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Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Originally Posted by Garak
Originally Posted by Vikas
Shannow has vested interest in the survival of traditional energy companies but to layman when middle east countries move away from fossil based energy plants and starts building solar electric plants, the "energy market" has been already disrupted. Nobody is building new coal fired generating plants anymore.

If this province were ever foolish enough to try 100% solar and wind, I'd be living like my grandfather did, burning wood and using candles and lanterns. This province also uses significant coal and natural gas, and it's not realistic to expect that to change soon. Nuclear is the only other viable option. We have a heck of a lot more uranium than we do sunlight.

Really?
Is uranium renewable?
Just askin...

All kidding aside, a broad, multi faceted approach seems to offer the most promise.


Yes, uranium is renewable with a breeder reactor. Those aren't really in favor as they can also be used to make nukes.

Fracking in the US has a lot of cheap natural gas, that's what's putting the coal plants out of business, not wind and solar.

The cost of a nuke plant per megawatt is way up there compared to a regular natural gas fired plant.

Fusion is just 20 years away and has been for a long while, but maybe with ITER, it will really happen in 16 years. MIT just announced some breakthroughs with fusion, but what normally happens is that they find some unaccounted for instabilities at some point.
 
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Originally Posted by Garak
Originally Posted by Vikas
Shannow has vested interest in the survival of traditional energy companies but to layman when middle east countries move away from fossil based energy plants and starts building solar electric plants, the "energy market" has been already disrupted. Nobody is building new coal fired generating plants anymore.

If this province were ever foolish enough to try 100% solar and wind, I'd be living like my grandfather did, burning wood and using candles and lanterns. This province also uses significant coal and natural gas, and it's not realistic to expect that to change soon. Nuclear is the only other viable option. We have a heck of a lot more uranium than we do sunlight.

Really?
Is uranium renewable?
Just askin...

All kidding aside, a broad, multi faceted approach seems to offer the most promise.


Breeders for U238 and Thorium as have been explained actually MULTIPLY the amount of fuel on offer many many times over.

Do you honestly think that Solar is "renewable" ?

There's 4 times as much energy harvested as it costs to make the cells per the reviews on energy return on investment), and that drops to 2 when coupled with batteries)...and given that most of them head straight to landfill at the end of their useful life....that's not "renewable"

What about the wid farms, and the huge block of concrete that has to be poured to stop them falling over ?

When they are done, do we harvest and recycle the concrete ?

Is that renewable ?

EROI-of-Solar-Wind-Nuclear-Coal-Natural-Gas-Hydro.png
 
Originally Posted by Vikas
Shannow has vested interest in the survival of traditional energy companies but to layman when middle east countries move away from fossil based energy plants and starts building solar electric plants, the "energy market" has been already disrupted. Nobody is building new coal fired generating plants anymore.


I'm an engineer, I don't believe in unicorns, until one fronts up and I can measure and pat it. I don't believe stuff because it makes me warm and fuzzy, like you and your ilk...

It's EASY for disruptive (non) renewable energy to disrupt...it's easy for the noisy kid in class to disrupt.

500MW of solar can destroy the profitability of a 1,000MW thermal plant, driving it out of business, and having your ilk patting themselves on the back at the disruption….however, it then needs a "seamless" transitional installation of an additional 3,500MW of solar the next day, plus somewhere to store it for the rest of the day that it's not light...look at Hawaii, and Ca's time of use tariffs to see what's happening.

In the meantime, while the noisy disruptors are disrupting, the remaining plant has to be cycled harder and harder, to achieve a couple of the necessities of a STABLE grid.
* frequency control...they can't won't do it.
* system inertia...they don't have it, and are referring to "synthetic inertia", which means that they have to build more panels, and put in storage (didn't I say the ? If I say it, it's because it's vested interests...if greens say it, it's them responding to needs).
* Schedulability...tell a thermal when to make it and they do.

The evening peak ramps are becoming massive, and there's fewer (you actually have ONE point that you are correct in) thermals to push two to three times harder every afternoon than they ever did before.

I predicted South Australia going black...they did...then installed diesel generators, by the thousand to prop up "renewables"....how green is THAT ???

You want the ability to come home and post tripe online, 24/7...you are relying on one of the formerly most reliable systems, delivering just in time to the 99.99999th percentile...while wilfully trashing it.

https://www.smh.com.au/national/tas...ctricity-until-june-20160329-gnt0pd.html
http://joannenova.com.au/2017/12/re...uts-means-diesel-generator-sales-up-400/
 
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Originally Posted by Garak
Originally Posted by Vikas
Shannow has vested interest in the survival of traditional energy companies but to layman when middle east countries move away from fossil based energy plants and starts building solar electric plants, the "energy market" has been already disrupted. Nobody is building new coal fired generating plants anymore.

If this province were ever foolish enough to try 100% solar and wind, I'd be living like my grandfather did, burning wood and using candles and lanterns. This province also uses significant coal and natural gas, and it's not realistic to expect that to change soon. Nuclear is the only other viable option. We have a heck of a lot more uranium than we do sunlight.

Really?
Is uranium renewable?
Just askin...

All kidding aside, a broad, multi faceted approach seems to offer the most promise.


With a breeder? Yes. But even without that, extracting it from the ocean would yield millions of years of it for power generation.

I've also argued for a blended approach that should consider geography. 25% of Ontario's electricity is from hydro-electric, something that isn't possible in some places. Quebec is essentially entirely hydro. Wind is significantly more available on the Atlantic coast than it is in Ontario. The focus should be on what facilitates rapid decarbonization, something that has been entirely unachievable with the championing of VRE as some universal panacea. Nukes and hydro have a record of successfully displacing fossil sources, so we should be leveraging them in the role. Shutting them down and in turn, making no progress, like Germany, is utterly idiotic.
 
Sorry guys.
Uranium ore, a solid, is mined and converted to a fuel used at nuclear power plants. Uranium is not a fossil fuel, but it is classified as a nonrenewable fuel. It is, however, a clean energy source as compared to fossil fuels.

Solar is classified as renewable because it is easily replenished in a short period without the help of man.
But nice try.
 
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Sorry guys.
Uranium ore, a solid, is mined and converted to a fuel used at nuclear power plants. Uranium is not a fossil fuel, but it is classified as a nonrenewable fuel. It is, however, a clean energy source as compared to fossil fuels.

Solar is classified as renewable because it is easily replenished in a short period without the help of man.
But nice try.


It's easy to turn off your brain and thoughtlessly repeat the officially accepted nonsense.
Solar panels have a life cycle, in order to replanish them, one needs "the help of man" to make new panels.

Where is the renewable part?
 
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Originally Posted by KrisZ
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Sorry guys.
Uranium ore, a solid, is mined and converted to a fuel used at nuclear power plants. Uranium is not a fossil fuel, but it is classified as a nonrenewable fuel. It is, however, a clean energy source as compared to fossil fuels.

Solar is classified as renewable because it is easily replenished in a short period without the help of man.
But nice try.


It's easy to turn off your brain and thoughtlessly repeat the officially accepted nonsense.
Solar panels have a life cycle, in order to replanish them, one needs "the help of man" to make new panels.

Where is the renewable part?

Sunlight. It comes from outer space.
 
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Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Originally Posted by KrisZ
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Sorry guys.
Uranium ore, a solid, is mined and converted to a fuel used at nuclear power plants. Uranium is not a fossil fuel, but it is classified as a nonrenewable fuel. It is, however, a clean energy source as compared to fossil fuels.

Solar is classified as renewable because it is easily replenished in a short period without the help of man.
But nice try.


It's easy to turn off your brain and thoughtlessly repeat the officially accepted nonsense.
Solar panels have a life cycle, in order to replanish them, one needs "the help of man" to make new panels.

Where is the renewable part?

Sunlight. It comes from outer space.


And material for the panels comes from where exactly? And please don't tell me we can recycle, because that can apply to nuclear as well.
 
Originally Posted by KrisZ
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Originally Posted by KrisZ
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Sorry guys.
Uranium ore, a solid, is mined and converted to a fuel used at nuclear power plants. Uranium is not a fossil fuel, but it is classified as a nonrenewable fuel. It is, however, a clean energy source as compared to fossil fuels.

Solar is classified as renewable because it is easily replenished in a short period without the help of man.
But nice try.


It's easy to turn off your brain and thoughtlessly repeat the officially accepted nonsense.
Solar panels have a life cycle, in order to replanish them, one needs "the help of man" to make new panels.

Where is the renewable part?

Sunlight. It comes from outer space.


And material for the panels comes from where exactly? And please don't tell me we can recycle, because that can apply to nuclear as well.

I am speaking to renewable energy sources. Use of any source requires processing; there ain't no magic.
You are comparing the source with material needed to make use of the source.
Others are doing the same.

There is no man effort needed to replenish sunlight, which is a key definition of renewable energy sources.
Examples include solar, wind, hydro electric (biggest in US), biomass, geothermal and the oceans tidal energy.

I hope this helps. It is not nonsense, it is science.
 
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Originally Posted by KrisZ
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Sorry guys.
Uranium ore, a solid, is mined and converted to a fuel used at nuclear power plants. Uranium is not a fossil fuel, but it is classified as a nonrenewable fuel. It is, however, a clean energy source as compared to fossil fuels.

Solar is classified as renewable because it is easily replenished in a short period without the help of man.
But nice try.


It's easy to turn off your brain and thoughtlessly repeat the officially accepted nonsense.
Solar panels have a life cycle, in order to replanish them, one needs "the help of man" to make new panels.

Where is the renewable part?

Sunlight. It comes from outer space.


A giant nuclear reactor in the sky with a finite lifespan.
 
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk


There is no man effort needed to replenish sunlight, which is a key definition of renewable energy sources.
Examples include solar, wind, hydro electric (biggest in US), biomass, geothermal and the oceans tidal energy.

I hope this helps. It is not nonsense, it is science.


No, it's marketing.

- Rivers erode and change course, sometimes they even dry up.
- Biomass involves razing forests; it is a fuelled source of power, no different than coal
- Geothermal involves exploiting the big 'ol nuclear reactor we are all sitting on, but at least is not a fuelled source

Proponents of technologies they want to see succeed have chosen what to classify as "renewable". Hydro-Electric has been a very controversial one because it is already well established. That's a key part of the "renewable" brand, it is technology that is not part of the existing infrastructure in any major way and thus has needed all this "support" like Feed-in tariffs and other nonsense.

For something to be "renewable", barring the marketing nonsense, you need to be unable to run out of what feeds it. Since we are likely to never run out of water, hydro is considered renewable, since we can grow more forest, biomass gets to be called "renewable", since the sun has millions of years of life left, we call solar renewable, since the wind isn't going to stop blowing, it gets to be called renewable, since the moon affecting the tides isn't likely to change, that gets to be called renewable. If we were extracting Uranium from the ocean, which would last basically indefinitely, it could also then be called "renewable". If we were breeding fissile material and thus using a closed fuel cycle, it would also be "renewable". There's nothing inherently less renewable about Nuclear than biomass, if anything it is more so, and it also has the key benefit of not emitting CO2 in the process, nor the transportation of its fuel source in the case of a breeder or plant built near a body of water that could extract uranium from that source. Even with traditionally fuelled nuclear plants, the amount of fuel transport required compared to the power generated is minuscule, unlike with a biomass plant.

Link to Forbes article

Originally Posted by Forbes
Nuclear fuel made with uranium extracted from seawater makes nuclear power completely renewable. It's not just that the 4 billion tons of uranium in seawater now would fuel a thousand 1,000-MW nuclear power plants for a 100,000 years. It's that uranium extracted from seawater is replenished continuously, so nuclear becomes as endless as solar, hydro and wind.
 
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk

I am speaking to renewable energy sources. Use of any source requires processing; there ain't no magic.
You are comparing the source with material needed to make use of the source.
Others are doing the same.

There is no man effort needed to replenish sunlight, which is a key definition of renewable energy sources.
Examples include solar, wind, hydro electric (biggest in US), biomass, geothermal and the oceans tidal energy.

I hope this helps. It is not nonsense, it is science.


You discount nuclear as it needs stuff dug up...but then discount exactly the same argument for solar.

Solar panels "process" less than 4 times the energy that it goes into mining and making them over their entire life...less than two times if coupled with storage. And the panels AREN'T recycled they are landfilled, and leach heavy metals...Ca is thinking of labelling them hazardous waste.

Nuclear plants "process" 75 times the energy that they consume in mining and producing the fueal and "processing" plant.

Consider the footprint of 1,000MW of nuke, versus 1,000MW of solar/wind, and that the Nuke delivers 3 times as much energy per day, plus WHEN YOU NEED IT....

you can't have your cake and eat it too when making these "renewable" arguments....yes Solar is essentially infinite...but it takes resources to "process it"...so it's only REALLY renewable when it's drying my clothes.
 
Originally Posted by Shannow
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk

I am speaking to renewable energy sources. Use of any source requires processing; there ain't no magic.
You are comparing the source with material needed to make use of the source.
Others are doing the same.

There is no man effort needed to replenish sunlight, which is a key definition of renewable energy sources.
Examples include solar, wind, hydro electric (biggest in US), biomass, geothermal and the oceans tidal energy.

I hope this helps. It is not nonsense, it is science.


You discount nuclear as it needs stuff dug up...but then discount exactly the same argument for solar.

Solar panels "process" less than 4 times the energy that it goes into mining and making them over their entire life...less than two times if coupled with storage. And the panels AREN'T recycled they are landfilled, and leach heavy metals...Ca is thinking of labelling them hazardous waste.

Nuclear plants "process" 75 times the energy that they consume in mining and producing the fueal and "processing" plant.

Consider the footprint of 1,000MW of nuke, versus 1,000MW of solar/wind, and that the Nuke delivers 3 times as much energy per day, plus WHEN YOU NEED IT....

you can't have your cake and eat it too when making these "renewable" arguments....yes Solar is essentially infinite...but it takes resources to "process it"...so it's only REALLY renewable when it's drying my clothes.

Shannow, no one digs up sunlight, as far as I know.
I am saying Uranium is not a renewable energy source, nor have I ever seen a scientific article calling it one.
I believe you are comparing the source (sunlight) to the requisite needs to use it.
I am talking about the source.

I believe the answer to energy issues depends on many factors.
In sunny Silicon Valley, there are few cloudy days.
I was speaking with a co-worker in the UK this morning; lotsa cloudy days there.
FYI, I almost got a Murai; there are 2 filling stations within blocks of my house.
The owners I talked to were not that impressed.
The cost of fuel was high (although subsidized by Toyota I believe) and other issues.
Of course, the Murai is driven by electric motors, so it is faaaast.
 
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You can't bury your head in the sand (so to speak), and say that one technology is not renewable because it involves digging stuff up...and a PROCESS that involves digging MORE stuff up, and using MORE energy per unit energy delivered IS renewable...based on semantics of one being a process, and one a resource.

If the greens can feel that they can legitimately use doubles standards like this, there is no hope for rational discourse.

Vikas has already demonstrated that labels are the next part of "discussions".

Did you read OVERKILL's seawater article ?

How can you gloss over solar panels to toxic landfil simply because it's part of a process ?
 
Jeff, I suggest you take your Tesla on the Altmont Pass Road into the valley. You will see some nice, renewable wind turbines that have been abandoned and left there to rot.
That's how most of these green initiatives end up, abandoned, with no one accountable to clean up the mess.
[Linked Image]
 
This is my biggest beef with these solar or wind farms. They take up massive amounts of acreage and have their own downsides besides being a blight on the landscape. The large numbers of bird killed by these turbines is well known but the noise and distraction of the blades affects wildlife on the ground as well. The solar farms have their downsides as well.

A nuclear plant would occupy a tiny fraction of that footprint and provide constant energy regardless of weather conditions.
 
Originally Posted by Shannow
You can't bury your head in the sand (so to speak), and say that one technology is not renewable because it involves digging stuff up...and a PROCESS that involves digging MORE stuff up, and using MORE energy per unit energy delivered IS renewable...based on semantics of one being a process, and one a resource.

If the greens can feel that they can legitimately use doubles standards like this, there is no hope for rational discourse.

Vikas has already demonstrated that labels are the next part of "discussions".

Did you read OVERKILL's seawater article ?

How can you gloss over solar panels to toxic landfil simply because it's part of a process ?

I am not burying my head.
You seem to not understand that nuclear energy uses Uranium, which is not considered renewable by science.
Solar energy uses sunshine, which is considered renewable.

There is a difference between the consumable source and the technology required to make use of that source.
I am speaking to the energy source, which I mentioned. Every energy source requires technology to make usable energy.
The Forbes article is certainly fascinating, but science still classifies Uranium as non-renewable.
From Aug 2018
 
Originally Posted by PimTac
This is my biggest beef with these solar or wind farms. They take up massive amounts of acreage and have their own downsides besides being a blight on the landscape. The large numbers of bird killed by these turbines is well known but the noise and distraction of the blades affects wildlife on the ground as well. The solar farms have their downsides as well.

A nuclear plant would occupy a tiny fraction of that footprint and provide constant energy regardless of weather conditions.


Yes.

- A 4-unit CANDU plant occupies ~150 acres with a generous skirting and has an installed capacity of 3,512MW (Darlington in Ontario). At ~90% CF that facility can produce 28,000GWh/year. That's a level of density no other non-emitting source can even come close to.

- The Twiggs Solar Farm in Georgia will occupy 2,000 acres and will have an installed capacity of 200MW. At 26% CF that facility can produce 455GWh/year; roughly what Darlington, at less than 1/10th the area, produces in 6 days.

- The world's largest wind farm, The Walney Extension in the UK occupies 35,840 acres and has an installed capacity of 659MW. At 35% CF that facility can produce 2,020GWh/year; roughly what Darlington, occupying 1/240th the area, produces in 27 days.
 
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk

You seem to not understand that nuclear energy uses Uranium, which is not considered renewable by science.


Science is hardly so cut and dry. Or are Nuclear physicists who advocate for breeders and seawater extraction, making it more "renewable" than Biomass, not scientists?

Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
Solar energy uses sunshine, which is considered renewable.

And Biomass burns trees, not much different from a Coal plant, yet that's also considered "renewable"
smirk.gif


Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
There is a difference between the consumable source and the technology required to make use of that source.
I am speaking to the energy source, which I mentioned. Every energy source requires technology to make usable energy.

Except the whole concept of Biomass betrays this.

Originally Posted by JeffKeryk
The Forbes article is certainly fascinating, but science still classifies Uranium as non-renewable.
From Aug 2018


That would be the government classifying it, not Science.

In Utah, the government classifies it as renewable:
Utah Bill HB 430
Originally Posted by Utah
Subsection
181 10-19-102 (11) and includes generation powered by nuclear fuel.
182 (7) "Renewable energy development zone" means a renewable energy


And there's an extensive Wiki on the subject, an excerpt from which reads:

Originally Posted by Wikipedia
In 1987, the World Commission on Environment and Development(WCED), an organization independent from, but created by, the United Nations, published Our Common Future, in which a particular subset of presently operating nuclear fission technologies, and nuclear fusion were both classified as renewable. That is, fission reactors that produce more fissile fuel than they consume - breeder reactors, and when it is developed, fusion power, are both classified within the same category as conventional renewable energy sources, such as solar and falling water.

Presently, as of 2014, only 2 breeder reactors are producing industrial quantities of electricity, the BN-600 and BN-800. The retired French Phénix reactor also demonstrated a greater than one breeding ratio and operated for ~30 years, producing power when Our Common Future was published in 1987. While human sustained nuclear fusion is intended to be proven in the International thermonuclear experimental reactor between 2020 and 2030, and there are also efforts to create a pulsed fusion power reactor based on the inertial confinement principle (see more Inertial fusion power plant).


So it's hardly this cut and dry diatribe being peddled here as "settled science". If Utah can call Nuclear renewable, any state can. If breeders can be called renewable, then using a breeder with a conventional reactor in a close fuel cycle is also renewable.

Most of what's being sold out there is a brand; marketing.
 
Originally Posted by JeffKeryk

There is a difference between the consumable source and the technology required to make use of that source.
I am speaking to the energy source, which I mentioned. Every energy source requires technology to make usable energy.


Yes...but you keep ignoring that the technology that's used also uses resources more or less efficiently.

Solar...generates less than 4 times the energy, over it's entire lifetime, as that used to create the cells...less than 2 times if battery storage is included...that's only 0.8 to 2 steps away from digging hole to fill up the one behind you. And the "technology" only gets one use before going to landfill.

Nuclear, it's 75....and a LOT of a power plant is re-used/recycled at the end of life.

Surely you can acknowledge that, rather than simply replaying "the sun is free" mantra, that ignores the cost to environment and land utilisation.
 
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