100%... Pebble-Bed reactors are the way to goClearly, the “greenies” have a different method of “accounting” than is popularly employed by those who actually use numbers in their calculations. Shutting down coal plants, without an adequate and relatively inexpensive alternative, is spitting into the wind - it will come back and spatter all over your own face.
There is a quick fix, NOT involving all this artificially supported and ineffective “renewable energy” sources like wind or solar power, that is reliable, adaptable to shifting load demands, and of which the technology already exists. Natural-gas fired turbines can be spooled up and running on line in only minutes in times of heavy demand, or cut out as the load slackens, and they use a readily available and mostly less expensive energy source, natural gas. For standby purposes they are nearly perfect, and would have to be built ANYWAY if the “renewable energy” sources are widely adopted, as these so-called “green alternatives” have not shown much in the way of either flexibility or reliability.
So just cut out the double expense, and never even build the “renewable energy” wind and/or solar plants. Except for very specialized applications, that technology is pretty much a dead end.
But for long-term supply of power for the base loads, Nuclear power generation is the standard for reliability and minimal fuel costs. However, the technology is based on the “burning” of uranium as the power source, when any rational thinker would consider the application of thorium-based nuclear reactors as a much more cost-effective and far less troublesome technology. For one thing, the presence of thorium is much more wide-spread than uranium, and the “spent” fuel takes up far less volume of space that the profusion of “spent” uranium fuel rods. Even more useful, the thorium reactors are capable of using the untapped energy that remains in the “spent” uranium rods, through a breeder reaction, and thus consume the ever-growing stockpile of atomic “waste” that now limits the further application of nuclear power generation.
The technology already exists, and development has reached the stage of industrial application. What is missing is the will to cast off all the superstitious fear and get on with the business of generating adequate power to sustain a growing civilization.
I totally agree with your assessment, alloysteel. Great post.
15 megawatts of “renewable” energy to replace 668 of coal fired. Sounds like a fair trade to me. Here’s a question for the greenies: How much energy does that endless forest of windmills in northern Indiana produce (when they are running)?
100%... Pebble-Bed reactors are the way to go