Paper

It’s easy to criticize the current nuclear regulatory system. But we need a replacement. What should it look like? Here’s my proposal.

I don’t expect to make it to 90. So I had to write this history a little prematurely. It tells the sad tale of how another opportunity to use nuclear power to solve the Gordian knot foundered on the Two Lies reef. jack

In Part 1, we found we probably have the better part of a century to react to global warming. In Part 2, we discovered the enormity of attempting to replace fossil fuel. If we screw this up, we could kill billions and rip civilization to shreads in the process. We also found that the current plan based on wind and solar has been and will continue to be a massive failure. So what should we do? This paper argues that the answer is nuclear power. But it must be truly cheap nuclear. Expensive nuclear is no where good enough. Thanks

This paper is based on the latest iteration of the Gordian Knot Group’s electrical grid model. The potential primary sources are wind, solar, nuclear, gas and coal. At user option, the model implements both battery and hydrogen storage. The model minimizes the sum of the grid cost and the social cost of CO2 at a user supplied CO2 price. In this paper the model has been exercised on Germany for a range of CO2 prices and nuclear costs. The results demonstrate the overwhelming importance of the cost of nuclear to the combinations of grid cost and CO2 emissions that are

One common and plausible argument against nuclear power is that it is too slow. The evidence offered is recent interminable builds in the US and Europe. But is this inherent in the technology? This post examines the American, French, and Japanese record. It turns out that there is no technical reason why a nuclear plant should require any more time than a coal plant to build. On the other hand, the whole learning curve concept for power plants appears to over-rated. Those who are betting on the learning curve to markedly reduce current exorbitant nuclear costs and endless build times,

There is a new book out, The Leak by Robert Crease which describes another screw up of which I was unaware. It is a textbook example of how not to handle a release of radioactive material. This post is brief summary of the incident and some musings on what we should learn from it. The paper assumes a background equivalent to reading Why Nuclear Power has been a Flop.

This is an old but excellent paper on used nuclear fuel. Some good graphics and brings together a bunch of useful calculations. The health hazard numbers are based on LNT which massively over-estimates risk at low dose rates. I disagree with Professor Cohen on the need for deep geologic disposal. We need to keep this valuable fuel where it will be easily accessible for use in breeder reactors.

To avoid further global warming, the consensus is we must get rid of fossil fuel and soon. Given these instructions, an engineer will ask, what does that imply? What am I being asked to replace? This post attempts to answer that question.

This is the first of a three part series entitled An Engineer Looks at Global Warming. Engineers are trained not to take sides. They are trained to understand the problem before proposing a solution. They are trained that in coming up with a solution everything is a trade-off. Every alternative worth investigating will have plusses and minuses, benefits and costs. This training goes against some of our most basic tribal instincts and is not always successful. But it does give an engineer a different perspective than most. Engineers solve problems by asking questions. This series asks three questions about global