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Should Ireland go Nuclear?

Sam Russell

Ireland rejected nuclear energy a long time ago. Should that be revisited?

It would be near impossible to get this past the voters in general.
It would not be possible to get a location for the reactor. NIMBYism would not cover it. 'Not in my county or any county near me' would be closer.
It would make the metro cost look like loose change. How would it be funded?
What if it had to be shut down, how would we cope? So far this year, we have had two gas plants out of action for most of this year and only now are they coming back on stream. To celebrate, three other plants are going off line. Add the lack of wind in September - how will we cope?
Nuclear plants have a history of costing a multiple of the initial cost, and taking two or tree times the construction time,
If it had full public support, which it will not have, it would take at least a decade before a single kwh of energy is generated.

Would we be better trying to get of-shore wind, and grid battery back up, with interconnector reserve? Or would micro-generation domestic PV be a better bet with smart meters shedding demand where necessary?

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[Deleted User]

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118112213#Comment_118112213

So you'd be happy with a nuclear power plant being built with your house on one side and your kids school on the other.

What you proposed would allow for that to happen without any recourse or avenue of appeal for you.

Also, bizarre that this needs to be stated butt here we are, Antrim is not in the Republic so you'd be relying on the likes of the DUP to agree to storing waste from the south, up north, good luck with that.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118112366#Comment_118112366

Well the UK government let them build reactors that power their nuclear subs, so it's not like they havent built such things before.

The design might be a bit different in some specifics, but so what? RR make a variety of aircraft engines of different designs. They made the engines for the concorde, each of which when it was retired had accumulated more time supersonic than the combined total of every millitary aircraft on the planet since Yaeger. Are you afraid to get on a 737 because you don't trust the RR engines because they aren't the same as the ones that powered the Concorde or those powering an A380?

Wanderer78

yes we should, but we probably wont, we ll only consider it if we start experiencing black outs

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118112458#Comment_118112458

Our branch of apes is approximately 3 million years old. If in another 3 million years we have regresssed to the point nuclear waste carefully deposited 3+ km underground in 220 million years stable salt deposits presents an insurmountable problem, I frankly don't care. I'm an optimist on this one as I doubt in 3m years anyone would have cause to come upon such wastes and it would be no more than an interesting curriosity, rather than a hazzard, if they did. I haven't heard of archaeologists running around screaming in terror when they find human remains that were buried in a lead-lined coffin.

It wouldn't surprise me if a future form of humans actually went looking for nuclear waste sites and mined them as a valuable resource.

[Deleted User]

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118109583#Comment_118109583

Have you seen the price of electricity lately?

timmyntc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118111834#Comment_118111834

27 tonnes of waste sounds huge, but given nuclear material and waste are both so incredibly dense, the volume taken up is actually quite small.

27 tonnes of Uranium would fit into a volume of ~1.5m^3. That is nothing, and would be totally manageable - look at the volume of waste created for mining for lithium and other rare earth metals for batteries (and waste products from battery production). Also waste products for 1GW of wind turbines easily exceed 1.5m^3 per annum for the lifetime of a nuclear plant.

[Deleted User]

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118113519#Comment_118113519

Big difference between those waste types and nuke waste, apples to oranges

timmyntc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118113548#Comment_118113548

Big difference in volume certainly, nuclear waste is small, the others require huge amounts of storage.

Unless we get really good at recycling all the component parts there will be huge waste storage requirements for our ever increasing renewables. The density and low volume of nuclear waste is actually a pro in this instance, because it will take much less space to store. And with projected population increases, surface area on this planet will become even more of a premium - buying land to turn into wind turbine graveyards is not efficient.

Henry Ford III

I'm all for it......as long as the reactors are sited in Louth or perhaps Leitrim.

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118113616#Comment_118113616

...dublin city center, be grand!

Markcheese

Well we struggle to build high voltage transmission cables - so if you were going to build a nuclear station it would have to east of the country ..

Those small modular reactors could be great ,but they're not even developed yet - let alone trialled - (and they could also be very expensive - ) maybe in 2040 ?

[Deleted User]

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118113591#Comment_118113591

There's more to waste than volume, try looking at the toxicity instead and see which waste type you would/wouldn't want stored near you

timmyntc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118113811#Comment_118113811

Seeing as 27tonnes of nuclear waste occupies such a miniscule volume, its very easy for it to be stored nowhere near anyone - it literally is as easy as building a concrete bunker/shed and youd have room for all the waste for the lifetime of the plant. Your initial mention of 27 tonnes was clearly to imply that there is loads of toxic waste and where would we store it all - the reality is its so dense that its easily stored.

Properly stored it wouldnt raise background levels of radiation at all outside of the storage facility, so I would rather have that nearby than a massive dumping ground for old wind turbines

[Deleted User]

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118113924#Comment_118113924

I would rather have that nearby

I honestly chuckled at that one

Sam Russell

Is there not high level waste and low level waste, like cooling water?

The high level waste, like used fuel rods are dense, but the water type waste is not. What happens to that?

[Deleted User]

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118114015#Comment_118114015

Various methods for different waste types can be found at the link below. There's a lot of info so not going to copy and paste

https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/nuclear-fuel-cycle/nuclear-waste/storage-and-disposal-of-radioactive-waste.aspx

Part of the problem of handling Nuclear waste, is the massive cost of it.

As a guide, Sweden is currently planning to build a Nuclear Waste Repository. They started planning back in 2011, but it hasn't even started construction yet (and the similar Finnish one is taking more then 20 years to build) and the Swedish government have put it on hold. When/if it gets the go ahead, it is estimated that it will cost €15 billion

So you'd have to add that to the cost of building a Nuclear plant, probably in the region of €25 to 30 billion (Hinkly Point C the latest reactor in the UK being built is costing €25bn and counting) for just one reactor/plant, plus in the region of another one to two Billion to equip the Aircorp with necessary jet fighters, radar, etc.

All in, you'd be talking in the region of €40 to €50 Billion for a similar reactor + waste handling facility and security costs!

It simply wouldn't make any financial sense for us.

By comparison, for just €10 Billion, we could build enough offshore wind to power more than 100% of our needs and enough interconnectors to France and UK to back that up and export the excess wind power and become a net energy exporter.

Danzy

It's easy for a Govt to make a virtue of banning nuclear power.

The waste disposal, the decontamination of the plant, its construction are where the incredible costs are in Nuclear, The State covers those one way or another as private investors won't touch nuclear without the cost burden being off-loaded.

Up to 9bn dollars to construct a 1100 mw Nuclear plant.

Hinkley point at 3500mw is heading past 24bn sterling.

Where are you going with it.

The fuel is cheap but Nuclear is a boondoggle best left to dictatorships.

The free market place has killed nuclear.

tom1ie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118114262#Comment_118114262

Exactly this.

although I would add get to 150% of peak energy needs using wind, and use the extra 50% to make green hydrogen for export in hgv’s/ tankers and storage for when the wind doesn’t blow.

back all that up with interconnectors (that are made up partly of nuclear) and bobs your uncle.

everyone’s happy.

RobAMerc

part of the issue is we would also need a new grid. Our grid couldnt handle a single source of power from a (even small) nuclear plant

Sam Russell

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118115112#Comment_118115112

Does Moneypoint not provide the obvious site. It is quite remote, close to the ocean for cooling water, already on the grid. It is a relatively secure site.

What more would be needed?

It is already seen a good site as a base for off-shore wind turbines.

gjim

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118114357#Comment_118114357

Yeah - it wasn't the hippies who killed nuclear - it was cold cruel financial arithmetic.

The biggest lie about nuclear is that it provides cheap electricity - this WAS true but a lot has changed in the 40 years since then.

The hay-day for the nuclear power industry was the 1980s when it provided 25% of the worlds electricity. This was after the 1970s oil crisis and, at the time, it looked like a winner. It was new, hi-tech and seemingly promised almost unlimited energy "almost for free" and reduced our dependence on the middle-east for energy.

But history hasn't been kind to nuclear. Prices have risen inexorably and now it cannot compete in terms of cost per kWh against even the most expensive fossil-fuel base generation (open-cycle gas) never mind cheaper renewable alternatives. It's barely hanging onto a double digit share of global electricity generation - about 10.5% - down from over 25% 30 years ago. Nearly every private company involved in the nuclear power industry from its hay-day in the 1980s has gone bust and the few survivors - like EDF - are surviving on government handouts.

These days, averaged across the world, every watt that comes out of a newly built nuclear plant costs 4 to 7 times that produced from a grid-scale wind or solar PV plant.

As well as rising costs, the industry has basically killed itself almost by managing to massively screw up every major new high-profile plant/reactor build in the West over the last 2 decades: Flamanville 3 (France), Olkiluoto (Finland), V.C. Summer, Vogtle (USA), etc

It would be absolute madness for Ireland to hitch itself to a dying industry when nearly every western country is winding down their involvement with it. Particularly as it would impoverish the country as it would result in electricity costing multiples of what it currently costs.

Nuclear is dead and it has little to do with green politics but everything to do with engineering and finance.

RobAMerc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118115426#Comment_118115426

might be a great spot for it. But the issue is that our grid couldnt handle all the power coming from once source. It would need to come from many smaller sources - which wouldnt work with nuclear.

Jeremy Sproket

Being afraid of nuclear because of Chornobyl is like being afraid of sailing because of the Titanic

And before some clown references Fuckishima, we don't get earthquakes here.

And if some clown mentions "terrorism", an attack on a NPP in France would kill us all here the same, France is pissing distance away the way the crow flies. Wexford is probably the same distance to France as it is to Donegal.

Nuclear is clean and efficient.

[Deleted User]

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118115684#Comment_118115684

Nuclear is clean and efficient.

The waste isn't and its so inefficient in terms of cost of energy production that its pretty much a dead industry

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118115684#Comment_118115684

Nuclear is neither clean nor efficient. No one has made a proper breeder or actinide burner yet. Or even gotten close.

Nuclear isn't remotely cost effective. Nuclear doesn't use fuel efficiently even with unclean reprocessing. And nuclear isn't competing with today's renewables it's competing with the cost efficiency of renewables during the 15 years it takes to get a plant build and the 35 years it takes to "break even" if it ever does.

High level waste is a red herring because it's low volume and decays quickly so it's economic to keep the stuff secure. Stuff with longer half lives is the stuff that's nasty for longer than our political structures.

we don't get earthquakes here. The old "it can't happen" even though it has already happened, multiple times. An earthquake doesn't have to be here, and it doesn't have to be an earthquake.

The Great Flood of 1607 (cause unknown) shows that there are tsunami's in the Irish Sea. The Lisbon earthquake of 1755 : A three-metre (ten-foot) tsunami hit Cornwall on the southern British coast. Galway, on the west coast of Ireland, was also hit, resulting in partial destruction of the "Spanish Arch" section of the city wall. In County Clare Aughinish Island was created when a low lying connection to the mainland was washed away. At Kinsale, several vessels were whirled round in the harbor, and water poured into the marketplace.

See also Storegga Slide, and that volcano that's due to collapse on the Canaries.

gjim

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118115684#Comment_118115684

Funny nobody mentioned Fukushima, except you. That's classic strawman stuff - why not address the negatives people have actually put forward like:

cost of electricity (4 to 7 times the cost of renewable electricity per kWh)
deployment time (the Flamanville reactor has been under construction for 2 decades)
its a globally declining/sunset industry
project risk (Flamanville 6 times over budget - $22B, Olkiluoto 3 - 3 times over budget, 13 years late, VC Summer plant - abandoned after 10 years after spending $9B, Vogtle - twice budget and currently projected to be 5 years late)
overcoming political/local opposition, finding a site in Ireland

maestroamado

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058216150/should-ireland-go-nuclear

Can you imagine us building a nuclear plant we certainly blow ourselves up... We are not able to build houses...

Sam Russell

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118116532#Comment_118116532

I was going to say we can build houses, but then I thought of Donegal and their mica problem.

The more general problem with housing is not we cannot build them, it is just we haven't, and we are not building enough. In the 1950sand 1960s we built huge estates of Corpo houses - Ballyfermot, Ballymun, etc. We could do that now, except we have a paralysed political class.

As for renewables, 40% or thereabouts is the current contribution to our electricity generation - not bad. If we could increase that by 50 to 100% to 60% to 80%, we would not need nuclear. Solar works when the wind does not blow, batteries can supply a short term lull.

We are unlikely to get even one politician in the state to back a nuclear reactor in their own constituency, and unlikely to back one anywhere else. However, there is no shortage of politicians who 'blah, blah, blah, blah' about carbon and methane and housing.

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118109743#Comment_118109743

Much the same as you. The whole Carnsore thing was a long time ago, couple of generations come since. I'm not convinced that the Irish public would be opposed to one of the newer smaller nuclear plants. These huge industrial wind farms have significant environmental costs and cause much damage both onshore and some argue offshore too. So they are not actually that Green at all.

The only thing for sure is that there's a major mismatch at the moment between government policy encouraging a move to electrifying our power needs and our ability to provide same electricity reliably and independently for that matter.