Guest Post: Another Asian Fukushima Imminent?
Submitted by John C.K. Daly from OilPrice.com,
Another Asian Fukushima Imminent?
Taiwan imports 99 percent of its energy, which is vital to its rapidly industrializing economy.
The island nation's electricity demand was recently growing at almost 5 percent per year, but this is slowing to about 3.3 percent per annum to 2013. Nuclear power has been a significant part of the electricity supply for two decades and now provides 17 percent of the country's overall energy needs.
But this has come at a potential cost. The country's three nuclear power plants (NPPs) comprise four General Electric boiling water reactors and two Westinghouse pressurized water reactors.
Taiwan launched its nuclear power project in 1972 with the construction of a General Electric boiling water reactor (BWR) at the Chinshan 1 Nuclear Plant in northern Taiwan. By 1985 Taiwan had a total of six reactors online at the Chinshan, Kuosheng and Maanshan NPPs, which provided nearly 20 percent of the island's power that fueled Taiwan's economic take off. The NPPs are operated by the Taiwan Power Co. (Taipower) utility under the Ministry of Economic Affairs.
In the wake of the 11 March Fukushima nuclear catastrophe in Japan, Professor Chan Chang-chuan of National Taiwan University's College of Public Health noted that Taiwan's three existing nuclear plants and a fourth, the one now under construction, are located in earthquake-prone regions near the sea, which originally facilitated the transportation of nuclear fuel and construction materials but leaves the sites facing the double hazards of earthquakes and tsunamis. Chan said, "Such locations expose our reactors to a double risk."
All six of Taiwan's existing reactors are built near major fault lines, and two more reactors are under construction at the advanced boiling water reactor (ABWR) Longmen NPP in New Taipei City's Gongliao District. On 31 October Taiwan's Minister of Economic Affairs Shih Yen-shiang said that the Longmen facility is expected to enter commercial operation no later than 2017.
Now the issue of the country's NPPs has entered the arena of the country's upcoming presidential elections, scheduled for 2012. All three of Taiwan's presidential candidates agree that the life of the country's three operational nuclear power plants should not be extended, but are divided on whether construction of the Longmen NPP should continue.
Capturing the high ground, on 3 November Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou unveiled the government's new nuclear energy policy, promising to gradually move the country towards a nuclear-free future, announcing that the scheduled 40-year service life of the Chinshan, Kuosheng and Maanshan nuclear plants would not be extended, while the New Taipei City Longmen NPP would only begin commercial operations when all necessary safety requirements were met. Ma said, "This new energy policy is crafted in a proactive, practical and responsible manner in keeping with the principles of no power rationing, maintenance of stable electricity prices and continued reduction of carbon dioxide emissions to meet international goals."
Going Ma one better, on 15 December Opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairwoman candidate Tsai Ing-wen declared that if she wins next year she will close all three of Taiwan's existing nuclear power plants and mothball the Longmen NPP, seeking to end Taiwan's nuclear energy program by 2025 and candidate number three, James Soong of the People First Party, favors not extending the service life of the three existing NPPs but favors a 'wait and see' approach on the Longmen NPP. The Chinshan NPP license expires in 2018-2019, Kuosheng in 2021-2023 and Maanshan in 2024-2025.
The policy represents a significant turnaround in Taiwan's commitment to nuclear power, as in May 2009 Taipower was examining the prospects for six more reactors, starting with the Longmen NPP.
Therefore, the only remaining question is whether the South China Sea's notorious weather patterns will remain benign over the next 14 years. If not, according to Wang To-far, economics professor at National Taipei University, "if a level-seven nuclear crisis were to happen in Taiwan, it would destroy the nation."
Fingers crossed.
(11 votes)
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Wang To-Far....Long Duck Dong and Bang Dae Ho's cousin.
LMFAO
You are one sharp dog.
Am I missing something or what does weather have to do with tsunamis and earthquakes? Or are they saying that if some kind of Fukushima event occurred in Taiwan the inevitable typhoon would smear the fallout all over the island, and do so 2-4 times per year?
I got no clue, and neither do their candidates, who seem to think they can have power without having power plants.
So if they are going to BOTH reduce nuclear power AND cut CO2 emissions, where the fuck EXACTLY are they gonna get electricity from?
There is no fundamental problem with Mark 1 BWR that poses any great risk. The problem with NPP is always the same- decades worth of cores are sitting uncontained in swimming pools. This is true be they the latest CANDU or APWR, or the most ancient Mark 1 BWR.
Fukushima should have at least taught the necessity of H2 venting, and having shore power present within 6 hours of scram. Either way, the catastrophe at Fukushima is from the SFPs, not the reactors. Had those ponds been empty, this would have been a serious disaster but nowhere NEAR the scale it turned out to be.
Trav, I hate to agree with you, but, I do.
It seems that the more complex human lives become the more stupid they get. If Tiwan has an " anomalous incident of a rare and unusually a-typical complex unheard of coincidences ..blah, blah, blah" there will be a deserted rock off the coast of the Peoples Republic of China that has had an Easter Island experience. Within a week of a blow up/earthquake nuclear disaster Taiwan would be 80% depopulated. The Red Chinese will welcome their brethren home to occupy new cities that have already been built but not used. The Chinese Nationalists will surrender what ever they need to in order to get fed and housed. No shots fired. Just a crises driven emergency evacuation and eventually the manufacturing dynamo that was once Taiwan is transfered to the mainland.
I can see a welcomed Normandy type invasion by a Red Chinese flotilla of thousands of ships to hurriedly rescue the island's population from nuclear fall out. Mother Nature is not happy with human foolishness and is going to fix the problem by making life much simpler for humans to handle. Can you imagine trying to evacuate up to 23 Million people!
> having shore power present within 6 hours of scram.
That's a step in the right direction, but doesn't help you much if the main power distibution rooms are flooded with seawater...
Trav, Taiwan's regional geological setting is different to Japan's but it's almost equally prone to large earthquakes.
See figs 2, 3 and 4.
http://140.115.123.30/papers/Study%20on%20Probabilistic%20Seismic%20Haza...
That impressive fresh-looking central mountain belt is the result of regular large earthquakes. Note that figure2 is the product of a sample period that's far too short to show the scale and periodicity what made those mountains so impressive.
One day we'll find out what does that and I hope they're not still operating BWRs when that happens.
General Electric/Obama and Westinghouse make sh*t reactors built by union goons who vote Dem.
I thought Toshiba now runs Westing house? In anycase, Taiwan is an integral part of the world economy at this point. If Taiwan has a nuclear meltdown, such a small island society will not be able to cope with it. Their downfall might trigger a broader East Asian economic collapse.
Wait until the full reality of the Fukushima disaster dawns on the japanese people themselves.
We'll (sadly) see something new in the global economy. Open revolution in a "developed" country.
People have started getting sick and dying already, it has begun. Until now the cultural code in Japan has held this process of open revolt within check.
Radiation affects intelligence. How would citizens react, if they'd know? In both the USA and Japan, the effects are known, can be known.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Jo1Kqez3fUU
So... there are more problems because of .... more awareness??!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDHS6Ddn4ow
In Japan and in Belarus they call that "harmful rumours".
And no, a fair number of USA plants are EXACTLY the same as Fukushima Dai-ichi. The new AP-1000 is not safe at all, no "lessons from Fukushima" have been implemented. They just going to build the plants, reason be damned! http://fairewinds.com/content/ap-1000-press-conference-%E2%80%93-technic...
Why? Here's why: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2011/11/21/2795537/warren-buffett-visit...
Cognitive dissonance at it's finest.
General Electric (and the whole nuclear industry): cesspool
Whistleblower Jack Shannon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yf1ur9aBiS8
You forgot his brother, Wang To-Suck.
If his Wang To-far, then I hope the wife's Pu See Wei-deep
"Dr Stu's Blog" 3/24/11___Stuwart Farrimond
'The Future of Nuclear Power after Fukushima': Thorium Reactors *{LFTR-Reactors'}
http://www.realdoctorstu.com/2011/03/24/the-future-of-nuclear-power-afte...
I like how people express how safe, efficient and non-waste producing these LFTRs are. Especially considering they are hypothetical.
What I want to see is for a bunch of them to be built in a desert somewhere, and then tested to higher standards than we test cars. smash stuff into them, flood them, bomb them. Let one run for 50 years, and see what happens at the end of its life.
I mean, Fukushima reactos were within 3 years of being decommisioned; if they were brand new, they wouldnt have overfilled spent fuel ponds and likely wouldn't have been so problematic.
Forget how awesome it is hypothetically. I want to see real-world worst case scenarios and know the true risks and costs from planning through operation to complete decommissioning and disposal of all waste before we deploy them all over the world in large numbers.
I want you people to sit back and contemplate how MINOR Fukushima would have been had it NOT been for the 50 years' worth of spent core material sitting in uncontained swimming pools.
Even Gundersen maintains that the big boom was caused by a prompt criticality in a SFP.
The problem with NP is NOT the reactor design...although the Mark 1 has some definite safety flaws, these were not what the great risk was. If you decomission a BWR, STILL wtf do you do with the spent fuel!?!?
Fukushima in the event of coolant loss has the same issues with hydrogen and explosions and release of core materials because they'd STILL have been in those pools. If Japan built a brand-new APWR on the site, they would STILL HAVE the SAME issues with spent fuel to deal with (although some of the newer reactor designs can partially reprocess and burn this stuff)
Dude, Fukushima (sans pools) is still playing out. They don't know where the corium is, but they do know they have contaminated groundwater.
Imagine a solar storm taking out everything electrical in the US or even the globe. Including the NPP control systems...
Without immediate cold shutdown capability nuclear power is a huge bet against nature. And on a long enough timeline...
Newer designs have passive safety features.
if there is such a solar storm FAR MORE people will die as planes fall out of the sky than from nuclear material
Did you even read my post before replying to it? I specifically said: "I mean, Fukushima reactos were within 3 years of being decommisioned; if they were brand new, they wouldnt have overfilled spent fuel ponds and likely wouldn't have been so problematic." I already considered how much less of a problem there would have been.
When the BWRs were originally designed, they were made to have a certain amount of fuel in the Spent Fuel Ponds. Over time, the amount of material and the density of storage was increased multiple times, since they never came up with a long term solution.
Who knows what challenges there would be after 40+ years of operating a Thorium reactor? who knows what modifications to procedures and regulations will be implemented to cut costs, or "solve" waste storage problems? The only way to know would be to run one for real through its whole life, prior to deploying them all over the world, in case they somehow create some as-yet-unforseen problem worse than the SFP problem we currently have.
of course I read your post, don't assume that I am specifically replying to you as opposed to the theme in general.
Without a solution to the waste problem, no NPPs can be built, until we get magic Gen 4 that can burn waste and generates stuff only radioactive for a few hundred years lol
So you're saying the complete meltdowns of several reactor cores were/are not a real problem?
no; they really weren't a big deal compared to the other issues.
Meltdowns are just when core materials melt.
Hypothetical my ass. They had one running for five years, and I for one don't want to wait until after I'm dead to adopt thorium power.
Your comments smack of someone woefully uniformed about thorium power.
You comment smacks of someone who only cares about short term gain, without considering any long term implications. It's thinking like yours that got us into this whole problem of overfilled Spent Fuel Ponds to begin with. Why worry about waste disposal now? I want my cheap electricity NOW, and someone else later on can figure out where to dispose of the waste.
Matt +1
I think it's very possible that between the three E's (Economy, Energy, Environment), humanity will not have the money/resources to properly decommission most of the plants now in operation. I personally believe that peak cheap oil, peak debt, and overpopulation will result in the unravelling of industrial civilization, leaving these radioactive buildings' pipes, wiring, etc to be scrapped in the future by people who have no idea what the plant's original purpose was.
Dmitry Orlov has proposed a competition to design statues that are both very enduring and will properly convey to illiterate people the horrors that await them if they try to salvage materials from these sites. God help them if this doesn't happen.
Are you actually saying that we don't know how to store the waste?? I swear, you dumb anti-nuclear cunts lobby left and right to cut off any and all waste disposal options and then use waste disposal problems as a reason to continue being anti-nuclear. Go die in a fire!
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2009/06/24/if-reid-obama-kill-yucca-mountain-where-will-nuclear-waste-go-think-fusion
http://reid.senate.gov/about/upload/yucca-mountain-accomplishments.pdf
And he has the temerity to count this as an "accomplishment!" Stupid asshole.
Outstanding SheepDog
Outstanding
Yuu Arafuka, just shut up.
Shake and bake bitchez...
But.....but......but I thought they figured out what went wrong in Japan and fixed it. No more Earthquakes by order of the www.BIS.org.
many many more 9.0 Earthquakes to come courteousy of Nuclear Fallout (thank you 2000 plus nuclear tests and other PLANNED releases!) changing the absorption albedo of the ICE it landed on Leading to Melting Ice (40 Trillion Tons per year in Greenland alone) Leading to Isostatic Depression of the Ocean floors Leading to Changes in Ocean Current (Big time Climatic Change: Ice Ages Etc), Continental Plate Movement to Compensate, ETC!
Watch some believersunderground (YT). He looks like a jesus goof until you check out his references. (lol).
Radiation is good for you, just ask, anyone within a 20 mile radius of Fukushima...
What's that supposed to mean?
The problem is way way WAY beyond Fukushima's 20 miles, or even Japan.
You all need to watch this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwYDPUszF4s
o__o
If this is true, and it seems likely, how much worse is it in Japan? Millions?
http://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/U.S.-Fukushima-Medi...
Ha! It's probably happen 6 times in China already and we just don't know about it.
Irrefutable Politician Logic:
"We should move of nuclear power for the security of our country"
Imports 99% of its energy, most of it from China.
it's no accident that reactors are built on fault lines! it's no accident radioactive safety limits have been raised, and deemed safe!
check out 1:50 min. into the video!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLFB4C5FCF0D8CE1A1&feature=player_detailpage&v=yIfU41BICf4
Check out how many reactors are located on important rivers and lakes in the US.
JFC I hope you were being sarcastic here; if not, you are an idiot.
Are you denying that reactors in the US are located on rivers and lakes?
Whoosh! Right over yer haid! Think for a sec: Something hot that's cooled by water -- WHERE do you place it?
No way captain.
Nice to know...But will that change anything? No. In relation to Nuclear what is the best way forward? Thorium. The reason we don't want to change IMO is the shit it used in bombs. Easy to get your hands on if it's everywhere. But I could be wong.
Ron Paul/Thorium 2012!
I'm canceling my timeshare condo in Taiwan.
http://vegasxau.blogspot.com
Yet another kneejerk overreaction to a one-time catastrophe. If Taiwan really does shut down its nuclear power plants, the island's economy will collapse. Taiwan's economy has already been hollowed out from moving manufacturing (and jobs) over to mainland China; Taiwan simply cannot afford to import enough oil and natural gas to make up the balance, and as we've seen in Spain, "green energy" is a fraud.
"Yet another kneejerk overreaction to a one-time catastrophe"
lol
"Knee jerk overreaction"???
Perhaps you should go and live in Fukushima dumbass.
Fukushima was preventable.
Perhaps you should go and live in the DARK, bitch
Agreed. This is fear-mongering idiocy of the type ZH regularly denounces when it's, for example, coming from the U.S. concerning Iran.
FACTUALLY INCORRECT
the nuclear industry has been covering up all kinds of accidents.
moreover they've covered up the MEASURABLE negative influence on people living near or under the smoke of nuclear reactors.
WATCH THIS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Uxz-x7Oifs
THEY LIE, HAVE ALWAYS LIED, AND AT BEST ARE TOTALLY INCAPABLE OF RUNNING THIS KIND OF INDUSTRY.
http://enenews.com/bloomberg-exposes-conflicted-iaea-safety-division-is-...
(also read the comments of the above link)
The japanese didn't even know how to operate their own plant in case of an emergency. !!!!!!!!! @__@
at 1:29 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOyfeGxmkDI
It WAS built on a KNOWN fault line (so the radioactive water can now spread and contaminate massive areas of ground water). Great.
http://babelfish.yahoo.com/translate_url?doit=done&tt=url&intl=1&fr=bf-h...
Nuclear fission was always subsedised by governments. It can not be competitive with alternative energy sources. (Solar foremost) These are now CHEAPER than nuclear fission.
Thorium is cumbersome, it requires a high tech plant, run by capable people, since it's not as easy to do as people say.
Solar panel producing plants in the USA have gone bankrupt. That is because there was corruption, and mismanagement (as was thouroughly covered here on ZH). In other parts of the world this technology is booming. They made a descision for the american people, and marketing and a media blackout is used to cover up the fact that it was the WRONG descision.
The whole artificial nuclear "renaissance" is over, and it should be. http://timesfreepress.com/news/2011/dec/29/1229-a1-experts-nuclear-initi...
SO PLEASE STOP POSTING LIES. FISSION NUCLEAR ISN'T "TOUGH", IT'S STUPID. IT'S NOT POLITICAL, OR GOOD FOR THE USA, IT'S STOOOOPiIIDD
IT'S THE LOSING STRATEGY.
Smoke?! LOL
yes, I need a smoke. thank you. hmm
Nonsense -- they can convert the capacity to NG fueled plants. The cost isn't that much greater, especially if they include the nuclear waste disposal costs of the nukes.
OT...but hilarious.
World Criminal Court Released it's Annual "WAR CRIMINALS STILL AT LARGE" Top 10...
1.Omar al-Bashir, Sudan
2.Joseph Kony, Uganda
3.Bosco Ntaganda, Congo
4.Mengistu Haile Mariam, Ethiopia
5.Kaing Guek Eav ('Duch'), Cambodia
6.George W. Bush, USA
7.Dr Aribert Heim, Na_zi Germany
8.Richard Cheney, USA
9.Jean-Pierre Bemba, Congo
10.Donald Rumsfeld, USA
Where's Barry?
Could he be the first 'peace prize' recipient to make this top 10 list?
that too would be hilarious...and sad.
Where is Kissinger?
Nuclear is fast becoming the most hated energy source on the market-
Uranium miners look to be putting in a bottom-
When everyone hates something-its generally a buy signal-
I'm sure a couple of wind turbines and a bank of solar panels will easily replace those nuclear plants. /SARC
What are they going to replace them with? The ONLY viable option are coal fired power plants and a constant supply of coal brought in by dry bulk freighters. Even then it's going to be problematic due to the envirowhacks efforts to end all coal mining. I'm too old to watch this show unfold over the next 15 or so years.
silly article. Another reactor meltdown IMMINENT? Hardly.
Fukushima Daiichi was there for about 40 years before it had its accident. There were many earthquakes in Japan over that time period.
Clearly nuclear power comes with high potential risks. but I think it silly in the extreme to declare that a Korean accident is imminent due to one accident over 40 years in Japan.
Is there an IMMINENT flooding of Manhattan since Katrina flooded New Orleans recently... and both Manhattan and New Orleans are in Hurricaine pathways?
what makes you think that 'hurricane alley' hasn't already changed its trajectory path,... with 2012 and beyond following the eastern atlantic shore-line into the heart of the north-east
nyc was saved this time - but, if i'm right, and this pattern change becomes routine,... there are a great many nukes in its [their] pathway, on the edge to be, 'quite', overly concerned & cautious about -
never say never,...
PS. as for quoting Faber on predictions --- "Just don't say when the change occurs,... only that there will be a change [tops/bottoms?] a comin --- but, living in florida, i can personally tell ya that the weather has changed dramatically over the last three years
I thought we were talking about Taiwan, where did you come up with Korea? What am I missing?
I'll bet you ONE ounce of gold, that within the next 5 years there's going to be another major nuclear accident, if this train keeps on moving as it has.
We'll either be rich, or zombies with our collective dicks fallen off from the Ceasium. (or both)
Taiwan imports 99 percent of its energy, and yet nuclear power provides 17 percent of the country's overall energy needs...
Are you saying that they import nuclear energy? If so, why is it relevant what the source of the imported energy is?
Clearly, if three nuclear plants put together produce less than one percent of their energy, then Taiwan needs to look at either the efficency of their nuclear plants, or their overall energy consumption (or both).
Taiwan also imports its nuclear energy in the form of uranium. It isn't relevant.
most dishonarable meltdown.
I guess it was time to clean my screen, anyhow.
So how many folks have dropped dead from radiation poisoning in Japan? Zero? How large was the spike in birth defects over the last 9 months? There wasn't one? More people die falling off of windmills than at level 7 nuclear events.
Be patient, my friend.
absolutely brilliant,... uber excellente!!!
perhaps this kind of intellectual discourse was the reason for belonging?
There was likely many more than zero that have died. The MSM doesn't do a very thorough job of reporting them though and it's not likely to do so in the forseeable future.
http://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/U.S.-Fukushima-Medi...
All your godzillas are belong to us...
Energy is in general a bad news business. Good for Taiwan to consider their options carefully. But islands don't have very good options with current technologies.
As for the headline--let me see your earthquake predictor, it must be really awesome. Please do warn the people who would be directly hurt or killed by any disaster big enough to take down the reactors.
How do these environmental freaks fit into a financial analysis site?
Where is the free lunch in any energy source?
Is it okay to destroy the migratory paths of birds and butterflies with windmills?
How many insects will go extinct with miles of solar panels?
Do you love the smell of coal dust?
Do you think base-load power is insignificant?
Michael Crichton was right on the money in his book, State of Fear: the environmental groups are heavily financed attorneys with friends in the Middle East.
The number one cause of death and disability on this planet within a decade will be the automobile. Hey, but where's the sci-fi in that?
another absolutely brilliant response,... fabulous!!!
don't get any better?
more migratory birds and insects die in the HUGE drainage pools filled with radioactive acid, that were formed as byproduct to uranium mining. moreover groundwater bassins that stretch out over hundreds of miles are now being polluted with a steady stream of radioactive leakage from the effects of raw uranium mining and processing. (the western aquifer in Australia) http://world-nuclear.org/info/inf25.html
Effects won't be noticable the first decade or so, but after that, it's logical to see a decline in life, since uranium latches on DNA and fucks it up FORGOOD. DAMAGE IS HEREDITARY AND WILL BE COVERED OVER TO FUTURE GENERATIONS.
In Siberia, another "unspoiled" wasteland, we send our used up nuclear fuel, our radiating uranium and plutonium. it's just sitting there, waiting for the buildings and sheet covering to crumble, and then fuck up HUGE stretches of land.
So, how does this compare to Solar or Wind?
yeah there's a free lunch. it'll actually stimulate small to medium business all over the world, as it's essentially decentralised. solar, wind all kinds of new technology is sprouting up everywhere. to state we're forever dependent on a few technologies that existed at some point in time 40 years ago, is doing gross disservice to the inginuity of man. Moreover, the cheap and cheerful fossile fuel is used up on frivolous wars and other idiocy. While human beings should use it to propel us forward in a new phase of energy independence. which also will mean FREEDOM to do other things.
Yeah it's possible it's free and it's impossible to control centrally. and that's EXACTLY the reason it's not happening right now.
think I'm fantasising? think again! http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-29/utilities-giving-away-power-as-...
THE PROBLEM IS NOT THE TECHNOLOGY AVAILABLE, OR THE RESOURCES, IT'S OUR LEADERSHIP THAT'S FAILING MISERABLY.
Americans are Spolit - most countries simply have no choice in the matter.
No coal , no Hydro - means you must split atoms.
NG for electricity generation is a epic waste of a precious resourse even if you have a surplus for a moment in time.
Waste means more people die of poverty.
If nuclear was easy it would have been done on a larger scale already.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5dCJmZmYCc
(they have closed the loop on nuclear waste… it doesn’t have to be dirty)
Regardless of how good or bad nuclear is,
It has been set up as a poster child for failure.
yes, some of the most recent reactor designs are proliferation-proof and can consume spent fuel to reduce its toxicity.
Nobody is building them due to immense capital cost and there's STILL NOWHERE to put any spent rods or any waste of any kind.
The PROMISE going in was that this waste situation would be sorted out. As it HASN'T been, no real new development can be done. Even a decom...where do you send the radioactive parts?
Nobody is building them due to immense capital cost and there's STILL NOWHERE to put any spent rods or any waste of any kind.
*************
Over 60 power reactors are currently being constructed in 14 countries plus Taiwan (see Table below), notably China, South Korea and Russia.
The International Atomic Energy Agency in its 2010 report significantly increased its projection of world nuclear generating capacity. It anticipated at least 73 GWe in net new capacity by 2020, and then 546 to 803 GWe in place in 2030 – much more than projected previously, and 45% to 113% more than 377 GWe actually operating at the end of 2010. OECD estimates range up to 816 GWe in 2030. The change was based on specific plans and actions in a number of countries, including China, India, Russia, Finland and France, coupled with the changed outlook due to constraints on carbon emissions.
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf17.html
The reality is that Fukushima was no accident. When there economy goes down, the whole island is going to be used for waste storage. It's already being discussed inside the industry at industry events like: http://www.radwastesummit.com
ok, I should have caveated, nobody in the WEST. Yes, Areva is standing up some capacity in their modern gen 3, EPR or something.
However, on the flipside, even in Taiwan you see there are people seriously talking about shelving ALL NPPs without any alternative. Germany did the same thing.
It's ridiculous. The US depends upon reactors built ALL in excess of 30 years ago, for 20% of electricity or thereabouts.
The Irish spent nearly 100 billion in fixed capital investment during 2005 & 2006.
However we choose to build Houses & roads which was a bit of a mistake..............
We only need 2 Sizewell B size reactors for our base load !
At the very most thats 10 to 15 billion spread over a 10 year construction phase !
The west simply spends too much on consumer durables which we pretend is capital - its just a question of defective resourse allocation.
And to think we could have gone out in a blaze of glory with a Tricolour planted on the Ocean of Storms !!!!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nfz9O_mSY1U
A large nuclear programme however does have the benefit of Diverting NG to its most valuable use - direct combustion , rather then wasting the stuff on Transformation losses.
Economists claim to not understand Opportunity costs - only concentrating on the direct costs of a Nuclear programme - the loss of gas to more useful combustion seems to be lost on them.
The Irish politicians chose to send a lot of Irish taxpayer money to Africa cause that tax cheat Bono Hewison told them to do it. That fkkking Bono also pushed Ireland into the Euro.
F Bono and U2.
meh, just go back to good ol' emmanuel labor
I luv it when the ZHews rank on the Asians. Good times, great banter.
Can we not sell them coal? China is downwind and will never frucking notice it.