Merged nuclear power safe?

[uruk]

The problem is that renewables are a huge waste of resources and will consume a massive amount of space.

The huge wind farms in Texas are placed with in huge tracts of farmland. Each Turbine tower only takes up several square feet of that land. Certainly it adds up when hundreds of towers are involved, but it does not significantly affect the farms production in this particular case. There are other wind farms in Texas which are placed in miles of unused hill land. Nothing there but wild brush and fences. Again the space used has no impact on any industrial, agricultural or residential areas.

And there are other form of renewable power sources like geothermal and hydroelectric. (wave and tidal power, not the dams which are devestating to local ecologies)
There is even a new system being developed to power hand held devices by extracting electricity from the ambient RF that is surrounding us 24/7.

As i have written already, just putting up windmills and solar panels is just the beginning of the problem with renewables. No "smart grid" can help you with that, despite the fantasy stories they like to tell us.

You will have to give me more information concernning this. Most individual who use solar and/or wind power at thier residences use "Net metering". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_metering. You will have to direct me to sources where Net Metering has caused problems with the national (or local) power grid.

I understand there are concerns with large scale wind and solar power sources and areas where the power grid is antiquated. I suppose they would need to be upgraded. Which would be no small feat nor would it be cheap. But the grid would benefit from the improvement in either case.

Can you show us how all that is supposed to work, how many resources and installations are needed? And please, use numbers that make sense and check them yourself before posting, and do not repeat some fantasy-land dreams about how easy it all is. Hard numbers, hard facts. So far, no one has ever been able to produce numbers that have any relation to reality. And once you are done with getting to the bottom of it, use those numbers to tell us what electricity will cost then, and also tell us who is supposed to pay for that.

No change to any system that old and huge will be cheap or easy. It would obviously had to be done in sections over time.

Besides, as I have admitted before. Solar and wind technology is not at the level at which it could replace nuclear power, nor would it ever on it's own, I suspect.

I do not like the present technological state of nuclear power because of the nature of the waste it produces. Especially in this social/political climate which is stalling the proper disposal of the radioactive waste. I am for anything that will reduce the need for the use of fossile fuels as a source for the generation of electrical power and reduce the amount of radioactive waste.

As you know, most of our electrical power is not produced by nuclear energy. If we can use such renewables as wind, solar, geothermal, hydroelectric, and RF conversion to replace fossil fuels then I am all for it. If by then we can replace nuclear fission production with something safer and as reliable, then Hallelua!!!!!

But it is going to take time and technological advancement.

I'd recommend you that you look up on the "EEG" in Germany (Erneuerbares Energien Gesetz). It is eye-opening, because it shows what massive subsidies are required and used up right now for a very marginal result. Oh, yes, i know. We can not call that "subsidies", as a european court has ruled. But the effect is exactly the same, the difference is just that instead of the government handing over that money and collecting it back through taxes, we all (the consumers) have to pay a high premium for every kWh that we use that goes goes directly into that.

Nuclear energy has also been the recipient of huge government subsidies over here. Back in 2008 every nuclear plant being built or in operation had at least $13 billion in government subsidies applied to it. Not to mention a tax break to the companies operating the power plant issued by the Energy Policy Act of 2005.

There are also hidden costs in nuclear power plants. The costs of fuel, and waste management are included in the per kWhr costs but decommissioning costs are not, which can pop up unexpectedly as price increases.

Without that no one would ever build a wind farm or put solar panels on their roofs. Because they would make no profit at all with that.

Actually, Net Metering can reduce a consumer's power costs and, in some cases (though rare) provide profit.

And water isn't "consumed" as such. Most water is needed for cooling, that's why these things are often placed close to rivers or the sea. The remainder can easily be decontaminated if needed and put back into circulation. See, pretty much as we do with the water we use to flush our toilets, etc.

There is a distinction between water withdrawn form a source and returned and water consumed by the plant. The water used to cool the reactor and run the turbines can be decontaminated and reintroduced to the environment.

Some water, particularly the water that comes into direct contact with the radioactive materials in BWR type reactors is lost due to hydrogen separation and being bound to particulates forming radioactive "sludges" in filters. Most of the "reactor" water that is recovered is usualy stored in pools to be reused. Sometimes it is reintroduced to the environment in states that allow it.
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Magazines/Bulletin/Bull314/31404683742.pdf

Greetings,

Chris

ETA: We already pumped in excess of 100 billion Euros into renewables during the past years, here in Germany, and all we get from that is a meager few percent contribution of the overall electricity demand.

 

[uruk]

Here in Germany they had an underground storage, but it "leaked". So they were searching for new places. Every time a proposal came up, it was massively protested against and in turn discarded mainly due to these protests.

So it's a bit like ping-pong nowdays. "You nuclear folks don't have a solution for safe storage, you need to do something" - "Here we have that place ..." - "No, not there, because of [whatever reason]. So, you nuclear folks don't have a solution for safe storage, you need to do something" - ...

Greetings,

Chris

Handford in Tennessee has been leaking since 1945

 

[Christian Klippel]

The huge wind farms in Texas are placed with in huge tracts of farmland. Each Turbine tower only takes up several square feet of that land. Certainly it adds up when hundreds of towers are involved, but it does not significantly affect the farms production in this particular case. There are other wind farms in Texas which are placed in miles of unused hill land. Nothing there but wild brush and fences. Again the space used has no impact on any industrial, agricultural or residential areas.

All nice and fine, but the situation in the US can't be projected onto other countries. Here in Germany (and most of Europe, for that matter) we simply do not have that space available.

And there are other form of renewable power sources like geothermal and hydroelectric. (wave and tidal power, not the dams which are devestating to local ecologies)
There is even a new system being developed to power hand held devices by extracting electricity from the ambient RF that is surrounding us 24/7.

Both of these options are available only to a very small degree over here. Hydro is pretty much at it's peak, there are no more rivers where hydroelectric plants can be build, at least not if they are to be somewhat efficient.

Geothermal has it's own set of problems and it's far from clear that it has no impact on the environment (geologically speaking).

As for harvesting RF: Well, every radio, TV, etc. does that. Not to provide power for lamps or such, of course. However, the available energy is miniscule. Such technology may be used to operate very low-power devices, but i really doubt that it can be used for large scale electricity generation.

Also, there is a reason for that "ambient RF": It's there so that you have cell-phone reception, UMTS, radio, TV, etc. That means that much of that energy is already pumped into the ambient environment somewhere else.

You will have to give me more information concernning this. Most individual who use solar and/or wind power at thier residences use "Net metering". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_metering. You will have to direct me to sources where Net Metering has caused problems with the national (or local) power grid.

Again the situation is completely different over here. We have this system:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feed-in_Tariff#Germany

What it doesn't tell you there (but would on the German WP page about the EEG) is that these tariffs are fixed for 20 years. You set up some solar panels and get the price per kWh that you can see in the table for 20 years fixed. The degression and all that is only for newly installed systems, and again, they would get the specified rates for 20 years.

What that means is that people who live in multi-home houses (the vast majority here) and/or have little money (quite a lot) effectively subsidize the small group of people who can afford their own house and who install PV systems, for example.

That simply is the wrong way to go.

I understand there are concerns with large scale wind and solar power sources and areas where the power grid is antiquated. I suppose they would need to be upgraded. Which would be no small feat nor would it be cheap. But the grid would benefit from the improvement in either case.

It's not just a problem of an antiquated grid. If the wind blows, it doesn't do so everywhere. So you have to transport it over long distances sooner or later. Idealized calculations simply do not reflect reality.

For example, we could install lots of windmills in the north, off-shore. But all that would do is to provide excess power in the north, and no power in the south. Transporting it from north to south is possible, but involves very huge losses. No amount of storage can help there either, the power has to get to the storage and taken from the storage at one point.

Again, it's not impossible, just a huge waste of resources.

No change to any system that old and huge will be cheap or easy. It would obviously had to be done in sections over time.

Besides, as I have admitted before. Solar and wind technology is not at the level at which it could replace nuclear power, nor would it ever on it's own, I suspect.

And i'm fairly sure that it never will. Overall efficiency is too lousy, compared to the resources needed. It's too unsteady, requiring lots of extra systems that add up to the resource requirements. And then there is the problem of required space. Oh, and servicing all that is no small feat either.

I do not like the present technological state of nuclear power because of the nature of the waste it produces. Especially in this social/political climate which is stalling the proper disposal of the radioactive waste. I am for anything that will reduce the need for the use of fossile fuels as a source for the generation of electrical power and reduce the amount of radioactive waste.

Question is: Should we really _dispose_ that material, which you call waste? Or wouldn't it be much better to implement technologies that make use of that material? The gain would be two-fold: For one the final amount of waste would be drastically reduced, once it has gone through new fuel cycles, and second: while doing that we produce lots and lots of energy.

Burying it somewhere doesn't really help. Stupid things like vitrification even makes it almost impossible to re-use the spent fuel in future reactors.

As you know, most of our electrical power is not produced by nuclear energy. If we can use such renewables as wind, solar, geothermal, hydroelectric, and RF conversion to replace fossil fuels then I am all for it. If by then we can replace nuclear fission production with something safer and as reliable, then Hallelua!!!!!

Yes, too bad that we do not use nuclear to satisfy most of the demand, but burn fossil fuels instead.

Sure, if we can use wind/solar/etc., all good. Where possible it should be used, no question about that. But it's not possible everywhere, and even where it is it doesn't always make sense due to the massive resources needed.

And forcing it onto the people, as is done here in Germany right now, is stupid beyond belief. The technology simply is not usable for that scale of energy production. It's not now, and never will. 100% renewable is simply a pipe dream.

But it is going to take time and technological advancement.

Nuclear energy has also been the recipient of huge government subsidies over here. Back in 2008 every nuclear plant being built or in operation had at least $13 billion in government subsidies applied to it. Not to mention a tax break to the companies operating the power plant issued by the Energy Policy Act of 2005.

There are also hidden costs in nuclear power plants. The costs of fuel, and waste management are included in the per kWhr costs but decommissioning costs are not, which can pop up unexpectedly as price increases.

Again the situation is different over here. Operators of NPP's are required to set back enough funds for decommissioning, it's regulated that way by law.

Yes, they do get subsidies, and i think that subsidizing anything that is sold is a bad idea. If it can not survive on the market on it's own, too bad. I make a few exceptions to that in areas where it makes sense. Health care, pension funds, etc.

However, the debate about subsidies in the nuclear sector is very, very unfair over here. For one, they simply add up _everything_ nuclear. Public research included. Plus, they add up _every_ penny that was ever given since day one, and then compare that to the subsidies that renewables get for a year, for example. That's just not how that can work. The only way would be to compare it on a year-by-year basis. And doing that it suddenly becomes clear that nuclear tech got much less in the recent years. _Much_ less.

Then there is the "problem" with France. If nuclear would be so dependent on subsidies, how come they can sell the electricity cheaper than we do, while having comparable rates for taxes and stuff? Something simply doesn't add up with that "nuclear works only because it's heavily subsidized" argument.

Actually, Net Metering can reduce a consumer's power costs and, in some cases (though rare) provide profit.


There is a distinction between water withdrawn form a source and returned and water consumed by the plant. The water used to cool the reactor and run the turbines can be decontaminated and reintroduced to the environment.

Some water, particularly the water that comes into direct contact with the radioactive materials in BWR type reactors is lost due to hydrogen separation and being bound to particulates forming radioactive "sludges" in filters. Most of the "reactor" water that is recovered is usualy stored in pools to be reused. Sometimes it is reintroduced to the environment in states that allow it.
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Magazines/Bulletin/Bull314/31404683742.pdf

Yes, but that amount of water isn't that much anyways, and as you yourself wrote, it usually is re-used. Every process has losses, no doubt. But the hydrogen will find some oxygen and become water again at some point. It's not as if that stuff is sent into outer space or some such.

Also, this problem can be reduced by implementing "new" reactor technologies, like MSR's, especially LFTR's.

Greetings,

Chris

 

[uruk]

Please don't try to make an argument from ignorance. We currently don't have better solar technologies and we can't make decisions based on the assumption that we one day will. We have to work with what we know.

We frequently do make decision based on assumptions. I'm sure the assumption was made that when we decided to use nuclear power that there would be an underground facility to properly dispose of the radioactive waste. Presently there isn't due to mitigating circumstances.

And even when we do "go on what we know" we assume that things "will get better" or 'improve", especially when we impliment those things and see what works and doesn't work and how to improve on those things that do work. That's how things get better. At least in theory.

Not anywhere near the amount you need for all those windmills and solar panels. And who cares about recycling ? You can't recycle it while it's being used for electricity.

So there aren't any other sources of copper and iron etc from which to recycle?

And isn't recycling spent fuel an advantage in nuclear power?

It doesn't "consume" it in the sense that the water is still there and still useable and drinkable after having been used.

Not so much the water that comes in direct contact with the fuel and is converted to hydrogen or that is bound to liquid waste and cannot be extricated. Wouldn't want to drink that.

 

[Belz...]

We frequently do make decision based on assumptions. I'm sure the assumption was made that when we decided to use nuclear power that there would be an underground facility to properly dispose of the radioactive waste.

Why ? Why are you so hung on nuclear waste ? It isn't THAT dangerous compared to other forms of waste we have. The only thing that makes it different in many people's minds (and I suspect in yours) is the word "radioactive". I'll take alpha radiation over mercury any day.

And even when we do "go on what we know" we assume that things "will get better" or 'improve", especially when we impliment those things and see what works and doesn't work and how to improve on those things that do work. That's how things get better. At least in theory.

The problem is that this assumption also works with nuclear, and all else being equal, nuclear always remains superior to the alternatives.

So there aren't any other sources of copper and iron etc from which to recycle?

You tell me.

And isn't recycling spent fuel an advantage in nuclear power?

Yeah but it's not like we need it for something else. You know, like copper and iron, which we use for pretty much everything.

Not so much the water that comes in direct contact with the fuel and is converted to hydrogen or that is bound to liquid waste and cannot be extricated. Wouldn't want to drink that.

Okay I'm going to need some numbers as to the amount of water thus converted and rendered unusable.

 

[uruk]

~snip~

As for harvesting RF: Well, every radio, TV, etc. does that. Not to provide power for lamps or such, of course. However, the available energy is miniscule. Such technology may be used to operate very low-power devices, but i really doubt that it can be used for large scale electricity generation.

Also, there is a reason for that "ambient RF": It's there so that you have cell-phone reception, UMTS, radio, TV, etc. That means that much of that energy is already pumped into the ambient environment somewhere else.

At this point RF harvesting is good for keeping batteries charged, which is the intent.
http://www.mouser.com/rf_energy_harvesting/

Recharging the batteries of portable device takes a decent portion of your kwHr usage. Just having the "wall wart" or power adapter constantly plugged into your socket when not in use uses electricy as it circulates through the primary coil. RF harvesting can take that load off the grid.

It's not just a problem of an antiquated grid. If the wind blows, it doesn't do so everywhere. So you have to transport it over long distances sooner or later. Idealized calculations simply do not reflect reality.

For example, we could install lots of windmills in the north, off-shore. But all that would do is to provide excess power in the north, and no power in the south. Transporting it from north to south is possible, but involves very huge losses. No amount of storage can help there either, the power has to get to the storage and taken from the storage at one point.

Again, it's not impossible, just a huge waste of resources.

Again, wind power alone is not the intention. Wind power is just part of a larger system to help reduce the amount of fossil fuels being used. It would be a plus if it can also help to reduce the output of radioactive waste.

Question is: Should we really _dispose_ that material, which you call waste? Or wouldn't it be much better to implement technologies that make use of that material? The gain would be two-fold: For one the final amount of waste would be drastically reduced, once it has gone through new fuel cycles, and second: while doing that we produce lots and lots of energy.

Burying it somewhere doesn't really help. Stupid things like vitrification even makes it almost impossible to re-use the spent fuel in future reactors.

Fuel recycling is problematic from a political stand point. A product of fuel recycling is purified plutonium, otherwise known as "weapons grade" plutonium. Try telling another country that you have a nuclear weapon reduction treaty with that the plutonium that your are producing is for reactor fuel recycling.

It is a political issue that has yet to be resolved. And the types of reactors that recycle the spent fuel are also a bit more expensive to build.

Also spent fuel is only a part of the total waste output. Other types of waste include contaminated tools and equipment, saftey suits, fuel casings and racks, resins, evaporator sludge, trans-uranic materials, airfilters, glass blocks and other materials used in storing, and decontaminating water, even rags and paper towels used in clean ups. Some of this type of waste is produced on a daily basis

Then here is also contaminated scrap metal and structural materials that need to be safely stored when a plant becomes decommissioned.

Some of this waste, particularly the trans-uranic material and anything contaminated by it is dangerously radioactive for a very long time.

Not all nuclear waste can be recycled.

Yes, too bad that we do not use nuclear to satisfy most of the demand, but burn fossil fuels instead.

Sure, if we can use wind/solar/etc., all good. Where possible it should be used, no question about that. But it's not possible everywhere, and even where it is it doesn't always make sense due to the massive resources needed.

I think "massive resources" may be a relative assesment. I mean, the production of automobiles must certainly use up way more resources than the production of Wind turbines.

 

[shadron]

There is a distinction between water withdrawn form a source and returned and water consumed by the plant. The water used to cool the reactor and run the turbines can be decontaminated and reintroduced to the environment.

Some water, particularly the water that comes into direct contact with the radioactive materials in BWR type reactors is lost due to hydrogen separation and being bound to particulates forming radioactive "sludges" in filters. Most of the "reactor" water that is recovered is usualy stored in pools to be reused. Sometimes it is reintroduced to the environment in states that allow it.
http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Magazines/Bulletin/Bull314/31404683742.pdf

Water is kind of a unique material with respect to nuclear use. Most materials used in reactors become activated by neutron capture; high neutron fluxes in the reactor core is, of course, what reactors are all about. An atom of aluminum-27 can capture a neutron and become Al-28, intensely radioactive with a half-life of about 300 seconds; it decays by beta into Si-28, which is stable. Hydrogen in water, after absorbing a neutron becomes deuterium, which is not radioactive, but stable. To become radioactive, a hydrogen nucleus has to capture two neutrons to become tritium. The oxygen atom in water is even harder to activate; it has to be converted from O-16 to O-19 by absorbing 3 neutrons per nucleus before it becomes radioactive. The second thing in water's favor is, unlike carbon-12 which requires 2 neutrons to activate, it is a liquid that is moved in and out of the core, so a much larger mass of it is exposed to the high neutron flux than the parts that have to just "stand there and take it". It is rare for pure water to get activated; usually it is simply contaminated, as with activated sodium from sea salt in a bomb test (that isotope caused the unexpected contamination of the Crossroads test fleet and brought the series to an abrupt end in 1946), and the contamination can be left behind through filtering and distillation. Tritium separation, used to decontaminate the minute amount of "extra-heavy water" present in stage 1 reactor water (that water that passes through the rector itself), pretty much brings water activation to a halt.

 

[Christian Klippel]

At this point RF harvesting is good for keeping batteries charged, which is the intent.
http://www.mouser.com/rf_energy_harvesting/

Recharging the batteries of portable device takes a decent portion of your kwHr usage. Just having the "wall wart" or power adapter constantly plugged into your socket when not in use uses electricy as it circulates through the primary coil. RF harvesting can take that load off the grid.

But that doesn't change the fact that this RF was produced elsewhere in the first place. And with "elsewhere" i mean sources like TV stations, cell phone towers, etc. That simply is the biggest source for that RF. It must be, otherwise things like radio and cell phones would not work: the signal to noise ratio would be so bad that no useful reception is possible.

And any energy that you take out somewhere is missing somewhere else. As long as such "RF harvester" things are rarely used it might be OK. But the more people use it, the worse the systems for which that RF was intended will work.

And really, RF is the worst method of transferring power. I would book that RF harvesting under "curiosities".

Again, wind power alone is not the intention. Wind power is just part of a larger system to help reduce the amount of fossil fuels being used. It would be a plus if it can also help to reduce the output of radioactive waste.

Yes, i know that wind power alone is not the intention. However, you can replace wind with solar or tidal or hydro or whatever, and you will still have the same basic problems when it comes to "mass usage".

Fuel recycling is problematic from a political stand point. A product of fuel recycling is purified plutonium, otherwise known as "weapons grade" plutonium. Try telling another country that you have a nuclear weapon reduction treaty with that the plutonium that your are producing is for reactor fuel recycling.

It is a political issue that has yet to be resolved. And the types of reactors that recycle the spent fuel are also a bit more expensive to build.

It's part political and part technological. Do not forget that many (most?) reactor designs in use right now had the express purpose of dual-use when they were invented. Depending on what reactor technology is used in the future, that problem may virtually be non-existent. For example, i have a hard time imagining that it would be feasible to extract plutonium from the core of a LFTR.

Also spent fuel is only a part of the total waste output. Other types of waste include contaminated tools and equipment, saftey suits, fuel casings and racks, resins, evaporator sludge, trans-uranic materials, airfilters, glass blocks and other materials used in storing, and decontaminating water, even rags and paper towels used in clean ups. Some of this type of waste is produced on a daily basis

Then here is also contaminated scrap metal and structural materials that need to be safely stored when a plant becomes decommissioned.

Well, while some of those materials may end up as waste, a lot of them can be recycled for new reactors, like all things metal, plastic and glass. Things like paper towels, well, let's burn them. That would still release magnitudes less radioactive waste into the environment than a single coal plant produces.

Some of this waste, particularly the trans-uranic material and anything contaminated by it is dangerously radioactive for a very long time.

Not all nuclear waste can be recycled.

Not all but most of it, i would think.

I think "massive resources" may be a relative assesment. I mean, the production of automobiles must certainly use up way more resources than the production of Wind turbines.

Yes, automobiles use up a lot of resources as well. That's why they recycle them too. And even more, modern cars are built especially so that most material can be easily separated for future recycling. Also, from the metal you need to build one windmill you can create parts for a lot of cars.

But cars are not the topic. The topic is safety of NPP's compared to other means of electricity generation, as well as the feasibility of renewables in comparison to nukes. And there the point still stands: It is a far more efficient use of material to build nukes than it is to build windmills/PV-systems/whatever-renewable. Simply because conventional power plants produce energy almost 24/7 except for maintenance downtimes, whereas renewables like solar and wind only work a fraction of that time. Plus the storage issues, plus the grid.

Renewables have really big problems with that, but you rarely hear about these problems. Most of the time you get shiny ad prospects with nice looking numbers. You never hear about China. You never hear about overall system efficiency. You never hear about things like scalability. All you get to see is "look, wind/sun is for free, and this shiny windmill/PV panel harvests it for you".

The more i look into them, the more i calculate the numbers, the less feasible it looks for big-scale use. Like, there is no point in building a wind farm while at the same time needing a conventional power plant in stand by just in case things go south because the wind decided to not blow for a longer period. There is no point in installing multiples of the capacity required just to handle storage systems. All that this does is a wasteful use of resources which in the end will be missed somewhere else.

Funny thing is that the proponents of such systems slowly wake up, at least over here, now that they are going to have their say. Now they talk about using less electricity. To give up a lot of things. To have the electricity producers dictate when i can use my washing machine (that is, when it just so happens that there is enough electricity available). Basically they are saying we have to go back 100 years in our style of living as society, just to make their dreams come true. Of course they pack that in different words, but the result is the same.

Sorry, not with me. I don't want a smart meter that dictates me what appliances i can use. I don't want that smart meter to spy on my energy consumption profile, because that spying bears a very real and heavy risk. I don't want to waste loads of resources just to make a few greenies happy.

Yes, nuclear is not the best solution of all times. It is not risk free. But for now it just is the best we have, and it probably will be for quite some time to come. The benefits outweigh the risks by a large margin, compared to other methods of power generation. By finally using better reactor designs, which are not made with dual-use in mind, the waste problem can be greatly reduced.

And even more, i would welcome it if instead of some big NPP's, we would switch to build many small ones. Just big enough to supply small areas with electricity and heat. That would reduce the need for massive grids. It would greatly reduce the damage that could be done if one of them goes south. If such small reactors would go south at all, since you can add better safeties. Smaller things are usually better to control than big things.

It would result in better use of the energy, since a lot of the thermal energy that is wasted in cooling right now could be used to heat homes and industrial sites. It would make overall availability of energy much more secure, since if a small unit fails it's only a very small loss that can be made up by neighboring units. If a big plant fails, you have a big "hole to fill".

Heck, i would be really happy if we could have mini/micro LFTR's, where each of them supplies only a few blocks. If such things would be available, i would put them in my basement in no time (if i had a basement, and the money).

Greetings,

Chris

 

[uruk]

Why ? Why are you so hung on nuclear waste ? It isn't THAT dangerous compared to other forms of waste we have. The only thing that makes it different in many people's minds (and I suspect in yours) is the word "radioactive". I'll take alpha radiation over mercury any day.

Any dangerous waste is bad wether it be from mining, fracking, oil drilling, fossil fuels burning, or nuclear waste.

I would prefer niether. Cancer, radiation sickness and birth defects over, neurological disease and birth defects. Hmmm is there a third option?

The problem is that this assumption also works with nuclear, and all else being equal, nuclear always remains superior to the alternatives.

So why must we have to only deal with systems that produce dangerous waste? Why can't we try to find something better? Or at least something that will help to reduce what is bad about nuclear energy.

You tell me.

old cooling and air handeling units, airconditioners, refridgerators, auto radiators, old electrical and network wiring, compressors, boilers, pluming, fixtures, roofing cladding, old cook ware, cuttlery, water heaters, old transformers, old genreators, electronics, electric motors, alternators, musical instruments, And that is just scratching the surface for copper.

Okay I'm going to need some numbers as to the amount of water thus converted and rendered unusable.

See here. but it defines "consumed" as water that is not returned to it's source. In this case it means water evaporation. http://www.nuclearenergyfortexans.org/pdfs/NEIWaterFacts.pdf
here is another, same definition:
http://www.aph.gov.au/Library/pubs/rn/2006-07/07rn12.pdf

Here is one about hydrogen that is produced in nuclear ractors. I don't quite see a rate or amount. My eyes could be bleary though:
http://www.getenergysmart.org/Files/HydrogenEducation/7HydrogenProductionNuclear.pdf

I can't seem to find any source that has a definite amount or rate at which hydrogen is produced from the water reacting with the zircalloy tubes in the core. Apprently it is enough to blow up a reactor at Fukushima, be a serious concern during the Three Mile Island incident, and the production of hydrogen is at a high enough rate for nuclear power plants to be considered as an economicaly viable method of producing pure hydrogen for industrial uses as well as fuel cell cars.

How much of this equates to water consumption does not seem to be defined at any source that have seen sofar. I guess I would need to dig deeper to give you any meaningful data to satisfy your question..

 

[uruk]

Water is kind of a unique material with respect to nuclear use. Most materials used in reactors become activated by neutron capture; high neutron fluxes in the reactor core is, of course, what reactors are all about. An atom of aluminum-27 can capture a neutron and become Al-28, intensely radioactive with a half-life of about 300 seconds; it decays by beta into Si-28, which is stable. Hydrogen in water, after absorbing a neutron becomes deuterium, which is not radioactive, but stable. To become radioactive, a hydrogen nucleus has to capture two neutrons to become tritium. The oxygen atom in water is even harder to activate; it has to be converted from O-16 to O-19 by absorbing 3 neutrons per nucleus before it becomes radioactive. The second thing in water's favor is, unlike carbon-12 which requires 2 neutrons to activate, it is a liquid that is moved in and out of the core, so a much larger mass of it is exposed to the high neutron flux than the parts that have to just "stand there and take it". It is rare for pure water to get activated; usually it is simply contaminated, as with activated sodium from sea salt in a bomb test (that isotope caused the unexpected contamination of the Crossroads test fleet and brought the series to an abrupt end in 1946), and the contamination can be left behind through filtering and distillation. Tritium separation, used to decontaminate the minute amount of "extra-heavy water" present in stage 1 reactor water (that water that passes through the rector itself), pretty much brings water activation to a halt.

Interesting. I know that water can be decontamonated of radioactive materials. the discussion with Belz was that water was being consummed by nuclear reactors and rendered "useless for human consumption". To be sure, this is a small amount in relation to other forms of water consumption. Since the definition was zeroed down abit by Belz, I restricted myself to the "rendered unusable" where as the nuclear regulatory commission defined consummed as "not returned to it's source".

The water that "rendered unusable" is the water that is not recovered from the sludge in the filtration system and the water that is converted to hydrogen and oxygen in the reactor core. The process is thermochemical in nature. The oxygen in the water is atracted to the heated zircalloy tube which contain the fuel rods. The liberated hydrogen is collected (and I assume released) as it rises to the top of the chamber. I have not yet found the rate at which this process happens (since the sources are not forth coming with anything resembling a number) which would give an indication as what rate the water was being converted to it's individual components. Since the oxygen is not reunited with the hydrogen, this water is "rendered usleless" for human consumption.

 

[uruk]

But that doesn't change the fact that this RF was produced elsewhere in the first place. And with "elsewhere" i mean sources like TV stations, cell phone towers, etc. That simply is the biggest source for that RF. It must be, otherwise things like radio and cell phones would not work: the signal to noise ratio would be so bad that no useful reception is possible.

And any energy that you take out somewhere is missing somewhere else. As long as such "RF harvester" things are rarely used it might be OK. But the more people use it, the worse the systems for which that RF was intended will work.

And really, RF is the worst method of transferring power. I would book that RF harvesting under "curiosities".

RF harvesting does not reduce or interfere with the communications systems The vast majority of the energy that is tansmitted by RF towers is wasted. The issue of RF harvesting is that early designs could only extract electricity form one frequency at a time. New developments allow RF harvesting from broad spectrums ranges. The more freqencies that you can harvest at one time the higher your electrical output.

 

[Ziggurat]

RF harvesting does not reduce or interfere with the communications systems

It certainly could, depending on where it was put up and how large the harvester was. If it's big enough, then it will indeed create an RF "shadow" behind it which will block or at least attenuate communications signals.

 

[tyr_13]

The more i look into them, the more i calculate the numbers, the less feasible it looks for big-scale use. Like, there is no point in building a wind farm while at the same time needing a conventional power plant in stand by just in case things go south because the wind decided to not blow for a longer period. There is no point in installing multiples of the capacity required just to handle storage systems. All that this does is a wasteful use of resources which in the end will be missed somewhere else.

Funny thing is that the proponents of such systems slowly wake up, at least over here, now that they are going to have their say.

That's been me these last couple of years. Now I still think renewable and smart grid technology (and most importantly, co-products) are an important segment that will grow. However, I believe that their place is only in certain places for certain applications.

The thing is, the same materials that a windmill needs, a hybrid or electric car needs. Guess which will be more beneficial in the long run?

The more I've looked into it, the more attractive nuclear has become to me. The funny part is, I started looking because some eco activists back in high school were talking about how bad nuclear power is. I believed them, and started to learn more. The more I learned, the more I realized that I'd been lied too.

 

[Christian Klippel]

That's been me these last couple of years. Now I still think renewable and smart grid technology (and most importantly, co-products) are an important segment that will grow. However, I believe that their place is only in certain places for certain applications.

The thing is, the same materials that a windmill needs, a hybrid or electric car needs. Guess which will be more beneficial in the long run?

The more I've looked into it, the more attractive nuclear has become to me. The funny part is, I started looking because some eco activists back in high school were talking about how bad nuclear power is. I believed them, and started to learn more. The more I learned, the more I realized that I'd been lied too.

Similar story for me here. Quite some years ago (> one decade) i was all about renewables and such things. I was happy whenever i heard that a new wind farm or big PV system was installed. Then i looked at the numbers, and what percentage these systems contribute to the overall electricity generation here. And what impact the production of the materials needed has on the environment. That was quite an awakening.

However, i never was a strong anti-nuke folk. Might be because i have some physicists among my close friends, and because i was always aware that high energy densities are nothing to toy around with.

It's interesting to see that the "save the planet" folks here, which got a lot of forests, land, rivers, etc. heavily protected now have absolutely no problem to "ruin" that by wanting to put loads of windmills in those spots. In some way they betrayed themselves by now.

Hybrid's (as well as "pure" e-cars) are something that concerns me, in conjunction with renewables. Here they want to switch to 100% renewables. They start to get the idea that the current demands are somewhat impossible to meet with that. But that does not stop them from wanting to go all electric for cars as well.

Now, if these renewables are already unable to satisfy current demands, how are they supposed to take up the heavy extra load that would be imposed on them by millions of electric cars?

Greetings,

Chris

 

[Belz...]

I would prefer niether. Cancer, radiation sickness and birth defects over, neurological disease and birth defects. Hmmm is there a third option?

Wow. It must be fun when answering school tests to be able to choose an option that isn't there.

No, there is no third option. You can have human activity and no waste. You can't have energy generation and no waste. You just have to pick the best way and deal with it.

So why must we have to only deal with systems that produce dangerous waste?

Because they're the only ones that do the job. But have you missed the part about solar and wind producing waste, too ? You seem to be ignoring the bits you don't like. It isn't like you, Uruk.

old cooling and air handeling units, airconditioners, refridgerators, auto radiators, old electrical and network wiring, compressors, boilers, pluming, fixtures, roofing cladding, old cook ware, cuttlery, water heaters, old transformers, old genreators, electronics, electric motors, alternators, musical instruments, And that is just scratching the surface for copper.

I repeat: those things are recycled when no longer needed. You'll need windmills for a very very very long time.

Thanks for the links.

 

[Christian Klippel]

It certainly could, depending on where it was put up and how large the harvester was. If it's big enough, then it will indeed create an RF "shadow" behind it which will block or at least attenuate communications signals.

Exactly. And it doesn't even need to be a huge harvester, enough small ones can do the same trick.

If one pumps 1 kW into an antenna, in an idealized world it would be possible to harvest 1 kW from that. In the real world it would only be a fraction of that. And that leaves little to nothing for the devices that signal was intended for.

My guess is that it would be far more beneficial (in terms of energy use, not general resource use) to abandon the big towers with their multi-kW RF power, and instead build a grid of many small low-power stations. That would probably save more energy than what could ever by harvested with the current system.

Same goes for cell phone towers. While they already use relatively low power, splitting them up into even smaller cells with less power for each antenna would have some benefits. Lower overall consumption, signal coverage where needed, avoidance of RF shadow areas, and the "cell phone radiation kills" nutters should be happy as well since the emitted energy per antenna would be rather small compared to the current system. Oh, and cell phone batteries would last longer since they would always a base station nearby.

Oh, and the typical GSM base station has 10 watts per sector and channel, about 4 channels per sector and 3 sectors per base station. Makes a whopping 120 watts in total. Not that much already. (Note: These numbers are from a quick search about the situation here in Germany). UMTS pretty much the same, albeit it could work with a little power.

Greetings,

Chris

 

[Rasmus]

Same goes for cell phone towers. While they already use relatively low power, splitting them up into even smaller cells with less power for each antenna would have some benefits.

The downsides would be considerable, though.

 

[Christian Klippel]

The downsides would be considerable, though.

Care to explain?

Yes, the management of the cells gets more complex. And more resources would be needed to build all the small base stations (that's why i explicitly talked about energy consumption).

Greetings,

Chris

 

[Aepervius]

RF harvesting does not reduce or interfere with the communications systems The vast majority of the energy that is tansmitted by RF towers is wasted. The issue of RF harvesting is that early designs could only extract electricity form one frequency at a time. New developments allow RF harvesting from broad spectrums ranges. The more freqencies that you can harvest at one time the higher your electrical output.

That is downright wrong. the energy emitted by the RF source is limited. The energy required for normal reception at a certain distance will also be set. Add your battery RF loader in high quantity enough, and there won't be enough photon/energy available anymore reducing the distance at which the source is usable , aka , lowering the reception distance or quality.

You can get away with a *few* of them, because due to the volume involved and the energy captured it does not make a difference. Make them too popular and you won#t sing the same tune.

 

[Rasmus]

Care to explain?

Yes, the management of the cells gets more complex. And more resources would be needed to build all the small base stations (that's why i explicitly talked about energy consumption).

Greetings,

Chris

Those are the points I had in mind.

I am not really an expert, but I think the management of the cells and the active devices traveling between cells would be prohibitive. Also, IIRC the only reason providers use smaller cells currently are too many devices active per cell.