As the Senate gets ready to examine energy and climate legislation, America's most serious welfare dependent is back at the taxpayer trough again. Unsatisfied by a set of federal loan guarantees, subsidies, and other trinkets and baubles that would make the greediest gold digger blush, the nuclear complex is demanding still more. Passage of any legislation that requires those who emit carbon to pay for the carbon sinks they preempt will, appropriately and unavoidably, mean a competitive advantage for nuclear power. If carbon permits sell for $30 per ton of CO2, as the EPA estimates they would under the House bill, the cost of coal-fired electricity vs. nuclear would go up $.03 per kilowatt hour-- a healthy boost.
But that's not enough. Instead Republican senators like Lamar Alexander are calling for a federal commitment to build 100 new nuclear plants. It appears that what is envisaged is that the taxpayers actually pay for building these plants -- but not that the taxpayers would ever be repaid from the sales of electricity. No, the profits from this investment would flow to shareholders in big utility and nuclear companies. This is not even a bailout -- I guess you could call it a bail-forward. And it would be very expensive.
A new report prepared for the Consumer Federation of America suggests that if we were to build 100 new nuclear plants, and they actually ended up producing electricity, the power generated would cost Americans between $1.9 and $4 trillion dollars in extra utility bills, with the power being billed at $.12 to $.20 per kilowatt hour.
In further bad news for the nuclear industry, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has determined that eighteen of the country's existing nuclear plants haven't set aside enough money to pay for decommissioning their reactor shells after their useful life ends. Recent estimates indicate that the cost of dismantling existing nukes has increased by $4.6 billion, while the amount set aside to decommission them has declined by $4.4 billion because of loss of investment value.
Even the Business Round Table, in its recent study calling for major policy initiatives in the climate arena, conceded that in the absence of much larger subsidies than are currently available to nuclear, the most we can realistically expect is to replace the existing fleet of nuclear power plants as they are retired -- nuclear simply is not going to be a bigger part of our energy future unless we just keep throwing more money at it.
But there has always been an interesting question -- is the problem nuclear technology per se, or is it the nuclear industry and its culture of welfare dependence -- something that in other contexts is referred to as the soft-bigotry of low expectations? If we really made nuclear stand on its own, would it learn to build plants that make economic sense? It appears we will never find out.
Instead we are witnessing the collapse in Europe of a much bruited -- and publicly subsidized -- nuclear revival. This is the month that Finland's Olkiluoto 3 nuclear power plant was scheduled to go on-line, the vanguard of a new generation of safe, affordable nuclear reactors. Instead, Olkiluoto is at least three and a half years late and more than 50 percent over budget. A similar plant being built in France is 20 percent over budget and struggling to stay on schedule only 18 months after breaking ground. In Britain, where the nuclear utility is owned by the French utility EDF, there is no sign of new orders being placed, and EDF is complaining that it can't afford to build new plants if it must compete with renewables.
Amory Lovins has acerbically summarized how we should respond to the hoopla about allegedly reviving nuclear power:
But in due course, the aging advocates of the half-century-old reactor concepts that never made it to market will retire and die, their credulous young devotees will relearn painful lessons lately forgotten, and the whole nuclear business will complete its slow death of an incurable attack of market forces. Meanwhile, the rest of us shouldn't be distracted from getting on with the winning investments that make sense, make money, and really do solve the energy, climate, and proliferation problems, led by business for profit.
The nuclear industry's recent whining that it must never, ever be asked to stand on its own confirms that Amory's got it right about the "incurable attack of market forces." And yet, many in Congress appear impervious to this logic. Since most of the advocates of the "build a hundred nukes" caucus in Congress are certified "free market" advocates, this seems oddly inconsistent. Perhaps the way to get them to reconsider is to call the industry's bluff. If the public's money is going to finance the next generation of nuclear power plants, provide for the waste disposal, protect against terrorism, guarantee the risks, and overpay for whatever electricity is generated, then perhaps we should recognize nuclear power for what it is -- a very expensive and socialist way of making electricity that, in the real world, is actually paid for and controlled by the government. It's no coincidence that the one nation widely cited as proof that nuclear power works is France with its socialist and hugely money-losing power sector.
University of Greenwich Professor of Energy Studies Stephen Thomas recently pointed out that to duplicate the French model in the U.S. "you would essentially have to nationalize your electric utilities and have all new power plant siting decisions emanate from the White House."
So why don't the cheerleaders for nukes like Lamar Alexander and Mike Crapo offer the only real nuclear option and see how many votes it gets: an explicitly socialist electricity model where plants are sited, built, paid for, and operated by the federal government (with profits, if any, used to repay our investment)?
Somehow, I don't think that idea would have many takers. But it would be a more honest approach than the one that Congress is currently being peddled (and that it seems likely to approve).
Follow Carl Pope on Twitter: www.twitter.com/CarlPope
Proliferation leads to global nuclear war, sooner.
That's insane. all for power we can get cheaper from 3 cent/kwh rooftop solar and biochar biofuels
Forever.
The nuke industry just keeps hiring pr writers to try and resurrect this monster:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-kirsch/climate-bill-ignores-our_b_221796.html
Nuke power can't even get insurance without Taxpayers!
More nuclear power industry, thousands more engineers, scientists, people learning and working with nuclear technology, thousands more reactors and refiners, thousands more opportunities for diversions, for spies, for states to go rogue or fail. thousands of times more tons of nuclear fuel in transit....
Obviously will increase proliferation.
More proliferation will Obviously make global nuclear war more likely, sooner.
"The nuke industry just keeps hiring pr writers to try and resurrect this monster:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-kirsch/climate-bill-ignores-our_b_221796.html" --
this use of the colon (":") means the part to the right of it restates or proves the part to its left.
If someone is saying the philanthropist Steve Kirsch is writing PR on the nuke industry's dime, that's a lie whose teller should identify himself or herself. Go ahead, this is the net; justice won't be done on you.
I don't.
I was thinking more of the people who chimed in on Kirshes article, like fusion and couple of others. I can only speculate that Kirsh has something to gain from the expansion of nuclear power, because the facts totally destroy the concept.
The Sierra Club should have figured out ten years ago what Hansen and Moore have figured out -- if we are serious about not trashing the environment, we have got to move to compact innocuous powerplants, which means nuclear. We have 1600 coal plants in this nation and the Sierra Club should be working towards plans to replacing them all in with 200 new nuclear units. Nearly all of those new units can go on existing nuclear plant premises, which will make it possible to start the hard work of restoring those coal plant sites.
http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid56.php
Pope wrote (MY CAPS)
Republican senators like Lamar Alexander are calling for a federal commitment to build 100 new nuclear plants.
NO, THEY ARE TRYING TO REMOVE BARRIERS THAT PUT PRIVATE CAPITAL AT POLITICAL RISK.
It appears that what is envisaged is that the taxpayers actually pay for building these plants.
THIS IS FALSE.
... the power generated would cost Americans $.12 to $.20 per kilowatt hour.
THAT'S LESS THAN THE PRICE FOR UNSUBSIDIZED WIND AND SOLAR!
Amory Lovins has acerbically summarized....But in due course, the aging advocates of the half-century-old reactor concepts that never made it to market will retire and die, ....
NO ONE IS PROPOSING TO BUILD REACTORS WITH HALF-CENTRUY OLD TECHNOLOGY.
LOVINS AND POPE ARE PART OF AN INSIDIOUS CIRCLE OF FANATICS WHO KEEP QUOTING EACH OTHER AS EVIDENCE.
Since most of the advocates of the "build a hundred nukes" caucus in Congress are certified "free market" advocates, this seems oddly inconsistent.
THE UTILITIES PAID FOR WASTE DISPOSAL AT $.001/KWH. IT'S FUNDED ALREADY.
THERE'S NOT MUCH WASTE, LESS THAN 1/1000 OF ALL OTHER HAZARDOUS WASTE ANNUALLY DISPOSED OF AND RECORDED BY EPA.
So why don't .. Lamar Alexander and Mike Crapo offer ..: an explicitly socialist electricity model
THE SENATOR AND REP ARE DOING THE OPPOSITE, TRYING TO OPEN UP THE MARKET TO UNSUBSIDIZED COMPETITION.
Recycling of spent nuclear fuel reduces the "waste" to a tiny fraction of what it is today while generating magnitudes of additional energy via newer, more efficient designs of plants (LFTR, IFR and others); a small land-use footprint of each atomic plant coincides with environmental goals of maximizing open space (wind and solar require very large land areas - for example, replacing a 1,000 MWe nuclear plant would require 235 square miles of wind farm - that's 50% of Los Angeles city area); the 90% up-time of nuclear plants cannot be matched by anything else and is fully controllable where wind and solar are not.
I am invested in the solar industry and stand to benefit financially when our new technology comes to market, but am not deluded into thinking it can replace the density of nuclear power. Solar will be a complement to nuclear base-load but will not likely replace it.
If the US had continued to build nuclear power plants at the rate they were scheduled for during the 1970's we would not be burning any coal today for electricity generation. We would already be meeting our emission goals and enjoying cleaner air.
Breakthroughs include the MagGen. These magnetic generators will initially make it possible to cut the cord on a plug-in hybrid so it no longer needs to plug-in. Later, they can replace the batteries in an electric car. Then, the MagGen can run when the car is parked and sell power to the utility. Prototypes are under development.
Next is a Self Powered Internal Combustion Engine - SPICE, which can power a hybrid. It will need no fuel and is another path to ending the need to plug-in. The engine can run when parked.
Both systems can wirelessly transmit and sell power to the local utility.
The SPICE will be powered by hydrinos - which let a barrel of water equal hundreds of barrels of oil.
Scientists and engineers will doubt these technologies are possible until validation by Independent Laboratories, an important step on the agenda.
Until now, car ownership has been an expense. Payments to car owners driving a hybrid with a SPICE, or powered by MagGen, are likely to be substantial.
The cost of many vehicles might be paid for by utilities, as they purchase power. Parked cars each will become decentralized power plants - a rapid, cost-effective path to catalyze reduction of the need for fuel.
Consumers can generate substantial demand for such vehicles and accelerate the needed change leaving nuclear in the dust!.
Cars don't produce energy, they expend it, whether it comes from electricity, diesel, gasoline, biofuel, or hydrogen. If you pull energy out of the car, you just lost energy in the process as well as having less fuel to make the car do work.
The SPICE engine will not defy these laws of physics, nothing will. "MagGen" and "SPICE" are nothing but a marketing hoax.
But the more serious misstep of the writer is that he believes there is no nuclear revival. How sad. In fact, orders ARE coming in which is why hundreds of millions of Euros are being spent at Sheffiled Forge Masters and Areva to build of their component infrastructure. Sweden overturned it's misconceived "phase out" of nuclear as did Italy, with that country YESTERDAY passing legislation to reestablish it's Nuclear Energy Commission so *they can build FOUR EPRs*. Bulgaria's new gov't also announced completion of their 2 Russia VVER reactors and maybe add more to the project. Britain itself has not slowed down and EPR's are being planned for several locations around the country. What part of "Renaissance" does he not understand?
David Walters
Overcoming this challenge will take money upfront. Nuclear power will at least pay for itself over the next 80 years, and the more we build the cheaper it will get.
The most effective renewables will be hydro and geothermal, but there is only so much of that which can be developed.
Nuclear plant radioactive emissions limits are ~100x smaller than radiaoctive releases from coal burning, as coal contains uranium and thorium, besides mercury, chromium, arsenic etc, at several to hundreds of ppm. If you are afraid of radiation, coal is the problem, not nuclear.
Spent fuel from the current reactors is safely stored within the plants, all the spent fuel in dry casks with the needed shielding take less space than the employee parking lot. Moreover, this spent nuclear fuel by >95% consists of U+transuranics, fuels needed to start the next generation of nuclear power plants, which are a precious resource if we get serious with clean energy fast.
The rest are fission products, which are much shorter radioactive hazard (hundreds years of shielding needed compared to tens of thousands years), more importantly all the fission products are rare materials with unique properties, with many applications in industry, medicine, and sanitation - applications severely limited by the low availability of these materials.
http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/policy/germanys-green-energy-gap
The anti-nuclear forces repeat the same tired, distorted diatribes. Reality is starting to sink in for those that actually understand the issues and challenges of energy production, distribution, and use.
geothermal
biomass
fuel cells
small EVs
public transportation
cogeneration
colocation
conservation
insulation
telecommuting
heat pumps
tidal
biodiesel
all of which add jobs and move capital through the economy.
But if your goal is to "replace polluting coal" with another polluting technology that drains capital from everything else and creates tons of dangerous byproducts for future generations to worry about, you're right -- nuclear is the only way to go.
No one has ever been hurt by exposure to used nuclear fuel in the past 50 years. What makes anyone believe that record will change as we progress into the future?
Furthermore, if you are going to be calling any source of energy a "nuclear polluter" it would be a coal plant. Coal plants scatter many types of radioactive particles into the atmosphere - uranium, radon, thorium and arsenic, lead, cadmium, and mercury to boot - and that's just a short list. The worst case scenario that is postulated for a nuclear plant is something that coal plants get away with everyday.
Best,
Jim Jeffries
Press Secretary
U.S. Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.)
People of the world, stop being fooled by this sad lie. The same people who say nuclear power is to expensive are the same people campaigning to make it to expensive, for the express purpose of telling you it is to expensive later.
How many people are annuallykilled by combustion wastes every year? [millions according to WHO]
How many people are annually killed by "nuclear waste", stored spent fuel rods from plants? [none]
This is why you antinukes seem like a blind cult.