Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-25

[The Brain]

Housecats routinely torture and kill small animals, so it's fine if people in the energy sector do it.

[viper37]

Which issues do you think are the most important here?

A massive earthquake, followed by a massive tsunami in the middle of the upper St-Lawrence river (close to Montreal).  That is, according to the opponents of nuclear energy who closed our only nuclear power plant.

[The Brain]

Which issues do you think are the most important here?

A massive earthquake, followed by a massive tsunami in the middle of the upper St-Lawrence river (close to Montreal).  That is, according to the opponents of nuclear energy who closed our only nuclear power plant.

Is katmai even allowed to enter Canada?

[viper37]

The renewables have seen a massive public intervention too (subsidies and what not), probably even more than nuclear, for far less actual gain.

TBH, it's not like oil is deprived of public help.

We give them generous tax credits for drilling and exploring, we give them a generous fiscal regime, they get subsidies to conform to environmental norms, they get a legal bypass to operate in natural reserves, etc., etc.

And on top of that, they form an oligopoly and the energy has tremendous entry barriers.

Either we remove all their privileges, something most government dependent on oil revenues are opposed to, or we subsidize new industries.

[viper37]

Which issues do you think are the most important here?

Costs, safety concerns, and waste storage.

But really the commissioning and decommissioning costs are a pretty big obstacle here in Texas with the way we have our power sector structured.

We seem fare less advanced than Europeans at recycling nuclear waste over here.  Or is it my flawed perception?  It seems we only store nuclear waste until it's no longer a problem while France, at least, recycle its nuclear waste.

[viper37]

Basically, 85 to 90% of all politicians.  Great.  

[Josquius]

Back on Ukraine, a question for the weaponary inclined.
Just why is it NATO and the Soviets use different standard ammo sizes?
Surely this is something where there should be a 'correct' answer of which is best to standardise on?- Obviously neither want their enemy using their stuff but then this would equally be a minor concern for both.
Something akin to different railway gauges with this going back quite some way with too many investments having already been made in Russian  and American norms to change for minor gain?

[The Larch]

From what I hear about the depopulation of the Spanish countryside there should be plenty of space to put windmills.

The vast majority of Spain's windpower comes from the depopulated interior indeed. That's why there was very little opposition to it at first, as there was plenty of great sites that didn't bother anyone. Now that the best sites have already been taken, new ones are closer and closer to populated areas, so problems that didn't exist in the past have started to arise.

Wind has been such a huge success story with such rapid development I really interested to see where that train takes us and what that technology looks like decades from now when it matures into its final form. Still lots of issues to work out and aesthetics and impacts on nature are certainly up there with energy storage. Also: keeping ice from forming on the blades.

Yes, in Spain wind is I believe the biggest success story renewables-wise. For a few years around the early 00s we were actually world leaders in the field, and we had some worlwide industry leaders, but our potential for growth was limited, and once larger countries started investing heavily we were left behind. We are still 5th worlwide, but China and the US outpace everybody else by ridiculous margins, and India is getting there.

Another important issue regarding wind is decomissioning/waste management, given that now we're seeing lots of old wind farms getting upgraded and older turbine models getting decomissioned and replaced by upgraded ones. At the moment old blades are mostly sent to landfills, which is quite a waste, but their recycling is, AFAIK, not yet possible.

One problem I see with windmills inland in Spain is that I believe southern Spain is an important bird migration zone and windmills and birds don't mix.

That's not really an issue, a wind farm is not going to bother migrating birds that fly far above the tallest turbines. It could theoretically be a concern if you build a wind farm right next to a nesting site, for instance, but there's no need for that. The important sites for migrating birds in Spain tend to be wetlands in flat areas, and you're not going to build a wind farm there.

It's all getting very big off-shore here.

The UK is, in fact, a world leader in offshore wind power (the largest wind farm in the world is like 100 km off the coast of Hull, for instance), only behind China. You can add that to the sectors that the UK is good at, and it's actually one with an industrial base, that can help deprived coastal areas, as shipyards can be turned into supporting actors for the industry.

In Europe most countries around the North sea are heavy into offshore wind farms. Denmark was historically the other industry leader in Europe together with the UK. Germany has also grown exponentially in recent years, and nowadays together with the UK they both account for like 2/3rds of worldwide installed offshore wind power. The other giant in this area is, of course, China.

The experiments with tidal power in Orkney are also exciting. When I was a kid I lived just south of Orkney on the mainland and they had an experimental wave power turbine installed on the Pentland Firth on the theory that if it can survive there, it can survive anywhere. It sunk within three April days - and then everyone in the region was doing day trips to see it slowly collapsing into the sea

The UK, and particulary Scotland, has always been in the forefront of the more *esoteric* marine renewables, like wave energy and tide energy. None of them are still anywhere close to becoming comercial, even after decades of research and pilot experiments like the one you mention.

[HVC]

One problem I see with windmills inland in Spain is that I believe southern Spain is an important bird migration zone and windmills and birds don't mix.

That's not really an issue, a wind farm is not going to bother migrating birds that fly far above the tallest turbines. It could theoretically be a concern if you build a wind farm right next to a nesting site, for instance, but there's no need for that. The important sites for migrating birds in Spain tend to be wetlands in flat areas, and you're not going to build a wind farm there.

Then build away. Wind power is good because there's wind at night too. Alleviates some of the energy storage problems.

[crazy canuck]

The trouble is it's proven factually that nuclear power is safe but getting the public at large to accept this proof seems to be further away than ever.

It is next to impossible to convince a critical mass of the public that climate change is an imminent threat.  If that were different it would probably be a lot easier to convince them that nuclear is a good option to solve help solve that threat.

[Berkut]

And fires rarely kill people, so let's set kindergartens on fire.

Yes, that is definitely the right analogy there. Windmills are just like setting kindergartens on fire.

I am glad you have refrained from making illogical, emotive arguments.

[HVC]

And fires rarely kill people, so let's set kindergartens on fire.

Yes, that is definitely the right analogy there. Windmills are just like setting kindergartens on fire.

I am glad you have refrained from making illogical, emotive arguments.

Thanks for cutting the rest of my post. Real honest discussion tactic you have there.    

[Duque de Bragança]

Extending the lifetime of existing nuclear plants is the logical thing to do, by far the easiest and cheapest solution in the short term, but it's also a bit of a kick the can down the road kind of plan unless you start doing the mid-long term solution right then. There's also the risk of any of the plants not being able to have its lifetime extended, but they know better than anybody else if it's realistic to expect them all to be extended or not.

EDF has studied and planned that life-extending project since 2008, it's called Grand carénage.
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_carénage
It's costly, but doable.

As for announcements of new plants I don't really know what to think, earlier this year he had already announced 14 new ones, now he's talking about 6 new ones. Are those 6 part of the 14? On top of them? In any case, the French state is going to have to write lots of cheques in the coming years if they want to open so many new plants, given the costs involved and how they are going to have to underwrite lots of them, as there's so little appetite in the market for nuclear energy.

6 reactors first, then possibly up to 14, following studies. It's recent, last February, got lost in the campaign and the war in Ukraine.

No idea about that particular project, research is always necessary, so unless that particular model was determined to be a dead end it's a bit of a pity. In any case unless they've completely dismantled it I imagine it can be reactivated.

Anyway, debating about a Gen IV reactor when Gen III ones haven't been able to make it is more theoretical than practical.

Gen III are about to make it, but they have had their teething problems.
As for mid-term or long-term research, that's a bit too much to ask for a politician only looking at the next election.

The off-shore wind farms generate less discontent than inland ones, very polarising (irrational if you ask me).

Unless you ask fishermen... 

Macro also switched to off-shore given the opposition to inland. I guess the French interior is not depopulated enough, or the parts that are are not good enough for wind. No idea really.

Over here inland wind farms are starting to get controversial due to saturation, but for decades tons of them were built with very few issues.

Quite the opposite here, with nimby-ism uniting some Greens, conservatives and regionalist types (let them build wind farms in Paris!).

[Sheilbh]

The UK is, in fact, a world leader in offshore wind power (the largest wind farm in the world is like 100 km off the coast of Hull, for instance), only behind China. You can add that to the sectors that the UK is good at, and it's actually one with an industrial base, that can help deprived coastal areas, as shipyards can be turned into supporting actors for the industry.

In Europe most countries around the North sea are heavy into offshore wind farms. Denmark was historically the other industry leader in Europe together with the UK. Germany has also grown exponentially in recent years, and nowadays together with the UK they both account for like 2/3rds of worldwide installed offshore wind power. The other giant in this area is, of course, China.

Agreed. It is really cool when you fly over the North Sea or even parts of the Channel and seeing the giant wind farms. It should be a huge part of our strategy. Although the most deprived bits of British seaside are the old resort towns and sadly it probably wouldn't help them.

Is there any reason why it's been so much more adopted in the North Sea area? I imagine partly because those countries are rich enough to sustain the investment and they have developed power grids (same reason I imagine Orkney is of interest for tidal power) and partly because it's relatively shallow for fixed turbines. But surely there must be other bodies of water globally where off-shore wind could be used at scale?

The UK, and particulary Scotland, has always been in the forefront of the more *esoteric* marine renewables, like wave energy and tide energy. None of them are still anywhere close to becoming comercial, even after decades of research and pilot experiments like the one you mention.

Yeah I hope the new experimental ones work - and again I'm not sure commercially viable is necessarily the criteria at this stage (though obviously it allows for huge growth - eg with solar and wind as they've become so much cheaper) as much as whether it can generated enough and can be scaled. I don't think we can necessarily rely on commercially viable options for net zero.

Although I really hope tidal power is viable because it's predictable and I feel like that'll be helpful as a base renewable (a bit like hydro in countries with the geography for that). Also on a purely aesthetic level I find there's something really cool about the idea of ultimately powering our society by the moon

[The Larch]

One problem I see with windmills inland in Spain is that I believe southern Spain is an important bird migration zone and windmills and birds don't mix.

That's not really an issue, a wind farm is not going to bother migrating birds that fly far above the tallest turbines. It could theoretically be a concern if you build a wind farm right next to a nesting site, for instance, but there's no need for that. The important sites for migrating birds in Spain tend to be wetlands in flat areas, and you're not going to build a wind farm there.

Then build away. Wind power is good because there's wind at night too. Alleviates some of the energy storage problems.

For Spain the challenge now is moving into offshore. As I said, inland wind power has already been heavily exploited and the potential there, even if there's still some, is much smaller than it used to be.

Now, in offshore there's so much more than can still be done, and wind there is stronger and more constant than inland. Historically it used to be quite expensive, as turbines had to be anchored to the seafloor, which also limited the number of sites, but recently costs have gone down and floating turbines have been developed, and that should open up many more areas. Good areas for offshore wind farms in Spain are limited, though, mostly in the Atlantic coast and right into the Med after the straits of Gibraltar. There are issues with fishing and navigation, though.