cupera1 pinkunicorns
3 hours ago
For those that want to return to a world that runs totally on green, like it was centuries ago, be careful about what you wish for. Wood was used for heating and cooking; charcoal for smelting and blacksmithing; wind or waterpower for pumps, mills, and sail ships for transport; and whale oil for lamps. People and soldiers walked or rode horses and the manure that dropped on the streets dried and blew into people’s lungs and was a lot more harmful than asbestoses ever was. The smoke from open fires choked and blackened cities. This smoke from wood and dried manure would make the smog of LA look like a clear day after a rain. The forests were stripped of trees; most of the crops went to feed draft animals.

For 99.999% of the people, life was nasty, brutish and short. You would be old and worn out at 40 and dead by 50. People would be laboring 18 hours a day from before the snow starts to melt to well after snow starts to build up in the fields, then you hope you have wood to make it through the winter and enough food to last until the next harvest.

Both wind and solar power are voracious land hogs. Wind or solar can need 90 to 100 times more acreage than a natural gas plant to generate the same amount of electricity. And let’s not forget the large swaths of land that will have to be appropriated, and in heavily forested areas clear cut, to build transmission lines that connect solar and wind farms to distribution lines. //

You can't get around the energy density problem; you just can't. Physics is a harsh mistress. And the amount of land - habitat, if you want to put a point on it - required is considerable. //

Eco-activists fuss and scold over the cutting of trees to clear land for housing, commercial development, and raw materials, but apparently it’s just fine to remove trees if they’re replaced by solar panels. //

What we need more of isn't windmills, solar panels, or batteries. We need more nuclear power plants. We need more small modular reactors. We need a decentralized grid powered by splitting atoms. Do you want clean energy? This is clean energy. //

Throughout our history, every major technological advance in power – from animal to machine, from wood to coal to oil to gas – has had one key characteristic in common, and that is increased energy density. Nuclear power represents just such an increase over generating electricity with coal or gas. Solar and wind power run in just the opposite direction, which is why they don’t scale up, and were we to try, as we see here, the cost in land would be massive.

STATUS OF U.S. NUCLEAR OUTAGES

Every morning, each nuclear electricity generator in the United States reports its operating status to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). The NRC compiles this information in its Power Reactor Status Report, and we present that information in interactive visualizations on our Status of Nuclear Outages page. Our analysis tool combines the NRC daily status with data gathered from our Annual Electric Generator Report and Monthly Update to the Annual Electric Generator Report. The page includes two maps showing the capacity and outage status of U.S. nuclear plants.

STATUS OF U.S. NUCLEAR OUTAGES

To some observers, the plan’s collapse also raises questions about the feasibility of other planned advanced reactors, meant to provide clean energy with fewer drawbacks than existing reactors. NuScale’s was the most conventional of the designs, and the closest to construction. “There’s plenty of reasons to think [the other projects] are going to be even more difficult and expensive,” says Edwin Lyman, a physicist and director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists. //

Jacopo Buongiorno, a nuclear engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says the NuScale design has an Achilles’ heel. Each reactor’s core resides within a double-walled steel cylinder, with a vacuum between the walls to keep heat from leaking out. The reactor modules sit in a big pool of water, which in an emergency can flood into the vacuum space around a reactor to prevent it overheating. Compared with a conventional reactor’s building, the pool requires more reinforced concrete, the price of which has soared, Buongiorno says. “In terms of tons of reinforced concrete per megawatt of power, NuScale’s design is off the chart.” //

Buongiorno says he wouldn’t read NuScale’s failure as a verdict on all advanced reactor designs. “I would steer clear of broad-stroke comments in terms of cost,” he says. Baker says he has no doubt that the country needs new nuclear plants to supplement the fluctuating supply of power from wind and solar. “To achieve the nation’s decarbonization goals, it’s got to happen.”

Uranium mining in the United States hasn’t been profitable since the Russians flooded the global market with predatorily priced ore and processed fuel a decade ago.

Long before, the nation’s uranium enrichment industry, episodically idled by market paralyses and perpetually frozen in costly regulatory entanglements, had fallen into obsolescence.

In 1980, the United States produced and processed 90 percent of the uranium used by 251 nuclear power plants that generated 11 percent of the country’s electricity.

In 2021, only 5 percent of the uranium used by the 55 nuclear power plants operating in the United States—which now generate 20 percent of the nation’s electricity—was produced domestically.

After years of Russian market manipulation stymied profitable domestic production, Congress has responded since 2020 with a series of bills that could, if approved, collectively spend up to $5 billion by 2035 in an attempt to bring a domestic commercial uranium market back to life. //

But unfortunately, there’s nowhere in the United States for Wyoming mines to send ore for enrichment. Nationwide, only one plant in New Mexico has the capacity to enrich uranium for use in commercial nuclear reactors.

“Even if we were mining it now, we’re shipping it somewhere else [overseas] to get it enriched and refined,” Deti said. “When it comes to conversion and enrichment, we have no capacity to do that [in the United States]."

Operations Displays

View new displays below: Solar DART, Regional Directional Transfer, Generation Outages

Never forget that Ebenezer Scrooge was inspired by Thomas Malthus //

In other words, the underlying reason for the electricity emergency is the lack of natural gas, nuclear, and coal, which can provide reliable electricity in all weather conditions, unlike solar panels and wind turbines.

It’s true that solar panels and wind turbines can still operate in cold weather. There is often still sunlight and wind when it is cold. Snow can be brushed off of solar panels, and it is possible to de-ice frozen wind turbines.

But the sun often doesn’t shine during the hours people most need electricity and wind is not reliable enough to provide electricity during the winter. Right now, PJM is generating very little electricity from wind and has had to resort to burning oil, which is dirtier and less efficient than coal, and far worse than natural gas or nuclear.

An exciting advancement over prior AR Summits was the major role that customers played in presentations and hallway conversations. Though nuclear utility operating companies like Duke Energy, TVA, Southern Company and Ontario Power Generation (OPG) made important and encouraging presentations, the strong demand signals provided by Nucor – the largest steelmaker in the US, Dow – one of the largest chemical companies in the world, and Microsoft – one of the world’s largest data center operators – made an even bigger impact on most attendees.

Presentations from Nucore, Microsoft and Dow validated many of the concepts that have long motivated advanced nuclear developers. They showed that credible customers were willing to pay for process heat, always-on carbon free power, and behind the meter installations.

Each of the three said they were willing to assist entities that would own and operate the facilities in obtaining affordable financing by inking long-term, economically viable power purchase agreements (PPAs). Projects with PPAs from established, well-capitalized companies are almost as bankable as a captive base of ratepayers. None of them want to own or operate nuclear power plants.

This post is a sampling of information gleaned during the event. There may be additional posts based on presentations and conversations at the Summit. Several important players in the advanced nuclear community did not attend the conference. //

NuScale has attracted several strategic investors/partners that will help build its plants and/or buy power from those facilities. A notable recent addition to the NuScale team is Nucor, the largest steel maker in the United States.

Nucor is so excited about the capabilities that SMRs offer to meet some of its most challenging requirement that it sent Leon Topalian, its Chairman, President and CEO, to the summit to meet members of NIC and to provide a keynote address. (Attendees also appreciated Nucor’s hospitality as the sponsor of a rooftop welcoming reception.)

Aside: Topalian proudly reminded the audience that Nucor’s initial name was Nuclear Corporation of America. It long ago pivoted to focus on steel making but is now returning to its roots. End Aside.

Nucor operates 50 electric arc furnaces in the US. Its total electricity demand is about 50 GWe that has little variation during the 8760 hours of each per. Assuming Nucor facilities have capacity factors that are close to 90%, its electricity demand is almost 50% of the power produced by the current US nuclear fleet.

A coalition of more than 1,600 scientists critical of their peers’ hyperbolic claims about climate change drew a prominent recruit to sign their 2019 declaration that the climate “emergency” is a myth.

John Clauser, who won last year’s Nobel Prize in physics, became the second Nobel laureate last month to sign the document with 1,607 other scientists rebuking the idea of a climate crisis.

“Climate science should be less political, while climate policies should be more scientific,” the declaration organized by the Climate Intelligence Foundation (CLINTEL) reads. “Scientists should openly address uncertainties and exaggerations in their predictions of global warming, while politicians should dispassionately count the real costs as well as the imagined benefits of their policy measures.”

Last year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) debuted a roadmap to net-zero emissions that became the model for corporate bishops of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) standards. A June report from the Energy Policy Research Foundation criticized the initiatives outlined as a “green mirage.” The IEA roadmap, researchers wrote, “will dramatically increase energy costs, devastate Western economies, and increase human suffering.”

“The aim of global policy should be ‘prosperity for all’ by providing reliable and affordable energy at all times,” reads CLINTEL’s World Climate Declaration. “There is no climate emergency. Therefore, there is no cause for panic and alarm.”

Norwegian-American engineer Ivan Giaever, who won the Nobel Prize in physics in 1973, is also a signatory to the declaration. //

The World Climate Declaration also notes that carbon dioxide is plant food, “not a pollutant.”

“It is essential to all life on Earth,” the document reads.

In fact, reforestation is on the rise, promoted by a global “greening” effect proliferating plant growth.

Prescription for the Planet

by Tom Blees

"This is the most important book that has ever been written on sustainable development... You MUST read it! It is not A revolution, it is THE revolution, THE way to go."

• Bruno Comby Ph.D, Founder and President of Environmentalists for Nuclear Energy

Click here to download the entire book as a PDF courtesy of the author and SCGI.

The Integral Fast Reactor (IFR) is a fourth-generation fast nuclear reactor design that offers more efficiency and safety, while generating 1,000 times less waste than current light-water reactors, the predominant designs used in the US. It uses existing nuclear waste for fuel. The energy needs of the US can be supplied for over 1,000 years just using the existing nuclear waste now in storage.

1. Proven to be reliable and safe over almost 50 years of operational experience

• Ran for 30 years in the USA without any mishaps
• Chernobyl and TMI scenarios were tested on the IFR: the IFR reactor shut itself down w/o human intervention or active safety systems.
• Russians have been running commercially for 30 years without problem (BN-600)
• Passively safe (guaranteed by the physics). Does not require electricity, operator intervention, or active safety systems to shut down if it overheats.

2. The waste has 1,000 times less long-term radioactivity per unit of power than LWR (waste meaning what is no longer usable in the reactor).

3. Uses existing nuclear waste (DU, decommissioned bombs) for fuel. A variety of fuels can be used (any actinide), not just uranium. //

4. Using fast reactors, there is more energy in the trace uranium in the coal than we get from burning the coal. Extracting uranium from coal ash is on the verge of being economically competitive.

In just two decades Sweden went from burning oil for generating electricity to fissioning uranium. And if the world as a whole were to follow that example, all fossil fuel–fired power plants could be replaced with nuclear facilities in a little over 30 years. That's the conclusion of a new nuclear grand plan published May 13 in PLoS One. Such a switch would drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions, nearly achieving much-ballyhooed global goals to combat climate change. Even swelling electricity demands, concentrated in developing nations, could be met. All that's missing is the wealth, will and wherewithal to build hundreds of fission-based reactors, largely due to concerns about safety and cost. //

Based on numbers pulled by the research team from the experience of Sweden and France and scaled up to the globe, a best-case scenario for conversion to 100 percent nuclear power could enable the world to stop burning fossil fuels and start fissioning uranium for electricity within 34 years. Requirements for this shift of course would include expanded uranium mining and processing, a build-out of the electric grid as well as a commitment to develop and build fast reactors—nuclear technology that operates with faster neutrons and therefore can handle radioactive waste, such as plutonium, for fuel as well as create its own future fuel. "No other carbon-neutral electricity source has been expanded anywhere near as fast as nuclear," Qvist says.

Our Vision

Humanity already has the technology to implement a global energy revolution. We can now usher in a post-scarcity era while solving the most intractable problems that threaten life on Earth.
Our Mission

The Science Council for Global Initiatives, Inc. (SCGI) is an international nonprofit organization dedicated to informing the public and policymakers about technologies and strategies that can lead to an energy-rich world. SCGI provides a forum for many of the world's prominent scientists, authors and activists to collaborate and share their knowledge regarding solutions to the world's energy, resource and environmental problems.

Contrary to claims by opponents of nuclear energy that it is “unsafe,” “unclean,” and thus “unacceptable,” nuclear energy is the safest, cleanest, and among the most practical forms of power generation today. Unfortunately, opponents of this wonderful source of power are succeeding in their efforts to deceive people about it; and the deceived, in turn, are fueling legislation and regulations that shackle the nuclear industry. It is time to set the record straight and to defend this life-serving industry.

If I were Alexander

Since I am running out of things to say about nuclear power, it is time to play king-of-the-world. Suppose I were given the omnipotent capabilities to change the rules currently reserved for the NRC, what would I do to resurrect nuclear power in the United States and show humanity a solution to the Gordian knot of energy poverty and global warming?

The Progressive Case for Nuclear Energy
(A presentation prepared by Nucleation Capital in 2020, updated in 2021. Click the image to view the deck.)

I expected to hate this film; but that's not where I ended up. With a few glaring exceptions, the problem is not what is in the film. The problem is what is not. The crucial importance of cost is barely mentioned in passing. The fact that nuclear power was and could and should be the cheapest source of electricity is not even hinted at. And the elephant in the room, the NRC regulatory apparat, is totally ignored.

I came away thinking so close, and so far.

Never let a crisis go to waste. This may be one of the least original thoughts ever. It's been attributed to Niccolo Machiavelli, Saul Alinsky, and Rahm Emanuel among others. As Emanuel explained, a crisis ``is an opportunity to do things you could not do before". Trite but true.

The Federal bureaucracy, specifically the NRC and the EPA, present an insurmountable hurdle to the promise of cheap, reliable, pollution-free, nearly CO2 free nuclear power. They are incapable of change. Congressional prodding with pieties such as the Nuclear Energy Innovation and Modernization Act is slow walked by the NRC and then turned into even more onerous regulation. The ADVANCE Act if passed will have the same fate. Congress suborned by well endowed, wind/solar lobbies is not about to do anything that would make a real difference.

But this will change. Under the present deranged policy of promoting intermittent sources and discouraging dispatchable sources, it is only a matter of time before the nation suffers a string of debilitating brown outs and black outs. Congress will suddenly wake up to the fact that those lobbyists may have oodles of money, but they represent maybe 5% of Americans. The other 95% will be pissed.

The political beasts will be desperate to do something to keep feeding at the public trough. We must be in position to tell them what.

The Lessons that should have been learned

The Two Lies are Lies

This should have been the big take away. Three Mile Island brazenly and unmistakably exposed the nuclear establishment's two big lies.

1. The Negligible Probability Lie. The probability of a significant release is not negligible. The probability of the next release is 1.00. It is inevitable. It is only a matter of when.

The usual way that the nuclear establishment tells the Negligible Probability Lie is they throw out a bogusly small frequency number, say 1 in 17000 reactor years, expecting the public to interpret this as a ``no need to worry about it" number. But in a fully decarbonized, all nuclear world we will need at least 25,000 large reactors. So even if the 1 in 17000 number were correct, we could expect a TMI-or-larger release about once a year. The actual performance to date is about 1 TMI+ release every 4000 reactor years, in which case we are talking about roughly 6 TMI+ releases a year.

2. The Intolerable Harm Lie. The radiation harm associated with a release is not intolerable. In this case, if there was any harm, it was far too small to be detected. If the TMI release had been more than 1000 times larger as it was at Windscale, there would have been no detectable harm. If the TMI release had been 300,000 times larger as it was at Fukushima, there would still have been no detectable public harm due to radiation.

At one point, the Rogovin Report appears to realize this:

Just as the regulators must change their attitudes to appreciate that this [the public's] perception of risk cannot be dealt with by trying to convince the public that it ``can't happen", so renewed efforts must be made to educate that the risks and benefits of nuclear power must be weighed against the very real health and environmental risks associated with other forms of power generation.\cite{rogovin-1980}[p 91]

But there is no follow up. Nor does this insight show up in any of their recommendations. The problem is, if the two lies are false, then there is no need for an NRC. And neither the Rogovin nor the Kemeny report is going to go there. //

The utility filed a four billion dollar suit against the NRC alleging the NRC's failure to tell MetEd about what happened at Davis Besse caused the loss. The way this works is MetEd first had to file a complaint with the NRC. The NRC Commission rejected the complaint on the grounds that it is not responsible for what happens at a nuclear power plant.

The commission does not, thereby, certify to the industry that the industry's designs and procedures are adequate to protect its equipment or operations,\cite{upi-1981}

This rejection allowed MetEd to go to the Courts. The court came up with a different out. It turns out the Davis Besse loss of feedwater was listed in a routine monthly Licensee Event Report that the NRC sends out to all the plants. According to the court, that's all it had to do.

When an agency determines the amount of information necessary to fulfill its regulatory mission, it is exercising the essence of its discretionary function.\cite{yorkdailyrecord-1984}

Let me get this straight. The NRC admits it is not responsible for nuclear plant safety. And the courts say the NRC has the discretionary power not to tell the plants that the training that the NRC has approved and required is both wrong and dangerously misleading. What does it have to do?

To survive, the NRC must spread fear and then sell a bogus solution to that bogus fear. To survive, the NRC must promulgate the Two Lies, even if events like Three Mile Island prove both are false. That's what it has to do and continued to do.
People who screw up must pay

Accountability shows up almost no where in the Kemeny and Rogovin reports. There is one exception. The TMI Reactor Operators lost their licenses and had their careers ruined, for doing what they had been trained to do. [3] And when that failed, they did a pretty good job of coping with the resulting mess. They were not culprits; they were scapegoats. //

[3] This was based on an NRC Office of Inspection and Enforcement Report which pinned the blame squarely on the operators.\cite{nrc-oie} The problem was their mindset.

There is considerable evidence of a ``mindset", that overfilling the reactor cooling system (making the system solid) was to be avoided at almost any cost. Undue attention by the TMI operators to avoiding a solid system led them to ignore other procedural instructions and indications that the core was not being properly cooled.\cite{nrc-oie}[p 2]

Nowhere in this 800 page exercise in unapologetic deflection is there any admission that this strange mindset was a product of NRC approved and required training, nor that the NRC had ample, multiple warnings that the training was dangerously wrong.