Solution to the oil problem

[PLC1]

Like I said before, we don't have enough large-geothermal plants in operation to make a fully accurate comparison.

But for your sake let's just take one nuclear plant, just a hypothetical one that represents the basic nuke setup vs one geothermal plant of equal output.

We have to look at what runs the nuke plant as to expense
1. Mining uranium, the equipment, personelle, fossil fuels to run them, containment, contamination, affected surrounding populace near mines.
2. Transportation of uranium fuel. Terrorist risk. Personell. Fossil fuels. Machinery, maintenance. Security escort.
3. The startup costs: the safety features, containment vessel, widgets and whatnots of keeping radioactivity from poisoning surrounding populaces. Permits, appeals, more permits.
4. Personelle to monitor, run and deal competantly with nuclear power, accident claims, health issues, exposure etc. Compensation claims.
5. Waste disposal: facility construction, monitoring (for several generations), transportation. Security escort.
6. Terrorist target: potential disaster scope: immense

Now if you can put a guestimate on all those costs, then we'll compare them to geothermal
1. Drilling to underground reservoirs once. No distant ongoing mining. Steam sources are never "spent" like uranium fuel rods.
2. No transportation, steam already at site.
3. Startup costs, basic safety features, building permits, no containment for "waste" since there is none. No storage needed. No threat to generations of people.
4. Personelle to monitor, run and manage steam turbines. No claims related to radiation sickness or cancer from steam. Usual number of industry claims.
5. No waste disposal
6. No terrorist target.

Now guestimate those figures.

Compare the two.

Here is a cost comparison between conventional methods:

Now, let's compare geothermal:

Geothermal energy currently produces over 8,000 MW of electricity worldwide. The United States produces over 2200 MW. California and Nevada account for over 90% of the US capacity for geothermal electricity. Geothermal power currently provides about 8% of California's total electrical demand. There are various development plans to add more than 500 MW of US geothermal electrical capacity over the next decade. The cost of geothermal electricity in the U.S. ranges from less than $0.03 to $0.08 per kilowatt-hour. The lowest-cost geothermal producers sell power for $0.015 per kilowatt hour. THE GEYSERS in northern California sells power at $0.03 to $0.035 per kilowatt hour. Many geothermal power plants built today are economic at about $0.09 per kilowatt hour.

As you can see, the cost varies widely, depending on geographic location. The lowest cost geothermal plants do produce electricity at a cost comparable to nuclear plants.

To say that geothermal energy is going to solve our problems overall is a huge stretch. There is no doubt that there is a place for geothermal energy in the mix, along with wind, solar, nuclear, coal, and hydro. Which one is best will depend on geographic location primarily.

What we have to do, must do, is to develop all of the above. To do otherwise is to continue to be dependent on foreign oil imported from countries that hate us.

 

[Sihouette]

I like this discussion of costs. I don't think your chart includes the following costs, so I will

Accident types

Loss of coolant accident
Main article: Loss of coolant
See also: Nuclear meltdown

Criticality accidents

A criticality accident (also sometimes referred to as an "excursion" or "power excursion") occurs when a nuclear chain reaction is accidentally allowed to occur in fissile material, such as enriched uranium or plutonium. The Chernobyl accident is an example of a criticality accident. In a smaller scale accident at Sarov a technician working with highly enriched uranium was irradiated while preparing an experiment involving a sphere of fissile material. The Sarov accident is interesting because the system remained critical for many days before it could be stopped, though safely located in a shielded experimental hall [2]. This is an example of a limited scope accident where only a few people can be harmed, while no release of radioactivity into the environment occurred. A criticality accident with limited off site release of both radiation (gamma and neutron) and a very small release of radioactivity occurred at Tokaimura in 1999 during the production of enriched uranium fuel [3].


Decay heat

Decay heat accidents are where the heat generated by the radioactive decay causes harm. In a large nuclear reactor, a loss of coolant accident can damage the core: for example, at Three Mile Island a recently shutdown (SCRAMed) PWR reactor was left for a length of time without cooling water. As a result the nuclear fuel was damaged, and the core partly melted. However, the main cause of release of radioactivity in the Three Mile Island accident was a Pilot-operated relief valve on the primary loop which stuck in the open position. This caused the overflow tank into which it drained to rupture and release large amounts of radioactive cooling water.


Transport

Transport accidents can cause a release of radioactivity resulting in contamination or shielding to be damaged resulting in direct irradiation. In Cochabamba a defective gamma radiography set was transported in a passenger bus as cargo. The gamma source was outside the shielding, and it irradiated some bus passengers.

In the United Kingdom, it was revealed in a recent court case that a radiotherapy source was transported from Leeds to Sellafield with defective shielding. The shielding had a gap on the underside. It is thought that no human has been seriously harmed by the escaping radiation.[1]


Equipment failure

Equipment failure is one possible type of accident, recently at Białystok in Poland the electronics associated with a particle accelerator used for the treatment of cancer suffered a malfunction [4]. This then led to the overexposure of at least one patient. While the initial failure was the simple failure of a semiconductor diode, it set in motion a series of events which led to a radiation injury.

A related cause of accidents is failure of control software, as in the cases involving the Therac-25 medical radiotherapy equipment: the elimination of a hardware safety interlock in a new design model exposed a previously undetected bug in the control software, which could lead to patients receiving massive overdoses under a specific set of conditions.


Human error

Human error has been responsible for some accidents, such as when a person miscalculated the activity of a teletherapy source. This then led to patients being given the wrong dose of gamma rays. In the case of radiotherapy accidents, an underexposure is as much an accident as an overexposure as the patients may not get the full benefit of the prescribed treatment. Also, humans have made errors while attempting to service plants and equipment which has resulted in overdoses of radiation, such as the Nevvizh and Soreq irradiator accidents. In Japan two minor millennium bugs came to light [5]

In 1946 Canadian Manhattan Project physicist Louis Slotin performed a risky experiment known as "tickling the dragon's tail" [2] which involved two hemispheres of neutron-reflective Beryllium being brought together around a plutonium core to bring it to criticality. Against operating procedures, the hemispheres were separated only by a screwdriver. The screwdriver slipped and set off a chain reaction criticality accident filling the room with harmful radiation and a flash of blue light (caused by excited, ionized air particles returning to their unexcited states). Slotin reflexively separated the hemispheres in reaction to the heat flash and blue light, preventing further radiation of several co-workers present in the room. However Slotin absorbed a lethal dose of the radiation and died during the following week.


Lost source

Lost source accidents[6][7] are ones in which a radioactive source is lost, stolen or abandoned. The source then might cause harm to humans or the environment. For example, see the event in Lilo where sources were left behind by the Soviet army. Another case occurred at Yanango where a radiography source was lost, also at Samut Prakarn a cobalt-60 teletherapy source was lost [8] and at Gilan in Iran a radiography source harmed a welder [9]. The best known example of this type of event is the Goiânia accident which occurred in Brazil.

The International Atomic Energy Agency have provided guides for scrap metal collectors on what a sealed source might look like.[10][11] The scrap metal industry is the one where lost sources are most likely to be found.[12]


Others

Some accidents defy classification. These accidents happen when the unexpected occurs with a radioactive source. For instance if a bird grabs a radioactive source containing radium from a window sill and then was to fly away with it, returning to its nest and then the bird dies shortly afterwards from direct irradiation then it is the case that a minor radiation accident has occurred. As the act of placing the source on a window sill by a human was the event which permitted the bird access to the source, it is unclear how such an event should be classified (if is a lost source event or a something else). Radium lost and found[13][14] describes a tale of a pig walking about with a radium source inside; this was a radium source lost from a hospital.

Also some accidents are "normal" industrial accidents which happen to involve radioactive material, for instance a runaway reaction at Tomsk (see red oil) caused radioactive material to be spread around the site.

For a list of many of the most important accidents see the International Atomic Energy Agency site [15] .


Analyses of nuclear power plant accidents

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) now requires each nuclear power plant in the U.S. to have a probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) performed upon it. The two types of such plants in the US (as of 2007) are boiling water reactors and pressurized water reactors, and a study based on two early such PRAs was done (NUREG-1150) and released to the public. However, those early PRAs made unrealistically conservative assumptions, and the NRC is now generating a new study.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_accident

 

[Sihouette]

High level radioactive waste

See also: High level waste
Spent fuel is highly radioactive and needs to be handled with great care and forethought. However, spent nuclear fuel becomes less radioactive over time. After 40 years, the radiation flux is 99.9% lower than it was the moment the spent fuel was removed, although still dangerously radioactive.[42]

Spent fuel rods are stored in shielded basins of water (spent fuel pools), usually located on-site. The water provides both cooling for the still-decaying fission products, and shielding from the continuing radioactivity. After a few decades some on-site storage involves moving the now cooler, less radioactive fuel to a dry-storage facility or dry cask storage, where the fuel is stored in steel and concrete containers until its radioactivity decreases naturally ("decays") to levels safe enough for other processing. This interim stage spans years or decades, depending on the type of fuel. Most U.S. waste is currently stored in temporary storage sites requiring oversight, while suitable permanent disposal methods are discussed.

As of 2007, the United States had accumulated more than 50,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel from nuclear reactors.[53] Underground storage at Yucca Mountain in U.S. has been proposed as permanent storage. After 10,000 years of radioactive decay, according to United States Environmental Protection Agency standards, the spent nuclear fuel will no longer pose a threat to public health and safety.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_plant

Yeah, that cost-analysis thingy gets a little trickier when you start crunching ALL the numbers...

With geothermal steam-driven turbines, instead of nuclear's radioactive-steam driven turbines, there is not cost analysis to compare to the foregoing.

So once again we're left judging off the hip which one is more expensive in the long and short run.

In both scenarios it's nuclear from conception to electrons flowing out to the grid. What kind of price could you put anyway on 10,000 years of environmental poisoning? How will future generations write their history books of our era? Presuming they're even around then to do so?

Radioactivity is a very serious matter that we monkeys don't have business fooling with. We don't have the right to subject future generations to poisoning. We should be preemptively guilty of murder. 50,000 tons of highly radioactive waste that won't be safe for people to be around for 10,000 years and we still don't know what to do with it..

And BigOil stockholders want MORE nuclear? F that.

 

[PLC1]

Of course, there are rare but not unheard of problems with nuclear reactors. There are problems with any sort of power generation. How about earthquakes, as an example?

How about offshore winds as an alternative energy source?

The winds blowing 15 miles or even farther off the U.S. coasts potentially could produce 900,000 megawatts of electricity, or roughly the same amount as nearly all the nation's existing power sources combined, according to Department of Energy estimates.

Being able to double power output should help, don't you think?

 

[Sihouette]

During the period in which financial support for solar energy was growing and a "windfall tax" on the profits of the oil industry was imposed, the proponents of big oil were gathering their own resources on Capitol Hill. Political action committees (PACs) that were affiliated with oil and gas interests began to sprout and, from 1977 to 1979, they contributed over $2.6 million to House and Senate candidates. A report by Alan Berlow and Laura Weiss in Congressional Quarterly concluded that most of the money went to candidates "with strong pro-industry voting." Support for alternative energy took a downward spiral when Ronald Reagan (a former spokesperson for General Electric) was elected U.S. president and became a staunch ally of corporate America.

By the late 1970s, oil companies had bought out many of the patents for photovoltaic cells, and corporate giants like Atlantic Richfield, Amoco, Exxon, and Mobil took control of solar power companies. This trend would lead Alfred Dougherty, former director of the Federal Trade Commission's bureau of competition to warn, "If the oil companies control substantial amounts of substitute fuels ... they may slow the pace of production of alternative fuels in order to protect the value of their oil and gas reserves." Edwin Rothschild, a spokesperson for the Citizen Energy Labor Coalition, was concerned that the big oil companies "see solar power as a competing source of energy, and they want to control it and slow it down." However, ownership of solar technology by big oil was only the first step in the methodical dismantling of the alternative energy renaissance.

Source: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1374/is_5_60/ai_65133031

We are hearing today even "alternatives are still a long way off". No, they're not. They haven't been for decades. And you're not fooling us anymore.

Bring our troops home.

 

[Sihouette]

"Competing sources of energy...they want to control it, slow it down..."

We're supposed to buy that installing solar panels, wind turbines or putting a pipe into a thermal vent is some futuristic sci-fi fantasy that needs to be bridged-over to.

But expensive, complex offshore oil rigs in numbers, in rough seas? Lots of risky superstructure nuclear plants?

Yeah, we can get those up next week..

Imagine if the money spent by the U.S. government on foreign aid and by oil corporations on fossil fuel exploration were invested on the development of alternative fuels. Apparently loyalty to fossil fuels is too deep. According to a recent analysis by the Congressional Research Service, reported in the March/April issue of Mother Jones, seventy-seven cents of every energy research dollar from 1973 to 1997 went to nuclear and fossil fuels; just fourteen cents went to alternative energy.

Source: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1374/is_5_60/ai_65133031/pg_3?tag=artBody;col1

 

[Sihouette]

Same article, Page 2:

The lack of support for the development of alternative energy continued despite the findings of a study released in 1980 by the National Academy of Sciences at the request of the Energy Research and Development Administration. The study concluded that "a costly push by the government would lead to rapid growth in solar-related energy sources" and, if this occurred, "renewable energy sources could account for a quarter or more of the nation's energy needs within thirty years." Instead, the Reagan administration preferred to rapidly expand military aid and sent billions of dollars to foreign countries. It also greatly increased the federal budget for the research and production of atomic weapons.

This is an interesting article. I'm beginning to see a pattern in how the US handled energy policies for decades now...

I wonder if any of it had to do with BigOil coercion?

Nah...

 

[Pidgey]

Well, there are plenty of alternative energy technologies out there--that's really not the question. As a project engineer, I've always thought that arguments about this stuff get kinda'... "out-of-hand" most of the time. The real criteria for judging which alternatives to employ has necessarily always proceeded from an economic basis. Nobody wants to be the guy that comes up with a great idea that ultimately costs far more money to implement than will be gained from it. To some degree, you can interchange the word "money" in that last sentence with the word "energy".

And "therein lies the problem" (grammatically incorrect) because many alternatives ultimately don't end up with a viable return on investment yet. It's always believed that The Holy Grail of alternatives is just right around the proverbial investment corner but an awful lot of R&D budgets have really not panned out. Frankly, if ever one does don't think BigOil or BigCoal or BigGas or whoever is going to stand in the way--they'll probably be more than happy to buy or invest in the production side of the equation. For as long as I can remember, there's always been the "conspiracy theory" out there that the oil companies have suppressed untold amounts of technology that would destroy their profits if ever they got out. I can't count the patents and publications that I've sifted through for the sake of making a breakthrough that simply haven't panned out in the real world of results.

I'm not saying that there isn't an answer--just that all the vitriol out there against the oil and power companies is very misplaced. The devil is always in the details. I think we need to keep looking and trying everything possible but if a proposed system doesn't work out economically, I just don't see the need to pump in too much money trying to chase it--you can really throw a lot of money down a rabbithole quickly in this business.

 

[Andy]

This is an interesting article. I'm beginning to see a pattern in how the US handled energy policies for decades now...

I wonder if any of it had to do with BigOil coercion?

Nah...

If anything, BigOil has pushed for alternative energy. You don't realize how much money the companies have made off of this stupidity. How much subsidies has BP collected for it's massive push of expensive solar panels that never produce as much power as is needed to create them?

See this is how stupid the conspiracy left is. They constantly think they are somehow going to 'stick it' to the oil companies, while instead filling their pockets with money.

R-12 AUTO A/C
It reminds me of R-12 refrigerant for car AC systems. All this crap came out, and DuPont suddenly jumped on board for banning it. All the liberal leftist sheep, started chanting see, it must be bad because even DuPont wants it banned.

Later we find out... oh... DuPont's patent on R-12 was about to expire, so they helped ban it, so they could have a lock on R-134a refrigerant for cars. Brilliant leftists, played like a fiddle and lined the pockets of executive board with their money, and our too. BRILLIANT!

I may be wrong... Not sure about this, but.... patents last 20 years I think. And looky what's going on now... it looks like R-134a is going to be banned from the EU in 2011... huh I think R-134a came on the market in early 90s right? DuPonts going to do it again if they can, and all the puppet libs will jump in step.

OIL COMPANIES
Now we look at the oil issue, and see the exact same pattern emerging. Here, the leftist prevent drilling, prevent building refineries, and the logically assumed constraints on the product have driven up prices filling the pockets of some oil companies. Look at the puppet leftists being toyed with.

Further they demand we subsidies alternative energies with their pie-in-the-sky views, and who do we see supporting them? The rich! Ted Turner loves his tax payer subsidies for Ethanol. BP loves their tax payer subsidies for un-economical solar panels.

If it wasn't for the fact that liberal idiots end up harming everyone with their stupidity, I would be overwhelmingly humored by how much they think they are harming the oil companies, while at the exact same time, being nothing more than a puppet, a pathetic tool of the very companies they hate, to gain them wealth.

I see many more rich wealthy people in rich wealthy companies that support legislation for eco-nut causes, than not. Why? Because it fills their bank accounts with our money. Thank you libs. The upper class loves you.

 

[Sihouette]

You guys both sound like PR spindoctors for BigOil..

Not like they'd have any of them on the internet defending the indefensible (killing troops for profit) but you know...it is a remote possibility...

Pidgey writes,

"Nobody wants to be the guy that comes up with a great idea that ultimately costs far more money to implement than will be gained from it. To some degree, you can interchange the word "money" in that last sentence with the word "energy".

And "therein lies the problem" (grammatically incorrect) because many alternatives ultimately don't end up with a viable return on investment yet."

The thing is that you cannot convince me that installing a nuclear facility is cheaper than installing a geothermal one of comparable output. You just cannot. And you're not fooling anyone saying you can. You cannot tell me that it is more expensive to install a solar farm, moreso than an offshore oil rig...along with payroll, maintenance and disaster cleanup costs...

You just can't pull the old decades-long wool over the eyes of Joe Public anymore. We know we're running out of oil. We know alternatives have been controlled and suppressed by BigOil. And we know as a direct result of that, US Troops are dying in numbers in the Middle East.

We know the Georgia situation isn't about lofty socialist ideals from either the US or Russia. It is, plain and simply, about controlling oil. Oil. Oil. Oil.

We have a series of hurricanes back to back pounding the Eastern and Gulf seaboard. On the beach I go to sometimes, the low tide mark is now where the high tide used to be. High tide falls daily on the record tide line...and so on..

Icecaps are melting, the climate is going to hell. We're getting raped at the pumps and soldiers are dying overseas. Guess what? A brain-dead toad could trace the breadcrumbs back to the gist of this article:

The adverse effects that burning fossil fuels have had on our environment and their contribution to global warming are well documented. Yet, according to Exxon Mobil's 1999 annual report, the company acknowledged the public's concern over "climate changes" due to the use of fossil fuels but said that the projected serious effects "rely on speculative assumptions and results from unproven models." Exxon Mobil doesn't believe that "the current scientific understanding justifies mandatory restrictions on the use of fossil fuels" as it is certain "that significant economic harm would result from restricting fuel availability to consumers." The fact is that the company would lose profits--just as any other oil company would if alternative energy sources were developed. Oil companies are searching for more oil reserves, not alternative sources for fossil fuels. More oil means more profit.

Source: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1374/is_5_60/ai_65133031/pg_4?tag=artBody;col1

 

[Jarlaxle]

The thing is that you cannot convince me that installing a nuclear facility is cheaper than installing a geothermal one of comparable output

Then how are you any different from a 4-year-old covering his ears and hollering LA-LA-LA-LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU LA-LA-LA-LA! whenever he is told something he doesn't like?

 

[Andy]

You guys both sound like PR spindoctors for BigOil..

Actually, you do. It's your policies being enacted that have led to the high gas prices that BigOil is feeding from. You could be a the very "bigoil agent on the forum" you warned me about before.

Not like they'd have any of them on the internet defending the indefensible (killing troops for profit) but you know...it is a remote possibility...

Still taking medication from your surgery?

The thing is that you cannot convince me that installing a nuclear facility is cheaper than installing a geothermal one of comparable output. You just cannot. And you're not fooling anyone saying you can. You cannot tell me that it is more expensive to install a solar farm, moreso than an offshore oil rig...along with payroll, maintenance and disaster cleanup costs...

If not, then cite your evidence, because I fully supported my points from Why I Believe: Geo-power thread.

If you can not accept the evidence given, without any valid evidence to the contrary, then you are just a simple close-minded person, who has chosen to be willfully ignorant.

Like Jarlaxle said "a 4-year-old covering his ears and hollering LA-LA-LA-LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU LA-LA-LA-LA! whenever he is told something he doesn't like"

You just can't pull the old decades-long wool over the eyes of Joe Public anymore. We know we're running out of oil. We know alternatives have been controlled and suppressed by BigOil. And we know as a direct result of that, US Troops are dying in numbers in the Middle East.

We have conclusively proven time and time again, this theory is false. On all accounts. You have nothing new to say, and no evidence to support the same broken record. You are wrong, and have been for as long as I've heard these lame posts.

We have a series of hurricanes back to back pounding the Eastern and Gulf seaboard. On the beach I go to sometimes, the low tide mark is now where the high tide used to be. High tide falls daily on the record tide line...and so on..

Icecaps are melting, the climate is going to hell. We're getting raped at the pumps and soldiers are dying overseas. Guess what? A brain-dead toad could trace the breadcrumbs back to the gist of this article:

Global temps are falling, the Antarctic ice cap has reached record highs. None of your other circumstantial evidence is valid. A brain dead toad clearly doesn't look at the evidence, because it doesn't support your theory, that only a brain dead toad would believe.

 

[Sihouette]

According to the July 7 Fortune 500, Exxon Mobil, Ford Motors, and General Motors are some of the top profit-making corporations in the United States, and they wield a great amount of economic and political clout. Although there are alternative energy sources and related technologies available for development to meet our growing energy needs, there is currently not enough profit in them to be an attractive alternative for corporations. Perhaps renewable energy, too, is destined to become fossilized.

Well, in all fairness, this article was written in 2000 I think. 8 years later we have the fruition of this "political clout", and oh what a bitter harvest it is..

Now alternatives aren't an option, they are a mandate.

You did it to yourselves BigOil. You can look in the mirror for someone to blame. The trouble is, not only did you screw over your stockholders and your own financial glut, you screwed the entire country by placing us in a position of vulnerability.

That is the unforgivable sin: Selling out American safety with plans for obscene profit...which back in the day was called "treason". Now it's just "good capitalism"...

 

[PLC1]

they are a mandate.

You did it to yourselves BigOil. You can look in the mirror for someone to blame. The trouble is, not only did you screw over your stockholders and your own financial glut, you screwed the entire country by placing us in a position of vulnerability.

Big oil's stockholders are doing very well, thank you. It's the GM stockholders who are taking it in the shorts.

 

[Sihouette]

That would be because BigOil coerced them to scrap their money-maker: the electric car. Imagine if GM had stayed with that and honed it over the years? Their stock would be worth quite a bit. All the difference in the world in fact. Instead BigOil talked them into the guzzling "hummer".

If I was a stockholder, I'd organize, investigate and sue some SOBs who richly deserve it. Pun intended..

Meanwhile, I hear that Congress has put out a funny "compromise" on offshore oil pleas from the mega-profit monopoly: 50 miles offshore only and only if the State agrees...


Hmmm...50 miles average where the Continental Shelf drops off. Drilling could get fun in really deep water where rough seas are not uncommon. And then only if the State agrees... Good luck in California. Even if you pad the Governator's pockets really well, you'll have millions of protestors on your hands. Last I heard, Ahhnold was staunchly opposed to offshore drilling. Austrians can be so stubborn sometimes!