A Real Plan to Get Rid of Fossil Fuel and Cut Carbon

I thought we'd raise the issue, again, of nuclear, gas, coal and carbon with regards to capacity factors. Capacity factors are basically the nameplate maximum power over a period of time that a given form of generation can perform under optimal conditions.

So, from http://www.eia.doe.gov/... the Energy Information Administration of the DOE we get the following for the year ending 2006:

Coal:                           335,830 MWs or 335 GWs.
Natural Gas:                442,945 MWs or 442 GWs
Nuclear:                      105,585 or 105 GWs
Renewables, excluding hydro but including wind, solar, swamp gas, etc: 26,470 MWs or 26 GWs.

Now, ACTUAL capacity factors, that is what they can really produce when called upon to do so is a lot different than their name place capacity. Nuclear is about 90% or a little more of their capacity. Coal is about 70% and NG is about 65%. Wind is about 20 to 30% and solar is...well, about 25% or less. But for this discussion, we don't care, we'll use the nameplate capacity.

We know that in the US, 40% of all CO2 emissions are from electrical generation. 50% is from transportation and 10% from various masc. agricultural and industrial activities. We also know that deaths attributed to coal by the EPA amounts to almost 30,000. Respiratory illnesses in general, about 300,000, and that's a year. Every year. This of course has nothing to do with CO2 but with particulate thrown up into the air as a part of combustion along with water vapor and CO2.

None of the 3 Prez candidates as of this Diary have a clue about any of this, it seems. McCain has an inkling, as his handlers have told him, "John, can you say "nuclear"?" Good John. Well, he utters a solution without really understanding it I think. And, he doesn't understand the problem, putting everything into "Energy Independence" as it that means something. Anyway, that's my tip-of-the-hat to the Kos community with regards to all the Obama mania (who, among the 3 of them, from Illinois, SHOULD no something about this but clearly doesn't).

Back to the capacity factors. The goal is then to get rid of fossil. Especially coal. How do we do this? Well, of course, we need a serious conservation and efficiency program. But most of these programs, whether they are implemented by tax incentives, building codes or other forms of legislation and subsidies, will, at the end of the day, be voluntary. And thus unpredictable as to their ability to effect generation caused CO2. I'm all for it, which is why I mentioned it, but I'm not going to depend on it.

The only solution is a rapid, full-on program to replace the approx 700 GWs of fossil (with the 330 GWs of coal a priority) with approx 500 new generation III nuclear power plants. The 'average' size of a new NPP is around 1400 MWs (the low being 1100 MWs and the largest being 1800 MWs). We could eliminate ALL fossil base load and much peaking power plants this way. This would mean a 40% reduction in overall US CO2 emissions. This is a good thing, not a bad thing. It would make our electrical generation more reliable since nuclear plants don't come off line as much as coal or NG plants. There would be a tremendous health benefit as fewer people would come down with coal-generated respiratory and cardiac illnesses.

It would take us until 2050 but it could be done. It would mean building up a lot of the ancillary nuclear component infrastructure as well as raw materials like concrete and steel rebar. But it could be done. If we think it important enough to address these problems seriously. This would mean starting about 1 new NPP every two weeks. It would be mean rewriting useless and cumbersome NRC regulations that were designed to slow down, not make safe, NPP construction. It would mean true pre-approval of already approved NPP designs and make the location/siting stake-holders testimony the real hearings. From proposal to first concrete should not be more than 1 year, not the 4 years it takes today.

It means lowering the fees for smaller under-100 MWs NPPs to take into account lower revenue streams and it's more limited usages.  It means a whole-sale overhaul of the NRC to make it really an advocate of nuclear safety and expansion.

The Generation III plants within 20 years would give way to Generation IV Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors that would cost half as much to build, produce almost no waste at all and would breed it's own fuel from America's vast thorium resources.

But alas, few in the political world of electoral politics are brave enough to make this vision their own.

David Walters