A Nuclear Texas

Is #nuclearenergy the answer for Texas? Is it the answer for anywhere? Can we be objective, or will #energy rationality get overrules by hysteria?

I just read it, and this article makes a several good points, in particular, that #nuclear has been partly derailed simply by the difficulty of getting it approved.

#Environmental / #climate groups have claimed that nuclear is not a solution because it takes too long and costs too much.

But if you look a little deeper, you find such groups are far from objective bystanders, and are in fact, the variously named #greenenergy movements have focused on attacking it and preferring #wind and #solar.

Big #hydro has also gone out of favor, the WWF and others disowning it recently; though it is always included when touting how #green a particular area's energy is or isn't. [Like Oregon - where it's actually hydro, coal and #naturalgas, see below]

Considering, from all appearances, that all environmental groups, of late, push as their number 1 priority #climateaction, then I could surmise that most people cannot make sense of the fact that they concomitantly oppose the greatest known source of #carbonfree energy.

So, if these groups simultaneously oppose all #fossilfuels development, especially in the developing world, one might wonder how they expect to maintain any standard of living at all with current technology? What can we say about the developing world we #solarpower #minigrids just decayed? You can't just build it and forget about it as 90% of the communities of one project learned.

You can look again--what if we indeed turned it all off--nuclear and #oilandgas (and #coal)?

Meanwhile, back in Texas, as I said on Friday, peak load hits just as the sun is going down. Wind starts to pick up. It's physics. Yes, we can have batteries, especially for that 6-9 slot (see graph below) or longer in the wintertime and especially if more and more people electrify everything in their homes and expect all heating to come from electricity. It does cost in the billions, so let's be real.

Looking again at the above #ERCOT dashboard, the straight line is nuclear. They can run supply a baseload and are quietly going about their business while people argue about the peak load. And if you raised that baseload line, what would happen?

Texas has not added NET baseload in 20 years through many political administrations. They have added wind and solar. But as we know, we can't call upon them from 6-9. They call upon you, not the other way around. We can add 1GW of wind turbines for perhaps $1B, but it won't give us 1GWh per hour. It's capacity factor is 45%, but even that is not on-demand. Yet nuclear in Texas is 5% of power capacity but 10% of generation.

We know Texas is also oil and gas. Its reserves and its history mean it will be for a long time, but it may come as a small surprise to some that so many oil and gas people seem to support nuclear. It may be because our backgrounds are from science, and we care more for physics and thermodynamics than memes and hashtags.

Engineers are not politicians. Our calculations do not include whether popularity or elections.

If people, politicians and companies can work together better, we can improve energy access and affordability, reliability and care for the environment.

Making better energy decisions requires a pretty broad mind and forward thinking.

Let's do it.

RBAC, Inc. rbac.com