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Renewing Support for Renewables
Can opponents of nuclear power overcome the lobbying of industry giants, an economist asks?
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28 Readers' Comments
I wish that were true, but I have a sneaking suspicion that any new regulations will just be window dressing thanks to heavy lobbying by the nuclear industry and its supporters.
Until we change the constant growth paradigm, a clean energy future is wishful thinking.
The real issue is not dangerous nuclear, is not dirty carbon spewing coal, it is the fact that we have a huge oversupply of natural gas in this country. At least 120 years of the stuff and it is very low cost. While people who live in Nancy's home town have been paying $3.50/gallon and to be soon over $4 for heating oil, the cost of heating their homes with natural gas has dropped an average of 11% this year.
Natural gas is equal to fuel oil at about $.84 cents per gallon, a whopping 75% less cost to heat your home with natural gas vs heating oil. It is also cheaper to make electricity with clean low risk natural gas than coal. And as you know natural gas travels by pipeline into your home, no more energy consuming trucks.
Now electrical heat is even more expensive than fuel oil. So why would Nancy advocate a form of energy production that is extremely expensive, hurts the consumer, hurts the taxpayer and indeed does nothing for the environment (ever try to sleep near a wind mill farm?).
Remember wind and solar require huge amounts of surface land, huge amounts of mining iron ore, glass sand, cement, concrete rock and sand, tons of trucking, continous maintenance (I don't know why wind and solar are called renewables with the huge amount of maintenance these facilities require).
Well I guess what my first economics professor taught me is true, there is no such thing as a free lunch!
I think this has definitively been the case for several years, solar panels brought their price / KwH down to a level comparable with coal. And without the aid of government subsidies. Not all panels can boast that price, but it is currently possible and will continue to become more available as production facilities come online.
Renewable technologies aren't perfect, but I've never seen any credible source assert that they are. We need a better balance of energy technologies, and for a variety of reasons. We are past the point where environmental benefits are persuasive because the social and economic arguments have become increasingly important.
Take renewable development in very conservative communities: Some have welcomed wind farms or solar panels because they create jobs, reduce monthly bills, and help them become more self-sufficient. What better cause can renewables bring to communities than an opportunity to revitalize on their own terms?
Articles like this one help to dispel some of the social baggage that has been attached to renewable industries, and perhaps open opportunities that people might miss for the social 'camouflage'. Now if we can just convince our politicians that these technologies can address a host of needs and expectations, rather than a narrow ideological focus, maybe we can encourage them to open more opportunities to more communities. Some may take it or leave it, but currently all that baggage isn't getting us here or there.
One square meter of sunlight in Colorado is worth more than one barrel of oil per year. One square meter solar concentrator costs $150 and lasts longer than 30 years. Solar energy is cheaper than cheap oil.
But when considering fuel supply issues, nuclear has perhaps the biggest problem. Oil is not going to run out before a car made today goes to the junk yard, but with uranium, at the current rate of consumption, only 80 years of supply remain. If the rate of consumption is only doubled, then a new nuclear plant with a design lifetime of 60 years will have to stop operating in 40 years. That means that nuclear power is 50% more expensive than current already high estimates with only moderate growth in its use. Clearly, it can do very little to displace coal use no matter what the subsidy regime.
Since natural gas infrastructure can be re-purposed to renewable energy in schemes similar to that proposed by Jacobson, a short term increased reliance on natural gas could be part of an optimal emissions reduction path. The fossil fuel developments to really watch are in situ coal gasification which vastly expands coal resources, tar sand exploitation and oil shale development. James Hansen has estimated that burning all of these could lead to Earth experiencing the Venus Syndrome. http://www.amazon.com/Storms-My-Grandchildren-Catastrophe-Humanity/dp/B0...
An inexpensive, green, Low Energy Nuclear Reactor (LENR) invented by Andrea Rossi is now in production.
It is inherently much safer than existing nukes and uses non-radioactive Nickel, not radioactive Uranium, as fuel.
Power cost is projected at one penny per kilowatt hour.
No nuclear waste is produced.
See Cold Fusion at www.aesopinstitute.org to learn more.
A one Megawatt heating plant has been approved to open in Greece, in October. A similar plant is under negotiation for construction in the USA.
A nuclear scientist has said when these compact modular units, which can be linked like solar panels to produce any desired power level, begin producing inexpensive electricity it will start a "stampede".
Several competitive designs are being developed. Early regulatory approval has been received in Greece and may prove possible here.
These technologies will cost-competitively undercut any need for new Uranium fueled nuclear plant production and allow the replacement of existing installations as rapidly as mass manufacturing and concerned parties will permit.
These revolutionary designs have no possible chance of a meltdown!
They can be a building block for decentralized energy generation.
Big is fragile and ugly. Small is still beautiful.
A video of the demonstration of the Rossi reactor in Italy a few weeks ago: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCdxpt86fv4&feature=related
For other surprises see Black Swans on the Aesop Institute website.
I guess I could ask the same question. Why should you tax me to pay for your obsession with fossil fuels? You've been doing it for like a century to keep them cheap, and if they were truly economically viable why should I continue to subsidize it? In fact, can I have some of that tax money back? I never really wanted it there in the first place. I want MY money to go toward less destructive forms of energy, not fossil fuels. I also want my tax dollars to go toward light rail and other more efficient forms of transport than sprawling suburban roads clogged with SUVs.
See how the "don't use my tax money for X" argument goes both ways just as easily? It's not so smart to dismiss Nancy's article until you've read through the articles she linked to by Jacobson and Delucchi, which I've downloaded and will read today.
I think the biggest problem with renewables are not '... primarily social and political, not technological or even economic.' If you were correct renewables wouldnt need subsidies and mandates. Rather, the problems with renewables are the physics. There is no efficient way to store power, other than in chemical bonds like coal, oil, and natural gas, or as mass like in nuclear. When there is an effective solution to the physics problem, renewables will blossom all by themselves.
"So why would Nancy advocate a form of energy production that is extremely expensive, hurts the consumer, hurts the taxpayer and indeed does nothing for the environment (ever try to sleep near a wind mill farm?).
Remember wind and solar require huge amounts of surface land, huge amounts of mining iron ore, glass sand, cement, concrete rock and sand, tons of trucking, continous maintenance (I don't know why wind and solar are called renewables with the huge amount of maintenance these facilities require)."
Are you kidding me?!! Does natural gas magically appear in maintenance-free, naturally-formed (geological processes or did God make them?) pipelines. (Ever try to breathe/drink water near a gas well?) You can do better than that... and if not, your lobbying firm should fire you.
There are an awful lot of natural gas proponents (Holly, Chris, Roland) making comments that are neglecting to discuss the environmental costs of extracting their "clean low risk natural gas". I would posit the reason natural gas is so "cheap" is that the laws regulating natural gas' extraction have been rigged (intersection of money, lobbyists and politicians - but that's a different and more infuriating discussion :-) to completely ignore the costs to the health/quality of life of people living near these wells, the environmental costs and risks of using large amounts of water filled with hundreds of toxic compounds (exempt from the Clean water act) to fracture bedrock lying beneath the aquifers we drink from. And let's not forget, burning natural gas still produces carbon dioxide. If natural gas were to account for those costs it wouldn't be so cheap.
This is the problem with all economic arguments for "clean coal," oil, natural gas etc. and until these "hidden" costs are accounted on an economic basis, arguments for continued use of any of these fuels are fatally flawed. And let's face it, the only argument for continued use of fossil fuels has been and is based solely on economics.
Wow.
Very nice piece. For those of you interested in learning more about many of the wind/water/solar power issues brought up here, including cost, availability of materials, land use, variability of supply, and more, I recommend reading the two journal articles mentioned in Nancy's article. Anyone wishing to have a technical discussion about the analyses in those articles is welcome to e-mail me.
Sincerely,
Mark Delucchi
Research Scientist
University of California
madelucchi@ucdavis.edu
Better strategy is conservation: Walk for errands up to 2 miles. Ride a bike for errands up to 7 miles. Stop watching the Plasma screen TV at 450 watts and listen to a headphone portable radio.
We tend to seek solutions through miraculous technology. Because of costs and national bankruptcy it may not save our hide.
The cheapest kilowatt produced is the one you saved through energy efficiency.
At the height of the financial crisis, many thought it was a no-brainer for new President Obama to follow in the footsteps of Franklin Roosevelt and create jobs and prosperity with a "New Deal" to build new infrastructure around renewable energy. But he did not do that. Instead the BP oil disaster and the Japanese nuclear disaster have spotlighted how much money flows through fossil fuel and nuclear lobbying. So I see that failure to create opportunity in renewable energy as another outcome from the distortions created by the influence of big money on our democracy. To me, it looks like the country had a chance to do better but it was squashed by the same forces that profitably poison our habitat. And that is a recurring theme that also runs through reforms in finance and health care.
Oceanogenic Power, also, is the only one that makes feasible all the production of a clean energy carrier (hydrogen) for current transports.
Oceanogenic Power; at this moment of history, is the unique clean renewable energy idea for the world capable to supply all base and peak loads at a time locally, America or the World.
This is no small issue given the fact that the Liberals, who generally support alternative energy, will fight alternative energy solutions when it is proposed in their neighborhood(see Nantucket).
The fact is solar and wind will be viable sources of power when is cost effective to install on individual homes..
The problem at this time is battery storage technology and given the current price tag of a Chevy Volt, it still seems that battery storage technology is still far from making these sources of energy viable.
The question then becomes,what happens if we divert the subsides currently provided for ethanol, nuclear, and oil, towards battery storage development and alternative energy?
We have seen what computers, the internet and automation have done to the print, recording, and manufacturing industries, what would the elimination of utilities and fuel oil companies mean to the overall economy? I believe it would be for the better but only time will tell.
A 1% risk of 200 years of devastation from spent nuclear fuel rods, radiation releases, and death is not the same as another 1% risk.
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