Speculation on the future...

[perry]

With the advent of high oil prices, which have a primary effect on transportation and home heating cost, and a secondary effect on a lot of other things....

It is expected that oil prices will remain high from here out. They might dip a bit, but they may also go up more. This is because the worlds demand for oil has now reached its capactiy to produce oil. While some more oil production will be brought on line; it is not expected to offset the already decreasing production in the Middle East (oil wells have reached and passed their maximum production and oil production is now going down as the oil resevors are being drained - and the next 10 years is expected to see a significant decrease in production capability) and the increase in world demand from China and India and other parts of the world. I.e.; we are now production limited - and demand now determins price... The oil industry speculation is that prices will range from $50 - $100 per barrel (currently arround $70, $100 barrel about $4.00 gal gasoline in the US).

What is your guess as to how long term America and the world will change?

My speculation is as follows:

1) America will start buying smaller vehicles that get better gas mileage. In 10 years the US will reduce oil consumption by about 3 million barrols of oil a day (assuming the light vehicle average is 30 MPG). The us currently uses about 20 million barrals of oil a day, ,of which 9 million barrels is soley for light vehilcle gasoline -- i.e I estimate that we will cut that by a third.

2) The global market place will again change: Many jobs have been and continue to be exported from the US to other countries becasue "it''s cheeper..." In regards to manufactured goods - that is going to start shifting back again as the transportaion cost have changed significantly (long distance transportation is now at least 4 times as expensive as only 5 years ago just due to fuel prices). Smaller high value items may still be imported (i.e. electronics / computers are a good example) ==> but shipping of large lower value ($/Lb) items will now not nearly be as cost effective (prime example: lower to mid market Automobiles).

3) In the case of Automobiles: While more will be manufactured in the US; they won''t be manufactured by the big three auto companies. Other companies can set up and run production plants a lot cheaper because of the reduced wages and benifits that they have compared to the existing UAW contracts at the big 3 (these other companies pay good wages; but they are not paying an experience worker $70 per hour in wages and benifits for simple assembly thy jobs).

4) Natural gas prices are linked to oil prices: people are going to find major home renovation and insulation (tear down the interior walls and fully insulate properly) to more practicle than just blowing in insulation into existing older houses. They may start add stud hight as well (to change from a 4" wall to a 6" wall).

5) No major price increases in gems due to fuel inflation. Very high value per weight. Shipping charges has no real effects.

So what do all you think will change?

Perry

 

[colormyworld]

Perry as always a well thought out post.
I will add my 2 cents which is a little less rosey. I see the USD losing value compared to the euro. Right now oil prices are set in dollars. I see this changing to euros soon. (5 years or less) As this happens inflation will run wild. Not a good outlook from where I am looking. Buy gold!

 

[strmrdr]

there is no shortage of oil.
There is a shortage of guts.

There is a shortage of cheap oil and the enviro-wackos need to have there cars taken away and banned from the any form of transportation that uses fuel.
Then start pumping it up.
start converting oil shale into oil there is a lot of it available.
tell the enviro-wackos to go to hell and dig for such shale.
build some new refineries and tell the world to go to hell.

build a wall sealing off both borders and end all foreign aid and put the money to research with any of the patents based on public research are to be licenced free to US owned companies.
Any foreign company that uses the research much pay a billion dollars a day in royalties.

Then round up all the illegals and kick em back the other side of the wall.

Pull our troops home except for the nuke subs.
Nuke select targets around the world at the right time to end a couple threats.

10000% tariff on all foreign produced goods.
50% tariff on any product of a 50%+ foreign owned company on goods made in the US.

eliminate the federal reserve and reserve notes.


All it takes is some guts.....

 

[colormyworld]

I agree with the part about getting rid of the federal reserve.
I kind of like the idea of being able to breath some what clean air. Maybe we can bring back CFCs. We could all get used to putting on suntan oil with a SPF of 10000. I also like the idea of being able to eat the fish I catch in the ATLANTIC OCEAN. Which is some what of a problem now because of mercury. But I guess mercury poisoning is over rated. What the heck Love canals for everyone!
You and GWB must be looking at the same new map of the world. I saw this in another forum.
I guess "all it takes is guts"

 

[strmrdr]

With the billions saved on foreign aid we can develop cleaner ways of doing it and in the mean time get working on getting the job done with what we have.

I forgot to add approve one or 2 designs of nuke power plant for use across the US tell the inviro-wackos and the not in my backyarders to jump and start building them.
Anyone that complains not near me don''t get no energy from it and can go without.

All it takes is some guts.

 

[strmrdr]

also for the record GWB is a traitor who sold this country out to Fox and big business.

 

[perry]

Storm says:

I forgot to add approve one or 2 designs of nuke power plant for use across the US tell the inviro-wackos and the not in my backyarders to jump and start building them.
Anyone that complains not near me don't get no energy from it and can go without.

I actually share part of those setiments.

I thought you would like to have an update on your concept of standard designs for Nuke Power Plants.

The current US Nuclear power plants were all essentially custom designed and the permits were approved while they were being built. If there were problems or required design changes the permits got delays - and in the worst case plants that were expected to cost $300 million to build over 4 years cost over $1 Billion to build over 10+ years.

That is not going to happen again (no one will finance that kind of risk).

The new plans are that the NRC would pre-approve basic plant designs.

Then, anyone could build a pre-approved plant design by getting a combined "site specific" Construction & Operating License (prior to the start of major construction).

If someone wanted to speed the process up - they could apply for an "Early Site Permit" which would allow basic support type construction and theroetically speed up the Combined Operating License (COL).

Each step listed above is a very long - expensive - multiyear process.

The NRC website is down tonight - so I cannot verify parts of the following information.

Here is where the US currently is at:

I belive there have been at least 4 reactor designs pre-approved that anyone could build at this point. In reality, 3 of them will almost certainly never be built in the US and 2 of them do not have really good passive safety designs. One of them (an older designed GE Boiling Water Reactor) is under construction overseas (The US has the most rigorous reactor design and regulatory process in the world. US NRC pre-approved reactors can be built in any country in the world without question - and some other countries are indicating that all they will consider in the future is US approved reactor designs).

The one that will almost certainly be built in the US is the AP1000 a Westinghouse 1100+ MW Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR) power plant (electric MW, not thermal MW for any who sees some numbers about 3000 - 4500 MWt nuclear plants).

To give you an idea of the approval process: The AP1000 application was submitted in March 2002 and final regulatory approval occured in March 2006 (several months ago). The NRC actually had to only do minor review work as the AP1000 is based on the AP600 design that was approved after 6 years of effort and a half billion dollars of engineering and review in 1999. The AP600 is likely to be build overseas in some countries as more fully explained below.

Here is a link to a 2003 presentation on the AP1000 you may find interesting.

www.eng.tulane.edu/FORUM_2003/Matzie%20Presentation.pdf

It has been a few months since I last counted - but my last memory is that US companies have indictated that they are planning to construct at least 18 AP1000's.

Under current review is a new generation "passive safety" GE Boiling Water Reactor (BWR) the ESBWR which entered the NRC review and approval process in August 2005; and is not likely to be approved until 2009.

Several companies have indicated that they want to build ESBWR's and I seem to recall a total of 4 are currently being planned to be constructed.

3 companines are in "pre-review" status for new reactor designes and a 4th has dropped out.

Westinghouse on an advanced passive safety IRIS 335 MW PWR power plant for the international market. Many countries do not need 1100+ MW power plants. They need several hundred MW power plants. A series of 335 MW plants would serve them best. A few might then move up to the 600 MW size and may build the AP600. (To put this in perspective - there is not a single 1000 MW or larger power plant in my home state of Wisconsin. The largest units are arround 600 MW - even for new plants under construction. One of the problems you have to be able to handle - what do you do when a power plant trips off line. You folks may notice the light flicker as the rest of the system automatically picks up the missing 500 - 600 MW. A 1000 MW loss would probably cause a cascading blackout in our area - just like what happened out east a few years ago).

France's "Areva" is in pre-review discussions for application for US NRC approval of their EPR a 1500MW PWR. They want the certification in order to be able to better sell their technology arround the world; and are even hoping to sell some in the US in future years.

Canada is in pre-review discussions for their ACR700 "Candu" reactor. This is a PWR design, but is unique in that it uses heavy water to moderate the reactor and can burn low (or even no) enriched uranium. Most if not all nuclear power plants in Canada are of the Candu design. What is interesting is that these reactors could potentially take "old" spent fuel from US reactors and burn them for fuel (utilizing more of the uranium in the existing pellets) if older US fuel rods were opened and the "spent" fuel pellets recycled into Candu fuel assemblies. Something to realy look at if the design gets submitted to the NRC for approval and makes it through the process. They may never be used to burn old spent fuel for other reasons (safetly of handling new "old" fuel)- but it is an interesting concept that people are discussing.

The Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) has been withdrawn from the process as it seems to have enough issues to not make is as attractive of a design as many had hoped for. South Africa, India, and I think China are still persuing PBMR designs (the key reason India is persuing this is the PBNR's ability to burn thorium - which they have a lot of). I see several practical problems that I do not think they have adequately addressed (the theory is great - and it works in a lab; but there is a long ways from theory and lab to long term functioning and reliable power plants).

To Sum up:

Modern "passive safety" designs Approved, and plans to build:

Westinghouse AP600 600 MW+
Westinghouse AP1000 1100 MW + 18 plants verbally committed to in US

Modern "passive safety" designs under review:

GE ESBWR 1100+ MW 4 plants verbally committed to in US

Modern "passibe safety" designs likely to be submitted for review in next several years; approval not expected untill 2010 or beyond:

Westinghouse IRIS 335+ MW (International small power reactor)

Canada ACR700 700+ MW (Candu design)

France EPR 1500+ MW


So lets talk about building a plant:

At least 2 companies have applied for and are working through the "Early Site Permit" process which would allow starting of site preparation construction (roads, support buildings, etc). The first one should be approved by the end of 2006 (a 2-3 year process). Thus, theoretically construction on the next US nuclear plant site could start in 2007.

No one has yet applied for a Construction & Operating License (COL) - which would be required before you could start building an actual nuclear power plant. The US power industry is working with the NRC to define what needs to be in the application (no US nuclear plant has been permitted in over 20 years; we're starting over folks).

The COL process is expected to take 3-5 years after the application is submitted (and the short end is for plants with Early Site Premits).

Several companies are already spending many millions of dollars to start putting together a COL application. A lot of work has to be done up front. Area sismic studies, site geology studies, cooling water supplies, etc, etc, etc. This is being minimized in many case by using existing nuclear plant sites - or previously studied sites for nuclear plants - but it is still a 10+ million dollar process to assemble a COL application.

It is expected that the first COL applications will be made in late 2007 or early 2008.

Once a COL is issued, construction of a plant - using an exisiting pre-approved design - is expected to take 4-5 years initially; with follow-up plants in about 3 years.

Overall, it will be about 2015 before the first new US nuclear plants could be on line - and more likely 2017; but then expect 3 - 5 plants a year for a while.

Long term, the US needs to build 10 plants a year (forever) to meet electrical needs and start generating hydrogen with them. Remeber that old plants will be retired and will need to be replaced; and that 60 years is the maximum plant life that will probably ever be.

And no, renewables cannot replace this generation in a cost effective manner - even if you could figure out how to effectively build that much renewable capacity.

Hope this helps.

Edited to add: For those wondering; you as a taxpayer are not funding the NRC reviews of these plans. The companies who submit them pay the NRC for every manhour they expend on these reviews (billing rate is over $100 per manhour). The NRC is largly self funded from user fees - with the power industry paying the lions share and subsidizing hospitals and other smaller industrial users (look at the fee structure). The power industry also pays for every manhour the NRC works on their issues and inspections of the plants.

Eddited to add: Currently 103 nuclear power plants generate about 20% of all electricity in the US. My vision of 10 plants per year would top out with about 600 plants (actually probably 550 as some plants will close early). I forsee nuclear power eventually supplying about 60% of electricity (i.e. 300 plants) and the rest being used to make hydrogen. it will take about 60 years to get there.

Perry

 

[strmrdr]

My question is why not us aircraft carrier style reactors they are self contained and in the 250-300 range and are rail transportable.

Set up a factory and mass produce them then ship them out and assemble on site.
use groups of 3-4 per plant as needed.
Could do 5-6 plants a year easy and start production in under a year.
By the time the buildings were ready the reactors will be too.
All it takes is the guts to cut the red tape.

 

[perry]

Storm:

There are several reasons that Naval reactors are not used.

Fundamentally, it comes down to cost; from several perspectives.

Naval reactors are much more expensive to build than civilian reactors, and have some fundamental design difference. First, to eliminate routine refueling the fuel enrichment is very high - and very very costly to fabricate (cost increases exponentially with enrichment level). Because of the high fuel enrichment the core internals are also different.

In order to fit everthing into a compact package for a ship - other things are done to minimize space that are also costly to do.

From a production side the naval reactors are designed and tuned to turn a steam turbine propeller system. Installing a power plant steam turbine generator would not be very efficient for the design.

Finally - from a cost standpoint, they - or any "old style" reactor - requires about the same size staff to run. For years it was thought that the ideal size of all future power plants (coal and nuclear) would be in the 600 MW size range. Hence the AP600 and the 600 MW GE BWR design that were certified by the NRC but will never be built in the US. Staffing and maintenance cost in the US drives the nuclear industry to 1000+ MW units; and fortunatly the US grid is large enough to support such large generating units (what happens when one trips off line). My plant has about a 100 million dollar a year payroll. If we had 1000 MW units instead of 535 MW units we would only need a staff of about 120 million per year. A similar sized coal fired power plant has a staff of about 15 million per year.

The newer civilian designs (AP1000) will require about 1/2 the staff of my generation of plant. US Naval reactors will never see such a staff reduction because they cannot adopt many of the passive technologies or low maintenace items due to space constraints.

An important safety and reliability issue is that the Naval reactors will never have the passive safety systems that have been designed into the latest civilian reactor designs. There is not room for them on a ship and will never be room. Thus, the Navy never has to consider them.

There are a variety of NRC standards that the Navy also does not have to meet. Not saying they couldn't meet them with some design changes, and I note that the US Navy has similar programs and safety goals (but may have meet those goals by a different method not recognized in the civilian world).

In the end, Naval reactors would cost at least 3 times as much per MW elctric produced, and would not be able to encorporate component reduction and passive safety features.

These are not problems for the Navy. Propulsion economics are different than electrical utility economics; and safty standards on ships (and protection from certain design basis events) are not the same (naval reactors are not designed to withstand earthquakes - the ship sloshes arround on the water in an earthquake with little note to the ship at all).

So if you redesign things so that they work in a civilian world and to civilian power plant economics - you end up with the current designs.

Regardless of the design of the reactor - it would still have to go through NRC approval process, and the utilities would still have to get a COL. This is not the military, and we are not like other countries that can chose and approve a site in a couple of months; and there are no questions of getting an operating license (also, most other countries do not even have security forces surrounding the plants. You can litterally drive your car up to many of those plants and walk into them and ask for a tour (if nuclear plants are such a target - how come no one has targeted them arround the world - where there is no security at all like what the US has?).

As much as I do not like the "red tape" of the NRC or their inspections (most of you have no idea how intense these are); nor the fact that they take years to do reviews and approve major projects or changes. I do admit that they are quite professional and effective. They are not perfect, no one is; but, I am not sure if the american public understands just how good of a job they really do when it comes down to protecting the health and safety of the public.

As an example of this: ask the DOE (department of energy) about how happy they are that they have to appply to the NRC for permission to license Yucca Mountain; and all the headaches of trying to get the application ready.... and that the NRC will not just rubber stamp things. People in government are used to other government agencies just approving their projects with at most cursory review. These people are stunned and very angry that the NRC does not work that way - and that the DOE also has to pay the NRC for every manhour the NRC spends reviewing the application (when it gets there). So far the DOE has not done well preparing their application because in part they never thought that they were really going to have to actually meet all of those requirments (the NRC had provided some "pre-application" reviews and wasted no time in telling the DOE that they just did not understand the process and the requirments on what the license application had to be and cover - and to beef up their submittal).

Hope that answered some of you questions.

Perry

 

[strmrdr]

ok so some changes would need to be done but the principle applies.
Set up a factory and mass produce them to reduce the cost per unit.
Then cut the red tape to get the site approval under a year.
History has shown that the economics of scale will kick in and save a ton of money by setting up mass production.
Once the US demand is met they could even be sold elsewhere as you mentioned that US designs can be sold anywhere.

It is a complex answer to a complex problem but its better than what we have now.

 

[perry]

Storm:

Please review the link to the presentation on the AP1000 that I inserted into my first post describing the current state of new reactors and the process. Pay attention to page 20 onward.

The AP1000 has been modurlized as much as possible. All key components and sections - for any plant site - are identicle. It is expected that there will be factories that do nothing but produce certain components and moduls. In the end it is expected that construction of a plant can be done in about 36 months (from a green unprepared site) once things are up to speed. However, the first ones are expected to take 5 years to construct because we''ve never done this before (in the US and too US regulations).

How much can site permitting be reduced? That is unknown at this time. The NRC is aware of the issue - and knows that they will be able to shorten up the process once they get through a few. Unfortunately, it is expected to take 4 to 5 years for the first several of the same design.

In the end I doubt that they will get site licensing (COL) down to 1 year (except perhaps for existing sites). But I feel that 2 years for a new site iis probably doable. Keep in mind that the utility will probably have to invest about 2 years on a green site before that in site testing and assembling the application package as well.

In the end I could forsee a 6-7 year process from when a utility starts looking for a new site to build these plants at to online operation. Currently the process is well over 10 years (and even with existing sites at about 12 years for the very first plants built - remember that the first Early Site permits - at existing plant sites - were applied for sevearl years ago).

However, the siting of a major coal power plant also takes time - and companies start years in advance on them as well.

One other factor. It takes at least 3 years to train the plant staff prior to operation; and that is after they have been sorted out and passed the security clearances. That will never change.

Perry

 

[strmrdr]

Date: 5/10/2006 7:44:06 AM
Author: perry


One other factor. It takes at least 3 years to train the plant staff prior to operation; and that is after they have been sorted out and passed the security clearances. That will never change.


Perry

disagree..
once you have 2-3 identical plants you send them to the others for training while its being built so its ready to run once its completed with a complete staff.
The problem with the industry is the same problem I seeing in your posts and please don''t take this wrong its not aimed at you personally...
old thinking and don''t want to change.
Doing things the old way cant be done.
Just because it isnt done that way now doesnt mean it cant be done.
It takes a new way of doing things and some guts to get it done.

 

[perry]

Storm:

The vast majority of the training process occurs during the construction process. This allows the operators and maintenance people to be ready essentially when the plant is finished. Perhaps the last 3 - 6 months of the training would be completed in the plant. All nuclear plants have simulators to train on.

Training at "similiar" plants is done, and will be done. However, there will always be some plant specifics because of local conditions and designs to handle those local conditions. NRC operator and supervisor licensing is very site specific; and does not transfer. If a licensed person moves to another plant - they cannot "operate" until they complete and pass the appropriate local operator training and pass the exams developed for a specific site (this could easily be a 2 year process, and I know a SRO who just transfered to another plant and has entered their SRO training program).

Even in engineering, where we are not licensed. It still takes about 3 years to train someone to function properly in the nuclear world. This has nothing to do with "pure" engineering - but has to do what the regulations and license conditions are - and how we evaluate issues against those regulations and license conditions.

Anyway, I think we are in agreement that more nuclear plants are the way to go.

Note that some states in the US (Florida) for example are passing laws to speed up the construction of new nuclear plants in their state.

Here in Wisconsin, one utility spent 5 years just to get state regulatory approval (including court cases from the environmental groups) to build a coal fired units (2 - 600 MW units) - at an existing coal fired plant. Construction started about 6 months ago on those units and they won't be done for several years (any large power plant takes years to build).

Have a great day.

Perry