This video has just been published by Jeremy Leggett of Solar Century and the Green New Deal group. He has been at the forefront of renewable energy thinking for longer than I suspect he'd care to admit. It was made at an investment forum he has been speaking at. The last three minutes may be the most telling - on what the executives of legacy energy companies should be doing now.
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I don’t buy the re-newable story time: niche, yes, but ‘global answer to Big Fossil’, no. Math physics and engineering (let alone money) dictate that gen4 nuclear is more likely to be the “global” energy of the future e.g.
https://www3.rgu.ac.uk/news/rgu-nuclear-versus-renewables-debate-a-huge-success?
https://alexcoram.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/mathsnuclearumass2o13oooo1o.pdf
http://en.yibada.com/articles/54534/20150817/fast-nuclear-reactor-start-construction-2017.htm
As Jeremey noted: new solar capacity beat coal, gas, oil and nuclear combined last year
You’re backing a dead horse
I have no doubt that the nuclear lobby is very powerful (no pun intended) in view of the profit potential. But common sense dictates that solar energy has to be the way ahead for planet and people – http://www.iqsdirectory.com/blog/the-energy-of-the-future-is-solar-power.
The sun has enough hydrogen to last about another 5 billion years by which time human life will be long gone.
Solar energy is an essential element of the Internet of Things – https://www.sierrawireless.com/iot-blog/iot-blog/2017/12/the_future_of_iot_in_solar_energy_how_innovative_technology_is_expanding_the_solar_sector.
http://www.iflscience.com/technology/how-trillions-tiny-solar-panels-could-power-internet-things.
While the environmental issue is paramount, the economics of solar make more sense than any of the other options. Once the capital infrastructure has been paid for (via MMS economic programmes, lol) we are then in the world of zero marginal cost energy: “…. most of the naysaying has been that renewables were too expensive, soon we’ll hear about how they’re too cheap.” https://electrek.co/2016/12/28/solar-power-at-1%C2%A2kwh-by-2025-the-promise-of-quasi-infinite-and-free-energy-is-here.
QED 🙂
Increasing solar PV last year (which accounts for less than 1% of global consumption / production) by a record of 98 GW, increases global energy production by some even further tiny fraction of 1%.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-renewables-investment/solar-power-eclipsed-fossil-fuels-in-new-2017-generating-capacity-u-n-idUSKCN1HC1NC
Richard, I fail to see how this amounts to a trend?
Further, its far from clear that all energy costs in solar PV production and installation, e.g. factory building costs, transport, site fixing, maintenance, & eol recycling / decommissioning are fully ameliorated by solar PV advocates and analysis, reducing efficiency even further.
Land taken out of other use is rarely if ever factored in by them either.
Full scale investment in gen 4 nuclear would push big fossil out of profitability sooner than later, when we’re barely past half way through the remaining oil & gas still in the ground. I don’t see any signs whatsoever of big fossil giving up these profits.
Sellafield sits on a huge gen 4 fuel bonanza in the form of gen 3 waste, enough to power the UK for centuries.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/feb/02/nuclear-reactors-consume-radioactive-waste https://www.theengineer.co.uk/issues/energy-and-sustainability-special/prism-project-a-proposal-for-the-uks-problem-plutonium/
In China and the US other fuel for gen 4 nuclear is already waiting in rare earth mined tailings.
Instead I see the so called solar PV revolution as a good, but misleading and misguided short to medium term distraction from these sorts of realities.
You don’t see the trend
I trust Jeremy
Reminder: not all nuclear is born equal. Why does the renewable lobby ‘always’ seems to lump the legacy WW2 plutonium extracting fetish of existing dirty gen 3 slow neutron water cooled uranium nuclear into the same pigeon hole as gen 4 fast neutron?
Because it’s all enough to send us to oblivion
The whole point of gen 4 (which was, perverse as it seems, the original tech back in the 1940s) is that you can’t make bombs and the reaction cycles are designed to be self limiting !
I’m not worried about bombs
I am worried by half lives
Richard,
Glad you agree: gen4 nuclear *is* mostly weapons proliferation proof c/w gen3.
However, most people get it wrong about nuclear half lives:
First, the shorter the half life the WORSE the radiation poisoning potential; and
Second, the 112 tonnes or so of high level waste now stored at Sellafield is dangerous for 5,000 years, but is potential FUEL for gen 4 nuclear just waiting there to be ‘burned’ in a gen 4 reactor such as the GE Hitachi PRISM design offered to the Blair government’s nuclear review, which shamefully rejected this 21C solution out of hand, perhaps in part due to how it would expose the connections between gen3 nuclear power and weapons production.
Third, instead of trying to safely bury that 112 tones of waste for 5,000 years, which is far far far more difficult than building a PRISM reactor or similar, which is fail safe, it would render ALL that waste as benign as background radiation (e.g. same as Dartmoor granite) over the course of several decades to a century or so, with the side benefit of being capable of generating all the UKs electricity and more besides for that time period.
I’d call this a win win win.
I used to be anti-nuclear power as I thought it was impossible to separate weapons from energy, which for gen3 it largely is. But the Physics and maths show I was wrong. And because of that I now just ignore the silly ignorant scaremongering of the likes of Leggett and Greenpeace etc… and am now highly sceptical of solar PV claims in light of that industry’s lack of full amelioration c/w the higher bar set for the above gen4 route.
With respect, calling Leggett ignorant does not endear you or your argument to me
I strongly suspect you are astroturfing
Richard,
I am sorry you have interpreted my suggestion that Leggett is “ignorant” as an attempt to “astroturf” him or otherwise insult him or anyone else. This is not the case. The definition of ignorance is simply a lack of knowledge. But I may of course be entirely wrong with this assessment. Lets see.
Since around circa 2006/7 (when I was involved in setting up the since disbanded and seriously flawed Transition Town experiment in Brighton – e.g. no model of banks or money) I first became aware aware of Leggett. Up until that time I was absolutely against all forms of nuclear, and lauded his new Solar Century venture.
However, in 2011 following several days discussing a climate change paper with its author, mathematical economist Alex Coram at Sydney University I now believe that renewable advocates such as Leggett and Greenpeace (e.g. their ‘100% UK re-newable by 2030’ paper) simply lack all necessary knowledge for a robust analysis. They seem inexplicably (or not, £$) wedded to continuing to ignore all factors, as detailed here (also linked to in my previous comment):-
https://alexcoram.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/mathsnuclearumass2o13oooo1o.pdf
I’m surprised the Green lobby continues to mislead itself and others by these omissions, yet it is still clings onto the same blanket denials of the significant role that nuclear must play in rational projections. Hence my posting here to offer some counterbalances.
For example: re-newables simply scale up existing tech. And incumbent Big Fossil has a century+ of profitability record behind it. Clearly then, both have far easier access to credit c/w to new tech build nuclear. Big Fossil is also the largest re-newable investor globally. So it seems perverse to argue against nuclear on grounds it doesn’t enjoy the same credit ratings and incumbent support that re-newables does?
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-24/big-oil-is-investing-billions-to-gain-a-foothold-in-clean-energy
Clearly the energy future is a mixed one, and will include some mixture of both nuclear and re-newables. So of course non-nuclear renewables have a significant and real long term role to play, but why do its advocates serially fail to honestly amortize whole life embedded costs, including environmental impacts?
And seriously, are we going to cover an area the size of Texas with PVs, just to power say all of the US? Or shade over a good portion of the Sahara to power the EU? And where’s the energy going to come from to build install and maintain & manage workers, extra housing and 10,000’s of Km2 of infrastructure and compensate for the land taken out of use? And all the extra copper, lithium, and rare earth mines for remote turbine magnets needed c/w nuclear?
Please – anyone here (if you have the time and inclination and aren’t yet too “bored” Mike Parr) briefly, where and how has the good prof Dr. Coram’s math & physics analysis got it wrong due to ignorance of relevant facts?
(But lets not follow the entrenched sarcastic arguing style some in the anti-nuclear lobby adopt e.g. without lowering the debate with phrases such as “Thor-bores” etc. as at reneweconomy.com.au – thanks G Hewitt – I’ll respond to their factual claims if anyone’s interested in due course).
Regards,
Natasha
I heard your types of assurance when I was 13rrom my father – an electricity transmission engineer
He could never convince me that anyone remotely near nuclear power had a clue how to deal with the risks it posed to humanity
Nothing has still done so
And no maths will
Whilst Jeremy is promising all the power we might ever need and a future f9r my children
You are wasting your time with me
And anyone else with any sense
Richard
It’s the (hydrogen) economy, stupid! https://www.commonspace.scot/articles/12907/worlds-first-hydrogen-powered-ferry-be-built-scotland-eu-funding Although we’ve just bought an electric car, which we charge from our pv panels, I don’t think batteries are the future as they depend on the mining of rare minerals which leads to environmental degradation and have disposal issues.
Solar energy also includes, wave, tide, wind and maybe photosynthesis research will lead to even more efficient conversion of solar energy into fuel and perhaps there are other processes not even thought of as yet. Nor does it leave a disposal problem lasting thousands of years (or only hundreds according to Gen 4 advocates).
Critique of Gen 4 from FoE OZ: https://reneweconomy.com.au/james-hansens-generation-iv-nuclear-fallacies-and-fantasies-70309/
[…] http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2018/06/19/the-clean-energy-revolution/ […]
PV still has some tech development left in it: efficiency will move towards 30% in the next 5/6 years with thus further declines in cost/kWh. That said, the UK sits on Europe’s largest wind resource by some distance. Off-shore is estimated at around 400 – 500GW more than enough to power much of Europe’s electricity needs (with hydrogen bolted in to help do things such as primary steel production).
What is missing from the discussion is money. Central banks have a role to play & could fund large-scale RES (and small scale RES) and energy efficiency. My guesstimate is Euro1 trillion for both RES and energy efficiency in the EU. Taking a trivial example: 75% of buildings in Europe were built pre-1980 & thus are energy incontinent.
In the euro-zone the ECB could via the EIB fund the whole lot via buying bonds issued by companies involved in RES or energy efficiency. Same could happen in the UK, oh err hang-on, the UK has no substantive companies in the RES area, pity. That said, I notice that in principle the UK has already made the decision to print money to fund zero-carbon generation, in this case the new Wylva nuclear station on Anglesey. Oddly the Guardian newspaper thinks it will be taxpayers funding it – perhaps they should get out more.
Staying with nuclear: channelling Lady Gaga (Poker Face) “promises promises”. As an electrical power engineer, I’m not anti-nuclear. But I’m bored with the broken link between what the nuclear bunch promise and what they deliver & the on-going need for subsidy after nearly 70 years. I have no doubt 4th gen reactors could burn nuclear waste: but at what cost?
There is also a problem of control: energy efficiency coupled to distributed RES could on a sunny summer day result in very very low levels of demand (15GW?) for elec’ in the UK (taking one example) at a transmission level. Must-run nuclear (10GW?) will be knocking elbows with other must run stuff, with Nat Grid sitting as piggy in the middle. Yes I know elec vehicles would add to load – but their charging would be covered mostly by embedded renewables (you will have no other choice in locations such as London)..
So, on balance I side with Leggett and like him I have put all my money where my mouth is.
Hear, hear
Meanwhile, lack of government funding seem set to scupper our lead in marine energy https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jun/19/huge-mistake-britain-throwing-away-lead-in-tidal-energy-say-developers but at least they’ll build another nuclear bomb, sorry, power station in Wales, since they are not going to invest in a tidal barrage scheme.
It’s windy outside.
It’s contribution to grid load is 5.53GW (15.5%)
CCGT contributions is 15.43GW (43.2%)
Nuclear is at 7GW (19.8%)
Solar is at 3.97GW (11.1%)
The French and Netherlands Interconnectors are providing 1.6GW (5.3%)
But wind, and solar, are not dispatchable energy…and until there is high-capacity-fast-release storage attached to them, they will never be.
I would remind you that because of the unreliability of wind, we have attached and waiting, 10GW of coal generation available….and spinning.
Not mentioned is that, at times, wind is providing power, but it is not used because it is intermittent. But it is still paid for. By the consumer.
With no storage, it is unreliable and has to be used with fossil-fuel generation attached and waiting to take the load.
Which is why tides need to replace it
I’ve heard tides are fairly predictable (lol). A giant battery just waiting to be connected.
In addition to green energy production we could and should seriously rethink our building standards, need/desire to transport people and materials over long distances every day and both the need for and service life of manufactured products, tools, machinery and equipment.
Ultimately it is our general pattern of living which is driving us to the brink of civilisation collapse. A holistic approach to reducing the energy intensity of our lifestyles/work-patterns AND investing in renewable energy could resolve the threat of climate change and ecological collapse and bring many substantial quality of life improvements too.
Only reason we won’t consider such a dramatic change is it would permanently undermine the power base of established monopolists.
I agree with upgrading building standards. There’s no reason why all new houses couldn’t be built to Passivhaus standards, (orientated to take advantage of solar gain) and fitted with pv roofs – other than government obduracy. And the cost would be competitive.
But the bigger problem is the existing housing stock, which leaks heat like a sieve, burning householders’ money and contributing to global warming. The Green New Deal had this in it’s manifesto, but government wasn’t and isn’t listening.
A decade on nothing has happened
Batteries do not necessarily have to be made from exotic materials (btw one argument against – at least current – nuclear: we don`t have no uranium here so we`ll always be at the mercy of the producers; what`s the future price of uranium? and what`s the future price of wind?)
If a fraction of the cash that has been spent on nuclear research (let alone development) had gone into battery research I`m sure the picture would be quite different.
Tidal barrages are massive batteries
I think I should make the point
Sometime soon someone is going to realise this and dam The Wash – to also protect areas up to 70 miles inland from flooding
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/blog/2015/jan/12/12-dams-that-changed-the-world-hoover-sardar-sarovar-three-gorges
The environmental cost will be huge. The financial cost will be huge. The ongoing engineering cost will be huge.
I doubt it, very much
So far, no-one has explained what will happen at 6 pm on the coldest day of the year, grid demand is over 45 GW, the wind farms are running at between 9% and 16% load factor due to a large area anti-cyclone over the UK, it’s dark (there’s no solar) – 16/01/2017 it lasted from 12:15 to 20:45 and is not unusual. Until someone can come up with a viable energy storage system, we’re going to need fossil fuel thermal or nuclear to bridge the gap. Battery technology is improving, but needs to go a long way to meet the needs of grid supply. Hydrogen is a possibility but is relatively inefficient (about 35%). All our options for hydro storage or more or less use up.
I would suggest that anyone thinking wind, tide and solar can solve our energy problems should read the late Prof David Mackays book ‘Sustainable Energy – Without the Hot Air’ (it’s free as a PDF download). I think he once said ‘I’m not in favour of nuclear , bur I am in favour of arithmetic’. Making the point that nothing adds up without significant despatchable thermal power being available (ie fossil fuel or nuclear).
I really don’t think you get it
I am not saying we never need back up
But I am saying a) we might have to ration for very short periods and b) whenever we can not fry the planet we should not
I would also like to avoid frying the planet but most green energy sources are marginal at present and, unless there’s a big breakthrough in storage technology, will remain so for the foreseeable future. We definitely need wind, solar and tidal but they can only provide energy when the sun’s shining, the winds blowing ( but not too hard) or the tides flowing.
I looked at the Wash proposal and found an MSc paper on the subject. It appears the power output could be as high as 940 MW ( about 50% greater than a large thermal system genset) but its load factor is only about 37%, meaning the average power will be only 350 MW. Nice to have but not a game changer.
Nuclear can provide all the energy we need, it can ‘burn’ the high level waste at Sellafieldand reduce it to low level waste and it doesn’t fry the planet. The genie’s out of the bottle as far as high level waste is concerned, we can bury and hope it doesn’t come back and bite future generations or we can ‘burn’ it and get the benefits of the energy. The information I’ve seen suggests that the nuclear accidents so far have not been as devasting as forecast or as suggested by the ‘green’ lobby. Future nuclear plants will be much safer and will have none of the problems experienced at Fukushima or Chernobyl.
When I first took an interest in climate change and energy production (about 10 years ago) I was shocked at the magnitude of the problem. The amount of energy used by the UK and the other OECD countries is staggering add to that the BRIC economies and the problem becomes even more unimaginable. Again using one of Prof Mackay’s quotes (a paraphrase of the Tesco catchphrase) ‘Every huge helps’!
I hate to say it, but I simply do not believe this.
And if it’s so good why are such massive subsidies needed?
Richard, Robin Trow,
There’s plenty of primary research suggesting a big enough renewable grid of micro generators would be able to smooth out-put demand, so we can be reasonably well assured this particular issue isn’t contentious.
But until a big enough renewable grid of micro or any other sized generators is built the only base load back-ups available now – nuclear & fossil – will both, if we believe the anti-nuclear rhetoric, “fry the planet” and only renewables can save it!
To avoid such a “fry” is it really viable to suggest instead that UK industry must accept having to factor in unscheduled random slow downs, rationing, black outs, and remain competitive locally or globally?
Or wait for a tidal barrage to be built? Tidal as base load is superficially attractive but a) we don’t have it now, nor in the foreseeable future, and b) it has huge primary environmental & energy build / maintenance costs. For example tidal power from the Wash remains a former IT execs pipe dream: circa 1000Km2 of land and water would be required with a 100% certainty of environmental disaster in most of that area
http://www.tidalenergy.eu/wash_barrage.html
Such a scheme would only generate the same power as 1 large nuclear reactor taking up say 1km2 of land, and comes with the best safety and health record of all energy generation types put together.
http://world-nuclear.org/information-library/safety-and-security/safety-of-plants/safety-of-nuclear-power-reactors.aspx
Solar PV has nearly 5 times the death rate than nuclear !
https://www.statista.com/statistics/494425/death-rate-worldwide-by-energy-source/
What’s with the hair shirt rhetoric, pipe dreams, and blind “trust” in ‘experts’ like Leggett & Greenpeace that seems to sustain the renewable / green lobby?
Even if all the present stock of nuclear power reactors were to somehow all magically blow up together, the “planet” and human civilisation wouldn’t give a shit:
Chernobyl is a tourist attraction theme park
https://chernobylguide.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/chernobyl_tours-1.jpg
And Nagasaki ground zero is a tourist monument
http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2466/5702787901_ab45fbd69a_z.jpg
I argue such a micro or macro renewable grid won’t be built. Because it can’t be built. Because the full costs – additional energy cost for infrastructure building transport copper lithium concrete and ‘externalities’ such as environmental impacts etc.. – are far too high c/w nuclear, which is one of the most highly regulated industries of all: quite rightly, it ‘aint allowed externalities.
So its seem to me far from clear that those who reject nuclear “get it” with respect to long term energy projections and tech analysis free of emotional led irrationality (“fry the planet”) in face patent facts supporting nuclear.
For example that China has since the 1990s been developing gen4 nuclear that has already proved in tests it can put power into the grid, and looks likely to go full power, and be duplicated well before anyone get close to building a 14Km dam across the Wash…
http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/NN-First-HTR-PM-vessel-head-in-place-0401185.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTR-10
BTW Richard, I think your MMT work is 1st class, and I acknowledge you say you will stick to your views on renewables vs nuclear, so I only offer this on this Blog post of yours for others to assess.
“And if it’s so good [nuclear power] why are such massive subsidies needed?”
Because energy is a Natural Monopoly.
No, monopolies make excess profits: they do not necessarily require subsidies for 70+ years
“What is a ‘Natural Monopoly’ ?
A natural monopoly is a type of monopoly that exists due to the high fixed or start-up costs of conducting a business in a specific industry. Additionally, natural monopolies can arise in industries that require unique raw materials, technology or similar factors to operate. Since it is economically sensible to have some monopolies like these, governments allow them to exist, but provide regulation, ensuring consumers get a fair deal.”
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/n/natural_monopoly.asp
But like all monopolies they don’t need subsidy for 70 years so there is something fundamentally wrong with the economics of nuclear power
Hydrogen: https://www.nrel.gov/continuum/energy_integration/hydrogen.html
If the government invested a decent amount of money into renewables instead of subsidising fossil fuels and nuclear and worked towards reducing demand for power then we might make some progress.
Hydrogen is great for heating and probably for HGVs (battery weight andvrange may be a major issues). In fact there’s an article covering the subject in the latest IMechE magazine. For cars, the efficiency losses in extracting and compressing hydrogen would increase electricity demand significantly. Although it could use local wind power or solar.
G Hewitt, but the reverse also applies i.e. if the gov invested (like the Chines gov has) in nuclear we might make some progress (like the Chines have) ! BTW hydrogen is a battery not a primary energy source.
Belief is a funny thing, some things are believed even though there is no evidence while others are not believed despite the evidence. MMT is a case in point, the evidence is there but getting the general public to believe is an uphill struggle!
As for the subsidies, I don’t know. Is the subsidy any greater than for green energy when ROs and FITs are included?If so