Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

[santafe2]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

Is nuclear energy clean energy? I think nuclear energy has good potential.

By current convention, clean energy is a non specific term used to describe any energy source that does not come from a barrel of oil. For example, providers of coal based energy like to talk about clean coal. To be more specific it may be helpful to use the more discrete term, renewable energy which describes a group of energy products that have a much smaller carbon footprint.

As for nuclear, it's not renewable but it is clean unless there's a containment or disposal problem. Then it's quite problematic and the issues are not always easily contained to a geographic region. Nuclear energy is clean in the same way a caged tiger is safe.

I'm not an expert in the area of nuclear energy but I think it's fairly well accepted that there is no more than 50 years of uranium resources remaining on earth at current levels of use so the nuclear issue will most likely work itself out before it's resolved with policy or legislation.

[sadsack]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

I'm not an expert in the area of nuclear energy but I think it's fairly well accepted that there is no more than 50 years of uranium resources remaining on earth at current levels of use so the nuclear issue will most likely work itself out before it's resolved with policy or legislation.

While the world supply of U235 may be this low, the supply of U238 is orders of magnitude greater. While U238 is not a fissionable isotope (i.e., you can't create a sustainable chain reaction with pure U238 fuel), it can can be transmuted in a fast breeder reactor to the much more highly fissionable Pu239 - this is what the Japanese planned to do in the 80's/90's - build a few hundred breeder reactors and gain energy independence.

Other elements like Thorium can similarly be transmuted into fissionable isotopes.

An energy economy based on Plutonium comes with it's own suite of problems, to be sure, but these problems don't include scarcity.

[santafe2]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

An energy economy based on Plutonium comes with it's own suite of problems, to be sure, but these problems don't include scarcity.

Thanks for the contribution. A few more questions if you don't mind:
Is this process commercially available?
Is the spent material less toxic?
More proliferation resistant?

It seems clear that we're going to grow from the 400-500 plants we have today so it will be important that the world community lay out guidelines for developing a much safer methodology for development, management, recyling and storage.

[Rajiv]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

Here are some links for your information

Fast breeder reactor

Breeder reactors: A renewable energy source

[sadsack]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

Thanks for the contribution. A few more questions if you don't mind:

Is this process commercially available?
Is the spent material less toxic?
More proliferation resistant?

The answer is a resounding "HELL NO!" to all three questions (these are but a few of the "whole suite of problems")

It seems clear that we're going to grow from the 400-500 plants we have today so it will be important that the world community lay out guidelines for developing a much safer methodology for development, management, recyling and storage.

There's another type reactor design developed at Argonne National Labs back in the 80's and early 90's called the Integral Fast Reactor. It was developed to address the concerns you mention. This link provides general FAQ about the IFR program, written by an retired Argonne nuclear researcher:

http://www.nationalcenter.org/NPA378.html

I'm having trouble tracking down the original project info right now - sorry.

[GRG55]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

Before this is done, the term "clean energy" is going to be stretched and reshaped in ways we probably can't imagine today. Look for some aspects of conventional energy to be "re-branded" as clean energy - natural gas would be one possibility.

Anyone expecting Big Oil to be "pushed aside" may be in for a big disappointment - the best of them will re-invent themselves (the early, and not yet successful, leader down this path is BP with its "Beyond Petroleum" sunflower)...

Another example:

Chevron finishes 1st solar project phase

January 31, 2008

SAN PABLO, Calif.—Chevron Corp. said Thursday it completed the first phase of a $35.2 million solar-power project installation at the Contra Costa Community College District in California.

The overall project includes a 3.2 megawatt solar-power generation system, energy-management systems, electrical system replacements and high-efficiency lighting, heating, ventilation and air-conditioning equipment. The first phase of installation was for 2.65 megawatts worth of power generation, with the rest to be added this year.

Chevron said the project is the largest solar-power installation at a North American higher-education institution.

A one-megawatt plant running continuously at full capactiy can power 778 households each year, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Solar technology has lower capacity since its power generation is constrained by availability of the sun...

Link:

http://www.boston.com/news/science/a...project_phase/

[bill]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

Nuclear power development will be controlled threw distribution of enriched uranium fuel.
Politically correct, in the name of security and packaged plant technology with uranium fuel guarantees determines who gets nuclear power.
Energy security!
Policy makers:

http://www.nti.org/b_aboutnti/b1_board.html

http://www.gnep.energy.gov/

http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/News/...sdonation.html

http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2008_01-02/fuelcycle.asp

Recent Davos thinkers:

http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/ex...d-250108.shtml

report:http://www.weforum.org/en/initiative...risk/index.htm

Areva is looking for a uranium enrichment plant site in US . A plant is already under construction by LES http://www.urenco.com/sectionFrontPage.aspx?m=1705 in New Mexico .

http://www.argusobserver.com/article...c949272969.txt

BOISE (AP) — Areva Inc., a French government-controlled nuclear energy company, is in talks with officials in Idaho and other states over a planned $2 billion uranium enrichment facility that by 2014 could supply fuel to commercial nuclear power plants. Areva recently hired Erika Malmen, wife of Gov. C.L. ‘‘Butch’’ Otter’s former chief of staff, Jeff Malmen, to lobby Otter and state legislators, according to documents obtained from the Idaho secretary of state. Lawmakers said they’ve been drafting legislation to provide hundreds of millions in tax incentives to help persuade the company to build a plant near the Idaho National Laboratory nuclear reservation near Idaho Falls. Areva, whose U.S. operations are based in Bethesda, Md., has narrowed its list of places to build the plant to five states, spokeswoman Laurence Pernot told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

She declined to say if Idaho was on the short list and wouldn’t disclose the other locations, but said a final announcement is due ‘‘in the coming weeks.’’

The company already has a uranium enrichment facility in France and is currently building another $3 billion plant in its home country. Areva plans to add this new U.S. plant by 2014, to help compensate for a U.S. nuclear fuel supply that could shrink once a program in which Russia has been converting weapons-grade uranium to low-enriched uranium and selling it to an Areva rival expires in 2013.

‘‘This demonstrates a real need for additional domestic capacity,’’ Pernot said. ‘‘Areva is ... committed to fueling the nuclear renaissance.’’

Idaho has a long history of involvement in nuclear research at the Idaho National Laboratory, where reactor tests have been conducted since 1949.

[bill]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

Nuclear power development will be controlled threw distribution of enriched uranium fuel.

http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/News/...sdonation.html

A rush to sign.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080202...m_080202051231

Sat Feb 2, 12:36 AM ET
The agreement, signed at Dulles International Airport near Washington by Gutierrez and Russian Federal Atomic Energy Agency Director Sergey Kiriyenko, allows for sale of Russian uranium products directly to US utilities under a quota for Russian exports from 2014 to 2020.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JB09Ak03.html
Russia will supply uranium fuel to the US

Feb 9, 2008 The Washington deal means a lot to Russia - commercially, politically and strategically. Kiriyenko admitted it is worth US$5-6 billion in commercial terms in the coming five-year period alone. By 2014, one in five American nuclear plants will be running on Russian uranium. The access to the US market enables Russia to fully utilize its uranium enrichment capacity, which stands at 40% of the world total.

The Russian daily Nezavisimaya Gazeta noted that Washington has signaled that "it is interested in expanding cooperation with Moscow in civil nuclear power". According to the US Nuclear Energy Institute, the American market will have a uranium shortage beginning in 2011 so it makes sense for the US to liberalize its market for Russian uranium.

This new partnership will develop a uranium fuel distribution network globally.

Therefore, through Friday's deal, Washington offers a bonanza to Moscow by jettisoning the prohibitive and discriminatory 112% customs duty that has so far kept Russian low-enriched uranium off the US market. The US ban also covered any fuel supply or reprocessing of waste fuel by Russia for US-made nuclear reactors in third countries such as Taiwan or China.

Clearly, a cartel is in the making in the highly lucrative nuclear fuel trade. And Washington and Moscow are on the same page.

[sadsack]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

Rise, bubble, rise - "the power of Christ compels you . . ."

This came to my attention courtesy of CNN (article is first link, report summary is the second link):

http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/science....ap/index.html

http://www.cera.com/aspx/cda/public1....aspx?CID=9239

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (Feb. 5, 2008) -- Increasing public concerns about climate change -- and its potential economic and political security consequences -- are driving public policy and private investment to bring clean energy technologies from the fringes of the global energy industry to the center of activities as quickly as possible, a new analysis by Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA) has concluded.
The result of this rising public and private momentum is an increase in worldwide clean energy investment that could surpass US$7 trillion by 2030 in cumulative real 2007 dollars, according to the CERA report Crossing the Divide: The Future of Clean Energy.

The bolded portion caught my eye. Cumulative investment through 2030 in dollars discounted to the present is $7 trillion. Factoring in some "POOM"-style inflation of 8-10% yields a ballpark figure in nominal dollars of $20 trillion.

The inflated figure is about the size EJ has guesstimated elsewhere . . .

[Slimprofits]

Re: Time To Move On to the Next Bubble: Clean Energy

A rush to sign.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080202...m_080202051231



http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JB09Ak03.html
Russia will supply uranium fuel to the US

This new partnership will develop a uranium fuel distribution network globally.

Russia makes year's first uranium shipment to U.S.

Russia's Techsnabexport shipped on April 7 the first batch of low-enriched uranium to the United States in 2009 under a bilateral agreement, nuclear-power corporation Atomenergoprom said on Wednesday.

Techsnabexport, a Russian company that exports goods and services produced by the nuclear power sector, is integrated into Atomenergoprom.

"This shipment has initiated the schedule of deliveries in 2009, which will be carried out at a new price approved by the governments of both countries," Atomenergoprom said in a statement.

Russia and the United States are cooperating in the nuclear sphere on the HEU-LEU project. The HEU-LEU contract, also known as the Megatons to Megawatts agreement, was signed in February 1993 and expires in 2013.

It aims to convert 500 metric tons of high-enriched uranium (HEU), the equivalent of approximately 20,000 nuclear warheads, from dismantled Russian nuclear weapons into low-enriched uranium (LEU), which is then converted into nuclear fuel for use in U.S. commercial reactors.