The Renewable Energy Revolution Is Here

One could speak of a revolution these days. New solutions and technologies, studies and news articles are reaching the internet like a tsunami. And the best thing is that it's all good news!

Renewable Revolution is going on. Picture: Jukka Seppälä/Creator's Fingerprints

Well, there exists some not so good news also, but it depends on the angle of view that you take whether it's bad or good.

For example in the U.S.A. there have been 24 wise senior energy experts hunting for the "black swans". In other words they have been looking for possible disasters that can threaten the very existence of American way of life, American Culture, and the U.S.A. as a world power.

LINK- POWER: http://www.powermag.com/smart_grid/The-Electric-Grid-Civilizations-Achilles-Heel_5252.html 

Grid failure - the black swan of the industrialized  world.  Picture: Jukka Seppälä/Creator's Fingerprints

Black swans come from a Lebanese-American Scholar Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who created the metaphor. Black swans are catastrophic events, outliers of which we have no historical experience before and also events that carry an extreme impact.

Link - WIKIPEDIA:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_swan_theory

The two dozen wise men found out that the most probable "black swan" in the near future would be the collapse of the electic grids.

So is this a good or bad news? The good news is that the americans have found out it to exist. And that there is a lot to be done to prevent it, turn the black swan into a white one.

But the bad news is that here in Europe and especially in Finland our politicians and power industry experts seem to be more or less blind - they can't see the black swan that swims towards us. When it reaches us, it will be too late to act.

That has been my personal worry over a year now. From the first story of my energy blog   http://solarwindpronet.blogspot.fi/2011_10_01_archive.html   I started warning about the black swan I could see swimming towards us to destroy our energy grids and modern way of life. And to kill and injure millions of people around the world. And that black swan will attack our nuclear power plants and spent fuel pools and destroy them like it did in Chernobyl and Fukushima. This time there are dozens of them in danger. Solar storms do not respect any country border on this planet. The greatest danger is on the northern hemisphere but the more southern countries have also a certain risk. Afterwards it will be easy to say: "We should have seen the risk, it was imminent." But it won't help any more.

The time is now right for action: secure our power grids, our transformers, our nuclear power plants and spent fuel pools. The technology needed is available, it just takes some money to build up. http://solarwindpronet.blogspot.fi/2012/11/michio-kaku-solar-flares-can-cause.html  And don't forget to create backup systems for everyday life - shopping, banking, transportation, health care, heating, fresh drinking water and waste water systems etc. They should work in emergency mode with minimum power or totally without electric power. Perhaps we could use 1950-1970ies shopping and banking models as backup system if we lose the grid totally for some time. But we need now more wise men and women to plan how we could cope with such an extraordinary severe condition that a once in hundred years solar storm could trigger.

And the good news!

One more study found recently out that the U.S.A. could lean solely on renewable energy 99.9 % of time already in 2030. This time it was University of Delaware and Delaware Technical Community College that made the research. When combined wind power and solar power to new battery and hydrogen fuel cell technology the demand of power could be effectively met and the costs remain relatively low.

LINK - UDEL:  http://www.udel.edu/udaily/2013/dec/renewable-energy-121012.html

Another news story tells about plans to build a doughnut-shaped artificial island in Belgium to use sea water for generating hydropower when wind power is not available. The idea is to pump sea water from the artificial pond inside the island to the sea using extra wind power capacity when the demand of windpower is low. When the power demand is higher sea water runs back through the turbines generating hydropower. Belgium is closing down all of its nuclear reactors following the example of Germany and some other countries. New technologies for efficiently utilizing wind and solar power are needed.

LINK - REUTERS: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/17/belgium-island-idUSL6N0AM7GU20130117

Japan's power grid is old-fashioned for renewable energy. Photo: Jukka Seppälä/Creator's Fingerprints


A Japanese Consortium is aiming to build a totally new type of internet-like smart grid to allow the country to build enough renewable energy to cover the demand of energy after all of Japan's nuclear power plants will be decommissioned. The grid would function as a bank account or stock market computer system buying and selling power for the producers-customers.

LINK - SPECTRUM:
http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/the-smarter-grid/japans-digital-grid-scheme



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Naoto Kan - the Prime Minister of Japan during the Fukushima nuclear accident. Photo: Jukka Seppälä/Creator's Fingerprints

The former Prime Minister of Japan Mr. Naoto Kan is one of those politicians who recognized the black swan immediately it had landed on Japan after the tsunami and multiple nuclear meltdowns. He sees clearly the other dark swans waiting for to come in  - the continuing danger of nuclear meltdowns if Japan reactivates its nuclear power program. It is so sad that many other Japanese politicians and economical leaders are so blind about it.

LINK - JAPANTIMES: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2013/01/26/commentary/read-all-about-it-how-kan-do-attitude-averted-the-meltdown-of-japan/#.UQQCzWfAHos

JPS

USA Could Have 80% of its Energy From Renewable Sources by 2050

According to National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL is a national laboratory of the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Effciency and Renewable Energy) USA could well have 80% of its electric power generation made with renewable energy sources in 2050.

Renewable Electricity Futures Study finds out that already commercially available renewable energy generating technologies combined with more flexible electric system is more than adequate to supply 80% of total U.S. electricity generation in 2050 while meeting electricity demand everywhere in every part of the country.

Renewable Electricity Futures Report is divided in four volumes. In addition to that there are available the modelling and cost data used in the study.

You can find the report here:

http://www.nrel.gov/analysis/re_futures/

IAEA gave recently out a report of nuclear power plants of the world. Quite surprizingly almost all of the Japanese NPPs (47 of them) were marked as "Long-Term Shutdown" plants. Let's hope they stay like that! Or even better - will be moved to "Permanently Shutdown NPPs" category!

Link - World Nuclear Industry Status Report:

http://www.worldnuclearreport.org/spip.php?article132

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I apologize for not updating my energy blogs for a long time. In addition to Christmas and New Year celebration with my children and grandson I have been quite busy with my video movie projects and setting up a new computer optimized for video editing. It really took weeks of around-the-clock working days - especially fighting with the program bugs and system crash-events. Didn't have enough nerves to start blogging when having certain deadlines with my video projects.

I try to update my blogs more frequently in the future - so stay tuned.

I Wish All my Readers a Better and More Renewable Year 2013!

 

Picture: Jukka Seppälä/Creator's Fingerprints

JPS

Onkalo In Trouble - Copper Capsules Thousands of Times More Sensitive To Corrosion Than Predicted

Copper canisters planned to be used by Posiva and SKB for depositing spent fuel of nuclear reactors are thousands of times more corrosion sensitive than nuclear industry claims (Photo: Jukka Seppälä/Creator's Fingerprints)


Swedish corrosion researchers at KTH in Stocholm have found out that the thick copper canisters that are planned to be used for safely burying spent nuclear fuel of Finland and Sweden deep in the bedrock are not as corrosion safe as the companies planning the nuclear waste caves claim. According to recent Swedish studies the capsules can corrode thousands of times faster in anoxic water than the nuclear industry predicts on their own studies. Recently, after having checked out the swedish studies, STUK (Finnish nuclear safety official) has asked Posiva for further explanation. The Swedish research group led by Peter Szakálos found that copper capsules would last only about 1000 years instead of 100 000 years calculated by Posiva and Swedish nuclear waste depositing company  SKB.

LINKS (Finnish) - YLE:

http://yle.fi/uutiset/ydinjatteen_loppusijoitus_ajautumassa_vaikeuksiin/6421859

http://areena.yle.fi/tv/1740835

LINK - COPPER CANISTER CORROSION STUDY - STRALSAKERHETSMYNDIGHETEN:
http://www.stralsakerhetsmyndigheten.se/Global/Publikationer/Rapport/Technical%20Note/2012/SSM-Rapport-2012-17.pdf

There are also open questions about bentonite - the clay layer around the copper cylinders - how it reacts with ground water or if it gets frozen during the next ice ages. STUK is ivestigating the possible weaknesses of this nuclear waste depositing process before giving their final green light for the project.

100 000 years is a long time. I agree with nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen: it would be easier for the engineers to solve the problem how to store solar or wind energy over one night than to try to work out how to store highly radioactive waste for hundreds of thousands of years.


JPS

Olkiluoto-3 EPR to Cost at Least 8.5 Billion Euros

Olkiluoto-3 EPR in Finland will cost at least 8,5 Billion Euros. It will never be profitable. (Photo: Jukka Seppälä/Creator's Fingerprints)



Today the price of Finnish TVO Olkiluoto-3 EPR nuclear reactor project was updated to 8.5 Billion Euros, at the same level as its sister reactor under construction in Flamanville, France.

Just recently the Italian Company ENEL was withdrawing from the French EPR -project because of extremely high costs, constantly rising. This last update rose the costs of a single EPR reactor with 2 Billion Euros, which is more than a half of the projects original price estimate of 3 Billion Euros. So the reactor is now estimated to cost roughly 3 times the original price-estimate.

But does the rising of the costs finish here. Personally I believe that this reactor type will cost at least 10 Billion Euros to be ready to generate energy. If the trend of rising costs continues and the costs that follow from European stress tests for nuclear reactors will be fully recognized 10 Billion may not be  an overestimate. The complicated new tecnologies that are to be developed during the construction of the reactor and updated according to new data of safety issues will be really demanding economically.

But even if we take this 8.5 Billion Euros as a realistic price and add fuel and maintenance costs, decommisioning the reactors (300 million to 3.7 Billion Euros depending who is making the calculations) and hundreds of millions of Euros to safely (?) bury the nuclear waste and spent fuel, we'll end up in a sum huge enough to make some comparison with renewables.

The electric power generating capacity of Olkiluoto-3 (and Flamainville reactor) would be 1600 MW, so it would be the most powerful (experimental) nuclear reactor in the world. If we take large 4,5 MW Wind generators, we need 356 of them to generate the same amount of power on windy days at optimal locations. But if we think more realistically we would need 1068 - so three times that much - these windmills to generate the same amount of power yearly.

Now we could make some calculations. If we take 1068 of these mills and start producing energy with them, we have the ability to ask, which is more economical and safe as investment? Those mills would be at the present price-level about 5 Million Euros per unit, so the total price would be about 5.34 Billion Euros for total capacity of 4806 MW which is equivalent to a single 1600MW nuclear power plant that costs now at least 8,5 Billion Euros.

Or then we could read some Finnish studies about the subject to make our own conclusions.
In 2009 there was made a cost comparison between different energy generation methods. The study found nuclear power to be the cheapest alternative. But when you read the study more carefully and the statistics of power generating costs, you'll end up to a conclusion that Olkiluoto-3  and Flamainville EPR-reactors will be economically catastrophal for their owners (and in the end for the tax-payers).

The study made in Lappeenranta Technical University by Essi Ahonen 2009 showed the lowest power price for a new nuclear power plant of 1500 MW and 4.1 Billion Euros to pay back the investment during its 40 years economical plant life to be 35 Euros / MW. The recent estimates of power price on nordic markets tell the price to sink to 34 Euros / MWh next year and even to 25 Euros / MWh year 2018. And there is a 50% chance that power price would be about 20 Euros / MWh during the last quartal of 2013 if Olkiluoto-3 starts production. Last year the average price for selling power was 46,1 Euros / MW.

The cause of decreasing trend of power prices in Nordic countries seems to be miscalculations of available generating capacity and use of electricity because of dry and cold years 2010 - 2011. The long lasting trend of sinking power prices was forgotten for a while. And now building of large scale wind power capacity as well as huge NPPs like Olkiluoto-3 are creating over capacity which is pushing the prices down. Also decreasing energy consumption due to change in our basic industrial structure is causing power price to go down.

So you don't have to be an economist to see what is happening to companies that build new nuclear power capacity. They will be bankcrupted if they continue with their projects. If a NPP needed 40 years to pay back investments with 35 Euros / MW power price and 4.1 Billion Euros investment, how could a NPP like Olkiluoto-3 or Flamanville do that with 25 Euros / MW power price and 8,5 Billion Investment? According to my mathematics it will be a MISSION IMPOSSIBLE!

It would be cheapest to stop all construction work at Olkiluoto-3 and Flamanville -sites and decommission these projects permanently. Perhaps we could modify these plants to realtively safe spent fuel storage sites while searching for better solutions. If they will continue these NPP-projects they will find out that every single generated MW will be increasing their economical loss. But Finns are famous to have SISU. But in this case I would call it STUPIDITY. Let's hope we have learned something as a nation!

LINKS:

OLKILUOTO-3 PRICE UP (Finnish) - KAUPPALEHTI: http://www.kauppalehti.fi/etusivu/olkiluoto+kolmonen+maksaa+8,5+miljardia/201212321921

LAPPEENRANTA UNIVERSITY STUDY (Finnish) - DORIA: http://www.doria.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/45095/nbnfi-fe200905151457.pdf?sequence=3

POWER PRICES (Finnish) - TALOUSSANOMAT: http://www.taloussanomat.fi/energia/2012/10/02/pankki-sahkon-hinta-ensi-syksyna-vain-puolet-nykyisesta/201239038/12

WIND POWER PRICES IN FINLAND (Finnish) - SIMO: http://www.simo.fi/?g=kuntainfo&pid=730&cg=385


JPS

Fukushima Daichi And Daini Having Still Risks of Continuous Radiation Releases

Last weeks 7.4 on Richter scale earthquake (updated from 7.3 to 7.4 afterwards) and a 1 meter tsunami made it clear to everyone that the danger of new wide spreading radioactive releases still exists at Fukushima Daichi and surprisingly also at Fukushima Daini nuclear power plant that is situated a few miles south of F. Daichi.

The earthquake made some kind of nuclear reaction to occur in Fukushima Daichi reactor 1 causing hydrogen levels in torus room and containment vessel to spike up. Nuclear engineers are concerned of situation though hydrogen levels haven't reached explosive mixture yet.

LINK - ENENEWS: http://enenews.com/gundersen-dont-believe-tepco-indications-problem-unit-1-fukushima-daiichi-hydrogen-levels-dramatically-video

But the dark secret of TEPCO remain unsolved: what is the damage for the reactor core for Fukushima Daini reactors or even to Fukushima Daichi reactors 5 and 6 that have not been widely discussed publicly. The pressure of the containment vessel of Daini reactor 1 was increased after the recent earthquake and at least senior nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen supposes some core damage have occurred in Daini reactor number 1 and perhaps in Daichi reactors 5 and 6 also. He came to this conclusion after having read the data of loss of cooling times after the tsunami had destroyed the possibility to cool down the reactors effectively. Loosing the diesel generators may have caused some core damage to F. Daini reactor 1 and this was perhaps causing the pressure increase also after the last week EQ.

LINK - FAIREWINDS ENERGY EDUCATION-PODCAST: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ufnRZ6H7A0Y

Geologists have warned of a possible new earthquake of 8 on Richter scale to occur at the same region as last weeks EQ. That kind of quake could trigger a new nuclear disaster if the spent fuel pools couldn't stand the force of it. The fuel could run dry and overheat causing a significant fallout and make controlling of the  reactors very difficult or even impossible. That could mean a world wide fallout much more severe than Chernobyl was.

We can only hope and pray the worst scenarios not to happen. Meanwhile, we could learn something of the mistakes of the past.


LINK - NHK-DOCUMENTARY OF FUKUSHIMA-ACCIDENT:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=vpA0TOgB9-o


JPS

How to Reduce Warming - Cooling Costs Radically?

I was surprized by a Finnish company importing warming - cooling systems: their new inverter split type room air conditioner is capable of using straight solar PV-energy, then batteries and if that isn't enough, using the grid. The company speaks about 50 euros per year warming/cooling costs in ideal conditions (in Finland!).

And they say that this sum was counted with only one monochrystallite PV solar panel with efficiency of 190W. The unit can be equipped up to three of this kind of PV-panels, so the total maximum solar effect would be 570W.

The maximum input of the air conditioner is 800W for warming and 900W for cooling. The output is 3900W for warming, 3700W for cooling.

And what is the price? The air conditioner slightly less than 1000 euros, PV-panels about 250 euros each, installing service just under 400 euros. If you by all the stuff needed (batteries, 1 PV, installing series etc.) the total price could be somewhere between 2000-2500 euros. You will still need extra heating device for the most coldest days (under -20 degrees centigrade, when the conditioner is not able to produce enough warming for your house and water, of course, must be warmed by other means). But this kind of quite simple energy technology innovation is something that can have a major effect on energy market if it is widely adapted by consumers.

Ten years ago the same company made it possible for the Finns to buy their air conditioners at European prices when they bought the equipment straight from manufacturers and the price niveau of air warming/cooling devices dropped dramatically. Now it remains to be seen if they do the same with solar PV technology. At least their advanced solar panels seem to be the cheapiest I have found in Finnish market.

Here is the link for this new device English Manual: https://emea.salesforce.com/sfc/p/200000006Q3qyNXVtpsvDxXa3TwCXrp9UGC68K4=

(Exceptionally I do not add the link to their Finnish websites here, but if you want to Google-search for this Finnish company it is called Ultimatemarket.) And I don't get any money from them (though I'm using their air-to water warming device as a part of the heating system of my house).

JPS

Michio Kaku: Solar Flares Can Cause Multiple Fukushima-Style Meltdowns and Worldwide Chaos in Near Future

In This 6th of June 2012 Transit of Venus -Picture the Sun is still very silent with no flares but things are rapidly changing when solar maximum begins (Photo: Jukka Seppälä/Creator's Fingerprints)

There was a fresh radio interview of Physisist Michio Kaku, who is widely known of popular science TV-programs and books. In this interview Mr. Kaku tells his concerns about recent growing of solar activity and the worldwide consequences it could have. The possibility of long power blackouts could mean core meltdowns in several nuclear reactors and severe contamination worldwide.

As from the very first page of my SOLARWINDPRONET and SOLARWINDPRONET-SUOMI energy blogs I have been sharing my concern of this same issue (please visit my first blog pages: http://solarwindpronet.blogspot.fi/2011_10_01_archive.html  and  http://solarwindpronet-suomi.blogspot.fi/2011_10_01_archive.html ), Mr. Kaku sees the situation to be quite severe and hopes the governments to invest in securing at least power grids, nuclear power plants and satellites. They had asked the US government to give 200 million dollars to secure these vital infrastructure, but they got zero.

LINK - ENENEWS: http://enenews.com/professor-really-disturbed-solar-flares-week-could-lots-fukushima-type-events-around-one-power-blackout-all-hell-could-break-lose-video

When does the world wake up, when does politicians and citizens start using their brain capacity. I'm afraid we don't have time enough. But we should at least try!

JPS


P.S.

I'm sorry I have been too busy to update my blog for a week now - I have been participating Vaasa Wildlife - Nature Film Festival http://wildlife.vaasa.fi/index.php/en/festival-2012  where my film "The Battle of Our Energy Future" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPL_q3XOSWA&feature=plcp   was among the finalists. I'll try to update my blogs more frequently in the future.

JPS