Canadian Province at the Forefront of Solar

[russ]

No NUC plant can provide affordable power unless it is spread over at least 40 years. Then it is garbage.

To repost what I said yesterday - the cost of nuclear power is a green bogus chattering point - though maybe Jason agrees with you. Anytime greens get into a discussion about nuclear power that is one of the first items they parrot.

[Ian S]

What does the Ontario grid do with the lack of solar pv output when a very large cloud system comes in off the lakes?

Turn off Niagara Falls?

[bonaire]

Turn off Niagara Falls?

They'd need the Sir Adam Beck power plant even more when the solar pv arrays are quiet during the typically cloudy days. I grew up in Niagara Falls and the great lakes make for quite a lot of clouds down in Southern Ontario. If the poster above is quoting Ontario's MW of Solar, he/she is posting about the total Pmax of the arrays. If you could graph the actual output of the arrays over the course of a day (sunny or cloudy) you'd find it producing a very low amount of the consumed power in the province.

[Sunking]

Japan has no real estate left to put in solar or wind. Not even coal plants. Only two things will work there that have the energy density. Nuclear and NG. Japan has no NG supplies.

50% of the cost and time building a Nuke plant is all needless RED TAPE. Todays nuclear plants are passively safe and cannot melt down even in a disaster.

[inetdog]

Japan has no real estate left to put in solar or wind. Not even coal plants. Only two things will work there that have the energy density. Nuclear and NG. Japan has no NG supplies.

50% of the cost and time building a Nuke plant is all needless RED TAPE. Todays nuclear plants are passively safe and cannot melt down even in a disaster.

Even if they are badly engineered to start with?

BTW, did you notice the interesting activity in CA involving the bid award for the first section of the high speed rail project? (We can get back to the topic later or take it immediately to the general forum?)

[Sunking]

BTW, did you notice the interesting activity in CA involving the bid award for the first section of the high speed rail project?

I read in the WSJ that a bid was accepted of around $1B for the first 28 mile segmant. Is that what you are referring too?

[inetdog]

I read in the WSJ that a bid was accepted of around $1B for the first 28 mile segmant. Is that what you are referring too?

Yes. The initial bid evaluation process, agreed to by the board, was that the top 60 % of the bidders in a first phase evaluation of technical competence of their proposal would advance to the second round where cost would be added as a criterion.
The board chair and staff were allowed to make "non-substantive" change to the bidding process, so after the bids had been opened, without consulting the full board, they decided to drop the first round. The winning low bid would not have made it into the second round and has a good record for screwing up other projects.
The excrement has impacted the impeller when the losing bidders found out.

There has been entirely too much political drama about the whole project before this happened.

[Sunking]

This kind of reminds me of another rail project hat happened about a decade ago in Las Vegas. Originally the city had planned on building a monorail running from the airport running right down the center of Las Vegas Blvd all the way to downtown. It would have worked.

But no the Transportation Union threw a fit and stopped it. They made the city use what was first a Private Monorail Between MGM and Bally's and extended it to the Las Vegas Convention Center going down Koval Blvd. It made the Mono Rail completely useless.

[MikeSolar]

They'd need the Sir Adam Beck power plant even more when the solar pv arrays are quiet during the typically cloudy days. I grew up in Niagara Falls and the great lakes make for quite a lot of clouds down in Southern Ontario. If the poster above is quoting Ontario's MW of Solar, he/she is posting about the total Pmax of the arrays. If you could graph the actual output of the arrays over the course of a day (sunny or cloudy) you'd find it producing a very low amount of the consumed power in the province.

That was my point,in terms of the cost paid by the rate payer, which is what irks Russ. The actual amount of power provided by solar is so small as to be insignificant on the bill. We are no where near California or Germany.

I first quoted installed capacity because that is what the govt here uses for its benchmarks. Power output is determined in 5 minute intervals and gas peakers are throttled up or down as needed by the system regulator. NUC plants don't change much in output and in this province anyway, after 40 years they are getting very expensive retubing (hence my garbage comment) which means that the cost of power provided by the NUC operators is never as low as they initially say it will be.

[russ]

Yep - Expensive nuclear power!

I remember being in Portland, Oregon when they were building the Trojan nuclear plant. Greens and others whining about the cost among other things.

I also remember being back there years later when it was being decommissioned - the same bunches were crying because that was now the cheapest power (other than hydro) on the grid was being decommissioned.

If one understands costing of an operating plant, the capital cost is paid off somewhere over the years. Then the maintenance and operating costs are the only charges. Mike's comments about cost show a total lack of understanding about business and investment.

[MikeSolar]

Yep - Expensive nuclear power!

I remember being in Portland, Oregon when they were building the Trojan nuclear plant. Greens and others whining about the cost among other things.

I also remember being back there years later when it was being decommissioned - the same bunches were crying because that was now the cheapest power (other than hydro) on the grid was being decommissioned.

If one understands costing of an operating plant, the capital cost is paid off somewhere over the years. Then the maintenance and operating costs are the only charges. Mike's comments about cost show a total lack of understanding about business and investment.

Russ, tell me if all the costs of decommissioning the plant are included and if the tax payer is footing the bill for any of it. This includes storing the fuel in Cheyenne mountain ( or wherever it is stored).

I am not a rabid greenie as you might imagine and I am not against NUCs if they will be truthful about all the costs. In Canada the power plants use tax payers money to build the plants, re-tube them if needed AND in one way or another, the tax payer has paid to develop the technology (both here and in the US, and everywhere else, IFAIK). Most of the plants need major work after 25-40 years and my taxes help pay for it.

I have a vested interest in having power that is created in the best interest of my kids and their kids, not just current electricity cost, and I do understand the business end of power and investment which is why I am in this business.

[bonaire]

Greens can help out the nuclear folks. Here's how.

Keep beating the drump to start Nuclear Fuel recycling programs like they have in Europe. There is NO need to store them in Yucca Mtn. (not Cheyenne Mtn - that's where NoRAD operationos is - they don't want extra radiation there "at all costs" )

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_repository

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheyenne_mountain

[russ]

Greens can help out the nuclear folks. Here's how.

By learning a bit about the newer nuclear technologies rather than just continuing with the same No! No! whine would help too.

[SunEagle]

Greens can help out the nuclear folks. Here's how.

Keep beating the drump to start Nuclear Fuel recycling programs like they have in Europe. There is NO need to store them in Yucca Mtn. (not Cheyenne Mtn - that's where NoRAD operationos is - they don't want extra radiation there "at all costs" )

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_repository

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheyenne_mountain

Actually the burying of these rods is really a way for our future generations to be able to find a large source of fuel and mine it so it can be used in their electrical generating facilities. Isn't that really thoughtful of today's generation?

Sorry. Too easy to be sarcastic when it comes to the obvious.

[Aric Dyson]

A recent article points to Canada as a model for American energy and environmental policy. According to a piece published in Yale Environment 360, Ontario has shut down nearly every coal-fired plant, a final step in a plan laid out back in 2003."The decade-long process to replace a quarter of the province's electrical generating capacity with new plants fueled by natural gas and renewable energy sources represents one of the most ambitious low-carbon generating strategies in the world." The shift away from coal-fired power plants has lead to legislation including "...feed-in tariff provisions, modeled after similar programs in Denmark and Germany, which offered 20-year contracts to purchase wind, solar, biomass and biogas-fueled electricity from producers at generous prices."

More...

We can't deny the fact that Canada gained more environmental policy and this policy brings to Canada know in order to have a good character by generating more fuel. We already know that Nuclear recycling can make a lot of benefits to generate more power supply. Moreover, this kind of policy is considered as source to gained a better future.