110 Comments

  1. Now I know this might be a bit childish, but I hope Shumlin and friends get stuck with the SAFSTOR approach to decommissioning. 60 years is a long time to be reminded of a silly decision.

    He wants the area cleaned asap and dedicated to, well, maybe another thermal plant there. (A clean coal or gas plant)

    I hope Entergy sticks it to them. I think it is their decision to determine if the SAFSTOR approach will be taken.

  2. And on an optimistic note at the planetary level: nuclear opposition lately is directed mainly to the cost of building nukes. The waste is not a big issue but in the US.

    You can tell that something is palatable when money shapes itself into patterns never seen before.

    We see partnerships being built everywhere around the world without the US. The UK is the banker of the EU. They want in. China has the cash in the form of 1.1 trillion US dollars. How many nuclear plants is that ?

    Well the UK has made them a little place in the sun within the EU. They will be able to setup banks. Having Chinese banks operating in London will allow direct trading between the Yuan and the British pound, instead of going by way of the dollar as things are done now. Kill the transaction costs and improve liquidity one might think.

    The French are cash strapped and technology rich. They will partner with the chinese everywhere on the planet once the first EPR is up and running. Read my lips on that. They have built the relationship.

    Russia ? Well they are fully invested in nuclear research and are building, operating and taking the waste home. Thinking outside the box? But they are not done. The Russians are buying equity in the power utilities in Finland to help setup the deals.

    Smart US money is finding its way into nuclear without any help from the US Government. It will be like that for a long long time.

  3. He wants the area cleaned asap and dedicated to, well, maybe another thermal plant there.

    That would be almost the expected outcome. Fort St. Vrain, once a 330 MW nuclear power plant, is now a 1000 MW power plant burning natural gas.

    Or maybe Vermont will put a few solar panels there and call it a solar power plant, like they did at Rancho Seco (was 913 MW nuclear, now ~2 MW solar, the real power comes from the nearby Consumnes power plant, also located on the Racncho Seco property, which burns natural gas). Perhaps they too will convince themselves that they scored a “victory” by replacing nuclear with solar.

  4. I am a 28 year old living nearby in NH and Vermont is a state with no future. It already has the smallest economy of any state and when you adjust it for it’s higher than average cost of living it’s output gets even more sad. Vermont is also is the second oldest state in the union with one of the lowest birthrates and even with it’s undersized supply of young people Vermont likes to pursue policies that make anyone who wishes to have a future to leave. IBM already is firing people en masse because of serial idiocy from Montpelier. Way to go Shumiln! the only area that’s growing in VT is the Burlington area because of the college bubble. There is a considerable faction in the liberal wing that seems to think that they can form a functioning economy around coffee shops and farmers markets and that the wealth to purchase their Chinese-made smartphones, European cars, Chinese solar panels, Colombian coffee etc will just magically manifest itself into existence without the need ugly factories, steel mills, or power plants.

    Twenty years from now Vermont is going to be nothing but grey haired hippies living in dilapidated farms and the only income coming into the state will be whatever graft it’s two senators can bring in. Any young person with a functioning pair of legs and a thumb will have long ago hitched themselves sways from that futureless disaster of a state.

  5. Vermont Yankee isn’t large plant by nuclear plant standards… One of the smallest actually at 600 MW, but still it produced more electricity last year than every windmill and solar panel in New England, New York, and New Jersey combined.

  6. I’m with you, whether it is childish or not. I have no real interest in decomissioning per se (I want to build things, not tear them down), but in this case I hope Entergy stands by its decision to go with SAFSTOR. It saves them money, allows the decommissioning fund to grow, keeps the site free of the very harmful prospect of a gas-fired plant being put there, and, best of all, it will stick it to those bums like Shumlin and Sanders. Let them go to their graves knowing that VY is still there. The VY site is private property. Let Shumlin and Sanders stew about it. That’s the minimum they deserve for harming so many good people and their families.

  7. Rod,

    Do not blâme on malice that which can be attributed to stupidity.

    SONGS And Crystal River closures must be Linked to managérial incompétence.

    VT to lack of vision And pugnacity.

    Lots of graduates from Vermont Law School.

  8. I’ve always thought of Vermont as the place where old hippies from California go when they want to experience the four seasons again.

    Nuclear power advocates keep dancing around the elephant in the room. Look at the places in the US (or in the world) where nuclear plants are being built and where they are being shut down. See the pattern? This is not a coincidence. This is not just a result of dumb luck.

    When stupid people elect stupid politicians, who enact stupid policies, this is the natural result. The only thing that is surprising to me about Vermont Yankee is that Entergy — with help from the tireless efforts of good people like Angwin and Shaffer — was able to hold out this long.

  9. Twenty years from now Vermont is going to be nothing but grey haired hippies living in dilapidated farms and the only income coming into the state will be whatever graft it’s two senators can bring in.

    Heh … Vermont – the West Virginia of the North.

  10. Or you can look at interstate migration patterns, Or where virtually EVERY new industrial project is being constructed. How Many multi-billion dollar industrial/commercial facilities do you hear about being constructed in California? or New York? or New England? If you do hear about it there are often 2-3x more being shut down. There all in the South followed by a little in the Midwest. All the Nuke plants being constructed or planned are in the South.

    The Northeast and Cali have pursued policies that push up the cost of energy and production for decades, hindering their ability to produce REAL wealth and REAL purchasing power, and now Cali/NE have costs of living 30%-40% higher than the rest of the USA. You need a $60K income to equal a $40K income in the rest of the USA. These policies have hurt the middle class the most and what you now see in places like California now is a hollowed out economy with a small affluent upper class and a very large underclass. California has more billionaires than even the largest of European countries, but adjusted for cost of living, California has the highest poverty rate in the nation, and more people on Welfare than the next 4 or 5 states combined. While Cali and the NE have the highest per capita incomes still in nominal terms, adjusted for the cost of living they aren’t that special. Their real purchasing power has declined now for a long time, tracking their decline of real wealth production.

    You need to *produce* wealth to purchase wealth. If you don’t produce it yourself you must produce something of equal value to trade for it. The Northeast and Cali have hollowed themselves out for decades, and people have been emigrating away because of it.

    Producing wealth requires energy. Energy consumption correlates strongly with every societal characteristic you would consider desirable. The Greens think that wealth can be manifested into existence by the sheer will of their good intentions.

  11. Shumlin and his cronies still have an advantage – they can spend lots of taxpayer money on continuing lawsuits until they get their way, requiring Entergy to respond using $millions in corporate funds they would rather use more productively.

    I have heard that the legal expenses for defending VY from its host state have run into many tens of millions – a significant financial component in the decision to shutter the plant.

    If anyone deserves the epithet “let him freeze in the dark”, it is Shumlin. Unfortunately his ilk are usually the last to suffer from their own conniving.

  12. OK, they want to play that game, play it. Give it back to them in spades. Make them spend millions of state taxpayer dollars for those lawsuits. And then countersue them when they lose the case. Make them pay both ways. And take the money out of the decomissioning fund (since the lawsuits would presumably be over the decomissioning plan, that would be a legitimate use of those funds).

    This plant is a privately owned asset. The state can’t dictate to the owner what path to follow, as long as they choose a legal one. Last I checked, the NRC was okay with SAFSTOR.

  13. Daniel said: “SONGS And Crystal River closures must be Linked to managérial incompétence.” Pretty hard to argue that statement about CR3, but what accountability has the CEO had to face for that? He now has a similar position in a larger company, along with his severance package from Duke Energy. This problem is endemic in nuke power.
    I’m a little more sympathetic with SONGS, and have to admit I’d really hate to be a Util Exec these days, as they about can’t win. SONGS faced SG replacements a few years ago, along with the need to upgrade plant capacity. I’d guess their thinking was, with all the potential stumbling blocks (state util commission, interveners, cost, etc.) to both processes they’d go with doing both at one shot. Something most reasonable people would probably agree to do. But through no fault of SONGS, the company that built the original SGs is no longer in business (also none of the original PWR vendors of any flavor), so they had to go overseas. The end result problem for SONGS is the engineering for the upgrade got blown. The current required fix is not possible. Can’t replace the secondary side upper tube support plate surrounding the thousands of tubes to fix the high flow on the secondary side, and installing flow limiting baffles on the RCS side (because the flow on that side is too high for the engineering) is about like relicensing the plant. It’s possible the plant could have been de-rated (at least U2, U3 is junked), but again there is no certainty that would be successful.
    My guess is if Mitsubishi had been asked to clone the original SG design, they would have been OK, but they blew the upgrade. Decisions made 30 plus years ago set this trap. And no doubt it is people, not the technology. Lot of discussion on this thread about VY, again it is people problems. Every nuke state has a legislature making rules, utility commissions, etc., all different. Different lobbyists with different priorities. Pretty hard to fight that system when we can’t even ID the bad guys… because they are everywhere.

  14. I hate to say it but I have to: Yes, you should be more emotional but I notice a lot of negativity among the nuclear professionals, even on this board. For example, you think VY closure is a done deal: Why aren’t engineers telling the Entergy to keep the place open or at least not take it apart? There is the chance that they could change their minds. I know it is hard to get corporations to do anything but people in New England got Nabisco to bring back Crown Pilot crackers so it might be worth trying. Or the question of why a nuclear plant cannot be restarted. Why is it that way? I know it is more complex to restart than a school/store/restaurant/salon/glass factory/auto plant/fossil fuel powerplant/emergency department but all those have been restarted and people wonder why not. Yet you all seem to happy it is that way. Why not have a team of operators at the ready for when a place has to restart? After all, they had to assemble this team when the plant first opened so why can it not be done again? There was an article about a VY operator who says he cannot go work at another nuclear plant becuase he has a “very specific skill set”. I hear the same from the chefs who have failing restaurants tell the same thing to Chef Ramsey. Why is a license for one plant only? That is kind like a doctor can only ever work in 1 hospital. I can only stand brand specific buy why only one plant?

  15. I heard they want a “peace park” on the site after tearing out the plant’s roots down to bedrock.

  16. I kind of wonder that too. After all, the people in Vermont did not always feel that way, or VY would never have been built in the first place. Wasn’t it part of a group of “Yankee” power stations that were about the earliest but they are all gone now? Be interesting to know the history of the “Yankee” series, were they built by 1 company?

  17. Not so fast with SONGS. They could have ran the plant at 70% capacity and not encounter any problem.

    Instead they decided to ask the NRC for advice. Say no more. When asked, the NRC will do the tricycle trick on you.

    Tricycle trick ? OK let me tell a NRC tricycle story.

    From William Tucker:

    I saw a large tricycle sitting in front of the administrative building. I asked my guide what purpose it served. He explained that no cars were allowed “inside the fence” and employees often found themselves walking long distances around the site in the winter cold. So they had finally asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission if they could ride bicycles. The NRC considered the matter for eight months before coming back with a word that bicycles would be too dangerous but it would allow a tricycle.

  18. Realistically, Entergy just has to hold their ground until the VT state government is under new management. As the debacle of renewables mandates gradually becomes more apparent, this may become more likely.

  19. Greetings!

    I only soberly wish that the whole nuclear community would’ve been a hell of a lot more emotional and passionate about the attacks and smears nuclear energy — and their careers and professions — have been receiving the last thirty years, going as totally unchallenged as a welcome mat. Hell of a time to play catch up in the U.S. at least — and we’re still not even doing that in the nuclear public education realm! Have you checked out cable science shows lately? Astronomers and archaeologists are coming out of the woodwork! Anything nuclear is still a black hat or shoved mum in the basement! Any FUD-busting nukers? Can pigs fly? China has the ball now it seems and all the power to them! And to think we’re the ones who first lit the fire back 1941! Unbelievable!

    James Greenidge
    Queens NY

  20. Let’s keep things in perspective. England was the first country to have a civil nuclear reactor operating.

    Now China is investing and becoming the nuclear banker of the world.

    You can’t fight the trend.

    A lot of countries are in the band wagon. I an watching the parade from across the pond.

  21. There were four Yankee plants, Yankee Rowe, Connecticut Yankee, Vermont Yankee, and Maine Yankee. They were all owned and built by groups of joint owners, none of the owners had a majority interest. Originally the idea was they would all be operated by the Yankee Atomic Company.

    Maine Yankee was the first to be decommissioned due to problems with the electrical systems documentation.

    Next was Yankee Rowe, decommissioned due to it’s small size making it uncompetitive with gas.

    Connecticut Yankee was next, also decommissioned due to lack of competitiveness with gas.

    Finally Vermont Yankee being shutdown due to the weird New England energy market rules.

    In general friction among the joint owners contributed to the retirement of these units.

  22. Rod,
    If you are anti-nuclear, you are pro-fossil. You are not fighting carbon. You are helping it into the atmosphere.
    The last sentence in that simple statement will make nuclear folks even less trustworthy as it is not true.

    All anti-nuclear people favor renewable and not carbon.
    Even in Germany where CO2 fluctuations deliver a rise in the last few years, the target is clear: 100% renewable. With first big goal: >80% renewable in 2050, which implies <20% of all electricity is via carbon. That is a huge improvement compared to now. A goal no nuclear country has with that much of public support

  23. You HAVE to be a paid troll.  Such idiocy simply cannot co-exist with such good grammar in a second language.

  24. @Bas

    All anti-nuclear people favor renewable and not carbon.

    Baloney. As just one example that turns your “all” into a misstatement, Gerhard Schroeder left his post as an antinuclear politician who “negotiated” a plan to close all German nuclear plants before their end of life. Within one month after leaving his post as Chancellor, he was given a huge bonus as part of his new job with Gazprom.

    He remains a high level executive with that Russian state owned methane monopoly.

  25. “All anti-nuclear people favor renewable and not carbon.”

    Absolutely and totally false. Robert Kennedy Jr. came right out and said that by favoring wind generation he was really pushing for more use of natural gas. Anyone who favors more use of natural gas is no “environmentalist”, since methane itself is probably the most harmful greenhouse gas out there.

    Even your Great God Amory Lovins has come out in favor of burning carbon-based fuels. For a long time he was a passionate advocate of fluidized bed combustion of, of all things, coal. How do you like that for being a “not carbon” advocate?

    Man, the stupidity of some of you anti-nuke kooks is really something to see.

  26. Man, the stupidity of some of you anti-nuke kooks is really something to see.

    And Bas is giving it his all to exhibit it here. Sometimes I wonder whether he’s being paid overtime for his efforts.

  27. Atomikrabbit
    Which debacle of renewable? where?

    I only see cost of solar going down much faster than the 8%/a predicted.
    Wind going down too, further than I assumed (I once thought that a 8MW wind turbine would be the max. size with present technology. Turned out to be wrong.)

    No issue with supply reliability.
    ?

  28. Daniel

    The waste is not a big issue but in the US.

    The waste is a big issue almost everywhere!
    It was a very convincing issue in the German debate that delivered the Energiewende in 2000.

    It is such an issue because no progress has been made during the last 50years.
    Worse, no new solution is visible at the horizon.

  29. Are you blind Bas?

    Germany has had stagnant carbon intensity of electricity generation for more than a decade now. And the German government has admitted that the carbon intensity of electricity generation will remain stagnant for another 10 years.

    Meanwhile, estimates of the cost of the ‘Energiewende’ range from 100 to 250 billion euros for Germany. This hard-earned (tax-payer!) money has simply been destroyed by people like you, with absolutely nothing to show for it.

    It is normal to call this a ‘debacle’. Otherwise we have to find a new definition for the word ‘debacle’.

  30. So Germany has cheap macro scale storage now? I suppose you’re going to tell me that you can make a baby in one month with nine women.

    The simple fact is that wins and solar will never be anything more than a minor supplement without large scale cheap energy storage. Were closer to fusion technology wise than that. No amount of price reductions is going to make a solar panel produce power at night. Storing seven days worth of electricity here in the US with lead batteries woul require tens times the amount of known recoverable lead reserves.

  31. I’m laughing on the inside thinking about how many gearboxes an 8 MW wind turbine is going to shred through. The people who buy those are going to be hating life pretty quick.

  32. estimates of the cost of the ‘Energiewende’ range from 100 to 250 billion euros for Germany.

    100 billion Euros = 12 EPRs at the FOAK Olkiluoto price = 19.2 GW capacity.
    250 billion Euros = 48 GW capacity.

    Germany’s 2010 electric consumption of ~550 TWH is an average of about 62 GW.

  33. … how many gearboxes an 8 MW wind turbine is going to shred through.

    Hence the need for rare earth metals.

  34. @Engineer-Poet
    Thanks of your compliment regarding my English!
    _____
    @Brian
    Indeed I was occupied in the weekend.
    Thanks for your interest!

  35. This Bas character has a standard of reasoning which runs something like this: Chairs have legs, we have legs, therefore we are chairs.

  36. Or maybe he just needs more fiber in his diet.

    Meanwhile, why do you even answer him? I ask the question about why not be able to restart plants and I guess no one has an answer to that one. If restarting is not possible, then maybe nuclear professionals should dream up a way to make it possible.

  37. Meanwhile, why do you even answer him?

    Why should I allow someone to spread his ridiculous BS across the comments section here like a farmer spreading manure over his field?

    Whether Bas is, as he claims, simply an old fart with too much time on his hands or whether he’s an agent who is paid to spread disinformation is irrelevant. Misinformed, misanthropic a-holes like him have had the field to themselves for too long now. If we don’t challenge this nonsense, then who will? If not now, then when?

    Besides, this guy provides a perfect example of how intellectually and morally bankrupt the anti-nuclear side is. But nobody will realize that unless someone like me points it out.

    As for your question about restarting, it’s a complicated matter, which is probably why nobody bothered to address it. First of all, the decision has not yet been made about what will be done with the plant, but even if it is mothballed, restarting the plant at some later time is not a trivial matter. Most of the difficulties have to do with regulatory red tape (and the associated costs of such regulation), not any physical or engineering challenges, but this is the world in which we live.

  38. @Bas
    So when you have covered every mountain, dammed all rivers and covered the land with solar panels. Will you be happy then?

    Your energy policy is the same as transforming our nature to one giant industrial park.

  39. I liken Bas to someone spray painting graffiti. If you ignore them then you end up with a graffiti covered neighborhood and all that any visitor sees is the graffiti. The only way to deal with it is to paint over it whenever it pops up.

  40. Yeah, they were all closed during the last gas glut. Getting seabrook open was also an ordeal here. It was supposed to be a two unit plant but it ended up with one. North Easterners are the most anti nuclear people in the US which is sad because this is the area that would benefit the most from nuclear power. We have no FF resources of our own and we’re at the end of the supply lines so we pay the highest prices. Even if renewable energy were feasible we have lousy resources and a high population density. The northeast would really benefit from 6-8 GW of new nuclear.

  41. ‘What kiddy playground……’ This coming from someone who only has smear attacks and FUD to bring to this site. If you had interpreted my remark correctly, which clearly you haven’t, then you would understand that it was an attack on the arguments ( based on outrageous lies) rather than on the person. I could refute those arguments, as well as the similar dubious spin you have published on this site before, but why bother? Rod, Brian and others already do an excellent job of that. So dont accuse me of childish behaviour when you have excelled at it. Get over yourself ‘jaagu’

  42. robjoh
    October 29, 2013 at 2:58 AM
    @Bas
    So when you have covered every mountain, dammed all rivers and covered the land with solar panels. Will you be happy then?
    Your energy policy is the same as transforming our nature to one giant industrial park.

    Right on Robjoh! That should be the tagline for Pandora’s Promise!

  43. ddpalmer
    October 29, 2013 at 7:37 AM
    I liken Bas to someone spray painting graffiti. If you ignore them then you end up with a graffiti covered neighborhood and all that any visitor sees is the graffiti. The only way to deal with it is to paint over it whenever it pops up.

    Unfortunately the bogus graffiti he and his sort spew is lapped up like alcoholic Kool Aid by millions of the clueless gullible.

  44. Rod & Wayne,

    My all was not meant to take literally. Not correct, sorry.
    Yes, people change opinion sometimes.

    Schroeder needed support of the Greens to stay Chancellor.
    His signing of the Energiewende in 2000 was not renewable belief. It was a necessity to realize his reform program, as without that new elections would be inevitable.

    Schroeder became chairman of the board of Nord Stream, owned by Gazprom, 2 German utilities, Dutch Gasunie, French GDF Suez.

    The Nord Stream pipeline through the Baltic sea stagnated due to quarrels with Putin. It became urgent when the Belarus dictator made a remark that Germany should show more gratitude as he allowed the gas to flow through his country (for which he had a lucrative contract already)! Gas that heats most German houses.
    So Schroeder being a good friend of Putin, took the job and turned Nord Stream into a success.

    Nord Stream is primarily for heating German houses. And electricity cannot do that within an acceptable time frame for an affordable price.

  45. Engineer-poet, robjoh, Mitch, a.o.

    This study regarding the costs of German solar-panels, etc. shows quite different figures: http://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/en/publications/veroeffentlichungen-pdf-dateien-en/studien-und-konzeptpapiere/recent-facts-about-photovoltaics-in-germany.pdf

    It also delivers many other answers.
    Are tennants subsidizing home owners?
    Influences on German electricity prices?
    PV-panels overload the grid?
    Predictability of Solar production?
    Storage needs.

  46. Brian,
    Rare earth metals are used in the permanent magnets. Can be avoided against a relative small price.

    As long as the capacity (MW) of Wind turbines doubles with each new generation while the cost per MWh goes down with 30%, it is still immature technology. Just as the gearbox problems show. With mature technologies improvements are <10% such as with cars, passenger planes, etc.

    That phase may be reached in ~2040 when the standard Wind turbine capacity is ~20MW while the load / capacity factor is also better.

  47. Rare earth metals are used in the permanent magnets. Can be avoided against a relative small price.

    Bas – The rare earth metals are used to avoid the problems with the gear boxes, idiot. Please don’t try to lecture me, because you clearly have no idea how this technology works.

    That phase may be reached in ~2040 when the standard Wind turbine capacity is ~20MW

    Geez … I swear that you get even dumber with every comment you post here.

    A 20 MW wind turbine? Really?! Can I also look forward to the 6 GW nuclear reactor about that time?

    I realize that you have no understanding of engineering or economics, Bas, but could you do us all a favor and not make it so blatantly obvious?

  48. The rare earth metals are used to avoid the problems with the gear boxes, idiot.

    @Brian Mays

    Enercon direct drive turbines have no gearbox and no permanent magnets. Are they the alchemists of the wind industry?

    Other companies are looking at superconducting wire for very large and economically competitive turbines offshore, or nanostructured magnets.

    Give your exceptional engineering expertise on these matters … how is it that rare earths are essential and fundamental for direct drive (gearless) generators again? If you have some relevant insights to offer on these matters … we’re more than willing to hear it.

  49. Enercon direct drive turbines have no gearbox and no permanent magnets.

    EL – Yes, I’m aware of these types of designs.

    Are they the alchemists of the wind industry?

    No, they just take a performance hit from having to generate the magnetic field with electricity. There’s no such thing as a free lunch.

    Read more carefully. I said that rare earths are used to get away from needing a gearbox. I never said that they were the only way, but they do provide better performance, which is why they are so popular in designs.

    Never let it be said that renewable folks aren’t dreamers. There’s nothing like needing to cool part of your wind turbine to the temperature of liquid nitrogen or below. And people think that gearboxes are hard to maintain. Sheesh!

  50. Tell me about it. The crazies in the NE threw away a perfectly operable plant in Shoreham. Cuomo (mafia Mario) should have been strung up for that one. They even trashed a perfectly benign research reactor at Brookhaven Lab (High Flux Beam Reactor). The lives of a good many very fine people were ruined by trashing Shoreham and the HFBR. Now its happening with VY. What kind of diabolical, evil minds do people have that they would celebrate the taking away of so many of their fellow citizens’ livelihoods and careers?

  51. Ah, great, so Germany is now even more beholden to Russia for supplies of natural gas which they are making their very lifeblood because of their stupid, emotion-driven energy policy. That’s really going to help them from an energy security viewpoint, being utterly dependent on a country which just a few decades ago had leaders saying things like “we will bury you”, and now puts in charge a retired KGB field spook.

  52. Never let it be said that renewable folks aren’t dreamers. There’s nothing like needing to cool part of your wind turbine to the temperature of liquid nitrogen or below. And people think that gearboxes are hard to maintain.

    Yes.  I’m sure you’re correct.  GE, Northrop Grumman, General Atomics, Kawasaki, and others are just dreamers and have no idea what they are talking about.  Engineering drop outs … the lot of them.

  53. I’m as pro nuke as anyone can be having become interested in FUSION in 1958 and studying nuclear physics; nuclear chemistry and geology at Northeastern Univ and Boston College.
    After a short stint as a Nuclear Weapons Crew Chief in the Far East during the Vietnam War, I returned to Boston and ran a seismic field crew (1968-69) doing site surveys on Seabrook;Vernon; Wiscassett; Pilgrim; North and South Anna (their major problems are tritium leaking into the ground water. God forbid it gets into the aquifer for Cape Cod.)
    I testified before NRC at the Seabrook hearings in 2011 Re: 6.0 eartquake due off NE coast overdue and Fukashima “Black Swan” event possibilities offshore and again at Plymouth, MA hearing on Pilgrim shutdown and 60 years dry cast storage on site. They didn’t like the townspeople becoming aware of “What do you do with Nuclear Waste, you WIPP IT!! to New Mexico.
    Unless the population is educated on the safety and viabilty of nuclear power by god knows what methods, we are doomed to intense Global Warming from Natural Gas expansion in replacement plants for old can’t compete Large 30-40 year old NPP’s with no vision for replacement with SMR’s. I’m working with Alex Rezvoi hopefully with his Late Gen 4 Early Gen 5 new core SMR design

  54. I don’t live in Vermont. I’ve never been to Vermont. I work at a coal plant in the Midwest. They closed Vermont Yankee. They closed Kewaunee. You know what they’ve closed a lot more of? Coal Plants! There’s been about 150 closed since the year 2000 with many more to come. No coal. No Nuclear. No lights? I work on a project to clean flue gas. The company I work for is spending billions on cleanup. No additional electricity will be generated from this work. Is it needed? I don’t really know.

    Maybe, just maybe, all these plant closings will be an opportunity for something better. I’m talkin’ Thorium here. I’ve been reading about the LFTR. This could be a panacea! It’s time to shout down the whackos of “The Friends of The Earth,” “Sierra Club,” and their ilk. Their are real problems to be solved, but their way will ruin more than Vermont. They will ruin the whole country.

  55. Another Daniel, when they shut down a coal plant do they DECON or Safestore them? When I drive to my sister on the way there is a 100 year old coal plant that has not run for decades and is a terrible eyesore. I wish they would be forced to Decon the place. At least a safestored nuclear plant won’t be as bad looking for the next 60 years.

  56. EL – In case you haven’t noticed, they place entire nuclear reactors into ships and boats. Compared to that, putting in a cryogenic unit is a cakewalk.

    There’s a big difference in what designers can practically put in a ship or a large power plant compared to what can practically be put into a wind turbine. The amount that one is willing to pay for maintenance costs differs greatly between the two. In this case, the dreamers must demonstrate that the cryogenic unit has less maintenance issues that the well-understood gear box. These turbines are usually sited in remote locations (e.g., out at sea) with no full-time maintenance staff to handle issues as they arise and before they become serious problems. Compare that to the situation on board a ship with a full-time crew.

    We engineers think about these things. We don’t just blindly post links to advertisements, press releases, and sales brochures. That’s the purview of advertising agencies, propagandists, and idiots.

    If I’m going to be skeptical here of vaporware posing as new nuclear reactor designs — and I express my skepticism all the time — why are you at all surprised if I’m skeptical of vaporware posing as a new kind of wind turbine technology?! I’ve seen a lot of vaporware in my time, so today I believe it when I see it. Please come back when they’ve actually built some of these things on a commercial scale. Until then, I politely ask you to keep your eristic opinions to yourself. Thank you.

  57. Brian,
    A 20 MW wind turbine? Really?!
    Yes.
    The EU (Brussels) spent money on a study regarding the biggest viable wind turbines. That study showed that 20MW wind turbines are feasible with present technologies.

    Remember that some years ago 200KW turbines were considered as huge.
    Then 2MW were considered as the best.
    Now we have 8MW turbines, near massive roll-out….

    As bigger wind turbines reach higher in the air, more production per km2.
    Shorter interconnection lines per MW between the turbines.
    The bigger generators also allow more advanced techniques (higher yields).
    etc.

    Btw.
    These giant steps forward also show the immature state of present wind turbines.

  58. The EU (Brussels) spent money on a study regarding the biggest viable wind turbines. That study showed that 20MW wind turbines are feasible with present technologies.

    Ah … so a “study” says so. Well, I can point to studies by companies who promise that they can build a nuclear reactor that is the size of a hot tub. You could stick one in your basement and power your neighborhood.

    I tell you what … let’s not bring either one up again until they actually exist. OK?

    These giant steps forward also show the immature state of present wind turbines.

    If you really believe that, then have I got a deal for you! It’s prime real estate in a major North American city. I’ll cut you a very sweet deal on this first-class, one-of-a-kind bridge. Interested?

  59. Wayne,
    Sorry that I expressed myself not clear.

    Germany was already dependent on Russian gas. The old pipeline that feeded Russian gas to Germany, goes through Belarus. And the dictator of Belarus threatened to close the pipe. Not an imaginary threat.

    Ukraine did that a few years earlier (partially) with a pipe that feeds some S-European countries and Hungary, etc. They had a real hard time (happened of course in winter). And that was only because Ukraine had a quarrel with Russia about the gas price.

    So the Belarus threat / blackmail made Nord Stream an urgent project.
    Hence an excellent powerful politician that could solve the for years ongoing quarrels with Putin and other nations (a.o. Sweden), was urgently needed!
    Schroeder was the right guy (may be the only) for that job.

    The Energiewende is going to make Germany also less dependent on Russian gas. Especially when one of their many upscaling & improvement projects regarding electricity to gas/fuel conversion, becomes a success.

  60. Joris,
    Please read my post(s) more accurate.
    Your solutions do not take away the simple fact that
    it is a big issue everywhere! Generating debate, etc.

    Btw.
    The main reason for those discussions:
    Those ‘solutions’ concern storage, which imply that many thousands of generations after us are charged with the difficult task to manage the dangerous stuff. Difficult if the rock, etc. in which it is stored get in turmoil, etc.

    First small signs are visible in Germany where waste will have to be removed from the stable salt formations that turned out to be not enough stable in the end.
    Costs; ~€100billion? Taxpayer!
    Similar at Sellafield where the waste a solution has to be found for the waste.
    Costs ~ €100billion. Taxpayer!
    First signs of the huge waste disposal subsidies that NPP’s get!

  61. It will make them even more dependent on Russian natural gas. That is the only viable backup power source for unreliable energy sources like wind and solar. You need the ability to bring capacity on-line in a hurry when the sun goes down or gets blocked by clouds, or the wind stops blowing or blows too fast. Its the only way to maintain any level of reliability for their grid. Quick-start gas turbines and gas-fired boilers are really the only way to do it. Germany is going to be utterly beholden to Russian gas supplies. Not a good situation from a national security viewpoint.

  62. “Hence the need for rare earth metals.”

    IIRC, the Vestas 8MW turbine uses a gearbox though.

    The switch to rare earths also increases the costs of Wind Turbines by about 30%, which have already roughly doubled in cost since 2004… I thought RE costs were only supposed to go down forever??? When the solar glut ends and all these subsidized Chinese producers running on negative/zero margins consolidate and a floor is found there and prices start going up or staying flat… Watching the RE pumper’s heads explode is going to be entertaining.

    Most of the US windfarms have gearboxes. I’m positive that after the 10 year PTC expires, when most of the aging wind farms will be working at a much lower CF and looking at their second gearbox replacement, they’ll probably be abandoned. I bet the rent-farmers who push these thing also conveniently left out the need for a decommissioning fund so these ugly hulks will be there for a long time until oxidization and gravity finally win the battle.

    Wind power is the most useless form of power there is. Solar has it’s niches, but wind energy is complete junk.

  63. ZachF
    so these ugly hulks will be there for a long time until oxidization and gravity finally win the battle.
    Any civilized state in Europe has rules that oblige the owner to decommission old, left buildings (hence wind turbines) in a decent way. Don’t you have those?

  64. I bet the rent-farmers who push these thing also conveniently left out the need for a decommissioning fund so these ugly hulks will be there for a long time until oxidization and gravity finally win the battle.

    Knowing some of the people I know and what they can do, I’d bet that the scrap value would get them out of there sooner rather than later.  Lots of copper in the generators, and steel towers aren’t exactly without markets.

  65. Wayne,
    Consider the German results: 15minutes down time per year per connection, while UK, France have more than an hour down time and US ~4hours,

    So you should conclude that the Germans know to manage the grid in conditions with a lot of renewable!

    ability to bring capacity on-line in a hurry when the sun goes down or gets blocked by clouds, or the wind stops blowing or blows too fast.
    So the Germans use excellent weather and load forecasting!
    They find that especially production from solar it quite accurate to predict!

    Probably also because the many solar production facilities are spread over a big area (many roofs in many villages), so the % that the sky will be clouded delivers already good prediction!

  66. Sure they can have high reliability, because they have backup power! That is what I am saying!! They can burn more fossil fuels to give them the reliability they need! And they are!! And, the last time I checked, the sky is 100% covered by night, which happens about half of the time every day!!! You can’t avoid night!!! And if your “excellent” weather forecasting and “excellent” load forecasting says that there will be a significant load during and extended period of bad weather, where do you go for your power?!?! You know as well as I do! You go back to burning fossil fuels, maybe that gas coming in from Russia that you are so utterly dependent upon!!!!

  67. @ Wayne SW

    A tremendous amount of offshore wind capacity—from 100 MW to 13,000 MW—is expected to play a major role in Germany’s transition to sourcing 80% of its power from renewables by 2050. However, Energiewende —the country’s energy transformation—has often been hampered by disruptions to the connection of offshore wind parks in the North Sea, stemming from delays in planning and building. This August, to the relief of grid operator TenneT, which bought the 11,000-kilometer-long grid network from E.ON in 2011 and has been tasked with connecting all wind parks in the North Sea, the infrastructure for connecting offshore wind farms has finally begun to take shape.

    On Aug. 26, ABB installed the DolWind1 offshore wind connector platform—what it says is the “world’s highest-voltage offshore converter station” in the North Sea. The 320 kV station has an 800-MW power transmission capacity and will convert alternating current from three wind farms off the coast of Germany into high-voltage direct current (HVDC) for transmission to the mainland. And on the same day, Siemens Energy finished installing the 576-MW HVDC HelWin1 offshore platform, also in the North Sea, to link two offshore wind farms—Nordsee Ost and Meerwind—to the mainland …

    http://www.powermag.com/giant-wind-power-sockets-installed-in-the-north-sea/

    This lack of connectivity has been a problem area for the Germans. Now we will see a big jump in wind generated power in Germany.

  68. Wayne,
    You forget that the end target of Germany is 100% renewable.
    Just as already reached by a number of countries.

  69. So desperately running and stumbling and going broke to blindly spoil pristine mountains and seashores to flee a power source proven reliable compact and safe and already in place just because of a rare natural incident thousands of miles away. Yes, Germany deserves ruined natural vistas and environment if they’re that inane chasing pies in the skies.

  70. @Bas

    Do those European rules include an enforcement mechanism or a requirement to prove that the required resources exist? It is difficult to force a bankrupt owner to do anything.

    Decommissioning wind turbines and their tall towers is not a trivial matter; there are numerous examples in the US where they have been simply retired in place. In almost no case are the deep foundations removed.

  71. There is not a single country with any significant industry that is 100% solar and wind. Your claim is only true when you consider hydro, geothermal and biomass. Two of which require specific limited conditions to be viable.

    Although technically true your claim is irrelevant and disingenuous. As has been pointed out to you time and again. Especially when the discussion is on your favorite unreliables, solar and wind.

  72. Re: Rod: “Decommissioning wind turbines and their tall towers is not a trivial matter; there are numerous examples in the US where they have been simply retired in place. In almost no case are the deep foundations removed.”

    Those Vermont anti-nukers demanding such of VY are just doing so out of sheer spite.

    James Greenidge
    Queens NY

  73. ZachF – Yes, I agree.

    However, I also agree with EP, I’ve thought for some time that in about 20 years or less, some enterprising fellow is going to put together a solid business (for a little while, at least) tearing down these broken monstrosities and salvaging the material. Some wind farms have already suffered from scavengers trying to steal the copper from the facility.

    The only question to me is whether it’s done legally or illegally and whether it is the taxpayer who will pick up the tab.

    In almost no case are the deep foundations removed.

    Rod – If you know how much reinforced concrete is in those buried foundations, you understand why.

    By the way, does broken wind capacity that no longer runs still count as wind capacity in these statistics that get constantly cited?

  74. @Brian Mays

    Scavenging valuable materials is not the kind of decommissioning that most of us believe is required. It implies that all of the stuff that has little or no value will be left behind, probably in a less stable condition than before the scavengers arrived.

    Since I have some understanding of the physics associated with stabilizing a 100-150 meter tall tower holding a massive rotating blade and a heavy nacelle containing generator/reduction gear machinery at the top of the tower, I have a pretty good idea for the amount of foundational material required.

  75. Rod
    Do those European rules include an enforcement mechanism
    If you do not (or not well), government will tell you to do it. After repeated reminder, government will organize decommission and send you the bill.
    And government has rather powerful tools to enforce payment.
    I do not know what happens in case op bankrupt. Chance that debts to government are preferential to other debts.

    If people can see it from a road, it is part of the public space. And it is the task of government to keep public space pleasant / congenial, as we all have to spend some time in it.

  76. @Wayne & ddpalmer

    extended period of bad weather, where do you go for your power?
    Suppose it is unexpected.
    So they have spinning reserve as well as other (a.o. demand side management, batteries). Furthermore they use (pumped) storage and hydro. That is enough for a day.
    That day is enough to bring the necessary fluidized bed power plants on line again. Those can burn waste+biomass together with some lignite or other fuel.

    So even now, German electricity generation can operate without any gas.

    Btw.
    They can also buy (somewhat more expensive) Dutch gas if necessary. The Dutch transport operator, Gasunie, even owns major share of the German gas grid…

  77. I don’t trust anybody who touts unreliable energy source installed capacity without first providing a number for capacity factor. All the installed capacity in the world won’t do squat if your primary unreliable energy source (wind) isn’t blowing. California has found this out the hard way. A few years ago when they had their bad heat waves the wind capacity factor was around 5%. That is worse than laughable.

    So if your plan is to blanket the North Sea with unreliable wind platforms, I’d say you’re going to fail, and fail hard. You’re going to be burning more natural gas, coal, and lignite, polluting the atmosphere, acidifying the oceans, destroying life on the planet. Way to go, whack jobs.

  78. @Bas

    Your response has nothing even slightly to do with my comment. So why did you address that response to me?

    Oh and in case you missed it (well lets be real you did not miss it, you ignored it) Germany’s pump storage facilities are being shut down.

  79. I have a few comments on what I have been reading. Please feel free to correct me if I am wrong. I am a mechanic at Indian Point power plant. I defend nuclear power on web sites, write letters to my local newspapers. I do show emotion when I argue. I have had River keeper speakers yell at me call me a HIT MAN FOR ENTERGY! I have argued with an anti-nuke at the baseball hall of fame in the middle of the plaque room Here are my points. If you build wind turbines that produce more power don’t you have to put bigger generators and cables in them? There for you would lose power at lower wind speeds. The other argument I have for Germany is isn’t France nuclear power a back up for their power?

  80. @Tom
    Of course a 20MW wind turbine needs a bigger generator and cable than a small 2MW wind turbine. And that is installed (incl. grid adaptation).
    Get the impression you were looking for something else?

    Back up:
    It is more the other way around.
    This spring Germany acted as the backup facility / supplier for France. France had some NPP’s out, and had not enough generation power when a sudden cold wave struck the country. Germany has lot of over-capacity and is by far the biggest electricity exporter in NW-Europe. Netherlands import lots of their electricity against prices our gas plants cannot compete against.

    If you want to know more about how the Germans turn the intermittent nature of wind/solar into very reliable electricity supply for the next 10-20years, read this nice overview.

  81. “That day is enough to bring the necessary fluidized bed power plants on line again. Those can burn waste+biomass together with some lignite or other fuel.”

    So, you admit that you are okay with burning carbon-based fuels, as long as it avoids the use of nuclear. You are, in fact, pro-carbon. You are throwing millions of more tons of CO2 into the atmosphere, increasing greenhouse gas concentration, causing the pH of the oceans to become more acidic, both of which will, if continued for a time, result in massive environmental damage. You are no friend of the environment. You are advocating its destruction. But at least now you have documented your support for that catastrophe.

  82. @ Wayne SW

    Capacity factor is not the criteria for wind power. Everyone knows that the capacity factor for wind is around 30-35% annually. So engineers think of wind as generating 30-35% of the rated capacity – never 100%.

    As a Californian, we have no problem with the variability of wind and solar. We are adding both at record numbers. To make up for the variability of wind and solar, California has lots of hydro power. Also California just passed legislation the three major utilities in California must provide energy storage:

    The California Public Utilities Commission … unanimously established an energy storage target of 1,325 MW that California’s largest investor-owned utilities, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Southern California Edison, and San Diego Gas & Electric, must meet by 2020.

    The decision will help California optimize the grid with measure such as peak reduction, contribute to reliability needs, and defer transmission and distribution upgrade investments … It will also help the state integrate renewables per its 33% by 2020 renewable portfolio standard and to aid the state in goals to cut greenhouse gas emissions to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050.

    http://www.powermag.com/cpuc-issues-nations-first-energy-storage-mandate/?hq_e=el&hq_m=2771072&hq_l=5&hq_v=17b51a8303

  83. @jaagu

    Capacity factor is not the criteria for wind power. Everyone knows that the capacity factor for wind is around 30-35% annually. So engineers think of wind as generating 30-35% of the rated capacity – never 100%.

    I sure hope that engineers take into account the true variability and do not model wind as some kind of predictable 30-35% of rated capacity.

    During a California heat wave a couple of years back, the entire state’s wind infrastructure generated less than 5% of its rated capacity for several days in a row due to the way weather works in a high pressure area.

    On other days, fronts can drive the infrastructure to the point where all of the turbines are producing near their nameplate and that onslaught can happen in a matter of minutes. Somehow, the grid must be designed to adapt – but the wind generators don’t pay the cost.

  84. The California Public Utilities Commission … unanimously established an energy storage target of 1,325 MW that California’s largest investor-owned utilities, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Southern California Edison, and San Diego Gas & Electric, must meet by 2020.

    The RE generators create costs, which the CPUC is now forcing the IOUs to bear even more of.  Now, what happens when the utilities go out of business and their storage shuts down?

  85. “To make up for the variability of wind and solar, California has lots of hydro power.”

    You also have whack-job environmental groups agitating to blow up dams all through the Western states. You have a very active whack-job group agitating to blow up the Glen Canyon Dam. If they have their way, what does that do to you hydropower?

    “Also California just passed legislation the three major utilities in California must provide energy storage:”

    Ah, yes, the old “if we pass a law it will happen” argument. Well, the laws of physics and economics pay no mind of whacko legistaltive actions.

    “The California Public Utilities Commission … unanimously established an energy storage target of 1,325 MW that California’s largest investor-owned utilities, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Southern California Edison, and San Diego Gas & Electric, must meet by 2020.”

    1325 MW, eh? You just threw away twice that in zero-emissions capacity from SONGS. The PUCs can establish all the targets they want. If the economics and physics don’t match up, all their “targets” are for crap.

    “It will also help the state integrate renewables per its 33% by 2020 renewable portfolio standard and to aid the state in goals to cut greenhouse gas emissions to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050.”

    Ain’t gonna happen unless you install new nuclear capacity. If not, all you will be doing is what you are doing now, burning more natural gas. Methane is probably the worst greenhouse gas out there. By advocating policies that use more, you are destroying the environment.

  86. @jaagu
    Amazing to read California has nearly similar goals as the German Energiewende!

    Last year I visited California (~all major areas / cities), and saw hardly any solar panel on the roofs. In Germany you see them everywhere (well if you drive around, you see one every few minutes as ~2% of the houses have them).

    I do not understand why. Especially since California is much more south and has far better climate (more sunshine), while peak electricity consumption is much more during the day as you have lots of airco.

    Why do home owners not invest in generating their own electricity via solar panels on the roof?

  87. @Bas

    California does have lots of solar panels of roofs, but maybe not as much or as dense as Germany. California does not need much air conditioning along the coast cities (where most people live) – the interior cities do need some air conditioning. California has dry heat and the nights are cool which also reduces air conditioning needs. California has a program to have one million residential roofs with solar panels.

    The government incentives are not enough for people to buy a $25,000 system with a ROI of 7 to 10 years.

    http://www.californiasolarstatistics.ca.gov/

  88. @ Wayne SW

    California has hundreds of hydro electric dams with over 14,000 MW of capacity and pumped storage facilities. The major dams are Shasta, Folsom and Oroville. The Glen Canyon dam is not in California – it is near Page, Arizona. California does import hydro power from Pacific Northwest.

    http://www.energy.ca.gov/hydroelectric/index.html

    Energy storage is not that complicated and innovation will reduce the costs. There are many options and the economics is not the issue. The PUC has worked out the program with the utilities. Energy storage is the future.

    http://docs.cpuc.ca.gov/PublishedDocs/Published/G000/M078/K912/78912194.PDF

    SONGS was relegated to the rubbish pile because it had crappy steam generators that SCE did not want to replace again.

    California renewables goals will be met without nuclear or fossil fuels – there are no technical issues with renewables. California also has lots of geothermal besides the hydro mentioned above.

    Methane is a GHG, but when it is burned it becomes CO2 + H2O. So your concerns about methane are nada.

  89. Jaagu,
    Thanks!
    The diagram in your link shows the price now still is ~$5/W.
    Here the price for a typical 5KW installation is ~$2/W while using the same China produced panels.

    This summer EU enforced a minimum import price for those panels of $0.70/W (experts state they could import those for $0.55/W before the min. price rule).
    US has a 40-45% import tax. So with that tax included, imported panels should cost <$1/W. So this explains only $0.30 of the price difference.

    Salary costs for this type of work (installation, transport, etc) are here ~30% higher.
    In general taxes here are higher too.

    So I really cannot understand that the huge price difference continues while you are installing solar at substantial rate???
    Gives me ideas to come over and start my own business, getting rich.

  90. @jaagu

    I can testify that you have correctly described California’s unique climate. It is the only place I have ever lived where my house did not even have an air conditioner. I’ve spent most of my life, however, in the southeastern United States where the only people who try to survive without the comforting blast of air conditioning are poverty stricken people without any other choice. My grandmother, who died in 1997, is the last person I knew who was actually adapted to living in a place where the temperature and the humidity often race each other for 100 – % in the case of humidity and degrees F in the case of temperature.

    That unique California climate, with a southerly moving current from Alaska and deep canyons off of places like Monterrey, is the only reason that the land of the fruits and nuts is able to claim its mantle as an energy efficient place. It is certainly not because the majority of the population there are self-sacrificing individuals like my grandmother who have learned to do more with less.

  91. My concerns about methane are much, much more than nada. You evidently don’t understand the technology. Fugitive emissions of methane from the extraction step alone dwarf the total carbon footprint of nuclear plants. I’ve had a gas leak outside my home for the past year now (the gas company won’t fix it) that has emitted methane into the atmosphere that has caused more environmental damage than the two nuclear plants in my state.

    But even without those you evidently are okay with burning methane to produce CO2. You are doing that now since SONGS went down. And you’re going to be doing that when 1) it is night (that happens fairly often), 2) the wind dies, and 3) your pumped storage is inadequate and/or depleted. You are in fact pro-carbon, and anti-environment.

    I never said Glen Canyon was in CA. I used it as an example of the fact that you have whack-job “environmental” groups advocating the destruction of major hydroelectric facilities throughout the Western states. If those whackos have their way, what does that do to your hydroelectric capacity? First they went after the nukes, now they’re going after hydro. Be careful of what you wish for, because the throat you cut may be your own.

  92. Geothermal plants emit more radiation than nuclear plants (radon dissolved in the brine) as well as chemical wastes (hydrogen sulfide). Geothermal plant waste has an average radon concentration of about 132 pCi/g, whereas the background level in normal soils ranges from 0.2 to 4.0 pCi/g. And if you’re anywhere near even slightly elevated concentrations of hydrogen sulfide, well, let’s just say you wouldn’t want to be around them for very long.

  93. Wayne
    …gas leak outside my home for the past year now (the gas company won’t fix it)..
    In NL (and Germany, etc) the gas company will fix within a day.
    Strange. Last weeks info (no decommissioning, unreliable grid, permanent gas leaks) make me almost think US is a poor underdeveloped country.

    whack-job “environmental” groups advocating the destruction of major hydroelectric
    What if such groups change target, and finds a nice relative weak NPP?

  94. Wayne,
    That is interesting stuff as there some big green houses (growing tomatoes & flowers) nearby that use geothermal to heat those (cheaper than gas).

    Can you show more info? Research findings? Would it be only in relative unstable California soil, or also in very stable NW-Europe?

  95. The hydro dams are much, much more vulnerable targets than any NPP out there (including your favorite whipping boy, Oyster Creek, so please spare us the tiresome routine of grinding that stupid ax again). So are the reservoirs which sometimes double as a potable water source for major cities. So please use your misguided energies going after nuclear plants, and go after some of these much more vulnerable and dangerous targets, like “renewable energy” hydroelectric dams.

  96. @ Wayne SW

    Maybe you are concerned about the radiation from geothermal, but I am not concerned.

    Maybe you are concerned about hydrogen sulfide from geothermal, but I am not concerned.

    I have been to the geothermal plants in Northern California. In Sonoma County we even pump and inject our treated sewage waste water into the steam fields to extend the life of the plants. Works well getting rid of waste water and generating power.

  97. My point is that geothermal plants discharge more radioactive material to the environment on a routine, operational basis than nuclear plants. If you stand on the waste mound at a geothermal plant your radiation dose will be higher than if you stood at the containment wall of a nuclear plant operating at full power. Yet people go bonkers over the words “radiation” and “nuclear plant”, yet whisper nary a whimper about geothermal plants, which are much more harmful to the environment.

    Geothermal plants pollute vast areas of land with their waste discharge. They throw thousands of tons of hydrogen sulfide into the air. Nuclear plants do none of this. Do you have any idea of the elements that are contained in the brine disharge from geothermal plants? I do. I did a trace element study of the brine discharge from geothermal plants in California and New Zealand. You’ve got nasty RCRA elements in there in significant concentrations, things like lead, chromium, mercury, cadmium, and nickel. The brine at depth tends to concentrate those elements. And that isn’t even getting into the stuff that drives whackos nuts, things like uranium, thorium, radium, and radon. Those are present in greatly elevated concentrations. Why don’t things like this make the news, yet nuclear plants, which emit none of these, are crucified.

  98. Wayne SW writes:
    Why don’t things like this make the news, yet nuclear plants, which emit none of these, are crucified.

    ————————————-

    Simple:
    1. Chernobyl and Fukushima
    2. History of huge cost and schedule problems
    3. History of lying to the public
    4. History of many nuclear problems
    5. History of no high level waste disposal
    6. History of nuclear warfare and nuclear bomb testing

  99. Stupid:

    1. Chernobyl and Fukushima

    Chernobyl is a weapons reactor design adopted to mixed-use electricity production and plutonium production. It is totally different from LWR technology. The handful of fatalities attributable to Chernobyl are more rightly classfied as being from the weapons production program of the former USSR.

    Fukushima. No fatalities, no serious injuries. It was damage to an industrial facility caused by an unprecedented natural event. No human error was involved, no technology failure caused it. It was an unprecedented act of nature, nothing else.

    2. History of huge cost and schedule problems

    Almost exclusively traceable to regulatory inefficiencies and intervenor sabotage and abuse of the licensing process.

    3. History of lying to the public

    Mostly myths perpetrated by anti-nuke kooks. I was in the business for over 30 years and never lied to anyone. Anyone I ever knew (thousands) never lied to the public.

    4. History of many nuclear problems

    Far fewer than any other comparable industrial activity. And even those very few problems have still not resulted in a single member of the public being harmed. Can you say that of natural gas, coal, petroleum, chemicals, dams, automotive, aviation, building construction, heavy manufacturing?

    5. History of no high level waste disposal

    Any number of viable technologies and strategies have been developed (reprocessing, actinide recycle, integral fast reactor, Yucca Mountain, WIPP, et al.). Almost all of which have been delayed or stopped by political and intervenor action, not technological failure.

    6. History of nuclear warfare and nuclear bomb testing

    Absolutely nothing to do with commercial electricity production. The nuclear power industry today has less in common with the weapons program than the wind energy industry has (R&D on propeller-driven aircraft for the military is the basis for most modern windmill designs).

  100. Bas I really wasn’t looking for you to answer my question. I was looking for someone in the field to answer my question. Not a know it all who read an article or two and now thinks he is an expert. My point was once you put bigger generator in the wind turbine you lose the capacity to make power at lower wind speeds and that makes you less productive. Thanks for sending me on a wild goose chase. The article you sent me did not mention Germany supplying France with power. I did find an article about what you were talking about. It happened a few years ago and it really was because of the dams freezing over not the NPP’s. being out of service. That was only one incident. Over all France supplies Germany with power more than the other way around. Look at this article. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-06-20/french-power-exports-to-germany-rise-amid-record-low-dam-output.html

  101. By the way Bas as for your theory’s about radiation causing cancer. I work in the field at Indian Point. My life time exposure for about 30 years is nearly 15 REM. That does not include what I pick up outside the plant. I have diabetes, kidney stones. two deteriorated vertebrae in my neck. None of this is caused by radiation! So how do you explain people like me and don’t say lucky I guess. Just admit you have wacko theory’s.

  102. @ Wayne SW

    You call my points stupid. But they are the issues that have kept nuclear power from being regarded with respect and honor. Your answers are stupid nuclear industry propaganda. Those answers do not hold up under critical analysis.

    Nuclear power is doomed when their advocates use stupid arguments and blame everything on anti-nukes. If nuclear power had a good product, then nothing would stop it from succeeding.

Comments are closed.

Recent Comments from our Readers

Similar Posts