A utopian but nonetheless interesting discussion

[KingRaptor]

@gajop & KingRaptor:
again: technical solutions alone are no solutions. if it costs a lot to build this stuff, and it does not generate enough profit, or say.. even more profit then the "normal" nuclear power plants, then it will not be built, and thus.. obviously, is not a solution, but a mere virtual thing.
as long as bill gates does not build sufficiently many of them himself, or does get the technology profitable enough, it is not a solution.

All true... but the exact same applies to every other power generation technology.
(which is very bad, because counting on the profit-driven market to solve this issue is going to be a complete disaster)

[hoijui]

well...
what else would you count on?
i would not know of any alternative.

if due to this reason these other nuclear reactors that could be used for "waste disposal" are no option, then i must say, all the wind and solar stuff and so on, seems more viable to me, as.. this stuff exists, and is getting improved, and even if it, as you say, suffers from the same unprofitability problem, it makes just more sense, due to some properties.
for example, it consists of many small parts, that alone can be tested and improved, and placed in different spots, and produced and financed individually. it is just generally simpler, and scalable. big, and small communities, even individuals can decide to use it, and do it right away; it is simple to do that. try to convince your city to build a breeder, and find money for it and what not, where would the money come from? the market oriented party would be against you, the green and social parties would be against you, the local population would be against building a nucular plant, ... . it is like buying a car vs building a space rocket program to bring you to the other side of the planet.

when you build solars on your roof or a wind thing, you see immediately what he benefit is. you don't have to pay for the regular bill anymore, or less, and you know that you don't rely on coal and nucular anymore, for what you directly consume as power. with a breeder, you have the benefit of 1'000 vs 1'000'000 years of bad waste...
is kinda harder to sell (basically impossible). it absolutely needs profitability.

[gajop]

I'd like some evidence which shows that scalability of wind and especially solar.
Usually even with such energy sources which could be used to power a single structure, it's usually wise to include the energy source into the grid instead. This is because with these sources you have large energy production fluctuations - the Sun doesn't always shine (especially at night), and the wind doesn't always blow.

The common idea would be to build large batteries to store the power locally, but if you want to have power over night, they become really expensive. For comparison, we currently have enough energy for around 10 minutes of the world's power needs.
And due to energy fluctuations (both at the producer and consumer end if not on grid), there's a bit of extra energy inefficiency to compensate for it.

From wikipedia on German's (pretty much the leader of renewable energy) future solar power predictions:

Some market analysts expect the solar electricity share could reach 25 percent by 2050.

Which is imo a joke, we should be at 0% carbon by that date, and if not even Germany can achieve that, we'll be in a world of hurt. So I say again, I honestly don't see how you plan to rely exclusively on solar & wind with modern day energy storage technologies.

[FireStorm_]

I'd like some evidence which shows that scalability of wind and especially solar.

Wel you are the one who posted the Musk video, saying it was better / had better points that the other one...

This is a better (even though a lot longer) video I watched recently, about our energy-related future: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1HZIQliuoA. Much more based on actual facts.

...And IIRC in that video he says that if you take the entire terrain/land-surface used by a nuclear power plant and cover it with solar panels you'd generate the same amount of energy. If that is correct I think I'd prefer that over a nuclear installation.

And on the sun not always shining:
Rifkin suggests the internet infrastructure can be used to buy and sell excess energy from and to other areas. If i'm not mistaking that is already kinda how it works in some households using solar-panels. On a sunny day the solar-panel-installation sells power to the power-net, so to speak.

[zwzsg]

...And IIRC in that video he says that if you take the entire terrain/land-surface used by a nuclear power plant and cover it with solar panels you'd generate the same amount of energy. If that is correct I think I'd prefer that over a nuclear installation.

That goes against everything I've been told so far.

Since it's bad to rely on hearsay for such sensible subject, let's try to estimate it ourselves:

Wikipedia says a typical photovoltaic installation in Europe produce 1 kWh/m²/day. There are 24 hours in a day, so that makes 0.04 kW/m² on average.

From there I see that our reactors have a power of about 1000 MW.

From there I see that a nuclear power plant takes less than 1 km². So 1000x1000 m².

Covering it with solar panel would produce 0.04 * 1000 *1000 = 40000 kW so 40 MW.

So, for a square kilometer, it's 40MW from Solar versus 1000 MW from Nuclear.

Therefore, that video is all lie and bullshit, and I'm glad to not have watched it.

[gajop]

I don't recall the exact words, but I got the impression he said that the solar panels (not the economically sensible and widely used, but the best you have, currently used in space and such) could produce the same amount of the entire area "used" by the power plant, including the no-entry zone, which is supposedly really large (I don't have the numbers). It's a stretch but can be imagined I guess.

[FireStorm_]

Therefore, that video is all lie and bullshit, and I'm glad to not have watched it.

Wow, why such harsh judgement of what you haven't seen yet?
I did check, if Musk actually said it, and he said he read it in some study, sort of clarifying that 'study' is vague and not proof, and said it was true for most plants, not all of 'em. (video time: 1:06:20)

I wouldn't dismiss people because of my hear-say.

At least you weren't to lazy to do some match like I was but:
isn't 1000 MW a bit optimal compared to all existing plants?

I must concur though that the original statement seems to be a strong exaggeration.

[raaar]

...And IIRC in that video he says that if you take the entire terrain/land-surface used by a nuclear power plant and cover it with solar panels you'd generate the same amount of energy. If that is correct I think I'd prefer that over a nuclear installation.

That goes against everything I've been told so far.

Since it's bad to rely on hearsay for such sensible subject, let's try to estimate it ourselves:

Wikipedia says a typical photovoltaic installation in Europe produce 1 kWh/m²/day. There are 24 hours in a day, so that makes 0.04 kW/m² on average.

From there I see that our reactors have a power of about 1000 MW.

From there I see that a nuclear power plant takes less than 1 km². So 1000x1000 m².

Covering it with solar panel would produce 0.04 * 1000 *1000 = 40000 kW so 40 MW.

So, for a square kilometer, it's 40MW from Solar versus 1000 MW from Nuclear.

Therefore, that video is all lie and bullshit, and I'm glad to not have watched it.

that may seem bad, but 1 km² is a relatively small patch of land. You could generate the same amount of energy with a 5 by 5 km square.

That's pretty good!

if each of those panels costs 300$, then the lot would cost 7500 M$, or about 6000 M€. Wikipedia says it could cost about half for such a large scale installation.

That may seem like a lot of money, but even a small country like Portugal is paying more than that yearly on debt interest... If they "cheated" and cut the interest to like 1000 M€ the remainer could fully finance one of those power stations each year with public money.

Brasil, for example, is going to spend more than 3000 M$ on stadiums alone for the 2014 world cup.

The US invasion of iraq is estimated to have cost more than 800000 M$ since 2003...
You could build 100 5*5 Km solar facilities with that amount of money

this says the US used 3.741 trillion kWh of electricity in 2009

the power source to generate that much energy over a year would have about 3741 000 000 / (24 * 365) MW = 427 000 MW. What americans paid for the iraq war would get them enough solar to cover for about 25% of their electric energy needs.

it would probably require lots of energy storage.

Generally speaking, energy storage is economical when the marginal cost of electricity varies more than the costs of storing and retrieving the energy plus the price of energy lost in the process. For instance, assume a pumped-storage reservoir can pump to its upper reservoir water equivalent to 1,200 MW·h during the night, for $15 per MW·h, at a total cost of $18,000. The next day, all of the stored energy can be sold at the peak hours for $40 per MW·h, but from the 1,200 MW·h pumped 50 were lost due to evaporation and seeping in the reservoir. 1,150 MW·h are sold for $46,000, for a final profit of $28,000.

assuming half of the about 1000 000 000 MWh they'd get from those 100 5*5Km covered with solar panels over the year came from storage, at a cost of 15$ per MWh, it'd cost 7500 M$ every year

that's not a lot.

[FireStorm_]

that may seem bad, but 1 km² is a relatively small patch of land. You could generate the same amount of energy with a 5 by 5 km square.
That's pretty good!

Yesterday, trying to verify z's math, was thinking the same thing.
z's math suggests one would need (1000MW/40mW) 25 times the surface of a nuclear plant. That also sounded like an exaggeration.

Some wikipedia examples in Spain:
(In any case I think the look pretty cool )

Gemasolar
185 ha (1.85 km2),
19.9 MW of power,
can supply 110 GWh per year.

Andasol
200 ha (2 km2) for the installation, 51 ha for the only the collectors.
21 MW power,
producing around 180 gigawatt-hours (GW·h) per year

It sound about right to me for now. Even if it's somewhere between 5 and 25 times, I'd still think I'd prefer it over nuclear if possible.

And more directly@raaar:
A financial comparison is something I'd be very interested in. But I think it far more fair if you'd compared the price of a big solar panel installation to the price of a nuclear equivalent.

[raaar]

wikipedia says:

According to Benjamin K. Sovacool, the marginal levelized cost for "a 1,000-MWe facility built in 2009 would be 41.2 to 80.3 cents/kWh, presuming one actually takes into account construction, operation and fuel, reprocessing, waste storage, and decommissioning".[65]

In 2013, the US Energy Information Administration estimated the levelized cost of electricity from new nuclear power plants to be $0.108/kWh.

the other wikipedia page said

The fully loaded cost (cost not price) of solar electricity in 2008 was $0.25/kWh or less in most of the OECD countries. By late 2011, the fully loaded cost was predicted to fall below $0.15/kWh for most of the OECD and reach $0.10/kWh in sunnier regions.

[yuritch]

Does this low solar cost include subsidies for 'green' power by chance? If so, real costs may be a bit higher.

[KingRaptor]

Andasol Wikipedia page says it cost US$380 million to build for 21 MW, or $18095/kW. Wikipedia also says a solar array can last for 25 years or more; let's call it 30.

The World Nuclear Association reports that Chinese estimates of the cost for new units of the Westinghouse AP1000 reactor is is around $1600/kW; estimated three times as much in the US (so $4800).
Older NPPs were designed to run for 30-40 years but have often been extended; I've heard that newer ones are designed to last 60 years but can't find a source for it now. Let's go with 40.

So adjusting for lifespan, capex for a new solar thermal plant is about 5x that of nuclear. I suspect the figures for solar PV are worse.
I just noticed I was applying the lifetime for solar PV to a solar thermal plant. Well, without taking lifespan into account, capex per kW for a modern nuclear plant is still 3.77x that of a solar thermal plant.

On a mostly related note, here's a good book for those interested in energy: Sustainable Energy: Without the Hot Air. Accessible and informative, with extensive calculations not just on where the energy comes from but also where it goes.

[FireStorm_]

Thanks guys for doing some more math for me

Still, I don't think the cost comparisons should be used as a strong weighing argument. For me it's more a periodic indicator to get a feel for how far the (photo-electric-solar) technology has developed. I think that technology will only get more expensive, because there is so much promising research in this field.

For instance, there are multiple examples of scientist experimenting with various ways of implementing nano-tech to greatly improve efficiency. Like trying to re-focus the light on nano scale, or get the distances of the interacting electrons to a minimum. Or make the cells so tiny they can be stacked on top of each-other.

They make fantastic claims, and if they are true, ways of making better solarpanels will probably be developed and also the machines to do so. So I figure it's gonna get more expensive...Up to a certain point that is.

I suppose it is a matter of intuition, but for now I still prefer the use of solar energy (to be the biggest way of generating electricity) over the alternatives.

[PicassoCT]

Im actually a fan of geothermals.. but they are not beloved. and they demand longterm investments at the start.

[ByronTucker]

...And IIRC in that video he says that if you take the entire terrain/land-surface used by a nuclear power plant and cover it with solar panels you'd generate the same amount of energy. If that is correct I think I'd prefer that over a nuclear installation.

That goes against everything I've been told so far.

Since it's bad to rely on hearsay for such sensible subject, let's try to estimate it ourselves:

Wikipedia says a typical photovoltaic installation in Europe produce 1 kWh/m²/day. There are 24 hours in a day, so that makes 0.04 kW/m² on average.

From there I see that our reactors have a power of about 1000 MW.

From there I see that a nuclear power plant takes less than 1 km². So 1000x1000 m².

Covering it with solar panel would produce 0.04 * 1000 *1000 = 40000 kW so 40 MW.

So, for a square kilometer, it's 40MW from Solar versus 1000 MW from Nuclear.

Therefore, that video is all lie and bullshit, and I'm glad to not have watched it.

that may seem bad, but 1 km² is a relatively small patch of land. You could generate the same amount of energy with a 5 by 5 km square.

That's pretty good!

if each of those panels costs 300$, then the lot would cost 7500 M$, or about 6000 M€. Wikipedia says it could cost about half for such a large scale installation.

That may seem like a lot of money, but even a small country like Portugal is paying more than that yearly on debt interest... If they "cheated" and cut the interest to like 1000 M€ the remainer could fully finance one of those power stations each year with public money.

Brasil, for example, is going to spend more than 3000 M$ on stadiums alone for the 2014 world cup.

The US invasion of iraq is estimated to have cost more than 800000 M$ since 2003...
You could build 100 5*5 Km solar facilities with that amount of money

this says the US used 3.741 trillion kWh of electricity in 2009

the power source to generate that much energy over a year would have about 3741 000 000 / (24 * 365) MW = 427 000 MW. What americans paid for the iraq war would get them enough solar to cover for about 25% of their electric energy needs.

it would probably require lots of energy storage.

Generally speaking, energy storage is economical when the marginal cost of electricity varies more than the costs of storing and retrieving the energy plus the price of energy lost in the process. For instance, assume a pumped-storage reservoir can pump to its upper reservoir water equivalent to 1,200 MW·h during the night, for $15 per MW·h, at a total cost of $18,000. The next day, all of the stored energy can be sold at the peak hours for $40 per MW·h, but from the 1,200 MW·h pumped 50 were lost due to evaporation and seeping in the reservoir. 1,150 MW·h are sold for $46,000, for a final profit of $28,000.

assuming half of the about 1000 000 000 MWh they'd get from those 100 5*5Km covered with solar panels over the year came from storage, at a cost of 15$ per MWh, it'd cost 7500 M$ every year

that's not a lot.

Cost of installation of these panels are very high..I have got panels of my home roof but now I am able to save good amount of money on electricity bill.

[SinbadEV]

Thorium.

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p ... axxbXdWnXK