So much has been made of the fires still raging in Los Angeles that you may not have heard about the unrelated fire that broke out last Thursday (January 16) at the Moss Landing battery plant, located near San Francisco.
Yes, and each type of generation has its own unique operational advantages and disadvantages which make it necessary to employ a mix of different types of generation to operate the grid in a safe and reliable manner
In each case you are discussing things where we have decades of experience and tens of thousands of hours of safe operation. Nuclear reactors have millions of hours of safe operation under their belt. Oil tankers have millions of miles of safe voyages. Utility scale batteries are all of 5 years old. We have already seen devastating fires - At Moss landing there have been THREE previous fires.
I agree that there is a problem, but what is it? It's actually easy to explain, if I may.
In the case of oil tankers, there are a grand total of 810 in the world. Nuclear reactors? 94 in the U.S. The batteries, as a whole are not failing. It is the individual cells that are failing. When a single cell fails catastrophically, it sets off a chain reaction. Hence a correct comparison is not between the number of installations, but in the number of individual batteries, just like individual ships, and individual reactors.
The battery installations consist of millions of cells. A single manufacturing defect, in a single cell, can cause a loss of the whole facility. Such a defect is almost impossible to detect.
If we had 10 million nuclear reactors, or 10 million oil tankers, I'd expect our failure rate to be more significant. The real problem is what I like to call the tyranny of large numbers. With a big enough pile of cells, you are going to have fires - you can't stop it from happening. Even small failure rates translate into a large number of fires.
The solution is to ditch lithium-ion cells for this purpose. You need batteries that are inherently safe - likely flow cell batteries, or solid-state batteries. Or set up an energy system where you are not trying to store so much energy - it's a pretty stupid starting point for running a utility. energy doesn't want to be stored. It's why, for the last 120 years, we have not stored very much of it. Power systems learned this back in the days of Edison. Look up flywheel storage accidents sometime. Extremely reliable energy storage, and very dangerous when it fails.
One more thing. Yes, fires can be deadly regardless of the source, but my understanding is that EV battery fires are *much* harder to extinguish than gasoline fires. And don't forget that the "renewable" energy zealots are proposing huge stacks of these kinds of batteries as backup for wind and solar intermittency. Try to imagine a mountain of these things burning uncontrollably for days or weeks on end.
I agree with your main points, but I think you need to understand that nuclear power is by far the safest and cleanest large-scale source of energy. But the mainstream media coverage of nuclear accidents has been so ridiculously one-sided and lacking in perspective that the public believes nuclear power is the most dangerous source of energy.
Take Fukushima for example. Not one member of the public died as a result of the radiation release, but many died as a result of an unnecessary evacuation. The "exclusion zone" had radiation levels less than many natural places that people go to without concern. As for plant workers, I don't recall the exact figures, but I don't think more than one or two workers died as a result of radiation. Yet as a result, Germany foolishly decided to shut down its perfectly good nuclear reactors!
I am a supporter of the use of nuclear power, in combination with other generation types, including renewable resources. And I agree that Germany was foolish for shutting down all its nukes, although I believe that decision was made before Fukushima. But it is important for supporters of nuclear power, and supporters of other types of generation, to recognize the detriments of that generation. Nuclear power may have a good record of safe operations, but it undeniably carries with it the greatest risk of catastrophe if everything goes wrong. Rather than call opponents names, supporters should be emphasizing the benefits of nuclear power and explaining all the safeguards that are taken
Matt, I have been strongly pro-nuclear since the 1980s when I read the classic book "The Health Hazards of Not Going Nuclear" by Petr Beckmann. Had we not had the TMI incident and the utterly irrational media and public reaction to it, we would likely have many more nuclear power plants in operation today, and they would provide major benefits for both the economy *and* the environment. Had nuclear power progressed as it should have, there would be no need for wind and solar power, which are economic *and* environmental disasters as far as I am concerned, not to mention a hideous blight on natural landscapes.
Let me push back a bit on that. First, I don't agree that the reaction was "utterly" irrational. The accident at Three Mile Island could have been much worse, and it was important to acknowledge that, investigate what happened and take steps to make sure it could not happen again. The risks were overstated but they did exist
Second, construction of nuclear power plants already was slowing down at the time because of the expense, which came close to causing some utilities to declare bankruptcy and did leave Public Service Company of New Hampshire to declare bankruptcy. I think that, today, the cost of new nukes is a major impediment to the construction of new large plants. Yes, large plants can operate for up to 100 years but no one invests their money based on the return that can be earned over 100 years.
Third, the grid could not operate reliably with nuclear power plants alone. Nukes do not have the operational flexibility to constantly change their output as loads increase in the morning, peak in the afternoon, and decrease after that, as well as fluctuate throughout the day. Grids need different types of generation to provide different types of needed service.
Fourth, renewables have their own benefits and detriments. They are no more an economic or environmental disaster than nukes. Renewables cannot be the sole or primary source of generation for the grid based on today's technologies, but they can make a valuable contribution and have important benefits
Of course the TMI incident was an engineering fiasco and needed to be managed carefully, but the media blew it ridiculously out of proportion. The entire nation was riveted to their chairs for days on end wondering if there would soon be 100,000 dead bodies littering the streets as some of the activists had warned. Then there was the movie "The China Syndrome," warning that the reactor could melt its way to China!
I never said that nuclear power can do the job alone. Yes, we need natural gas to precisely "follow the load," but nuclear does a fabulous job with the base load and slow variations beyond.
The huge costs of nuclear power plants are the result of draconian overregulation. Robert Hargraves, Jack Devanney, and many others have covered this issue well. It all starts with LNT.
If nuclear power had been developed to its full potential, we would not need wind or solar power. Solar power is appropriate for remote, off-grid use and nothing more in my opinion. Wind power is good for nothing, really.
Yes, LNT is the huge problem - It has 100% been proven wrong for decades, every way we CAN prove it wrong, yet all the regulations are written as if it were true.
It seems like a year or two ago I read an article claiming that LNT was the result of outright scientific fraud. I don't recall the details, but according to the article, the committee that was tasked with finding the safe limits of low-level radioactive exposure didn't have a clue how to do it, so they basically just made up LNT along with very strict limits to be "cautious." Unfortunately, that extreme "caution" drove up the cost of nuclear power to the point that it was replaced with far dirtier and more dangerous sources of energy.
I would like to see the statistics on what percentage of vehicle fires are EV vs ICE. There are 290 million ICE vehicles and only about 4 million EVs, so of course there’s more ICE fires, but it certainly seems like the EVs catch fire more frequently.
From Matt’s post
“A study by the National Fire Protection Association shows an estimated annual average of 215,096 vehicle fires in the United States from 2018–2022. This study does not differentiate between fires in gasoline fueled cars and electric vehicles, but other data indicates that there are significantly more car fires in gasoline fueled vehicles than electric vehicles. “
Good thinking, leading to "How should we evaluate our energy sources?"
1. Sufficiently ample?
2. Cost per unit of energy?
3. Power available when needed?
4. Observed harm to human life and health?
5. Pollution of the environment?
6. CO2 emissions?
7. Consumption of finite natural resources?
8. Security of supply and supply chain?
9. Support to national security?
Answer: a thoughtful combination of above, no single issue.
Yes, and each type of generation has its own unique operational advantages and disadvantages which make it necessary to employ a mix of different types of generation to operate the grid in a safe and reliable manner
In each case you are discussing things where we have decades of experience and tens of thousands of hours of safe operation. Nuclear reactors have millions of hours of safe operation under their belt. Oil tankers have millions of miles of safe voyages. Utility scale batteries are all of 5 years old. We have already seen devastating fires - At Moss landing there have been THREE previous fires.
I agree that there is a problem, but what is it? It's actually easy to explain, if I may.
In the case of oil tankers, there are a grand total of 810 in the world. Nuclear reactors? 94 in the U.S. The batteries, as a whole are not failing. It is the individual cells that are failing. When a single cell fails catastrophically, it sets off a chain reaction. Hence a correct comparison is not between the number of installations, but in the number of individual batteries, just like individual ships, and individual reactors.
The battery installations consist of millions of cells. A single manufacturing defect, in a single cell, can cause a loss of the whole facility. Such a defect is almost impossible to detect.
If we had 10 million nuclear reactors, or 10 million oil tankers, I'd expect our failure rate to be more significant. The real problem is what I like to call the tyranny of large numbers. With a big enough pile of cells, you are going to have fires - you can't stop it from happening. Even small failure rates translate into a large number of fires.
The solution is to ditch lithium-ion cells for this purpose. You need batteries that are inherently safe - likely flow cell batteries, or solid-state batteries. Or set up an energy system where you are not trying to store so much energy - it's a pretty stupid starting point for running a utility. energy doesn't want to be stored. It's why, for the last 120 years, we have not stored very much of it. Power systems learned this back in the days of Edison. Look up flywheel storage accidents sometime. Extremely reliable energy storage, and very dangerous when it fails.
One more thing. Yes, fires can be deadly regardless of the source, but my understanding is that EV battery fires are *much* harder to extinguish than gasoline fires. And don't forget that the "renewable" energy zealots are proposing huge stacks of these kinds of batteries as backup for wind and solar intermittency. Try to imagine a mountain of these things burning uncontrollably for days or weeks on end.
Firefighters have a "let it burn" strategy.
I agree with your main points, but I think you need to understand that nuclear power is by far the safest and cleanest large-scale source of energy. But the mainstream media coverage of nuclear accidents has been so ridiculously one-sided and lacking in perspective that the public believes nuclear power is the most dangerous source of energy.
Take Fukushima for example. Not one member of the public died as a result of the radiation release, but many died as a result of an unnecessary evacuation. The "exclusion zone" had radiation levels less than many natural places that people go to without concern. As for plant workers, I don't recall the exact figures, but I don't think more than one or two workers died as a result of radiation. Yet as a result, Germany foolishly decided to shut down its perfectly good nuclear reactors!
I am a supporter of the use of nuclear power, in combination with other generation types, including renewable resources. And I agree that Germany was foolish for shutting down all its nukes, although I believe that decision was made before Fukushima. But it is important for supporters of nuclear power, and supporters of other types of generation, to recognize the detriments of that generation. Nuclear power may have a good record of safe operations, but it undeniably carries with it the greatest risk of catastrophe if everything goes wrong. Rather than call opponents names, supporters should be emphasizing the benefits of nuclear power and explaining all the safeguards that are taken
Matt, I have been strongly pro-nuclear since the 1980s when I read the classic book "The Health Hazards of Not Going Nuclear" by Petr Beckmann. Had we not had the TMI incident and the utterly irrational media and public reaction to it, we would likely have many more nuclear power plants in operation today, and they would provide major benefits for both the economy *and* the environment. Had nuclear power progressed as it should have, there would be no need for wind and solar power, which are economic *and* environmental disasters as far as I am concerned, not to mention a hideous blight on natural landscapes.
Let me push back a bit on that. First, I don't agree that the reaction was "utterly" irrational. The accident at Three Mile Island could have been much worse, and it was important to acknowledge that, investigate what happened and take steps to make sure it could not happen again. The risks were overstated but they did exist
Second, construction of nuclear power plants already was slowing down at the time because of the expense, which came close to causing some utilities to declare bankruptcy and did leave Public Service Company of New Hampshire to declare bankruptcy. I think that, today, the cost of new nukes is a major impediment to the construction of new large plants. Yes, large plants can operate for up to 100 years but no one invests their money based on the return that can be earned over 100 years.
Third, the grid could not operate reliably with nuclear power plants alone. Nukes do not have the operational flexibility to constantly change their output as loads increase in the morning, peak in the afternoon, and decrease after that, as well as fluctuate throughout the day. Grids need different types of generation to provide different types of needed service.
Fourth, renewables have their own benefits and detriments. They are no more an economic or environmental disaster than nukes. Renewables cannot be the sole or primary source of generation for the grid based on today's technologies, but they can make a valuable contribution and have important benefits
Of course the TMI incident was an engineering fiasco and needed to be managed carefully, but the media blew it ridiculously out of proportion. The entire nation was riveted to their chairs for days on end wondering if there would soon be 100,000 dead bodies littering the streets as some of the activists had warned. Then there was the movie "The China Syndrome," warning that the reactor could melt its way to China!
I never said that nuclear power can do the job alone. Yes, we need natural gas to precisely "follow the load," but nuclear does a fabulous job with the base load and slow variations beyond.
The huge costs of nuclear power plants are the result of draconian overregulation. Robert Hargraves, Jack Devanney, and many others have covered this issue well. It all starts with LNT.
If nuclear power had been developed to its full potential, we would not need wind or solar power. Solar power is appropriate for remote, off-grid use and nothing more in my opinion. Wind power is good for nothing, really.
Yes, LNT is the huge problem - It has 100% been proven wrong for decades, every way we CAN prove it wrong, yet all the regulations are written as if it were true.
It seems like a year or two ago I read an article claiming that LNT was the result of outright scientific fraud. I don't recall the details, but according to the article, the committee that was tasked with finding the safe limits of low-level radioactive exposure didn't have a clue how to do it, so they basically just made up LNT along with very strict limits to be "cautious." Unfortunately, that extreme "caution" drove up the cost of nuclear power to the point that it was replaced with far dirtier and more dangerous sources of energy.
This is the third fire at plant in four years.
I would like to see the statistics on what percentage of vehicle fires are EV vs ICE. There are 290 million ICE vehicles and only about 4 million EVs, so of course there’s more ICE fires, but it certainly seems like the EVs catch fire more frequently.
From Matt’s post
“A study by the National Fire Protection Association shows an estimated annual average of 215,096 vehicle fires in the United States from 2018–2022. This study does not differentiate between fires in gasoline fueled cars and electric vehicles, but other data indicates that there are significantly more car fires in gasoline fueled vehicles than electric vehicles. “
Fourth fire actually. two minor fires and 2 large fires.