Slow Train to Yucca Mountain & Green Nuclear ?

[LMagic007]

Slow Train to Yucca Mountain

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2008/05/slow-train-to-yucca-mountain.html

Also an artilce on nuclear being green

Nuclear power could lose green tag, research shows

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/04/30/2231769.htm

???

[Wobs]

Originally Posted by LMagic007

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2008/05/slow-train-to-yucca-mountain.html

LOL. Only in the US:
"it even printed up T-shirts and coffee mugs for visitors to purchase at lunchtime."

While there are some good points in the article, regarding the ploitical history of the issue, it does fall foul of some classic areas, such as mentioning that there is a dairy down gradient to it. This is hardly relevant when the repository is deep below the ground.

It also is misleading in that it claims much of the waste (uranium) will be dangerous for for 4.5 billion years. This is simply untrue.

If they were to use Yucca as a place for disposing of fuel that will have been spent after reprocessing and reuse, the stuff left over will be safe far sooner.

[Besoeker]

Whether Nuclear is green or not, there are no viable alternatives on the required scale in the short to medium term.
Other than fossils, of course.

[LMagic007]

Originally Posted by Besoeker

Whether Nuclear is green or not, there are no viable alternatives on the required scale in the short to medium term.
Other than fossils, of course.

Whatever the short and medium term represent ? Well the short term may be seen probably within the next 10 years as that's how long it can take to plan and build a typical nuclear power station and sometimes longer. Therefore there needs to be solutions within that period that can be applied. Solar and wind technologies are being rolled out to help supplement grid requirements now and over a 10 year period they can expect to make a valuable and significant contribution of scale, at current growth rates of these technologies. Also based on current cost projections, in 10 years time renewable energy technologies will be even more efficient and cost competitive. These are viable alternatives for supplementary purposes, however as I have always maintained, no single power generation technology can be relied upon globally, as we head into an uncertain future.

[forfismum]

Originally Posted by LMagic007

Also based on current cost projections, in 10 years time renewable energy technologies will be even more efficient and cost competitive. .

And all other technologies will just stay as is?

[LMagic007]

Originally Posted by forfismum

And all other technologies will just stay as is?

Of course not. Other technologies will obviously improve over time. The problem is, those other energy technologies that use fossil fuels, are projected to increase in terms of delivery price per kWh over time, regardless of their technical improvements. On the other hand, renewable energy of varying forms, is on the whole expected to fall in terms of delivery price per kWh over time as its technology improves and fossil fuel prices are squeezed further.

Also fossil fuel power generation will also be squeezed by carbon tariffs before very long. This will put more demand pressure on all other energy resources, but other even clean fossil fuel based resources will have to serve a greater demand as coal based power generation becomes less competitive and clean coal more expensive. This could also squeeze renewable energy prices up, but they will likely be least effected out of all, because their fuel is not limited in the same way that fossil fuels are. i.e once the plant has been built, there is no fuel cost.

The problem fossil fuels have is their finality or at least in a more pragmatic sense, limited supply at a given cost, in the face of growing demand for a resource that is far more finite than renewable energy. The world is at a point historically, where the curves for cost between the two energy types are converging. Fossil fuel prices have already risen and are expected to rise further. As oil rises in price, so will other fossil fuels as they then also become more sought after as a substitute to replace dependency on oil. They are also driven up in price by the global trading.

This is fairly much common knowledge, but there might be others interested in this perspective. Its happening as we speak day by day, so we may as well be as prepared as we can be, which means we need to aggressively evolve the renewable energy base to help take up this increasing demand, wherever it can and save our fossil fuels for when we really need them the most. I have always maintained though that we can't rely on any single energy resource into the future.

[Besoeker]

Originally Posted by LMagic007

These are viable alternatives for supplementary purposes, .

I agree with that.
What we needed now, in UK, is bulk power generation to replace plants being taken out of service.
Sadly, I think we have done too little too late.
I'm an old coger. Perhaps the crunch won't kick in to any serious extent before I shuffle off my mortal coils.
That doesn't make me feel any better about it.

[forfismum]

Originally Posted by LMagic007

Also fossil fuel power generation will also be squeezed by carbon tariffs before very long.

Only if the nutters get their way and that roller-coaster is slowing right down.The scam of man-made whatever is over and alternative intermittent power will take its proper place at about 10% of total requirments.You can fool some of the people some of the time ...etc.

[LMagic007]

Originally Posted by forfismum

Only if the nutters get their way and that roller-coaster is slowing right down.The scam of man-made whatever is over and alternative intermittent power will take its proper place at about 10% of total requirments.You can fool some of the people some of the time ...etc.

And all people most of the time. I have little doubt though in terms of a global average, it will extend well beyond 10% in the longer term once energy storage has been improved and it's cost sufficiently lowered.

[Deathridesahorse]

Originally Posted by forfismum

Only if the nutters get their way and that roller-coaster is slowing right down.The scam of man-made whatever is over and alternative intermittent power will take its proper place at about 10% of total requirments.You can fool some of the people some of the time ...etc.

...are you a disinformation agent who has it all bassackwards....(?!?)