Great article. Even if we give the nuclear energy proponents the benefit of the doubt that they can solve the problems of waste and weapons (a big if) they time frame of getting SMRs functionally on line by late 2020s is too long to solve the climate crisis.
This is a most excellent article. As a resident of WA state in the late 1970's, I watched the debacle of WPPSS, the Washington Public Power Supply System (“Whoops!”) in its beginning and the horrendous mess it created. Frightening is that nuclear power plants would have been built on very active earthquake fault lines which no one considered at that time.
This seems to be an excellent summary of the issues with nuclear power. I plan to subscribe to The Raven especially for your review of TerraPower which addresses some of the cost issues of scale for the SMRs. Longterm waste is already a problem and may well benefit in its own right from developing burner reactors that use up the actinides and shorten longterm storage.
I would like to see the cost estimates and critical evaluation of the disseminated electrical grid, storage costs for excess electricity production with wind and solar, and environmental costs of battery mining, manufacturing and recycling.
Fine article. The most interesting paragraph for me is actually this one about the alternatives to nuclear. While true, we have just as long a road to travel as the new nukes to achieve it. I'd like to see the roadmap analysis for all this to truly validate the arguments against the new nukes:
"Many studies document the capacity of wind and solar to replace fossil fuel electricity. The challenge of varying sunlight and wind speeds is met with a smart grid that can adjust energy demand to available supply and link diverse geographies. So when the wind is blowing on the Great Plains, it can supply juice while clouds block sunlight in Chicago. For times when none of that is sufficient, storage in many forms can be used, from batteries to pumped storage reservoirs. Even household water heaters. If all else fails, backup generators fueled with stored hydrogen can be brought into play. Hydrogen can be electrolyzed from water through solar and wind energy that would otherwise go unused because generation exceeds the demands of the grid. "
Great article. Even if we give the nuclear energy proponents the benefit of the doubt that they can solve the problems of waste and weapons (a big if) they time frame of getting SMRs functionally on line by late 2020s is too long to solve the climate crisis.
This is a most excellent article. As a resident of WA state in the late 1970's, I watched the debacle of WPPSS, the Washington Public Power Supply System (“Whoops!”) in its beginning and the horrendous mess it created. Frightening is that nuclear power plants would have been built on very active earthquake fault lines which no one considered at that time.
This seems to be an excellent summary of the issues with nuclear power. I plan to subscribe to The Raven especially for your review of TerraPower which addresses some of the cost issues of scale for the SMRs. Longterm waste is already a problem and may well benefit in its own right from developing burner reactors that use up the actinides and shorten longterm storage.
I would like to see the cost estimates and critical evaluation of the disseminated electrical grid, storage costs for excess electricity production with wind and solar, and environmental costs of battery mining, manufacturing and recycling.
Fine article. The most interesting paragraph for me is actually this one about the alternatives to nuclear. While true, we have just as long a road to travel as the new nukes to achieve it. I'd like to see the roadmap analysis for all this to truly validate the arguments against the new nukes:
"Many studies document the capacity of wind and solar to replace fossil fuel electricity. The challenge of varying sunlight and wind speeds is met with a smart grid that can adjust energy demand to available supply and link diverse geographies. So when the wind is blowing on the Great Plains, it can supply juice while clouds block sunlight in Chicago. For times when none of that is sufficient, storage in many forms can be used, from batteries to pumped storage reservoirs. Even household water heaters. If all else fails, backup generators fueled with stored hydrogen can be brought into play. Hydrogen can be electrolyzed from water through solar and wind energy that would otherwise go unused because generation exceeds the demands of the grid. "