London Array - offshore windfarm

[Andrew_Fanner]

Re: Well, I think its a good idea - you are a right bunch of Green Nimbys

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Only a politically based industry could possibly happen with no real idea of its own ecomonics. Nuclear is political not practical.
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RupertW. Your point is, as ever, highly valid. I have to insist that wind energy fits into exactly the same category, with the added proviso of not having been military technology for 50 odd years. The military quite like their stuff reliable and safe enough to use in close proximity. On the whole they are less fussy about costs.

I guess one of the base level problems in the debate is that there are dyed in the wool types on both sides, each having no concept that the other's pov has any validity. There are also polit5icians in decision making positions, politicians who may have degrees in media appreciation and getting elected, but no real understanding of the technology. Terms like "base load" "storage" and so forth have no real meaning to them. It isn't even their money, so doesn't feel like spending, as long as the currently fashiionable boxes are ticked, or the greatest number of voters are appeased.

Micro nuclear power stations, using standard military reactors, on suitably sized barges and thus connected to the National Grid. To me, that sounds cheap, mobile and achieveable in a short time period. The footprint is small and if decommissioning became an issue then a subduction zone may well put all the radioactive core back into the place it came from. I'm sure that there are valid engineering arguments against, but I have yet to hear any.

 

[michael_w]

How about having them powered so they can provide a nice F3 on otherwise calm days.

One could request a downwind passage all the way across the estuary. For an extra fee, starboard gybe the whole way can be arranged.

/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif

 

[RupertW]

Re: Well, I think its a good idea - you are a right bunch of Green Nimbys

That's the trouble with tuning into Radio 4 (at about 9ish on Wednesday night, I think) - I missed the bit on a program on climeoengineering (or somthing) where they explained what powers these proposed ships. I've been wondering too and will spend idle time at work between Christmas and New Year googling it.

 

[RupertW]

Re: Well, I think its a good idea - you are a right bunch of Green Nimbys

Andrew - I obviously didn't convince you last time then

I accept your argument that wind power is being driven politically but where I think windpower is entirely different to nuclear is that we can have a debate on engineering terms, economic terms, life-cycle terms or any other reasonable argument. There's a good chance of getting to a collective conclusion on everthing but their prettiness.

Whilst we can't be sure of long-term effects of radiation, likelihood of nuclear accidents and their impact (possibly even worse than a windmill falling on a Bavaria) and cost in terms of both carbon and money of the full lifecycle of a nuclear plant, then it's just posturing on both sides. But with some pretty dangerous toys that we still don't know how to play with 60 years on.

 

[ParaHandy]

Re: Well, I think its a good idea - you are a right bunch of Green Nimbys

"where I think windpower is entirely different to nuclear is that we can have a debate on engineering terms etc .."
windpower is precluding debate on all others.

there was a pdf file dished out by the DoE or DTI or some gov office on the severn barrier which was written as if the civil servant who was its author fancied a trip out of the office to placate the plebs out west. The scheme's seriously expensive. The recovery of the capital required there to be ROC's available throughout its (financial) life eg 30-40 years and the gov would make no such comitment. Ergo, the popularity of windfarms with a much lower capital cost (£1.3m per Mw) and quick capital recovery ... hence the reason windfarms are the only game in town as far as this gov is concerned.

basically, we're screwed or being screwed. there is a shortfall in generation. windpower might fill the gap and its advocates stress how aggregating wind farm output from all over the UK wil smooth out the troughs but this is not true because the weather systems over the UK are bigger than the UK ie the whole of the UK tends to be windy or not at the same time.

we're fooling ourselves but then, that's what all this green shoyte's about ..

 

[DaveS]

Re: Well, I think its a good idea - you are a right bunch of Green Nimbys

While it's not really my field of expertise, and I'm sure someone much more knowlegable will come along later, I think it's worth knocking some of the wilder myths on the head.

The idea that we do not know how to decommission old nuclear stations is simply untrue. The first generation of commercial nuclear generators, the Magnox stations, are currently being decommissioned. It is however a quite intricate, time consuming, and expensive process, mainly because they were designed with little, if any specific provision for ultimate dismantling. It's easy for us to now criticise this as being short sighted, but much of the technical thinking in the late 50's and early 60's was. I can remember that when the Forth Road Bridge was opened in 1964 it was said that unlike the Rail Bridge there would be no need for endless painting or other major maintenance. Well...

Putting active waste in a place of safety where it can do no harm is an obvious requirement. The government appointed committee COREM recently spent over a year looking at all options - sensible and daft (including dropping it into subduction zones and blasting it into the sun) - before concluding what most of us have always thought: controlled underground storage in geologically stable rock is the best bet. Not that we've actually started doing it yet, or even decided on the best location. Meantime the Finns have theirs nearing completion - and are building a new nuclear station.

The requirement for safe waste disposal exists, regardless of whether or not any new nuclear stations are built. Indeed, given the much greater efficiency in fuel conversion of newer designs, a decision to replace all of the UK's currently operating reactors at the end of their life with new reactors of current design would only add between 5 and 10% to the total amount of waste which will require long term storage / burial.

Nuclear and renewables should not be seen as alternatives. They are both capable of producing electricity which is effectively CO2 free. And if we believe that human emissions are exacerbating global warming, and that that is a bad thing, then using technologies other than burning fossil fuels wherever that can sensibly be done would seem to me to be a logical response.