ralfy wrote:There is one interesting article here about nuclear power and global energy needs, but it's from 2011:
https://phys.org/news/2011-05-nuclear-p ... nergy.html
The gist is that time, there was 375 GW of power supply from nuclear reactors. Given their rate of consumption, there should be around 80 years' worth of "viable uranium." There is also a limit brought about by availability of "exotic metals" needed for the nuclear reaction.
Global power consumption that time was 15 TW. Clearly, nuclear power cannot cover it because that would require around 15,000 nuclear reactors and uranium supply down to 5 years' worth.
According to another article, consumption as of 2016 was around 18 TW:
http://www.anthropocenemagazine.org/howmuchenergy/
Uranium can be extracted from seawater, but it might be impractical to do so by three decades or so.
Given these, we might be able to have at least 1 TW of power from nuclear sources.
Another source
https://www.world-nuclear.org/informati ... power.aspx
points out that by 2040 energy demand may increase by more than half, or probably up to 25 TW by 2040.
That 25 TW figure is supported in the "How Much Energy" article mentioned earlier, but it refers to conditions similar to what we face today, i.e., with most earning less than $10 daily. In order to lift most out of poverty, that has to rise to almost 70 TW. But that's for the population of 2016.
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Tanada wrote:Isn't it odd how little these so called environmentalists protest fossil fuels while taking every opportunity to stage events against nuclear power? Coal power kills more people in a single month world wide than Nuclear power has killed in its entire history. If you use a 5 year timescale coal power has killed more people than nuclear power and nuclear weapons used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined.
Ibon wrote:Tanada wrote:Isn't it odd how little these so called environmentalists protest fossil fuels while taking every opportunity to stage events against nuclear power? Coal power kills more people in a single month world wide than Nuclear power has killed in its entire history. If you use a 5 year timescale coal power has killed more people than nuclear power and nuclear weapons used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined.
In a perfect world a politician who spoke in such articulate terms about energy would get voted into office.
But since money talks in politics, and since the Nuclear Industry Lobby has very little cash and since the Fossil Fuel Lobby is loaded, we have this reality.
I wonder how the coal power death rate compares with the Covid19 pandemic?
Why don't we grind the global economy to a halt because of the coal power pandemic killing so many? Aren't we all about savings lives these days?
Tanada wrote:
YAWN! Once again we get citations that if we keep using 1970 technology and insist on using it in the same poorly thought out manner we have used it for the last 5 decades we will run out of Uranium toot suite.
However alternatives to 1970 level Nuclear technology have existed for decades as well.So far the only country to try deploying them commercially is Russia but so far their deployments have been a success story. When that technology, plutonium breeder reactors, was developed and tested in the USA/France/Japan in every case anti-nuclear politicians closed down the programs. In the USA the IFR proved itself to be safe and viable a few weeks before Chernobyl, but the Clinton Administration and Senator John Kerry took the extraordinary measures needed to kill the program anyhow. In France the Superphenix was completed but every attempt to bring it online was blocked and delayed by anti-nuclear politicians until it had wracked up so much debt it was in an unrecoverable financial state, at which point they ordered the whole thing scrapped as a financial loser. In Japan a series of poorly constructed sodium pipes developed leaks which in turn caused small scale fires and damaged some equipment. There was never any danger to the public but the Monju Reactor was closed for years as activists inside and outside the government used the problems as a hook to terrify the public. After the 2011 Tsunami it was never reopened and again the anti-nukes blame its expense and inefficiency on its technology instead of on their NIMBY attacks at every step of the program.
On the other side of the coin the IFR in the USA ran for thousands of hours with 100% safety record and Russia has been operating BN-600 sodium breeder reactor since 1980 and the BN-800 larger version since 2014. Russia also developed REMIX fuel to use up reactor grade plutonium in light water cooled reactors without requiring any changes in the core design.
Once upon a time before 1972 the USA was the world leader in development and deployment of advanced nuclear energy designs. Then the Petroleum Industry as a whole decided commercial nuclear power was a threat to their business model and since that time it has been a full court press of support both over and covert through lobbyists and payments to anti-nuclear groups like Greenpeace and Earth First. Isn't it odd how little these so called environmentalists protest fossil fuels while taking every opportunity to stage events against nuclear power? Coal power kills more people in a single month world wide than Nuclear power has killed in its entire history. If you use a 5 year timescale coal power has killed more people than nuclear power and nuclear weapons used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined.
Yet Nuclear is the "terrible boogeyman that is going to destroy us all"!
REAL Green wrote:EV’s and Renewables are vital and excellent tech but the application is important.
We may go back to savages in the wreckage of techno pyramids
or worse the way of the dodo bird.
Tanada wrote:However alternatives to 1970 level Nuclear technology have existed for decades as well.So far the only country to try deploying them commercially is Russia but so far their deployments have been a success story.
ralfy wrote:Tanada wrote:
YAWN! Once again we get citations that if we keep using 1970 technology and insist on using it in the same poorly thought out manner we have used it for the last 5 decades we will run out of Uranium toot suite.
However alternatives to 1970 level Nuclear technology have existed for decades as well.So far the only country to try deploying them commercially is Russia but so far their deployments have been a success story. When that technology, plutonium breeder reactors, was developed and tested in the USA/France/Japan in every case anti-nuclear politicians closed down the programs. In the USA the IFR proved itself to be safe and viable a few weeks before Chernobyl, but the Clinton Administration and Senator John Kerry took the extraordinary measures needed to kill the program anyhow. In France the Superphenix was completed but every attempt to bring it online was blocked and delayed by anti-nuclear politicians until it had wracked up so much debt it was in an unrecoverable financial state, at which point they ordered the whole thing scrapped as a financial loser. In Japan a series of poorly constructed sodium pipes developed leaks which in turn caused small scale fires and damaged some equipment. There was never any danger to the public but the Monju Reactor was closed for years as activists inside and outside the government used the problems as a hook to terrify the public. After the 2011 Tsunami it was never reopened and again the anti-nukes blame its expense and inefficiency on its technology instead of on their NIMBY attacks at every step of the program.
On the other side of the coin the IFR in the USA ran for thousands of hours with 100% safety record and Russia has been operating BN-600 sodium breeder reactor since 1980 and the BN-800 larger version since 2014. Russia also developed REMIX fuel to use up reactor grade plutonium in light water cooled reactors without requiring any changes in the core design.
Once upon a time before 1972 the USA was the world leader in development and deployment of advanced nuclear energy designs. Then the Petroleum Industry as a whole decided commercial nuclear power was a threat to their business model and since that time it has been a full court press of support both over and covert through lobbyists and payments to anti-nuclear groups like Greenpeace and Earth First. Isn't it odd how little these so called environmentalists protest fossil fuels while taking every opportunity to stage events against nuclear power? Coal power kills more people in a single month world wide than Nuclear power has killed in its entire history. If you use a 5 year timescale coal power has killed more people than nuclear power and nuclear weapons used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined.
Yet Nuclear is the "terrible boogeyman that is going to destroy us all"!
I can't see anything in your post that addresses what I shared. Let me summarize my points (using estimates):
World power consumption: 20 TW
World nuclear power capacity: .4 TW
Uranium supply given world nuclear power capacity: 80 years + 30 from sea water
Uranium supply given world power consumption: less than 5 years
Feasible world nuclear power capacity given exotic metals supply: 1 TW
World power consumption needed to adjust to population increase by 2040: 30 TW
World power consumption needed to decrease poverty in current population: 40 TW
World power consumption needed to adjust to population increase plus decrease poverty: 70 TW
Given that, here are my questions:
1. Given advancements in technology, what do you think will be the highest world nuclear power capacity, and why? What will be the new figure for uranium supply in years?
2. Will it meet current world power consumption of 20 TW? World power consumption double that to decrease poverty? World power consumption double that plus 25 pct or more to meet increasing poverty? If not, what do you think will have to take place?
Alfred Tennyson wrote:We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Tanada wrote:Uranium supply is not limited to 80 years at current consumption rates, the true figure is on the order of 6400 years at current consumption rates. The 80 year figure is made using the assumption that "known reserves" are most of what exists and totally ignores the facts on the ground, like for example Phosphate minerals usually produce Uranium as a byproduct. In the USA they stopped producing the Uranium component from phosphate processing because the regulations add a huge cost and the price of Uranium is too low to support doing all that regulatory BS. On top of that the USA/France/UK/Russia/China have a million tons or more of "depleted Uranium" but what does Depleted mean? Natural uranium in about 0.7% U-235 but everything from 0.4% down to 0.15% processed Uranium counts as "depleted" even though the former still contains over half its initial U-235 component. In addition to the raw Uranium supply every Uranium consuming reactor produces from 50% to 100% Plutonium replacement fuel as it operates. The oldest Gen I reactors managed a touch over 50%, the Gen III EPR is expected to produce around 85% and all the Gen IV designs are expected to produce 95%-105%.
In other words the Gen IV designs are all high fuel efficient convertors or technically breeders meaning they consume all the Natural Uranium, plus they can consume the natural Thorium as well once they are operating. If we are using Gen IV designs like the American IFR or Russian BN-600/BN-800/BN-1200 sodium cooled designs or the Molten Salt reactors that are currently the hot topic in development then instead of the proposed 80 years using the 0.7% U-235 you keep bringing up you can burn all of the 99.3% U-238 in that natural Uranium plus the 100% natural Thorium that is four times as abundant as the Uranium. That effectively means 500 times as much energy just from the already known supplies or 80*500=40,000 years at current consumption rates. Divide that by current world energy demand and you still have 400 years producing 40 TW a year of energy. If we can't come up with a solution in 400 years we deserve the fate which awaits us then.
REAL Green wrote:This is so dystopian to me. Our system has proceeded to a point where robots will cut up animals for our consumption. What needs to be done instead is a return to the small-town butcher who respects and values his meat.
It’s music to an environmentalist’s ears: Six Flags Great Adventure wants to power its park with solar energy by installing a solar panel farm on a portion of the 134 acres of land it owns in Jackson, New Jersey. But as the company spells out its plan, the needle scratches across the record: To make room for the panels, it plans to level 66 acres of trees.
The plan, the largest solar installation in New Jersey, will generate 21.4 megawatts of electricity, enough to power the amusement park’s Garden State facility. The company projects that the initiative will eliminate approximately 215,000 tons of CO2 emissions over 15 years, a result that it says more than compensates for the loss of trees.
Local residents and environmental groups—including Clean Water Action, Crosswicks/Doctors Creek Watershed Association, Environment New Jersey, NJ Conservation Foundation, Save Barnegat Bay, and the Sierra Club—beg to differ, claiming that razing nearly 15,000 trees will adversely impact water quality, air quality and sound quality; decrease the wildlife population; and affect biodiversity, as the state loses a section of forest known as the Pine Barrens. “As green as solar is, you don’t get a pass for chopping down a forest,” said David Pringle, campaign director for Clean Water Action. “If they kept the forest and put the panels in a parking lot, you get all the benefits of solar without any of the costs of clear-cutting the forest.” State officials even offered to buy the land to stop Six Flags from deforesting it, but the company declined their offer.
Those opposed to the project say if Six Flags really wanted an environmentally friendly project, it would have placed the lion’s share of the solar panels on one of its parking lots, creating so-called canopies—structures with panels placed on top, so cars can park underneath. Company officials say most of the lots were unsuitable, citing safety issues, special events held there, and future development plans that might utilize that space. Critics counter that the company just didn’t want to give up parking spaces, as the lots often fill to capacity in peak season, and in the off season, a portion of them is rented out to Amazon, which parks trailers there to serve as warehouse space.
And there are other environmental concerns, too. A recent study in Renewable Energy found that as many as 138,600 birds have been killed at what the researchers call Utility Scale Solar Energy projects—either from birds flying into panels or being singed by exposure to concentrated sunlight—and if all of the large-scale projects currently planned are built out, that figure could rise to 480,000 annually.
“I think the major environmental issue here is that deforestation undermines the greenhouse gas benefits of the solar project,” says Dustin Mulvaney, an associate professor in the environmental studies department at San Jose State University.
Some 29 states and the District of Columbia now have renewable portfolio standards in place stating that a certain minimum amount of renewable energy such as wind, solar, biomass, or geothermal should be used to generate electric power, and those figures rise over time. The result has been exponential growth in solar energy projects, with the number of installations—residential, commercial, and utility-size—having doubled since 2013, says the Solar Energy Industries Association. Mulvaney says private companies are leasing large swaths of undisturbed land in the Southwest, three or four miles wide, that are full of old-growth cactus, yucca trees, and in some cases, Joshua trees, scraping them clean with these large machines that clear away all the vegetation, and then installing 8 million or 9 million solar panels. The power is then sold back to the utilities, so that they can meet their federal renewable energy mandates.
C8 wrote:Here is a great article that shows how state environmental mandates are leading to the wholesale destruction of forests and fragile ecosystems as companies are clear cutting complete forest regions to meet state standards- bold and italics are mine
REAL Green wrote:C8 wrote:Here is a great article that shows how state environmental mandates are leading to the wholesale destruction of forests and fragile ecosystems as companies are clear cutting complete forest regions to meet state standards- bold and italics are mine
It is my opinion that solar farms need to be put in brownfield sites when possible. I am sure there are many in NJ but from a business standpoint Six Flags has the land so the lowest cost approach is made under the guise of green development. Tesla did something similar in Berlin with their new EV factory cutting down many trees. There was an outpouring of protest but I believe the project is proceeding.
jedrider wrote:Nobody really knows how to get us out of this environmental catastrophe that we are headed for, but we all should be able to agree that the forests must be sacred and preserved. Of course, this gets in the way of all sorts of development and, actually, almost all development.
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