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nuclear or hydro? try coal - gregor

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  • nuclear or hydro? try coal - gregor

    Global Hydro and Nuclear Power in Perspective

    At the recent ASPO conference in Washington, DC I found myself in a lunchtime conversation discussing the contributions Nuclear and Hydro were making to world energy supply. It’s worth noting that Hydropower did experience an uptick in global use in the past five years. Nuclear meanwhile, which has seen a slowing rate of consumption since the 1980′s, leveled off and fell during the same period. While these two energy sources are worth discussing, they pale in comparison to oil and coal use globally, as the second chart shows.



    In a post earlier this year, I showed similar graphics as below for global energy use by source for two distinct years: 1998, and 2008. With updated data, it’s worth juxtaposing the latest information (for 2009) with the close-up of Hydro and Nuclear to give a sense of proportion.





    The prospects for any future growth from nuclear power are now very dim, at least, if one was hoping to extract a meaningful contribution from that energy source. The reasons are myriad, but, in the developed world because of societal concerns and the pricing of risk it’s not even possible for the nuclear industry to function without government support–from financing to insurance. Meanwhile wind power, with its relatively fast construction times and consequent return on investment at moderately attractive levels, is now more competitive by comparison. Yes, wind is a different kind (and different quality) of energy. But we are already witnessing wind power construction globally pulling way, way ahead of the nuclear industry.

    Unfortunately, the entire discussion of Wind, Solar, and Nuclear power is marginal when considering how the world powers itself, in the main. The title of my ASPO conference talk, Return to Coal, addressed the coming crossover point when coal once again becomes the primary energy source of the world. When we consider these energy sources, and their actual use in perspective, we can see that the politics of Climate Change legislation for example is actually just a parlour game played in the developed world: and one that offers no practical solutions. Most proposals have been very light and mostly symbolic, regardless, and even these failed to pass as most leaders recognize them as lose-lose propositions for their political careers. Meanwhile, its the five billion people in the developing world, industrializing, who are now in the drivers seat of the world economy, and world energy usage. They have adopted coal as their primary energy source while the OECD countries, overly indebted and losing power on the world stage, delude themselves into thinking they have some say in the matter. (We) don’t.

    -Gregor
    http://gregor.us/coal/global-hydro-a...Google+Reader\
    Last edited by jk; October 16, 2010, 08:11 PM.

  • #2
    Re: nuclear or hydro? try coal - gregor

    When we consider these energy sources, and their actual use in perspective, we can see that the politics of Climate Change legislation for example is actually just a parlour game played in the developed world: and one that offers no practical solutions. Most proposals have been very light and mostly symbolic, regardless, and even these failed to pass as most leaders recognize them as lose-lose propositions for their political careers. Meanwhile, its the five billion people in the developing world, industrializing, who are now in the drivers seat of the world economy, and world energy usage. They have adopted coal as their primary energy source while the OECD countries, overly indebted and losing power on the world stage, delude themselves into thinking they have some say in the matter. (We) don’t.
    That has the ring of truth to it. Ugh. Whatever happened to "Let a thousand reactors bloom"?

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    • #3
      Re: nuclear or hydro? try coal - gregor

      Don't count on a return to coal, for very long anyway:

      Peak coal is the point in time at which the maximum global coal production rate is reached, after which, according to the theory, the rate of production will enter to a terminal decline. Coal is a fossil fuel formed from plant matter over the course of millions of years. It is a finite resource and thus considered to be a non-renewable energy source.

      It must be kept in mind that there are two different peaks: one measured by mass (i.e. metric tons) and another by energy output (i.e. petajoules). The energy output has dropped significantly since 2000, so the energetic peak will come much sooner than the mass peak.

      The contemporary concept of peak coal follows from M. King Hubbert's Hubbert peak theory, which is most commonly associated with Peak oil. Hubbert's analysis showed how each oil well, region, and nation has a depletion curve.[1] However, this question was originally raised by William Stanley Jevons in his book The Coal Question back in 1865.

      Hubbert noted that United States coal production grew logarithmically at a steady 6.6% per year from 1850 to 1910. Then the growth leveled off. He concluded that no finite resource could sustain exponential growth. At some point, the rate of production will have to peak and then decline until the resource is exhausted. He theorized that production rate plotted versus time would show a bell-shaped curve, declining as rapidly as it had risen.[2] Hubbert used his observation of the US coal production to predict the behavior of peak oil.

      The estimates for global peak coal production vary wildly. Many coal associations suggest the peak could occur in 200 years or more, while scholarly estimates predict the peak to occur as early as 2010. Research in 2009 by the University of Newcastle in Australia concluded that global coal production could peak sometime between 2010 and 2048.[3] Global coal reserve data is generally of poor quality and is often biased towards the high side.[4] Collective projections generally predict that global peak coal production may occur sometime around 2025 at 30 percent above current production in the best case scenario, depending on future coal production rates.[5][6]
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_coal

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