Greens, new-energy backers at odds over use of desert—Solar plans spur heated debate

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.vaildaily.com/article/20090907/NEWS/909039947/1078&ParentProfile=1062

Monday, September 7, 2009

Greens, new-energy backers at odds over use of desert

Solar plans spur heated debate

Michael Riley
The Denver Post,
JOHNSON VALLEY, Calif. — If the vast creosote-covered plain that is California's Mojave Desert represents to some the grand potential of America's renewable-energy future, Jim Harvey sees something else.

“Their model is ‘You must kill land to save land,' “ said Harvey, a Web- page designer and homegrown activist who sees the Obama administration's push for green energy here as a destructive force poised to swallow his beloved desert. “How does that make any sense?”

Pushed by federal stimulus money on one side and pulled by renewable-energy mandates on the other, the Mojave is about to come alive with solar energy.

Nowhere else in the country is there such a concentration of proposed renewable-energy projects on such a scale: Sixty- six projects would cover 577,000 acres of Southern California desert with a collection of photovoltaic panels, sun-focusing mirrors and sci-fi solar collectors atop 70-foot poles.

…

[Statistical]

1. Years ago I made jokes that some enviromentalists would even be against wind & solar.

Enviromentalists in the 70s killed nuclear. The outcome of that is we built 800 coal power plants since we stopped building nuclear plants.

We went from nuclear to coal.

Couple years ago the backlash against wind started, now the drone against solar will grow louder.

Now this isn't all environmentalist, some are rational and understand modern society needs energy (even though we could conserve to cut down how much we need). There are others that will not be happy with any form of power.

We could cut emissions by 30% by simply replacing all coal plants with nuclear. Never going to happen. Well more correctly never going to happen IN THE US. The entire rest of the world has nearly 200 plants planned or under construction.

[Warpy]

2. Yes, when it screws up their view

Desert ecosystems are very fragile and need to be respected. However, solar installations are unlikely to cover much of it, not really, especially the solar tower generating stations.

Nuclear plants have their own set of problems, including limited life spans followed by toxic wastes that take thousands of years to decay.

Even hydroelectric power, the cleanest of all, requires damming rivers and flooding some land while drying other, disrupting wildlife habitat.

There is no single plan that will please everybody and no single plan that will generate the electricity this country needs. It will have to be a patchwork of many different sources of electrical power.

There will be somebody to bitch about every bit of it. That's the one sure thing that can be said.

[Odin2005]

4. Those "environmentalists" are not environmentalists, they are luddites and NIMBYists.

Some are yuppies that don't want the vistas of their new houses out in the wild boonies to be "ruined", others are luddites nuts that really wish that our technological society collapsed and thus will always find an excuse to oppose all forms of energy generation

[NNadir]

5. I agree with the term "luddite," but in one way these bourgeois brats have proved useful.

They have created a standard for waste, risk, and environmental impact for nuclear energy that, in fact, only the nuclear industry can meet.

I personally think that these standards are on some level acceptable, but if and only if all energy industries are required to meet them.

This year, at Bio 2009, I went to a wonderful lecture from a speaker (I regrettably forget his name) from the Nature Conservancy on land use and energy. The talk ended up being pro-nuclear by default.

I questioned in the Q & A session whether any form of the car CULTure could ever be sustainable, and the speaker both in session and afterwards conceded it could be sustained, not at this population any way.

Solar will never meet high environmental standards, not on land use, mass use, not on reliability or toxicity, but it's good now to force it to try.

The nuclear industry is the only energy industry that was required to examine all of these criteria before it became significant. What comes around, goes around. The same process should be asked for every industry.

In fact, we should make the process retroactive, and apply waste, land use, and toxicity standards retroactively on the coal, oil and natural gas energy industries, although of course, these industries are pretty good at hiring Green washing staffs.

[joshcryer]

8. I completely agree. Solar standards should be met with zero polluting aspects (except for CO2).

The CO2 exception until you have farms online capable of producing more solar without it.

It is true that nuclear had to meet very stringent requirements (not necessarily unjustified) before it was allowed to gain ground. In that time coal had ample opportunity to meet the upswing in demand for electricity and the new grids that were being built. After that electrical demand has been gradual, making it so that new uptake would be unlikely by nuclear plants.

edit: and by this I mean we simply should not be allowed to import solar unless it is made cleanly. Of course it's not going to go down that way, I completely understand, I'm just sayin'. Would be nice.

[bananas]

6. It's an interesting myth.

"Enviromentalists in the 70s killed nuclear" - not true.
I've pointed out a number of times, for example here and here, that the nuclear industry crashed in 1974.
Do you really believe that the board of directors at all the utilities across the country all simultaneously decided, "Hey, those environmentalists are right, let's start canceling all the reactors we ordered, and stop ordering new ones."
No, that's ridiculous.

What's really interesting about this myth is that the nuclear industry is trying to portray itself as environmentalists, while at the same time attacking environmentalists.

[Statistical]

7. The enviromental red tape increased the build time from about 3 years to about 12.

Nuclear reactors are front loaded.

Unlike say a coal reactor which is "cheap" to build but uses expensive fuel a nuclear reactor is expensive to build and uses cheap fuel (fuel and fuel disposal accounts for less 15% of lifetime costs).

So say I want to build a reactor, so I get a loan right? Now from day 0 until the reactor starts producing power I have no cashflow so the interest capitalized (rolls back into the loan).

Hypothetical I can get a loan @ 8%.
The "overnight cost" (if I could build a reactor in 1 day, w/ no interest) is $3 million per MW.
The reactor is 1000MW so build cost is ~ $3B

If it takes me 3 years to go online from day 0 then my upfront cost is now $3.8B

So my reactor will need to produce $3.8B worth of power in its lifetime. Actually it will need to produce more to cover maintenance costs, interest costs, fuel costs, and decommissioning costs however the construction & TIME created $3.8B in upfront costs. Now that $3.8B will be paid down slowly (40 yr bond) once plant is generating cashflow. $3.8B ammortized over 40yrs @ 8% is about $10.2B

Now at 12 years....
$3B*1.08^12 = $7.55B upfront
$7.55 amortized over 40 yrs @ 8.0% = $26B.

So the same exact reactor but 3yrs vs 12 yrs from breaking ground until going online increases the build cost a staggering $15B. A reactor can produce in excess of $33B worth of power in a lifetime (80 years, 95% uptime, 1000MW * 24 * 365). $15B more in capitalized and interest costs can ruin the economic math.

We are building new reactors again due to changes in nuclear regulations. These certify the plant up front (clock isn't ticking), and then certify the site/land (small loan used not full $3B loan). Then assuming the plant is build EXACTLY to specs the time line should be substantially reduced. Reactors are standardized not custom built. For example every single AP1000 built around the world will be identical. Every bolt, every valve, every switch exactly the same.

Reducing the timeline from 12 years to 3yrs on the same reactor saves $15B and that is the difference between bankruptcy and comfortable profit margin.

BTW: The reactors are required to turn over all nuclear waste to the DOE and pay the US govt 1/2 cent per KWH (that works out to $3.3B per reactor per lifetime on average). So all nuclear waste in this country is owned by the US govt. The US govt has collected $48B in fees for disposal and hasn't disposed of the waste. It would be kinda like paying the garbage man but he doesn't pick up the trash.

[joshcryer]

9. The AP1000 is friggin awesome.

Now if only we had a breeder design that was as standardized (and worked!). :)

[Statistical]

10. It will happen I think the model will be used for all future plants.

Standardize the plant down to the bolt.
Approve the site.
Build standardized plant on approved site.
Final inspection.
Spin up
Begin commercial generation.

The failure of "timely" construction in the 70s was clearly the largest factor to halt of commercial nuclear plants starts.

Solving the time issue goes a long way towards solving the economics of nuclear power.

cap & trade will also make coal & gas reflect the "true cost" of generation. Even at modest cap & trade levels coal becomes substantially more expensive making nuclear more viable.

[HillbillyBob]

3. Aren't there areas such as the salt plains which are barren?

Then there are played out mines such as the old factory sites, borax and copper mines that could be possible sites?
edit to add (i hit post instead of preview duh)

Well we have cut our power use by half and are not freezing, sweating to death or sitting in a quiet dark house, mostly be switching to more efficient lighting and appliances as the old die off and using several cases of Great Stuff foam around windows, pipe and wire penetrations in the houses envelope. We painted the roof with Kool Seal 287 White, lowering the temp in summer by 20-30 degrees, we have not used ac all summer.
Many houses have roof space as do school, commercial and government buildings for instance.

If we all switched to CFLs...
We are switching to LEDs as the CFLs die off and we keep them in a box until there is a nearby county or city hazardous waste day. Many communities are doing that and some are even setting up permanent e waste stations.

As for breakages in 6 7 years of using them we have only broken two out of the 30 or so lights in the house. I have extra fine filters for my shop vac and house vac I carefully and slowly swept up the glass and used the vac to pick up the rest then disposed of the bag when it was hazardous waste day. I don't really like keeping the stuff till hazardous/e waste around, but do put them in a plastic bag in a box that the dogs won't get at them.

[tinrobot]

11. Why not start in the cities?

We've already paved over more than enough land. Put solar on rooftops, along major highways, over parking lots, etc...