Clean electricity is the road to the future
2030 will be here in 10 years and our quality of life depends on what we do now. Subsidizing coal as a “clean fuel,” pretending methane is better than coal, and burning U.S. forests for use as fuel in the U.K. and other countries as “carbon–neutral,” is taking us in the wrong direction.
We are running out of time and we don’t have time to build unsafe dams, wait for geothermal power, or hope atmospheric carbon emissions will be removed and stored safely. We have one last hope and can’t afford to fail. We need to use the best solutions we have and decide based on facts and science, not emotions.
Clean air, for example, justifies banning combustion and using instead clean nuclear power, according to Meredith Angwin, an expert chemist who hates nitrogen oxides. She says in her book, Campaigning for Clean Air: Strategies for Pro-Nuclear Advocacy, “the nitrogen in the air combines with the oxygen in the air, in a very hot flame. The air is always there, and at high temperature, the air burns itself.”
This explains the first and last ultra-supercritical advanced clean coal SWEPCO Turk plant, operating at elevated steam temperature and pressure… creating nitrogen oxides, ignoring chemistry.
The transportation and electric sectors account for 55 percent of the total greenhouse gas U.S. emissions. To stop transportation GHG emissions, we need to replace internal combustion engines with electric vehicles (EVs) powered by clean energy. This is a major political and economic challenge. Sixty-six percent of the electricity in the U.S comes from fossil fuels.
How much clean electricity do we need?
We need clean electricity to power homes and businesses and charge the EVs on the road. Extreme weather events in the next 10 years will increase in severity and frequency, with higher demands for cooling and heating. The demand for clean electricity will double while we shut down safe nuclear power plants without plans to upgrade plants to extend their life.
Can solar and wind alone replace fossil fuels?
No, wind and solar farms provide variable bulk generation. The UK National Grid has proved the value of solar and wind is to reduce the cost of clean electricity when there is a demand for variable power. The UK pays wind farms to stop feeding electricity and asks customers to charge their batteries. Adding nuclear will provide resilient power.
Replacing the grid
The grid is the name given to several interconnections with public and privately-owned transmission lines and thousands of substations. The grid grew with captive ratepayers and promises to “keep the lights on today and in the future” with coal and gas-fired power plants. The grid was not designed for extreme weather events. Making it larger increases the cost and complexity – substations are the weakest link.
Living off-grid with solar energy and storage is the best solution. Microgrids owned by business and communities, designed to disconnect from the grid, provide resilient solutions. However, these are not options for everyone. Some have to use the grid.
Pacific Gas & Electric and the California Independent System Operator made high investments in solar and wind farms trying to reduce carbon emissions. PG&E provides high-cost unreliable service, with power blackouts for days when demand increases. To avoid blackouts, California communities are building microgrids.
Replacing the grid with distributed microgrids is a resilient architecture, with small modular nuclear reactors for dependable electricity.
The road to 2030
Michael J. Fox is the ultimate optimist, a brilliant actor and writer, and an activist for Parkinson’s disease. In his latest book, No Time Like the Future, he talks about working at remote locations feeling isolated and sad. In Thailand he was rescued by a puppy he found on a beach, who he named Sanuk. Fox could not bring Sanuk to the U.S., but three years later, someone mentioned traveling to Thailand and staying in the same hotel. Sanuk had grown and looked happy to mingle with the guests who knew him as Michael J. Fox!
Keep your eyes wide open and protect your future.
Dr. Luis Contreras
Do you remember waiting until the last minute to prepare for a final exam, staying up all night hoping to makeup for all the homework and classes you missed?
How did that work for you?
We have known man-made carbon dioxide emissions are the main cause of the climate disruption for over 50 years, but we ignored many incremental solutions, waiting for a better day.
Carbon Fee & Dividend, Energy efficiency, Circular Economy, and Nuclear Power Plants are some of the best known solutions.
Will we wait, again?
Geoengineering is the name of Hail Mary, last minute, never tried before, high-risk ideas to “fix the climate.” Oil companies are making promises that would give them time to sell oil and gas while pretending to care for the climate. This is what some experts say:
“Despite its fantastical nature however, the negative emissions idea has recently burst into the public arena, where it is already leading a life of its own. For skeptics, this raises the concern of a “moral hazard”, or the possibility that the mere promise of future NETs could act as a break on emission reductions in the present. Techno-optimist policy makers, the thinking goes, might very well seize on the negative emissions idea as a “get-out-of-jail” card, holding back from rapid near-term decarbonization in the belief that opportunities for future negative emissions offer sufficient guarantee that the climate crisis can be contained. It is above all future generations, and particularly the poorest among them, that would face the consequences when this “high-stakes gamble” eventually backfires and large-scale NETs turn out to be little more than a pipedream.”
“Take the example of Shell. While not exactly known for its vanguard mitigation actions, the company recently released a document in which it outlines its vision to keep global warming to “well below 2°C”. Unsurprisingly perhaps, Shell’s “most ambitious climate scenario” turns out to include substantial fossil fuel use well into the future. It for example assumes that demand for oil will grow until about 2025, and then decrease only gradually. By 2050, the year when the world needs to reach net zero emissions in order to stay below 1.5°C, oil demand in this scenario would still account for about 85% of current consumption.”
The Promises and Perils of Geoengineering on the Brink. Rutgers University Press.
https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/has-it-come-to-this/9781978809352
Clean air is fundamental for life. Air pollution from coal-fired power plants kills people
“According to Dr. James E Hansen, a pioneer in climate change science and awareness, nuclear power has saved over 2 million lives from fossil fuel air pollution. This is due to the clean air benefits of nuclear power, compared to the fossil fuel pollutant emissions, including particulates.”
“Particulate matter is the term for particles found in the air, like dust, dirt, soot, smoke, and liquid droplets. Particulate can be inhaled into and accumulate in the respiratory system. Small particulates, less than 2.5 micrometers in diameter, have major health risks because the particles are so small that they can lodge deeply into the lungs.”
– Campaigning for Clean Air: Strategies for Pro-Nuclear Advocacy by Meredith Angwin
For further reading on nuclear power’s contribution to a clean environment, please see:
Gwyneth Cravens’ Power to Save the World
https://www.meredithangwin.com
Too good to be true
The Turk SWEPCO ultra-supercritical coal-fired power plant was meant to be clean, the first and the last! The plant, like Doctor Frankenstein’s hero-monster, was doomed to be forever alone on the day it was born.
“As an ultra-supercritical coal-fired power plant, Turk operates at extraordinarily high pressures and temperatures, well above typical supercritical pressures of around 4,500 psi and hotter than 1050 degrees Fahrenheit.”
“As you increase temperature you increase your efficiencies. Turk achieves the highest efficiencies around in coal power generation today; 40 percent of the thermal energy available in the fuel comes out as electric power. This level of efficiency in extracting energy from coal allows Turk to use less of the stuff to produce the same amount of power. Less coal burned means less emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, mercury, carbon dioxide and particulate matter. It also means fewer waste products and less fly ash, and decreased need for the commodities used in environmental control activities, like activated carbon and ammonia.”
AEP should have talked with Meredith Angwin, an expert clean air and chemist. She says, “I HATE NOx. The problem with nitrogen oxides is that you can’t get away from it. NOx is produced when air burns itself: the nitrogen in the air combines with the oxygen in the air, in a very hot flame. You can’t get rid of NOx by using a cleaner fuel. The air is always there, and at high temperature, the air burns itself.”
https://www.power-eng.com/2013/06/12/first-last-the-ultra-supercritical-coal-fired-turk/