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[Climate Change] : Paris Agreement Signed

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Posts

  • ACSISACSIS Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Wich brings me to another point: nuclear power is also a very expensive solution. Vast ammounts of money create lobbism and thats the only reason i can think of to keep going with this kind of technology for energy production. Its dangerous, expensive, not managable for the required extended waste handling process and plain stupid to do so.

    ACSIS on
  • HacksawHacksaw J. Duggan Esq. Wrestler at LawRegistered User regular
    ACSIS wrote: »
    Wich brings me to another point: nuclear power is also a very expensive solution.

    There is no cheap solution.

  • ACSISACSIS Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    There are. I see a silver line on the horizont, though. As we use up our deposits of fossil fuels we HAVE to look for alternative fuel sources and Hydrogen is the premier choice here. When the infrastructure to produce it is developed enough, abandonig nuclear powerplants is a natural part of the process, if i am right. So this madness will continue for a few decades tops only before we switch to efficient, cheap and emission free technolgies.

    ACSIS on
  • HacksawHacksaw J. Duggan Esq. Wrestler at LawRegistered User regular
    I'm inclined to disagree about hydrogen. I mean, I'm sure it's what we'll all eventually be powering our cars with, yeah, but I don't see it becoming the life's blood of our national power grid.

  • ACSISACSIS Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    You have to store the energy somehow. There are certain ways to do this, like lakes with dams for an example - but those require major altering of landscapes. Its the best solution i can come up with. Geotherma energy is another possibility and might require less storage because its much more continous, however its not practically to do it at any location.

    Hydrogen has to be mass produced and it has to be cheap, that will solve all our problems. I don't see any other practicable alternatives here.

    Just imagine the money the US and Europe spend on war to secure strategic resources of fossil fuels and to maintain nuclear installations and waste disposal. Imagine they took that money and built a Hydrogen infrastructure instead.

    You wouldn't have to pay waste disposal, you wouldn't harm the environment and you wouldn't have to wage wars for resources anymore.

    ACSIS on
  • HacksawHacksaw J. Duggan Esq. Wrestler at LawRegistered User regular
    Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it incredibly expensive to refine Hydrogen for fuel purposes right now?

  • EgoEgo Registered User regular
    Problem is the great majority of reactors CAN fail.

    Counting every nuclear incident no matter how severe or the maturity of the field at the time, and throwing in the casualties from Hiroshima and Nagasaki under the label of 'nuclear energy' just to stack the deck, nuclear energy is still safer than hydrocarbon and hydroelectric power for the energy produced.

    Also, that something used to be less safe than in modern incarnations is a piss poor argument against using said modern incarnations. If you oppose pebble bed reactors because 'oh no nuclear power' but still feel okay turning on your lights at home for any reason at all given what powers them today, you need to sit down and rethink your positions.

    Magic hippy powerplant solutions aren't ready yet. It'd be nice if we could get over them until they are and just use the best options available today.

    Erik
  • ACSISACSIS Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Hacksaw wrote: »
    Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it incredibly expensive to refine Hydrogen for fuel purposes right now?
    Its actually rather simple. Storage and safety is another cup of tea because being a highly efficient fuel it IS quite volatile. Usually its pressurized and cooled. Refining it is not much more hassle than running electric power through water, you can do it at home, if you like (but i wouldn't advise it, its explosive gas, you know).
    Ego wrote: »
    nuclear energy is still safer than hydrocarbon and hydroelectric power for the energy produced
    Depends how you define safety. A thermonuclear explosion is practically ruled out in civilian reactors due the fuel ultilized, so one could claim hydrogen power production would be a greater "explosion risk".
    However an explosion of a hydrogen plant, whilst still a major disaster, is still preferable to the likes of Chernobyl and Fukushima in my book, because there is no long therm environmental damage and, wich is the most important point, no genetic damage to the human race as a whole. And there is no waste. All its going to produce is fresh water, wich isn't a bad thing i guess. You don't spoil the planet for generatios to come but it can still blow up in a major fireball, that is true. Probably a BIG fireball when the fuel stockpile goes up. I still prefer it.

    Its also lighter than air. I imagine all those transport cars we have now replaced by Zeppelins air-sailing along with their cargo without fuel consumtion as a possible byproduct. And i like that idea. Of course those Zeppelins can blow up, too, as history tought us. But cars cause accidents and planes crash in any case. Even here i think its worth learning to handle the risk. There will be setbacks of course, certainly. But it won't do any long-therm damage. And it will pottentially fix our environmental problems singlehandly.

    ACSIS on
  • TofystedethTofystedeth Registered User regular
    ACSIS wrote: »
    There are. I see a silver line on the horizont, though. As we use up our deposits of fossil fuels we HAVE to look for alternative fuel sources and Hydrogen is the premier choice here. When the infrastructure to produce it is developed enough, abandonig nuclear powerplants is a natural part of the process, if i am right. So this madness will continue for a few decades tops only before we switch to efficient, cheap and emission free technolgies.
    Hydrogen is not an energy source. It is a storage medium.

    steam_sig.png
  • ACSISACSIS Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    That is right, it is fuel. And has the nice benefit of reducing the weight of things containing it because its lighter than air. That stuff is pure magic. Thats the future, like it or not because fossil fuels are rapidly being used up and that is our alternative. Back ten years or so when you said stuff like that you usually would get a reply like "yeah, you always say the fossil fuels will eb used up shortly but i don't see it". We passed that already by now. We will also pass through the rest of it, like it or not. Ah, all those great airships in the sky... it will be great.

    Now that raises the question how to produce the electricity for Hydrogen production. Geothermal energy, air and sea currents, tidal power and alikes are all very practical concepts of generating energy. Even nuclear power is, but creating such waste for running a steam turbine is just... its crazy.

    ACSIS on
  • Void SlayerVoid Slayer Very Suspicious Registered User regular
    ACSIS wrote: »
    cannot fail unless the laws of physics change
    Problem is the great majority of reactors CAN fail. And the waste issue remains, of course. Also people claimed the Titanic couldn't sink.
    You're totally ignorant of the physics involved, aren't you? The longer a half-life a substance has, the less radioactive it is.
    True that, but 24000 years is still a looong time. If you think Plutonium is no health risk, you are probably okay with the rest of the world stashing it under your bed, right?
    Uranium tailings
    Removal of very low-level waste

    Uranium tailings are waste by-product materials left over from the rough processing of uranium-bearing ore. They are not significantly radioactive. Mill tailings are sometimes referred to as 11(e)2 wastes, from the section of the Atomic Energy Act of 1946 that defines them. Uranium mill tailings typically also contain chemically hazardous heavy metal such as lead and arsenic. Vast mounds of uranium mill tailings are left at many old mining sites, especially in Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah.

    Low-level waste

    Low level waste (LLW) is generated from hospitals and industry, as well as the nuclear fuel cycle. Low-level wastes include paper, rags, tools, clothing, filters, and other materials which contain small amounts of mostly short-lived radioactivity. Materials that originate from any region of an Active Area are commonly designated as LLW as a precautionary measure even if there is with only a remote possibility of being contaminated with radioactive materials. Such LLW typically exhibits no higher radioactivity than one would expect from the same material disposed of in a non-active area, such as a normal office block.

    Some high-activity LLW requires shielding during handling and transport but most LLW is suitable for shallow land burial. To reduce its volume, it is often compacted or incinerated before disposal. Low-level waste is divided into four classes: class A, class B, class C, and Greater Than Class C (GTCC).

    Intermediate-level waste
    Spent fuel flasks are transported by railway in the United Kingdom. Each flask is constructed of 14 in (360 mm) thick solid steel and weighs in excess of 50 tons

    Intermediate-level waste (ILW) contains higher amounts of radioactivity and in some cases requires shielding. Intermediate-level wastes includes resins, chemical sludge and metal reactor nuclear fuel cladding, as well as contaminated materials from reactor decommissioning. It may be solidified in concrete or bitumen for disposal. As a general rule, short-lived waste (mainly non-fuel materials from reactors) is buried in shallow repositories, while long-lived waste (from fuel and fuel reprocessing) is deposited in geological repository. U.S. regulations do not define this category of waste; the term is used in Europe and elsewhere.

    High-level waste

    High-level waste (HLW) is produced by nuclear reactors. It contains fission products and transuranic elements generated in the reactor core. It is highly radioactive and often thermally hot. HLW accounts for over 95 percent of the total radioactivity produced in the process of nuclear electricity generation. The amount of HLW worldwide is currently increasing by about 12,000 metric tons every year, which is the equivalent to about 100 double-decker buses or a two-story structure with a footprint the size of a basketball court. A 1000-MW nuclear power plant produces about 27 tonnes of spent nuclear fuel (unreprocessed) every year.

    Transuranic waste

    Transuranic waste (TRUW) as defined by U.S. regulations is, without regard to form or origin, waste that is contaminated with alpha-emitting transuranic radionuclides with half-lives greater than 20 years and concentrations greater than 100 nCi/g (3.7 MBq/kg), excluding high-level waste. Elements that have an atomic number greater than uranium are called transuranic ("beyond uranium"). Because of their long half-lives, TRUW is disposed more cautiously than either low- or intermediate-level waste. In the U.S., it arises mainly from weapons production, and consists of clothing, tools, rags, residues, debris and other items contaminated with small amounts of radioactive elements (mainly plutonium).

    Under U.S. law, transuranic waste is further categorized into "contact-handled" (CH) and "remote-handled" (RH) on the basis of radiation dose measured at the surface of the waste container. CH TRUW has a surface dose rate not greater than 200 Roentgen equivalent man per hour (to millisievert/hr), whereas RH TRUW has a surface dose rate of 200 Röntgen equivalent man per hour (2 mSv/h) or greater. CH TRUW does not have the very high radioactivity of high-level waste, nor its high heat generation, but RH TRUW can be highly radioactive, with surface dose rates up to 1000000 Röntgen equivalent man per hour (10000 mSv/h). The U.S. currently disposes of TRUW generated from military facilities at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant.
    WHY are we doing this when better alternatives are possible?
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6-_UTU_bJ0

    Show me a working thermal plant, including the technology to transport electricity to the mainland, and I might agree with you. There are MANY technical problems with large ocean based platforms that deep in the ocean. it is certainly something that should be tried, but before we put all our hopes into it and abandon other technologies that can help get us off fossil fuels for electrical generation AS SOON AS POSSIBLE we need to have the concept proven to work.

    No one is saying nuclear is perfect but it is safer then fossil fuels and can be scaled up to meet all electrical generation needs right now.

    He's a shy overambitious dog-catcher on the wrong side of the law. She's an orphaned psychic mercenary with the power to bend men's minds. They fight crime!
  • TofystedethTofystedeth Registered User regular
    ACSIS wrote: »
    That is right, it is fuel. And has the nice benefit of reducing the weight of things containing it because its lighter than air. That stuff is pure magic. Thats the future, like it or not because fossil fuels are rapidly being used up and that is our alternative. Back ten years or so when you said stuff like that you usually would get a reply like "yeah, you always say the fossil fuels will eb used up shortly but i don't see it". We passed that already by now. We will also pass through the rest of it, like it or not. Ah, all those great airships in the sky... it will be great.
    Okay, you completely didn't understand me and maybe that's my fault for being terse. We still have to generate that H2. That's going to take at least as much energy as we will get out burning it thanks to thermodynamics. That energy has to come from somewhere. There aren't just vast clouds of it (on Earth) sitting around waiting to consumed. We're going to need a massive energy generation infrastructure to create all that hydrogen, and nuclear will most likely be a part of that.
    Its also lighter than air. I imagine all those transport cars we have now replaced by Zeppelins air-sailing along with their cargo without fuel consumtion as a possible byproduct. And i like that idea. Of course those Zeppelins can blow up, too, as history tought us. But cars cause accidents and planes crash in any case. Even here i think its worth learning to handle the risk. There will be setbacks of course, certainly. But it won't do any long-therm damage. And it will pottentially fix our environmental problems singlehandly.
    What does all this even mean? Without fuel consumption? So you just float up there and let the wind take you wherever? We already have hot air balloons for that.

    steam_sig.png
  • EgoEgo Registered User regular
    That is right, it is fuel. And has the nice benefit of reducing the weight of things containing it because its lighter than air.

    ...this is such an ignorant statement.

    Do you really think hydrogen stored as a fuel is lighter than air? Spend a minute thinking about it.
    Depends how you define safety.

    Risk to human health / cost in human lifespan. You know. Safety.

    It's really, really easy math. Basically: people who opposed nuclear power for safety reasons are ignorant. The safer stuff doesn't work yet and the more dangerous stuff that we use instead is more dangerous.

    Erik
  • TofystedethTofystedeth Registered User regular
    I suddenly just noticed I'm discussing nuclear safety with Fallout 3 in my sig...

    steam_sig.png
  • tbloxhamtbloxham Registered User regular
    ACSIS wrote: »
    cannot fail unless the laws of physics change
    Problem is the great majority of reactors CAN fail. And the waste issue remains, of course. Also people claimed the Titanic couldn't sink.
    You're totally ignorant of the physics involved, aren't you? The longer a half-life a substance has, the less radioactive it is.
    True that, but 24000 years is still a looong time. If you think Plutonium is no health risk, you are probably okay with the rest of the world stashing it under your bed, right?
    Uranium tailings
    Removal of very low-level waste

    Uranium tailings are waste by-product materials left over from the rough processing of uranium-bearing ore. They are not significantly radioactive. Mill tailings are sometimes referred to as 11(e)2 wastes, from the section of the Atomic Energy Act of 1946 that defines them. Uranium mill tailings typically also contain chemically hazardous heavy metal such as lead and arsenic. Vast mounds of uranium mill tailings are left at many old mining sites, especially in Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah.

    Low-level waste

    Low level waste (LLW) is generated from hospitals and industry, as well as the nuclear fuel cycle. Low-level wastes include paper, rags, tools, clothing, filters, and other materials which contain small amounts of mostly short-lived radioactivity. Materials that originate from any region of an Active Area are commonly designated as LLW as a precautionary measure even if there is with only a remote possibility of being contaminated with radioactive materials. Such LLW typically exhibits no higher radioactivity than one would expect from the same material disposed of in a non-active area, such as a normal office block.

    Some high-activity LLW requires shielding during handling and transport but most LLW is suitable for shallow land burial. To reduce its volume, it is often compacted or incinerated before disposal. Low-level waste is divided into four classes: class A, class B, class C, and Greater Than Class C (GTCC).

    Intermediate-level waste
    Spent fuel flasks are transported by railway in the United Kingdom. Each flask is constructed of 14 in (360 mm) thick solid steel and weighs in excess of 50 tons

    Intermediate-level waste (ILW) contains higher amounts of radioactivity and in some cases requires shielding. Intermediate-level wastes includes resins, chemical sludge and metal reactor nuclear fuel cladding, as well as contaminated materials from reactor decommissioning. It may be solidified in concrete or bitumen for disposal. As a general rule, short-lived waste (mainly non-fuel materials from reactors) is buried in shallow repositories, while long-lived waste (from fuel and fuel reprocessing) is deposited in geological repository. U.S. regulations do not define this category of waste; the term is used in Europe and elsewhere.

    High-level waste

    High-level waste (HLW) is produced by nuclear reactors. It contains fission products and transuranic elements generated in the reactor core. It is highly radioactive and often thermally hot. HLW accounts for over 95 percent of the total radioactivity produced in the process of nuclear electricity generation. The amount of HLW worldwide is currently increasing by about 12,000 metric tons every year, which is the equivalent to about 100 double-decker buses or a two-story structure with a footprint the size of a basketball court. A 1000-MW nuclear power plant produces about 27 tonnes of spent nuclear fuel (unreprocessed) every year.

    Transuranic waste

    Transuranic waste (TRUW) as defined by U.S. regulations is, without regard to form or origin, waste that is contaminated with alpha-emitting transuranic radionuclides with half-lives greater than 20 years and concentrations greater than 100 nCi/g (3.7 MBq/kg), excluding high-level waste. Elements that have an atomic number greater than uranium are called transuranic ("beyond uranium"). Because of their long half-lives, TRUW is disposed more cautiously than either low- or intermediate-level waste. In the U.S., it arises mainly from weapons production, and consists of clothing, tools, rags, residues, debris and other items contaminated with small amounts of radioactive elements (mainly plutonium).

    Under U.S. law, transuranic waste is further categorized into "contact-handled" (CH) and "remote-handled" (RH) on the basis of radiation dose measured at the surface of the waste container. CH TRUW has a surface dose rate not greater than 200 Roentgen equivalent man per hour (to millisievert/hr), whereas RH TRUW has a surface dose rate of 200 Röntgen equivalent man per hour (2 mSv/h) or greater. CH TRUW does not have the very high radioactivity of high-level waste, nor its high heat generation, but RH TRUW can be highly radioactive, with surface dose rates up to 1000000 Röntgen equivalent man per hour (10000 mSv/h). The U.S. currently disposes of TRUW generated from military facilities at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant.
    WHY are we doing this when better alternatives are possible?
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6-_UTU_bJ0

    Because 100 double Decker buses may sound like a lot, but its actually almost nothing and everything you listed would be no more radioactive than it was when we dug it up within a few hundred years (or a decade or two if we use breeder reactors) considering uranium is already a radioactive metal.

    You are concerned about problems that don't exist and have been manufactured by the fossil fuels lobby and 'back to nature' members of the green lobby.

    "That is cool" - Abraham Lincoln
  • tbloxhamtbloxham Registered User regular
    And as others have said, hydrogen is an energy storage medium. If you want it, nuclear power is the best choice to power your plant.

    And genetic damage to the human race? ACsis that is an absurd claim even for you.

    "That is cool" - Abraham Lincoln
  • autono-wally, erotibot300autono-wally, erotibot300 love machine Registered User regular
    ACSIS wrote: »
    Germany shutting down nuclear power because of Fukushima is one of the dumbest things Germany has done in the last ten years. Like, number one is the balls stupid way they set up the Euro and then this.

    Fucking pointless NIMBY bullshit.

    See, we got 1986 Chernobyl and 2011 Fukushima. The assumption was that nuclear power is safe if handled properly. We now know that isn't the case, with two major incidents in 25 years. If you do the statistics you can expect four major incidents in a century or about fourty each millenia. It means we render this planet uninhabitable in a relatively short ime if we continue this. Its playing russian roulette with your country.

    Both of those examples are of nuclear power not being handled properly, so I repeat,

    NIMBY.
    Bullshit.
    It pains me to agree with ACSIS, but... A system that can no tolerate human error without catastrophic consequence should probably be thought about more thoroughly than "lol user error"
    It's not always about the possibility of an accident, but also about the severity of its consequences.

    kFJhXwE.jpgkFJhXwE.jpg
  • electricitylikesmeelectricitylikesme Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    ACSIS wrote: »
    Hacksaw wrote: »
    Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it incredibly expensive to refine Hydrogen for fuel purposes right now?
    Its actually rather simple. Storage and safety is another cup of tea because being a highly efficient fuel it IS quite volatile. Usually its pressurized and cooled. Refining it is not much more hassle than running electric power through water, you can do it at home, if you like (but i wouldn't advise it, its explosive gas, you know).

    Actually Hacksaw is more correct. Straight hydrolysis of hydrogen from water is incredibly inefficient due to recombination mechanisms. Almost 70% of the hydrogen you produce will recombine with oxygen before it can recovered - giving off heat. This exact effect is what led to the first faulty cold fusion claims, and it is an inefficiency of electrolysis. This is why there is such interest and work in finding more efficient hydrogen catalysts. Plants go to enormous lengths to carefully prevent the hydrogen and oxygen recombining, which is why they can do that particular trick with just sunlight.

    EDIT: Also nuclear power can tolerate a great deal of error really. Where it goes wrong is with reactor designs that require active cooling. We have designs now which don't require active cooling, to the point that physically blowing the reactor apart would render the whole thing harmless.

    We're being extraordinarily stupid at the moment by not having much more serious discussion of how to build a reactor we're comfortable deploying - no nukes is just foolish when we don't have a reasonable alternative, and especially where the actual result to date has been running older plants well past their lifetimes because no one will let us build a replacement for them, and no one wants another coal generator to go up in it's place either.

    I have similar objections to the attitude when it comes to open-ness and transparency in nuclear safety: it doesn't work if the only answer you'll ever get is "shut everything down, then take everyone's money forever".

    electricitylikesme on
  • tinwhiskerstinwhiskers Registered User regular
    What continually drives me fucking bonkers when people start talking about energy alternatives, is how the panacea we need right now, is of course a power point or a youtube video.

    A single working testbed? Nope.
    Prototype scale plant? Nope
    1 Commercial sized design? Not a fucking chance

    But surely we can go from powerpoint slide to thousands of gigawatts of generation in the critical next couple of decades.

    Honestly there's so much stupid with that idea. First 400c(Despite being hot enough to 'Melt LEAD') isn't that hot at all for steam out of a boiler.

    1MW=3600000Kj Assuming you can make use of say say that waters at 350 when if finally gets up to the ship(which is going to be stupid high because there's no fucking way you're getting water up a 3000m pipe and not losing most your heat.)

    1 Kg of water 250*4.18 will have 1045Kj of energy. Carnot cycle means you'll get(1-373/623) 60% of that, under completely theoretical ideal conditions. Rounding down to 523Kj/KG(50% efficiency), your looking at 6883 KG of water to provide one MW of power.

    So to replace 1 mid sized nucelar plant, of 1200 MW, 8260038 KG/hr or water or roughly 2,189,407 gallons an hour.. Assuming the vents can supply that much. Of course, pumping up all that water is going to use tons of energy in it own right. like 30KJ/KG with 100% efficient pumps. So you're out 6% of your energy yield, before you even get to the boiler side of things.

    And this is just a problem with the basic thermodynamics of the idea, it completely ignores the difficulties in actually carrying it out.



    They actually did try a test run of a similiar idea out in the Australian desert. Where they were going to try and basically frak a path between 2 shafts, inject the water down, and use the steam that came back to power the turbines. But they blew the well head, and I think that project is dead now.

    And this is like that, except floating in the ocean, with even more experimental completely theoretical systems.

    6ylyzxlir2dz.png
  • Anon the FelonAnon the Felon In bat country.Registered User regular
    What continually drives me fucking bonkers when people start talking about energy alternatives, is how the panacea we need right now, is of course a power point or a youtube video.

    A single working testbed? Nope.
    Prototype scale plant? Nope
    1 Commercial sized design? Not a fucking chance

    But surely we can go from powerpoint slide to thousands of gigawatts of generation in the critical next couple of decades.

    Honestly there's so much stupid with that idea. First 400c(Despite being hot enough to 'Melt LEAD') isn't that hot at all for steam out of a boiler.

    1MW=3600000Kj Assuming you can make use of say say that waters at 350 when if finally gets up to the ship(which is going to be stupid high because there's no fucking way you're getting water up a 3000m pipe and not losing most your heat.)

    1 Kg of water 250*4.18 will have 1045Kj of energy. Carnot cycle means you'll get(1-373/623) 60% of that, under completely theoretical ideal conditions. Rounding down to 523Kj/KG(50% efficiency), your looking at 6883 KG of water to provide one MW of power.

    So to replace 1 mid sized nucelar plant, of 1200 MW, 8260038 KG/hr or water or roughly 2,189,407 gallons an hour.. Assuming the vents can supply that much. Of course, pumping up all that water is going to use tons of energy in it own right. like 30KJ/KG with 100% efficient pumps. So you're out 6% of your energy yield, before you even get to the boiler side of things.

    And this is just a problem with the basic thermodynamics of the idea, it completely ignores the difficulties in actually carrying it out.



    They actually did try a test run of a similiar idea out in the Australian desert. Where they were going to try and basically frak a path between 2 shafts, inject the water down, and use the steam that came back to power the turbines. But they blew the well head, and I think that project is dead now.

    And this is like that, except floating in the ocean, with even more experimental completely theoretical systems.

    This was awesome. Thank you. It's not about theoretical alternatives, it's about what we have in our hands right now to work with the problem. This "Future Tech" ACSIS keep's talking about is exactly that, Future Tech. It's something we don't have on the scale we need it. You can not like what's available, but if it's better than what we are doing, let's do it.

  • tinwhiskerstinwhiskers Registered User regular
    I actually think the Australia project has some promise theoretically. As it really hinges on deep drilling, which we have a good amount of experience with (Deepwater Horizon aside), and fracking/water injection. Which is something that's getting tons of $ thrown at it by the NG companies.

    Actually just re-looked up the Australia project. Looks like they are back up and working, and the blowout was cause by choosing the wrong steels for the brine(injection water) chemistry they were using(Whoever said that stuff about Gold Rushes and safety up thread, here's exhibit A for you.). And now the 1 MW test they were going to have up and running in 2009, is still not done, and they are just now re-drilling the well. Overall they've been at it for 10 years, and don't have a working station up yet.


    6ylyzxlir2dz.png
  • OakeyOakey UKRegistered User regular
    I like ACSIS's logic. On the one hand he's dismissing nuclear beacuse it's 'dangerous' yet on the other he's pushing Hydrogen and already notching up the possible deaths as a result of that as 'acceptable collateral damage'.

  • TastyfishTastyfish Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    There's some interesting stuff going on in Europe which is looking to link up the various renewable resources via underwater cables - the UK buys power from icelands geothermal stations when it needs to top up it's own wind and tide power, using the money it generates by selling it's excess power off to the rest of mainland europe, both directly and via Norway where the excess power is used to pump water up Norwegian fjiords that lead to hydro-power stations.

    Laying cable and making the most of what the current tech can do seems like it would be a pretty good alternative, though whether increasing countries energy reliance on other countries is a recipe for peace or trouble I don't know. Would renewable would function like oil and gas in this regard?

    Tastyfish on
  • OakeyOakey UKRegistered User regular
    Are you sure about that?
    Wiki wrote:
    As of 2005 imports of electricity from France have historically accounted for about 5% of electricity available in the UK. Imports through the interconnector have generally been around the highest possible level, given the capacity of the link. In 2006, 97.5% of the energy transfers have been made from France to UK, supplying the equivalent of 3 million English homes. The link availability is around 98%, which is among the best rates in the world. The continued size and duration of this flow is open to some doubt, given the growth in demand in continental Europe for clean electricity, and increasing electricity demand within France

    I think we import more energy than we export? I think the data is available on the National Grid site but as I haven't got Excel installed I can't check.

  • override367override367 ALL minions Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    ACSIS wrote: »
    Germany shutting down nuclear power because of Fukushima is one of the dumbest things Germany has done in the last ten years. Like, number one is the balls stupid way they set up the Euro and then this.

    Fucking pointless NIMBY bullshit.

    See, we got 1986 Chernobyl and 2011 Fukushima. The assumption was that nuclear power is safe if handled properly. We now know that isn't the case, with two major incidents in 25 years. If you do the statistics you can expect four major incidents in a century or about fourty each millenia. It means we render this planet uninhabitable in a relatively short ime if we continue this. Its playing russian roulette with your country.

    Both of those examples are of nuclear power not being handled properly, so I repeat,

    NIMBY.
    Bullshit.
    It pains me to agree with ACSIS, but... A system that can no tolerate human error without catastrophic consequence should probably be thought about more thoroughly than "lol user error"
    It's not always about the possibility of an accident, but also about the severity of its consequences.

    Nuclear, except for chernobyl, has a safer track record than just about every form of fossil fuel in terms of environmental damage, and it has grown leaps and bounds safer with every iteration. Fukushimi was hit with a combination of user error and nearly the most cataclysmic thing that can happen without involving extraterrestrial threats like asteroids, and still caused less damage than an exploding oil refinery would.

    Every day coal puts more radiation into the environment than nuclear does each year, and the newest reactor designs cannot melt down. Yeah sure you can say "Well they said the titanic wouldn't sink", but nobody would have denied that it was physically possible for boats to sink.

    Saying a pebble bed reactor cant melt down isn't like saying the titanic can't sink, it's like saying the titanic can't fly

    override367 on
  • CantidoCantido Registered User regular
    My college just had our Senior Design Symposium (my project got me a job.) And we had a guest speaker saying that Germany is currently generating more Joules through solar power than the United States and they get about as much sun as Alaska.

    3DS Friendcode 5413-1311-3767
  • AManFromEarthAManFromEarth Let's get to twerk! The King in the SwampRegistered User regular
    Cantido wrote: »
    My college just had our Senior Design Symposium (my project got me a job.) And we had a guest speaker saying that Germany is currently generating more Joules through solar power than the United States and they get about as much sun as Alaska.

    Does that mean more than we do with solar power or more than we do with power in general?

    Because it wouldn't surprise or confuse me if they had more solar generation than us.

    Lh96QHG.png
  • ZephiranZephiran Registered User regular
    Germany, to its credit, has this initiative going on where there's no minimum limit for how much juice private people can pump out into the grid before they can start getting paid. This has some neat benefits since it's incentivised the population to plonk down windmills and solar panels on their private property and start generating that sweet, sweet juice.

    I imagine part of the supposed solar power generation advantage Germany has is due to this clever piece of legislation, but I may be mistaken.

    Alright and in this next scene all the animals have AIDS.

    I got a little excited when I saw your ship.
  • CantidoCantido Registered User regular
    edited April 2012
    Cantido wrote: »
    My college just had our Senior Design Symposium (my project got me a job.) And we had a guest speaker saying that Germany is currently generating more Joules through solar power than the United States and they get about as much sun as Alaska.

    Does that mean more than we do with solar power or more than we do with power in general?

    Because it wouldn't surprise or confuse me if they had more solar generation than us.

    More than we do in solar power. And that China also passed the United States last year.

    But goddamn. Effing Skyrim is getting more out of their sun than our deserts. Who's in charge of our deserts?! Oh...right.

    Cantido on
    3DS Friendcode 5413-1311-3767
  • DynagripDynagrip Break me a million hearts HoustonRegistered User, ClubPA regular
    edited April 2012
    hydrogen is too energy intensive to produce, store at any reasonable density, and transport. Nuclear would be pretty much the best technology I think to get us off of carbon fuels. Nuclear plants put out a shitload of energy and their uptime is basically 100%, not subject to the vagaries of the sun and wind. I think solar and wind are great but the lulls and such are an issue and you pretty much have to have another more conventional powerplant to operate along with them.

    I've been thinking about this stuff a ton lately and was even contemplating starting a thread.

    I have a feeling that with climate change we're basically going to have to engineer ourselves out of the hole we've dug if we don't want to see catastrophic levels of warming. Like geo-engineering on a massive scale. It will be interesting times.

    Dynagrip on
  • AManFromEarthAManFromEarth Let's get to twerk! The King in the SwampRegistered User regular
    Cantido wrote: »
    Cantido wrote: »
    My college just had our Senior Design Symposium (my project got me a job.) And we had a guest speaker saying that Germany is currently generating more Joules through solar power than the United States and they get about as much sun as Alaska.

    Does that mean more than we do with solar power or more than we do with power in general?

    Because it wouldn't surprise or confuse me if they had more solar generation than us.

    More than we do in solar power. And that China also passed the United States last year.

    But goddamn. Effing Skyrim is getting more out of their sun than our deserts. Who's in charge of our deserts?! Oh...right.

    Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it's a good thing. But to me it's just A thing.

    Lh96QHG.png
  • TastyfishTastyfish Registered User regular
    Oakey wrote: »
    Are you sure about that?
    Wiki wrote:
    As of 2005 imports of electricity from France have historically accounted for about 5% of electricity available in the UK. Imports through the interconnector have generally been around the highest possible level, given the capacity of the link. In 2006, 97.5% of the energy transfers have been made from France to UK, supplying the equivalent of 3 million English homes. The link availability is around 98%, which is among the best rates in the world. The continued size and duration of this flow is open to some doubt, given the growth in demand in continental Europe for clean electricity, and increasing electricity demand within France

    I think we import more energy than we export? I think the data is available on the National Grid site but as I haven't got Excel installed I can't check.

    This assuming that we get a bunch more wind and tidal power plants built, far as the capacity for this sort of renewable energy the UK has (probably due to all the coastline) the most in Europe.

    BBC article didn't have a map showing the proposed new pipelines, so here's a Guardian article

  • MillMill Registered User regular
    Dynagrip wrote: »
    hydrogen is too energy intensive to produce, store at any reasonable density, and transport. Nuclear would be pretty much the best technology I think to get us off of carbon fuels. Nuclear plants put out a shitload of energy and their uptime is basically 100%, not subject to the vagaries of the sun and wind. I think solar and wind are great but the lulls and such are an issue and you pretty much have to have another more conventional powerplant to operate along with them.

    I've been thinking about this stuff a ton lately and was even contemplating starting a thread.

    I have a feeling that with climate change we're basically going to have to engineer ourselves out of the hole we've dug if we don't want to see catastrophic levels of warming. Like geo-engineering on a massive scale. It will be interesting times.

    Yeah, I've been of the opinion for awhile now that our next step in energy reform would be to shift over to nuclear power. We already have technology that makes it much safer than when the idea first became practical, and it's far more reliable than other alternatives. I suspect the costs and dangers would actually go down further if it saw more widespread use since we'd need to train more people to run such plants and I'm sure that's going to result in more research and ideas on how to get the most out of nuclear power safely.

    My biggest pet peeve with the anti-nuclear crowd is that they are often ignorant of the current technologies and fail to grasp that the current main stays of energy production (natural gas, coal and oil) are only cheaper because we're more familiar with the technology since it's been around longer. I'm pretty sure if people back in the day, stuck with the BS argument that natural gas, coal and oil plants are unsafe and expensive, we'd would have never gotten very fair with our current tech. In some ways, I equate it to the idiocy that people use to justify not voting at all when the GOP are too conservative and the dems aren't liberal enough, the only thing that results from turning your nose up at the alternative is that you screw yourself over in the long run because our fossil fuel energy isn't going to go anywhere till we either run out or replace it entirely with one of our current choices of alternative energy (nuclear seems to be the only one up to par).

    Now I wouldn't mind seeing efforts to continue developing the other alternatives as we switch over to nuclear and even after we finish the transition to it. We might make those sources reliable enough to use or at the very least they can supplement our current power usage. Generate too much power from wind and solar, if I'm not mistaken, cut back on the nuclear plants output till the wind and solar start to drop off on being able to cover power needs. It also gives us a fall back in the event that something happens to the plant. If nothing else, continuing research in other areas is always good because that can yield new insights that could be useful elsewhere.

  • DarkewolfeDarkewolfe Registered User regular
    You guys are arguing with ACSIS. The guy who believes aliens built the pyramids.

    What is this I don't even.
  • The EnderThe Ender Registered User regular
    Darkewolfe wrote: »
    You guys are arguing with ACSIS. The guy who believes aliens built the pyramids.

    I try not to flagrantly engage in logical fallacies, and while I agree that ACSIS has no credibility, I don't consider it my privilege to dismiss someone's arguments because they've said other absurd things in the past. There's lots of reasons ACSIS is wrong, and I know a lot of people who make arguments similar to his, so I think it's useful to explain those reasons.

    With Love and Courage
  • spool32spool32 Contrary Library Registered User regular
    Mill wrote: »
    Dynagrip wrote: »
    hydrogen is too energy intensive to produce, store at any reasonable density, and transport. Nuclear would be pretty much the best technology I think to get us off of carbon fuels. Nuclear plants put out a shitload of energy and their uptime is basically 100%, not subject to the vagaries of the sun and wind. I think solar and wind are great but the lulls and such are an issue and you pretty much have to have another more conventional powerplant to operate along with them.

    I've been thinking about this stuff a ton lately and was even contemplating starting a thread.

    I have a feeling that with climate change we're basically going to have to engineer ourselves out of the hole we've dug if we don't want to see catastrophic levels of warming. Like geo-engineering on a massive scale. It will be interesting times.

    Yeah, I've been of the opinion for awhile now that our next step in energy reform would be to shift over to nuclear power. We already have technology that makes it much safer than when the idea first became practical, and it's far more reliable than other alternatives. I suspect the costs and dangers would actually go down further if it saw more widespread use since we'd need to train more people to run such plants and I'm sure that's going to result in more research and ideas on how to get the most out of nuclear power safely.

    My biggest pet peeve with the anti-nuclear crowd is that they are often ignorant of the current technologies and fail to grasp that the current main stays of energy production (natural gas, coal and oil) are only cheaper because we're more familiar with the technology since it's been around longer.

    I think that's a very charitable way of describing opponents of nuclear power. I would say that those people believe we should just use less energy, and have fewer people, and if that means a lower quality of life and something something population reduction, well sustainability is the main thing in the end so whatever means we use to get there...

    Opponents of nuclear power aren't anti-nuclear, they're anti-progress.

  • HacksawHacksaw J. Duggan Esq. Wrestler at LawRegistered User regular
    edited April 2012
    spool32 wrote: »
    Opponents of nuclear power aren't anti-nuclear, they're anti-progress.

    No, I don't think that's actually the case. I'm pretty sure they're firmly anti-nuclear.

    Hacksaw on
  • The EnderThe Ender Registered User regular
    I think that's a very charitable way of describing opponents of nuclear power. I would say that those people believe we should just use less energy, and have fewer people, and if that means a lower quality of life and something something population reduction, well sustainability is the main thing in the end so whatever means we use to get there...

    Opponents of nuclear power aren't anti-nuclear, they're anti-progress.

    This outlook makes no sense. If 'anti-progress' or population control were a goal for misguided environmental groups, it would make more sense to simply do / say nothing.

    With Love and Courage
  • MillMill Registered User regular
    spool32 wrote: »
    Mill wrote: »
    Dynagrip wrote: »
    hydrogen is too energy intensive to produce, store at any reasonable density, and transport. Nuclear would be pretty much the best technology I think to get us off of carbon fuels. Nuclear plants put out a shitload of energy and their uptime is basically 100%, not subject to the vagaries of the sun and wind. I think solar and wind are great but the lulls and such are an issue and you pretty much have to have another more conventional powerplant to operate along with them.

    I've been thinking about this stuff a ton lately and was even contemplating starting a thread.

    I have a feeling that with climate change we're basically going to have to engineer ourselves out of the hole we've dug if we don't want to see catastrophic levels of warming. Like geo-engineering on a massive scale. It will be interesting times.

    Yeah, I've been of the opinion for awhile now that our next step in energy reform would be to shift over to nuclear power. We already have technology that makes it much safer than when the idea first became practical, and it's far more reliable than other alternatives. I suspect the costs and dangers would actually go down further if it saw more widespread use since we'd need to train more people to run such plants and I'm sure that's going to result in more research and ideas on how to get the most out of nuclear power safely.

    My biggest pet peeve with the anti-nuclear crowd is that they are often ignorant of the current technologies and fail to grasp that the current main stays of energy production (natural gas, coal and oil) are only cheaper because we're more familiar with the technology since it's been around longer.

    I think that's a very charitable way of describing opponents of nuclear power. I would say that those people believe we should just use less energy, and have fewer people, and if that means a lower quality of life and something something population reduction, well sustainability is the main thing in the end so whatever means we use to get there...

    Opponents of nuclear power aren't anti-nuclear, they're anti-progress.

    No, it's only charitable some of the anti-nuclear crowd. I'm pretty sure they're are some that would rather use what have out of ignorance because of "hey if it ain't broke don't fix it," and "OMG! radiation will kill us all!" I'd also wager that we have some elements that oppose nuclear power out of self-serving interests, I don't see many of the powerful and wealthy who made their profits off of fossil fuels being keen on developing alternative energy technologies that could make their fossil fuel powered money trees much less valuable (possibly even worthless).

  • tinwhiskerstinwhiskers Registered User regular
    There was actually some stuff a while back where some of the major power companies opposed the chamber of commerce's opposition to cap and trade. Because they were very nuclear heavy, so they'd be able to sell the credits for$$$

    6ylyzxlir2dz.png
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