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Post by Roger Clifton on Sept 30, 2013 13:12:50 GMT 9.5
Edireland has pointed out that a nuclear country with an extensive grid coverage would be best served by GW-sized power plants. This may one day come to be true of Java, Bali and Sumatra, but the rest of Indonesia is in a different category. According to Wiki, the following islands have 100,000 to 1,000,000 people, so initially need SMRs rather than giant NPPs. Bangka 960,692 Nias 756,338 Sumba 686,113 Halmahera 449,938 Buton 447,408 Ambon 441,000 Seram 434,113 Bintan 329,659 Muna 268,140 Belitung 262,357 Tarakan 193,370 Ternate 185,705 Buru 162,116 Alor 145,299 Rote 119,908 Lembata 117,829 Biak 112,873 Peleng 109,319 Bengkalis 108,700 Most of these islands were formed by, or include, an active or dormant volcano. Apart from the need to rescue a valuable generator before/during/after an eruption, these places have evolving demand so may plan to upgrade and move their old NPP elsewhere, mid-life. The Russian 40 MW NPP on-a-barge seems ready-made to fit both needs. Not quite so mobile, SMRs could only be moved if they were designed for dismantling. During or before dismantling, the core would need some form of cooling arrangements. (How small and how aged does a core unit have to be before it can travel air-cooled?) The core of an SMR would probably most practically be left in its convecting coolant for a year or so - the Toshiba 4S core is planned to be left to cool for 2 years before extraction. Concrete excluded, the heaviest component for SMRs is the reactor pressure vessel. According to "World status of SMR projects" the RPV plus contents for an SMR is modest - NuScale is 300 t, mPower 500 t - some of which, such as core and coolant, would be removed before transporting. But such mass is quite truckable.
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Post by jagdish on Oct 1, 2013 13:40:02 GMT 9.5
1. Fast reactors are low pressure compact and lighter. The Light Water reactors were developed as power units of submarines. Here we are talking about reactors as main load. 2. Medium power reactors (500-700MW) should be the standardized design. Fast medium power reactor should be an order of magnitude lighter.
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Post by edireland on Oct 2, 2013 1:23:31 GMT 9.5
Medium power reactors have little or no benefit over Larger ones, require additional units with additional political costs and scattering of infrastructure all over the place which is not necessarily the best economic option. (Power lines are cheap, having multiple reactor sites probably isn't).
As to LWRs being developed for submarines, that primarily refers to PWRs, BWRs came about as part of the Army Atomic power programme that wanted mobile reactors to provide power for bases. You can't tar all LWRs with the brush of the PWR.
And as to that list of Islands in Indonesia that you think would be better off with SMRs than a giant nuclear power plant I note the following: Bangka 960,692 - only 13km from Sumatra so could easily draw power from it, without even bothering with HVDC Nias 756,338 - 110km from Sumatra, so a VSC based HVDC solution would be easily capable of providing all its power from the Sumatran grid Sumba 686,113 - a 45km undersea jump gets you to the island of Flores which has a population of 1.8 million and is part of the same island chain as Bali and Java Halmahera 449,938 - a 200km undersea VSC HVDC line gets you to Papua which has a population of several million Buton 447,408 - 6.5km from Sulawesi, so trivial to connect it even without a HVDC connector Ambon 441,000 - 12km from Seram, so see below Seram 434,113 - 137km gets a HVDC Line to Papua, allowing both Seram and Ambon to tie into the Papuan grid Bintan 329,659 - 130km from Sumatra over a long chain of islands seperated by relatively shallow channels, an AC connection with reactors would be feasible, let alone HVDC. Muna 268,140 - 500m from Buton, so really easy to connect to Sulawesi. Belitung 262,357 - 100km from Bangka over a chain of three islands, so VSC HVDC should have no trouble at all Tarakan 193,370 - 3.6km from Kalimantan, so AC connection will certainly suffice here Ternate 185,705 - 12km from Sulawesi, so easy to connect. Buru 162,116 - 70km from Seram via three intervening islands Alor 145,299 - part of the same Island chain as Flores and thus couplable to the larger Balian-Javan grid Rote 119,908 - trivial to connect to Timor but coudl also be connected to Sumba and hence Flores Lembata 117,829 - part of the same Island chain as Flores and thus couplable to the larger Balian-Javan grid Biak 112,873 - 130km from Papua Peleng 109,319 - 14km from Sulawesi Bengkalis 108,700 - 6.8km from Sumatra
As you can see, every one of these islands is in a position that would allow it to be connected to a larger grid using the currently available Voltage-Source-Converter HVDC technology. Recent advances that allow for multi-terminal HVDC links capable of black starting the connected grids and the advances in IGBTs that allow converter stations with powers down to the tens of megawatts have rather eroded the market for SMRs in my opinion. Additionally many of those larger islands are sufficientyl close that the possibilty of a Pan-Indonesian interconnection cannot be ruled out.
With undersea HVDC cables now in service for distances of several hundred kilometres at depths of up to 1650m, the SMR market is rapidly diminishing if capital-lumpiness benefits (which I believe are merely a result of today's flawed electricity market model) are ignored. Proposals to extend HVDC lines to 2000+m depth and the fact that these lines can remain competitive above-water for thousands of kilometres do not bode well.
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Post by Roger Clifton on Oct 8, 2013 17:38:34 GMT 9.5
Edireland said that a few BWRs plus an extensive grid is better than many scattered grids driven by SMRs. Nevertheless, the crucial value of SMRs is that they can be mass produced. In a world where decisions are driven by cost-per-capacity, they have yet to prove their relative cheapness when mass produced. But in the event of a worldwide response to climate emergency, SMRs may be preferred simply because they offer the only way to urgently roll out massive non-carbon power capacity. Heavy industry could survive. Considering the thread we are currently in, I should concede that wind/solar could also be massively rolled out along with something like sodium-sulphur batteries. However the arithmetic in previous threads indicated that such a solution would have to include a sit-in-the-dark phase for sustained bad weather. Heavy industry would prefer to destroy our future by continuing to emit carbon than be so hobbled by its replacement.
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Post by edireland on Oct 9, 2013 3:12:33 GMT 9.5
You can "mass produce" most of the components of large scale nuclear plants, you just can't assemble them on a factory floor quite as easily.
Imagine, if you will, travelling work crews that assemble numerous reacotrs to identical plans on numerous sites in sequence.
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Post by sod on Oct 15, 2013 5:01:32 GMT 9.5
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Post by Ed Leaver on Oct 15, 2013 12:56:52 GMT 9.5
Sad truth: nuclear gets 35 Billion euro, fossile 25 +40 billion in damages, compared with only 30 Billion for renewables... Disgraceful. Two questions: (1) Have you read your linked google docs draft report "Delivering the internal electricity market: making the most of public intervention" in its entirety? (2) What do you believe should be the objective of EU energy subsidies? Thanks.
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Post by quokka1 on Oct 21, 2013 20:40:46 GMT 9.5
The UK government has given the go ahead for two EPRs at Hinkley Point. The announced strike price is 8.95p/kWh if the Sizewell C EPR project goes ahead and 9.25 p/kWh if it doesn't. This is lower than the announced draft strike price for on-shore wind which is the cheapest of the renewables.
DECC's central estimate of the LCOE for gas fired electricity for projects started in 2018 is 8.5p/kWh.
So much for "nuclear is too expensive".
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Post by sod on Oct 22, 2013 0:44:34 GMT 9.5
The UK government has given the go ahead for two EPRs at Hinkley Point. The announced strike price is 8.95p/kWh if the Sizewell C EPR project goes ahead and 9.25 p/kWh if it doesn't. This is lower than the announced draft strike price for on-shore wind which is the cheapest of the renewables. DECC's central estimate of the LCOE for gas fired electricity for projects started in 2018 is 8.5p/kWh. So much for "nuclear is too expensive". Nuclear is getting an insane subsidy. £92.50/MWh, nearly twice the market price today. Does wind get 35 years contracts? with adjustments for inflation? and insurance against future extra costs (like insurance:)? www.theguardian.com/environment/damian-carrington-blog/2013/oct/21/nuclear-power-energy-edf-deal
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Post by sod on Oct 22, 2013 3:58:13 GMT 9.5
Free money to nuclear companies: "The 10% rate of return on investment reportedly given to EDF is double what is offered to renewables. When DECC was challenged over the reduction in the rate of return under the Feed in Tariff (FiT) for small scale solar PV, it stated, “we continue to consider that a significantly lower tariff is needed to provide generators with a rate of return of 4.5% to 5% for well-located installations. We are not persuaded that a higher rate of return would be reasonable given the focus of the FiT’s scheme ... and given the current investment climate."" www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/oct/21/new-nuclear-reactors-deal-consumersdefinitely a good deal for the people....
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Post by Ed Leaver on Oct 22, 2013 7:59:01 GMT 9.5
Probably. But you're evading the question. What do you think should be the goal of EU and UK energy subsidies?
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Post by edireland on Oct 22, 2013 10:59:23 GMT 9.5
Free money to nuclear companies: "The 10% rate of return on investment reportedly given to EDF is double what is offered to renewables. When DECC was challenged over the reduction in the rate of return under the Feed in Tariff (FiT) for small scale solar PV, it stated, “we continue to consider that a significantly lower tariff is needed to provide generators with a rate of return of 4.5% to 5% for well-located installations. We are not persuaded that a higher rate of return would be reasonable given the focus of the FiT’s scheme ... and given the current investment climate."" www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/oct/21/new-nuclear-reactors-deal-consumersdefinitely a good deal for the people.... Rate of Return is irrelevent. The only thing that matters is that the electricity delivered is as cheap as possible. Unless you think the poor should subsidise the panels owned by the rich and upper middle classes (since they are the only ones who can afford the capital outlay?). That said, I still think it would have been better if the British State had simply built and operated the plant itself, but then I am an unreconstructed socdem.
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Post by quokka1 on Oct 22, 2013 12:43:11 GMT 9.5
Sod asks: "Does wind get 35 years contracts?"
This "injustice" is most likely rooted in the reality that wind turbines will most likely start falling apart after 20 years or so. But such matters of engineering reality seem to take a back seat to political tales of energy costs.
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Post by sod on Oct 22, 2013 14:10:29 GMT 9.5
Sod asks: "Does wind get 35 years contracts?" This "injustice" is most likely rooted in the reality that wind turbines will most likely start falling apart after 20 years or so. But such matters of engineering reality seem to take a back seat to political tales of energy costs. For a comparison, you have to use the same time frame. And wind power will be deployed much faster. Actually wind has a high chance of being build AND past the price guarantee BEFORE Hinkley will actually produce power! Even Monbiot is calling this deal a "farce": www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/21/farce-hinckley-nuclear-reactor-haunt-britain
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Post by Ed Leaver on Oct 23, 2013 0:37:03 GMT 9.5
Still not answering the question...
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Post by sod on Oct 23, 2013 1:34:25 GMT 9.5
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Post by Ed Leaver on Oct 23, 2013 4:05:42 GMT 9.5
What do you think should be the goal of EU and UK energy subsidies? When one alleges that public monies have been or will be misspent, might not one have a mind for the purpose of those monies?
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Post by edireland on Oct 23, 2013 4:39:15 GMT 9.5
And the price of German electricity is now so high that the subsidy levels are massively distorted. Lets compare like with like and look at the subsidies "renewables" get in the United Kingdom. (These are installations that are added to the grid now for reference) Sub 4kW PV installations have a FiT of 14.9p/kWh. 4kW-10kW PV installations have a FiT of 13.5p/kWh And it runs all the way down to the bottom category for large stand alone installations which recieve 6.85p/kWh. In addition all operators are paid a further 4.64p for electricity that is exported to the grid. This means that the range of Solar electricity prices runs from 19.54p/kWh to 11.49p/kWh. That means that at best we are paying £114.9/MWh for PV solar, which is rather higher than the price of Hinkley Point electricity which is going to be dispatchable. Oh and before you claim that large scale solar is rapidly getting cheaper, it IS NOT, subsidy levels for large solar appear to have bottomed out recently and are not dropping any more. (And this is before we get into the idea of covering a rather large proportion of Britains land area with solar panels, since rooftop installations get a far higher subsidy level - and generating nearly 60GWe in January when solar flux levels are at 0.5kWh/square metre.day) And that 'too cheap to metre' comment was by someone not actually involved in a programme but a simple politician. I am sure I can find all sorts of ridiculous political statements about the viability of Solar.
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Post by edireland on Oct 23, 2013 4:59:32 GMT 9.5
And just to hammer this point home:
On the 12th February 2013 the total national grid electricity consumption was roughly 1TWh (and this is using actual National Grid Total Gross System Demand figures for reference). . That is approximately 1bn kWh of electricity consumed Using solar panels at 20-40% efficient that is going to require roughly somewhere in the region of 5-10bn square metres of solar panels if we allow for diurnal storage (and you need a LOT of storage since peak demand occured at 18:00, london sunset was 17:12).
5 billion square metres of panels is 5,000 square kilometres, 10bn is 10,000sq km. That would be 2.1%-4.2% of the UKs land area. And these demand figures don't include Northern Ireland as they are not part of the National Grid, so the true percentage is even higher.
That is simply unthinkable, and I dread to think abotu the cost.
And before anyone asks about Wind: that has also been known to go through multi-DAY lulls in the middle of February when demand is peaking at nigh on 60GWe, so also requires insane storage, and covering the country in ridiculous numbers of windmills to meet demand.
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Post by sod on Oct 23, 2013 6:31:07 GMT 9.5
What do you think should be the goal of EU and UK energy subsidies? When one alleges that public monies have been or will be misspent, might not one have a mind for the purpose of those monies? The spending should not be based on lies. And i did not claim that the money is misspent. (though it is, of course) I was merely pointing out that in contrast to popular believe, nuclear and fossile fuels get MORE subsidies than alternative power. That is one of the lies, that people should stop telling.
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Post by sod on Oct 23, 2013 6:45:19 GMT 9.5
And the price of German electricity is now so high that the subsidy levels are massively distorted. Lets compare like with like and look at the subsidies "renewables" get in the United Kingdom. (These are installations that are added to the grid now for reference) Sub 4kW PV installations have a FiT of 14.9p/kWh. 4kW-10kW PV installations have a FiT of 13.5p/kWh And it runs all the way down to the bottom category for large stand alone installations which recieve 6.85p/kWh. In addition all operators are paid a further 4.64p for electricity that is exported to the grid. This means that the range of Solar electricity prices runs from 19.54p/kWh to 11.49p/kWh. That means that at best we are paying £114.9/MWh for PV solar, which is rather higher than the price of Hinkley Point electricity which is going to be dispatchable. Oh and before you claim that large scale solar is rapidly getting cheaper, it IS NOT, subsidy levels for large solar appear to have bottomed out recently and are not dropping any more. (And this is before we get into the idea of covering a rather large proportion of Britains land area with solar panels, since rooftop installations get a far higher subsidy level - and generating nearly 60GWe in January when solar flux levels are at 0.5kWh/square metre.day) And that 'too cheap to metre' comment was by someone not actually involved in a programme but a simple politician. I am sure I can find all sorts of ridiculous political statements about the viability of Solar. So nuclear is a little bit cheaper TODAY, than solar power is in RAINY Britain??? That is one hell of an achievement! the german subsidy for solar is reduced by a fixed percentage every month, while the Hinkley nuclear plant one will RAISE with inflation. And nobody is looking at 100% solar PV in Britain. (does not make any sense) But Britain might get several percent of solar power (own and from abroad) BEFORE the Hinkley reactors even go online. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_in_the_United_KingdomBasically the huge price will be paid for the plant NOT producing power during significant parts of the day.
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Post by Ed Leaver on Oct 23, 2013 9:02:28 GMT 9.5
What do you think should be the goal of EU and UK energy subsidies? When one alleges that public monies have been or will be misspent, might not one have a mind for the purpose of those monies? The spending should not be based on lies. And i did not claim that the money is misspent. (though it is, of course) I was merely pointing out that in contrast to popular believe, nuclear and fossile fuels get MORE subsidies than alternative power. That is one of the lies, that people should stop telling. In absence of answer to the question, wherein lies the tragedy?
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Post by edireland on Oct 23, 2013 10:49:59 GMT 9.5
Why do you keep referencing this 'German' case?
Subsidies for British solar power installations are uprated with RPI, just as the nuclear ones are. And the problem is all these renewables are completley useless for producing baseload wintertime power.
And that is what Britain needs. During the last really cold winter we had we had a two week period with almost no wind generation at all and several complete lulls.
That is going to eat through storage capacity real fast.
You can whine all you want about renewables being "cheaper" but you haven't included all the implicity and hard to quantify grid subsidies, for example have a look at the new capacity charge being levied in Spain.
Ranting on and on about how "Solar is cheaper" using highly selective and inappropriately combined figures is not going to convince anyone, and I am beginning to get sick of constantly pointing out the obvious flaws in your arguments.
EDIT:
And I note that the 'average' Household electricity price in Germany has now climbed to a staggering 26 Eurocents, which is something approaching 22 eurocents excluding grid costs. That is £186.7/MWh.
So double the price of Hinkley Point electricity.
And an Official Germany Government study puts the price of electricity in 2040 at 40 eurocents per kWh in today's money. That is just ridiculous.
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Post by Nuclear on Oct 23, 2013 13:44:35 GMT 9.5
How did the British government manage to get itself screwed over by EDF so much to accept a subsidy that high for an established technology?
Even the EPR at Olkiluoto with its €8.5 Billion price tag will be able to produce electricity for around €66/MWh during its first thirty years of operation. If the British projects suffer from similar cost escalation problems, EDF will still be able to cream off a massive profit of €49/MWh.
A moderate carbon floor price (~€30/MWh)and loan guarantees should be sufficient to make the construction of new nuclear power plants economical.
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Post by Ed Leaver on Oct 24, 2013 4:10:41 GMT 9.5
How did the British government manage to get itself screwed over by EDF so much to accept a subsidy that high for an established technology? Even the EPR at Olkiluoto with its €8.5 Billion price tag will be able to produce electricity for around €66/MWh during its first thirty years of operation. If the British projects suffer from similar cost escalation problems, EDF will still be able to cream off a massive profit of €49/MWh. A moderate carbon floor price (~€30/MWh)and loan guarantees should be sufficient to make the construction of new nuclear power plants economical. Construction of Olkiluoto Unit 3 commenced in 2005. Hinkley C probably not until 2015. In the United States the Producer Price Index for Primary Metal Manufacture has increased 97% since 2006. Also in the United States, the low-end estimate for Southern Company's AP1000 units, currently under construction at their site in Vogtle Georgia, is $7.5bn each, or $6.41/W. The capital cost estimate for the two Hinkley Point C 1.6GW EPR's is £14bn or $22.7bn at $1.62/£. Which gives capital cost of $7.10/W for plant that will come on line at least five years after Vogtle (but we'll see). So the EU capital costs are in line with US. But the U.K. will not front the capital outlay at Hinkley C. Southern Co. thinks Vogtle will be saving its customer's money by 2030. Mr. Davey thinks Hinckley C will be saving his customers money by then as well. The design life of both plants is nominally 60 years. If current (1970's era) plant experience is any guide, the new Gen III+ plants should last at least 80 years, and perhaps a century. (Brief pause whilst ramifications sink in.) Making predictions is hard. Particularly about the future. I'm not an economist, and the only thing I know with reasonable certainty is that Mr. Davey did not set out with intent of striking a bad deal for Britain. Likewise, EDF is looking out for France. They both wanted a deal. The price they struck is £89.50/MWh if EDF Group goes ahead with plans to develop a new nuclear power station at Sizewell. I'm hoping the deal is good enough for both parties that EDF goes ahead with Sizewell. I'm hoping U.K. goes ahead and shows the world it is indeed possible to have a clean, reliable, essentially fossil-free national grid at reasonable cost by 2050. Low cost fracked-gas could certainly toss a spanner in the works -- but it won't meet the goals Britain has set in its National Carbon Plan.
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Post by quokka on Oct 24, 2013 8:34:40 GMT 9.5
A moderate carbon floor price (~€30/MWh)and loan guarantees should be sufficient to make the construction of new nuclear power plants economical. Unfortunately, I don't think it's that simple. Nuclear power also needs political support. If prospective investors do not perceive sufficient political support, they won't go near it because the risk is too great. What's good about the Hinkley deal is that it demonstrates that the nominal political support from the three major parties in the UK can translate into a real project. If the EDF negotiations had failed, I think it would have been a major setback for the prospects of new nuclear power in the UK. It's now not a question of will there be new nuclear power in the UK, but of how much new nuclear power. There are possibly wider implications too. There are a group of countries in Europe that want more nuclear power and there forces that would like to stop that (not mentioning any names). The UK will be one of the leaders (if not the leader) of the group planning more nuclear. The Hinkley decision will make it harder for the antis to apply pressure on smaller or less powerful states to stop nuclear.
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Post by quokka on Oct 24, 2013 9:10:19 GMT 9.5
Here's DECC's LCOE estimates (UK costs) Electricity Generation Costs July 2013For projects commissioning by 2030, by central estimate nuclear remains cheaper than any renewable technology or coal with CCS. Around 2025, nuclear becomes cheaper than CCGT.
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Post by sod on Oct 24, 2013 21:48:29 GMT 9.5
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Post by Ed Leaver on Oct 25, 2013 3:50:12 GMT 9.5
Sod: Why on earth should solar (or wind) get the same treatment nuclear does? What do you think should be the goal of EU and UK energy subsidies?
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Post by Nuclear on Oct 25, 2013 15:46:00 GMT 9.5
Yes, nuclear needs government support, but price-fixing is the devil. IMO the government should provide cheap, multi-Billion dollar loans to prospective investors. It should directly finance capital-intensive energy projects, but try not to directly meddle with the energy market. These nukes will continue producing electricity even when prices are negative, and the tax payer has to cover the difference. It's madness.
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