Vast Swath of US At Risk of Summer Blackouts, Regulator Warns (newsnationnow.com) 195
An anonymous reader quotes a report from NewsNation: Blackouts could plague a number of states in the U.S. this summer, regulators warn, as a combination of drought, heat, potential cyber attacks, geopolitical conflicts and supply chain problems could disrupt the power supply, according to a grim new report (PDF) from the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC). The regulatory body found that large swathes of the U.S. and parts of Canada are at an elevated or high risk of energy shortfalls during the summer's hottest months.
The Midwest is at especially high risk due to the retirement of older plants, which has caused a 2.3% decrease in capacity from last summer, as well as increased demand, according to NERC. In the Southwest, plummeting river levels may cripple hydropower production, the group warned, and in Texas drought-related heat events could cause extreme energy demand. A NERC map shows all states in the western half of the continental U.S., including North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas are at least under elevated risk of energy shortfalls, with parts of the northeastern-most states under high risk. Many states under the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois and Indiana are either entirely or partly at high risk. "Industry prepares its equipment and operators for challenging summer conditions. Persistent, extreme drought and its accompanying weather patterns, however, are out-of-the-ordinary and tend to create extra stresses on electricity supply and demand," said Mark Olson, NERC's manager of Reliability Assessments. "Grid operators in affected areas will need all available tools to keep the system in balance this summer."
The Midwest is at especially high risk due to the retirement of older plants, which has caused a 2.3% decrease in capacity from last summer, as well as increased demand, according to NERC. In the Southwest, plummeting river levels may cripple hydropower production, the group warned, and in Texas drought-related heat events could cause extreme energy demand. A NERC map shows all states in the western half of the continental U.S., including North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas are at least under elevated risk of energy shortfalls, with parts of the northeastern-most states under high risk. Many states under the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), such as Arkansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois and Indiana are either entirely or partly at high risk. "Industry prepares its equipment and operators for challenging summer conditions. Persistent, extreme drought and its accompanying weather patterns, however, are out-of-the-ordinary and tend to create extra stresses on electricity supply and demand," said Mark Olson, NERC's manager of Reliability Assessments. "Grid operators in affected areas will need all available tools to keep the system in balance this summer."
lol no (Score:5, Insightful)
No, the midwest is at especially high risk because they've nimby'd renewables. They didn't close those older plants on a whim.
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No, the midwest is at especially high risk because they've nimby'd renewables. They didn't close those older plants on a whim.
This in a nutshell...
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Kinda like stopping fossil fuel exploration and processing BEFORE alternates are already online and viable to take over.
It's not nimbys (Score:5, Insightful)
It's the same reason we have baby food shortages. In the past the government would have stepped in and insured supply before they were shortages. But we've cut regulations and spending to the Bone and so a disaster wasn't inevitable.
It turns out that while communism doesn't work either does unfettered capitalism. You need a little from column a little from column b.
But nobody likes to be told what to do. Never forget the scariest words are I'm from the government and I'm here to help. I mean sure the government built out your power grid and stabilized your economy and food supply from the disasters of the 1930s and 40s... We're not allowed to teach that history anymore in schools and it's not like it's sunk in when we did.
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Wrong we have a baby formula shortage because unscientific government regulations make importing perfectly safe baby formula products from say the EU with its lower infant mortality rates...
Nope the problem is entirely one of governments make. Its entirely one that are already very large administrative state was even aware of but chose instead to not act on or did not care enough to run the issue high enough up the chain to get anything meaningful done in time. Bigger government would only have resulted in
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It does not have anything to do with the government per se, or capitalism versus communism.
You have a monopoly manufacture for baby milk. And because of your retarded out of control capitalizm: he only has one single factory - just like in a bad SF movie. And that factory is closed. Ooops.
But that is America. Gods own country of awesomeness.
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And closing that factory for weeks instead of cleaning in a day then proceeding with heightened testing is a government competency problem. Failure.
re: wind and solar (Score:4, Interesting)
No.... wind and solar don't *really* "work just fine". Not in the sense you need stable, 24/7 base load power generation if you want truly reliable electric power for your city or state.
Wind farms are turning out to be kind of a joke in many respects. Have you seen the worn out or broken blades that are piling up in junk yards because they don't lend themselves to any kind of feasible re-use/recycling? You also have the high expense of maintenance on those because people need special training and certifications just to climb the towers and work on them at those altitudes. Never mind the original issues like bird kills. But even if all of this was magically corrected tomorrow, you can't make the wind blow constantly.
Solar generates absolutely NO power at night; a fact that doubling the installation cost with large battery storage schemes doesn't change.
These technologies are great for supplemental power generation, but any plan to deploy them in PLACE of existing generators that were capable of 24/7 power generation is NOT going to improve things. Truthfully, what government is best at is getting really, really big and costly projects started that private industries don't want to take a risk on. That's how America got a space program, not to mention our copper wire land line phone grid (which was a blessing for a century or so and then became more of a curse, when others leapfrogged us in fiber and wireless tech). Government should have been pushing for nuclear power plant upgrades and new deployments using safer technologies. Instead, we've got these feel-good, less costly or controversial measures like putting up more solar panels. They're silent and don't pollute -- so they don't get a lot of resistance to constructing them. But they aren't constant base-load power sources.
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Yes, it's very unfortunate that there is just no way that solar can work at night and no one has ever built a solar facility that can provide energy at night... Oh wait, it can and they have: https://futurism.com/molten-salt-make-24-hour-solar-energy-possible/ [futurism.com]
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This has literally nothing to do with a lack of money in Midwestern states. There are some pretty complex things going on here, but the two most relevant are the utter failure of yet another wholesale power market to perform as designed, and massive fuel shortages for fossil generators.
MISO's capacity auction a few weeks ago saw capacity prices increase by a factor of 50 year over year. A capacity auction is designed to ensure that the regional grid operator has enough capacity margin to serve all load wi
Re:It's not nimbys (Score:5, Insightful)
many can, but choose not to. And many say they "can't"...but it's just because they don't want to make time for it.
Well how's about fixing the problem of Maternity leave? In most European countries one of the things that contributes to higher rates of breast feeding is that mothers get reasonable amounts of paid time off just after the birth of their children to start looking after them. That's followed by a right to unpaid leave with a guarantee of return to work in most countries.
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Maternal leave is not unpaid.
It is paid.
And a couple can have roughly 16month leave, and can decide who of them takes which months.
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But you know many can, but choose not to. And many say they "can't"...but it's just because they don't want to make time for it.
Tell me you've never had kids without telling me you've never had kids.
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There are windmills all over Iowa. To the extent that I'm surprised how many I see. I know I first started seeing them 20 years ago.
They're present in North and South Dakota, Nebraska, and Kansas too...I've traveled through all recently, but I haven't covered enough area there to get a good feel of the extent.
North and South Dakota have a number of hydroelectric dams.
Up until recently, there was a nuclear plant in Omaha...but that has apparently been shut down.
That's just what I'm familiar with in my gene
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And, for what it's worth...Ethanol. I'm still not sure, one way or another, if it's actually a good thing or not...but it's considered a renewable.
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Wind generators do just fine in corn fields - flat farmland is great for wind generation.
Ethanol would be viable without subsidy right now. We don't even have to waste the grain - just process the cellulose leftover from the dead plants. The problem is that it wasn't viable 10 years ago so everyone abandoned cellulosic ethanol.
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I did read when Biden was asking the EPA to allow the E15, that there are some concerns with increased smog. I am not sure also about Ethanol, as it seems like it is very wasteful of cropland, and there are fossil fuels used in fertilizer and equipment to produce it, so likely it has a high amount of emissions involved in it. Also, Ethanol causes issues for certain types of robber materials, and has to have special care given to the materials in gaskets and tubes used in the vehicle it is being used in.
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certain types of robber materials,
Interesting typo, unfortunately missed it on my preview. Should be rubber...
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In a sense it's an apt description, why would a car manufacturer use seals that perishes when exposed to ethanol? Because it's cheaper and it robs the owner of the car of it's usage prematurely. No manufacturer builds a car to last, because how else are they going to increase the sale of parts and new models?
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I would expect it has to do with age more than anything, E10-E15 is a relatively new thing.
I filled my gas tank last night at a pump with E15, and happened to read the warning label about when not to use E15, and one of the requirements to use it is a 2007 or newer car. Likely older cars were not meant to function with Ethanol in the fuel, so it was not recommended to be there. I have also heard that it does bad things to lawn equipment, but as it is all that is available in this area, I expect that probl
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Midwest is at especially high risk because regulatory requirements made it unprofitable to operate the legacy generating plants.
If the lights go out its the EPA's fault.
It's the Republican-created EPA's fault if a bunch of Republican-run states can't wipe their own asses, i.e. they can't generate power without shitting all over everyone else? Go on, pull the other one.
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Nixion has virtually no connection the current GOP.
Right, Nixon was a much better person than these world-burning shitlords.
Re:lol no (Score:5, Informative)
Nixion has virtually no connection the current GOP. The regulations that have most hurt the generating industry were put in place by Obama appointees.
Yeah fuck clean air! Texas sued Obama (and lost) because their pollution was drifting into other states. Oh I just learned something really interesting about the Texas power grid. You know how they don't want to be connected to the rest of the states for reasons? Well it turns out they have interconnects with Mexico!
https://www.ecmag.com/section/... [ecmag.com]
Re: lol no (Score:4, Informative)
They don't want to be connected to the American grids because it subjects them to federal regulations. Lots of federal powers come from their role in regulating interstate commerce. You can avoid many federal laws by simply not operating across state lines.
Re: lol no (Score:4, Informative)
The feds regulate international commerce too.
They just haven't taken that tack with Texas because money
Re: lol no (Score:2)
Because the federal government doesn't care if the Texas power grid goes out or the Mexican power grid. They care very much if the California grid takes out the Idaho grid.
They'll win the next time they sue (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, elections have consequences, and one of them is a partisan Supreme Court that will strike down any law that runs counter to their party.
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That's fine, however ignoring past precedents because your voter base is concerned about sky daddy is not fine.
Meanwhile Benjamin Franklin was handing out abortion instructions. https://www.npr.org/2022/05/18... [npr.org]
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If you're alluding to abortion...even Ruth Bader Ginsberg had stated the Roe decisions was bad law...
I personally wish the Roe thing would stand..
I think at least through first trimester sure, its a choice. I think MOST people in the US go along with that.
And it could possibly jeopardize the conservative wave this election year.
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She also said overturning it would be bad law [uchicago.edu]:
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Not quite. The "interpretation" of the Constitution is based on English Common law insofar as the founders wanted to prevent such laws from happening. For example, the First Amendment right to free speech is a direct attack on English law which prohibited certain free speech, especially against the Crown.
The same with not being able to quarter soldiers in civi
Re:They'll win the next time they sue (Score:4, Interesting)
Your point is what exactly? Yes we fought the revolution because there were aspects of English rule and English law we did not like. So yes both the constitution and the articles of confederation before it addressed specific issues.
Its a patch not a rewrite. In terms of understanding what is/was intended by the constitution you have to read it with an understanding of the common law environment that existed at the time. Where it does not conflict with common law or specific elements of US code laid down since, you should reasonably read it the background of what would Common law have done. Which is you know what our legal system usually does..
Madison did what Madison did - not all the others who ratified it; read things as radically as he did. Their understanding is every bit as operative or should be and we have been fighting over it ever since. If I were a lefty-wingnut I would not exactly hold Madison up either. He aided Jefferson in his attempt to block the previous administrations political appointments. Pretty much Trumps argument the siting president won the election thus aught to have the near absolute authority to reverse administrative actions of the prior administration without review. Personally I agree with Madison here; I think the concept of civil service is anti-democratic and election SHOULD have consequences. We should have pure spoils system, and current guy should be able to reverse the administative decisions of the last guy. If its creating a whipsaw situation than congress should get off their arses and legislate instead up setting up Yet-another-administrative-agency and passing the buck.
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Where does the constitution say I can't get an abortion? The old saying still stands. If men could get pregnant there would be abortion centers on every corner.
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Re:lol no (Score:4, Interesting)
working just fine for them
Yeah, fuck everyone else who was getting screwed over by the pollution and climate change it was causing. It worked just fine for Texans... Well, not Texans, they suffered too, but definitely worked fine for the owners of those polluting power stations.
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Well, the guy is dead after all. Not that this would prevent him from remaining active in GOP politics . . .
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all largely Democrat voting states
Minnesota: Governor (Dem), Senate (GOP), House (Dem)
Minnesota: Michigan: Governor (Dem), Senate (GOP), House (GOP)
Illinois: Governor (Dem), Senate (Dem), House (Dem)
Wisconsin: Governor (Dem), Senate (GOP), House (GOP)
Iowa: Governor (GOP), Senate (GOP), House (GOP)
For small values of "largely", yes
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You do know that is publicly available information [wikipedia.org] right? The largest margin of victory for Biden was 17% in Illinois and the lowest margin was less than 1% in Wisconsin. Also Biden lost Iowa decisively to Trump. So "by largely Democrat" you meant “not at all", then you would be correct.
Re:lol no (Score:5, Funny)
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Solar is also starting to have issues with environmental concerns because of all the plants that are being displaced.
Bahahaha. Yes it is so sad that all these homeowners could have plants on their roofs instead of solar cells. It is so sad that large scale solar plants in the middle of the dessert is displacing all those pine trees.
That doesn't even consider the production issues with any of these technologies, after all,
Yes because fossil fuel plants have zero costs. Steel just grow out of the ground in the form of turbine and pipes.
wind power produces more CO2 than nuclear.
Citation needed.
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Which political ideology exactly are you referring to? This is a problem in 3/4 of the US, if it is a political ideology that is at fault, it is both parties that are at fault.
FTFA: https://www.newsnationnow.com/... [newsnationnow.com]
Many of these electric companies are private organizations which fund through the electrical fees, so I am not even sure why you bring up taxes, as generally plants are not paid for that way. Many of the issues are related to the most extreme drought in modern history. Lake Mead is lower than
So this is a 2022 problem? (Score:3, Interesting)
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I'm glad I'm in TVA land... not that they're inherently any better at planning or even operating (although they did seem to learn from the Browns Ferry fire), but at least they aren't driven by the short-term profit goals that seems to be such a problem with so many companies.
And also: TVA appears to have sufficient generating capacity to cover the load demands.
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I do wish TVA would move more quickly with implementing renewables and shutting down coal. It's the South, the days and times when load is the highest are also the days and times when solar works best.
Summer dreams, ripped at the seams... (Score:2)
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It's almost as if... (Score:2)
It's almost as if there haven't been decades of warnings.
I mean. All energy companies invested in their infrastructure, right? Heh. I crack myself up.
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I mean. All energy companies invested in their infrastructure, right? Heh. I crack myself up.
Hey now you don't make money by writing checks.
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They do, but only for new projects. Energy companies don't get paid for maintaining infrastructure, and since we don't hold them responsible when it fails either (PG&E got a handslap for their century-old hooks failing, compared to the damage done and lives lost) they are only really motivated to build new generation facilities, and do the absolute minimum to make sure they can sell the power (which isn't as profitable as building the facilities.)
This is the real reason there is so much push from corpor
Electric companies getting smarter... (Score:2)
Re: Electric companies getting smarter... (Score:2)
If it is, then the insurance adjustors are gonna come in and fix that.
Solar Panels y'all? (Score:2)
I'd like to hope that the vast number of solar panels being installed in the US will reduce the crisis - but perhaps I'm being optimistic!
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In my case, I was ready to install panels 10 years ago. I have a large south-facing roof in Texas. My biggest issues in doing this have mainly been getting accentuate bids from reliable companies, and my electrical service as it comes into my home. Every contractor out there seems to be fly-by-night trying to "lease" me a system, I want to buy mine and most companies dealing in that are too new ( 2 years of operation) or don't want to sell it to me outright. I could DIY or then hire another installation co
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Well about $8K of that is electrical service work, bringing the service off the street to the East side of the home and another $12K in a new roof. So that takes a good chunk out of the budget. I'm on my second roof now in 22 years of owning this place and all the contractors have said that while the roof is good, you're not going to mount panels on it without redoing the roof, so I'll upgrade it as well. So that's half of the budget. Maybe I'll do it after a hail storm and see if my insurance company will
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Wasting $40k on virtue signaling is insane. That would pay my power bill for more than a thousand months. Do you really think that system is going to last more than eighty years so it can pay for itself?
It's not all virtue signaling. When you put in solar plus battery storage (with the storage mostly being the most expensive part), you are setting yourself up to ride though power outages (without storage, solar panels don't help you when the grid goes down.) If you work from home, have a family member with a medical condition that needs electricity, live in an area where lack of climate control is a safety issue, or just don't want to be inconvenienced by a grid outage, spending money on having a reliable
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Portable generators are much cheaper than battery storage. Mine runs on propane so I don't have to worry about gasoline solidifying inside the generator while it sits in storage. I don't need it to power the whole house, just the fridge and some cell phone chargers.
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That's why I have both. Just not the PowerWall.
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Possibly an apples to oranges comparison, but I have a fairly large house with multiple family [PH]EVs here in the UK. With the on-going energy crisis and price rises
So what did Americans think would happen (Score:2)
This is why they want to take over the schools, BTW. I was taught what the TVA is an how it's basically the reason why the mid west and south (read: the poor states) have electricity in the first place. 40+ years of "Starve The Beast" and austerity politics (which somehow still manage to run up deficits while providing shit se
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California leads the way in brownouts since the early 2000s. Team D also fails to spend on infrastructure.
Oh, I See (Score:2)
Can it get any worse? (Score:2)
Re:Mark Olson's comment means... (Score:5, Insightful)
What he's really saying is he's an AGW denialist. Persistent, extreme drought and its accompanying weather patterns are no longer out of the ordinary, and he needs to crawl out from under the rock he's been using to hide from reality and wake up to how things work now. AGW has always been predicted to exacerbate existing trends in some cases, and also reduce predictability. You might get extended droughts punctuated by flash floods that overwhelm drainage capacities and cause landslides while running off too rapidly to soak in and replenish aquifers, for example. Or you might get extended floods punctuated by droughts, with soaring temperatures and humidity levels for long periods that kill people by the score, literally.
This whole fantasy that we can expect things to go back to how they were, or that things haven't changed, is literally insane. You can't plan for the future by ignoring the present.
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I replaced my 35 year old central air conditioning system a week ago. The new one should be more efficient, requiring less electricity. It cost a lot of money, but it should help solve this problem.
I did the same thing last fall, only my old AC was 43 years old (according to the stamp on AC) and after one season of use I only seen 15% electricity cost savings. These meager savings are very disappointing, I hope during peak heat savings are more substantial.
I suspect that notable energy savings could only be had by massive renovation to upgrade insulation and sealing, something that is not even remotely feasible or cost effective.
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I replaced three 18yo units a couple of years ago, my summer rates have dropped about 20% YMMV.
Next year it's solar panels and a couple of Tesla Powerwalls.
Re: I did my part. (Score:2)
15% of AC use or 15% of overall? 15% overall is pretty good. It probably means getting a new fridge or washer/dryer would make a good dent as well.
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You say that you have seen only a 15% electricity cost savings. Not sure why you would expect a whole lot more savings since you've only had it for fall, winter and part of spring. If that 15% is from your total electricity bill, since I doubt you have sub-metering for your AC, that would imply a higher than 15% reduction in AC power usage by your HVAC.
You don't say where you live, but where I live we don't tend to use AC during winter, and only recently had it back on. Therefore I would not expect even
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No way you'll save enough to pay for the unit before it dies.
I did back of the napkin math prior to replacing AC, and it would need to function for about 15 years to break-even on electricity savings. Which is feasible with a reliable unit. However, upgrading AC should not be purely about savings - you also lowering your energy consumption, which is systemic benefit.
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If you install a heat pump where you didn't have one before, you might also be saving a lot on heating energy use. There's nowhere in the continental US at least where you don't want heat sometimes.
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If you install a heat pump where you didn't have one before, you might also be saving a lot on heating energy use. There's nowhere in the continental US at least where you don't want heat sometimes.
Realistically, you probably won't save enough to pay for the cost, if you save anything at all. Very few homes still use resistance heat these days except as a backup for when it gets so cold that heat pumps stop working adequately. Most of the time, the alternative to a heat pump is natural gas, and in a lot of places, gas is much, much cheaper as a heat source than electricity, even with the most efficient heat pumps you can buy.
Here in California, for example, at the cheapest PG&E residential per-k
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I'm sure glad you are thinking of the environment. Glad that you will continue to drive your old car, and haven't purchased a large diesel or gas powered truck in the last 5 or 10 years. We need more thinkers like you.
There is something odd about your statement though. If you believe the new unit won't last very long, why do you think the old unit will? It would seem foolish to replace a fully functional unit that has good efficiency to get one with only marginally better efficiency. However, if the un
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I replaced my 35 year old central air conditioning system a week ago. The new one should be more efficient, requiring less electricity. It cost a lot of money, but it should help solve this problem.
Me too, I turned down my swimming pool heater from 87 to 85 degrees. It's a big sacrifice but I'm willing to do it.
Law of Unintended Consequences on Waste (Score:2)
I replaced my 35 year old central air conditioning system a week ago. The new one should be more efficient, requiring less electricity. It cost a lot of money, but it should help solve this problem.
Please get back to us on that and let us know how it turns out. I am very skeptical of such statements: Compressing refrigerant is the highest power consumption of the AC process (immutable) and, end-user assumptions aside, the only people telling us the newer systems are significantly more efficient are those trying to sell us one.
We replaced our decades-old unit for alleged efficiency. The newer unit broke every several years, costing hundreds of dollars each time. Eventually, IT had to be replaced.
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I replaced my 35 year old central air conditioning system a week ago. The new one should be more efficient, requiring less electricity. It cost a lot of money, but it should help solve this problem.
The trouble is, the people who are most likely to still be running old air conditioners are doing so because they can't afford a new one. It's the same deal with BEVs; if you've got the wiggle room in your budget for a $40k+ car, you're probably not someone who is truly struggling with the cost of gas. For a lot of people, going more efficient just isn't in the cards.
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This is true of almost everything. The only people who can save money are rich people. Poor people can't even buy groceries in bulk because they don't have room to store it. Literally everything is more expensive when you are poor.
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Poor people can't even buy groceries in bulk because they don't have room to store it. Literally everything is more expensive when you are poor.
Literally everything is easier when you are poor, but cooperativism can let poor people enjoy some of the benefits of having more purchasing power, in particular that bulk groceries thing.
Re:I did my part. (Score:4, Insightful)
your part would be to elect leaders that assure that liquid-fluoride thorium reactors (LFTRs, pronounced âoeliftersâ) are built throughout the USA in vast quantities
First someone has to successfully build and operate one viable commercial LFTR. So far that hasn't happened. Nobody can ensure that something that probably doesn't make sense, probably won't be profitable, and might not even be feasible is going to happen.
Instead what you did was mere virtue signaling, then bragging about it.
You're virtueless-signaling, that's even less.
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Oh, now we want capitalism to build a LFTR instead of government (i.e., Oak Ridge National Labs) to do it. Nice 180-degree turn there, SlashDot. Usually SlashDot's politics yearns for government to act instead.
Those of us who know we live in the real world where certain things are true understand the actual situation. Governments build large capital projects through contractors, and since capitalism is the controlling philosophy underlying literally all governments of consequence today in general the only exception to the idea that things have to be profitable on some level is military spending. Even public transportation, which loses money reliably on paper, is a benefit overall. But production is cheapest with
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If those reactors are economical and well designed then why doesn't anyone build one?
Re:I did my part. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Because "green" irrational fear of nuclear technology resulted in massive regulatory compliance costs
There's nothing irrational about it. The greens are just better at estimating risk than you are. You're only calculating deaths to date when there's nuclear waste sitting all over the place and poorly maintained nuclear reactors operating all over the place. You're not figuring in the costs of having to abandon large swaths of land in the case of failures. You're pushing your failures off onto future generations that shouldn't have to pay for your tendency to support shiny stuff that sounds neato.
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in 2022 you can walk next to both Chernobyl and Fukushima.
Sure as long as you stay on the hard surfaces and don't use vehicles the churn up to much radio-active dust. This about the most laughable statement I have read in a week. The fact that you visit the exclusion zone without your hair falling out and your digestive tract failing does mean its not still 100% impaired from an economic standpoint!
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in 2022 you can walk next to both Chernobyl and Fukushima.
Sure as long as you stay on the hard surfaces and don't use vehicles the churn up to much radio-active dust. This about the most laughable statement I have read in a week.
Right, that's why I disagreed with it and scoffed at it. Then I got modded down for that. Slashdot loves it when you speak truth to power, unless that power is nuclear.
The fact that you visit the exclusion zone without your hair falling out and your digestive tract failing does mean its not still 100% impaired from an economic standpoint!
Amen to that. People continually downplay the negative impact of nuclear power and it's tiresome. I get that there are reasons why it's attractive, but the numbers don't bear out a need for it, nor even the idea that it makes sense. I get why you'd use it on an aircraft carrier, but not to power cities (unless that aircraft carrier is parked
Re:I did my part. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I did my part. (Score:4, Interesting)
Nuclear is not emissions-free when considered cradle to grave. You're an outright liar. We need more load-following power, not more baseload, you're an outright liar again.
Are you saying that wind or solar emission-free when considered cradle to grave? Are you saying that solar and wind is load-following?
Honest question, are you trying to parody yourself or are you actually serious?
Re:I did my part. (Score:4, Interesting)
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Why didn't it go anywhere?
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Why didn't it go anywhere?
LFTRs & other MSRs are in the process of being commercialized by FLiBE, ThorCon, and 5 other startups (unlike fusion which cannot enter the engineering commercialization phase yet due to not ever having the science demonstrated by fusion's perennial inability to ever achieve breakeven.
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I believe the question was really "why hasn't it gone anywhere before now" given that the technology was supposedly viable in the sixties. Can't blame NIMBYs because they can only add on a decade and increase costs, they can't stop a plant.
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I believe the question was really "why hasn't it gone anywhere before now" given that the technology was supposedly viable in the sixties. Can't blame NIMBYs because they can only add on a decade and increase costs, they can't stop a plant.
Easily answered:
Cowan, Robin. “Nuclear Power Reactors: A Study in Technological Lock-In.” The Jour
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It has become increasingly clear in the last couple of years that people who use the term "virtue signaling" are always deflecting.
I don't agree, although I would propose that it is true more often than not. There really is real virtue signaling out there. There is a lot of it, too. Here's a really, really great example, in that it is unarguable: people who talk about themselves under the guise of asking questions during/after someone's talk. A question generally either begins with either one of the six question words (in English anyway) or an auxiliary verb. Do, can, should... It never begins with "I", unless you're posing it in the f
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Just see it. Irrefutable.
refutation after refutation [google.com]
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