Learning About Energy

The Uniqueness of Nuclear and Why it Makes All the Difference

Few people fully appreciate the uniqueness of nuclear fission as an energy source, and why this uniqueness makes all the difference in establishing an energy policy.  Oh sure, many people have been scared into believing that nuclear power is uniquely dangerous, although we’ve long-since shown that nuclear power stations are safer than any of their competitors.  For its workers and for the public.  Literally.  Decades of safe, reliable operation are available, plus a billion dollars of testing and analysis .  But that’s another post.

The uniqueness of nuclear power is that it outperforms its competitors by orders of magnitude. We’re used to choosing among options that vary a few percent, or maybe a factor of two or four. A nuclear fission fuel is more than seven orders of magnitude more efficient than any non-nuclear process.  That’s seven multiples of ten, or ten million times more efficient.  That number cannot be changed significantly by more research. It involves the fundamental difference between the binding energies of atoms and of molecules. (In real examples, the difference is usually several tens of millions.  I usually use 50 million as the ratio between nuclear and non-nuclear fuels.)

Let’s look at how orders-of-magnitude differences play out in the work-a-day world.

For example, commercial aircraft travel about 500 miles per hour (mph).  That’s an order of magnitude faster than cars or trains, whose cruising speed is about 50 mph.  And nearly two orders of magnitude faster than bicycles at 5-10 mph.  An airline might consider buying aircraft that are, say 20% (100mph) faster or slower.  But not a whole factor of ten. Someone taking a business trip to Los Angeles from New York would have to have a good reason not to fly.  And it’s is even unlikelier s/he’d choose the bike.

In the energy field, this means that any non-nuclear fuel—coal, ethanol, corn-stalks, algae—requires fifty million times as much material to be gathered up, transported, processed, and ultimately to be disposed of, than if nuclear fuel were used to make the same amount of electricity.  (Wind or sunshine are even more dilute, and also unreliable. )

Again, to understand what this means, we have to get actual numbers.  Let’s look at just part of the energy problem, replacing the coal used to make electricity in America.  Coal is mostly all carbon, and therefore is the cheapest, most efficient way to ship carbon.  Yet it still requires half the capacity of our entire national freight rail system to handle it.  How will we transport the same amount of carbon in the form of sugar-cane or switch-grass?  Paul Willems (“The Biofuels Landscape Through the Lens  of Industrial Chemistry,” Science 325, 707, 7 Aug 2009) writes: “Biomass is a bulky solid with relatively high water content. The range over which it can be economically transported to a manufacturing facility is on the order of 40 to 80 km.”

Do we really plan to set up biomass processing plants every 25-50 miles across America’s agricultural heartland?  It seems to me this is a show-stopper.  If we can’t answer this mundane question, then we shouldn’t be making grandiose plans for a 500 million tons per year biomass program.  We could support quite a crowd of researchers for decades that way, but if it’s never going to lead to a practical energy program, we should drop it.  Or if it’s to be justified as a biological research program, then it should be so designed, and not hidden under a false promise.

Recognizing the Absurd: A New Series of Blog Posts

 

Reductio Ad Absurdum is a basic tool of logic, first brought to our attention by the ancient Greeks.  It refutes a proposition by showing that it leads to absurd consequences.  To use it effectively, one must be able to assemble relevant facts that can be agreed to by the parties.  And one must be able to recognize absurdity.

 

In this day of Internet information systems, abundant facts are readily available.  But, incredibly, we seem to be losing our ability to recognize the absurd.  I will suggest some examples in which the facts seem to clearly indicate absurd consequences, but that fact is ignored, and research and development continue in the hopes of somehow finding a treasure at the end of this fundamentally unpromising road.

 

This brings up a secondary issue.  One can always keep a number of scientists employed researching an objective that is not worth achieving.  It’s like writing a novel that does not use the letter “e.”  This meets some basic characteristics that define a research project:  It is challenging, it can employ a number of people for a considerable time.  And it does seem reasonably likely to be achievable in the end.  But one wishes the effort had been put into another project, perhaps even more difficult, but with a goal well worth achieving.

 

There was a physicist named Lewi Tonks at the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory who suggested to Admiral Rickover in the early 1950s that Rickover and his Naval Reactors program could build up a lot of respect in the broader scientific community by devoting at least one or two scientists to some project that was “completely useless, but challenging.”  I assumed he was only half serious, but this reflects part of the problem I’m addressing.  There is certainly need in the world for “pure research,” but it does not follow that every unanswered question is, ipso facto, worth pursuing.

 

And one more part of the problem-solving process must be in working order:  For a problem to be real, it must manifest in the real world: people or the environment must be harmed—or potentially harmed—in some significant way, so that the effectiveness of a solution can be defined and measured.

 

These points will become clearer in the forthcoming messages, as the examples are spelled out.

Applying the Reality Test

I've been off-line for a while, doing some heavy background reading.  And I find several disturbing situations.  First, there seems to be an unstated premise that the whole energy/climate question just arose, and the new people just getting into it are expressing some of the first thoughts on the subject.  Little recognition is given to the fact that 36 years (so far) of heavily subsidized R & D on this topic followed the world crisis posed by the OPEC oil embargo of 1973.  Careful evaluation of the experience and lessons of those decades, should proceed drawing any conclusions from the situation of 2009.

Second, nuclear seems to have become a dirty word.  It is seldom mentioned any more in discussions of "how to get away from dependence on fossil fuels."

Third, an unquestioned goal seems to be to use many different types of energy sources, although the facts seem to indicate otherwise.

Although there is emphasis on new and exotic sciences throughout, the paleo-technologies wind and sunshine  are increasingly emphasized as the probable energy sources of choice.

Some of the detailed reports mention "show-stoppers" that bring into question the basic feasibility of using the energy source in question. They involve mundane subjects, like transporting biofuels from the field to the customer, or transmitting solar electricity from the western deserts to the New England power plants.  But the questions they raise must not be glossed over. They must be capable of being answered realistically in the commercial world, or the large-scale use of those energy sources are nothing but expensive pipe-dreams.

So, my next few posts will consider these topics, one at a time, and look for your input.  I will word the questions provocatively, but the discussions will be on a factual basis, not on unsubstantiated opinions.  I will introduce some interesting papers and sites, and will try hard to keep the discussion to factual matters that can be answered factually.

It is, you know, possible to agree on facts and still differ as to their implications.  But it is much more useful to clarify the facts than yell about differences of opinions.

First post of this series coming up soon.  Please join us.

A Case Where Size Really Matters

The key to making this point is to stress the incredible volume of biofuels required.  Coal currently ties up the lion’s share of our transportation capacity.  And biofuels are just VERY low-grade coal (as a fuel).  “American Scientist” and “Science” both ran articles on this point in the current issue.  But they didn’t mention nuclear.  

I don’t think we’ve pushed that point hard enough.  The fact that ANY non-nuclear plant requires many millions of times more material than any nuclear plant.  That fact alone gives nuclear a huge ecological advantage.  When you see the big trucks full of sugar-cane and realize how many trucks it takes to equal one rail car full of coal—and we know how many rail cars it takes to keep a single power plant going.

Unwanted Electricity - Why Subsidize a Nuisance?

An electric power network is like a troop of acrobats, spinning plates on the ends of long sticks.  It’s a nerve-wracking experience.  If a heckler started throwing in extra plates, the troop could handle one or two at a time, but not whole stacks!

Wind-farms are subsidized by the Government to play the heckler role, and expect us to pay the heckler for it.  Networks must maintain “spinning reserve,” ready at all times to cover for a large plant that might drop out unexpectedly. That’s like having a few extra spinners with only a couple of plates, standing by for the sole purpose of picking up any plates about to drop unexpectedly.  In that situation, the availability of more power, without knowing when or how much, is a problem, not an asset.  There is talk among utilities of charging, rather than paying for, such unwanted power.

Welcome to "Learning About Energy"

 Hi!  I'm Ted Rockwell, and this is the place to explore and discuss energy facts and policy, with special attention to the role of nuclear power.  That's a big subject, with lots of facts, myths, misunderstandings and little-known truths.  Who's to decide what's true?  YOU are.

There are issues on which well-informed people disagree, and that's OK.  We're all entitled to our own opinions, but not our own facts.  But facts are available, and I'll try to bring in the relevant facts whenever an issue needs cooling off. 

Energy policy is a perfect subject for blogging, because there always seems to be one more idea, or one more question, that should be examined in a little more detail. 

In addition to discussing energy, I have written a science-fiction book that may interest some of you.  It has nothing to do with energy, but it discusses some of the opportunities and problems that may arise as machines get smart enough to (seem to?) develop ideas, and even agendas, of their own.

It's called, "The Virtual Librarian: A Tale of Alternative Realities."  I've listed my first-born son, now deceased, as co-author, since he and I discussed many of the ideas that went into the book.  I've set up a separate category for those interested in learning more about the Virtual Librarian.

We've already built up an archive of posts that you're invited to browse, along with some comments.  There's an "About Me" link, and other typical weblog accoutrements.  Come join us and give us your ideas!

If you like, check out my website at:  http://www.members.authorsguild.net/tedrockwell