Caroline Lucas, Ed Miliband and Laura Sandys have written this in the Guardian this morning:
On Tuesday, the Institute for Public Policy Research launches its Environmental Justice Commission and we are coming together across Conservative, Labour and Green parties to serve on it. We are doing so with a very specific task in mind: to ally the issue of climate change with the economic and social transformation that we believe our country and citizens so urgently need and deserve. To act on that sense of hope.
This means committing to a transformational plan for a Green New Deal, an unprecedented mobilisation and deployment of resources to tackle the accelerating climate crisis and transform our economy and society for all.
Let's be clear: the Green Party apart this does not imply any form of endorsement for a Green New Deal from the parties these three represent.
But, as they note:
It is time for the UK to lead again and the commission will aim to help shape that leadership. And when people ask how we can bring the country together, we believe this issue has the potential to do so. For some, it will be the climate issue that motivates them, for others the economic and social justice gains that can be achieved in the war against climate change. For many it will be all of these. We owe it to our country and its future to make this happen.
Each step on the way to change is useful: I welcome this one.
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I agree with the IPPR but on reading their report they haven’t mentioned where the energy mix is going to come from.
The decommissioning costs of nuclear and sheer lack of an established process for doing it is highly problematic,
apparently we still have all our out of service, legacy, nuclear submarines parked up and waiting for a disposal strategy to be decided,
all at a lay up cost,
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-32086030
but, the real fly in the ointment is that of the other energy generating methods shown, hydro is pretty much fully exploited in the uk, though there is certain potential for micro generation,
and wind and solar are notably intermittent,
also the energy density of solar is very poor, couple that with the fact that the UK is rather northerly, even at midsummer the sun never gets higher than 62 degrees above the horizon at noon and at midwinter it only rises 15 degrees above the horizon at noon.
another prediction of climate change is an increase in low level cloud, we all know the UK is an island on the edge of the Atlantic and can be prone to thick cloud cover for days if not weeks at a time,
this just doesn’t happen if you live inland on a continental land mass like the USA, honestly, the Americans would go insane if they didn’t see the sun for 3 weeks in the winter but for a Brit it’s not an unusual phenomena,
the energy density issue of solar panels means you have to have a hell of a lot of them to get much output, that is if it’s actually daytime and if the sky is clear and if the sun is high enough to achieve much strength,
the reason coal was such a boon in the industrial era was it’s energy density, it’s stability in storage which added to the simplicity of transportation, but also it’s land usage aspect, the energy gained by mining was vast compared to the land area that was required for mining operations,
previous to coal the UK was run on wood and this required vast areas of land dedicated to forests and a very slow (in human terms) regeneration of harvested woodland.
look, the thing is that the development of human industrial civilisation and the expansion of the global human population has all along been tied to energy availability and usage, we went from wood, to coal, to oil and gas and have arrived where we are with 7.5 billion people and a very complex industrial society that is daily reliant on a constant supply of mind boggling amounts of energy.
the human race has painted itself into a corner by this paradox, our use of fossil fuels is killing the planet but keeping us alive ‘en masse’ (for the present)
stop using fossil fuels over night and the planet will start to recover but we as a currently technologically dependent species will start to die off at an alarming rate,
a sizeable chunk of the human race, if not majority, is now living in mega cities dotted over the planet, they don’t all have roofs for solar panels or a back garden vegetable patch,
we need a way of transitioning from fossil fuel dependence to a zero carbon energy future without destabilising the delicate balance that keeps society functioning and avoids chaos and anarchy,
the fact that as a species we have vacilated and pontificated since the 1970’s without really doing much just means that the transition is desperately overdue now and incredibly complex and challenging,
also fossil fuels are actually running out, we’ve used the easiest to access and the best quality stuff already, the rest is dirtier and more problematic to extract, running out of fossil fuels completely would actually save the planet but unfortunately we have enough left to kill the planet before they are exhausted.
much as I dislike nuclear it does have some redeeming qualities, it’s currently in a sufficiently developed form to be utilised commercially, it’s energy dense, it’s land usage is moderate and it’s output is constant, not intermittent,
the biggest reservation about nuclear is the potential mess of large scale cockups, the fact is that the first nuclear reactors that were built were reasonably small, in the region of 3.5MW, they were used for nuclear submarines etc. engineers could build a containment vessel for the reactor that could guarantee 100% containment in the event of a core meltdown,
unfortunately political and economic considerations pushed governments into commissioning vast 600MW plus projects, reactors of this size are beyond engineerings ability to build reliable containment vessels, it was a really dumbass move because we built loads of power stations that were all potential Chernyobl’s in the event of a cock up (cock ups are part of being human)
so yes, I am freaked out by any plans to build huge nuclear ‘vanity project’ plants because they are inherently dangerous,
but there are numerous smaller nuclear reactors currently in use worldwide reasonably safely, nuclear subs, nuclear aircraft carriers, nuclear icebreakers.
the Russians are currently building floating nuclear power stations using two of their nuclear icebreaker reactors, they supply 3.5MW per reactor, can output electricity or desalinated water,
their purpose is to replace the power stations in their northern coastal regions, their current power stations need decommissioning and building new ones is problematic because climate change is thawing the perma frost and making land based structures even more problematic to build that they have been historically.
I wonder whether, as part of a transiton strategy that minimises disruption, if the UK, being an island and surrounded by towns and cities with port facilities, we could build small nuclear power station barges using 3.5MW nuclear sub reactors that have reliable containment vessels, and use them as the primary constant energy supply hooked up to coastal towns and cities direct, we’d tow them back to say Rosyth or Devonport for service and refuelling whilst a refurbished one took up the berth at a coastal town.
I’m sure for security purposes and practicality the Royal Navy could run the whole thing, they have all the skills and experience already.
it would be a wiser expenditure of Government funds than building aircraft carriers we have no planes for, buying F-35’s from America that don’t work properly or building American designed nuclear submarines equipped with American leased nuclear missiles that can never be used as it would result in the end of life on earth!
the other plus point for floating nuclear power stations is that they are mobile, land based nuclear power stations could be inundated by rising sea levels even long after being decommissioned, the worst case scenario of decommissioning a floating power station is defuelling, encasing the reactor in concrete and scuttling it in the deep ocean, not a ‘perfect’ solution but much more practical than anything currently offered for land based nuclear power stations.
please don’t take this screed as any attempt to obstruct the transition, I’ve spent the last 10 years deeply immersed in the complexities of our current predicament desperately trying to find a realistic path through the present to a survivable future, I’m convinced it is possible but it does require us to be realistic and take a vast amount of conflicting issues and try to blend them into a broad policy.
magical thinking will not save us, reality is messy and will require some compromises,
we should accept the challenge to do these things, “not because they are easy but because they are difficult”
I think it worth reading this
https://jeremyleggett.net/2019/04/15/if-the-world-stopped-using-all-fossil-fuels-over-a-transition-period-could-we-fuel-the-energy-needs-of-the-global-economy-100-with-renewables/
I think this is worth studying too,
http://2050-calculator-tool.decc.gov.uk/#/home
Set up by
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/apr/18/sir-david-mackay-obituary
Author of
https://withouthotair.com/sewthacontents.shtml
I don’t care what motivates people, including politicians, right now. Time is running out. This move goes in the right direction, let’s all get behind it.
Wales published its Climate Emergency pathway document yesterday, it’s a framework which may need tweaking, it applies specifically to the needs of the Welsh economy and environment, but seems pretty holistic in its approach.
It could be a starting point for others.
I have looked, albeit briefly
I’d call it a start…
Martin Bottle’s comment does highlight the futility of pursuing a nuclear energy solution to reducing climate catastrophe. Clearly Hinkley Point C is an enormous white elephant that may never happen, Wyfla and other projects thankfully are abandoned for the time being. However ingenious Russian micro- nuclear generation may be we might as well use our resources for a massive energy conservation programme and investment in renewable energy generation. The fact is there is no safe method of dealing with nuclear waste that we have now, let alone any increase nuclear power. We are already lumbered with waste that remains toxic for thousands of years. Sellafield processing having been abandoned, for any further nuclear options should be abandoned and concentration made on clean safe alternatives.
Its misleading to state “The fact is there is no safe method of dealing with nuclear waste that we have now, let alone any increase nuclear power” when several experimental reactors have been built over the decades that can burn so-called “nuclear waste” i.e the spent uranium fuel produced by the existing global fleet of ageing Generation 3 reactors, such as the new Hinkley Point C reactor. The “nuclear waste” (c120 tones stockpiled in the UK) still has over 95% of the energy left in it, which generation 4 technology can ‘burn’ for energy + reduce the storage times from 300,000years to 100 or so years. Nuclear weapons can also be ‘burned’. The UK sits on enough “nuclear waste” to power the whole of the UK for 100s of years.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_IV_reactor
See also PRISM
http://www.theengineer.co.uk/energy-and-environment/in-depth/prism-project-a-proposal-for-the-uks-problem-plutonium/1016276.article
and
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/dec/05/sellafield-nuclear-energy-solution
and
http://prismsuk.blogspot.co.uk/
The Chinese and Russian & Indian governments (amongst others) are actively pursuing generation 4 tech now. Why? Because they realise that other renewables use too much LAND. (Yes nuclear is renewable since generation 4 tech is 60 times as efficient as gen 3, and the seas contain enough uranium to last for 10,000s of years and there’s four times as much mineable thorium which can replace uranium).
I am in the process of researching and writing up a fully referenced analysis of 100% renewable claims, which fail to properly and fairly account for land use – or just assume energy can be imported from poor equatorial countries – such as the “Global Energy System based on 100% Renewable Energy”.
For example “A plan to power Europe from solar power plants in Sahara desert, popularly known as Desertec, seems to have stalled… The Sahara is described as a vast empty land, sparsely populated; constituting a golden opportunity to provide Europe with electricity so it can continue its extravagant consumerist lifestyle and profligate energy consumption. This is the same language used by colonial powers to justify their civilizing mission and, as an African myself, I cannot help but be very suspicious of such megaprojects and their ‘well-intentioned’ motives that are often sugar-coating brutal exploitation and sheer robbery.”
https://www.ecomena.org/desertec/
The EU average energy demand is 125kWh/d/p. At that level the UK needs 62,000km2 of solar panels (based on Solarpark in Bavaria) i.e. 25% of the UKs 249,000km2. UK grown biofuels would need around 60,000km2 to replace fossil for transport. Onshore wind would need 155,000km2. The UK is divided between 57% farm, 35% natural, and 9% green urban & built upon. Where are we going to put the non nuclear renewable tech?
Or chase the dream of the now defunct copper wire to the Sahara desert and plunder other millions of Km2 of other peoples scrub land for biofuels?
There’s not enough land in the UK for 100% renewables, without more politically and morally unacceptable ‘western’ colonialism and “brutal exploitation and sheer robbery” : like it or not if we’re serious about tackling Big Fossil & CO2 human beings have to have nuclear power in the mix.
If you dislike nuclear, fine, but I challenge people to do their own maths and face up to what the real political, technological and economic impacts are of your plan are. Check out ‘Sustainable Energy – without the hot air’ for data and comparisons of all types of energy production.
https://withouthotair.com/c28/page_215.shtml
Plus the UK government is now actively investing in small modular nuclear reactor technology. These will be generation 4 designs. The 2015 program to “revive the UK’s nuclear expertise” especially through developing small modular reactors (SMRs) has been accompanied by expressions of interest from various quarters. The government plans a competition to identify the best value SMR design for the UK. The Nuclear Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (Nuclear AMRC) is focused on engineering capacity in the UK.
Since October 2015 NuScale, a 55% Fluor subsidiary, aims to deploy its 50 MWe SMR in the UK by the mid-2020s, and seeks partners for this in addition to Sheffield Forgemasters. In January 2016 National Nuclear Laboratory (NNL) confirmed that the NuScale reactor can run on MOX fuel, and said that a 12-module NuScale plant with full MOX cores could consume 100 tonnes of reactor-grade plutonium in about 40 years, generating 200 TWh from it. This comment addresses a UK agenda for plutonium disposal — see section below. NuScale announced in March 2016 that it would put its SMR forward as part of the UK government’s competition to identify the best value design for the UK. In September 2017, following acceptance of the company’s design certification application by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) earlier in the year, NuScale released a five-point UK SMR action plan. On release the company re-stated its hope that it will build an SMR in the UK within a decade.
Also in October 2015 Westinghouse submitted an unsolicited proposal to partner with the UK government to license and deploy its 225 MW light water reactor, an integral PWR. The Westinghouse proposal involved a “shared design and development model” under which the company would contribute its SMR conceptual design and then partner with the UK government and industry to complete, license and deploy it. This would engage UK companies in the reactor supply chain such as Sheffield Forgemasters. In April 2016 Westinghouse confirmed that the UK had the manufacturing capability to build its SMRs, and reiterated its “commitment to developing SMR technology in the UK,” but it has since put development of this reactor design on hold.
Early in 2016 Rolls-Royce said it had submitted a detailed design to the government for a 220 MWe SMR unit, an SMR of fairly conventional design. It then submitted a paper to the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, outlining its plan to develop a fleet of 7 GWe of SMRs with a new consortium. It said: “We firmly believe a UK SMR program presents a once in a lifetime opportunity for UK nuclear companies to be involved in the design, manufacture and building of next generation reactors for our needs at home and to access a huge global opportunity.” In January 2017 Rolls-Royce identified Amec Foster Wheeler, Nuvia and Arup, together with the Nuclear Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre, as partners. In July 2017 Laing O’Rourke joined the consortium.
In June 2016 GE Hitachi said it would be entering its PRISM fast reactor in the competition. See also mention of PRISM under Civil plutonium disposition below.
The Moltex stable salt reactor is another contender, the fast version of which the company plans to submit for GDA. Its fuel is plutonium-239 chloride with minor actinides and lanthanides, recovered from LWR fuel or from its ‘global workhorse reactor’. A 300 MWe demonstration plant — the SSR-W300 wasteburner — is envisaged with conventional fuel tubes running on plutonium and uranium chlorides. It will have increased relevance if the UK government decides to use fast reactors for plutonium disposition. Moltex has submitted this and another 40 MWe thermal version of its design — the ‘global workhorse’ — in the SMR competition.
Other participants in the UK’s SMR competition include EDF Energy and its Chinese partner CNNC. In 2016 CNNC subsidiary China Nuclear Engineering & Construction Corp (CNECC) submitted an expression of interest based on its ACP100+ design.
In July 2016 a UK parliamentary committee called for construction of an SMR at the brownfield Trawsfynydd site in Wales where a Magnox plant is being decommissioned.
In September 2016 the Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) released a report, Preparing for Deployment of a UK Small Modular Reactor by 2030. It examines the steps that will need to be taken by government, regulators, reactor vendors and operators in a “credible integrated schedule” to see construction of a first-of-a-kind reactor starting in 2025 with the reactor itself in operation by 2030. UK deployment of SMRs should allow for their use as combined heat and power (CHP) plants, supplying power to district heating systems.
http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/countries-t-z/united-kingdom.aspx
Who pays you to write this?
It feels like industry astroturfing
Natsha says:
“In September 2016 the Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) released a report, Preparing for Deployment of a UK Small Modular Reactor by 2030. It examines the steps that will need to be taken by government, regulators, reactor vendors and operators in a “credible integrated schedule” to see construction of a first-of-a-kind reactor starting in 2025 with the reactor itself in operation by 2030. UK deployment of SMRs should allow for their use as combined heat and power (CHP) plants, supplying power to district heating systems.
http://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/countries-t-z/united-kingdom.aspx”
I’ll take this seriously if the first plant is to be sited in Greater London.
Hi Richard,
First, thanks for publishing my comment. But why not answer the challenge – how much UK and overseas land & sea will the plan YOU support for 100% non nuclear renewable energy use? Instead you evade that hard question behind a “feeling” that suggests I’m corrupt and therefore should be ignored when you don’t know my CV or income streams?
Why not instead face up to the efforts of many, many scientist, like the author of the ‘without hot air’ book, head hunted government advisor, and polymath Sir David MacKay to shed light on the 100% renewable claims, via maths? Perhaps his most famous line is buried on page 169: “Please don’t get me wrong: I’m not trying to be pro-nuclear. I’m just pro-arithmetic.” and “The one ethical position I wish to push is “we should have a plan that adds up.” I agree.
http://www.withouthotair.com/endorsements.html
https://www.ted.com/talks/david_mackay_a_reality_check_on_renewables
After all, on the one hand we accept that scientists tell us global warming is real and caused by humans, but then on the other we reject the best solution they advocate: that nuclear energy MUST be in the mix? e.g.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/nuclear-power-is-the-greenest-option-say-top-scientists-9955997.html
Since you ask, but not wanting to fall for the ‘appeal to authority’ fallacy, FWI (not much) I am a semi retired cross curriculum (science & tech & maths & 3D design) special needs (EBD ASD) school and college teacher. Before that I had several decades of design and project management in the audio and spiral staircase design industry, written 2 patents and written and won several high profile human rights cases as a litigant in person via the former EOC. I ran a student scuba diving club for 7 years with 150 members – the biggest sports club in the university. I worked in the UKs first multi agency (9) partnership award winning Anti-Victimisation Initiative in Brighton, helping to set up and run one of the partner community of interest groups. I helped set up TT Brighton in 2007 (which failed because of local mismanagement, but more seriously it didn’t have a model of banks and money, and it rejected nuclear energy). And Occupy. And now XR.
IF the nuclear industry wanted to pay me – it doesn’t sadly – I wouldn’t be stuck behind a keyboard: I’d be out giving talks, and setting up a local voluntary sector organisation, that accepts maths and reality as a basis for urging our elected representatives to force government to invest in solutions to climate change that ADD UP. Also if I was paid by the nuclear industry to write comments on your blog, I would try to hide it better by being subtle and not directly linking to their output!
Further, the newly published ‘Global Energy System based on 100% Renewable Energy’ is embedded in old school neo-classical nonsense, for example, it argues…
“6.2.2. Phase-Out of Fossil and Nuclear Energy. New laws must reverse tax exemptions and other tax subsidies to the fossil and nuclear energy industry and other energy-intensive industry exemptions must be reversed or cancelled. This would not only save public money, but will also create a level playing field for renewable energy sources.”
If we are in a climate emergency – we are as I hope the UK parliament will vote today to declare – then why are you supporting such a neoclassical framework, via promoting Jeremy Leggett’s power point, both of which ignore land impacts and thus do not add up? I thought MMT rules applied round here!?
Regards
I will allocate not a square millimetre to nuclear
The rest follows
And those who know better than me advise it is possible
I believe them
I am not debating this
And you are flogging a dangerous dead duck
Richard,
Thanks for posting my comments and for your reply.
I understand how cognitive dissonance over this issue works: ten years ago I too held the same views you express. Maths, science and multi-faceted research (e.g. check out your firecrest critics and try to debunk them on their own grounds) exposed to me how very misguided such emotionally charged views are. In particular meeting with Tasmanian mathematical economist Alex Coram (a family friend) whilst he was writing this paper
https://alexcoram.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/mathsnuclearumass2o13oooo1o.pdf
You state that “those who know better than me advise it [i.e. 100% non-fossil and non-nuclear energy generation plan by 2050] is possible”. Perhaps I too am simply and only advised by those who know better than me?
But I am not. And neither should you abrogate your responsibilities. Both you and I have a very simple tool beyond simply taking their word for it in our own personal tool boxes: maths & logic.
For the sake of clarity, honesty, decency, the integrity of your other first class work in tax, MMT and the GND, and your own peace of mind, please use these tools, because your subject areas specialisms are just sub-sets of the global climate crisis we all face, and errors at that level will defeat all efforts in the sub-sets. And I want the GND to work, I really do.
Irrational fear based on the urging of others that nuclear tech will axiomatically “burn the whole world down” and “you are flogging a dangerous dead duck” cannot be part of a peaceful rational world view. Instead debunk your firecrest critics on their own grounds. Good practice for the coming fight to wean humanity off big fossil.
You obviously know how to use a spread sheet, and I’ve given you data sources. Spend a few hours, plug the numbers in and prove to yourself that the demands on land of a non-nuclear low carbon power generation future are politically, economically and technically feasible. That’s all I’ve done.
Then ask your friends, who know better than you, e.g. Jeremy Leggett: ‘what are the land impacts, in Km2 for each power source in the UK and elsewhere of their favourite 100% non-nuclear plan to decarbonise energy generation in the UK’?
They should be able to quickly and easily refute with numbers the claims I made in my above comments.
I look forwards to in the near future reading a blog post by you that will show me how wrong I and the majority of the scientific and academic community are about nuclear power’s role in decarbonising the world, with maths, science, logical assumptions, estimates and clear reasoning. Should be easy; a quick phone call to Jeremy; and a few hours on a spread sheet, no?
Once you’ve done this I’ll start badgering the majority of the scientific and academic community instead of you to start singing that tune instead. Deal?
Regards
Please don’t patronise me