Impressed £67.5 billion... nope... 263 billion, and rising.

[Raven]

But what about all the other countries and their power needs? You could have solar power/wind power generated wherever and whatever time it can be generated, then fire the energy in the form of a laser into a dish in near orbit which reflects it to other stations around the world. The laser could heat water at the point of reception to generate power. Again I imagine its near impossible to do and it would still be far more cost effective to just use nuclear.

 

[Chilly]

well, if you have a shitload of power you need rid of, then something like that could be an alternative. I am scared to compute what the average power cost of -say- a steel mill is, even with all the bulk discounts they most likely get 0o

re using flywheels, what would the inefficiency be if one had to use...10 r=100m ones rather than one r=1000m single wheel? I presume it's something like a order (or several) worse due to the maths?
I mean, I am thinking of CERN, with a 27KM tunnel. Surely there is some geologically stable place in the UK where such a thing could be built underground? Also, it seems to me that it's a hellalot easier to build 10 ...call it... 40K tonne wheels and support structures and not have them collapse on themselves than it is to build a single massive one.

The storage and efficiency will go up in relation to radius squared so you'd need to build loads of smaller ones to do the same job as even a slightly bigger one. The way I'd do it is levitate them with magnets and speed/slow them using magnetic induction. Requires constant power to keep the magnetic fields going, though.

 

[TdC]

yes I was thinking magnets too. no way will a contact bearing be able to handle that kind of stress. Only other thing I could come up with was pnumatics or hydraulics but that would be a biiiiiitch 0o

 

[Chilly]

In space, flywheels would be awesome. No friction from bearings or air. Just a weak magnetic field to keep them in place and a very powerful field to dump/harvest energy. In fact, in space you can overcome several limitations that you'd have on Earth. You'd make it out of whatever you wanted but make it pretty thin and spin it up to lol rpm and win.

 

[Scouse]

Wij - the overgeneration capacity issue. Undoubtedly we'd have to run a surplus. But you seem to be angling for this problem to only be solved within the UK borders - when clearly it's a European issue.

We live in a pan-European federal superstate after all

 

[Wij]

We simply do not have nor could we afford 30GW links with all European countries. That wouldn't help anyway when the wind isn't blowing anywhere in Europe, or are you planning 300GW links with the other continents? Again though these costs are going to be picked up by who? Still think you can provide reliable power to Britain for the same cost as nuclear?

Of course owners of wind plant don't care. Someone else will pay for that. Makes the 2 billion a year to look after nuclear waste look like peanuts.

 

[Scouse]

Makes the 2 billion a year - for the next thousand years - to look after nuclear waste look like peanuts.

Fixed for ya Wij.

When costs are occured effectively in perpuity then they're not cheap.

High initial costs with an end in sight are preferable.

 

[Wij]

Maintaining a load of phat-pipe of that magnitude is not just a capital cost. It's a huge piece of infrastructure to maintain in perpetuity and the TCO will dwarf that for nuclear.

 

[Scouse]

Maintaining a load of phat-pipe of that magnitude is not just a capital cost. It's a huge piece of infrastructure to maintain in perpetuity and the TCO will dwarf that for nuclear.

Rubbish.

Ongoing maintenance of giant wires is in no way comparable to that of nuclear. For a start, you can use regular contractors, the majority of the engineering problems are well understood, the technologies involved already developed, the materials you're handling non-lethal, yadda yadda yadda.

Oil, gas, internet, power pipelines already stretch across the globe. Many many thousands of miles. A pan-european system is not just sensible - it's inevitable.


View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPBX47zSktc&feature=player_detailpage#t=64.7



Edit: Gah. Why's the time-based youtubing not working

 

[rynnor]

Another option is to move the world entire capacity for smelting and refining metals to the UK and let them use up all the power.

Yes - pretty much what they used to do with hydro electric generation - it mostly went into Aluminium production.

Dunno if we still make it tho.

 

[rynnor]

You could use massive electrically powered air bags to raise the isle of wight when its windy and then use the pressure in the airbags to drive dynamos when its not windy

Store it as potential energy basically.

 

[Wij]

Rubbish.

Ongoing maintenance of giant wires is in no way comparable to that of nuclear. For a start, you can use regular contractors, the majority of the engineering problems are well understood, the technologies involved already developed, the materials you're handling non-lethal, yadda yadda yadda.

Oil, gas, internet, power pipelines already stretch across the globe. Many many thousands of miles. A pan-european system is not just sensible - it's inevitable.


View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPBX47zSktc&feature=player_detailpage#t=64.7



Edit: Gah. Why's the time-based youtubing not working

HVDC is not cheap. Especially not on the scale you are talking about. Look at the costs Germany is racking up to connect new wind-plant in the north to replace nuclear plant in the south. It's billions.

Also note I said TCO. The other capital costs are for the fact that you have to provide wind-plant massively in excess of your needs to cover the variability of wind, so 76GW of capacity rather than 32GW and then you STILL need to maintain more than double the gas-plant backup that you'd need if running against wind rather than reliable baseload generation. And you then need to maintain those plants which, due to regulation, will not be able to turn a profit so will need to be subsidised or there will be blackouts.

Even ignoring the last bit and assuming that money will come from somewhere the capital costs of the extra main plant (double), the extra backup plant (more than double) and the EVDC will run into hundreds of billions and will then need to be maintained.

Setting that against 2 billion a year (most of which is from the fact that those plants were designed along the same lines as those for weapons research rather than to minimise waste as modern gen is, but what the hey, 2 billion, don't need to argue) which looks like the most expensive option to you?

 

[rynnor]

Those in the south east could all drill into the gas layer for cheap power

Of course the govt wants to sell the rights to that gas to fracking companies so it would no doubt be considered illegal but it has been used in the past.

 

[Scouse]

which looks like the most expensive option to you?

Depends if they manage to break the laws of physics, or not - as I think'll be the case

 

[Wij]

Depends if they manage to break the laws of physics, or not - as I think'll be the case

Not needed. Wait while the radiation levels have subsided enough and bury. There's worse stuff in the world buried now.

 

[Scouse]

Wait while the radiation levels have subsided enough and bury.

You're quoting the failed plan that governments the world over are failing to get off the ground because of science and economics, right?

 

[Wij]

As opposed to the vastly successful plan to reduce carbon emissions by rigging the market in favour of renewables which is actually increasing carbon emissions?

 

[Scouse]

Deflection. It's a failed plan that undermines your entire argument.

But to humour you:

As opposed to the vastly successful plan to reduce carbon emissions by rigging the market in favour of renewables which is actually increasing carbon emissions?

As opposed to the vast resources that have been and continue to be pumped into nuclear? Renewables rightly get investment as they're technologies still in relative infancy. Nuclear still gets billions - and equivalent - subsidy.

In addition to the unsolveable problems it creates, of course.

 

[Wij]

It's not deflection since it's not even key to my argument. My argument was that the infrastructure required to put mass wind on the grid would dwarf the 2 billion a year it costs to look after the nuclear waste. You were the one deflecting by suggesting the need for a change in the laws of physics to allow for disposal. I wasn't talking about disposal in the first place.

Then you move onto the standard green fud about subsidies which is comparing apples with oranges and only allows for renewable technology to be advancing rather than nuclear. It's standard blurb and is just moving the ground. Maintaining a grid based largely on wind will cost vastly more than one based largely on nuclear as I've been pointing out for the last few pages.

 

[Scouse]

Then you move onto the standard green fud about subsidies which is comparing apples with oranges and only allows for renewable technology to be advancing rather than nuclear. It's standard blurb and is just moving the ground. Maintaining a grid based largely on wind will cost vastly more than one based largely on nuclear as I've been pointing out for the last few pages.

Disagree on cost, maturation of technology and your subsidies points.

 

[Wij]

*sigh*

 

[georgie]

I don't know why you bother.

 

[Scouse]

*sigh*

Seriously, even the green cock vs t'other cock vid you posted the other day didn't really differ on costs - so to say that wind is vastly more expensive just ain't true.

 

[rynnor]

Seriously, even the green cock vs t'other cock vid you posted the other day didn't really differ on costs - so to say that wind is vastly more expensive just ain't true.

Really??? But we are going to have to pay the rich buggers who have put up tons of these bloody wind farms because its a ridiculously generous subsidy a higher price than we pay for standard electricity even when much of it we cant actually use to supply anyone - how is that ever going to be cheaper???

 

[Scouse]

we are going to have to pay the rich buggers who have put up tons of these bloody wind farms because its a ridiculously generous subsidy a higher price than we pay for standard electricity

Not cheaper. Same cost (same subsidy). Without long-term ever spiralling non-existant "disposal" risks + all the other shit that goes with it.

 

[rynnor]

Not cheaper. Same cost (same subsidy). Without long-term ever spiralling non-existant "disposal" risks + all the other shit that goes with it.

But we even have to maintain a shadow generation capacity (which will be horribly ineffecient due to the short startup time we'll need) to cover when its not windy and pay for all the transmission links needed to supply wind power from the north of scotland to where its actually needed.

Theres just no way that costs less than 2 billion and even less chance you could rely on it to power a modern country?

 

[Scouse]

2 billion

Costs less than 2 billion/pa for the next 1000 years.

 

[rynnor]

Costs less than 2 billion/pa for the next 1000 years.

You are assuming we will survive that long which at times looks unlikely - its still 2 billion a year v x billion for windpower over a thousand years though on your basis.

 

[Chilly]

Let me boil down the arguments here. We're all going round in circles.

Wind energy (and pretty much any green option) costs more to build and operate than nukes on a day to day basis and also introduces significant waste into the system which will drive prices per unit up. Cleanup costs for green energy? Not a great deal.

Nukes cost a shitload to build but you only need 4 and they churn out reliable, non-greenhouse polluting power for a long long time. Modern reactor designs can reduce long half-life waste drastically compared to older designs which also had to serve as weapons grade plutonium/uranium factories hence the very, very bad waste profile. The cleanup costs for a nuke plant are huge and continue for an extremely long time. Hundreds of years at the very minimum, even with the cleanest of modern designs. This is compared to tens of thousands of years for the dirtiest designs in history.

Now, lets assume fusion comes online in a century and we can move to what is clearly the best electricity source we know of right now in pretty much every category: greenhouse, waste, price (assuming costs become comparable to current fission minus the waste handling) and safety. When this happens we suddenly have this huge pile of old nuke waste sitting about from today and the next few decades. We now have to pay for the safe storage/processing of that waste without an industry to actually pay for it. EG, it *will* come out of direct taxation. Depending on the amount of high level waste still needing to be dealt with, that could be a large, ongoing cost.

However, because the cost of nuclear power per unit is so cheap and generally more useful than green sources, we're going to realise a cost saving by not using green sources. I do not know what this cost saving is, but I'm willing to bet it's fucking massive and well on the way to actually funding the waste management costs for the industry for quite some time to come. This is assuming we forget the costs incurred by old nasty reactors and only consider the costs from nukes built from today onwards. Anything else is irrational.

I think I've summed it up. There's certainly arguments to be made on both sides but I honestly don't think there's much point in carrying on. They key to the whole thing is to only ever build very modern reactor designs that recycle fuel and produce far less long half life material than previous designs. These reactor designs exist, are real and have been built. They would even be able to eat existing "waste" as fuel so in fact they might be a net SAVING when you consider the pre-existing cost of managing old waste stockpiles. They are also a natural anti-proliferation tool as they do not produce weapons grade isotopes, making them a PEACEFUL option.

 

[DaGaffer]

lots of good stuff

Scouse won't agree with any of that because he'd prefer to landscape the entire planet with windmills, which would be a price worth paying if the storage problem can be solved. There is some hope in that regard; there's a British company that's developed a pretty scalable cryogenic storage tech; its only at 50% recovery at the moment, but if they can get it to 70% it would offer a scalable solution. There's also a lot of work going in using existing battery storage to credit "micro-grids" for local storage, and new cheapo sodium nickel chloride battery tech that's a more scalable than current tech.

However, I personally think anyone who nails their colours to the mast of one energy method or another is an idiot; some nuclear, some renewables in the hope of a storage solution is the right way to go.