"China currently has 19.1 GWe of installed nuclear generating capacity. According to the plan, this will reach 58 GWe of capacity by 2020, giving China the third largest nuclear generating capacity after the USA and France. In addition, by 2020, China should also have a further 30 GWe or more of new nuclear generating capacity under construction."
Changing the subject slightly, I see you've got Gridwatch France up and running again; many thanks.
I note also that despite all its much vaunted wind power, at 0900 hrs this morning Denmark was only producing 44MW of wind-generated electricity, less than 1% of its total electricity consumption; all its fossil-fuelled generators are going flat out, and net imports are
"Whenever somebody with a decent grasp of maths and physics looks into the idea of a fully renewables-powered civilised future for the human race with a reasonably open mind, they normally come to the conclusion that it simply isn't feasible"
(some interesting thumbnails down the RHS, that I've not yet read).
The trouble is, no matter how much logic or analysis you bring to the argument, there will always be people like Harry who 'believe', with religious fervor completely dissociated from reality, that renewables are the only salvation and the way forward.
_If_ climate change is actually real and ongoing, and _if_ it's due to anthropogenic CO2*, then pious calls from the likes of the IPCC that the world should aim for a zero-carbon economy by the end of the century are hopelessly unrealistic. Better that we should spend the large sums of money currently going into renewables, on developing new forms of nuclear power (e.g. but not exclusively, FBR, LFTR and fusion), and on developing ways of accommodating and adjusting to a warmer world.
*Both of which are real possibilities, but as yet unproven.
We probably need an alternative to fossil due to rising costs and supply chain problems of fossil, irrespective of climate change.
If you look at the numbers WITHOUT the politics... renewables are hopeless.
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And nuclear power works out as cheaper than even coal.
The problem is that energy has now been totally politicised, driving the cost of nuclear up by three times+ and making it nearly as expensive as renewables, though not as expensive as renewables plus storage.
We *should* be able to deliver nuclear power at 2-3p a unit*. With the current regulations its nearer 9p.
This compares well with coal and gas at 3.5p and 5p respectively.
It also makes making very clean oil gas and petrol potentially feasible at the sort of 9-10p a unit (its around 5-7p on the open market right now) maybe using off peak surplus nuclear power.
I think that if the West survives at all, this is the way to do it.
There are moves now to develop SMRs - small modular recators, factory built and tested - and the hope is that these can get type approval, making assembling them into power stations a rubber stamp exercise rather than the 3-5 years approvals process they now have to go through.
*Looking at what the sort if build costs should be, shorn of an army of bureaucrats and consultants and nit pickers.
If you were talking only about home energy consumption, I think ways could be found to survive on renewables. I'd hate it, and so would everyone else, even the religious zealots, but it could be done. I was impressed by a 4 watt LED - if you fitted one in each room, equipped with a motion sensor so that they only came on when the room was occupied, lighting wouldn't generally be a problem. Cooking would have to be done when the wind was blowing/sun was shining, and you'd need really excellent insulation to keep refrigerated food cold while there was no power. Or the cooked food would have to be kept in perfectly-sealed containers until needed. Homes would all have to be insulated to space suit standards or better, not something anyone would enjoy. (Imagine the days after someone ate beans or the like!). But if it were akin to a wartime emergency it could be done (getting people to go along with it would be another matter).
Industry is yet another matter. Making steel but only when the sun shines brightly enough to raise temperatures to 4000 degrees in some kind of solar oven doesn't sound very workable. Ditto for any number of other things. Maybe colonists on Mars would have to learn to do these things, but it'd be an existence, not a life.
But would it be safe to give one to your Aunt Jane? :-)
You may be thinking MSR (Molten Salt Reactor - of which LFTR is but one example) rather than Modular Small Reactor that does not been to be MS based at all.
From what I understand, LFTR's are a possible candidate for SMR development. It seems that the Chinese are putting a lot of effort into this. I do think that Nuclear is the only viable solution to the future energy needs of the planet, tho' am not persuaded that it comes within the ambit of DIY :)
Seriously, SMR is an acronym that I wasn't familiar with and, perhaps, should have googled first.
The point here is twofold. Everybody heart-of-hearts knows nuclear is the way forward, but there is a huge mess of anti-nuke *emotion* in the green movement and now encapsulated in regulations.
Two ways forward are to produce 'cleaner' (thorium) reactors so reassuring the greens that 'new technology' is 'safer' and the other way is to get the cost down by type approval of reactors so that MOST of the regulations are met by a factory shipped unit.
Neither of these directions are in any way technically necessary. They are there to meet political problems of perception and regulation.
Existing reactors are way safe enough and so are existing ways to dispose of the small amounts of nuclear waste they produce.
Possibly - I get the impression that most of the small modular efforts are fixed life "fuel and forget" types. I.e. they live for a while (say
25 - 50 years) until they run out of a fuel, and then the whole thing is reprocessed.
LFTRs are more intended to allow for constant refuelling via a circulating fuel system (IIUC its this bit of their design that has not been fully proven yet)
;-) Yup I have broader attitude than most as to what is DIYable, but I have a feeling building my own nuke in the back garden may be stretching things a bit far at this stage!
Its not that commonly used as far as I can see so far, but there is lots of research activity in the area.
LFTR seems to definitely be the nuclear technology route to develop into actual production energy sources. Once the initial development into viable, tried and tested technology has completed via the usual route of building a dedicated power station or two, LFTR offers a means of cheaply upgrading existing coal fired power stations (followed by gas fired station upgrades).
LFTR is inherently safer by design which eliminates the most expensive "safety add-ons" such as the very large and expensive containment vessel required by the current reactors developed from the early designs based on a legacy of the Cold War requirements to rapidly build up stocks of weapons grade plutonium.
Regulations in regard to human safety have always been a necessity in regard of the power generation technology from water wheels to steam generation.
Regulation provides a level playing field within which the investors are less tempted to cut corners on safety features which only later become apparent as an economic benefit to the investor when they realise how much cheaper it is to avoid having to rebuild the plant after each annual explosion they might otherwise have accepted as a 'natural element of risk'.
Investors (i.e. shareholders) are their own worst enemy, often getting just what they deserved.
When it comes to infrastructure that's vital to a nation's economic health and the wellbeing of its citizens such as water supply, sewerage, power (energy) distribution, communications networks and mass transport (roads and railways), these should only be viewed as a necessary running cost to the nation and never ever be regarded as a means of monetary profit to otherwise disinterested shareholders.
The last thing any sane nation would want is to have such infrastructure treated as 'playthings' by a bunch of profit motivated investors. There are enough technological risks in developing infrastructure without the added burden of shareholder demands.
Putting aside the Chernobyl reactor design as a hopefully one off "Accident Waiting To Happen" example of nuclear power at its worse, nuclear power stations have been remarkably successful in regard of safety in spite of their inherently unsafe nature by design requiring expensive safety feature add-ons.
Even if I had remained in ignorance of MSR, in particular LFTR, I'd have still regarded conventional nuclear power station technology as the only safe and viable solution for our global energy needs. LFTR is simply the icing on the cake of nuclear power.
SMRs have been "the next thing" almost as long as fusion. Great claims were made ten or 15 years ago for the South African modular pebble bed reactor (sort of derived from German pebble bed designs), but all the promise seems to have evaporated.
Not that I am against the concept. But on the physics/chemistry side we have a *lot* of experience with U/Pu cycles, and managing the safety of the main designs with Rankine cycle back ends.
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