Thinking about an EV (nvm, bought one)

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172andyou said:
It's worth noting that he proposes switching the power grid to nuclear energy, which aside from having bigger mining and disposal issues than lithium, would also increase the price of electricity by a factor of three compared to solar or wind. We should take the 12% win from cars *AND* continue migrating the power grid to renewables. Nukes are dangerous dinosaurs and their price reflects that danger factor.
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Nuclear is one of the safest, most reliable forms of energy we have.

 
SoonerAviator said:
The problem is EPA/gov't regulation making it prohibitively expensive to even attempt getting approval
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The problem is that nuclear power is so dangerous that it requires enormous oversight to assure that corners don't get cut and kill tens of thousands of people in one go. I would love for nukes to be an option. But I'm also old enough to have seen promises of cheap and safe nukes be just around the corner for close to 60 years. Stopped holding my breath on that one a long time ago. Meanwhile, we have cheap renewables today.
 
Velocity173 said:
Nuclear is one of the safest, most reliable forms of energy we have.
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Yes. And it's been very expensive to make both of those things be true. It's not that nukes can't be done safely. It's that we've been close to being able to do it safely *AND* cheaply for 60+ years. The minute it can be done both safely and cheaply it will be game changing. Don't hold your breath. The phrase calling nuclear energy "too cheap to meter" goes back to even before my old self, 1954 (70 years). And it's never gotten even close because of the dangers involved.
 
Fun little refresh of my memory on this stuff. The guy who coined the phrase "too cheap to meter" in 1954 predicted that goal would be met within "5 to 15 years depending on the vigor of the development effort."

Ooops. :D
 
172andyou said:
Yes. And it's been very expensive to make both of those things be true. It's not that nukes can't be done safely. It's that we've been close to being able to do it safely *AND* cheaply for 60+ years. The minute it can be done both safely and cheaply it will be game changing. Don't hold your breath. The phrase calling nuclear energy "too cheap to meter" goes back to even before my old self, 1954 (70 years). And it's never gotten even close because of the dangers involved.
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Sure it’s expensive but you can’t compare solar’s energy capacity to nuclear. Nuclear can also be cheaper if you relied heavily on renewables. Germany is just now realizing (painfully) that fact.

www.forbes.com

Germany’s Energy Crisis Dispels Several Myths

Much of its problem is self-inflicted and demonstrates the perils of populist but irrational energy policy.
www.forbes.com www.forbes.com

www.energy.gov

Nuclear Power is the Most Reliable Energy Source and It's Not Even Close

Nuclear energy has the highest capacity factor of any energy source, and it's not even close.
www.energy.gov www.energy.gov

www.energy.gov

3 Reasons Why Nuclear is Clean and Sustainable

Most people immediately think of solar panels or wind turbines as clean energy, but how many of you thought of nuclear energy?
www.energy.gov www.energy.gov
 
172andyou said:
The problem is that nuclear power is so dangerous that it requires enormous oversight to assure that corners don't get cut and kill tens of thousands of people in one go. I would love for nukes to be an option. But I'm also old enough to have seen promises of cheap and safe nukes be just around the corner for close to 60 years. Stopped holding my breath on that one a long time ago. Meanwhile, we have cheap renewables today.
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You apparently know nothing about MSR plants or the non-1950s nuclear tech. The risk of meltdown or catastrophic failure is extremely low due to the nature of how they operate. Sure, it still takes a lot of oversight and specially trained personnel to operate, but this isn't Chernobyl / 3-Mile Island. Just to put it in perspective: nuclear power has provided over 20% of the total power generation in the US for over 3 decades. How many nuclear incidents have we had in that time span? How many times has the nuclear power plant been unreliable? Renewables aren't reliable. Wind stops blowing, cloudy days, calm seas., etc. They aren't good for base load needs. Nuclear is ideal for base loads and typically has low fuel and operational costs, it's the initial capital costs (design/engineer/build) that make nuclear expensive. Gen IV nuclear reactors are under development in various designs, but they have put low-cost fuels and fail-safe designs at the forefront for a long time.
 
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172andyou said:
Nukes are dangerous dinosaurs and their price reflects that danger factor.
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The pricing of nukes reflects the kneejerk fear people have of anything nuclear on top of the NIMBY problems.
 
Velocity173 said:
Sure it’s expensive but you can’t compare solar’s energy capacity to nuclear.
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I think you mean energy density, rather than capacity. Yes, solar takes up a lot of real estate. A lot of that can come from rooftops and parking lots in urban areas, but it's still objectively a large footprint. But the capacity is there.
 
SoonerAviator said:
You apparently know nothing about MSR plants or the non-1950s nuclear tech.
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Sure, make it about me instead of the technology. Ad hominem's always work, right?

How many MSR's are in production making power globally right now?
 
172andyou said:
I think you mean energy density, rather than capacity. Yes, solar takes up a lot of real estate. A lot of that can come from rooftops and parking lots in urban areas, but it's still objectively a large footprint. But the capacity is there.
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Yes the capacity CAN be equivalent to nuclear, but at what cost to the environment? Fact is, every form of energy is “dirty” to some extent.

hbr.org

The Dark Side of Solar Power

Solar energy is a rapidly growing market, which should be good news for the environment. Unfortunately there’s a catch. The replacement rate of solar panels is faster than expected and given the current very high recycling costs, there’s a real danger that all used panels will go straight to...
hbr.org hbr.org
 
172andyou said:
I think you mean energy density, rather than capacity. Yes, solar takes up a lot of real estate. A lot of that can come from rooftops and parking lots in urban areas, but it's still objectively a large footprint. But the capacity is there.
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Not sure that "density" is any better measure. At a certain point you can't cover every last spot with a solar panel or wind turbine. Not to mention that you seem to keep glossing over the fact that 1GW of nuclear power is not the same as 1GW of wind/solar power. Nuclear is sustained. Wind doesn't blow? No power. Sun doesn't shine? No power. That isn't reliable energy production.

1706823694933.png
 
172andyou said:
How many MSR's are in production making power globally right now?
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"Right now" is not the issue. We have to plan for the future.
EVs are not equal in all aspects to ICE cars "right now". But they will be.
The grid is not capable of handling total electrification "right now". But if we plan for the future, it will be.

I don't mind people that poo-poo new technology as not as good as old technology, as long as they precede their "Right now" with "not yet".
 
Velocity173 said:
Yes the capacity CAN be equivalent to nuclear, but at what cost to the environment? Fact is, every form of energy is “dirty” to some extent.
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Yes, power doesn't just magically exist. There is pollution in creating solar panels, mining uranium, disposing of panels, keeping nuclear waste secure for 10,000 years. All of those things are true.
 
SoonerAviator said:
Not sure that "density" is any better measure. At a certain point you can't cover every last spot with a solar panel or wind turbine.
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You don't have to. IIRC to power the entire planet with solar would take something like 2% of the land area of the US.
SoonerAviator said:
Not to mention that you seem to keep glossing over the fact that 1GW of nuclear power is not the same as 1GW of wind/solar power. Nuclear is sustained. Wind doesn't blow? No power. Sun doesn't shine? No power. That isn't reliable energy production.
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This is a much better point. We don't really have good ways of storing solar or wind power and using it when they aren't producing. The demand cycle for power and the production cycle for solar are pretty well aligned, so that's a good thing. But it's far from perfect. You would never catch me proposing that energy production should be all done with a single technology.
 
JOhnH said:
"Right now" is not the issue. We have to plan for the future.
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For those watching at home. The answer is zero. There are zero MSRs in production. There have only been a limited number of test reactors, despite the research on this technology going back to at least the 1960's. Maybe someday they can be part of an answer, but in the real world, they aren't part of equation today. If people want to continue to research them, great. Have at it. But today we have renewables that produce power for a third of the cost of nuclear. And, while it's possible that nukes might get better and/or safer, it's also possible that solar will get better. In fact, while we have 70 years of history of nukes getting safer at the expense of cost, solar has always been safe and has been getting cheaper and cheaper decade after decade.
 
172andyou said:
For those watching at home. The answer is zero. There are zero MSRs in production. There have only been a limited number of test reactors, despite the research on this technology going back to at least the 1960's. Maybe someday they can be part of an answer, but in the real world, they aren't part of equation today. If people want to continue to research them, great. Have at it. But today we have renewables that produce power for a third of the cost of nuclear. And, while it's possible that nukes might get better and/or safer, it's also possible that solar will get better. In fact, while we have 70 years of history of nukes getting safer at the expense of cost, solar has always been safe and has been getting cheaper and cheaper decade after decade.
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I'm with you 100% about going forth with solar and wind power development.
But I am also 100% behind further development of nuclear fusion power.

But regardless of the power source, the grid is the most immediate issue. We currently have three times the current power production capability just waiting in the wings for regulatory clearance to connect to the grid.
 
JOhnH said:
I'm with you 100% about going forth with solar and wind power development.
But I am also 100% behind further development of nuclear fusion power.
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I mean, fusion would be the home run. But I would be surprised if any of us are still alive to see it.

JOhnH said:
But regardless of the power source, the grid is the most immediate issue. We currently have three times the current power production capability just waiting in the wings for regulatory clearance to connect to the grid.
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Where can I read more about that?
 
172andyou said:
I mean, fusion would be the home run. But I would be surprised if any of us are still alive to see it.


Where can I read more about that?
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Google is your friend.
Here is the first result I got when searching for "power waiting for grid:
www.cnbc.com

Wind and solar power generators wait in yearslong lines to put clean electricity on the grid, then face huge interconnection fees they can't afford

Interconnection applications and fees make it slow and expensive for clean energy providers to connect to the electrical grid.
www.cnbc.com www.cnbc.com

The entire electric grid in the United States has installed capacity of about 1,250 gigawatts of power and there is currently 2,020 gigawatts of energy capacity waiting in line to be connected.
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I'll admit I was going from memory and the "three times" may have been in error. But we have a LOT of energy ready to be pumped into the grid if the grid could handle it and if the regulatory agencies were up to the task.
 
172andyou said:
But I'm also old enough to have seen promises of cheap and safe nukes be just around the corner for close to 60 years. Stopped holding my breath on that one a long time ago.
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A big part of that was the combination of the release of The China Syndrome, in March of 1979, followed 12 days later by the accident at Three Mile Island. That combination turned public sentiment against nuclear power and effectively stopped the expansion of nuclear plants in the US.

SoonerAviator said:
Nuclear is ideal for base loads and typically has low fuel and operational costs, it's the initial capital costs (design/engineer/build) that make nuclear expensive.
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That's so important in understanding the grid. Baseload plus peaker plants. Peaker plants are the "dirty" energy from coal and natural gas plants. Tesla Energy is working at replacing peaker plants with grid storage with their Megapacks which are being deployed as fast as they can produce them. As I mentioned above, Hawaii just replaced its last coal plant with a Tesla Magapack facility. As the grid storage capacity expands, baseload capacity can be expanded and excess baseload production can be stored, along with the expanding renewable production, then use as the replacement for the peaker plants.

As to solar coverage, many homes are adding solar to their roofs with their own storage batteries from Tesla, FranklinWH, and others. In some areas of Texas, and maybe some other areas, Tesla Powerwall owners can earn money by allowing their utility to use their battery capacity as distributed grid storage. If I'm remembering the number correctly, one such Powerwall owner was reciving $30/mo per enrolled Powerwall plus $300 to $400 per year in payments for the energy returned to the grid under the program. From the video, it looked like he had three Powerwalls so $90/mo plus ~$350/year, plus his excess production that he sells back.
 
172andyou said:
Yes. And it's been very expensive to make both of those things be true. It's not that nukes can't be done safely. It's that we've been close to being able to do it safely *AND* cheaply for 60+ years. The minute it can be done both safely and cheaply it will be game changing. Don't hold your breath. The phrase calling nuclear energy "too cheap to meter" goes back to even before my old self, 1954 (70 years). And it's never gotten even close because of the dangers involved.
Click to expand...

I am not even an internet expert on this SMR, Nuclear.... From what I have read, and been told by a few nuclear engineers I have met. The largest factor with the new "safe" solutions like the molten salt reactors, is our regulations. The alternative reactors are apparently much easier to convert the radioactive material into a bomb. Therefore, we banned them.

Tim
 
JOhnH said:
"Right now" is not the issue. We have to plan for the future.
EVs are not equal in all aspects to ICE cars "right now". But they will be.
The grid is not capable of handling total electrification "right now". But if we plan for the future, it will be.

I don't mind people that poo-poo new technology as not as good as old technology, as long as they precede their "Right now" with "not yet".
Click to expand...

Tim
 
tspear said:
I am not even an internet expert on this SMR, Nuclear.... From what I have read, and been told by a few nuclear engineers I have met. The largest factor with the new "safe" solutions like the molten salt reactors, is our regulations. The alternative reactors are apparently much easier to convert the radioactive material into a bomb. Therefore, we banned them.
Click to expand...
I don't think they've ever been banned. And certainly the security concerns are something that has to be dealt with. But there are tons of engineering/physics/chemistry problems as well.
 
SoonerAviator said:
Last couple of academic papers I saw on nuke power is that it had better payback over most other fuel sources (aside from Hydro) over the course of 20-25 years because that's how long it takes to even begin to break even on the capital costs vs coal/nat gas plants. The problem is EPA/gov't regulation making it prohibitively expensive to even attempt getting approval, and then finding capital to do so when the ROI is measured in decades, not years. "Dangerous dinosaurs" . . . can't really even take you serious after that comment. Molten-salt and other modern nuclear sources aren't anywhere near what I'd call dangerous, and many can reuse the spent fuel rods already in storage. Sure, nuclear has a problem with radioactive storage, but it's a stable long-term base load power source. Nuclear only costs more in the short term, but over the life of a nuclear plant is generally less than wind/solar/coal/gas. Having to replace and rebuilt solar panels and wind turbines frequently over the course of a few decades is no small cost.
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The Southern Company finally got one of its new units of Plant Vogtle operational last summer, 14 years after it was started. The second new unit is still being tested.

There was a point where the professional staff of Georgia's public service commission recommended that plant be abandoned, as it wasn't economically sound. The commissioners, who are majority Republican, overruled them and the plant was finished. We ratepayers have been paying the interest on the bonds for a number of years, and we have had one substantial rate hike and are looking at another.
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-st...rease-in-georgia-power-bills-starting-in-june
 
172andyou said:
You don't remember Mr. Fusion!?!?
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Of course I do, but Mr Fusion didn’t power the car, as was explained in Back to the Future Part 3. It only powered the time circuits (same as the plutonium).

They didn’t really explain how the gasoline engine (which I believe would’ve been the tiny turbo 4 as the V6 I thought was only offered with the automatic) powered the flying function. But that’s the whole reason why it went #rollcoal to hit 88 across Clayton - err Eastwood Ravine.
 
FormerHangie said:
The Southern Company finally got one of its new units of Plant Vogtle operational last summer, 14 years after it was started. The second new unit is still being tested.

There was a point where the professional staff of Georgia's public service commission recommended that plant be abandoned, as it wasn't economically sound. The commissioners, who are majority Republican, overruled them and the plant was finished. We ratepayers have been paying the interest on the bonds for a number of years, and we have had one substantial rate hike and are looking at another.
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-st...rease-in-georgia-power-bills-starting-in-june
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Yeah I remember reading about that not too long ago. Not exactly the best example of project management on something as complex and gigantic in scale as a nuclear power plant. Costing over double the original estimate due to delays and rework of major components is a poor way to start such a capital intensive process. Not to mention trying to finish it up during the Covid fiasco.
 
172andyou said:
I don't think they've ever been banned. And certainly the security concerns are something that has to be dealt with. But there are tons of engineering/physics/chemistry problems as well.
Click to expand...
One of the largest hurdles to salt/thorium reactors is dealing with extremely high-corrosive environments. Getting metal stuff to withstand it is pretty tough.
 
FormerHangie said:
The Southern Company finally got one of its new units of Plant Vogtle operational last summer, 14 years after it was started. The second new unit is still being tested.

There was a point where the professional staff of Georgia's public service commission recommended that plant be abandoned, as it wasn't economically sound. The commissioners, who are majority Republican, overruled them and the plant was finished. We ratepayers have been paying the interest on the bonds for a number of years, and we have had one substantial rate hike and are looking at another.
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-st...rease-in-georgia-power-bills-starting-in-june
Click to expand...

Was there a point you were trying to make with the "who are majority Republican" crack?
 
Ted said:
They didn’t really explain how the gasoline engine (which I believe would’ve been the tiny turbo 4 as the V6 I thought was only offered with the automatic) powered the flying function.
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Yeah, that's why I assumed it powered the car also. Didn't catch the part in #3 that disputed that!
 
172andyou said:
Yeah, that's why I assumed it powered the car also. Didn't catch the part in #3 that disputed that!
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I’m a car guy, mechanic, and an engineer who was born in the mid 80s.

I’ve watched all three BTTF movies many, many times.

i even watched them on VHS! :eek:
 
Ted said:
Of course I do, but Mr Fusion didn’t power the car, as was explained in Back to the Future Part 3. It only powered the time circuits (same as the plutonium).

They didn’t really explain how the gasoline engine (which I believe would’ve been the tiny turbo 4 as the V6 I thought was only offered with the automatic) powered the flying function. But that’s the whole reason why it went #rollcoal to hit 88 across Clayton - err Eastwood Ravine.
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And at the Twin.. err Lone Pine Mall.
 
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SoonerAviator said:
Yeah I remember reading about that not too long ago. Not exactly the best example of project management on something as complex and gigantic in scale as a nuclear power plant. Costing over double the original estimate due to delays and rework of major components is a poor way to start such a capital intensive process. Not to mention trying to finish it up during the Covid fiasco.
Click to expand...

IIRC, the original contractor went belly-up mid-project. Also, there may have been something about the project not being grandfathered in via old regs and had to change course mid-project for new regs. But yeah.. Pretty embarassing to get $B's off budget.
 
Larry in TN said:
Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) batteries do not have any rare earth metals (cobalt and nickel). Over half of the world's current EV production uses LFP batteries.
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Just saw today that Tesla is building a plant in Sparks, NV to build LFP batteries here in the US.
 
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