Energy infrastructure

Banana Republic 1 · 19-06-2021 3:07pm

cnocbui wrote: »

Without fossil fuels, what exactly would you be making wind turbine blades from? You do know it takes energy and fossil fuels to manufacture the materials used to make wind turbines (resin) and solar cells from? The energy used to provision fossil fuels is a fatuous argument since it applies to all energy infrastructure. You might as well moan about the electricity used to make the aluminium and steel used in HT pylons and cables and the glass used in the insulators and the trucks and ships used to move everything around, or the copper used in the wiring of your house. An EV takes about twice as much energy to manufacture as an ICE car. And around and around we go.

It takes a wind turbine about three years of generation to pay offf it's initial cost to manufacture, which includes a lot of energy.

That’s exactly why the Stone Age ended isn’t it, they ran out of stone….

Ben D Bus · 19-06-2021 8:17pm

Banana Republic 1 wrote: »

The internal combustion engine for example that’s only 30 to 35% efficient. Which means for every Euro of fuel you get at the pumps only 35 cent of that actually drives the car the rest is completely wasted.

And that 35 cent moves 2 tonnes of vehicle as well as its occupants around.

When you consider the actual "payload" is on average closer to 100kg, fuel efficiency of private cars is utterly abysmal.

Apologies if that's slightly OT.

Banana Republic 1 · 19-06-2021 9:16pm

Ben D Bus wrote: »

And that 35 cent moves 2 tonnes of vehicle as well as its occupants around.

When you consider the actual "payload" is on average closer to 100kg, fuel efficiency of private cars is utterly abysmal.

Apologies if that's slightly OT.

I don’t understand the point your making.

RainInSummer · 19-06-2021 10:25pm

Bit late to the party here, but what's the general consensus on nuclear? Or have ye reached one?
The SMRs being deployed elsewhere at the moment look interesting.

I know quite a bit about the Uranium fuel cycle, probably less so about where nuclear generation could possibly fit in to Ireland's grid.

19-06-2021 11:21pm

RainInSummer wrote: »

Bit late to the party here, but what's the general consensus on nuclear? Or have ye reached one?
The SMRs being deployed elsewhere at the moment look interesting.

I know quite a bit about the Uranium fuel cycle, probably less so about where nuclear generation could possibly fit in to Ireland's grid.

Nuclear will never be built in Ireland.

What locality do you put it in without insane objections?

What is the long term (multi-millennia) plan for the storage of the waste?

Where will the waste storage location be?

How will the waste be transported and what route will it take where that route won't be blocked by objectors not wanting the material to pass through their area?

Same as above for the unspent fuel.

How do you justify the spend on it when it's LCOE is way worse than alternatives?

Not much more to say other than it dies in the attempt to answer the questions above

19-06-2021 11:31pm

RainInSummer wrote: »

Bit late to the party here, but what's the general consensus on nuclear? Or have ye reached one?
The SMRs being deployed elsewhere at the moment look interesting.

I know quite a bit about the Uranium fuel cycle, probably less so about where nuclear generation could possibly fit in to Ireland's grid.

Nuclear is expensive and unnecessary.

Using Hinkley Point as the example, we could build one of them to cover about half of our energy needs. And then pay over the odds for electricity to justify it.
Or we could put batteries in every house that could hold a few days' worth of power and build 3x the wind capacity we need and go from there. On the rare occasion the wind doesn't blow and sun doesn't shine for a week we can import from the French, the huge potential exports the rest of the time ought to cover it easily enough.

bk · 20-06-2021 12:20pm

People talk about having to build duplication and backup gas plants for wind, due to it being intermittent.

But if we built a Hinkley Point C here that covered half our energy needs, then you would still need to build enough gas plants to duplicate that and back it up.

Because nuclear power plants often need to be taken offline for months if not years for maintenance or if there is an accident. So you still need a backup plan.

Some small European countries get away with it, because they are part of the European wide synchronous grid. So if their plant fails, they have a backup.

We don’t have that luxury. While we have inter connectors to the UK, they are DC and we currently don’t have much capacity.

So if we were to build a nuke plant, we would also have to build full duplication for it or a massive amount of interconnection with Europe.

If you are going to do that, you might as well spend the money on wind turbines instead.

In general, I’m a supporter of nuclear power, but in it’s current form it doesn’t make economic sense for such a small, disconnected country like Ireland.

Wind + interconnected to French nuclear makes much more sense for us + gas as a backup, hopefully transitioning to storage eventually.

antoinolachtnai · 20-06-2021 12:37pm

If sufficiently small scale nuclear plants were available it would solve that problem.

As of now there aren’t any proven small modular reactors. They are at an early stage.

Sam Russell · 20-06-2021 1:04pm

Heating demand will be mitigated by proper insulation of buildings, and less so by using heat pumps as they covert energy to heat more efficiently. It is a pity that this level of insulation was not done in the eighties and nineties when we built a lot of poor quality houses with next to no insulation.

Transport energy requirement will be mitigated by better public transport, more uptake of cycling and e-scooters, and P&R for rural dwellers trying to access cities, plus working from home using broadband. Shared use of cars such as Go-Cars would also help.

Travelling less might be a way of mitigating air travel. Surely, we do not have to travel to every country on the globe.

Keeping supply lines short by buying local would help. Why does Europe import beef from Argentina and Australia when we have so much good quality beef in Ireland?

There are much better solutions that building nuclear power stations.

20-06-2021 4:59pm

Has there been much recent progress in the way of wave energy recently?

There are a lot of knowledgeable posters when it comes to the energy sector so said I’d ask here

tom1ie · 20-06-2021 5:37pm

cnocbui wrote: »

The electricity generated from carbon sources is mostly wasted while that generated from renewables isn't. Tell my how that works, in detail.

Rehewables necessitate paying for two sets of energy generating infrastructue instead of one. It's like needing a car and buying two. That's cost and waste right there.

Not if renewables are paired with storage such as hydrogen or battery.
Hydrogen itself has a whole other industry, IE trucks busses container ships etc.

tom1ie · 20-06-2021 5:39pm

Sam Russell wrote: »

Heating demand will be mitigated by proper insulation of buildings, and less so by using heat pumps as they covert energy to heat more efficiently. It is a pity that this level of insulation was not done in the eighties and nineties when we built a lot of poor quality houses with next to no insulation.

Transport energy requirement will be mitigated by better public transport, more uptake of cycling and e-scooters, and P&R for rural dwellers trying to access cities, plus working from home using broadband. Shared use of cars such as Go-Cars would also help.

Travelling less might be a way of mitigating air travel. Surely, we do not have to travel to every country on the globe.

Keeping supply lines short by buying local would help. Why does Europe import beef from Argentina and Australia when we have so much good quality beef in Ireland?

There are much better solutions that building nuclear power stations.

Who pays for the proper insulation of buildings?
The homeowner?
At the same time as paying for an EV?
I dunno it's a big ask.

Sam Russell · 20-06-2021 7:10pm

tom1ie wrote: »

Who pays for the proper insulation of buildings?
The homeowner?
At the same time as paying for an EV?
I dunno it's a big ask.

Well, if the house was built properly and insulated well in the first place, the builder. Retrofitting can be funded by low cost loans and partly by grants, and from the resulting savings, the loans can be repaid.

The EV is again paid by the buyer, and the savings are a benefit. However the tax man cometh.

gjim · 20-06-2021 8:37pm

cnocbui wrote: »

Without fossil fuels, what exactly would you be making wind turbine blades from? You do know it takes energy and fossil fuels to manufacture the materials used to make wind turbines (resin) and solar cells from?

All manufacturing requires energy - not "energy and fossil fuels". Just energy - which can come from wind, solar, hydro, fossil fuels, nuclear fission, etc. Electricity doesn't have a smell.

Not sure what "resin" you're talking about but if referring to non-fuel uses of crude oil, then by definition we are not talking about fossil "fuels" since you're not burning the stuff releasing the carbon.

Capt'n Midnight · 20-06-2021 9:05pm

antoinolachtnai wrote: »

If sufficiently small scale nuclear plants were available it would solve that problem.

As of now there aren’t any proven small modular reactors. They are at an early stage.

HUNDREDS of small modular reactors have been proven by navies since the 1950's. The UK, US and French ones have a good safety record too.

It's off the shelf technology, it's just not anywhere near commercial yet.

There is also the slight problem of using higher grades of fuel than arms control people would like to have exported or lying around.

Capt'n Midnight · 20-06-2021 9:21pm

RainInSummer wrote: »

Bit late to the party here, but what's the general consensus on nuclear? Or have ye reached one?
The SMRs being deployed elsewhere at the moment look interesting.

I know quite a bit about the Uranium fuel cycle, probably less so about where nuclear generation could possibly fit in to Ireland's grid.

Excluding naval SMR's the average reactor size is increasing because of economies of scale.

Figure on 1.5GW which is about the same as our minimum summer night demand. Factor in spinning reserve, wind and plant that needed for frequency stability in Dublin , Cork areas and it's unlikely that ONE reactor here would be able to supply power to the grid for the 80% uptime. You could end up in a situation where nuclear power could have a negative price because you can't stop dispatching it.

Planning permission won't happen. Germany and Italy both shut down their nuclear power because of something that happened elsewhere. I can guarantee that if FF thought they could win an election with a promise to pull the plug they wouldn't hesitate.

What uranium fuel cycle ?It only extends the fuel by one sixth.

France states that the national policy of recycling spent fuel has meant that it needs 17% less natural uranium to operate its plants than it would without recycling.

BTW the US has burnt through most the decommissioned nukes from Russia.

gjim · 20-06-2021 9:27pm

RainInSummer wrote: »

Bit late to the party here, but what's the general consensus on nuclear? Or have ye reached one?
The SMRs being deployed elsewhere at the moment look interesting.

I know quite a bit about the Uranium fuel cycle, probably less so about where nuclear generation could possibly fit in to Ireland's grid.

Nuclear is dead as disco.

Nuclear peaked for electricity generation in the mid-1980s and has been in decline since then (from nearly 25% to 7% of global electricity generation).

It's all simple economics - it's too expensive. Funnily enough it was actually coal that ended nuclear's run by being much cheaper for a few decades until coal itself hit a peak about 10 or 15 years ago to be surpassed by natural gas. While now renewables are the current champs. Both burning coal and nuclear are now about the most expensive ways of generating electricity. Natural gas is still competitive (and WAY more dispatchable than coal or nuclear) and works well to compliment renewables but 90% of all generation capacity added globally in 2020 was renewables.

I'd be pro-nuclear if it delivered cheap power given it's carbon free but nuclear is more expensive than all other options and is very inflexible and takes decades to roll-out which is just too slow to help deal with the global warming crisis.

Nuclear advocates keep promising but never delivering. There's always some promising new design if only governments would pay billions, yet the "modern" 3rd gen EPR design has been a disaster of cost overruns and construction difficulties. The nuclear industry has become completely rent-seeking - wholly reliant on lobbying governments to support it - as it has no chance competing with the alternatives on price or features.

Capt'n Midnight · 20-06-2021 9:27pm

cnocbui wrote: »

It takes a wind turbine about three years of generation to pay offf it's initial cost to manufacture, which includes a lot of energy.

Between six to nine months from getting the raw materials through to disposal. After 20-30 years you can refurbish for a fraction of the initial cast.

Capt'n Midnight · 20-06-2021 9:31pm

gjim wrote: »

Nuclear is dead as disco.

Nuclear peaked for electricity generation in the mid-1980s and has been in decline since then (from nearly 25% to 7% of global electricity generation).

Changing from incandescent to energy efficient bulbs saves about 8.5% of electrical demand.

20-06-2021 10:14pm

tom1ie wrote: »

Who pays for the proper insulation of buildings?
The homeowner?
At the same time as paying for an EV?
I dunno it's a big ask.

Using Hinkley Point as the example again, if we were to build it and it only cost us what it's costing the Brits it would be ~€14k per household. Plus the guaranteed, index-linked price of electricity for 50 years coming from it.

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Changing from incandescent to energy efficient bulbs saves about 8.5% of electrical demand.

I love pointing out to people that their 50 inch TV uses less electricity than the bulb they were using 10 years ago.

RainInSummer · 20-06-2021 10:20pm

gjim wrote: »

Nuclear is dead as disco.

Well no. The industry is growing at about 1.5-2% a year. Not stellar growth I'll admit but it's a growth industry all the same. There's more reactors under construction than there are closing.

If you only apply a European lens to your news you could be forgiven for believing it is dying.

Look further afield to Asia and it's a different story. Even Japan are thinking to build new reactors and have already restarted 18 of the existing ones it shut down after Fukushima.

Globally lifetime extensions are getting granted to existing reactors as countries realise that they have no hope of meeting carbon emission targets without them.

But yes, the project management in the sector leaves a lot to be desired. An absolute **** show of epic proportions. If you fancy a story that would be funny if it wasn't so tragic, read up on Shoreham in Long Island.

About the only ones that site them well and bring them in on time are the Chinese. Then again they don't need to worry about nimbyism or re-election.

I have high hopes for the Gates/Buffet project in Wyoming that will see a Terrapower SMR slot in to the existing infrastructure of a decommissioned coal plant.

Re: The naval reactors, Russia is doing exactly that at the moment, they're going to build a molten metal Alfa class sub reactor onshore.

There's loads of other points that were made in the previous posts to address too and I hope some of this is interesting to some of you. I have a date with some strong lager but will hopefully get back before long.

gjim · 20-06-2021 11:12pm

RainInSummer wrote: »

Well no. The industry is growing at about 1.5-2% a year. Not stellar growth I'll admit but it's a growth industry all the same. There's more reactors under construction than there are closing.

If you only apply a European lens to your news you could be forgiven for believing it is dying.

Curious what you mean by growing 2% a year - in terms of global capacity?

But it's not a European lens, it's an advanced economy lens. Take Russia and especially China out of the picture and the collapse is obvious.

Of the advanced economy users - who represent over 70% of global generation - it looks like nuclear is in terminal decline. Capacity is expected to decrease by 20% by 2025 and 70% by 2040.

While there can be an economic and environmental case for extending the life of some existing reactors as you say, I just can't see any technology with a new-build cost over $100/MWh LCOE having a place in todays competitive wholesale markets even if we were capable of building them on time and on budget.

But eventually the existing reactors cannot be refurbed any more - hence all the predictions indicate a fairly bleak future for nuclear fission as a power source.

Capt'n Midnight · 20-06-2021 11:22pm

RainInSummer wrote: »

Well no. The industry is growing at about 1.5-2% a year. Not stellar growth I'll admit but it's a growth industry all the same. There's more reactors under construction than there are closing.

Electricity demand is projected to grow at 2.1% a year. ergo nuclear isn't growing if we believe youe numbers.

https://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/current-and-future-generation/plans-for-new-reactors-worldwide.aspx

the IEA's 'Stated Policies Scenario' sees installed nuclear capacity growth of over 15% from 2019 to 2040 (reaching about 480 GWe). The scenario envisages a total generating capacity of 13,418 GWe by 2040, with the increase concentrated heavily in Asia, and in particular India and China. In this scenario, nuclear's contribution to global power generation is about 8.5% in 2040.

15% over 21 years is 0.67% a year. Which means nuclear is projected to fall from just over 10% now to 8.5% of electricity in 2040.

LOTS of different reactors on the list so lots of new and varied problems to be expected if history is any guide.

Olkiluoto 3 has been under construction since 2005 in case it looks like loads of new starts, Mochovce 3 was delayed, construction started in 1987

gjim · 21-06-2021 2:10pm

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

HUNDREDS of small modular reactors have been proven by navies since the 1950's. The UK, US and French ones have a good safety record too.

It's off the shelf technology, it's just not anywhere near commercial yet.

There is also the slight problem of using higher grades of fuel than arms control people would like to have exported or lying around.

Coincidentally I came across this account of small modular reactors - http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2014/ph241/reid2/

The idea of a container sized reactor has been around since the 50s/60s and in fact they were used and deployed by US military in a number of locations. In this case at a base in the antarctic where there were huge logistic advantages to not having to be constantly shipping fuel to the base.

The tldr version - it didn't go well. And even the US military, with effectively limitless resources, abandoned the whole semi-portable nuke idea and figured diesel generation - even including the shipping/logistics involved for fueling - was far cheaper.

So the fundamental problem of nuclear fission as a power source is simply cost and unfortunately it would need cost reduction by a factor of 3 or 4 to compete in todays markets. But what's been happening is that the LCOE associated with nuclear has been rising and even were a tech breakthrough happen to cause a 75% reduction in the LCOE for nuclear, this would only allow it to hold its own for a year or two given the trajectory of wind turbine and pv panel prices. Turbine prices have been dropping about 10% a year for quite a while.

What I find strange is that the people who spent years claiming wind/pv were impractical because of their cost and that we would be impoverished by their deployment, are now promoting the idea of nuclear as an environment saviour but apparently when it comes to nuclear the cost isn't an issue. If cost was an issue for renewables 10 years ago (and it was), then it's an even worse problem for nuclear fission today.

Capt'n Midnight · 21-06-2021 6:28pm

gjim wrote: »

Coincidentally I came across this account of small modular reactors - http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2014/ph241/reid2/

That Antarctic reactor was nicknamed Nukey Poo

tom1ie · 26-06-2021 11:16am

Sam Russell wrote: »

Well, if the house was built properly and insulated well in the first place, the builder. Retrofitting can be funded by low cost loans and partly by grants, and from the resulting savings, the loans can be repaid.

The EV is again paid by the buyer, and the savings are a benefit. However the tax man cometh.

The loan is an extra monthly repayment that you wouldn't have had before and the savings would have to cover the cost of the loan which unfortunately won't happen due to costs of materials going up etc.

Again any savings made by having an EV are wiped out by the cost of monthly repayments on getting a loan for the EV.

tom1ie · 26-06-2021 11:18am

Interesting video on benefits of nuclear Vs renewables.
https://youtu.be/N-yALPEpV4w

Sam Russell · 26-06-2021 11:35am

Was this before or after Chernobyl? - or Three Mile Island?

If they are so safe, why are they built in remote locations?

The disposal of nuclear waste is a problem not yet solved.

How much land does a uranium mine take up, and how much devastation does it cause?

Etc. etc. etc.

Yellow_Fern · 26-06-2021 1:23pm

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Between six to nine months from getting the raw materials through to disposal. After 20-30 years you can refurbish for a fraction of the initial cast.

The variation between 6-9 months is way to small to accurately reflect the real figures. There are far too many factors to consider. Where they made in China, Demark or US etc. I followed that link and it turns out these figures come from a windturbine manufactor and it doesnt seem to be peer reviewed. I am not saying their figures are wrong but its probably a best case scenario.

Nuclear is the way to go. I am not against wind and solar. I have solar myself but its just too unproductive.

antoinolachtnai · 26-06-2021 2:56pm

tom1ie wrote: »

The loan is an extra monthly repayment that you wouldn't have had before and the savings would have to cover the cost of the loan which unfortunately won't happen due to costs of materials going up etc.

Again any savings made by having an EV are wiped out by the cost of monthly repayments on getting a loan for the EV.

Well you have to invest to make a transition. There is just no way around it.

A loan could be structured to have low repayments and to be recouped in full when the house is sold.

Energy infrastructure

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