Recently Sharon Squassoni, Director and Senior Fellow of the Center of Strategic International Studies, wrote an article in which she tries to show us why nuclear energy is becoming obsolete in the face of "impressive" economic developments of renewables. She aluded to nuclear as being "A climate cure worse than the disease"
I beg to differ, and therefore have written this brief response.
Dear Sharon,
I've read your article, and I think that you're applying the wrong metrics to your line of reasoning.
You should try: Materials invested per unit of energy produced over the lifetime of technology X.
Subsequently you should look at material production rates and try to determine the likelihood of said material production rates to be increased so that they can accommodate the required growth in wind and solar.
Only then can feasibility really be weighed. The question should be, what can we do to mitigate man-made carbon emissions? And the answer should be : create an all-inclusive energy mix in which there is an emphasis on R&D on technologies which can be scaled up quicker and more effectively —especially in terms of material usage efficiency.
You might think that "China’s ambitious nuclear power plant construction, which is the envy of the global industry, is dwarfed by China’s accomplishments in the renewables sector." But this growth is insignificant contrasted with what ought to be done i.e. decarbonizing somewhere between 150,000 and 300,000 TWh on a global scale. Good luck doing that on RE alone.
Besides, the discrepancy between projected primary energy demand, and subsequent required end-use efficiencies is grossly overestimated (especially by 100% RE / WWS proponents).
Attached you will find my most recent work on this issue.
In CC you will find guides of mine, simply to help them keep track of my activities : Dr. Alexander Cannara, Dr. Ken Caldeira, Dr. James Hansen.
With kind regards,
Mathijs Beckers
It is entirely possible that this mail has been sucked into the void of e-mail filters, and therefore I will publish this letter on my blog as well.
Thies out...
Anybody who thinks anything but nuclear energy can offset climate change is simply Credulous.
ReplyDeleteNuclear energy was unknown to the physicists of the 19th century, years after fossil fuels swept "solar renewables" off of the seas, the fields, and the highways,
A hundred gigawatt hours a year is not worth much if it doesn't arrive when grid demand needs it, and electricity storage is difficult and expensive.