of Irish electricity requirements, and gas itself is already subject to various Irish bans.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122191274#Comment_122191274

Over the span of a year that drops to around 20% which is a huge reduction in overall emissions.

PommieBast

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122191655#Comment_122191655

I've personally no problem with that, but based on the exploration and LPG ban using any gas at all is something that is (at least in come quarters) politically unacceptable.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122191655#Comment_122191655

Where are you referring to, because it sure isn't here? Last year 35% of our electricity came from wind, which means a lot of gas was burned. In 2022, 85% of Irelands energy, which includes heating and transport, came from fossil fuels.

The Koreans have in the past few years completed 6 reactors, with it taking about 8 years to build each one, not 20. I wonder if you can heat a home on fud?

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122194481#Comment_122194481

I am refering to the point where we actually follow through on our commitments and install wind, and based on countries which have already got there.

charlie14

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122175433#Comment_122175433

The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) stated at years end 2023 12 reactors had returned to commercial operation in Japan with 8 planning for a restart. Another 5 have pssed a government safety review and an additional 10 reactors are in the review phase.

Germany shut down the last of their nuclear reactors that were providing 14% of their electricity carbon neutral and are now spending €30 Billion on gas fired plants and LNG terminals, so yeah, I guess when it comes to green ideology politics does trump carbon emissions.

timmyntc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122175425#Comment_122175425

How many times do I have to explain to you that our grid rules say that if a 1.6GW reactor goes offline you'd have just FIVE SECONDS to provide 1.2GW from somewhere

The same constraints apply to all renewables, infact nearly all our baseload - what are batteries?

The idea you can't have a single large source of energy supply because of the ramp up time of backup is a ridiculous argument. This is a problem that's been solved.

There are many issues with nuclear feasibility, but this is not one of them

charlie14

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122191103#Comment_122191103

The expense would come down to what you are comparing it too. The current plan here for carbon neutral by 2050, even if you disregard it will not provide the Eirgrid projected electricity demand in 2050, is so financially unviable that nobody knows what it would cost……. or if they do they are keeping it very quiet.

Finland with the same population as Ireland recently started up another nuclear reactor that even after delays and over-run on budget that cost €11 Billion, that would provide over 30% of our present needs.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122194704#Comment_122194704

It provides 14% of Finland's needs. From 2009 - 2021 it provided 0% of Finland's needs. Then spent a lot of 2022 testing and being mostly offline before starting operation nearly 13 months ago, after being 13 years late.

Meanwhile Wind produced 18.5% of electricity in Finland in 2023.

This is how much wind was installed while the nuclear plant was delayed. You can see how quickly most of that 6.944 GW came.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122194996#Comment_122194996

Wind has a lousy capacity factor, so that much wind is really only 24% of that much wind, including multiple days in a row of nothing, such as the period of three days this month centered on the 20th when our multiple GW of wind capacity was generating only a few tens or hundreds of MW at best.

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122194630#Comment_122194630

While the same constraint applies, the largest hydro generator is 73MW (Turlough Hill with it's low duty cycle) and the largest windfarm is up to 192MW depending on the wind forecast.

Our renewables need lots less spinning reserve than nuclear which is an order of magnitude larger, and running all the time.