For most of the month of February the Northwest’s only nuclear power plant has been under a “no touch” order to help keep the heat on across the region.
The Bonneville Power Administration, which markets the electricity produced at the nuclear plant near Richland, asked for the restriction during an unusually cold February across the state that increased the demand for electricity.
The policy limits any maintenance activity that would either require a reduction in power or would pose a risk to sustaining 100 percent production, said Mike Paoli, spokesman for Energy Northwest. […]
The cold snap comes as water flows that spin dam turbines are low and wind generation is not at peak production.
h/t TH
This is where a counter activist, would just shut the damn thing down, and let the people have the unreliable power grid that they voted for. Shut it off, then go on TV and say “you voted for so called renewables, now enjoy the consequences of your decision”.
Like south Australia, people have to suffer the consequences of their own bad decisions if they are to learn anything.
To put it more concisely; “you keep voting for people who private jet to climate conferences, you get to freeze in the dark”.
The Nuculur fraidy cats have decommissioned all the nuculur power plants in CA.
https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-diablo-canyon-nuclear-20160621-snap-story.html
I am SHOCKED that the hardcore leftists in WA State would issue a “no touch” order … to a NUCULUR plant!! They are ORDERING the aged nuculur power plant to NOT maintain safety while the region is in desperate need of AFFORDABLE energy. The “green” politicians are ASKING for a China Syndrome in their own backyard!! Nuculur energy is DANGEROUS, and SCARY, and subject to all manner of human error that will unleash a hellish melt-down that irradiates half the State of WA!! … or so they say. The horror. The horror.
Why don’t they just fire-up some solar arrays? Or go blow their windmills into operation? Or just put on another sweater (read: down jacket), as Jimmy Carter scolded?
Gee, what a great idea – limiting maintenance worked so well at Chernobyl…
Where DO they come-up with these geniuses?
Whether you agree with this guys opinion on nuclear or not, it’s a great discussion of the negatives of wind and solar
https://quillette.com/2019/02/27/why-renewables-cant-save-the-planet/
Watched a program on nuclear fusion and how complicated it is to produce it for just a microsecond. Getting closer but a ways to go yet but will be an incredible triumph if they succeed.
Also in the article…limited pipeline capacity meant they couldn’t use natural gas for power generation as it was being used to heat homes etc during the cold snap.
Anxiuosly waiting for news of some lefty climate cultist that froze in “downward dog”. I’m getting the “I told you so.” Tshirt ready.
The answer if we must have nuclear (and we could make all the hydrogen we wanted, cheap – the ultimate use for solar – and best of all, when you use hydrogen as fuel it turns back into water, from which we just make more hydrogen), is the LFTR – the Liquid Fluoride Thermal Reactor. Denninger describes it really well – https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?singlepost=2491667 – I’ll summarize.
Every lump of coal the U.S. is burning for electricity, has 13-times more energy in it than you get by burning the coal, as Thorium – which is thrown-out with the ash after the coal burns. Thorium can be used in a reactor – the U.S. ran one in Oak Ridge for four years, the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment or MSRE – but ultimately shut it off because you can’t really make nukes with one. That’s a real big advantage in my book – the LTFR has a bunch of other advantages, including being so safe the Oak Ridge researchers would just turn it off when they left for the weekend.
And virtually all reactions produce waste heat – the Germans have no oil, so they used heat to make liquid fuel in both World Wars, via the Fischer-Tropf process. None of this is rocket science – it’s expensive to start the processes, but I’d rather spend tax dollars on that, than give it to jihadis in ten-million-dollar chunks. A pity Shiny Potato appears not to agree, or care……
The New Free Republic of Saskaberta should build nuclear power plants near the oilsands to produce the steam to remove the sand from the oil. This would free up the natural gas for liquefaction and export. The sand can stay in Alberta and fill in the open pit mines for reclamation of the land. The new country will start out without all the people-killing environmental regulations of Canaduh. Carbon dioxide emissions would drop substantially, nearly to zero. The existing pipelines would probably have plenty of capacity without transporting a bunch of sand down a pipe. Tell me where I am going wrong, please. Just don’t have SNC-Lavalin build the power plants, FFS.
If we use SNC/Lavalin, then the good old CANDU reactor could be back in play, as SNC owns them now
Coldmax, if we do use SNC-Lavalin, we are way STUPIDER than I originally thought. And that wasn’t covering us with all that much glory, to begin with.
you are so right but the talking heads will not agree as their pet projects and politicians might loose some money on this solution.
“transporting a bunch of sand down a pipe”
Heavy oil is just oil. It is the same as light oil but with a few more carbon atoms attached. It is no dirtier or cleaner than any other oil.
Ignorance of the reality of the oil sands is rampant, especially among its opponents. It’s amazing how so many people think pipelines transport the oil and sand together, that oil sands oil is toxic to life while conventional oil isn’t, that it won’t float if there’s a spill at sea but will sink to the bottom and smother all life forever, that no customers actually want it.
The media has a lot to answer for. The activists produce the lies, but they would get nowhere without the collusion of media.
Think, Oldtimer, think.
Where you are going wrong Oldtimer, is in not seeking out truth when eco-loons spread ridiculous lies about fossil fuels. Nobody transports sand down a pipeline. Duh!
– And it should be mentioned, Canada is a net absorber of CO2. All those trees…
So that nuke plant on I90 is the only one in the state. It has the classic cooling tower. Good esthetics.
The Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) publishes net generation and loads over its load balancing area in a handy graphical format. You can see it here: https://transmission.bpa.gov/Business/Operations/Wind/baltwg.aspx
It has been cold recently, and demand for power is up. At the same the sum total wind generation has been roughly zero.
So, to ask the question greens go out of their way to avoid: where does the power come from when the wind isn’t blowing?
That’s what I want to know.
Here’s the plan: When the wind is blowing, use the power to pump water back uphill into reservoirs. When the wind isn’t blowing, use the newfound hydro-power to fire-up wind-supply fans to blow air across the power generating fans … to get em going again.
I’ve SEEN the computer model for this!! Along with a really kewl video, with flyovers and everything !!
Laws of conservation of energy be damnned!! Think of the ‘green’ jobs that will be made!! And think of how we will be FREE from fossil-fuels!! Yeayyyyyyy !!!
And on the subject of windmills, here in Ontario the Ford Government is letting some of the wind farm projects that it promised to cancel, proceed.
For a pudgy guy, he’s starting to look and smell more and more like McGuinty every day.
The Great Lakes on both the US and Great White North shores should be lined with hundreds of Bobbing Bird heat engines for reliable power generation, 24/7.