Nuclear energy is more expensive than renewables, CSIRO report finds

Of course not.

AGAIN, Iowa did not find a need for building more of other sources to cover for wind.

Essentially ALL states could extend wind, the cheapest form of new energy, WITHOUT building alternate capability.


Also, it's been pointed out to you many times that Australia is demonstrating an energy strategy that is not some how invalidated by your constant claims of a requirement for enhancing fossil fuel or nuclear energy.

 

That's what I thought. Thanks for confirming.

 

Let's rephrase the question. As they've ramped up renewables, how much of their previous infrastructure have they decommissioned and dismantled?

If the answer is "none", then all renewables are added cost that stays on the customer's bill.

 

I have never claimed enhanced fossil or nuclear energy is required. My claim is that the cost of maintaining fossil or nuclear back-up is part of the cost of intermittent renewable energy.

 

No ICE limits are affecting demand for EVs today.

Subsidies are present to allow US auto manufacturing to move into the EV marketplace. Today, Ford notes that they LOSE an average of at least $30K on every EV sale. The concern is that they can't sustain that loss.

Today, China has EV models that are superior to US manufacturers (possibly excluding Tesla). They are entering Europe, Australia, SE Asia and other regions, displacing both US autos and the Japanese models we've become familiar with.

This is what is happening in the world today, and ignoring that factor risks losing US manufacturing in the same way that they almost crashed due to the entry of Japan in America.

 

Have you noticed recently that many manufacturers, particularly the American ones, are pausing or scaling back their EV plans as demand eases?

Probably due to excess EV inventory building.

That, and their legal departments are recommending waiting for June before they go all in.

 

This isn't about assuring they have the necessary utilities. This is about who gets axed from the system knowing they don't have enough.

https://www.desmoinesregister.com/s...-weather-noaa-midamerican-alliant/7456079001/

 

That is a claim for which I've seen no support.

Also, as has long been known we need serious improvement of our grid(s) such that electricity can be efficiently moved to where it is needed.

By sealing themselves off from the east and west grids of the USA, Texas was in serious trouble in Feb. 2021 without aid being easy.

 

Demand isn't easing.

Their own sales may be easing.

It would be great to see them create good EVs. But, their competition is not "waiting". And, "waiting" means others will be even FARTHER ahead.

 

They should get going with the wind power they say they are building, hopefully to be ready for their energy intensive summers.

 

They make money by selling electricity.

 

My first response on this subject was post #185. I posted the data presented on the EIA website that you provided. I noted that Iowa's total energy consumption is 959 trillion Btu and their total net electricity generation is 5,410 thousand MWh. This is a comparison between electrical generation and energy consumption. I even gave you the conversion factor.

Clearly I did not switch to consumption. The disparity between consumption and wind production was entirely the point. I think you just got caught up trying to defend the idea that 2/3ds of their electrical production is produced by wind power despite the EIA site data showing only 53%. I was thinking that maybe they included private wind production? There's lots of farmland there. There's possibly a significant number of farmers with wind generators. But I'm sure that energy totals to far less than the amount of LNG & diesel they burn keeping their greenhouses warm, producing CO2 for their plants to eat, irrigating, tending, harvesting, storing, refining, packaging & transporting their crops to market.

That's because the energy necessary is primary sourced through a well established petroleum based system. A meaningful shift of that energy use on to the electrical grid would require an exponential increase in grid capacity. That in turn would require a significant energy investment. They would be exponentially increasing their energy use trying to figure out how to use less petroleum energy. Which is pretty much par for the current course of action. By the way, the cost of this necessary expansion is usually

excluded from the argument which typically focuses on cost of operation.

I did not prognosticate anything. I showed you the math behind your own prognostications.

Oh gosh. How does have reserve capacity protect infrastructure that would be destroyed by such an event? You're pointing out a vulnerability in the grid itself that is not reduced by having "more grid" On the contrary, more grid makes the problem of self induction worse.

Are you claiming Iowa's conditions are analogous to world conditions?

This is a contradiction in terms. The further away an energy source is, the less efficient your transmission of energy to the load will be. One of the components of Ohm's law is resistance. Resistance is the force that pushes back against voltage limiting current. Resistance is affected by material, cross sectional area, length, and temperature. The longer your wire is, the more resistance it has over its length. Resistance drops voltage. The more current you try to push through a resistance, the more voltage drops. Long transmission wires are the opposite of efficient.

 

The problem in Texas was the absence of effective fossil or nuclear back-up. The stand-alone grid in Texas was part of national security planning.

 

Their operating costs are nonetheless part of the cost of the renewables grid.

 

And automakers make money selling autos. But if the price of steel skyrockets, so does the price of automobiles.

Same thing with electricity. If adding renewables isn't offset by a reduction in fossil fuel baseload capacity (not a bright idea at all), prices to customers also rise. It's basic economics and inevitable.

 

That doesn't address my point. My point is about their electricity generation.

Iowa produces 2/3 of their electricity from renewable sources, with by far their highest method being wind.

That's a demonstration that plenty of room for moving to renewable energy is available.

Yes - you want to move to discussing something other than electricity generation, focusing on total energy profile of customers. This is not about moving homes and businesses away from winter oil and gas heating, for example.

But, that is not the same topic as is the topic of whether there is significant room for renewable energy expansion.

This is not the topic I have been discussing. I've been discussing electricity generation.

Improving our ancient grid architecture could allow for cheaper transport of electricity as well as making it less expensive and time consuming to add sources such as wind and solar projects.

Also, it is a way to allow a wider region to provide electricity to a stricken area. It's what Texas didn't have with their separate grid when they had their 2021 event.

[/QUOTE]
My posts in this thread have said that Iowa is not totally analogous to other states, let alone other countries.

But, they aren't different enough to deny that many states are able to support far greater renewable energy production.

If Iowa can have twice the production from wind as they have from fossil fuel, this is a serious indication of what other states should consider.

A prime example is the region from Texas to Canada through our central region. There is even the opportunity for agricultural interests to take advantage of a separate income stream from compatible wind operations. In fact, some of these states are noting that the greater abundance of electricity is attractive to new industries, thus being an economic advantage for their state.

I haven't said anything about adding "long transmission wires". I have noted that there are architectures that allow for less expensive transmission than what we have today. And, there are other needed improvements as well.

 

No, it was not part of national security planning. We are not more secure by having state by state non-interoperable grids.

It came from Texas believing that if they joined, then national issues might affect them more.

 

There isn't a "renewables grid", so not sure what you mean there.

I'm sure you are right at some point - for example, if someone is proposing reaching 100% renewables with no nuclear, hydro, etc.

The point here is that the very conservative state of Iowa created a mix that has way more renewables than fossil fuel.

That is a crystal clear demonstration that we have a LONG way to go before meeting some form of the limit you keep proposing.

This is GOOD NEWS. It means that we have serious opportunity for expanding energy production using the cheapest form of energy production we have!!


Why even argue about that?

 

That's not a reasonable analogy. In both cases, there are choices to be made. Tesla used aluminum originally and has now move to a blend of steel and aluminum. Also, the costly component of EVs is usually the batteries, not the metal.

Steel went crazy because of Trump. Let's not do that again, please. It hurt too many American businesses.

As for electricity, you need to look at what Iowa is doing. There are choices they are making and have made concerning their energy strategy.

 

Sorry, but I participated in Continuity of Operations (COOP) exercises predicated on attacks on US power grids. Independence of the Texas grid was touted as a national security asset.

 

Because it's not really the cheapest.

 

How do you know it isn’t? And you have or should have a nationwide grid. If basepower is down in one state it should feed in from another

 

You know no one else is buying that argument - most and especially the electricity companies themselves

 

And I bet they thought decentralisation of segments of the grid was even better

 

So long as they can charge rates high enough to be profitable they don't care about the source, but they insist on factoring the their back-up into those rates.