SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Westinghouse Electric Company has filed for bankruptcy:
Westinghouse Electric Co, a unit of Japanese conglomerate Toshiba Corp, filed for bankruptcy on Wednesday, hit by billions of dollars of cost overruns at four nuclear reactors under construction in the U.S. Southeast.
The bankruptcy casts doubt on the future of the first new U.S. nuclear power plants in three decades, which were scheduled to begin producing power as soon as this week, but are now years behind schedule.
The four reactors are part of two projects known as V.C. Summer in South Carolina, which is majority owned by SCANA Corp, and Vogtle in Georgia, which is owned by a group of utilities led by Southern Co.
Costs for the projects have soared due to increased safety demands by U.S. regulators, and also due to significantly higher-than-anticipated costs for labor, equipment and components.
Pittsburgh-based Westinghouse said it hopes to use bankruptcy to isolate and reorganize around its "very profitable" nuclear fuel and power plant servicing businesses from its money-losing construction operation.
Also at Ars Technica and Business Insider.
Toshiba's Westinghouse problems have caused the company to sell off other assets:
Toshiba in Trouble
Toshiba Shares Plunge Ahead of Nuclear Investment Writedown
Toshiba Considers NAND Business Split; Samsung Delays Release of 4 TB SSDs
Toshiba Nuked Half its Assets
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 31 2017, @07:49AM (17 children)
As to be expected these plants were being developed by fossil fuel interests. They see nuclear as the most economically desirable transition away from fossil fuels. It has major barriers to entry, is completely centralized, and maintains a mutually empowering incestuous relationship between energy producers and the government. On that topic, these nuclear power plants were being built with $8.3 billion in guaranteed loans from the Obama administration, with no collateral required. In other words, the US taxpayer just had $8.3 go up in smoke. What I found particularly stupefying is how low power these reactors actually are. Apparently [wikipedia.org] these reactors were designed to generate slightly over 1GW of power a piece. To put these numbers in contrast China, last year alone, added more than 34GW [wikipedia.org] of solar power in 2016 alone. To put both of those numbers in contras the total US energy capacity is 1068GW [wikipedia.org].
I find the massive amount of astroturfed support for nuclear very frustrating. When you look into the numbers, it's just not a good idea. And of course while I think fear mongering is not the right path, one can't simply ignore the enormous consequences of nuclear disaster. The wiki page sources the current chances of a core damaging earthquake for the Vogtle reactor alone at 1 in 140,845. And those numbers were before the sharp spike in fracking which is now looking like to also imminently come to Georgia. That 'mysterious correlation' of increased seismic activity and fracking would likely send those odds sharply down. And of course as you add more reactors those odds also come down. And we haven't even gotten into nuclear waste, which of course increases in proportion to the number of plants. Just because something doesn't generate CO2 does not mean it's an inherently desirable energy source.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 31 2017, @08:09AM
The answer is clear. We need to transition from fracking to nuclear.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Friday March 31 2017, @08:42AM (3 children)
> What I found particularly stupefying is how low power these reactors actually are.
Russia's most powerful design that has been put into operation, the VVER-1200, seems to have basically the same power.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VVER#VVER-1200 [wikipedia.org]
https://www.rt.com/business/354754-rosatom-power-block-russia/ [rt.com]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novovoronezh_Nuclear_Power_Plant_II [wikipedia.org]
Areva's EPR is to have a higher output, around 1.63 to 1.75 GWe; none are yet in operation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Pressurized_Reactor [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 31 2017, @08:50AM (2 children)
One Areva horror story https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olkiluoto_3 [wikipedia.org] (a BWR)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 31 2017, @09:18AM
I mean to say an EPR...
(Score: 2) by Aiwendil on Friday March 31 2017, @09:35AM
the European Pressurized water Reactor (EPR) is a PWR as well..
As a sidenote - I will laugh quite a bit if Taishan-1 (the third EPR is you go on when construction started) becomes the first to enter comnericial operation, and even harder if Taishan-2 will be the secimd to enter commercial operation :)
(Both OL-3 and Taishan-1 are in testing stages)
(Score: 5, Informative) by Aiwendil on Friday March 31 2017, @08:47AM (3 children)
A few things.
1) Yeah, the AP1000 is a smaller large/upper midsize reactor
1b) It's main features are enhanced modularity and ability to be built progressivly cheaper (with high cost for start of the series)
1bb) also enhanced safety
1c) Keep an eye on the upcomming CPR1400 for future info about how it will pan out when properly managed.
2) China started up 5GWe worth of nuclear in 2016 iirc (and has about 20GWe under active construction)
3) USA's nuclear generation is about 19% of it's total, that from only about 100GWe nuclear installed
3b) Capacity factor matters
3c) The US grid actually can be supplied with less than 600GWe, it has a scary high degree of mismatch and ineffeciency in it.
4) If you want to see nuclear built properly take a look at VVER-1000, APR1400, Hitachi-ABWR, Candu 6e (latest finished ahead of time and under budget), or historically the french N2, and the swedish ABB BWR-69 and -75 or Westinghouse late-70s/early-80s models.
4b) USA (and sweden, and france, and germany) lost its game in the mid-80s, sad since they made lots of good stuff.
5) Why do people only point out the failures and never the sucesses? A few reactors (including a GenIII+) has come online (or entered commercial operation) this year already
(Score: 2) by Aiwendil on Friday March 31 2017, @09:37AM
Nope, remembered wrong - they started up 7.5GWe in 2016
(Score: 3, Informative) by subs on Friday March 31 2017, @10:33AM (1 child)
China started up [7.5]GWe worth of nuclear in 2016
Comparing that to poster's 34GW for solar would seem to be leaving nuclear in the dust. Until you compare capacity factors and find out that solar is about 0.1 while nuclear is 0.9 - 0.95. So in net terms, they've brought 2x the amount of nuclear capacity online.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 01 2017, @07:12AM
yeah, and there's ONE hospital for the whole country and it belongs to people who for soem reason don't like you (but also service the countries presidents health).
if the top-left area of the country crashes the grid and the single nuke .. err.. hospital happens to be in that area the whole country craps out.
we don't need more centralizrd nuclear waste generation to power your shitty iPad and xploding samsung mobile phones.
power to the people and give everybody a chance to participate in generating a stable grid ... with lots of little hospitals (with some that like you).
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday March 31 2017, @11:57AM (7 children)
I find the massive amount of astroturfed support for nuclear very frustrating.
As opposed to the astroturfed opposition to nuclear?
And of course while I think fear mongering is not the right path, one can't simply ignore the enormous consequences of nuclear disaster.
Apparently, your thoughts didn't prevent you from doing so. Not much point to your post, but I'll note that lower power per reactor can be a good thing because that can mean less fuel per reactor. After all, a key factor in the risk of nuclear reactors is the quantity of fuel that is crammed into one which is utterly massive. The less fuel that is required in order to function, then the less mess when things go wrong - all else being equal.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 31 2017, @02:01PM (6 children)
Different AC here.
Decentralization is the future of power generation. Solar is an obvious option here, and hopefully there may be many options to choose from. The more the merrier. Just get decentralized, generate your own power, stop being beholden to megacorps, plus environmental goodies, etc etc.
I've heard of some plans for miniaturized nuclear reactors. I think it would be fantastic to be able to plunk one of those down say as a neighborhood co-op. As you note, if something goes wrong, maybe it won't be an OMG disaster. (Of course, people need to get over OMG Nuclear! Chernobyl! Three Mile Island! Fukushima! China Syndrome!) They can put it in My Back Yard. Have you been following that sort of thing and can you add more?
(Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Friday March 31 2017, @04:43PM (3 children)
Decentralization is the future of power generation. Solar is an obvious option here, and hopefully there may be many options to choose from. The more the merrier. Just get decentralized, generate your own power, stop being beholden to megacorps, plus environmental goodies, etc etc.
The primary reason centralization is a factor in the first place is that there are considerable economies of scale to power generation and transmission as well as dealing with the vagaries of nuclear power regulation. A humongous reactor on an ocean shore will have access to a massive heat sink, a relatively simple and cheap link to the grid for the power supplied, and be relatively simple to deal with the paperwork, inspections, and other costs of nuclear power regulation.
Solar power can outright ignore the safety aspect of course. It has some safety issues (including an overall higher death rate per power generated), but not the enormous tail problem that nuclear power is regulated to prevent. The distributed nature of the power means a traditional power generation system would require more infrastructure in order to link it to the grid. The saving grace however is that demand is distributed as well and much of the demand has available space to link to an adequate solar power system resulting in a very parsimonious linking of supply to demand.
I've heard of some plans for miniaturized nuclear reactors. I think it would be fantastic to be able to plunk one of those down say as a neighborhood co-op. As you note, if something goes wrong, maybe it won't be an OMG disaster. (Of course, people need to get over OMG Nuclear! Chernobyl! Three Mile Island! Fukushima! China Syndrome!) They can put it in My Back Yard. Have you been following that sort of thing and can you add more?
First, this is a real thing. We actually have reactors like this. The catch is that they're intended for use in space. Russia in particular has developed the TOPAZ [wikipedia.org] reactor. The first generation has actually been used in two satellites in the 1980s. The second generation weighs about a ton and can generate around 10kW indefinitely for up to five years, if I understand the technology claims correctly. Anyway, these reactors were self-contained and designed to operate without human intervention for their entire lifespan. So that's a technology demonstration.
The problem is that currently reactors are constantly monitored and in a highly secure environment. But these would be placed in the midst of neighborhoods with modest surveillance. I doubt they've figured out how to get around the risks of someone trying to break into one while simultaneously making the reactor easy to service.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Sunday April 02 2017, @05:46AM (2 children)
TOPAZ reactors, according to your link, run on highly enriched uranium. HEU can be used to make bombs.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday April 02 2017, @12:08PM (1 child)
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Sunday April 02 2017, @03:00PM
Fair enough. My points are that the small size was achievable because of the use of HEU, and that HEU presents a greater proliferation risk than low-enriched uranium or natural uranium: the fuel can be used directly in a nuclear explosive. For that reason, a reactor running on HEU warrants extra security.
Use of Uranium enriched to significantly less than 93% U-235 (medium-enriched uranium [MEU], defined as approximately 35% U-235, or low-enriched uranium [LEU], defined as <20% U-235), always results in a mass penalty for the reactor core for a given power.
-- http://fissilematerials.org/library/doe94a.pdf [fissilematerials.org]
Fission reactors have been used to power satellites orbiting earth. Weapons-grade HEU has been exclusively used for such reactors due to the extreme size constraints imposed by space launches.
-- http://www.nti.org/analysis/reports/civilian-heu-reduction-and-elimination/ [nti.org]
(Score: 2) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Friday March 31 2017, @11:10PM (1 child)
...Of course, people need to get over OMG Nuclear! Chernobyl! Three Mile Island! Fukushima! China Syndrome!...
As soon as you can show me operators I can trust...
...They can put it in My Back Yard
...but not before. It's a people problem, not a technology problem.
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday April 02 2017, @12:10PM
As soon as you can show me operators I can trust...
You still have to show that you would trust those who are trustworthy.
...but not before. It's a people problem, not a technology problem.
Indeed.