On misinformation about Denmark's wind power

[kristopher]

There have been a few claims made recently that the Danish experience with wind power is evidence of severe problems with the technology.

This is a point by point rebuttal of those claims by Sigurd Lauge Pedersen who has "a M.Sc. in Physics and a Ph.D. in energy planning. He has more than 25 years of experience in the University of Copenhagen, Danish Technical University and Danish Energy Agency."

Wrong Claims About Danish Wind Power
Sigurd Lauge Pedersen

It is perfectly legitimate to hate wind power. But it is more convincing if you do your homework first. In his Financial Post Comment 8 April 2009, Michael J. Trebilcock appears to be willing to jeopardise his academic reputation by putting forward a series of wrong claims and false, suspect or irrelevant citations, mainly about wind power in Denmark.

Mr. Trebilcock claims that “Denmark …. has yet to close a single fossil-fuel plant”. There is no citation for this claim. Wise in a sense, for the claim is wrong. Denmark has closed several coal and oil fired plants in the last ten years. Mr. Trebilcock claims that wind power “… requires 50% more coal generated electricity to cover wind power’s unpredictability…”. Wrong again. One megawatt of wind power does not increase conventional power requirements – it saves 0,2-0,4 megawatts of conventional capacity. The high figure is for offshore wind power, the low figure for onshore wind power. This was shown by Diesendorf and Martin as early as 1980 (The Capacity Credit of Wind Power. 3’rd Int. Symp. on Wind Power) but is not very difficult to verify by standard probability theory. Yes, wind power is partly unpredictable. But so is a fossil or nuclear plant. True, they work most of the time. But 5-10% of the time they fail. Hence it is not unpredictability as such that distinguishes wind power from fossil or nuclear plants. It is the level of unpredictability. If Mr. Trebilcock’s argument were valid, any power system would need infinite back up: One coal fired plant can fail, hence needs a backup. This can also fail, hence needs a further backup and so on. Mr. Trebilcock’s argument rests on the unspoken assumption that electricity must be available to consumers always. It cannot be and it never will be.

Mr. Trebilcock claims that CO2 emissions went up by 36% in 2006 as a result of wind power. Again without citation. And of course this does not make sense. If a unit of wind electricity is added to any electricity system with fossil plants, production on a fossil plant will have to be reduced by one unit. The amount of hydro production will not be affected – this is determined by the amount of rainfall. Neither will nuclear production be affected – nuclear plants run full load (whenever they are available) for economic and technical reasons. Hence the claim that wind power increases CO2 is absurd. You can discuss which fossil plant that reduces it’s production, but that one does is simple physics. Mr. Trebilcock quotes “recent academic research” for a claim that wind power increases CO2 emissions. He does not specify which “recent academic research” he is referring to. Wisely in my view, since it does not make any sense at all (cf. above).

Mr. Trebilcock quotes Flemming Nissen from ELSAM power company. Not only is the quote misleading (at best). But Mr. Nissen has not been in ELSAM for years, and the company no longer exists. Mr. Trebilcock quotes Niels Gram of the Federation of Danish Industries. But it is years since he left. Mr. Trebilcock quotes Aase Madsen as Chair of Energy Policy in the Danish Parliament. A position she has not had for a long time.

Mr. Trebilcock quotes “a recent detailed analysis” that for each job created by state-funded wind power, 2.2 jobs are lost. Again, he does not specify the source. And again, I seriously disagree. The number of “wind jobs” in Denmark, around 20,000, recently passed the number of jobs in the bacon industry for which Denmark was long known (source: www.windpower.org).

Mr. Trebilcock claims that Denmark’s electricity generation costs are the highest in Europe. Again without quotation. And again wrong. The 2008 electricity price in Denmark to medium-sized industries is 7.85 eurocents/kWh, which is below the European average of 9 eurocents/kWh. Source: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu. Mr. Trebilcock may confuse electricity prices with electricity taxes. Danish taxes are high, yes, but this has nothing to do with wind power.

Denmark gets around 20% of it’s electricity from wind power. Is this a challenge? Absolutely. But it can be done. On the system operator website: http://www.energinet.dk/Integrationer/ElOest/ElsystemetLigeNu/energinet1.swf you can follow the Danish power production real-time. On the Danish Energy Agency website: www.ens.dk. you can find more information on energy policy in general and wind power in particular.


Sigurd Lauge Pedersen has a M.Sc. in Physics and a Ph.D. in energy planning. He has more than 25 years of experience in the University of Copenhagen, Danish Technical University and Danish Energy Agency.

[OKIsItJustMe]

1. See also

http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/campaigns/global-warming-and-energy/polluterwatch/koch-industries/case-study-the-danish-study

Case Study: The “Danish Study” on Wind Power and Koch Industries

Just a few months after the http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/campaigns/global-warming-and-energy/polluterwatch/koch-industries/case-study-the-spanish-study">"Spanish Study" was released, a similar play was conducted with another study linked to the Koch web. The http://www.cepos.dk/fileadmin/user_upload/Arkiv/PDF/Wind_energy_-_the_case_of_Denmark.pdf">"Danish study," prepared by Danish think-tank CEPOS, provides clean energy opponents a means of raising questions about the viability of renewable energy and a means of directly criticizing President Obama for his statement that http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-4962412-503544.html">Denmark produces almost 20% of its electricity through wind power.

However, the study contains http://www.awea.org/blog/?mode=viewid&post_id=196">factual errors, its conclusions have been http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/paltman/the_danish_study_that_blows.html">misrepresented and to boot, its findings are http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/ssuccar/the_danish_wind_experience_tru.html">not particularly relevant to the US. The study includes errors such as a miscalculation of the electricity production from wind in Denmark (they claim 5% of total production in Denmark though the real percentage is 20%). In addition, the study does not take into account the differences between the European and North American electric grids.

...

[kristopher]

2. Thank you. That is a very informative set of references. nt

[NNadir]

3. Whatever. All the hearsay reports in the world do not trump EU electricity price DATA.

The number of people who defend the "drill baby drill" energy policy and the greenwashing of it by having a tiny and ineffective wind "lipstick on a pig" program can be obviated by looking at the EU's published electricity rates: http://www.energy.eu/#domestic">European Electricty Prices

Denmark (Residential users): 26.71 Eurocents per kwh. At current exchange rates $1.33/1.00 Euro this is the equivalent of electricity rates of 35.5 US cents per kwh, about 350% of current US energy retail prices.

The number of countries in Europe that have electricity rates higher than Denmark is, um, zero.

The only country that challenges Denmark for high electricity rates is the only country that really phased out nuclear power, Italy, 25.54 eurocents per kwh.

The coal and gas plant building frauds in Germany whose paid Gazprom high level spy, Gerhard Schroeder, engineered a plan to destroy Germany's largest (still) by far source of climate change gas free energy, nuclear energy, have electricity rates of 21.25 eurocents per kwh.

Posting all the derivative bull from googling to find what one wants to hear will not trump data, and anyone confronted with data who says that hearsay trumps data is a liar.

Denmark was once the country of Neils Bohr and Aage Bohr, both Nobel Prize winners in physics. Neils Bohr was actually the only peer of Einstein in the 20th century

I guess a physics has fallen to a new low, in that increasingly silly country, given that this complete disingenuous ass, Pedersen was able to get a masters in the degree, and apparently believes that 26.71 eurocents is a competitive electricity price. This is a tragic decline.

Numbers don't lie. Mystics do.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[NNadir]

6. First show me that you can understand the difference between 26.71 eurocents/kwh in Denmark

and say, the electricity prices in France, 0.1319 cents/kwh.

Next explain to me why you think that personal information about me trumps the data that the EU posts about electricity prices, and why such a discussion would not be as stupid as any other conversation that one might have with an anti-nuke.

If you can't tell the difference between these prices, I will have reason to expect that you are having hallucinations, and are unstable and certainly not the kind of person with whom I would wish to discuss any personal issues.

Mostly I suspect all anti-nukes as having hallucinations, and am not interested in chatting with them about personal issues. I have a wife, and children, and am not fond of exposing them to the energy equivalent of tea partiers, to be perfectly honest.

Have a nice innumerate evening, lying next to the pool, contemplating the solar pool light, and smoking whatever it is you smoke, and drinking whatever it is you drink.

[Name removed]

7. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Fledermaus]

5. Wait, didn't William Shatner kill this thing when he saw it on the wing of his airplane?

[kristopher]

8. Your misinformation attempt has been competely disproved.

Here it is again just in case you didn't read it...

Wrong Claims About Danish Wind Power
Sigurd Lauge Pedersen

It is perfectly legitimate to hate wind power. But it is more convincing if you do your homework first. In his Financial Post Comment 8 April 2009, Michael J. Trebilcock appears to be willing to jeopardise his academic reputation by putting forward a series of wrong claims and false, suspect or irrelevant citations, mainly about wind power in Denmark.

Mr. Trebilcock claims that “Denmark …. has yet to close a single fossil-fuel plant”. There is no citation for this claim. Wise in a sense, for the claim is wrong. Denmark has closed several coal and oil fired plants in the last ten years. Mr. Trebilcock claims that wind power “… requires 50% more coal generated electricity to cover wind power’s unpredictability…”. Wrong again. One megawatt of wind power does not increase conventional power requirements – it saves 0,2-0,4 megawatts of conventional capacity. The high figure is for offshore wind power, the low figure for onshore wind power. This was shown by Diesendorf and Martin as early as 1980 (The Capacity Credit of Wind Power. 3’rd Int. Symp. on Wind Power) but is not very difficult to verify by standard probability theory. Yes, wind power is partly unpredictable. But so is a fossil or nuclear plant. True, they work most of the time. But 5-10% of the time they fail. Hence it is not unpredictability as such that distinguishes wind power from fossil or nuclear plants. It is the level of unpredictability. If Mr. Trebilcock’s argument were valid, any power system would need infinite back up: One coal fired plant can fail, hence needs a backup. This can also fail, hence needs a further backup and so on. Mr. Trebilcock’s argument rests on the unspoken assumption that electricity must be available to consumers always. It cannot be and it never will be.

Mr. Trebilcock claims that CO2 emissions went up by 36% in 2006 as a result of wind power. Again without citation. And of course this does not make sense. If a unit of wind electricity is added to any electricity system with fossil plants, production on a fossil plant will have to be reduced by one unit. The amount of hydro production will not be affected – this is determined by the amount of rainfall. Neither will nuclear production be affected – nuclear plants run full load (whenever they are available) for economic and technical reasons. Hence the claim that wind power increases CO2 is absurd. You can discuss which fossil plant that reduces it’s production, but that one does is simple physics. Mr. Trebilcock quotes “recent academic research” for a claim that wind power increases CO2 emissions. He does not specify which “recent academic research” he is referring to. Wisely in my view, since it does not make any sense at all (cf. above).

Mr. Trebilcock quotes Flemming Nissen from ELSAM power company. Not only is the quote misleading (at best). But Mr. Nissen has not been in ELSAM for years, and the company no longer exists. Mr. Trebilcock quotes Niels Gram of the Federation of Danish Industries. But it is years since he left. Mr. Trebilcock quotes Aase Madsen as Chair of Energy Policy in the Danish Parliament. A position she has not had for a long time.

Mr. Trebilcock quotes “a recent detailed analysis” that for each job created by state-funded wind power, 2.2 jobs are lost. Again, he does not specify the source. And again, I seriously disagree. The number of “wind jobs” in Denmark, around 20,000, recently passed the number of jobs in the bacon industry for which Denmark was long known (source: www.windpower.org).

Mr. Trebilcock claims that Denmark’s electricity generation costs are the highest in Europe. Again without quotation. And again wrong. The 2008 electricity price in Denmark to medium-sized industries is 7.85 eurocents/kWh, which is below the European average of 9 eurocents/kWh. Source: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu. Mr. Trebilcock may confuse electricity prices with electricity taxes. Danish taxes are high, yes, but this has nothing to do with wind power.

Denmark gets around 20% of it’s electricity from wind power. Is this a challenge? Absolutely. But it can be done. On the system operator website: http://www.energinet.dk/Integrationer/ElOest/ElsystemetLigeNu/energinet1.swf you can follow the Danish power production real-time. On the Danish Energy Agency website: www.ens.dk. you can find more information on energy policy in general and wind power in particular.


Sigurd Lauge Pedersen has a M.Sc. in Physics and a Ph.D. in energy planning. He has more than 25 years of experience in the University of Copenhagen, Danish Technical University and Danish Energy Agency.

Your stock in trade is spreading misinformation - one clumsy, slimy, clotted, mucus-coated, typed-out mumble after another. Whenever I read a post by you I see a picture in my mind of the stapler guy from Office Space.

Your comparison of prices between Denmark and France may or may not be accurate, but it has nothing to do with what technologies we use moving forward since there simply isn't a question that new wind is far less expensive than new nuclear. Even by the most conservative estimates favoring all assumptions to nuclear power doing all its proponents claim wind is going to be cheaper. And we BOTH know that you guys are not going to measure up to your hype; it just isn't going to happen. They are going to bust their construction schedules; they are going to get built then go bankrupt because the world just kept reaching for renewables (because they are better no matter how much or what shit you make up) all the while they were building.
Yes, PRIVATE money is going to keep flowing into REAL green technologies and that is going to keep pushing the prices down. More and more capacity is going to come on line delivering more and more of that cheaper and cheaper electricity.

So do you see how it is going to happen?

All those nuclear plants built with the expectation that they are going to be able to sell 90%+ of their annual production capacity are only going to be able to sell 55% and "Ooops, there it is" - all that taxpayer money backing those dead investments is going to bail out yet another bunch of greedy bastards.

But we will be OK. There are always parasites on any healthy organism. We really just need to bath in a refresher course of reality and that will get the slime off.

Report compiling wind integration impacts from IEA WIND Task 25
Some countries already get a substantial share of their electricity consumption from wind power: Denmark 20%, Spain and Portugal 11%, Ireland 9%, and Germany 7%. Power systems have to cope with variable electricity consumption. Variable wind power will increase variations that the power system has to manage. According to a recent IEA WIND report, wind energy is rather smoothly integrated as system operators get on-line production levels and forecasted production estimates in their control rooms.
13 November 2009 by Claudia Pring

High penetration of wind power is foreseen in many countries and regions globally. Therefore the impacts of wind power on power system reliability are widely studied. Wind integration impacts report by a research task for the Wind agreement of International Energy Agency (IEA) has been compiled from work done in Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, UK and USA. The report can be downloaded from IEA WIND Task 25 web site, find links below.

Adding large amounts of wind power requires reinforcing the existing transmission grid, including the interconnectors between countries and regions. New transmission lines may be needed where the wind resource is situated far from the existing network. Wind power will also increase the use of operational balancing power and thus increase balancing cost in the power systems.


The estimates for added balancing costs from investigated studies are increasing wind power production costs by 1–4 €/MWh. This is 10% or less of the wholesale value of the wind energy. Experience from West Denmark shows that the balancing cost from the Nordic day-ahead market has been 1.4–2.6 €/MWh for a 24% wind penetration (of gross demand). This is in the middle of theoretically estimated results.

Production from larger areas helps integration

It is easier to balance load and wind production from larger areas. This is because both wind variability and uncertainty will be reduced when geographically diverse power plants are aggregated. Additionally, larger balancing areas also can pool balancing resources. Large open electricity markets combined with intra-day and real-time trading lead to lower electricity costs. This market design also facilitates wind integration, because forecast errors of wind power production are much lower some hours ahead than day-ahead, and forecast errors also decrease when combining distributed wind power plants.

A wide, strong transmission network is a prerequisite for large electricity markets and aggregation benefits to smooth out variability. Increase in interconnection capacity between certain countries is needed in addition to national efforts, allowing stronger trading of (also) wind generated energy. Building the transmission for final amount of wind power will be more cost effective than reinforcing the grid piece by piece. Ambitious wind power targets in Ireland, Denmark, Germany, UK and US already foresee major upgrades in the transmission network. This is challenging, as building permits for new lines are difficult to obtain.

Studies show that despite its variability, wind power can contribute for a certain percentage to meeting the peak loads in a reliable way. This so called capacity value of wind power is lower than for conventional power, and will decrease as the wind penetration level increases.

New electricity storage has still low cost effectiveness for wind penetration levels of 10–20% (excluding some hydro power and pumped storage). With higher wind penetration levels the extra flexibility offered by storage will be beneficial for the power system operation. However, other forms of flexibility from generation units or flexible loads can offer cheaper solutions, if available to the power system. In any case, it is not cost effective to provide dedicated back-up for wind power in large power systems, just as it is not done for individual electricity consumption.

Further information: Hannele Holttinen, [e-mail], Operating Agent of Task 25 of IEAWIND.

But hey, thanks for playing.

[diane in sf]

9. Thank you--I always enjoy it when you inject reality into the discussion.

[kristopher]

10. My pleasure. nt

[Confusious]

24. Reality is what you misinterpret it to be I guess. Nt

[Statistical]

11. Sad thing is that despite all that Denmark still isn't meeting Kyoto treaty.

Neither is Italy & Spain.

However France & Sweden are.

Also Italy the only country to actually phase out nuclear power is phasing it back in. Make sense when you consider they currently import nuclear energy from France due to crippling energy shortages (mainly from closure of nuclear plants). All the renewables they have brought online is a tiny fraction of the nuclear power they took offline and thus emissions have increased.

[kristopher]

12. And you attribute Frances performance to nuclear power?

[Statistical]

13. 100% nuclear power? No. However producing 80% of electricity by emission free source certainly helps

If France had a more convention mix (say 20% nuclear and 50%-70% thermal power) they wouldn't be meeting their targets today nor would they have as cheap of power. The rise of EV can only help France since the emission reduction from gasoline to electric vehicles depends on the carbon intensity of electrical power.

France gets a win-win-win
Low emissions
Low cost of energy
Positive balance of trade by selling energy to neighbors

Spain placed a moratorium on new nuclear in 1983. The "wind & solar" will save us crowd cheered about how renewable energy was going to replace fossil fuels (just like you are now).



Didn't quite happen.

France on the other hand is meeting its targets AND exporting 69 TWh to rest of Europe (including Spain). At say $80 per MWh that's $5 billion annually collected from their neighbors.

Most of Europe is using nuclear power they are simply using nuclear power owned and located in France.

[kristopher]

14. It isn't a win-win: that is a typiucal half assed evaluation of facts.

1) you have absolutely no idea what power in France costs. No one does because it is a state secret.
2) France has not found a solution for nuclear waste except to send it to Russia where 95% it is just sitting there forgotten (even though they've been telling everyone that they "recycled" it). So those costs do not reflect a solution to waste and are not included in the pricing.
3) What do they do when the plants have to be replaced, do you think they will replace them with nuclear? Given price trends that is highly unlikely. As a predictor of the future pointing to France for the best course to take in the EU is like pointing to the nuclear fleet in the US. The cost of the electricity they are producing is not reflective of either the total original $$ costs to society nor of the future total $$ costs to society if we build more nuclear.

It is like pointing to a house you bought in 1975 for $25,000 (slightly below average for the time), which had gone through a bankruptcy after being built for the absurd price of $60,000 and saying that everyone should build houses in the same wasteful way now since everyone can pick them up cheap (not thinking about the bankruptcy process).

Not COUNTING the full costs does not eliminate those costs, it just produces piss poor analysis.

[Statistical]

15. "What do they do when the plants have to be replaced?"

Given France is building 2 new nuclear plants right now I think it is very likely they will replace existing plants with new nuclear plants.

However since "old" nuclear plants are good for 40-60 years and new ones are good for 60-120 years they have some time.



The advantage France has is all their plants are identical. Every plant is one of 4 designs.

900MW - 34
1350MW - 20
1450MW - 4
1600MW - 2 (under construction)

Their 56 existing plants can be replaced by about 36 new plants. By 2040 they could have a single design operating. Also as we have discussed France has a low capacity factor due to using nuclear energy in load following (rare) which is a requirement for 80% nuclear energy. If there is every any breakthrough in large scale power storage that could be used to allow fewer reactors operating at higher capacity factor to provide the same amount of power (generate and store vs load following).

[kristopher]

16. So all their plants are identical - one of 4 designs?

That's poorly worded due to trying to make a claim that is false.

Their construction went through 4 phases and each one took longer and judging by costs than can be inferred from public records each was more expensive per/kw than the previous one.

Your claims to longevity become more and more bizarre - now they are up to 120 years? They are barely getting past 40 years and that is suspect because of decreasing safety. Next thing we'll find out is that nuclear plants last forever.

In fact, there is no reputable agency making any such claim to 60 years.

Costs ... drop when assessors lengthen reactor lifetimes. Current plants were designed to last 30 years, and some licenses have been extended longer (Smith 2006). However, the global-average lifetime of the 119 already-closed reactors is 22 years (Schneider 2008). 19 US fission plants (20%) retired before 30 years, and more than $20 billion was spent on 121 plants that were later cancelled (Herbst and Hopley 2007). Thus more US reactors (140) were closed prematurely or cancelled (amid construction) than those (104) now operating.

Rather than 22 years, however, virtually all nuclear-cost studies assume longer reactor lifetimes, partly because (as noted) industry data exclude early-retirement/cancelled plants, e.g. (International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) 2007).

Some studies assume 60-year lifetimes, e.g. (Tarjanne and Luostarinen 2002); others assume 40, e.g. (World Nuclear Association (WNA) 2008; Scully Capital Services Inc. 2002; PB Power 2006; Royal Academy of Engineering 2004; University of Chicago (U Chicago) 2004; OXERA 2005; Department of Trade and Industry (UK DTI) 2006; International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) 2005).

To their credit, MIT analyses assumed 25–40 years (Ansolabehere et al. 2003; Deutsch et al. 2009), and one UK-government study assumed 15–30 years (Performance and Innovation Unit 2002).

Yet most studies assume operating-lifetimes of 40+ years. The result? The pro-nuclear MIT study calculated that increasing reactor lifetimes, from 25 to 40 years, would reduce overall nuclear-electricity costs 5% (Ansolabehere et al. 2003; Deutsch et al. 2009).

How does data-trimming affect fission-electricity prices? The preceding data show that including full-nuclear-liability-insurance expenses could alone increase atomic-energy costs 300% above most published nuclear-cost estimates — which were above $0.15/kWh in 2008, according to credit-rating firms (Finance 2008), and roughly $0.21/kWh in late 2009 (Lovins et al. 2008).

Including full, 15%, not 0, nuclear-interest charges could alone raise costs 188%.

Including 10-year, not 0, reactor-construction times could alone increase costs 150%.

Using historical-average (71%), not hypothetical (90–95%), nuclear-load factors could raise costs 19–36%.

Finally, using actual historical (22 years), not projected (40-year), nuclear-plant lifetimes could increase costs 5%.

Provided various cost-increases are independent, this means correcting 5 types of nuclear-data-trimming arguably could increase atomic-energy costs 662–679% (300 + 188 + 150 + (19 - 36) + 5)— far above all published estimates.

Yet even this figure may be too low because it excludes expenses such as full nuclear-waste storage, reactor decommissioning, and the 15% annual increase in nuclear-construction costs caused by labor/materials increases (Deutsch et al. 2009).

-Climate Change, Nuclear Economics, and Conflicts of Interest
Kristin Shrader-Frechette

[Statistical]

17. NRC has rated EPR, AP1000, and ABWR at 60+60.

60 year lifespan than refurbishing including replacement of RPV. Based on condition of plant license can be extended for 60 more years.

Most plants in US had a 30-40 year lifespan. Given that we stopped building reactors in the 1970s we should have no operating nuclear reactors right? Oh yeah they received 20 to 40 year extensions depending on design & condition. The vast majority of reactors in the US are well past their original service life. Most of the "wear and tear" on a reactor is the pressure vessel, the steam generators, and the primary cooling pumps. Plant extension is a cost effective way to safely generate another 20-40 years out of an existing plant by replacing only high use components.


Still lets assume not a single Gen III+ reactor gets an extension and they only last 60 year rated lifespan.

France current reactor fleet will reach end of life between 2020 and 2036. If they build replacement higher capacity reactors (34 x 1650MW) over that time period that is only 2 new reactor starts per year.

That means this "next generation" set of plants will reach end of life around 2085 to 2101.

Nuclear power doesn't need to last forever. The longevity of nuclear plants will push them into 22nd century. Who knows by then we may have 0.50 per watt solar at 35% efficiency.

[kristopher]

20. I have a more realistic assumption -

Lets assume that the same thing that happened before is going to happen again - the bullshit exaggerated claims of the nuclear industry are going to cost the taxpayers, ratepayers and (more importantly) the effort to eliminate carbon dearly.

Is there really a meaningful distinction any longer between the NRC and the nuclear industry?

No more than there is between the banks and its regulators.

[joshcryer]

21. What bank regulators? Or did you fail to realize that the bank problems were due to deregulation?

[FBaggins]

25. "Deregulation" can mean different things

The banks aren't short of regulation... in fact they're more heavily regulated than almost any industry shy of nuclear and airlines...

...it's just the WRONG regulations... and poorly enforced.

[kristopher]

26. Or...

Perhaps the relationship is more like the Mine Safety Commission and the Mining Industry.

Or the Food and Drug Administration with big pharma, Archer Daniels Midland and Monsanto?

Or maybe it is the Local Public Services Commission and the regional and local utilities?

WTF makes you think the NRC is so different? ESPECIALLY after we've insulated them from real public or Congressional scrutiny?


You swallow hook, line and sinker everything the industry feeds you and go into a reasonless zone of Rovian reality whenever confronted with solid, best-on-the-market academic evidence that the information from the industry not only is blatantly exaggerated, but is also easily documented as having been wildly exaggerated for 50 years. NONE of the claims of the nuclear industry have EVER been fulfilled.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x240735#240787

[FBaggins]

18. It isn't "false" - it's just poorly worded.

Though inconvenient for you... so you'll claim that he's trying to make a false claim.

The point is simple enough. They benefit from having a consistency of design. Four designs (essentially one at a given time) has significant advantages over dozens of designs.

that is suspect because of decreasing safety

That's poorly worded due to trying to make a claim that is false.

[Statistical]

19. Also starting in 2020 the number of active designs will decrease

as older plants are replaced by EPR. France & Areva have indicated that the EPR will completely replace all other forms of fission power in the country.

I think it is unlikely any plants will be retired early (simply due to sunk costs of plant already being built and paid for) so it will take about 2 decades for all the plants to be replaced.

[joshcryer]

22. I thought France was planning to move away from nuclear?

They're planning to continue doing nuclear? Got some interesting pages on this (in English)?

[Statistical]

27. France moving away from nuclear power? Which anti lied to you about that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Nuclear_Power

In 2006, the French Government asked Areva and EDF to build a next generation nuclear reactor, the EPR (European Pressurized Reactor), at the Flamanville Nuclear Power Plant.
This was followed in 2008 by a Presidential announcement of another new EPR, spurred by high oil and gas prices.

In 2005 EdF announced plans to replace the current nuclear plants with new 1650 MWe units as they reach the end of their licensed life, starting around 2020. This decisions confirms that France will continue indefinitely to use nuclear power as its primary electricity source. In order to replace the current 58 reactors, one new large unit will have to be built about every year for about 40 years.

Not only does nuclear energy supply 80% of electrical power in France it also allows France to export more electrical power (helping balance of trade) than any other country in the world.

There is only a single country that stopped using nuclear energy once they started. That country in Italy and it has been described as the "worst energy decision in the history of the country". Today Italy imports 30% of their electrical power (imagine what that must cost) from France where it is produced by nuclear energy. OF course Italy just announced a reversal of that stupid decision and has a contract with Avera (France nuclear energy corporation) to build 4 GenIII+ reactors over next decade.

[kristopher]

28. Who described it that way, John Perkins?

Or his replacement?

"Hit Men have "clients." Perkins' was a giant power company, Public Service of New Hampshire. PSNH was trying to sell New England lobstermen and potato farmers on the idea that they desperately needed a multi-billion dollar nuclear plant. The fact that this bloated atomic water kettle, called "Seabrook," would produce enough electricity for everyone in the Granite State to smelt iron didn't matter. That the beast could add a surcharge to electric bills equal to home mortgages was simply smiled over by Perkins and his team of economic con artists.

To steal millions, you need a top team of armed robbers. But to steal billions, you need PhD's with color charts and economic projections made of fairy dust and eye of newt. Perkins had it all - including a magical thing called a computer-generated spreadsheet (this was well before Excel)."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x240979

[JohnWxy]

23. recommended!