Re: [Phys-l] Nuclear Power

[John Denker <jsd@av8n.com>]

On 05/02/2011 01:17 PM, chuck britton wrote:

> How do you power-up a grid that has sooooo much damage?
>
> Apply power and hope that fuses/breakers go before more damage is done??
> Disconnect branch lines and power them up one at a time?

It's even worse than that.  They need the grid to present a
well-behaved load to the nuclear power plant.

> They'll need to get the grid repaired to bring power IN before they 
> can restart and send power OUT.

Yes, power IN is an issue, too.

That actually is (or was) a problem with non-nuclear power
plants as well.  Many of them are (or were) unable to restart
without external power.

OTOH I am told that after the last big regional blackout, new
regulations were put in place requiring "black start" capability
at non-nuclear power plants.  So maybe that has gotten better.

  As I understand it -- and I'm definitely not an expert --
  the nuclear plants are considered so fragile that nobody
  even dreams of black start capability.  In the event of a
  disturbance in the grid, the nuclear plants are always the
  first to go down and the last to come back up.

========

I am reminded of the advertisements that Entergy runs in New York:  
  "Indian Point provides clean, reliable, lower-cost power, safely"

Reliable?  You've got to be kidding.  In the event of a disturbance,
nuclear plants are always the first to go down and the last to come
back up.

Low-cost?  Dubious.  As far as I can tell, without government 
subsidies, nobody would ever build a nuclear power plant.  It's 
just not economical.  The true balance sheet is hard to figure.
On the coal side it's hard to account for the cost of climate
change.  On the nuclear side it's hard to account for spent fuel
storage, weapons proliferation, and other nasty stuff.

I'm liking the photovoltaic idea more and more.  Millions of
acres of PV.  It's not economical at the moment, but it's not
far off the mark, and it's likely to get cheaper relative to
carbon and relative to nuclear.  It might already be economical,
if we could even-handedly account for all the hidden costs for 
each of the options.

I have no idea what Japan should do, since PV doesn't seem like
such a good option for them.