Hydrogen from Nuclear Fission Economy

tahanson43206 · 2021-03-07 18:39:32

For SpaceNut ... we had no topics that combined these two terms ...

This update is significant (in my estimation) .... I've been hoping to see developments along these lines, and am glad to see I was not alone ...

Significant work has already been done at several sites...

https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/why- … 00655.html

Editor OilPrice.com
Sun, March 7, 2021, 5:00 PM EST
For carbon-free hydrogen to play a significant role in decarbonization, it will need to be produced in large quantities at low cost to compete with hydrocarbons. In a future power system heavily dependent on intermittent renewables, hydrogen will likely find economical use in power storage for grid balancing.
However, for an actual ‘hydrogen economy’ to arise, hydrogen will have to expand into the so-called ‘hard to abate’ sectors where a large portion of carbon emissions occur. Hydrogen for direct heat in industry, and hydrogen-derived fuels (synthetic fuels such as ammonia and synthetic hydrocarbon fuels produced from hydrogen and CO2), would displace the liquid hydrocarbons now used in heavy industry (cement, chemicals, steel), heavy shipping, and aviation.
<snip>
Going nuclear
A nuclear plant’s electricity and heat can power electrolysis for carbon-free hydrogen production. The concept is just beginning to be demonstrated at existing light water reactors in the US.
Researchers are also looking at utilizing light water reactors for high-temperature steam electrolysis, which offers efficiency advantages over lower temperature water electrolysis. This will require augmenting the heat produced by the plant to reach the temperatures required for more efficient steam electrolysis.
<snip>
This approach may prove viable while development continues on advanced high-temperature reactors. Meanwhile, the development of small modular reactors to potentially produce electricity for low-temperature electrolysis is also occurring.
Much of the research in the US is occurring through programs at Idaho National Laboratory (INL), which is the lead national laboratory for nuclear energy research, development, and demonstration. INL is working with corporate partners on numerous projects, including the demonstration of electrolysis technology currently operating light-water nuclear plants.
Important support for INL’s ongoing work with commercial partners comes from the U.S. Department of Energy's H2atScale initiative. As part of this the country’s largest nuclear plant operator, Exelon Corporation, has agreed to host a 1-MW electrolyzer at one of its plants, which could be operating by 2023 producing hydrogen for use on-site or for sale. The demonstration will allow simulation of scale-up to a larger hydrogen production unit.
Another commercial partner is Energy Harbor Corp., which emerged from bankruptcy last year and continues to operate several nuclear plants. The company is planning a demonstration of commercial electrolysis at its Davis-Besse nuclear plant, a single-unit plant located on the Lake Erie shore near Toledo, Ohio. The two-year project will seek to deploy a 1- to 3-MW low-temperature electrolysis unit to produce commercial quantities of hydrogen.
A demonstration of high-temperature steam electrolysis is also being planned at a currently operating light-water plant. The process requires heat augmentation to power electrolysis for hydrogen production at high temperatures (approx. 1000 degrees C). Minneapolis-based Xcel Energy was recently selected for the demonstration with $11 million in federal funding.
“The project is the first of its kind in pairing a commercial electricity generator with high-temperature steam electrolysis technology,” says Richard Boardman at INL. He is the national technical lead for the DOE Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program’s Flexible Plant Operations and Generation Pathway.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2021-03-07 20:36:58

There is also a safety need as well in the container and dispensing equipment that matches how you will make use of the fuel.
Of course couple it with fuel cells and its also a pollutant free means to power just about everything.

louis · 2021-03-07 20:37:13

As far as I know nuclear electricity is around the 8-10 cents mark. The cheapest solar energy is under 2 cents and of course excess solar or wind energy is effectively close to 0 cents at marginal cost. Even if they can utilise steam directly I doubt it will change the economics that much.

It's obvious to all but the most dedicated nukie that if you want to produce hydrogen via electrolysis you will do it with green surplus energy.

tahanson43206 wrote:

For SpaceNut ... we had no topics that combined these two terms ...
This update is significant (in my estimation) .... I've been hoping to see developments along these lines, and am glad to see I was not alone ...
Significant work has already been done at several sites...
https://www.yahoo.com/finance/news/why- … 00655.html
Editor OilPrice.com
Sun, March 7, 2021, 5:00 PM EST
For carbon-free hydrogen to play a significant role in decarbonization, it will need to be produced in large quantities at low cost to compete with hydrocarbons. In a future power system heavily dependent on intermittent renewables, hydrogen will likely find economical use in power storage for grid balancing.
However, for an actual ‘hydrogen economy’ to arise, hydrogen will have to expand into the so-called ‘hard to abate’ sectors where a large portion of carbon emissions occur. Hydrogen for direct heat in industry, and hydrogen-derived fuels (synthetic fuels such as ammonia and synthetic hydrocarbon fuels produced from hydrogen and CO2), would displace the liquid hydrocarbons now used in heavy industry (cement, chemicals, steel), heavy shipping, and aviation.
<snip>
Going nuclear
A nuclear plant’s electricity and heat can power electrolysis for carbon-free hydrogen production. The concept is just beginning to be demonstrated at existing light water reactors in the US.
Researchers are also looking at utilizing light water reactors for high-temperature steam electrolysis, which offers efficiency advantages over lower temperature water electrolysis. This will require augmenting the heat produced by the plant to reach the temperatures required for more efficient steam electrolysis.
<snip>
This approach may prove viable while development continues on advanced high-temperature reactors. Meanwhile, the development of small modular reactors to potentially produce electricity for low-temperature electrolysis is also occurring.
Much of the research in the US is occurring through programs at Idaho National Laboratory (INL), which is the lead national laboratory for nuclear energy research, development, and demonstration. INL is working with corporate partners on numerous projects, including the demonstration of electrolysis technology currently operating light-water nuclear plants.
Important support for INL’s ongoing work with commercial partners comes from the U.S. Department of Energy's H2atScale initiative. As part of this the country’s largest nuclear plant operator, Exelon Corporation, has agreed to host a 1-MW electrolyzer at one of its plants, which could be operating by 2023 producing hydrogen for use on-site or for sale. The demonstration will allow simulation of scale-up to a larger hydrogen production unit.
Another commercial partner is Energy Harbor Corp., which emerged from bankruptcy last year and continues to operate several nuclear plants. The company is planning a demonstration of commercial electrolysis at its Davis-Besse nuclear plant, a single-unit plant located on the Lake Erie shore near Toledo, Ohio. The two-year project will seek to deploy a 1- to 3-MW low-temperature electrolysis unit to produce commercial quantities of hydrogen.
A demonstration of high-temperature steam electrolysis is also being planned at a currently operating light-water plant. The process requires heat augmentation to power electrolysis for hydrogen production at high temperatures (approx. 1000 degrees C). Minneapolis-based Xcel Energy was recently selected for the demonstration with $11 million in federal funding.
“The project is the first of its kind in pairing a commercial electricity generator with high-temperature steam electrolysis technology,” says Richard Boardman at INL. He is the national technical lead for the DOE Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program’s Flexible Plant Operations and Generation Pathway.
(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-03-08 09:50:47

For Louis and SpaceNut ... thank you both for giving this new topic a boost!

SpaceNut. ..As I interpret your comments, you seem to have a better understanding of the prospects for success of this new direction for nuclear fission. The marketplace for raw electricity is not the best target for managers of nuclear power plants. A far better use of nuclear power is to make products of greater intrinsic value that are NOT easily made by other carbon free means.

For Louis ... If you are interested in the economics of competition between green suppliers, I hope you will contribute actual data to this new topic, from time to time. I expect to see that the advantages of nuclear power will prove superior to all other competitors over the long term.

In any case, this is NOT a theoretical exercise! The managers (and stockholders) of nuclear facilities are looking for ways to earn the best possible return for their investment over the LONG term, so I expect to see continued movement away from supply of raw energy and on to value added products that can be stored until the price is highest.

Thanks again for giving the topic a helpful push as it sets out on what I hope will be a fruitful and rewarding voyage.

(th)

louis · 2021-03-08 13:48:25

Here's some data:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_e … IA-AEO.png

In the SW USA, eg Arizona, solar is even more cost effective, coming in near or below $20 per MWh.

Why do you need to store nuclear power as hydrogen? Nuclear power pumps out electricity steadily over 24 hours. Maybe they are thinking of using night time electricity, not much in demand to make the hydrogen.

But I don't find the hydrogen economy credible. It's too difficult and costly to store and too dangerous for a lot of uses. Most Western countries already have a methane infrastructure in place. That is the obvious way to go - use green energy (especially wind) when it is producing a surplus to produce methane from water and air. Then use methane to store energy and/or heat homes.

tahanson43206 wrote:

For Louis and SpaceNut ... thank you both for giving this new topic a boost!
SpaceNut. ..As I interpret your comments, you seem to have a better understanding of the prospects for success of this new direction for nuclear fission. The marketplace for raw electricity is not the best target for managers of nuclear power plants. A far better use of nuclear power is to make products of greater intrinsic value that are NOT easily made by other carbon free means.
For Louis ... If you are interested in the economics of competition between green suppliers, I hope you will contribute actual data to this new topic, from time to time. I expect to see that the advantages of nuclear power will prove superior to all other competitors over the long term.
In any case, this is NOT a theoretical exercise! The managers (and stockholders) of nuclear facilities are looking for ways to earn the best possible return for their investment over the LONG term, so I expect to see continued movement away from supply of raw energy and on to value added products that can be stored until the price is highest.
Thanks again for giving the topic a helpful push as it sets out on what I hope will be a fruitful and rewarding voyage.
(th)

tahanson43206 · 2021-03-08 14:45:20

For Louis re #5

Thank you for keeping this topic moving!

Your points about solar and wind are certainly good ones, and there are investors around the planet who are either developing or are thinking about developing them. However, that is ** new ** money going into the risk pool.

It is not at all clear that any of those investments will succeed.

What is clear is that the nuclear fission investments have been made!

The situation is that trying to compete in the raw electric market is leading to ruin.

The alternative that appears to be gathering momentum is to allocate those investments to hydrogen, which is capable of holding energy for months if necessary, so that the investors can wait for the optimum market conditions to move their product.

Any solution that involves the use of Carbon is going to be suspect as we go forward.

However, if anyone has an interest in economics or finances, and would be willing to contribute actual data to this topic, it would be welcome.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2021-03-08 17:51:42

The issue for power stability (power systems failed due to cold and snow) and cost for the consumer is the issue for the solar and wind reserves that people would make use of to make there own hydrogen supply but then again so will the same features be required for supply and safety of the commodity being made....

louis · 2021-03-08 18:18:33

I understand the points you are making, it's just I am not convinced by them.

Nuclear power is great at providing baseload. But it does so expensively.

Where is the evidence that hydrogen is going to be the go-to energy storage solution? I don't see it. If it was an economic proposition it would already be winning out because as you pointed out electrolysis is a pretty simply process. But we see no real signs of the hydrogen economy taking off - due to the cost and difficulty of storing hydrogen and the fact it is not the safest form of storage around. There might come a point where it has some role to play but I don't really see it happening.

I think it's much more likely that the cost of solar and wind will continue to fall until they are so cheap (especially solar which will see still many more cost-reducing technological innovations) that artificial methane manufacture is economical within the overall cost package. Methane can easily store power enough for a nation to see itself through a really bad period of say 10 days of low green energy output.

tahanson43206 wrote:

For Louis re #5
Thank you for keeping this topic moving!
Your points about solar and wind are certainly good ones, and there are investors around the planet who are either developing or are thinking about developing them. However, that is ** new ** money going into the risk pool.
It is not at all clear that any of those investments will succeed.
What is clear is that the nuclear fission investments have been made!
The situation is that trying to compete in the raw electric market is leading to ruin.
The alternative that appears to be gathering momentum is to allocate those investments to hydrogen, which is capable of holding energy for months if necessary, so that the investors can wait for the optimum market conditions to move their product.
Any solution that involves the use of Carbon is going to be suspect as we go forward.
However, if anyone has an interest in economics or finances, and would be willing to contribute actual data to this topic, it would be welcome.
(th)

louis · 2021-03-08 19:21:28

More info on how green energy costs are going to see continuing huge falls up to 2030. I don't think nuclear can match this.

https://energypost.eu/analysis-shows-wi … the-2020s/

And the lower the cost goes, the more providers can invest in storage.

A reminder of how costs have been falling:

https://ourworldindata.org/cheap-renewables-growth

Last edited by louis (2021-03-08 19:25:17)

kbd512 · 2021-03-09 09:21:56

Louis,

It doesn't matter if "green energy", whatever that is, is free, when output drops to less than 3% of what it was before a little winter weather.

We certainly do spend a lot of "green" without getting much energy though.

tahanson43206 · 2021-03-09 10:40:44

For kbd512 re #10

Thanks for adding to the development of this topic.

The skepticism of Louis is helpful, in that it may (hopefully will) inspire other forum members to provide support for the investors and managers who are moving traditional business models from delivery of raw energy to delivery of value added products, such as Hydrogen promises to be. Another value added application is manufacture of Aluminum, which is energy intensive and has (in the past) consumed vast amounts of carbon based fuel.

Since the investment in nuclear fission systems is already massive, and since there is a strong incentive for everyone involved to find economically advantageous applications of the energy generated, I expect we'll see reports of continued movement AWAY from the spot market that Louis seems to prefer, TO product categories that are suitable for storage until market conditions are favorable.

(th)

kbd512 · 2021-03-09 13:27:19

tahanson43206,

I do want something fundamentally better than what we're doing now to come along. Thus far, science can't seem to deliver the goods, which is another way of saying we lack the technology to do what our "green this / that / the other" people want to do. They can't seem to see that from an outside perspective, it's looking a lot more like religion than a practical solution for supplying human civilization level energy requirements. If someone hands me solar panels that work in the dark or batteries that can power an airplane, I'm never going to turn my nose up at something fundamentally better, but nothing of the sort has materialized after multiple decades of intense research efforts around the world. Until then, humanity shouldn't "bet the farm", so to speak, on something that's still not ready for prime time, many decades after the new technology was created.

It's taken us more than a century to get a comparatively simple mechanical device like a combustion engine to the point where it is today. There's no telling how long it'll ultimately take for photovoltaics / wind turbines / batteries to truly replace them by providing like-kind functionality, but nobody who's alive today may still be here by the time that happens.

People may dislike the downsides of nuclear technology, and it's inherently dangerous, but it's also presently the most powerful energy source that humanity has. We should be using it to provide the master resource to get to that "better tomorrow" of sunshine and rainbows everywhere that "green energy" is supposed to deliver, but still hasn't, because the technology remains too immature and expensive. My father was a child when the first solar panels were used to power a spacecraft. He still can't afford to put any on his house. We can and have done so, but only because we make a lot of money, relative to what they ever did at our ages, and we're willing to invest. That said, we should have nuclear reactors providing most of the electricity for a society as energy-intensive as America is, because those things will still be there long after the photovoltaics / wind turbines / batteries have to be replaced a couple of times. That's long term versus very short term "feel good" thinking.

In the end, I'm a practical person. If solar and wind can truly supply 100% of the demand, then it's time that someone, somewhere, demonstrated that at significant scale, or stop with the incessant televangelism advocating for something that simply doesn't work well enough to do what they want it to do.

louis · 2021-03-09 14:55:15

Of course it doesn't but the energy storage issue will be overcome.

15 years ago the complaint against green energy was that it was "too damn expensive"...now, thanks largely to technological developments and manufacturing efficiencies, green energy is amongst the lowest cost profiles.

In another 15 years, I think we'll find the energy storage has been resolved. It already is being resolved over the 24 hour day-night cycle.

With further dramatic cost falls we will see green energy used to create its own energy storage (most likely as artificial methane) to combine with chemical battery storage. That is the simplest solution. Eventually we will be able to cover any reasonable low output event. In the UK that rarely extends beyond 3 days for both wind and solar. Once automobiles are all EVs you can also draw on the energy from their batteries offering people financial incentives to do engage in "reverse charging". Once you have sufficient green energy production, you can also turn all your hydro facilities into, effectively, energy storage.

It should be remembered that nuclear power in the past certainly has been vulnerable to very hot weather events - when reactors had to be closed down because cooling systems weren't working properly.

kbd512 wrote:

Louis,
It doesn't matter if "green energy", whatever that is, is free, when output drops to less than 3% of what it was before a little winter weather.
We certainly do spend a lot of "green" without getting much energy though.

kbd512 · 2021-03-09 18:34:09

louis wrote:

Of course it doesn't but the energy storage issue will be overcome.

Within our lifetimes? There's no evidence of that, whatsoever.

louis wrote:

15 years ago the complaint against green energy was that it was "too damn expensive"...now, thanks largely to technological developments and manufacturing efficiencies, green energy is amongst the lowest cost profiles.

It's still too expensive. Our rooftop photovoltaics and two Tesla PowerWalls, which can't even run one of our three AC units, at all or ever, cost around $60K.

louis wrote:

In another 15 years, I think we'll find the energy storage has been resolved. It already is being resolved over the 24 hour day-night cycle.

Again, claiming something doesn't make it true. The same claim was made 15 years ago.

How do you people do this to yourselves?

Running that Monty Python skit against yourselves, wherein you smack yourselves silly with the huge books while running around in a circle and chanting the same nonsense over and over again, DOESN'T MAKE IT TRUE!

Good grief, man. This isn't about what I or you want, it's about what science and engineering can realistically deliver.

louis wrote:

With further dramatic cost falls we will see green energy used to create its own energy storage (most likely as artificial methane) to combine with chemical battery storage. That is the simplest solution. Eventually we will be able to cover any reasonable low output event. In the UK that rarely extends beyond 3 days for both wind and solar. Once automobiles are all EVs you can also draw on the energy from their batteries offering people financial incentives to do engage in "reverse charging". Once you have sufficient green energy production, you can also turn all your hydro facilities into, effectively, energy storage.

Again, what planet are you living on?

Here on Earth, except for hydrocarbon fuels extracted from the ground, there is no energy storage to speak of. None. The batteries in Australia are a sales stunt that the purchasers of that system can't afford to repeat.

EVs supplying the grid with power is nuts. You can use the electric cars to drive places, you can recharge them using coal / oil / gas, or you can very temporarily make up for the fact that there aren't enough batteries in the world to power the grid for one lousy minute.

Hydro is a fixed resource, and it doesn't supply nearly as much energy as nuclear does. Here in the US, land of more navigable waterways and lakes than the rest of the world combined, in 2020 we received 790TWh from nuclear power, 388 TWh from wind, and 291TWh from hydro. Are we going to create brand new rivers and lakes using battery powered construction equipment?

You keep talking about things that simply don't exist at any significant scale, and probably never will, because the amount of energy and resource consumption required to create them with the benefit of fossil fuels, is so enormous that we can't figure out how to do it economically using the cheapest energy we'll ever have. You still can't figure out why we keep burning oil like mad, can you?

louis wrote:

It should be remembered that nuclear power in the past certainly has been vulnerable to very hot weather events - when reactors had to be closed down because cooling systems weren't working properly.

Reactors may have to reduce power output if their lake of water coolant warms up a bit, but they don't have to shut down because the water warms a few degrees, and any such claim is provably false in nature, and made for reasons not related to science, such as an anti-nuclear political agenda.

It should also be remembered that nuclear powered aircraft carriers routinely transit through some of the hottest and coldest regions of Earth, and sail in circles there at top speed for months on end, without refueling once over the same period of time required for a newborn baby to grow and age to the point that they can become a new sailor who can serve aboard the same ship that their mother or father served aboard.

Sailing ships can technically sail without using any onboard power source, but they also don't sail very fast and are completely at the mercy of the winds, which doesn't work from the standpoint of maintaining a technologically advanced civilization.

At some point in time in humanity's future, there will almost certainly be a battery as energy dense as an equivalent weight of liquid hydrocarbon fuel. It's almost equally certain at this point that neither you nor I will be alive to witness that.

louis · 2021-03-09 20:17:18

Not sure I did that right! lol - my responses are embedded below...

kbd512 wrote:

louis wrote:
Of course it doesn't but the energy storage issue will be overcome.
Within our lifetimes? There's no evidence of that, whatsoever.
louis wrote:
Solar energy contractors in the SW USA are now covering the nighttime gap using capacitors, chemical batteries and other storage. So that's a first step. Of course the technology needs to go a lot further.
I once worked out you could produce enough storage if you filled the equivalent of six of the huge NASA rocket assembly building with top of the range chemical batteries. If the cost of battery storage continues to fall as it has done, we will see a powerful price effect. Chemical batteries definitely work well with electricity generation. If the cost comes down enough, then they may be the solution.
louis wrote:
15 years ago the complaint against green energy was that it was "too damn expensive"...now, thanks largely to technological developments and manufacturing efficiencies, green energy is amongst the lowest cost profiles.
It's still too expensive. Our rooftop photovoltaics and two Tesla PowerWalls, which can't even run one of our three AC units, at all or ever, cost around $60K.
louis wrote:
That's a common confusion - using domestic solar as the price guide, rather than utility scale solar. But even at the domestic level I think the average payback time is something like 6 years. That's in unsunny UK! Might involve some subsidies though, so you might not like that...
louis wrote:
In another 15 years, I think we'll find the energy storage has been resolved. It already is being resolved over the 24 hour day-night cycle.
Again, claiming something doesn't make it true. The same claim was made 15 years ago.
How do you people do this to yourselves?
Running that Monty Python skit against yourselves, wherein you smack yourselves silly with the huge books while running around in a circle and chanting the same nonsense over and over again, DOESN'T MAKE IT TRUE!
Good grief, man. This isn't about what I or you want, it's about what science and engineering can realistically deliver.
louis wrote:
I not sure what more you require. Evidence is evidence. The cost of solar and wind have both reduced dramatically over the last 15 years and they are now right at the bottom end of electricity generation costs - much better than coal or nuclear for sure. There is nothing to suggest that prices will continue to fall significantly (indeed nearly analysts agree on this).
Battery storage costs have recently been following a similar strong downward trajectory.
If you dispute any of this, please post links with the counter-evidence.
louis wrote:
With further dramatic cost falls we will see green energy used to create its own energy storage (most likely as artificial methane) to combine with chemical battery storage. That is the simplest solution. Eventually we will be able to cover any reasonable low output event. In the UK that rarely extends beyond 3 days for both wind and solar. Once automobiles are all EVs you can also draw on the energy from their batteries offering people financial incentives to do engage in "reverse charging". Once you have sufficient green energy production, you can also turn all your hydro facilities into, effectively, energy storage.
Again, what planet are you living on?
Here on Earth, except for hydrocarbon fuels extracted from the ground, there is no energy storage to speak of. None. The batteries in Australia are a sales stunt that the purchasers of that system can't afford to repeat.
EVs supplying the grid with power is nuts. You can use the electric cars to drive places, you can recharge them using coal / oil / gas, or you can very temporarily make up for the fact that there aren't enough batteries in the world to power the grid for one lousy minute.
Hydro is a fixed resource, and it doesn't supply nearly as much energy as nuclear does. Here in the US, land of more navigable waterways and lakes than the rest of the world combined, in 2020 we received 790TWh from nuclear power, 388 TWh from wind, and 291TWh from hydro. Are we going to create brand new rivers and lakes using battery powered construction equipment?
You keep talking about things that simply don't exist at any significant scale, and probably never will, because the amount of energy and resource consumption required to create them with the benefit of fossil fuels, is so enormous that we can't figure out how to do it economically using the cheapest energy we'll ever have. You still can't figure out why we keep burning oil like mad, can you?
louis wrote:
Well if coal is energy storage, so is geothermal, so is waste for incineration.
The point is that with a green energy system you would have a different strategy from today. Hydro might only contribute 10% of your power, but you would keep your reservoirs topped up for the periods of low green energy. Likewise with energy from waste, you would be keeping considerable stores of waste material so that could come into play You'll find in most wast incineration plants they might have 3 burners and they normally use only one or two. The strategy with green energy would be to ensure you have 3 burners ready to go into full operation during critical periods. Likewise with biofuels. So a green energy strategy might mean during the critical period (when maybe your solar and wind sources have dropped to 10% of the requirement) you switch to full hydro (10%), full energy from waste (5%), full biofuel usage (5%), draw on EV batteries (might be 1 or 2%), reduce electricity usage in large user locations (20%), and then use your artificial methane store to generate the remaining 48% of normal or thereabouts. Of course that final figure could be further reduced through use of geothermal, tidal energy, and so on. Use of chemical batteries would also reduce the figure. Another element is of course creating continental size grids. We in the UK already import energy from neighbouring countries on mainland Europe. But there is a proposal we could connect up to Iceland and use some of their geothermal energy. That would fit well with a green energy strategy.
louis wrote:
It should be remembered that nuclear power in the past certainly has been vulnerable to very hot weather events - when reactors had to be closed down because cooling systems weren't working properly.
Reactors may have to reduce power output if their lake of water coolant warms up a bit, but they don't have to shut down because the water warms a few degrees, and any such claim is provably false in nature, and made for reasons not related to science, such as an anti-nuclear political agenda.
It should also be remembered that nuclear powered aircraft carriers routinely transit through some of the hottest and coldest regions of Earth, and sail in circles there at top speed for months on end, without refueling once over the same period of time required for a newborn baby to grow and age to the point that they can become a new sailor who can serve aboard the same ship that their mother or father served aboard.
Sailing ships can technically sail without using any onboard power source, but they also don't sail very fast and are completely at the mercy of the winds, which doesn't work from the standpoint of maintaining a technologically advanced civilization.
At some point in time in humanity's future, there will almost certainly be a battery as energy dense as an equivalent weight of liquid hydrocarbon fuel. It's almost equally certain at this point that neither you nor I will be alive to witness that.

louis wrote:

"Heatwaves forced nuclear shutdowns or curtailments across Europe in 2003, 2006, 2015 and 2018. In 2003 alone, EDF lost a record of 5.5 TWh in nuclear output. In 2006 2.5 TWh. Last year hot weather brought EDF to temporarily shut down three reactors in eastern France, resulting in 1.7 TWh loss in output."
https://www.climateforesight.eu/energy/ … -the-heat/
Yes we won't be around to see such an efficient battery but we may be around to see a battery that costs 20% of what it does today and cost is just as crucial as energy efficiency when it comes to electricity generation - in fact more so.

Last edited by louis (2021-03-09 20:18:05)

kbd512 · 2021-03-10 03:09:46

Louis,

I truly do wish we could use wind and solar for everything, but as of right now we're struggling mightily against basic physics and the limits of existing technology.

louis wrote:

Solar energy contractors in the SW USA are now covering the nighttime gap using capacitors, chemical batteries and other storage. So that's a first step. Of course the technology needs to go a lot further.
I once worked out you could produce enough storage if you filled the equivalent of six of the huge NASA rocket assembly building with top of the range chemical batteries. If the cost of battery storage continues to fall as it has done, we will see a powerful price effect. Chemical batteries definitely work well with electricity generation. If the cost comes down enough, then they may be the solution.

There is no night time coverage in Southwest US using batteries and capacitors. None. Period. It doesn't exist.

louis wrote:

That's a common confusion - using domestic solar as the price guide, rather than utility scale solar. But even at the domestic level I think the average payback time is something like 6 years. That's in unsunny UK! Might involve some subsidies though, so you might not like that...

I'm not confused by anything. The Germans have some of the highest electricity rates in the world and they're using utility scale solar. There's a very simple explanation for that. The Sun doesn't shine in Germany! Pseudo-environmentalists can play their childish "hide the true cost" games until the cows come home, but the rate payers aren't fooled by false claims when their electricity bills arrive.

louis wrote:

I not sure what more you require. Evidence is evidence. The cost of solar and wind have both reduced dramatically over the last 15 years and they are now right at the bottom end of electricity generation costs - much better than coal or nuclear for sure. There is nothing to suggest that prices will continue to fall significantly (indeed nearly analysts agree on this).
Battery storage costs have recently been following a similar strong downward trajectory.
If you dispute any of this, please post links with the counter-evidence.

There's no actual evidence to suggest that a solar or wind farm that you have to replace every 10 to 20 years is less expensive to own and operate than a nuclear reactor that lives for at least 75 years and can reliably produce its rated output for as long as it's turned on and has fuel. Given that wind and solar require at least an order of magnitude more resources to construct, it's not very hard to understand why. Construction and operational costs, which are largely associated with energy consumption, go right back into basic EROEI math. There are an endless series of specious claims made by wind and solar evangelists who flatly refuse to explain why the rate payers continually pay higher and higher rates for wind and solar in countries where a large percentage of their electricity comes from wind and solar. A bunch of analysts who are paid by wind / solar / battery companies will make whatever rosy projections that their employers pay them to make. The painted clowns in American media are paid to "lie convincingly" on TV every day of the week. You of all people should know that.

You keep posting links to evangelist assertions that have nothing to do with the electricity rates paid by rate payers. If wind and solar were truly as cheap as you claim, then somewhere along the line the rate payers would see a decrease in their electricity bills, or would at least pay what they were paying when we were primarily burning coal and gas. Due to basic math, the electricity rates keep going up, the more wind and solar we add to our grids. For power generation technology that's purportedly cheaper than coal, that's utterly impossible, except that it keeps happening, because it's a big bright shining lie being peddled by "green energy" propagandists. In another 10 to 20 years when all of the existing wind and solar has to be replaced again, rates will inevitably go up again, because that's how basic economics works and it doesn't care if you know how to count.

Lithium-ion batteries becoming slightly less absurdly unaffordable to power human civilization level infrastructure through a mere 16 hours of darkness is utterly meaningless. The difference between a kilo of Platinum versus a kilo of Gold is utterly meaningless to the average consumer, who can't begin to afford to purchase a kilo of either metal. At current prices, a kilo of Gold is equivalent to 40 kilos of enriched Uranium fuel, and 1,845.6kg of Thorium fuel. There's no way in hell that a lifetime's supply of batteries for your cordless electric razor will ever cost $30 USD and fit in the palm of your hand. This is what those of us who can do basic math see when we compare nuclear energy to unreliable energy, aka "green energy".

When I was working for Uncle Sam's Yachting Club, I could still afford to pay for my lifetime's supply of energy from Thorium, while making less than minimum wage, in less than a week's time. We only need to stop listening to the incessant and increasingly blatant lies of our "green energy" scam artists and accept the simple and indisputable fact that nuclear energy truly is the cheapest form of energy there ever was and likely ever will be within our lifetimes. The goal of the "green energy" scammers is to extract as much money and labor from everyone else as they can, until enough people are fed up with their scam and they subsequently lose political support, whereupon those of us who truly want cheap and abundant energy can choose to use whatever remaining public money wasn't squandered on the most inexpensive and abundant form of energy we actually know how to generate.

A single kilo of Uranium or Thorium is a cradle-to-grave, all-inclusive lifetime supply of energy for the average American. I can throw a rock in any direction, from any point on the surface of planet Earth, to include the oceans, and hit an energy-viable Thorium mine. While humanity waits for solar panels that work in the dark, batteries that store as much energy as gasoline, Star Trek replicators, and other science fiction nonsense, we can have affordable 24/7/365 energy, for at least the next several millennia, by using nuclear power.

If we could make Lithium-ion batteries last long enough, which is all that I'm hoping for at this point, then for light motor vehicles they would eventually mature into a practical alternative to small combustion engines. A practical solid state battery that solves the durability problems would, at most, double the energy density of existing wet Lithium-ion cells, but those likely won't see commercial production for another 10 to 20 years, if history is any indicator. In terms of flight time, that would mean light commercial aircraft like the all-electric converted DHC-3s operated by Harbor Air, that can presently fly for 15 minutes on current Lithium-ion cell technologies with sufficient reserve power, could fly for 30 minutes. An electric class 8 heavy duty truck, with a range equivalent to existing diesel powered trucks, would see 1/4 of its total payload weight capacity allocated to batteries, rather than 1/2. Such batteries would have to quadruple in energy density over existing batteries for us to get to the point where we can fiddle with the materials and fabrication methods used in the tractor and trailer to produce an electric heavy duty truck with diesel equivalent range and payload carrying capabilities. Again, this is what I'm hoping for, despite the fact that nothing of the sort is remotely ready for implementation on a human civilization scale.

Apart from marginal weight reduction using more powerful Iron Nitride permanent magnets and lighter conductors such as CNT wiring, along with relatively minor durability improvements, there's little to no room for significant efficiency improvements to existing electric motors, which are already 96% to 98% efficient, with a few approaching 99% efficiency, and exceptionally lightweight, surpassed only by rocket engines and very large gas turbines, for the power-to-weight ratio they're capable of providing. Existing Copper and Aluminum PMMs already take top honors for efficiency and power-to-weight, so any meager gains to be made here will come at extreme cost, relative to existing electric motor technology.

louis wrote:

Well if coal is energy storage, so is geothermal, so is waste for incineration.

Apart from turning coal into diamonds or liquid fuel, incinerating otherwise useful and highly-processed / highly-energy-intensive materials, such as plastics, is ultimately a waste of energy, because it takes far more energy to make new plastic than it does to recycle existing plastic. There's a practical limit to how far you can take that consumption model if sustainability is a goal, and we've already greatly exceeded it. When I say that we dump enough Aluminum in landfills every year to source enough Aluminum to rebuild our entire fleet of commercial aircraft, I'm applying that classic British trait for grossly understating the problem. Energy Skeptic says it's every three months, and she's probably correct. I'm using a different method of accounting for material waste, but it's easy to see how much energy is squandered without recycling and the more widespread use of durable goods. Anyway, that's an enormous amount of energy expended on packaging products that retain their material properties for thousands of years, yet have useful service lives measured in days, prior to being buried or burned.

louis wrote:

The point is that with a green energy system you would have a different strategy from today. Hydro might only contribute 10% of your power, but you would keep your reservoirs topped up for the periods of low green energy. Likewise with energy from waste, you would be keeping considerable stores of waste material so that could come into play You'll find in most wast incineration plants they might have 3 burners and they normally use only one or two. The strategy with green energy would be to ensure you have 3 burners ready to go into full operation during critical periods. Likewise with biofuels. So a green energy strategy might mean during the critical period (when maybe your solar and wind sources have dropped to 10% of the requirement) you switch to full hydro (10%), full energy from waste (5%), full biofuel usage (5%), draw on EV batteries (might be 1 or 2%), reduce electricity usage in large user locations (20%), and then use your artificial methane store to generate the remaining 48% of normal or thereabouts. Of course that final figure could be further reduced through use of geothermal, tidal energy, and so on. Use of chemical batteries would also reduce the figure. Another element is of course creating continental size grids. We in the UK already import energy from neighbouring countries on mainland Europe. But there is a proposal we could connect up to Iceland and use some of their geothermal energy. That would fit well with a green energy strategy.

What you're really claiming here is that "green energy" requires the continued use of fossil fuels into perpetuity, unless you intend to persist with this "solar panels and batteries for everything" fantasy. If you need two or even three complete power plants to supply the energy, one based upon "unreliable energy" / "green energy", the other based upon "fossil fuel energy", then the best you can hope for is a reduction in the amount of fuel required to keep the lights on. It'll never be less expensive to operate than a single reliable power plant, which is why the electricity rates only go up, as more "unreliable / green energy" is loaded onto the grid. Basic math and economics strikes again!

Hydro is less than 10% of the electricity generation here in America, where we have so much of it, because that's the extent of what it can actually provide without creating brand new artificial rivers and lakes. This notion that you can simply switch to using power plant A or B or C is fanciful nonsense. In reality, you have to pay for staff / materiel / equipment to maintain all three power plants, all the time, which can only increase the cost, because that's how economics works.

louis wrote:

"Heatwaves forced nuclear shutdowns or curtailments across Europe in 2003, 2006, 2015 and 2018. In 2003 alone, EDF lost a record of 5.5 TWh in nuclear output. In 2006 2.5 TWh. Last year hot weather brought EDF to temporarily shut down three reactors in eastern France, resulting in 1.7 TWh loss in output."
https://www.climateforesight.eu/energy/ … -the-heat/

This is precisely why I seldom bother responding to your claims anymore. You post links to articles that are deliberately duplicitous in nature, because it supports your ideology about "green energy". Here's the link from the article you posted, along with a quoted blurb explaining why EDF shut their reactors down.

https://www.power-technology.com/news/e … -heatwave/

That's the link in the article you posted, which explains why EDF's nuclear reactors were shut down. What follows below is the actual explanation for the shutdown:

So why is Golfech plant closing down during a heatwave? A Nuclear Industry Association (NIA) spokesperson explained: “It’s dependant on how the plants are cooled. With the French fleet, the reason for the cut in output is not because of a technical problem, but an environmental one regarding heating up the river water beyond what is safe for marine life.”

The shutdown had nothing whatsoever to do with the reactor's ability to withstand a slight increase in summertime temperatures. It was done solely with the intent to preserve marine life. Since the temperatures inside an operating nuclear reactor are hot enough to melt light metal alloys, it should come as no surprise to anyone who is intellectually honest that the cooling water being +/-3C above/below whatever is considered to be "normal" is completely meaningless.

Do we shut down solar thermal power plants that BBQ birds mid-flight, by the tens of thousands? How about the wind turbines that have wiped out bat populations in certain places? No, of course not. By that same logic or lack thereof, there's no need to shut down nuclear reactors to save the one-eyed one-horned flying purple people eaters living in the coolant ponds, either. EDF deliberately shut down their nuclear power plants for reasons unrelated to the operation of the reactor, because unlike our pseudo-environmentalists / televangelists who proselytize for their wind and solar fantasies, the nuclear power industry actually cares about all life on Earth and maintaining a livable environment for all species.

louis wrote:

Yes we won't be around to see such an efficient battery but we may be around to see a battery that costs 20% of what it does today and cost is just as crucial as energy efficiency when it comes to electricity generation - in fact more so.

That's about the only assertion that you've made thus far, backed by good historical evidence, regarding your favored energy storage technology. Even here, I think you're practicing the art of self-deception. It's improbable that existing high (for batteries) energy density battery technologies will cost 20% of what they do today within our lifetimes. Even if they did, then absent improvements in cell life, they'd still cost more than combustion engines. Simple Alkaline batteries were cheaper to purchase when I was a child, in both relative and absolute terms, than they are now.

Calliban · 2021-03-10 18:24:18

This article looks at a number of options for deep decarbonisation, which requires the production of synthetic fuels cheaply enough to displace hydrocarbons from the road vehicle, air transportation, shipping and heating sectors.

https://www.lucidcatalyst.com/hydrogen-report

To do this, hydrogen must be produced very cheaply: at a cost no greater than $0.9/kg. That is a tough target to reach. Solar and wind power sources are unlikely to get close to this goal, mainly because they cannot reach the required capacity factor to utilise the electrolysis units at the necessary capacity. The areas of land and water required to generate sufficient power using sun and wind are enormous. For most industrial countries, the power plants would cover an area approaching that of the countries themselves. The material and energy requirements of the infrastructure would be similarly enormous and it would need to be constructed at a time when high EROI fossil fuel sources are past their respective production peaks.

So the idea of a renewable hydrogen economy is a dead end. The hydrogen economy concept only makes sense if it can be realised through high power density, high temperature heat sources: namely advanced fission and potentially fusion. New nuclear power plants have been plagued by high construction costs in Western countries in recent years. But this is largely the result of the power plants being first of class and having to effectively restart the nuclear construction industry with all its supply chains, after decades of neglect. It has nothing to do with any inherent cost associated with nuclear power plants. In the 1970s, we were able to build LWRs for a capital cost of $1000-2000/kW. It really is only in recent years that these costs have escalated above $10,000/kW. LWRs have decades of operating experience. But they are far from the best option for production of hydrogen, which really benefits from much higher temperatures than LWRs can achieve.

Which brings us to the next point. Louis talks about 'nuclear' as if it were a single technology, with broadly the same characteristics and cost structure. But it is actually a broad class of technologies. There are boiling water reactors, pressurised water reactors, pressure tube reactors, heavy water moderated reactors, graphite moderated light water cooled reactors, gas cooled graphite moderated reactors, gas cooled fast reactors, liquid metal cooled fast reactors, molten salt reactors (thermal and fast) - the list is not exhaustive and there are subcategories within each. Each of these technologies is completely different from the others. For hydrogen production we would ideally choose a high temperature reactor, as this boosts electrical generation efficiency and can also provide heat for high temperature electrolysis or thermochemical water splitting. A gas cooled fast reactor will not only do this, but it will produce more fissile fuel than it consumes as it does so.

The lucid catalyst report finds that to meet a hydrogen production cost of $0.9/kg, shipyard construction techniques should be used to mass produce hydrogen production rigs. Each of these would be powered by a cluster of modular high temperature reactors. Lucid catalyst finds that ammonia is a more effective synthetic fuel for most applications, as it can be manufactured from hydrogen and N2 using the haber bosch process, using nuclear process heat. Ammonia is a liquid at room temperature under modest compression. It makes more sense in portable applications like the transportation sector.

To meet the entire world needs for gas and liquid fuels, an area of 3000 square km would need to be occupied by nuclear powered hydrogen and ammonia factories. To do the same thing with offshore wind would require an area of about 8 million square kilometres - about the size of Brazil. But wind power cannot produce synthetic fuels cheaply enough to be affordable, even if we could find that much space. We really do need advanced fission heat sources to meet this need. If those heat sources are gas cooled fast reactors, with a hard neutron spectrum and high breeding ratio, then the required nuclear capacity could be built up rapidly, as a relatively small fissile starter core can power a CANDLE system, which converts 238U in 239Pu, in situ, without need for reprocessing.

Really, the world does not need to sink into poverty as fossil fuel production declines over the next few decades. But without them, power can be produced in the large quantities and low cost needed by industrial civilisation, only by using nuclear reactors. This is required on a much larger scale than has been the case to date. Low power density renewable energy sources are absolutely not (and never will be) up to this task, because they cannot substitute the power density of nuclear energy or legacy fossil fuels. System power density is inversely proportional to the materials budget of a power source. This is why wind and solar electricity require orders of magnitude more steel, concrete and glass than an LWR of comparable annual electricity output. As fossil fuel production declines, these materials will rise in cost. Nature spreads solar and wind energy diffusely across the Earth surface. A smaller materials budget results in lower costs, all else being equal.

It is the declining EROI of fossil fuel production and the gradual escalation of cost over the past fifty or so years, that is responsible for the secular stagnation and declining prosperity of people in Western countries. This has become especially problematic since 2000. Disposable prosperity (money left in your pocket for non-essential items) is declining rapidly in Western countries. Income inequality is rising as well. There is no escaping the energy limits of the economy. It is a collection of energy based processes that are constrained by the first and second laws of thermodynamics. Just like everything else in the universe.

Last edited by Calliban (2021-03-10 18:35:03)

Calliban · 2021-03-10 18:48:12

The embodied materials requirements of a wind / solar energy system are orders of magnitude greater than the fossil fuel energy system that they are trying to replace.

Below is a link to the 2015 Quadrennial energy review, produced by the US department of energy. A reliable enough source?
https://www.energy.gov/quadrennial-tech … eview-2015

Go to Section 10, Table 10.4 for a summary of materials inputs into several different types of powerplant in ton/TWh. Here are some tallys per TWh:
Nuclear (PWR) = 760t concrete / cement; 3t copper; 0t glass; 160t steel; 0t aluminium.
Wind = 8000t concrete / cement; 23t copper; 92t glass; 1800t steel; 35t aluminium.
Solar PV = 4050t concrete / cement; 850t copper; 2700t glass; 7900t steel; 680t aluminium.

Compared to a pressurised water reactor nuclear power plant:

1. A solar PV plant producing the same electric power output will require some 5.3x more concrete; some 280x more copper, some 49.4x more steel; and thousands of times more glass and aluminium. A plant producing the same average electrical power output as a largish nuclear reactor, will occupy 200 square kilometres of land in northern Europe.

2. Wind turbines (presumably onshore) require about an order of magnitude more materials for the same amount of electrical energy generated.

3. There is no indication that these quantities include any materials investments needed for energy storage. This would require further materials investments in pumped hydro, CAES or some other means. This increases the materials cost of wind and solar still further. Embodied materials are a reflection of embodied energy.

The energy needed to mine and manufacture these materials is presently produced using fossil fuels. Concrete is cheap because kilns have access to cheap natural gas. Steel is cheap thanks to coke that reduces iron oxide and natural gas, coal and baseboard nuclear that provide cheap electric power for electric furnaces. What will happen to the cost of renewable electricity, when we have to use renewable electricity to manufacture the materials needed to build new wind farms and solar power plants? Is it realistic to suppose we can substitute wind and solar electricity for fossil fuels and produce orders of magnitude more steel and concrete? And just how renewable will these things be, when we take into account the fact that only a portion of their large material requirements are recyclable?

What these materials budgets tell me is that there is no possibility of renewable energy systems scaling up to provide the quantity of energy that we presently derive from fossil fuels. So far, these energy sources have substituted a small proportion of the electricity in a handful of wealthy countries. But even in these countries, the contribution of wind and solar is small when compared to the net energy required for all heating, process heat, transportation and electricity markets combined. And complete replacement of fossil infrastructure must be carried out across the world in all of these sectors.

I find it wryly amusing that anyone wanting to get humanity to Mars would advocate an energy policy that is certain to impoverish industrial nations, if not return them to the stone age. There is a bizarre contradiction embedded in this obsession. Somehow we are supposed to afford spaceflight and high technology, whilst subsisting on diffuse energy sources that reduce average income to a few thousand dollars per year. And Louis thinks we can get to Mars by doing this? Seriously man, you have not thought this through.

Last edited by Calliban (2021-03-10 19:15:27)

SpaceNut · 2021-03-10 20:40:00

Things left out of nuclear is the amount of water, level of maintenance, and the manufacturing of the fuel that is used which takes up even more energy to get it so we can produce power.

Wind mining of the magnets and processing plus manufacturing of the parts as well as the installer/ construction.

Solar the hazards chemicals, the chemical waste, building of the equipment to not only mine but to make them....

When we compare them all we must look to how we use energy and learn how to go without....

Say you did solar for just the microwave oven use it would be easier to solve for consistent use of it even in cycles of bad weather rather than trying to come up with a total home system which is under battery level power low or runs out to soon to none and net metering and the power is off due to branches.

If you make the smaller systems and give the ability yo battery share from each then you gain in the short term if you still manage what you use....

tahanson43206 · 2021-03-10 22:16:41

For everyone .... thanks for all your contributions to this new topic!

Let's try to stay focused upon the theme .... Nuclear power is an attractive option to produce "green(non-carbon)" Hydrogen.

Hydrogen is an attractive fuel for "green(non-carbon)" applications such as power, transportation, metal refining, manufacturing of various kinds and probably other applications i'm forgetting.

(th)

Calliban · 2021-03-11 04:27:54

SpaceNut wrote:

Things left out of nuclear is the amount of water, level of maintenance, and the manufacturing of the fuel that is used which takes up even more energy to get it so we can produce power.

SpaceNut, I don't think these things are left out of levelised cost of energy calculations. One of the attractive features of high temperature reactors is their high efficiency in the generation of electricity- around 50% for the modular helium cooled reactor. That means a lot less waste heat to dispose of and less cooling water requirements. Compared to an LWR with efficiency 32%, the high temperature reactor produces less than half of the waste heat per MW and waste heat is ejected from the Brayton cycle at higher temperatures. So modular helium reactors do not need large amounts of water for cooling and can be sited away from large water courses. It also saves money on cooling subsystems, as you need smaller heat exchangers.

If high temperature reactors are supporting high temperature electrolysis, then their heat is fed directly into electrolysis stacks, where it is converted into chemical energy with an efficiency close to 100%. The only waste heat in that situation would be the much smaller quantity involved in production of electricity for the electrolysis stack.

This design is especially promising. The GCFR and its power generation loop are small enough to fit into modular steel containers, that can be shipped to where needed as finished units. That is really what is needed to gain the benefits of economy of scale using series based, shipyard production.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_ … ier_Module

Last edited by Calliban (2021-03-11 04:38:27)

louis · 2021-03-11 05:28:14

These are just construction tonnages. You have to look at lifetime tonnages. How much tonnage is going in and how much waste is being produced with each system.

I'd be surprised if a large nuclear power station wasn't using a couple of tons of material a day (remember it's not just the power station - you have a large human infrastructure - offices, restaurants, WCs etc.). If I am right then that's 700 tons a year, or 28000 tons over a 40 year lifetime. A wind turbine keeps on turning without a great deal of human intervention - yes there will be input tonnages associated with maintenance but nothing like with a nuclear power station.

Calliban wrote:

The embodied materials requirements of a wind / solar energy system are orders of magnitude greater than the fossil fuel energy system that they are trying to replace.
Below is a link to the 2015 Quadrennial energy review, produced by the US department of energy. A reliable enough source?
https://www.energy.gov/quadrennial-tech … eview-2015
Go to Section 10, Table 10.4 for a summary of materials inputs into several different types of powerplant in ton/TWh. Here are some tallys per TWh:
Nuclear (PWR) = 760t concrete / cement; 3t copper; 0t glass; 160t steel; 0t aluminium.
Wind = 8000t concrete / cement; 23t copper; 92t glass; 1800t steel; 35t aluminium.
Solar PV = 4050t concrete / cement; 850t copper; 2700t glass; 7900t steel; 680t aluminium.
Compared to a pressurised water reactor nuclear power plant:
1. A solar PV plant producing the same electric power output will require some 5.3x more concrete; some 280x more copper, some 49.4x more steel; and thousands of times more glass and aluminium. A plant producing the same average electrical power output as a largish nuclear reactor, will occupy 200 square kilometres of land in northern Europe.
2. Wind turbines (presumably onshore) require about an order of magnitude more materials for the same amount of electrical energy generated.
3. There is no indication that these quantities include any materials investments needed for energy storage. This would require further materials investments in pumped hydro, CAES or some other means. This increases the materials cost of wind and solar still further. Embodied materials are a reflection of embodied energy.
The energy needed to mine and manufacture these materials is presently produced using fossil fuels. Concrete is cheap because kilns have access to cheap natural gas. Steel is cheap thanks to coke that reduces iron oxide and natural gas, coal and baseboard nuclear that provide cheap electric power for electric furnaces. What will happen to the cost of renewable electricity, when we have to use renewable electricity to manufacture the materials needed to build new wind farms and solar power plants? Is it realistic to suppose we can substitute wind and solar electricity for fossil fuels and produce orders of magnitude more steel and concrete? And just how renewable will these things be, when we take into account the fact that only a portion of their large material requirements are recyclable?
What these materials budgets tell me is that there is no possibility of renewable energy systems scaling up to provide the quantity of energy that we presently derive from fossil fuels. So far, these energy sources have substituted a small proportion of the electricity in a handful of wealthy countries. But even in these countries, the contribution of wind and solar is small when compared to the net energy required for all heating, process heat, transportation and electricity markets combined. And complete replacement of fossil infrastructure must be carried out across the world in all of these sectors.
I find it wryly amusing that anyone wanting to get humanity to Mars would advocate an energy policy that is certain to impoverish industrial nations, if not return them to the stone age. There is a bizarre contradiction embedded in this obsession. Somehow we are supposed to afford spaceflight and high technology, whilst subsisting on diffuse energy sources that reduce average income to a few thousand dollars per year. And Louis thinks we can get to Mars by doing this? Seriously man, you have not thought this through.

louis · 2021-03-11 05:38:10

Well as Musk himself maintains there isn't going to be a green hydrogen economy. I can see green hydrogen possibly being used as energy storage to generate electricity when there is low wind-solar output (I presume electrolysis is cheaper than complex methane manufacture but against that hydrogen storage is much more expensive than methane storage - but then again, if it's all on site at the green energy installation, you aren't having to move the hydrogen around). But I would agree with Musk that hydrogen cannot compete with chemical batteries for vehicle motor power and when we get on to things like heating, green energy will either be used to produce methane or will even be able to compete with gas to provide the cheapest heating. So I think the hydrogen hype is not convincing.

Calliban wrote:

This article looks at a number of options for deep decarbonisation, which requires the production of synthetic fuels cheaply enough to displace hydrocarbons from the road vehicle, air transportation, shipping and heating sectors.
https://www.lucidcatalyst.com/hydrogen-report
To do this, hydrogen must be produced very cheaply: at a cost no greater than $0.9/kg. That is a tough target to reach. Solar and wind power sources are unlikely to get close to this goal, mainly because they cannot reach the required capacity factor to utilise the electrolysis units at the necessary capacity. The areas of land and water required to generate sufficient power using sun and wind are enormous. For most industrial countries, the power plants would cover an area approaching that of the countries themselves. The material and energy requirements of the infrastructure would be similarly enormous and it would need to be constructed at a time when high EROI fossil fuel sources are past their respective production peaks.
So the idea of a renewable hydrogen economy is a dead end. The hydrogen economy concept only makes sense if it can be realised through high power density, high temperature heat sources: namely advanced fission and potentially fusion. New nuclear power plants have been plagued by high construction costs in Western countries in recent years. But this is largely the result of the power plants being first of class and having to effectively restart the nuclear construction industry with all its supply chains, after decades of neglect. It has nothing to do with any inherent cost associated with nuclear power plants. In the 1970s, we were able to build LWRs for a capital cost of $1000-2000/kW. It really is only in recent years that these costs have escalated above $10,000/kW. LWRs have decades of operating experience. But they are far from the best option for production of hydrogen, which really benefits from much higher temperatures than LWRs can achieve.
Which brings us to the next point. Louis talks about 'nuclear' as if it were a single technology, with broadly the same characteristics and cost structure. But it is actually a broad class of technologies. There are boiling water reactors, pressurised water reactors, pressure tube reactors, heavy water moderated reactors, graphite moderated light water cooled reactors, gas cooled graphite moderated reactors, gas cooled fast reactors, liquid metal cooled fast reactors, molten salt reactors (thermal and fast) - the list is not exhaustive and there are subcategories within each. Each of these technologies is completely different from the others. For hydrogen production we would ideally choose a high temperature reactor, as this boosts electrical generation efficiency and can also provide heat for high temperature electrolysis or thermochemical water splitting. A gas cooled fast reactor will not only do this, but it will produce more fissile fuel than it consumes as it does so.
The lucid catalyst report finds that to meet a hydrogen production cost of $0.9/kg, shipyard construction techniques should be used to mass produce hydrogen production rigs. Each of these would be powered by a cluster of modular high temperature reactors. Lucid catalyst finds that ammonia is a more effective synthetic fuel for most applications, as it can be manufactured from hydrogen and N2 using the haber bosch process, using nuclear process heat. Ammonia is a liquid at room temperature under modest compression. It makes more sense in portable applications like the transportation sector.
To meet the entire world needs for gas and liquid fuels, an area of 3000 square km would need to be occupied by nuclear powered hydrogen and ammonia factories. To do the same thing with offshore wind would require an area of about 8 million square kilometres - about the size of Brazil. But wind power cannot produce synthetic fuels cheaply enough to be affordable, even if we could find that much space. We really do need advanced fission heat sources to meet this need. If those heat sources are gas cooled fast reactors, with a hard neutron spectrum and high breeding ratio, then the required nuclear capacity could be built up rapidly, as a relatively small fissile starter core can power a CANDLE system, which converts 238U in 239Pu, in situ, without need for reprocessing.
Really, the world does not need to sink into poverty as fossil fuel production declines over the next few decades. But without them, power can be produced in the large quantities and low cost needed by industrial civilisation, only by using nuclear reactors. This is required on a much larger scale than has been the case to date. Low power density renewable energy sources are absolutely not (and never will be) up to this task, because they cannot substitute the power density of nuclear energy or legacy fossil fuels. System power density is inversely proportional to the materials budget of a power source. This is why wind and solar electricity require orders of magnitude more steel, concrete and glass than an LWR of comparable annual electricity output. As fossil fuel production declines, these materials will rise in cost. Nature spreads solar and wind energy diffusely across the Earth surface. A smaller materials budget results in lower costs, all else being equal.
It is the declining EROI of fossil fuel production and the gradual escalation of cost over the past fifty or so years, that is responsible for the secular stagnation and declining prosperity of people in Western countries. This has become especially problematic since 2000. Disposable prosperity (money left in your pocket for non-essential items) is declining rapidly in Western countries. Income inequality is rising as well. There is no escaping the energy limits of the economy. It is a collection of energy based processes that are constrained by the first and second laws of thermodynamics. Just like everything else in the universe.

tahanson43206 · 2021-03-11 07:23:20

For Louis re #23 and the views of Elon Musk on Hydrogen ...

You are betting on a losing horse, Louis ... or, more accurately, you are betting on a man who is talking about ** another ** horse race.

Elon and you have something in common .... you say things that provoke others to achievement they might not have thought possible.

There are many examples of impressive responses to the positions you have taken in the past in this forum.

In ** this ** case, Elon is provoking his fellow billionaires, like Jeff Bezos, who has built his vision on Hydrogen.

It's a Tortoise vs Hare situation .... Elon is in a hurry, and Carbon is a safe, proven, reliable and workable element upon which to build his vision.

Bezos has more time, and is betting for the long term, as are the rest of the investors who are allocating resources to the future of Hydrogen.

(th)

Calliban · 2021-03-11 08:34:14

louis wrote:

I understand the points you are making, it's just I am not convinced by them.
Nuclear power is great at providing baseload. But it does so expensively.

That's not true either, at least not for LWRs.
https://www.nei.org/news/2018/cost-of-n … 0-year-low

The only electricity source that beats legacy LWRs on cost, is gas turbines burning surplus shale gas on the US market. Because shale gas is a byproduct of shale oil production, wholesale prices have fallen to very low levels. How long that can continue is debatable, but it is a relatively recent development.

New build nuclear reactors are different story to the legacy plants now operating. Projected costs are much higher mainly because we are now attempting to build and commission new designs after decades of atrophy in supply lines and nuclear workforce. This means effectively starting a whole new industry. But it would be misleading to point to costs associated with Hinkley C, say, and take them as a baseline for all nuclear reactors built in the future. The Koreans for example, still have an extant nuclear build industry that has produced advanced LWRs at costs of $2000/kW. The Chinese have produced AP1000 reactors at similarly low cost. With few domestic fossil fuel resources, the Koreans did not allow their nuclear industry to wither in the way Western countries did.

louis wrote:

Where is the evidence that hydrogen is going to be the go-to energy storage solution? I don't see it. If it was an economic proposition it would already be winning out because as you pointed out electrolysis is a pretty simply process. But we see no real signs of the hydrogen economy taking off - due to the cost and difficulty of storing hydrogen and the fact it is not the safest form of storage around. There might come a point where it has some role to play but I don't really see it happening.

There is no evidence in this case, only perceived necessity. If you want to decarbonise sectors like aviation and shipping, you need synthetic fuels with high energy density. There is no possibility of battery based storage being effective in these cases. There are hard limits to how much energy you can store in electrochemical potentials of battery materials. The high cost is another consequence of this fact - you need big batteries to provide a range of 300km in an electric car. Storing hydrogen as anything other than a low density gas comes with heavy infrastructure and energy costs of its own. That is why hydrogen derived synthetic fuels are often advocated, I.e. ammonia. For that to work cost effectively compared to legacy fossil fuels, the primary energy source needs to be cheap. This is why the series production high temperature reactors are proposed. When economy of scale is achieved, they can out compete any other energy source.

louis wrote:

I think it's much more likely that the cost of solar and wind will continue to fall until they are so cheap (especially solar which will see still many more cost-reducing technological innovations) that artificial methane manufacture is economical within the overall cost package. Methane can easily store power enough for a nation to see itself through a really bad period of say 10 days of low green energy output.

A big part of the reason for the perceived cheapness of wind and solar power projects over the past decade is an artifact of zero effective interest rates and very low bond yields. It makes very capital intensive projects appear relatively cheap, because the capital is effectively free. How long this sort of thing can continue without seriously degrading the value of fiat currencies is uncertain. But the materials budgets I posted earlier should give pause for thought if you expect these energy sources to continue getting cheaper into the indefinite future.

As for surplus renewable energy being the best basis for producing hydrogen via electrolysis, that is shown to be false in the report that I referenced. I suggest that you read it. The biggest cost driver for synthetic hydrogen is the capacity factor of the energy supply. Running the unit off of occasional surplus energy spikes would result in very expensive hydrogen.

Last edited by Calliban (2021-03-11 08:58:57)

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