OIL - History Lesson (warning - wall 'o' text)

Angilion said:
Wave and tidal power on UK coasts could generate quite a lot more electricity than the UK uses.
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I would love you to be right, I am a big fan of renewable energy... in theory. But in practice projects on that kind of scale are not going to happen for a variety of reasons. The sheer size and cost of the projects, the energy in v energy out, and -- mainly -- their remoteness from demand centres. Energy transmission is something which we can't afford to ignore because it introduces massive inefficiencies.

Tidal is also great during peak flow, but not so impressive as flow rates drop for much of the day. And wave power in general is as reliable as the wind. ie not at all when it comes to boiling your kettle after Eastenders. Storage is still a big problem.

I want renewables to be the answer, but after 30+ years of hope and optimism I have had to reluctantly accept that the energy density and value for money those technologies offer is only ever going to be a small part of what is required. Current project have more to do with political expediency than practicality... they are there to make it look like we're tackling energy issues rather than actually doing so.

I want to be wrong, honestly. But I'm not, sadly.

Andrew McP
 
Analogy to bad company / labrat's Peak Oil threads.

BadCompany: *links 8 ridiculously dramatized youtube videos made by various Michael Moore wannabes*
OMG GUYS THE SUN IS GOING TO GO DOWN LATER AND WE WILL ALL BE PLUNGED INTO DARKNESS... FOR AGES!

OcUK: It's called night and we knew about this already, wtf?

BadCompany: *links 5 more ridiculously dramatized youtube videos*
NO YOU MORON YOU AREN'T UNDERSTANDING! IT WILL BE DARK, YOU DO KNOW WHAT DARK IS RIGHT? YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT I KNOW!
 
simulatorman said:
Is there something you're not telling us?
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Well, public consultations are happening. The information is there.
The other more interesting matters such as island design, timescales, construction partners, repository etc are currently being discussed between the different parties. I'm sure this information will be available on the public domain soon.
Although strictly speaking the national repository has nothing to do with new build.
 
badcompany said:
Have you not noticed us in the West are skint ! Fusion is still a long way off.
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do we actually spend anyhting on Fusion? Is anyone seriously working towards making it viable?

considering this is possibly a planet saving technology and the banks gave out billion in extra pay I would hope at least a few billion is thrown at this..
 
edscdk said:
do we actually spend anyhting on Fusion? Is anyone seriously working towards making it viable?

considering this is possibly a planet saving technology and the banks gave out billion in extra pay I would hope at least a few billion is thrown at this..
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well there are lots of experimental fusion reactors (mit even has their own) iirc the current biggest is in Britain (JET, joint European torus), and there's the huge ITER facility being built in France as a massive international effort like the LHC at cern.

ITER is multi billion project and is also incorporating new advancements from the other reactors as it's being built.


after ITER there's the planned DEMO reactor which is hoping to produce a few GW continuously and basically match a current commercial power station.
 
rypt said:
Fusion will be with us eventually, but Fission is a technology we have now and with enough fuel to power us for thousands of years, going into millions once we start to use seawater to get uranium.


Are we doing anything in the UK though? NOPE!
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lulz, thousdands of years to millions? i've heard very different estimations to that... we've missed the boat on nuclear fission, it's just not a viable solution at the moment, aswell as this the fact about food/plastics etc etc is still being avoided....


And SIGMA---

It's not about the oil running out, its about the situation whereby supply does not meet demand, and the price skyrockets, creating economic mayhem... thats the theory anyway.... I personally wouldnt have such confidence in peoples ability to "adapt", especially not in highly populated urban environments, there are only so many trees per person to burn, and only so much land per person to grow crops on/ cattle.... in short the western world is too highly populated to revert to the old days without serious consequences ....
 
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Ricochet J said:
There's a lot of things happening behind closed doors which joe public do not know about.
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Has any concrete been poured into the ground? Nope.
Have any plans been fully finalised? Nope.
Have we even planned to build LOTS? Nope, just a few.

So we have done sweet FA ... come back when we have STARTED construction on enough nuclear reactors that upon completion they will provide 80% of our needs :) and not just a few extra %
 
ojrules said:
lulz, thousdands of years to millions? i've heard very different estimations to that... we've missed the boat on nuclear fission, it's just not a viable solution at the moment, aswell as this the fact about food/plastics etc etc is still being avoided....
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Conventional sources using breeding are for thousands

Using uranium in seawater takes it into millions

Realistically we only need a few hundred at most.


As for plastic, if we stop burning oil there is enough for plastic. Equally we have had scientists use bacteria to create plastic.


We also have algae biofuel technology
 
rypt said:
Crap
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You don't have a clue.

What's your understanding of the nuclear industry? What's your understanding of how the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate are involved? Do you know what goes into constructing a new station? Do you know what stages EDF Energy are in with regards to constructing the new stations? Are you aware of the problems faced by the Finish Olkiluoto nuclear power plant?
 
I know that we still have not poured any concrete into the ground

I also know that the number and size of reactors planned is not sufficient to power 80% of our needs and thus replace all the other current power stations, but will only add a few % extra to our grid (depending when we finally start building)

Lastly, I know that after OVER 13 years of economic growth we have not built a single reactor. If every £ of the Brown yearly deficit went to building reactors (even in 100% government funding rather than 50-50 partnership) ... guess how many reactors we could have?
 
So the answers to my questions are nothing?

rypt said:
I know that we still have not poured any concrete into the ground
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Are you sure about that?

rypt said:
I also know that the number and size of reactors planned is not sufficient to power 80% of our needs and thus replace all the other current power stations, but will only add a few % extra to our grid (depending when we finally start building)
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France have this problem. Why can't a nuclear station power up and shut down during times of demand?

rypt said:
Lastly, I know that after OVER 13 years of economic growth we have not built a single reactor. If every £ of the Brown yearly deficit went to building reactors (even in 100% government funding rather than 50-50 partnership) ... guess how many reactors we could have?
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:confused:
There are no public funds available for nuclear new build. It depends on the company building the reactors. Otherwise we wouldn't have stuff like this:
http://www.edfenergy.com/media-cent...ncluding_20_million_Community_Fund_240211.pdf
 
Ricochet J :confused: There are no public funds available for nuclear new build. It depends on the company building the reactors. Otherwise we wouldn't have stuff like this: [URL said:
[/URL]
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It's rather obvious what he's implying: Brown wasted taxpayers money on things such as immigration, corruption and bureaucracy which are inferior investments to nuclear power.

Which would be better? Regular electricity blackouts or working with nuclear power and upsetting the uneducated environmentalists?
 
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PanMaster said:
It's rather obvious what he's implying: Brown wasted taxpayers money on things such as immigration, corruption and bureaucracy which are inferior investments to nuclear power.
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Exactly.

I admit that nuclear has high up front costs, which is why I wanted to see 50-50 public/private partnerships for the funding to build them.
 
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