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[alway]

I'm hearing a lot of pro-coal talk out of the White House lately. Are there any informed parties who would care to weigh in on the matter?
I was under the impression that coal is destroying our environment and killing the miners who labor to produce it. But maybe modern techniques make coal relatively harmless to obtain and use? What are the facts here?

So black lung *did* decline at one point in the past. However, it's apparently on the rise again. Been seeing lots of stories like these a few months ago: http://ohiovalleyresource.org/2016/12/16/fighting-for-breath-black-lungs-deadliest-form-increases/
http://www.npr.org/2016/12/15/505577680/advanced-black-lung-cases-surge-in-appalachia
Seen it blamed on a number of things:
mechanization of the processes means the job is physically easier and requires less workers; more worry of someone else in your high unemployment town taking your job + low wages = longer hours. Longer hours means more exposure, etc. There's cost-cutting on safety mechanisms like air filtration. And different mining techniques resulting from changes in the equipment and mine productivity.

[Max™]

Coal costs more than natural gas. Natural gas costs more than solar. Solar costs more than nuclear.

That said, solar doesn't make large areas of land uninhabitable for centuries when it goes wrong. Mainly it makes roofing contractors swear.

Oh, and nuclear costs more than hydroelectric.

I think wind is somewhere between coal and natural gas.

Huh, found the latest stats:

https://www.lazard.com/media/438038/levelized-cost-of-energy-v100.pdf

Wind is cheapest. Solar's more expensive, then you get to natural gas and stuff.

Well, nuclear doesn't actually do that outside of ridiculous confluences of mismanagement, natural disasters, poor design choices, lax maintenance, etc.

I can confidently state that nuclear power has had no effect on your lifespan, even the tiny bit of additional background radiation I got from Chernobyl didn't make a blip, and as was pointed out above it is lost in the noise from the radiation dose I've gotten from coal. Lord knows what effects a couple weeks working in a plant had.

Unless you happen to live somewhere completely secluded from their effects (basically a few pockets in the southern hemisphere) you've had a measurable decrease in your life expectancy from coal burning.

Coal has the best PR ever. "Blue collar jobs for people like YOU, down home cooking after you finish your shift in the mine, and hey if you happen to live long enough we'll see about taking care of retirement even, though we know you won't make it past 65."

[PTTG??]

The cheapest nuclear is more expensive than the most expensive solar. There are niches where nuclear works -- particularly spaceflight -- but for grid power solar and wind just work.

Of course the question is storage, but that's surprisingly cheap. Going with the present standard for large-scale storage, pumped hydroelectric, it's very roughly $1.9 per kW-year.... Assuming that number comes from a plant that stores and discharges 50% of it's capacity per day on average, and rounding up for ease, that's $2/(365*0.5)= $0.011 kWh, $11 per MWh.

If we assume that each MWh of solar capacity needs two MWh of storage capacity, using the numbers from my earlier source, the whole solar system costs less than nuclear does for the capacity, and that's using the high end of the solar range and the low end of the nuclear range.

Throw in grid-based distribution so you can distribute sun power where it's dark and wind power where it's still, and it doesn't make any damn sense that we're still burning coal.

I say ban coal today and use the savings to give everyone in the coal industry a nice pension.

[Amperzand]

I mean, I'm not really in favor of mass utilization of fission, but it's still better than coal. The effects of meltdown and fallout have been significantly overstated by antinuclear activists throughout the 20th century, leaving some serious issues with public perception of the stuff. Like, in '86 they though Chernobyl was going to be lifeless for centuries. Like, a zone empty of most life.

Even reasonable estimates of the amount of fallout from nuclear war assume worst case scenarios with mass use of high yield ground burst weapons, a sort of "fuck this, let's try to end the world" situation.

Obviously nuclear war would be effectively civilization ending, and nuclear meltdown is amazingly bad, but statements like "Nothing will live here for a thousand years" and "We can destroy the earth several times over" are bullshit.

Edit: The problem with switching to any new power source is that we have to build enough power plants to make everything work, not to mention upgrading the infrastructure to handle new usage/supply patterns.

[Sergarr]

The cheapest nuclear is more expensive than the most expensive solar. There are niches where nuclear works -- particularly spaceflight -- but for grid power solar and wind just work.

Of course the question is storage, but that's surprisingly cheap. Going with the present standard for large-scale storage, pumped hydroelectric, it's very roughly $1.9 per kW-year.... Assuming that number comes from a plant that stores and discharges 50% of it's capacity per day on average, and rounding up for ease, that's $2/(365*0.5)= $0.011 kWh, $11 per MWh.

If we assume that each MWh of solar capacity needs two MWh of storage capacity, using the numbers from my earlier source, the whole solar system costs less than nuclear does for the capacity, and that's using the high end of the solar range and the low end of the nuclear range.

Throw in grid-based distribution so you can distribute sun power where it's dark and wind power where it's still, and it doesn't make any damn sense that we're still burning coal.

I say ban coal today and use the savings to give everyone in the coal industry a nice pension.

You forgot capital costs, but solar is probably better in that regards, too. Solar was named by our economics professor as the direct competitor to nuclear that was posed to overtake it if there are no good advancements made in nuclear within, like, a decade or so.

[Max™]

I'm all for molten salt solar collectors and whatnot, but I'm not arguing nuclear over solar, rather nuclear+solar, as you still need load balancing. Distribution from dayside to nightside is a whole other scale of problem where we're looking at stuff like "is the risk of that Max asshole getting control of the system and turning it into a death ray worth the benefits of an orbital solar power collection/transfer facility?"

[Reelya]

You probably need only a fraction of the current night-time load. Because the carrot and stick currently encourages more consumption to shift to night time. The pricing incentives would reverse in a solar-oriented world. Other sources (hydro for example) could cover night-time needs. I just don't think there's a case that huge investments are needed in nuclear to cover night-time demand in a solar world, as pricing structures currently create artificially high night-time loads.

And there's another thing. All those cities that are visible from space because of light pollution? Some cities already deal with that. Broadcasting floodlights into space turns out to be a huge waste of energy. I think I saw something on a TED talk about how cities that don't give you heavily discounted electricity at night time don't have as much of that wasteful shit going on. So there is in fact a huge potential to drive down night-time base loads, through changing the pricing structures and policies.

[Neonivek]

The cheapest nuclear is more expensive than the most expensive solar.

It this from that weird article that adds in externalizations and super inflates them?

Then again solar is highly subsidized... and when someone is willing to pony ALL of... to 80% of the cost...

[PTTG??]

The cheapest nuclear is more expensive than the most expensive solar.

It this from that weird article that adds in externalizations and super inflates them?

Then again solar is highly subsidized... and when someone is willing to pony ALL of... to 80% of the cost...

I mean, the citations are actually in my two posts, but do carry on.

[Neonivek]

Yep it includes Subsidies. That explains why it is so mysteriously cheap in spite of its costs.

Also I had to look back to find your article sorry PTTG???

though you seem to be very peeved off. Maybe some nuclear coffee will make you feel better.

[Reelya]

The price of solar has massively crashed in the last few years and it has nothing to do with subsidies. It's been a global price crash per kwh generated. All countries, not just USA. If the price of solar was abnormally cheap in specific countries you'd have an argument that subsidies were keeping a lid on prices, but that's just not the case.

Hell if specific countries introduce subsidies that drives up demand for solar panels in those countries, which would cause a supply shortage in countries that lacked subsidies, driving solar prices up there, as a higher percentage than otherwise of panels created would be sold to the nations that had subsidies. So if nobody had subsidies at all, then the "base price" without subsidies would probably decline from currently, as demand would drop, driving prices down further.

[Neonivek]

The price of solar has massively crashed in the last few years and it has nothing to do with subsidies.

It has massively crashed from being unreasonable to being reasonable. (Though people suspect it will go down in price again soon)

It just isn't the "Super inexpensive, much cheaper than nuclear" option. That is where the subsidies come in.

I mean what are we coming up with in terms of price here? $0.011 kWh

When what is the cheapest solar power plant in the world right now? something along $0.33 or something along those lines? and was considered a achievement in efficiency.

[Max™]

True, but the full cultural rework to go back to a mostly diurnal lifestyle makes something like setting up orbital solar power collection/transfer stations look relatively simple.

Photovoltaic solar is great for a local use scenario, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentrated_solar_power has fun stuff like molten salt storage so it can keep generating power after dark.

Still run into the problem that trying to send electricity through more than say, 3000 km is going to start making transmission costs important. Solar thermal is awesome out in the Mojave, and it could be used to supply folks up in the lower parts of Canada even, but I'm not sure how that would fare against some sexy new Gen IV plants for a base load with CSP closer to the equator.

[Reelya]

http://www.solarcellcentral.com/cost_page.html

30 cents per kwh is for home installation roof-top cells. it's not the same price as industrial-scale solar plants. It's fundamentally wrong to quote those sorts of prices then compare them to a nuclear plant.

[Neonivek]

http://www.solarcellcentral.com/cost_page.html

30 cents per kwh is for home installation roof-top cells. it's not the same price as industrial-scale solar plants. It's fundamentally wrong to quote those sorts of prices then compare them to a nuclear plant.

OHH MY GAWD I do not want to fish for my old article.

Anyhow the prices it lists... are $3 kWh... if you exclude subsidies, discounts, and all that... For household solar. (then again once again... includes subsidies in its costs)

Which is a ridiculous price. So now I am going to have to find that article... and that sucks.

Then again the article does say that Solar is more expensive then nuclear... by 1/3rd.

Though it is based on averages. The cheapest Solar Generator is impressively cheap. So I suspect things will change.

---

Ok WHERE THE HECK is Solar coming up with these extra prices? Yes panels are expensive (though not as expensive as they used to be) and solar power has scaling issues (to an extent) and transmission and storage...

Yet why if people keep coming up with ridiculously low prices for solar... that it still manages to be more expensive? Is there something I don't know about decommissioning solar? Does it require regular panel change?