I received a very rude email from a politician who had taken great offence at my stance on the issue. Among the hidden costs I highlighted was the cost of decommissioning a nuclear plant at the end of its service life. The cheapest way is to simply lock the doors and go away. But even that strategy is expensive, usually to the taxpayer, because SOMEONE has to maintain the site, and SOMEONE ends up owning the property without the possibility of doing anything useful with it for quite some time to come.
Dr. Dennis Jensen, MP, was outraged and reminded me that many old nuclear sites have been rehabilitated over the years. Well, duh! I don't disagree with you, Dennis. There most certainly are many more expensive ways to decommission a nuclear plant besides just locking the doors. The point is that it costs money, and it's a cost usually borne by the unsuspecting taxpayer.
Dennis provided ample data to support his belief that nuclear power is actually quite cheap. The data comes courtesy of the manufacturers of nuclear power plants, so we know they aren't biased or anything.
Cheap for who? For the energy companies, maybe. But not for the taxpayer. The costings based on best-case scenarios do not include the cost of financing, overseeing, administering, providing security, building infrastructure and a host of other functions that governments habitually do in relation to nuclear energy. Interestingly, Dr. Jensen had nothing to say on that subject.
But the real point ignored and sidestepped, in typical politician fashion, is whether nuclear energy is a good fit for Western Australia.
WA is a state of around 2 million people with a land area of about 2.5 million square kilometers. That's about 1.7% of the Earth's land area, with less than 0.03% of the population. Half of that population is centered around Perth, leaving large swaths of the rest of the state virtually uninhabited.
WA does not have a large industrial base, and is by no means a "24-hour economy," since most businesses including large supermarkets must, by some ludicrous outdated law, close by 6 PM nightly. There are many mine sites are spread out around the state, and most do not have access to the integrated electricity network. They often rely on diesel generators.
Nuclear energy is primarily a baseload supplier of electricity. The economics of nuclear energy rely on scaling up. In other words, it's more affordable when you build the biggest power plant that you possibly can. As long as you're going through all the expense of making a nuclear reactor anyway, you may as well make it huge so it can pay down the mortgage faster.
WA's energy consumption consists of mainly peak power with a relatively low baseload requirement. Why, then, should WA consider installing massive baseload electricity generation capacity in the form of massive nuclear generators? Even if it were cheap, it would be a bad idea.
Another essential factor is geography. Nuclear power economics rely on the ability to sell excess electricity on an open energy market at a spot rate. On a large interconnected grid system,there will always be some energy provider somewhere having a problem meeting their own needs and will effectively have to buy electricity for their customers elsewhere.
In WA, there is only one energy retailer. WA doesn't have any close neighbors to whom it can sell electricity. The WA electricity network is tiny by international standards, and is completely stand-alone. It therefore has no capacity to buy or sell electricity, but must use all it can make and make all it can use. Nuclear energy just doesn't make sense for a market like that.
I am neither pro-nuclear nor anti-nuclear. It might be right in some situations, it might not be in others. Some technologies and reactor designs might be safe, others might not be. But the factors that help make nuclear power cheapER are objectively absent in Western Australia. For WA then, nuclear energy would be an expensive and wasteful exercise. Of this, there is little doubt.
Hmm, where do I start?
ReplyDeleteJohn, first up, be honest. When I spoke with you on the phone, you were completely unaware (so you said) about the fact that 7 nuclear power stations had been decommissioned to greenfield status. Now you claim that you were "reminded"; if that is the case, your argument in the WA Business News was disingenuous. Indeed, couldn't you make the same arguments about decommissioning ANY power station. At least with nukes, the cost of decommissioning forms part of the price of electricity.
You mention vested interests. First up, Eskom is the generator of about 95% of electricity in South Africa, and much of that is cheap coal. THEIR data is that nuclear is the cheapest in South Africa - and Eskom does not manufacture nuclear power plants. Then there is GE, who state that nuclear is the cheapest in the US. Yes, they do have a vested interest, they build nukes. But then agasin, they also do gas, solar and wind, so which to choose...
The cost issue, as I stated, can be argued ad infinitum. My point is not to force generators to use nuclear, it is to allow them the opportunity to generate nuclear power unencumbered by legislative bans, which is now the case. That is the best way to have it, otherwise you will have adherants and detractors making all sorts of spurious claims.
As can be seen from my reply in WA Business News, I have not "in typical politican fashion" sidestepped the issue of nuclear for the WA market. I pointed out that if something like an AP-600 were commissioned at the same time as decommissioning a coal fired power station, you would not have an indigestible increase in supply.
Other "strawman" argumets were put up by you, John, in the WA business news article. The fact is, 3 of the 5 strawman arguments you constructed were the case for coal as well, so I wonder how coal fired electricity works in WA. BTW, seeing you did not know what a strawman argument is, is is building up a false premise or argument so that it call be pulled down, and thus vindicate the position of the perosn.
Another factor is that many of the Gen IV and other technologies that will shortly be on the market have lower outputs, such as Pebble Bed reactors, with a 165MW output, which is very digestible in WA.
John, be honest about your article and your position. The first three paragraphs in your WA Business News article set up the premise that you are a dispassionate observer seeking to examine the facts. This is followed by strawman arguments (questions) and disingenuous twaddle about locking up and walking away from an unused power station (unlike, of course, East Perth and Kwinana abandoned coal fired power stations). However, as stated, the cost of decommissioning is included in the price of electricity.
John, what is your view of overturning the legislation banning nuclear power, and letting the market decided?
Dr. Jensen,
ReplyDeleteThank you for your comments. I've decided to post them unedited, because believe it or not I respect your knowledge, your opinions, and your right to have them.
I may be a bit forgetful, but I simply have no memory of ever having spoken to you on the telephone. Can you refresh my memory? I can confirm I would have been unaware of the specific examples you mention, but I may have given the impression that I was unaware of rehabilitative capabilities entirely. For that I apologise.
I have a question for you, Dennis: is there a taxation structure in place that would allow nuclear plant operators to "bank" part of pre-tax profits in anticipation of post-revenue expenses such as storage and decommissioning? Sort of like a pension plan, but for capital assets. The problem is, as you surely are aware, that losses or expenses cannot normally be carried backwards on tax returns, and so the expense of decommissioning either has to be covered by post-tax profits (which have a habit of going "walkabout"), or in the case of a company declaring bankruptcy, by the taxpayer. How is this problem going to be addressed?
I agree with you in principle that government has no business telling individuals or businesses what they can and cannot do (within reason). However, I detect that you are trying to maneuverer me into either the pro-nuke or the anti-nuke camp. That simply isn't going to happen: I am neutral. Legalize it or don't legalize it, I don't care. Implement it or not. All I'm saying to the community is, don't suffer any illusions about unlimited cheap energy. If we choose nuclear, it should be for the right and valid reasons. If we continue to ban it, that should be for the right reasons, too (such as having no storage and transport plan in place). Besides, we will still need significant peaking capacity whatever course we take.
The five selection criteria I mention in my original article (which you declaim as "straw men") I still believe are valid questions to ask in choosing the right form of power generation for a community. If as you say a small enough nuclear generator can be constructed and operated cost-effectively in WA's unique, isolated market, then go for it. I think it would be responsible to first solve the waste storage problem before committing to it.
Another thing I'd like to know, Dennis, is this: do you disagree that the taxpayers will end up bearing additional costs as a direct result of taking a nuclear approach? Whether or not it's good value for money can, as you say, be debated ad infinitum.
One more thing: Will operators be allowed to charge customers whatever they need to charge in order to recoup costs and maintain the network? I believe they should be given this latitude even now.