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03/16/2011 05:18:25 PM · #51 |
That's geothermal energy and you can't do it just anywhere and it isn't cheap to drill. Iceland, I believe, uses a fair amount of this for their power (can't give you the %).
Message edited by author 2011-03-16 17:19:01. |
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03/16/2011 05:23:32 PM · #52 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
That's geothermal energy and you can't do it just anywhere and it isn't cheap to drill. Iceland, I believe, uses a fair amount of this for their power (can't give you the %). |
Actually I think it can be done anywhere. We aren't talking about tapping a hot water source. You only need to find where the rock strata below us is hot. You go deep enough and it is everywhere. |
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03/16/2011 05:30:19 PM · #53 |
Originally posted by franktheyank:
I remember that it was quite a few years ago that a system was perfected whereby 2 holes are drilled deep into the Earth where the rock temperature is roughly 325 degrees F. Water is injected in one tube to the depths, goes through pourous rock and comes back as steam to turn a turbine. It depends on the geothermal nature of the area, but could require drilling several thousand feet. The beauty of this is that it could be done anywhere, even in a downtown metropolitan area. It is relatively simple and doesn't require transmission of electricity over huge, and expensive, distances. Could it be that our corporate structure is only looking for the most expensive ways to do things for maximum profit? |
I would love to see where this was done, how far down they had to go, and what costs would be associated with deriving a heat source from this type of procedure.
I am quite familiar with water source heat pumps, but this is not what you are advocating here. Having worked in a mine that went straight down on a single hoist for 1.5 mile, I would wager that the depths required to tap into this source of energy would be quite substantial, as in several hundred miles down.
Do let us know if you find that study... I would be very interested in reading up on that.
Ray
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03/16/2011 05:33:02 PM · #54 |
California levelized energy costs for different generation technologies in US dollars per megawatt hour (2007) (Wikipedia source page)
Technology Cost (USD/MWh)
Advanced Nuclear 67
Coal 74-88
Gas 313-346
Geothermal 67
Hydro power 48-86
Wind power 60
Solar 116-312
Biomass 47-117
Fuel Cell 86-111
Wave Power 611
Unless I'm misreading this it seems that in California wind is already cheaper than nuclear, even at the level of scale at the time of the study, and that solar may only cost twice as much.
Another important consideration is that you can have a wind or solar farm of almost any size operating pretty much by next month, while a nuclear plant is ten years and billion$$$ of dollar$$$ down the road. If we make a commitment to wind, solar, and tidal generation, the storage technologies will follow -- why not have as much faith in battery-makers as in nuclear engineers ...
A big part of the problem is the need -- caused by the existence of gigantic, monopolistic utilitiy/energy companites, for large, centralized generation facilities along with a high-capacity grid. With wind and solar generation you can have the production widely distributed (and owned by/profitiable the locals) ... for that matter, if you want nuclear, how about using the reactors the US Navy uses to power aircraft carriers -- I hear they are built to the highest possible safety standards (darn those Federal regulations!), and provide enough power to service a "city" with a population of some 5000 people.
I suggest one or two of those in the basement of every City Hall around the country will provide just the spark we need ... ;-)  |
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03/16/2011 05:39:45 PM · #55 |
| I'd be suspect of those numbers Paul. Gas (assuming that means natural gas) is more expensive than solar? I highly doubt it. Energy goes where it is efficient and in the US there is 20x as much energy output expected from natural gas as nuclear in the next twenty years (source NPR this morning). |
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03/16/2011 05:45:00 PM · #56 |
| The gas number looked funny to me too ... perhaps they are adding in a "carbon cost" not present in most of the other options? |
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03/16/2011 05:54:49 PM · #57 |
Originally posted by GeneralE:
California levelized energy costs for different generation technologies in US dollars per megawatt hour (2007) (Wikipedia source page) |
From that page:
Note that the above figures incorporate tax breaks for the various forms of power plants. Subsidies range from 0% (for Coal) to 14% (for nuclear) to over 100% (for solar).
That *is* a great resource page. One thing that is immediately apparent is how the picture changes when the input assumptions are different, for instance the scope (new, existing...), the location (US, EU, etc.).
The key thing here is that it's not about today's economics, but about tomorrow's. We need to be looking not at current costs for generation but at which technologies have the best potential to:
- Serve a large portion of our energy needs
- Not rely on non-renewable resources (unless an interim solution)
- Have the potential for cost reduction
This final point is an important one. Thermal solar, though the "old technology" compared to PV solar, still has far lower lifetime costs, even though PV solar has enjoyed a tremendous surge in research and development.
It's clear that many of the renewable sources are in fact becoming economical. this trend will continue, of course, since oil prices will go nowhere but up in the long term (production has already peaked, and reserves will dwindle ). There are other factors besides the cost that play in of course. Wind power provides a great example. In order to get a wind farm up and running, you need a firm willing to invest in creating it... but before you can do that, you need the transmission lines to get the power to the grid. The investors are different. The power lines won't get built unless there is a commitment for the generation capacity, and the capacity won't get built without a way to sell it... |
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03/16/2011 06:00:24 PM · #58 |
| And then you have rich people complain that it ruins their view of the mountains or the sea or whatever. Living in an area of the US where wind is already utilized, I can tell you NIMBY runs rampant when it comes to wind turbines. |
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03/16/2011 06:14:32 PM · #59 |
Originally posted by RayEthier:
Originally posted by franktheyank:
I remember that it was quite a few years ago that a system was perfected whereby 2 holes are drilled deep into the Earth where the rock temperature is roughly 325 degrees F. Water is injected in one tube to the depths, goes through pourous rock and comes back as steam to turn a turbine. It depends on the geothermal nature of the area, but could require drilling several thousand feet. The beauty of this is that it could be done anywhere, even in a downtown metropolitan area. It is relatively simple and doesn't require transmission of electricity over huge, and expensive, distances. Could it be that our corporate structure is only looking for the most expensive ways to do things for maximum profit? |
I would love to see where this was done, how far down they had to go, and what costs would be associated with deriving a heat source from this type of procedure.
I am quite familiar with water source heat pumps, but this is not what you are advocating here. Having worked in a mine that went straight down on a single hoist for 1.5 mile, I would wager that the depths required to tap into this source of energy would be quite substantial, as in several hundred miles down.
Do let us know if you find that study... I would be very interested in reading up on that.
Ray |
I found this doing a short internet search. //www.economist.com/node/16909897 |
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03/16/2011 06:20:48 PM · #60 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
And then you have rich people complain that it ruins their view of the mountains or the sea or whatever. Living in an area of the US where wind is already utilized, I can tell you NIMBY runs rampant when it comes to wind turbines. |
And with good reason. Google up what's happening on Cape Cod. We're a small piece of land, you can't site these things in splendid isolation. Where they've been built, they are having all SORTS of problems with flicker and noise, and they are destroying property values. Several of these industrial wind turbines have recently been shouted down and off the agenda by citizens, including one in my town. I have never actually heard of anyplace in America where wind turbines have been sited in close proximity to residents without waves of complaints coming in after they are operational. Putting them up in isolation, in the plains and the high desert, is a different story.
R. |
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03/16/2011 06:23:29 PM · #61 |
I remember reading that. I find it amusing, as a complete aside, that the technology is called HDR :-)
"In the early 1970s the concept of “hot dry rock” (HDR) geothermal power emerged at Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico, and researchers from the lab conducted the first tests at nearby Fenton Hill."
R. |
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03/16/2011 06:37:15 PM · #62 |
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
And then you have rich people complain that it ruins their view of the mountains or the sea or whatever. Living in an area of the US where wind is already utilized, I can tell you NIMBY runs rampant when it comes to wind turbines. |
And with good reason. Google up what's happening on Cape Cod. We're a small piece of land, you can't site these things in splendid isolation. Where they've been built, they are having all SORTS of problems with flicker and noise, and they are destroying property values. Several of these industrial wind turbines have recently been shouted down and off the agenda by citizens, including one in my town. I have never actually heard of anyplace in America where wind turbines have been sited in close proximity to residents without waves of complaints coming in after they are operational. Putting them up in isolation, in the plains and the high desert, is a different story.
R. |
Honestly, I don't have a ton of sympathy. Call me callous. The proposal is 5 miles from the nearest shoreline. I'm sure Mass. uses their fair share of electricity so why does it need to be generated in the midwest? |
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03/16/2011 06:40:11 PM · #63 |
Originally posted by FireBird:
Originally posted by jmsetzler:
Radiation doesn't "lodge" in anything. |
General is right. "Fallout" can be ingested or breathed into the lungs. The chance of any fallout on the West coast from these reactors will be close to zero. The trip across the ocean will dilute the particles, if any, a great deal. Since those reactors probably don't produce plutonium, I don't think we have to worry about that. The Japanese people near the plant are going to be the real losers if meltdown is serious and escapes the containment. |
Fallout is particulate matter though. Radiation is not always particulate. Gamma and X-rays are simple electromagnetic radiation (like light). Alpha and Beta radiation are particulate (even though at the atomic level) and are quite harmful.
At this point, this entire disaster is being blown out of proportion as far as radiation danger is concerned.
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03/16/2011 06:42:00 PM · #64 |
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
I remember reading that. I find it amusing, as a complete aside, that the technology is called HDR :-)
"In the early 1970s the concept of “hot dry rock” (HDR) geothermal power emerged at Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico, and researchers from the lab conducted the first tests at nearby Fenton Hill."
R. |
Thanks Robert. I knew it was in New Mexico, but I needed the clues you gave to find this report.
ees.lanl.gov/ees11/geophysics/staff/brown/HDRintheUS.pdf |
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03/16/2011 06:46:12 PM · #65 |
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
I have never actually heard of anyplace in America where wind turbines have been sited in close proximity to residents without waves of complaints coming in after they are operational. Putting them up in isolation, in the plains and the high desert, is a different story.
R. |
I'll respectfully have to disagree... We've had a *lot* of pre-project howling about them, but after they are up, you do not hear complaints. There's a large (for our area) wind farm about a half-hour north of us, sited in semi-rural and small town environs. It got some resistance prior to being built, but I have not heard a complaint since it was built. It envelops a small town that I go to a few times a year. In the Summer, the sound of the breeze through the trees is louder than any noise from the turbines. Are they unsightly? Not really. Are they beautiful? Not really ;-) |
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03/16/2011 06:52:57 PM · #66 |
Originally posted by kirbic:
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
I have never actually heard of anyplace in America where wind turbines have been sited in close proximity to residents without waves of complaints coming in after they are operational. Putting them up in isolation, in the plains and the high desert, is a different story.
R. |
I'll respectfully have to disagree... We've had a *lot* of pre-project howling about them, but after they are up, you do not hear complaints. There's a large (for our area) wind farm about a half-hour north of us, sited in semi-rural and small town environs. It got some resistance prior to being built, but I have not heard a complaint since it was built. It envelops a small town that I go to a few times a year. In the Summer, the sound of the breeze through the trees is louder than any noise from the turbines. Are they unsightly? Not really. Are they beautiful? Not really ;-) |
Are any of them within 1500 feet of residences? That's what we are dealing with here.
R. |
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03/16/2011 07:00:37 PM · #67 |
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
I'll respectfully have to disagree... We've had a *lot* of pre-project howling about them, but after they are up, you do not hear complaints. There's a large (for our area) wind farm about a half-hour north of us, sited in semi-rural and small town environs. It got some resistance prior to being built, but I have not heard a complaint since it was built. It envelops a small town that I go to a few times a year. In the Summer, the sound of the breeze through the trees is louder than any noise from the turbines. Are they unsightly? Not really. Are they beautiful? Not really ;-) |
Are any of them within 1500 feet of residences? That's what we are dealing with here.
R. [/quote]
For reals? That must be something different than the commonly debated offshore project which is nowhere near a residence. |
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03/16/2011 07:04:54 PM · #68 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
For reals? That must be something different than the commonly debated offshore project which is nowhere near a residence. |
Yeah. The offshore wind farm is a whole other animal, I have no objection to that. But what's happening is, the TOWNS are trying to site turbines within their townships to reap the tax benefits and income from power generation. And the town-owned parcels of land are surrounded with close development, and there have been major issues. Falmouth is the one to look for, for news. Harwich's got voted down in Town meeting after a ground swell against it.
Message edited by author 2011-03-16 19:05:49. |
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03/16/2011 07:06:50 PM · #69 |
Originally posted by Bear_Music:
Are any of them within 1500 feet of residences? That's what we are dealing with here.
R. |
1500 ft... 0.28 mi, yeh, that's probably close to the minimum distance. Not sure, from a regulatory standpoint, what distances they have to maintain. There are safety concerns, such as ice shedding, so you can't live right below one.
ETA: Closest I measure is just under 0.2 mi, so about 1000 ft. There are plenty between 0.2 and 0.25 mi. If you have Google Earth, fly to Brownsville, WI. Most of the turbines are North and East of town.
Message edited by author 2011-03-16 19:13:07. |
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03/16/2011 08:10:22 PM · #70 |
There is virtually no where you can site anything that will not raise some objection. Wind Farms in rural Altamont Pass kills a lot of raptors. In Arizona Solar farms will displace endangered species on BLM wilderness areas.
Where is the Buck Rodgers infinite energy machine that is too cheap to bother metering? I was expecting to have my jetpack by now! Damn it those SciFi authors I read as a kid lied to me. |
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03/16/2011 08:52:12 PM · #71 |
| Getting back to the Japan issue. It actually seems pretty reassurring that we have a 30-year old reactor hit with the 5th largest earthquake in recorded history and a tsunami that is likely to have killed thousands and we still don't know, days later, whether there is any appreciable impact on human populations. It seems to have held up remarkably well given the worst of all case scenarios. |
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03/16/2011 09:00:47 PM · #72 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
...It seems to have held up remarkably well given the worst of all case scenarios. |
Agreed. Well, second-worst case, anyhow. First is "asteroid impact." |
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03/16/2011 09:21:20 PM · #73 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
Getting back to the Japan issue. It actually seems pretty reassurring that we have a 30-year old reactor hit with the 5th largest earthquake in recorded history and a tsunami that is likely to have killed thousands and we still don't know, days later, whether there is any appreciable impact on human populations. It seems to have held up remarkably well given the worst of all case scenarios. |
good point. As i pointed out earlier modern nuclear plants are built with the failsafe that IF there is a meltdown and the core is breached the plated itself is designed to be the containment system. so the worst case scenario is these plants in Japan become unusable. newpapers and people are freaking out because radioactive steam is being vented into the air. that steam contains very small amounts of radioactivity and is considered a safe alternative to vent the pressure than having the rods melt.
on the subject of alternative energy, yeah its great, and i'm glad were exploring these, i actually plan to get solar panel on my home in the near future, but they should be growing to replace our dependency on fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are dependent on market demand, cause all kinds of political problems and are much more detrimental to the environment than nuclear power is. coal produces green house gas, global warming, puts mercury in water, acid rain, smog, not to mention the horrible mining conditions.
nuclear power produces much, much, more power than solar, geothermal, wind or any other clean energy ever could ever possibly hope to. Nuclear power is the big boy and everything else is a wannabe. clean energy is really only polular becuase the owners or financiers of these "farms" get to sell green credits to companies so that they can continue to polute. clean energy is never going to run this planet.
its a shame that we associate nuclear power with weapons and mutations and cancer, and freak accidents such as this continue to give it a bad name.
we need energy. lots and lots of it. we need nuclear power.
Message edited by author 2011-03-16 21:23:09. |
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03/16/2011 09:40:09 PM · #74 |
Originally posted by mike_311:
its a shame that we associate nuclear power with weapons and mutations and cancer, and freak accidents such as this continue to give it a bad name.
we need energy. lots and lots of it. we need nuclear power. |
Bravo.
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03/16/2011 11:00:25 PM · #75 |
Originally posted by kirbic:
[I'll respectfully have to disagree... We've had a *lot* of pre-project howling about them, but after they are up, you do not hear complaints. There's a large (for our area) wind farm about a half-hour north of us, sited in semi-rural and small town environs. It got some resistance prior to being built, but I have not heard a complaint since it was built. It envelops a small town that I go to a few times a year. In the Summer, the sound of the breeze through the trees is louder than any noise from the turbines. Are they unsightly? Not really. Are they beautiful? Not really ;-) |
I live in the country... Let the city folks enjoy these wonderful contraptions. They are an eyesore, loud and I for one seriously doubt just how effective they truly are and whether the taxpayer is getting bang for the bucks.
Too much loss of energy when the wind blows and none when the wind stops.
The one thing people truly need when dealing with power is consistency... and I doubt this is the answer.
Ray |
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