Utility Co Nukes or Solar: Which cost less:

what if we invest one trillion dollars in solar/wind/hydro and a new grid. pay it off thru utility bills over x years. sell bonds to finance it.
jobs, clean renewable power, long term investments, it's a wi/win for the entire world!

 

A couple of articles on how wind power affects electricity prices:

The Oil Drum: Europe | The cost of wind, the price of wind, the value of wind
The Oil Drum: Europe | Wind's latest problem: it . . . makes power too cheap

The gist of it is that renewables (the article is in reference to wind, but solar is the same) offset the most expensive energy because their costs are fixed and have no fuel costs. In essence, renewables keep the expensive gas fired peaker plants from operating during peak loads.

In Europe, the addition of a lot of wind power to the grid has actually reduced electricity prices!

 

in my fathers town, they put up two mega windmills on shore that supply all the energy for town use. they wanted to put 4 more offshore to supply all the rest of the residents/business use, but it turned out there were some complicated marine laws on what types of ships could be used for installation and the cost was exhorbitant. they havn't had any luck getting around the laws.

 

Solar doesn't provide 24x7 power, neither does wind. If you want to have electricity at night and when the wind is not blowing, then you either have to have some form of storage or an alternative source of energy on standby. Therefore, I don't think its quite accurate to claim that solar doesn't have any operational costs.

 

We just did a quick trip from Baltimore back to Bellingham Wa, to ferry a vehicle, (in 3+ days) I drive the northern tier several times a year, either I 90-94 or US 2. This was the first time I had driven I 80 in several years. I was struck by the number of wind farms going and going up. Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming, Idaho and WA all have very active wind farm operations. Spend a bit of time in a truck rest area (we were ferrying a truck) talking to a couple of drivers hauling wind mill blades and bases. The load on the truck/trailer was 176' long! He was hauling from Pennsylvania to Washington State, one of a group of 9 tractors moving units across the country.

He makes a full time job out of hauling windmill blades, 12 months a year. What a great sight to see! Hundreds of them spinning away generating zero emission power!

 

Read the links I posted - they cover the intermittent nature of wind energy quite well.

 

I am skeptical. While it is true that, e.g., a coal plant does not want to see capacity sitting idle, a scenario in which this same owner could scuttle wind development requires that no one but the plant owner can build out wind. This is simply not true.

I might also point out the boom and bust years of wind development in the US, that followed the political vagaries of the federal 2 cents/kwh production tax credit. Two cents a kwh is not a whole lot, well within the range of electricity cost differences in the US. This suggests to me at least that the commercial energy sector is quite efficient in pricing, and wind has been close to competitive but not quite as cheap as coal. The recent difference is RE portfolios mandated by government -- but that is not a money argument.

 

Solar/Wind aren't a problem until we reach a high % of total power generated with them. Stabilization would be a major problem once the % gets to be high.

I think the best option is to replace all the coal plants with gen 4 nuclear, keep the gas plants for load balancing and rest from renewables.

 

ummm...hmmm... ok, so maybe wind "can" provide 23.5 hour wind? because we have areas here where the wind goes from breezy to very breezy. a wind stoppage??, i guess its possible. anything is possible.

granted, areas like this are not prevalent enough in this country to supply us what we need, but it can provide more than enough to make it a worthwhile option.

 

I think Denmark is up to or planning 50% of energy use from wind, supplemented by imported hydro from scandinavia.

 

Exactly. Nukes are needed for baseload.

Now, the problem I've with nuke industry is that they talk about Gen 4 - but when it comes to actually bidding they bid Gen 3+. India & China are going Gen4 - why can't we ?

I'll fully support nukes that
- Either reuse nuclear "waste" or use LFTR
- Replace existing coal plants

Here is a pro nuke site to get all the information.

BraveNewClimate

Unfortunately nobody is even talking about any concrete plans for LFTR ...

 

How about, instead of nukes (bad idea for a whole lot of ideas I have spewed forth on many occasions!) we get serious about using 30-50% less electricity? It is an very easy goal to achieve if we are serious about solving the issues facing us!

Lighting, water heating, air conditioning, space heat etc are all ripe for great conservation (in residential applications) with minimal capital investment. Commercial (non industrial) is also ripe for fairly easy conservation. I cannot speak with any certainty about industrial applications.

Reduce consumption 30%, load shift, time of day, build lots of wind in areas where wind is both viable and reasonably predictably, and add Pv solar everywhere, especially in the SW. Use Evs, plug in hybrids to add to the storage capacity of the grid. (remember, car batteries can both buy from the grid, as well as sell to the grid, depending on when the load/demand equation is favourable.

Icarus

 

Your point is valid, but probably not as much as you might think.

Think of it this way: If you were charged 10 cents/kWh during the day and 20 cents/kWh at night, how much could you shift your electric loads to occur during the day. Without much trouble, technology would become available that would run hot water systems, air conditioners, refrigerators, car chargers, etc. in excess during solar hours to make up for the less availability at night.. A 90% day/ 10% night loading could easily be the norm.. Done nationwide, both day & night power might be doable just on sustainable sources.

 

So far, because US demand is being met by new wind farms.

 

Again, read the links I posted earlier. In the real world, there are multiple owners of power plants, as utilities aim to buy the least expensive electricity so they can make the most profit.

In terms of fuel costs, the pecking order goes something like this:

renewables < nuclear < coal < gas

Power plants have their costs in these categories:

Construction / Maintenance / Fuel

Once a plant is built - the primary determination as to what plant to run (if you are looking to make the most profit) is to run the plants with the lowest fueling costs as they at any time can offer a lower price than someone who must spend a higher amount on fuel.

Gas plants which have the highest costs are the first to shut down - so adding renewables to the grid reduces the cost of electricity any time that gas plants are running.