Nuclear power in Ireland

md23040 · 04-05-2019 07:43PM

Wind, solar and hydro are the future for renewable energy requirements and given technology advancements these are much cheaper generation options than Nuclear.

There are 2 or 3 cancelled Nuclear projects recently in UK as a result of these renewable developments. The worlds largest sovereign wealth funds namely Norway and Saudi ($1 trillion each) are now investing heavily in wind, solar and hydro projects as the return on investment is substantially higher than fossil fuels, which are finished by 2040, apart from gas to 2050.

Floating offshore wind turbines at 10MW are coming on stream and nuclear cant compete on cost. Someone mentioned traction on tidal and although it’s continuous energy it is too expensive on MW produced to cost (levelised cost of electricity- LCOE). But IMO the future driver within the RES will be residential micro generation with battery backup and smart grids these are rolling out very quickly already in some countries.

CrankyHaus · 04-05-2019 09:01PM

Annabelle Muscular Wrestler wrote: »

There is a dramatised mini serious by HBO/Sky on the Chernobyl accident and aftermath starting this month. Really looking forward to it, be interesting to see what angle they go for with it.

I recommend you visit, it was one of the most interesting places I've been.

s7ryf3925pivug · 04-05-2019 09:22PM

I was under the impression that storing power is problematic at the scale of national grid requirements. [I remember being told about research where it might be achieved by pumping water uphill to store it and then opening a weir to generate hydroelectricity when it needed to be consumed.] I guess we wouldn't be talking about Li batteries at least as they would be expensive and degrade relatively quickly... This is why I understand that we need a reliable continuous source and can't rely upon wind and solar alone. Is this no longer true then..?

04-05-2019 09:58PM

It’s fantasy stuff thinking renewables such as wind and solar can meet the demands required now never mind going forward. They absolutely have their place and will contribute a significant amount of generation capacity but without fossil fuels nuclear the only option to give the required reliability and capacity to meet our needs.

CrankyHaus wrote: »

I recommend you visit, it was one of the most interesting places I've been.

Oh it’s a place I very much intend visiting. I suspect it’s very difficult if not impossible to actually get into the plant though and while visiting pipryat etc would be fasinating without getting into the plant it would just be frustrating.

md23040 · 04-05-2019 10:06PM

Annabelle Muscular Wrestler wrote: »

It’s fantasy stuff thinking renewables such as wind and solar can meet the demands required now never mind going forward. They absolutely have their place and will contribute a significant amount of generation capacity but without fossil fuels nuclear the only option to give the required reliability and capacity.

I suggest you look at the generation stats for Denmark and Scandinavian countries.

Battery technologies and other storage solutions are improving immensely and price dropping like a stone since 2010. Some power stations are using batteries at present for balancing the grid.

Nuclear is no longer being considered as an energy solution due to LCOE from wind/solar.

Twenty Grand · 04-05-2019 10:12PM

Annabelle Muscular Wrestler wrote: »

It’s fantasy stuff thinking renewables such as wind and solar can meet the demands required now never mind going forward. They absolutely have their place and will contribute a significant amount of generation capacity but without fossil fuels nuclear the only option to give the required reliability and capacity to meet our needs.

Fantasy based on what?

There's no statistics to show that renewables can't supply the grid, in tandem with energy storage.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a13820450/wind-farm-cheaper-than-coal/

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/amp27347375/renewables-outproduced-coal-power-in-the-us-for-the-first-time-ever/

Ubbquittious · 04-05-2019 11:21PM

theguzman wrote: »

Irish people are too irresponsible and alcohol dependent to run a Nuclear Power Plant. The typical attitude of "shur it will be grand" just won't cut the mustard with Nuclear Energy. One accident would irradiate the entire island.

What a load of sh!t

theguzman · 04-05-2019 11:50PM

Ubbquittious wrote: »

What a load of sh!t

We look at responsibility as how do I blame someone else when TSHTF. There is never accountability in anything here.

McDermotX · 05-05-2019 02:56AM

KABOOM !!

Bring it on.

05-05-2019 08:30AM

Junkyard Tom wrote: »

Maybe we could generate power from the homeless? Kill two worms with one bird.

Give the homeless a break. Put the fatties on the hotseat instead.

ted1 · 05-05-2019 08:58AM

md23040 wrote: »

I suggest you look at the generation stats for Denmark and Scandinavian countries.

Battery technologies and other storage solutions are improving immensely and price dropping like a stone since 2010. Some power stations are using batteries at present for balancing the grid.

Nuclear is no longer being considered as an energy solution due to LCOE from wind/solar.

I’d suggest that you look at what those countries import over inter connectors. And see what their fuel mix really is.

https://www.energidataservice.dk/en/dataset/a6e2ea74-a0ca-49e9-be58-1a6ec816f869/resource_extract/02356e88-7c4e-4ee9-b896-275d217cc1b9

Ubbquittious · 05-05-2019 09:54AM

theguzman wrote: »

We look at responsibility as how do I blame someone else when TSHTF. There is never accountability in anything here.

There are still plenty of people who do an honest day's work and would do all they can to prevent an accident

We had a few watts of nuclear power of our own back in the day
https://www.irishlights.ie/tourism/our-lighthouses/rathlin-obirne.aspx

as well as a small reactor in UCC that never used to generate electricity

YFlyer · 05-05-2019 10:40AM

We can have biomass, wind, solar, hydro and hydro gravity (both similar), water wave, tidal energy sources. When the others are running low biomass and hydro gravity can kick in. They have a power station in Samó, Denmark that runs on wind, solar and biomass.

El_Bee · 05-05-2019 10:56AM

It will always cost more energy to store energy than what can be stored. That said, I would never trust any Irish government with the building and running of a nuclear power station, as we cannot even get a children's hospital built without it turning into a disastrous boondoggle.

fryup · 05-05-2019 11:08AM

if we did have a nuclear plant where would we base it??....the centre of ireland.. athlone?

Phileas Frog · 05-05-2019 11:19AM

fryup wrote: »

if we did have a nuclear plant where would we base it??....the centre of ireland.. athlone?

Carnsore Point

Capt'n Midnight · 05-05-2019 11:32AM

Ubbquittious wrote: »

There are still plenty of people who do an honest day's work and would do all they can to prevent an accident

In fairness there's not much they can do if there are major design flaws*, construction issues, fake parts, or fake materials.

* just look at how many nuclear plants had to have sea walls or backup systems upgraded after Fukushima , even ones under construction. Fukushima was far from the first or last plant flooded.

Because nuclear plants need a lot of cooling water they are susceptible to flooding as well as having to shut down when there's no cooling water due to dought, rivers being too hot or frozen over or intakes blocked by jellyfish. All totally preventable at the design stage by putting the plant on higher ground or using bigger intakes or just looking at historical records or natural disasters in the region.

Building higher costs more, bigger and better intakes and higher sea walls cost more, larger cooling ponds cost more.

Also for some strange reason transformers at nuclear power stations seem to attract fires. Maybe it's older the average age, or the higher average load. Every electrical power station uses transformers to connect to the grid so there's no real excuse for getting this wrong so often.

05-05-2019 11:49AM

Miguel Hollow Bobcat wrote: »

Chernobyl at one stage had only 10days before it would have rendered Ukraine, Europe & parts of Russ into wasteland, for 500,000yrs (or thereabouts).

Nonsense. Chernobyl was the worst possible nuclear reactor accident. Literally melted down and sprayed radioactive steam all over Europe.

05-05-2019 11:57AM

Steven Tight Week wrote: »

Tidal energy has the benefit over wind and solar that it is a reliable source, and therefore it actually could replace Moneypoint as things are now. our islandness means we could generate a similar or greater quantity than moneypoint can.

However I don't think it is being considered as a replacement. I read that the options being looked at are biomass and nuclear. Since nuclear is illegal and would be obstructed even if not then the biomass one is most likely. Biomass is carbon neutral if done right, but emits a lot of particulate, which has a major health impact.

Does anyone know why tidal power is not being looked at then? If not then perhaps it should be suggested?

Open Hydro, a Louth based company was selling tidal turbines all over the world except here - including the Scotland one - has commercially viable tech, got bought out by a French company who shuttered it a year later.

Their turbine is one of the few dependable ways of generating electricity 24/7 in a renewable way. And it sits on the bed of sea inlets, do no BS about obstructing views etc. Also the turbine turns slowly so fish etc are not harmed, unlike wind turbines.

There are plenty of Irish renewable startups.

Maybe if the government actually worked with them instead of against them we could have a world leading industry here?

Biomass is a TERRIBLE idea as it involves using vegetation for fuel. Also it isn't green at all.

ted1 · 05-05-2019 12:05PM

YFlyer wrote: »

We can have biomass, wind, solar, hydro and hydro gravity (both similar), water wave, tidal energy sources. When the others are running low biomass and hydro gravity can kick in. They have a power station in Samó, Denmark that runs on wind, solar and biomass.

Who’s we?
What commercial wave and tidal is there?

Where can we put hydro in Ireland ? Our mountain range is to low.

ted1 · 05-05-2019 12:08PM

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Open Hydro, a Louth based company was selling tidal turbines all over the world except here

That’s a bit of a tale , how many commercial tidal did they ever sell or install?

As for making foreign companies rich. I’d say they made a loss on open hydro, about 280 million euro worth of losses

https://fora.ie/openhydro-liquidation-2-4257250-Sep2018/

Discodog · 05-05-2019 12:28PM

ted1 wrote: »

Who’s we?
What commercial wave and tidal is there?

Where can we put hydro in Ireland ? Our mountain range is to low.

Galway Bay has up to 5 metre tides

Dempsey · 05-05-2019 03:27PM

I think the ban on nuclear energy production should be removed to allow a proper discussion on its role in Ireland/Europe etc

Reality is that the Irish State has a very poor track record of large infrastructure projects and any economically viable project would swiftly become a disaster multiple times that of the childrens hospital. Add to that the complete lack of expertise in this country in running such facilities.

We should just complete the Celtic Interconnect with France and leave the nuclear option as an import.

dxhound2005 · 05-05-2019 03:50PM

Dempsey wrote: »

I think the ban on nuclear energy production should be removed to allow a proper discussion on its role in Ireland/Europe etc

Reality is that the Irish State has a very poor track record of large infrastructure projects and any economically viable project would swiftly become a disaster multiple times that of the childrens hospital. Add to that the complete lack of expertise in this country in running such facilities.

We should just complete the Celtic Interconnect with France and leave the nuclear option as an import.

Apart from the hospital (which is not even built yet), which other large projects do you mean?

El_Bee · 05-05-2019 04:54PM

dxhound2005 wrote: »

Apart from the hospital (which is not even built yet), which other large projects do you mean?

Didn't most of our road network coming in way over budget and past deadlines? Otherwise we just don't have the experience with building besides throwing up houses ins the 00's and even there there's problems across the board.

ted1 · 05-05-2019 05:23PM

Discodog wrote: »

Galway Bay has up to 5 metre tides

And how will you harness the tides.

Dempsey · 05-05-2019 07:08PM

dxhound2005 wrote: »

Apart from the hospital (which is not even built yet), which other large projects do you mean?

Port Tunnel, Luas, Motorways, National Stadium, PPARS etc

There is a well defined pattern of failure when it comes to large infrastructure projects in this country

Capt'n Midnight · 05-05-2019 09:51PM

dxhound2005 wrote: »

Apart from the hospital (which is not even built yet), which other large projects do you mean?

Doesn't really matter because most governments fail when it comes to nuclear. People will be safely retired before the plants are completed and their successors will be caught in the trap where the only to pay back the loans is to keep throwing money into the pit until it comes online.

The UK had similar regulations and culture to ourselves, are a much bigger customer and have been doing nuclear power since 1956. It's also worth their while subsidising nuclear power so they can reprocess fuel into weapons, that's something we can't afford. And the only plant being built depends on Chinese money and French government support to a "too big to fail" company. And a guarantee of paying twice the market rate for the power.

Watts Bar 2 started construction in 1976.

It came online in 2016. And then 5 months after that it had to offline for 4 months for repairs despite the old kit having been refurbished.

Costs increased a tad over that time.

Huge hidden costs in nuclear are the abandoned projects and plants decommissioned early because there's billions worth of loans still to be paid for and no income because there's no power being generated.

dxhound2005 · 05-05-2019 10:09PM

There is no chance of a nuclear power station being built in Ireland, so the discussion is irrelevant to reality. But it has prompted the usual claims that Ireland is some sort of third world banana republic, incapable of doing anything right.

Cost overruns in infrastructural projects is a well known international phenomenon, not something peculiar to this country, nor to this era.

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1304/1304.4476.pdf

Cost escalation and its causes
On the basis of the first statistically significant study of cost escalation in transport
infrastructure projects, in a previous article we showed that cost escalation is a
pervasive phenomenon in transport infrastructure projects across project types,
geographical location and historical period.

More specifically we showed the following (all conclusions highly significant and most
likely conservative):
• Nine out of ten transport infrastructure projects fall victim to cost escalation
(N=258).
• For rail average cost escalation is 45% (N=58, sd=38).
• For fixed links (bridges and tunnels) average cost escalation is 34% (N=33,
sd=62).
• For roads average cost escalation is 20% (N=167, sd=30).
• For all project types average cost escalation is 28% (N=258, sd=39).
• Cost escalation exists across 20 nations and five continents; it appears to be a
global phenomenon (N=258).
• Cost escalation appears to be more pronounced in developing nations than in
North America and Europe (N=58, data for rail only).
• Cost escalation has not decreased over the past 70 years. No learning seems to
take place (N=111/246).

ToddyDoody · 05-05-2019 10:09PM

Fr_Dougal wrote: »

At least give them a roof over their head.

But your dignity?

Nuclear power in Ireland

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