my dad just put in 25k worth of solar panels. The math works, and his ROI will be seen in just 10 years. He also likes having the independence. He is also a staunch conservative.

But then again this is his choice not mandated by the govt.

(09-17-2013 10:50 AM)I45owl Wrote:  This is actually a complex issue. The best answer to waste is to use technologies that use the "waste" as fuel to avoid much of the problem.

Neither dry cask storage nor the large storage pools are inherently dangerous or risky, and Yucca Mountain is probably not the ideal solution to the storage problem, but it is certainly an adequate and safe solution.

Agreed.

I'd love to hear what ideas you have for reusing the spent fuel.

This should be a market driven issue....period. When and if solar technology becomes efficient enough to merit this...people will choose to add this to their homes. In some places this is already possible. Here in NC...not so much. There is not enough sunlight or panel efficiency yet to merit this.

(09-17-2013 12:01 PM)Fo Shizzle Wrote:  This should be a market driven issue....period. When and if solar technology becomes efficient enough to merit this...people will choose to add this to their homes. In some places this is already possible. Here in NC...not so much. There is not enough sunlight or panel efficiency yet to merit this.

Not enough sunlight or are the panels still just too expensive to justify installation?

Has a anyone anywhere ever met someone "opposed" to solar power?

Lol. I know I haven't. If it were a feasible alternative to running **** I'd be happy as can be to slap some of those silver shingles on the roof and be done with the power company, the gas station, refilling the propane tank and whatever else it would cover.

Small problem- It can't do ANY of those things. Otherwise, GREAT idea.

(09-16-2013 11:27 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 10:34 PM)mathenis89 Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 10:31 PM)ODUsmitty Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 06:43 PM)mathenis89 Wrote:  For a political party who preaches about hating being "indebted for oil in the middle east", Conservatives sure are against alternative energy.

Approval of the Keystone pipeline and opening of the shallow water oil fields off of the east coast for drilling.

Because the environment isn't important at all.

Sorry, but "oil here" rather than "oil there" isn't alternative energy.

But it is better for the environment.

Damn you are really stupid.

(09-16-2013 11:37 PM)smn1256 Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 10:34 PM)mathenis89 Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 10:31 PM)ODUsmitty Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 06:43 PM)mathenis89 Wrote:  For a political party who preaches about hating being "indebted for oil in the middle east", Conservatives sure are against alternative energy.

Approval of the Keystone pipeline and opening of the shallow water oil fields off of the east coast for drilling.

Because the environment isn't important at all.

Sorry, but "oil here" rather than "oil there" isn't alternative energy.

If its so important then why do you continue to buy oil and oil based products from countries that don't have our insane environmental laws? Polluting the environment is polluting the environment, right? So now the left seems to believe that buying oil from Mexico or Venezuela, who use whatever acquisition means available to them, is ok because they can't see the pollution or march against it. Elitist much?

Actually, using Venezuela oil is bad for the environment. Their oil is nearly as dirty as shale oil.

(09-17-2013 12:12 PM)JMUDunk Wrote:  Has a anyone anywhere ever met someone "opposed" to solar power?

Lol. I know I haven't. If it were a feasible alternative to running **** I'd be happy as can be to slap some of those silver shingles on the roof and be done with the power company, the gas station, refilling the propane tank and whatever else it would cover.

Small problem- It can't do ANY of those things. Otherwise, GREAT idea.

In principle, I'm not, but the chemicals involved in making solar panels can be pretty nasty as I understand it, just like the rare earth metals used in wind turbines and mining thereof can be toxic to the environment.

(09-17-2013 07:09 AM)I45owl Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 09:20 PM)JOwl Wrote:  No energy source is perfect; bear in mind that the America Lung Association has estimated that air pollution from power plants causes the deaths of 13,000 American _humans_ every year.

That doesn't include the 35k deaths worldwide from coal mining each year. And yet, nuclear power is the one that gets people all wobbly, responsible for slightly greater than zero deaths each year.

Tell that to the people in Japan. Btw, do you think all the radiation leaking into the Pacific as I type this is a good thing for people? People will eat radiated fish(no matter how hard they try to keep them out of the food supply). Not sure but what happens when that radiation reaches the west coast of the N. American continent?

(09-17-2013 12:21 PM)I45owl Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 12:12 PM)JMUDunk Wrote:  Has a anyone anywhere ever met someone "opposed" to solar power?

Lol. I know I haven't. If it were a feasible alternative to running **** I'd be happy as can be to slap some of those silver shingles on the roof and be done with the power company, the gas station, refilling the propane tank and whatever else it would cover.

Small problem- It can't do ANY of those things. Otherwise, GREAT idea.

In principle, I'm not, but the chemicals involved in making solar panels can be pretty nasty as I understand it, just like the rare earth metals used in wind turbines and mining thereof can be toxic to the environment.

Well, okay. But that can be said for a gazillion things. It's probably a real mess making slurpees too.

I was simply responding to those that make this claim about people being "opposed" to solar power. Or it's use. That is just a silly claim. If it were a legitimate alternative then I am quite certain it would claim a sizable market share very quickly.

Wind power on the other hand has some very serious reasons to object.

(09-17-2013 12:24 PM)RobertN Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 07:09 AM)I45owl Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 09:20 PM)JOwl Wrote:  No energy source is perfect; bear in mind that the America Lung Association has estimated that air pollution from power plants causes the deaths of 13,000 American _humans_ every year.

That doesn't include the 35k deaths worldwide from coal mining each year. And yet, nuclear power is the one that gets people all wobbly, responsible for slightly greater than zero deaths each year.

Tell that to the people in Japan. Btw, do you think all the radiation leaking into the Pacific as I type this is a good thing for people? People will eat radiated fish(no matter how hard they try to keep them out of the food supply). Not sure but what happens when that radiation reaches the west coast of the N. American continent?

Nothing?

(09-17-2013 09:52 AM)DrTorch Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 09:43 AM)Niner National Wrote:  The lifespan has never been advertised as 9 years. People with a grudge against solar like to make claims like that, but that has never been an advertised lifespan.

I hadn't heard that. In fact advertising a short life span doesn't make much sense IMO. I can't see solar haters pushing that.

What I fear is advertising too long of a lifespan (or implying one by not identifying any lifespan).

My understanding from researching solar ~10 years ago, was that 20 years was considered the avg lifespan. Not dissimilar from other solid state devices (which, despite having no moving parts, still fail).

But, even that 20 years doesn't really reflect that they aren't 20 years of full production. So, if you don't get full payback in about 10 years, then you come asymptotically close to not getting payback at all.

Quote:Solar is good for what it is intended to be: a supplemental power source.

Which serves sunny, warm areas best. Solar in Buffalo is just not a good idea.

Or Germany...

You guys are haters of anything "green". I wish you guys would just come clean and say you have a large investment in the oil business so we know where your allegiance is.

(09-17-2013 09:52 AM)Lord Stanley Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 10:34 PM)mathenis89 Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 10:31 PM)ODUsmitty Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 06:43 PM)mathenis89 Wrote:  For a political party who preaches about hating being "indebted for oil in the middle east", Conservatives sure are against alternative energy.

Approval of the Keystone pipeline and opening of the shallow water oil fields off of the east coast for drilling.

Because the environment isn't important at all.

Sorry, but "oil here" rather than "oil there" isn't alternative energy.

How do you post? Do you use a computer made out of vegetables? Is your internet connection made of smoke?

Or are you using plastics, which is petroleum based?

Typical hypocrite. Do as I say, not as I do. If you want to reply, please walk your response written in your blood (it's sustainable!) on organically grown papyrus to my mailbox.

OMG. Who said none of us use oil based items? I can't think of anyone on here that has said that. The point is to get to the time where we cut the use to as low a level as absolutely necessary.

(09-17-2013 10:30 AM)I45owl Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 09:51 AM)Niner National Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 07:09 AM)I45owl Wrote:  

(09-16-2013 09:20 PM)JOwl Wrote:  No energy source is perfect; bear in mind that the America Lung Association has estimated that air pollution from power plants causes the deaths of 13,000 American _humans_ every year.

That doesn't include the 35k deaths worldwide from coal mining each year. And yet, nuclear power is the one that gets people all wobbly, responsible for slightly greater than zero deaths each year.

Not entirely true.

Perhaps I have overstated this ... the average deaths may be on the order of ten. Factoring in the industrial deaths (I think one this year, a couple of deaths due to falling cranes and/or drowning at Fukishima) and mining deaths (which is far, far, far riskier than working in a nuclear plant). But, I'm pretty close.

(09-17-2013 09:51 AM)Niner National Wrote:  Direct deaths are probably approximately 0 each year, but there are still people around Chernobyl dying from deformities and illness caused by radiation.

False. Chernobyl is an example of about the worst possible design that you could conceivably come up with followed by poor operation of it. There were fewer than 60 deaths involved in the accident and immediate aftermath and somewhere fewer than 500 attributable to it in any fashion over the lifetime of the residents. There are still people living in the exclusion zone.

(09-17-2013 09:51 AM)Niner National Wrote:  The same will be true of Japan for decades to come.

False. The increase in cancer among those in the Fukushima area will be so small as to be impossible to measure.

(09-17-2013 09:51 AM)Niner National Wrote:  They've already had some workers die from radiation exposure.

False. I believe two workers at Fukushima were wading around in radioactive water and probably got the equivalent of a sunburn. That's probably what you were thinking of.

(09-17-2013 09:51 AM)Niner National Wrote:  The problem with nuclear is that although accidents are infrequent, when they do occur, they're huge problems.

The real problem with nuclear power is that people drastically overreact when there is a problem.

(09-17-2013 09:51 AM)Niner National Wrote:  Japan will be battling that reactor for 30-40 years before it is finally shut down. That's what they're saying right now at least.

You can say that it was foolish to build a nuclear plant where they did, but people often forget about the nuclear reactor in Virginia that was shut down for 6 months following the DC earthquake. It was only built to withstand a 6.0 and the earthquake in VA/DC was a 5.8. You never know what mother nature will throw at you.

Note that the earthquake did not damage the plant at Fukushima (although it is responsible for two deaths onsite due to a falling crane, and something over 15,000 deaths off-site, including the tsunami). Floodwater did not damage the nuclear reactor - what it did do is knock out diesel generators that are required to run the cooling systems when the reactor shuts down, and it's the lack of cooling that caused the meltdown. The site of the plant is not the real problem with this type of plant - water-cooled reactors must be located near bodies of water.

Consider, though, if you don't use water to cool the reactor but instead use molten salts, when there is some event that causes a meltdown, you won't have any of the problems running pumping units after the meltdown, you won't have the hydrogen coming off of chemical and heat reactions that then blows off the sides of the facility (the dramatic stuff in the days that followed the meltdown, and that ultimately spread small amounts of material elsewhere in the area). And, you won't have any issues with cooling equipment or cleanup or storage of water after the fact.

There are lessons to be learned from each of the incidents at Chernobyl, TMI, and Fukushima. But, the fact remains that biggest challenge in nuclear operations is accounting for the fear and political backlash caused by fear - safety issues are well thought out and managed, and nuclear power is far safer than most other sources of baseline power ... certainly orders of magnitude safer than coal.

You believe in the Easter Bunny too don't you?

(09-17-2013 11:49 AM)Jerry Falwell Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 10:50 AM)I45owl Wrote:  This is actually a complex issue. The best answer to waste is to use technologies that use the "waste" as fuel to avoid much of the problem.

Neither dry cask storage nor the large storage pools are inherently dangerous or risky, and Yucca Mountain is probably not the ideal solution to the storage problem, but it is certainly an adequate and safe solution.

Agreed.

I'd love to hear what ideas you have for reusing the spent fuel.

The Megatons to Megawatts program is controversial and may be an utter failure, but the idea is to (1) give Russia lots of money to hand over their plutonium to us, and (2) refine plutonium for use in nuclear reactors where it will eventually be rendered, well, not as plutonium any more, but generally, unsuitable for weapons usage. Whether any plant will ever use the resulting fuel is still in question. But, goal #1 is the primary motivator.

The reason there is nuclear waste is primarily because the chemicals added to the coolant water (boric acid) inside reactors degrades the cladding on the nuclear fuel, and the fuel has to be replaced after five years. At that stage, only a small percentage of the potential nuclear fuel cycle has be utilized - I think 3-5%. So, that waste is still viable fuel that can be used in the fission cycle.

Transatomic Power

http://transatomicpower.com/products.php Wrote:WAMSR can be powered by nuclear waste because it uses radically different technology from conventional plants. Instead of using solid fuel pins, we dissolve the nuclear waste into a molten salt. Suspending the fuel in a liquid allows us to keep it in the reactor longer, and therefore capture more of its energy. Conventional nuclear reactors can utilize only about 3% of the potential fission energy in a given amount of uranium before it has to be removed from the reactor. Our design captures 98% of this remaining energy.

(09-17-2013 10:50 AM)I45owl Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 09:59 AM)Jerry Falwell Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 09:51 AM)Niner National Wrote:  You can say that it was foolish to build a nuclear plant where they did, but people often forget about the nuclear reactor in Virginia that was shut down for 6 months following the DC earthquake. It was only built to withstand a 6.0 and the earthquake in VA/DC was a 5.8. You never know what mother nature will throw at you.

Here is where partial info is incredibly dangerous. They only damage done to North Anna was DRY CASK storage containers stacked next to the plant. Why were they stacked next to the plant? A: Obama & Reid shut down Yucca Mnt.

The rest of the delay was standard inspections and safety assurance required for anything out of the design. No damage was done to Anna, so your point here is void.

This is actually a complex issue. The best answer to waste is to use technologies that use the "waste" as fuel to avoid much of the problem.

Neither dry cask storage nor the large storage pools are inherently dangerous or risky, and Yucca Mountain is probably not the ideal solution to the storage problem, but it is certainly an adequate and safe solution.

We should just put it in your back yard. Given that you are in Texass, I am sure it won't be a problem to put it there given they couldn't care less about pollution in Texass.

Also,

Traveling Wave Reactor | TerraPower

http://terrapower.com/pages/traveling-wave-reactor Wrote:The TWR is a uniquely designed nuclear reactor. It is able to operate for an extended period of time, using only depleted uranium (U-238) as fuel. This material is produced during the enrichment process, when enriched uranium (U-235) separates from natural uranium. U-235 is the main fuel for today’s light water reactors, while U-238 is a by-product of the enrichment process and is currently set aside as waste.

Again, partial information is very dangerous.

1 - You get a very small amount of plutonium from an assembly... and create a mess to get it. No longer are your fuel pellets nearly contained in their rods. Not worth the hassle and risks IMO. If some of those loose pellets make it back into the reactor water (not hard), you risk destroying your fuel assemblies into a pile of rubble.

Also worth noting is the dangers involved with shipping weapons grade plutonium from Russia to the USA. And while I'm thinking about it, why wouldn't Russia use their own Plutonium?

2 - The boron clause you wrote is half right. I found new blends of fuel rod in 2006 that extended the life of the fuel rods by about 40% that AREVA now uses, so your data is out of date. Boron doesn't cause the rods to "wear out" in 5 years, but it does cause corrosion. Each fuel cycle is designed for 2 years. At the end of the 2 years, you discard 1/3 of your assemblies and shuffle the rest to the outside of the core. Your new 1/3 (about 75 fuel assemblies) fuel goes into the middle for a symmetrical distribution to keep the pressure from blowing your reactor dome off.

The radiation naturally decays in those 6 years, and reduces irradiation to the point where it is not effective enough to run the reactor... has nothing to do with the boron. What damages fuel is debris in your cooling water, as it enters as exits the reactor at a very high speed. Commercial fuel is 6% enriched, and it is only 1-2% enriched at the end of use.

So where your article says 3%, it means 50%... which is still partial to fiction.

(09-17-2013 12:03 PM)VA49er Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 12:01 PM)Fo Shizzle Wrote:  This should be a market driven issue....period. When and if solar technology becomes efficient enough to merit this...people will choose to add this to their homes. In some places this is already possible. Here in NC...not so much. There is not enough sunlight or panel efficiency yet to merit this.

Not enough sunlight or are the panels still just too expensive to justify installation?

There is plenty of sunlight in NC.

NC's power rates are fairly low though, so it does increase the ROI period. Eastern NC is a different story though. Many homes out east are serviced by municipal owned utility companies and they pay rates on par with the northeast, but anyone serviced by Duke is paying around 10 cents per kilowatt hour.

North Carolina has become one of the most popular areas for utility scale solar installations because of the amount of sunlight that we get and the low cost of land acquisition. We also have an attractive state tax credit, but as installation costs continue to decline, that is becoming less and less of a factor.

Germany has had several days now where they have had 50% of their daytime power supplied by solar energy and they get a fraction of the sun that NC does.

(09-17-2013 03:16 PM)Niner National Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 12:03 PM)VA49er Wrote:  

(09-17-2013 12:01 PM)Fo Shizzle Wrote:  This should be a market driven issue....period. When and if solar technology becomes efficient enough to merit this...people will choose to add this to their homes. In some places this is already possible. Here in NC...not so much. There is not enough sunlight or panel efficiency yet to merit this.

Not enough sunlight or are the panels still just too expensive to justify installation?

There is plenty of sunlight in NC.

NC's power rates are fairly low though, so it does increase the ROI period. Eastern NC is a different story though. Many homes out east are serviced by municipal owned utility companies and they pay rates on par with the northeast, but anyone serviced by Duke is paying around 10 cents per kilowatt hour.

North Carolina has become one of the most popular areas for utility scale solar installations because of the amount of sunlight that we get and the low cost of land acquisition. We also have an attractive state tax credit, but as installation costs continue to decline, that is becoming less and less of a factor.

Germany has had several days now where they have had 50% of their daytime power supplied by solar energy and they get a fraction of the sun that NC does.

Thanks. I was being a little sarcastic with the "sunlight" comment. I grew up in eastern NC, so I keep up with the news there. One particular eastern county has the highest electric rates in the state as a result of poor decisions made in years past.