Nuclear Power For Australia?

[basilio]

You could always build an large elecrolyser plant near to nuclear plant to make bulk hydrogen, rather than switch the nuclear off, so when the renewables are supplying the load the nuclear makes hydrogen for storage or export?
There are always options, if you look for them.
An electrolyser plant could be huge, it still wouldn't take up as much space as a solar farm. Lol

You could also setup a desalination plant on the WA coast and pump the water inland, either for town supply or irrigation.
Or you could build an electric arc furnace and turn some of the abundance of iron ore we currently export.
The excess oxygen generated from the elctrolysis plant producing Hydrogen would feed into the EAF.
Mick

Indeed. . Both of these ideas would make excellent use of excess power in ways that add value to the process.

That is why these ideas are also floated when considering the construction of large windfarms and solar farms and are equally valid
The differences are

1) We can build large solar and windfarms now and have them operational within a couple of years

2) The technology of these projects is well sorted and if anything still improving in terms of efficiency and cost effectiveness

3) The costs are between 25 and 50% of current estimated Nuclear power costs

4) Nuclear power cannot be provided under the most ambitious scenarios in under 12 -15 years.

5) To date every nuclear power installation has had massive cost, construction and completion overruns in the orders of magnitudes 2-3-5 times original estimate.

6) The moment a government decides to start up a nuclear plant development they are on the hook for the inevitable extra costs/problems/snafus associated with such a complex engineering construction

 

[IFocus]

Absolutely, it's never just black or white, there are a myriad of things that clean energy can be used for, we're only limited by our imagination and unforrtunately our inherent bias and underlying negativity.
On the subject of desalination plants in W.A, we already have two and I think I heard another was being built, therefore that base load is already existing.

I saw some where the decel pants are supported by renewables already nuclear just doesn't add up unless as Howard did use it for anything but renewables political diversion Coalition here in WA are running hard against renewables as a matter of ideology nothing more.

 

[basilio]

Tasmanian senator Jacqui Lambie is never one to mince her words.

So it was no surprise she gave this response when asked about the Coalition's proposed nuclear power plan.

"I would love to see nuclear energy. I would love to see it," she said.

"But quite frankly, I watched the Liberal National party for nine years argue about low level waste, and they couldn't get their xhit together there.

"So, let's be honest, good luck."

 

[sptrawler]

I saw some where the decel pants are supported by renewables already nuclear just doesn't add up unless as Howard did use it for anything but renewables political diversion Coalition here in WA are running hard against renewables as a matter of ideology nothing more.

I just added info to the above post, the Govt is talking about adding 400MW more renewables to mitigate the desalplants, but as far as I know it hasn't been done yet.

Even if they put in renewables, we have a huge problem with firming, as you know we are as flat as a tack over here.

The only potential large dam areas we have that I have heard about requires a lot of flooding down near Denmark and also upstream of Donnybrook has been looked at, But rainfall is a huge issue, we will be building RO desal plants forever and they use heaps of power.

So in W.A firming comes back to gas or nuclear, pretty simple really and it is only a matter of time before gas is told to shut down, like coal has been.

Guess you had better start and lighten your outlook, or you will end up being "that guy" out at the break.
Power generation is a technical issue, not an emotional one, the politicians should treat it as such otherwise we will be in a lot of manure.

 

[IFocus]

Peter Dutton’s flimsy charade is first and foremost a gas plan not a nuclear power plan
(Simon Holmes à Court, The Guardian)
Straight from the Donald Trump playbook the opposition leader left Australia with more questions than answers
Finally, on Wednesday morning Peter Dutton announced his nuclear plan … well, it’s more a vibe than a plan – a flimsy announcement leaving us with more questions than answers.
If there’s any doubt that Dutton has internalised the Trump playbook, here’s an example of how he’s deployed the infamous Steve Bannon technique: “flood the zone with ****”.
The media conference was a stream of falsehoods, empty rhetoric and veiled swipes, deftly delivered with unwavering confidence.
As an energy nerd, there’s a lot I like about nuclear technology, and my long-held interest has led me to visit reactors in three countries. Last year I took a nuclear course at MIT and met nuclear developers, potential customers, innovators and investors, tracing many footsteps of the shadow energy minister, Ted O’Brien.
I strongly believe nuclear power is an important technology – but it has to make sense where it’s used and that requires close questioning. Here are some important questions, and what we know so far.
How to remove the current bans?
Nuclear is banned in Australia by two acts of parliament. Naturally, to repeal the ban the Coalition would need to win back control of the house – a daunting task when they are 21 seats shy of a majority – and control of the Senate, power it hasn’t held since the end of the Howard era.
Once the federal ban is lifted, Dutton needs a plan for lifting state bans in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland.
The leaders of the Labor governments and their Coalition oppositions in each of these key states have expressed their clear opposition. Dutton rehashed the old quip that you wouldn’t want to stand between a state premier and a bucket of money, indicating that he thinks dangling commonwealth carrots will solve the issue.
They will not be cheap carrots!
Where will the reactors go?
The Coalition has named seven specific locations, two in Queensland, two in New South Wales and one each in Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia, all on sites of retired or soon-to-be-retired coal power stations.
One big problem – the commonwealth doesn’t own any of these sites, and in many cases the owners of the sites have plans to redevelop the sites, such as a $750m battery on the site of the old Liddell power station being built by AGL.
On Wednesday Dutton hinted that if the owners wouldn’t sell the sites, he had legal advice that the commonwealth could compulsorily acquire them. That’ll go down well.
How do we keep the lights on?
Australia’s 19 coal power stations generated 125 TWh of electricity last year. The Australian Energy Market Operator expects all will be retired by 2037. On top of that, our energy demand is expected to increase by more than 230 TWh by 2050. Over the next 25 years we need to build facilities that generate at least 355 TWh every year.
Dutton announced that the Coalition would build five large reactors and two small modular reactors by 2050. This would be about 6.5 GW of new capacity, which at best could be expected to generate 50 TWh a year – less than 15% of the new generation needed.
The Coalition has been quite clear that it wants to see renewable energy development slowed to a crawl. This would leave a massive hole in our energy supply, which could only be filled by extending the life of coal and a massive increase in gas power generation.
This is first and foremost a gas plan, not a nuclear plan.
What will it cost?
Gas is the most expensive form of bulk energy supply in the electricity market … at least until nuclear is available.
Replacing the cheapest form of energy – wind and solar, even including integration costs – with the two most expensive forms can only send energy prices higher.
The Coalition’s announcement is too vague to cost precisely and nobody really knows what SMRs will cost, but a reasonable estimate using assumptions from CSIRO’s GenCost would be in the order of $120bn, or to coin a new unit of money, one-third of an Aukus.
What does this mean for emissions?
An analysis by Solutions for Climate Australia, released before Wednesday’s announcement and which assumes a much more aggressive nuclear build, shows an aggregate increase in emissions by 3.2bn tonnes of carbon dioxide by 2050 – the emissions equivalent of extending the life of our entire coal fleet by 25 years.
While the Coalition has turned its back on Australia’s legislated 2030 target, their talking points say they’re still committed to net zero emissions by 2050. This does not compute. Dutton’s proposal would see high emissions in the electricity sector all the way to 2050 and beyond, blowing our carbon budget and every emissions target along the way.
What if locals object?
For years Coalition members have been running around the country fomenting then amplifying community concern around wind and solar farms. Genuine community consultation, which has sometimes been lacking, is the best antidote to opposition.
Yet the Coalition has made a massive blunder in telling communities exactly where they’ll go before any consultation. Worse, it has adopted a strong-man posture that communities will have to accept that the reactors are in the national interest. It will be fascinating to watch how the Coalition handles local opposition over the coming months.
How will they be built?
With a combination of astronomical costs and zero interest by energy companies, there only ever was one possible owner of a nuclear power station in Australia: the commonwealth government.
One of the biggest challenges will be locking in major contractors. With the high likelihood that a future Labor government would cancel any contracts, no contractor would proceed without very expensive cancellation protection.
When will the reactors come online?
We often hear that a nuclear reactor can be built in eight years. In reality it takes three to four years from signing the contract to completing the civil works to begin ‘construction’, and it would very optimistically take four years to complete site selection, planning, licensing, vendor selection and contracting. Add in the inevitable legal challenges and it’s highly unlikely a reactor could be delivered by 2035 – as Dutton claimed – let alone before the early 2040s.
The newest reactors in the United States took 18 years from announcement to commercial operation, while in the UAE, it took 13 years under an authoritarian regime … and I’m being kind by not mentioning contemporary projects in France, the UK, Finland and Argentina.
Dutton has said he favours the Rolls-Royce SMR, tweeting an artist’s rendering on Wednesday.
These SMRs exist only on paper, yet Dutton wants us to believe he can provide one by 2035. Remember, this is the mob that brought us the NBN and the Snowy 2.0 disaster. This is the team that couldn’t even build commuter car parks.
What about the water and the waste?
I think we can relax a little about water and waste. Yes, nuclear power stations generally require large volumes of water for cooling, but so do coal power stations. By choosing sites with existing access to cooling water, the Coalition has sidestepped this concern.
Public concern around nuclear waste is high, but ultimately the problem is manageable. The waste will be kept on site, likely in dry casks and eventually moved to wherever Australia decides to store its waste from the Aukus program. Nobody has ever been harmed by spent nuclear fuel.
Who will provide disaster insurance?
While serious nuclear accidents are very rare, their costs can be astronomical. The Japan Centre for Economic Research has estimated that total costs related to the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident may reach $350 to 750bn. The only viable solution is for the commonwealth to accept liability.
For a long time the Coalition’s nuclear plan sat beyond the horizon, to be unveiled before the election. But now Dutton’s built a castle and he has to defend it.
Dutton is still learning about nuclear. On Wednesday he said that an SMR would emit only a “coke can” of nuclear waste a year. In reality it would probably produce more than 2,000 times that.
Nuclear energy is complex. He and his team will keep making mistakes. Keith Pitt, a Nationals backbencher told RN Breakfast on the same day that the grid couldn’t handle more than 10% wind and solar power combined. Over the past year the grid has averaged 31% wind and solar.
Some people want to believe there are simple solutions to the complex solutions behind the cost of living crisis, and like his political forebear Tony Abbott, Dutton has a knack for delivering simple messages with cold competence.
But Dutton’s nuclear castle is made of cardboard. Close questioning over the many months until election day will show that behind the costly facade, it’s not so much a nuclear plan, as a plan to give up on our climate targets, turn our back on a clean energy future and burn a lot more gas (and money).
— Simon Holmes à Court is a Director of The Superpower Institute, the Smart Energy Council and convener of Climate 200. Contrary to Coalition belief, he is not a large investor in renewable energy.

 

[basilio]

Nuclear would have bankrupted NSW: Kean​

54m ago
By Courtney Gould
So the press pool tries again with a reworded question. Kean is asked this time from a "technology agnostic" view, if nuclear has a role in achieving net zero

"I can only talk about the role that I saw it play as the NSW energy minister," he says.

He says in the role he looked at all the options, including nuclear, and made decisions based on "economics and engineering".

"The advice that I received at the time which was most compelling was from the chief scientist of NSW professor Hugh Durrant-Whyte … it would take far too long and would be far too expensive for New South Wales.

"I didn’t want to bankrupt the state. And I didn’t want to put those huge costs onto families."
So basically. No.

 

[IFocus]

I just added info to the above post, the Govt is talking about adding more renewables, but as far as I know it hasn't been done yet.

Even if they put in renewables, we have a huge problem with firming, as you know we are as flat as a tack over here.

The only large dam areas we have requires a lot of flooding down near Denmark and also upstream of Donnybrook has been looked at, But rainfall is a huge issue, we will be building RO desal plants forever and they use heaps of power.

So in W.A firming comes back to gas or nuclear, pretty simple really and it is only a matter of time before gas is told to shut down, like coal has been.

Guess you had better start and lighten your outlook, or you will end up being "that guy" out at the break.
Power generation is a technical issue, not an emotional one, the politicians should treat it as such otherwise we will be in a lot of manure.

Nothing to do with emotional this is what's happening now

"Coalition here in WA are running hard against renewables as a matter of ideology nothing more."

https://www.facebook.com/search/top?q=andrew%20hastie

 

[basilio]

Peter Dutton’s flimsy charade is first and foremost a gas plan not a nuclear power plan
(Simon Holmes à Court, The Guardian)
Straight from the Donald Trump playbook the opposition leader left Australia with more questions than answers
Finally, on Wednesday morning Peter Dutton announced his nuclear plan … well, it’s more a vibe than a plan – a flimsy announcement leaving us with more questions than answers.
If there’s any doubt that Dutton has internalised the Trump playbook, here’s an example of how he’s deployed the infamous Steve Bannon technique: “flood the zone with ****”.
The media conference was a stream of falsehoods, empty rhetoric and veiled swipes, deftly delivered with unwavering confidence.
As an energy nerd, there’s a lot I like about nuclear technology, and my long-held interest has led me to visit reactors in three countries. Last year I took a nuclear course at MIT and met nuclear developers, potential customers, innovators and investors, tracing many footsteps of the shadow energy minister, Ted O’Brien.
I strongly believe nuclear power is an important technology – but it has to make sense where it’s used and that requires close questioning. Here are some important questions, and what we know so far.
How to remove the current bans?
Nuclear is banned in Australia by two acts of parliament. Naturally, to repeal the ban the Coalition would need to win back control of the house – a daunting task when they are 21 seats shy of a majority – and control of the Senate, power it hasn’t held since the end of the Howard era.
Once the federal ban is lifted, Dutton needs a plan for lifting state bans in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland.
The leaders of the Labor governments and their Coalition oppositions in each of these key states have expressed their clear opposition. Dutton rehashed the old quip that you wouldn’t want to stand between a state premier and a bucket of money, indicating that he thinks dangling commonwealth carrots will solve the issue.
They will not be cheap carrots!
Where will the reactors go?
The Coalition has named seven specific locations, two in Queensland, two in New South Wales and one each in Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia, all on sites of retired or soon-to-be-retired coal power stations.
One big problem – the commonwealth doesn’t own any of these sites, and in many cases the owners of the sites have plans to redevelop the sites, such as a $750m battery on the site of the old Liddell power station being built by AGL.
On Wednesday Dutton hinted that if the owners wouldn’t sell the sites, he had legal advice that the commonwealth could compulsorily acquire them. That’ll go down well.
How do we keep the lights on?
Australia’s 19 coal power stations generated 125 TWh of electricity last year. The Australian Energy Market Operator expects all will be retired by 2037. On top of that, our energy demand is expected to increase by more than 230 TWh by 2050. Over the next 25 years we need to build facilities that generate at least 355 TWh every year.
Dutton announced that the Coalition would build five large reactors and two small modular reactors by 2050. This would be about 6.5 GW of new capacity, which at best could be expected to generate 50 TWh a year – less than 15% of the new generation needed.
The Coalition has been quite clear that it wants to see renewable energy development slowed to a crawl. This would leave a massive hole in our energy supply, which could only be filled by extending the life of coal and a massive increase in gas power generation.
This is first and foremost a gas plan, not a nuclear plan.
What will it cost?
Gas is the most expensive form of bulk energy supply in the electricity market … at least until nuclear is available.
Replacing the cheapest form of energy – wind and solar, even including integration costs – with the two most expensive forms can only send energy prices higher.
The Coalition’s announcement is too vague to cost precisely and nobody really knows what SMRs will cost, but a reasonable estimate using assumptions from CSIRO’s GenCost would be in the order of $120bn, or to coin a new unit of money, one-third of an Aukus.
What does this mean for emissions?
An analysis by Solutions for Climate Australia, released before Wednesday’s announcement and which assumes a much more aggressive nuclear build, shows an aggregate increase in emissions by 3.2bn tonnes of carbon dioxide by 2050 – the emissions equivalent of extending the life of our entire coal fleet by 25 years.
While the Coalition has turned its back on Australia’s legislated 2030 target, their talking points say they’re still committed to net zero emissions by 2050. This does not compute. Dutton’s proposal would see high emissions in the electricity sector all the way to 2050 and beyond, blowing our carbon budget and every emissions target along the way.
What if locals object?
For years Coalition members have been running around the country fomenting then amplifying community concern around wind and solar farms. Genuine community consultation, which has sometimes been lacking, is the best antidote to opposition.
Yet the Coalition has made a massive blunder in telling communities exactly where they’ll go before any consultation. Worse, it has adopted a strong-man posture that communities will have to accept that the reactors are in the national interest. It will be fascinating to watch how the Coalition handles local opposition over the coming months.
How will they be built?
With a combination of astronomical costs and zero interest by energy companies, there only ever was one possible owner of a nuclear power station in Australia: the commonwealth government.
One of the biggest challenges will be locking in major contractors. With the high likelihood that a future Labor government would cancel any contracts, no contractor would proceed without very expensive cancellation protection.
When will the reactors come online?
We often hear that a nuclear reactor can be built in eight years. In reality it takes three to four years from signing the contract to completing the civil works to begin ‘construction’, and it would very optimistically take four years to complete site selection, planning, licensing, vendor selection and contracting. Add in the inevitable legal challenges and it’s highly unlikely a reactor could be delivered by 2035 – as Dutton claimed – let alone before the early 2040s.
The newest reactors in the United States took 18 years from announcement to commercial operation, while in the UAE, it took 13 years under an authoritarian regime … and I’m being kind by not mentioning contemporary projects in France, the UK, Finland and Argentina.
Dutton has said he favours the Rolls-Royce SMR, tweeting an artist’s rendering on Wednesday.
These SMRs exist only on paper, yet Dutton wants us to believe he can provide one by 2035. Remember, this is the mob that brought us the NBN and the Snowy 2.0 disaster. This is the team that couldn’t even build commuter car parks.
What about the water and the waste?
I think we can relax a little about water and waste. Yes, nuclear power stations generally require large volumes of water for cooling, but so do coal power stations. By choosing sites with existing access to cooling water, the Coalition has sidestepped this concern.
Public concern around nuclear waste is high, but ultimately the problem is manageable. The waste will be kept on site, likely in dry casks and eventually moved to wherever Australia decides to store its waste from the Aukus program. Nobody has ever been harmed by spent nuclear fuel.
Who will provide disaster insurance?
While serious nuclear accidents are very rare, their costs can be astronomical. The Japan Centre for Economic Research has estimated that total costs related to the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident may reach $350 to 750bn. The only viable solution is for the commonwealth to accept liability.
For a long time the Coalition’s nuclear plan sat beyond the horizon, to be unveiled before the election. But now Dutton’s built a castle and he has to defend it.
Dutton is still learning about nuclear. On Wednesday he said that an SMR would emit only a “coke can” of nuclear waste a year. In reality it would probably produce more than 2,000 times that.
Nuclear energy is complex. He and his team will keep making mistakes. Keith Pitt, a Nationals backbencher told RN Breakfast on the same day that the grid couldn’t handle more than 10% wind and solar power combined. Over the past year the grid has averaged 31% wind and solar.
Some people want to believe there are simple solutions to the complex solutions behind the cost of living crisis, and like his political forebear Tony Abbott, Dutton has a knack for delivering simple messages with cold competence.
But Dutton’s nuclear castle is made of cardboard. Close questioning over the many months until election day will show that behind the costly facade, it’s not so much a nuclear plan, as a plan to give up on our climate targets, turn our back on a clean energy future and burn a lot more gas (and money).
— Simon Holmes à Court is a Director of The Superpower Institute, the Smart Energy Council and convener of Climate 200. Contrary to Coalition belief, he is not a large investor in renewable energy.

I thought this analysis of the facts around the Nuclear Power fairytale was spot on and posted it earlier.

Thanks for reposting it in detail. Perhaps the critics could address the individual issues raised by Simon Holmes A'Court

 

[sptrawler]

Nothing to do with emotional this is what's happening now

"Coalition here in WA are running hard against renewables as a matter of ideology nothing more."

Well they will find themselves in manure also IMO, gas isn't going to be acceptable in 10 years time, so what then?

 

[sptrawler]

I thought this analysis of the facts around the Nuclear Power fairytale was spot on and posted it earlier.

Thanks for reposting it in detail. Perhaps the critics could address the individual issues raised by Simon Holmes A'Court

Simon Holmes A Court, WOW on what basis are his thoughts important, did he go to Uni? has he any formal qualifications in power generation/nuclear power, or does he have a link to renewable energy deployment?
But I will jave a chuckle and go through his issues, as they apply to W.A.

 

[sptrawler]

How to remove the current bans?

Both parties agree, then it should be easy.

Nuclear is banned in Australia by two acts of parliament. Naturally, to repeal the ban the Coalition would need to win back control of the house – a daunting task when they are 21 seats shy of a majority – and control of the Senate, power it hasn’t held since the end of the Howard era.

As above

Once the federal ban is lifted, Dutton needs a plan for lifting state bans in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland.

The Federal Govt can overrule on a national issue, the States have admitted that.

The leaders of the Labor governments and their Coalition oppositions in each of these key states have expressed their clear opposition. Dutton rehashed the old quip that you wouldn’t want to stand between a state premier and a bucket of money, indicating that he thinks dangling commonwealth carrots will solve the issue.

As above

They will not be cheap carrots!

No system replacement technolgy is going to be cheap, it will be twice as expensive if the wrong choice is made, $hit doesn't get cheaper as they are finding out with Snowy2, Kurri Kurri, or any other major project.

Where will the reactors go?

That's been suggested.

The Coalition has named seven specific locations, two in Queensland, two in New South Wales and one each in Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia, all on sites of retired or soon-to-be-retired coal power stations.
One big problem – the commonwealth doesn’t own any of these sites, and in many cases the owners of the sites have plans to redevelop the sites, such as a $750m battery on the site of the old Liddell power station being built by AGL.

If the Govt wants to aquire them they can, or they can build adjacent to the site, there will be many work around solutions.

On Wednesday Dutton hinted that if the owners wouldn’t sell the sites, he had legal advice that the commonwealth could compulsorily acquire them. That’ll go down well.

As above

How do we keep the lights on?

THe same way as we are keeping them on currently.

Australia’s 19 coal power stations generated 125 TWh of electricity last year. The Australian Energy Market Operator expects all will be retired by 2037. On top of that, our energy demand is expected to increase by more than 230 TWh by 2050. Over the next 25 years we need to build facilities that generate at least 355 TWh every year.

Where are the dams going to be built that can supply the firming for that amount of power? That is a question that the renewable advocates should answer, nuclear can do it easily.

Dutton announced that the Coalition would build five large reactors and two small modular reactors by 2050. This would be about 6.5 GW of new capacity, which at best could be expected to generate 50 TWh a year – less than 15% of the new generation needed.

The total required is only to supply firming, not the total load, renewables will still do the heavy lifting on a day by day basis.

The Coalition has been quite clear that it wants to see renewable energy development slowed to a crawl. This would leave a massive hole in our energy supply, which could only be filled by extending the life of coal and a massive increase in gas power generation.

Renewable energy has reduced to a crawl, because new projects are being curtailed, the life of coal and massive increase in gas power is already happening as it is.

This is first and foremost a gas plan, not a nuclear plan.
What will it cost?

Same question applies to renewable long duration firming.

Gas is the most expensive form of bulk energy supply in the electricity market … at least until nuclear is available.

And is also going to be the same with renewables, until several more Snowy 2.0 size hydro projects are completed.

Replacing the cheapest form of energy – wind and solar, even including integration costs – with the two most expensive forms can only send energy prices higher.

The issue isn't wind and solar, it is firming capacity, silly.

The Coalition’s announcement is too vague to cost precisely and nobody really knows what SMRs will cost, but a reasonable estimate using assumptions from CSIRO’s GenCost would be in the order of $120bn, or to coin a new unit of money, one-third of an Aukus.

There is no costing or announcement for renewable firming, that will also be required, people are pulling numbers out of their butts.

What does this mean for emissions?

An analysis by Solutions for Climate Australia, released before Wednesday’s announcement and which assumes a much more aggressive nuclear build, shows an aggregate increase in emissions by 3.2bn tonnes of carbon dioxide by 2050 – the emissions equivalent of extending the life of our entire coal fleet by 25 years.

Fluff.

While the Coalition has turned its back on Australia’s legislated 2030 target, their talking points say they’re still committed to net zero emissions by 2050. This does not compute. Dutton’s proposal would see high emissions in the electricity sector all the way to 2050 and beyond, blowing our carbon budget and every emissions target along the way.
What if locals object?

Fluff

For years Coalition members have been running around the country fomenting then amplifying community concern around wind and solar farms. Genuine community consultation, which has sometimes been lacking, is the best antidote to opposition.
Yet the Coalition has made a massive blunder in telling communities exactly where they’ll go before any consultation. Worse, it has adopted a strong-man posture that communities will have to accept that the reactors are in the national interest. It will be fascinating to watch how the Coalition handles local opposition over the coming months.
How will they be built?

Fluff
The rest is just padding.
Funny how Simon takes several pages of waffle, when Ziggy Switzlowski who actually is a nuclear nuclear physicist, sums it up in a sentence.

"The strong positions some critics have taken in the last 24 hours are ridiculous."

Peter Dutton's nuclear power policy is about to go through an early stress test

In the timing of his announcement, Peter Dutton is putting his nuclear power policy through an early stress test, writes Michelle Grattan.

www.abc.net.au

 

[basilio]

Simon Holmes A Court, WOW on what basis are his thoughts important, did he go to Uni? has he any formal qualifications in power generation/nuclear power, or does he have a link to renewable energy deployment?
But I will jave a chuckle and go through his issues, as they apply to W.A.

Would you prefer another name under the article SP ? Would that somehow "improve" it's accuracy ?
But go for it. Check out the issues he raises and consider your thoughts.

 

[basilio]

Both parties agree, then it should be easy.

As above

The Federal Govt can overrule on a national issue, the States have admitted that.

As above

No system replacement technolgy is going to be cheap, it will be twice as expensive if the wrong choice is made, $hit doesn't get cheaper as they are finding out with Snowy2, Kurri Kurri, or any other major project.

That's been suggested.

If the Govt wants to aquire them they can, or they can build adjacent to the site, there will be many work around solutions.

As above

THe same way as we are keeping them on currently.

Where are the dams going to be built that can supply the firming for that amount of power? That is a question that the renewable advocates should answer, nuclear can do it easily.

The total required is only to supply firming, not the total load, renewables will still do the heavy lifting on a day by day basis.

Renewable energy has reduced to a crawl, because new projects are being curtailed, the life of coal and massive increase in gas power is already happening as it is.

Same question applies to renewable long duration firming.

And is also going to be the same with renewables, until several more Snowy 2.0 size hydro projects are completed.

The issue isn't wind and solar, it is firming capacity, silly.

There is no costing or announcement for renewable firming, that will also be required, people are pulling numbers out of their butts.

Fluff.

Fluff

Fluff

The rest is just padding.
Funny how Simon takes several pages of waffle, when Ziggy Switzlowski who actually is a nuclear nuclear physicist, sums it up in a sentence.

"The strong positions some critics have taken in the last 24 hours are ridiculous."

Peter Dutton's nuclear power policy is about to go through an early stress test

In the timing of his announcement, Peter Dutton is putting his nuclear power policy through an early stress test, writes Michelle Grattan.

www.abc.net.au

Assessment: Fail E-

No analysis of individual issues. No acknowledgment of political realities of non control of all political processes ie Senate, State Government, Local Governments public opinion. All of these could be disregarded in a totalitarian dictatorship. They cannot be dismissed in the current democratic political system.

Did not engage in technical issues around supply of critical power needs while actively reducing available power supply.

Refused to acknowledge issues around Greenhouse Gas emissions in the period from 2025-2040.

 

[SirRumpole]

And is also going to be the same with renewables, until several more Snowy 2.0 size hydro projects are completed.

We know how to build hydro, we don't yet know how to build nuclear unless we rely on foreign salesmen who underquote then jack the prices up after they have the contract.

We have no facilities for fuel disposal, enrichment or transport, whereas for hydro it's all done by rivers.

 

[basilio]

Let's go Fission !!

Liberals next election slogan.
So catchy. Just the right number of words. One "big" one to show your brainy.
Lot's of fun smilies No distracting figures

 

[mullokintyre]

You could always build an large elecrolyser plant near to nuclear plant to make bulk hydrogen, rather than switch the nuclear off, so when the renewables are supplying the load the nuclear makes hydrogen for storage or export?
There are always options, if you look for them.
An electrolyser plant could be huge, it still wouldn't take up as much space as a solar farm. Lol

You could also setup a desalination plant on the WA coast and pump the water inland, either for town supply or irrigation.
Or you could build an electric arc furnace and turn some of the abundance of iron ore we currently export.
The excess oxygen generated from the elctrolysis plant producing Hydrogen would feed into the EAF.
Mick

Indeed. . Both of these ideas would make excellent use of excess power in ways that add value to the process.

That is why these ideas are also floated when considering the construction of large windfarms and solar farms and are equally valid
The differences are

1) We can build large solar and windfarms now and have them operational within a couple of years

You conveniently bypass the problem of firming.
You could build another 500 billion wind farms and solar farms and still be faced with the same issue of irregular supply.
Thats what we are trying to address here.

2) The technology of these projects is well sorted and if anything still improving in terms of efficiency and cost effectiveness

You could say exactly the same for Nuclear. Its been around for a lot longer and is not limited by climatic conditions.

3) The costs are between 25 and 50% of current estimated Nuclear power costs

No menyion of course of the massive footprint of these systems compared to a single nuclear plant.

4) Nuclear power cannot be provided under the most ambitious scenarios in under 12 -15 years.

Which explains why it should have been started 12 to 15 years ago.

5) To date every nuclear power installation has had massive cost, construction and completion overruns in the orders of magnitudes 2-3-5 times original estimate.

A slight exageration perhaps but we will let it pass.
I would suggest you go read the book called How Big Things Get Done by bent Flyvberg and Dan Gardner.
It looks at a number of big projects, some that worked well and some that failed.
It is most likely that politics or lack thereof that is what makes any project overrun in costs and time.

6) The moment a government decides to start up a nuclear plant development they are on the hook for the inevitable extra costs/problems/snafus associated with such a complex engineering construction

Like Snowy 2 perhaps? Or maybe the Wembley Stadium in WA? Maybe the West Gate Tunnel or North East link in Victoria?
Maybe Queenslands second M1 project. or NSW City and Southwest Metro rail line?
Now lets remove the politics from the equation.
The bottom line is that we need to replace energy generation from fossil fuels, whether you believe the climate is dependant upon their removal is a distraction. They are a finite source that will deplete. We need to have something in place before the depletion, not afterwards.
The public and industry demand that the energy be available 24/7, though perhaps not at an unlimited cost.
You are not going to get that with Solar or wind power.
The above is not a reliable continuous source.
The choices you have are nuclear (either fission or fusion) , mass storage devices in conjunction with solar and wind power or some as yet undeveloped technology.

Mick

 

[sptrawler]

We know how to build hydro, we don't yet know how to build nuclear unless we rely on foreign salesmen who underquote then jack the prices up after they have the contract.

We have no facilities for fuel disposal, enrichment or transport, whereas for hydro it's all done by rivers.

Let's go Fission !!

Liberals next election slogan.
So catchy. Just the right number of words. One "big" one to show your brainy.
Lot's of fun smilies No distracting figures

Could one of you two point me to ANY article, that actually states, where we are are going to get long duration firming from and how much we actually need?

Or is that just another brain fart waiting to happen.

You seem to have plenty of vigor and anecdotal evidence against nuclear, CAN YOU SHOW ME ONE, JUST ONE SCIENTIFIC ARTICLE ABOUT HOW MANY SNOWY 2.0's WE NEED?

You seem to be full quids on nuclear technology, hydro is a lot easier, so you shouldn't have any trouble explaining how much we need.

 

[basilio]

You could say exactly the same for Nuclear. Its been around for a lot longer and is not limited by climatic conditions.

THAT SIMPLY ISNT ACCURATE. If in fact Nuclear Power stations were become more cost effective and easier to build - then we wouldn't be seeing the lived examples of current Nuclear Power builds running wildly over cost and time.

A far as the "massive footprint" of other renewable power sources ? What is the relevance to Australia ? Of all places we have sufficient space to build these systems. That's an irrelevant distraction.

 

[basilio]

Long term energy storage

News Listing | Clean Energy Council

The Clean Energy Council is Australia's renewable energy association. Read about latest news and updates on our website.

www.cleanenergycouncil.org.au

EVs Are Essential Grid-Scale Storage

Electric-vehicle batteries may help store renewable energy to help make it a practical reality for power grids, potentially meeting grid demands for energy storage by as early as 2030, a new study finds.

spectrum.ieee.org

 

[sptrawler]

Exactly. Or use it for other energy intensive industries like aluminium and steel.

But you do these things when you are ready and to gamble the whole grid on nuclear while shutting down renewables investment is utterly foolish in my view.

There is no reason they would shut down renewable investment, the only suggestion is firming capacity, which either comes from hydro or nuclear as you yourself have already acknowledged.

Ok i'll pose another question, if Australia's economic base is to grow, the load grows with it.
Therefore where do we get the further firming that is required as it grows, more and more hydro dams? Think about 50 years time if we do build a manufacturing base again and we do process more and more minerals, the load growth and with it the firming requirement growth will be exponential. So what do we do? put in 50 Snowy 2.0's.
Let's get real, this isn't a static issue, our population has grown by a couple of million recently, that wont stay static. We are talking about processing green hydrogen, green steel, green iron ore, green aluminium FFS as that grows so does the firming demand and we haven't got any serious long duration firming at all yet.
Let's be honest there are heaps of people against Snowy 2.0 and we will need lot's and lot's more, what are people not understanding? It is dumb $hit, I can understand some going on about nuclear because they have skin in the game, but no one is mentioning where the alternative is coming from.
Even Japan has re started its nuclear programme, look I'm not all for nuclear, I just want someone to fess up where the long duration firming is coming from, that will enable our economy to grow.