My Snow Blower Batteries Are in the Garage Recharging. Guess What Isn't Charging Them on the PJM Grid?

[NNadir]

Solar cells.

We do have two functioning nuclear plants in New Jersey. As thermal plants, they are running at higher efficiency because of the cold heat sink, so that helps.

But for the most part on this grid, PJM, the batteries are charging on gas and coal. As of this moment, according to the Electricity Map the climate gas intensity of PJM is 445 grams of CO₂ per kWh. This is, in "percent talk" 1780% higher than the 25 grams of CO₂ per kWh of electricity in France as of this moment.

On our PJM grid as of this moment, 42.5% of our electricity is generated by combustion of dangerous natural gas, followed by nuclear 28.41%, followed by coal, providing 20.92%.

Happily our Democratic Governor Elect, Mikie Sherrill, supports another nuclear plant in New Jersey. So do I. I'd feel better about the damned magical lithium batteries for the snow blower if additional nuclear plants were operating.

Wait! Wait! There is solar on the PJM grid somewhere somehow despite being covered by snow!!!!! 2.6% of electricity comes from solar, probably down in Virginia. It's noon now, and the capacity utilization of solar on PJM is 16.13% in "percent talk." We're saved!!!!!!!

I'm an old man. I was half way through the sidewalk, with the batteries running out, my neighbor came by and graciously offered to finish the sidewalk portion of the job with his gasoline powered snow blower. I'm not sure, from a thermodynamic perspective, whether his snowblower has a lower carbon intensity than my battery powered one.

[Bluetus]

1. Please share the plan that you and Sherrill have

for dealing with 1000 years of radiation.

And by the way,, wind turbines work fine today. If we deploy cheap, environmentally insert sodium-ion batteries at scale, you can recharge those snow blower batteries any time of the day or night.

It is insane to spend another penny on any fission technology or deployment. Solar and wind are now lower cost than nuclear or fossil fuels, even if we don't include the cost of NOT dealing with the 1000 years of nuke waste. There has been enormous progress on fusion reactors. They now appear likely to be commercialized in the 2030s and will have none of the nuclear waste or meltdown issues we have with every fission reactor.

[NNadir]

2. I understand used nuclear fuel very well. I also understand the difference between fusion and fission. I support...

...the latter, but have no faith that the former will ever do anything, and if it does, it will be far too late.

By the way, I also am amused when antinukes, who know almost nothing about the thing they hate, pick a number of years that so called "nuclear waste" is supposed to be dangerous. Sometimes it's 1000 years, sometimes, 10,000 years, a million years, a billion years.

In addressing an ignorant antinuke sometime ago, I showed that with continuous recycling of used nuclear fuel - possible because of the extremely high energy density that makes it environmentally superior to all other forms of energy - that can reduce the intrinsic radioactivity of the planet that naturally exists.

Antinukes are spectacularly disinterested in the fossil fuel waste that will kill people in the next hour, just as they are spectacularly disinterested in the fossil fuel waste destroying the planetary atmosphere.

... The recovery of the transuranium actinides using a wide variety of processes is well understood, and all of them, not just plutonium but also neptunium, americium, and curium are potential nuclear fuels. I therefore always argue that it is just stupid to bury them, as they are vital resources in a time of climate change and massive rising air pollution death rates.

The following figure shows the very different case obtained if one separates the uranium, plutonium and minor actinides (neptunium, americium and curium) and fissions them, whereupon the reduction of radioactivity to a level that is actually below that of the original uranium in a little over 300 years:



The caption:

Fig. 4. – Radiotoxicity (log-scale, unit: Sv/tSM) of 1 t of heavy metal (SM) from a pressurized water reactor (initial enrichment 4.2% U-235, burn-up 50 GWd/t) with regard to ingestion as a function of time (log-scale, unit: years) after discharge. Left-hand frame: contribution of fission products (FP), plutonium (Pu) and minor actinides (MA) to radiotoxicity. Right-hand frame: Modification of radiotoxicity due to separation of U, Pu or U, Pu, MA. The reference value is the radiotoxicity of the amount of natural uranium that was used to produce 1 t of nuclear fuel. Source: [17].

(Hartwig Freiesleben, The European Physical Journal Conferences · June 2013)

Source 17, in German, is this one: Reduzierung der Radiotoxizität abgebrannter Kernbrennstoffe durch Abtrennung und Transmutation von Actiniden: Partitioning. Reducing spent nuclear fuel radiotoxicity by actinide separation and transmutation: partitioning.

It is important to note that simply because a material is radioactive does not imply that it is not useful, perhaps even capable of accomplishing tasks that nothing else can do as well or as sustainably. Given the level of chemical pollution of the air, water and land, in fact, the use of radiation, in particular high energy radiation, gamma rays, x-rays, and ultra UV radiation may prove to be more important than ever, but that's a topic for another time...

828 Underground Nuclear Tests, Plutonium Migration in Nevada, Dunning, Kruger, Strawmen, and Tunnels

Mikie Sherrill probably does not know how to deal with used nuclear fuel. Of course, being a very bright person, well educated, she surely knows how to ask people called "scientists" about the value of used nuclear fuel and how it should be managed; used nuclear fuel is just that, "valuable." Of course, it really doesn't require much attention, as it's proved to be spectacularly safe. The storage of used nuclear fuel has not killed, in the 70 year history of its accumulation, as many people as fossil fuel waste - air pollution - will kill in the next six hours. Antinukes might well improve their appalling ethics if they gave a shit about fossil fuel in the next six hours as they do about their paranoia over 1000 years.

Antinukes should try that some time, do as Mikie Sherrill might do, ask people who know about the subject, realize that there are people who know more about a subject than they do. In general, antinukes don't do as much. They just wallow in their ignorance, with which they seem very happy.

Personally, I find that appalling, but common.

I'm not happy with a destroyed planetary atmosphere.. I take it very seriously, and I know a great deal about the subject, having explored the primary scientific literature. This is the reason, among many, I support nuclear energy. I give a shit about the future of the humanity.

Have a very nice afternoon; and an enjoyable holiday season.

[Bluetus]

3. So, basically, your answer is

you have no plan for the waste (and didn't even acknowledge the very real radiation threat from runaway reactors, which has happened three times at global scale and countless other times at smaller scale) other than throwing out red herrings about exactly how many thousands of years the waste will remain a problem for the planet.

The biggest problem with all nukes is that they aren't needed, at least not until the current wave of AI nonsense. And even with AI, we can easily scale up our energy production using safe renewables, 100% known technology, at a lower cost than any fossil fuel or nuke installation.

If the fuel could be recovered and recycled as easily as you imply, surely we should have done so by now, rather than continuing these protracted NIMBY wars abut where to bury the waste. Can I assume you don't want the waste buried in your neighborhood, but you are fine with it being dumped in New Mexico or somewhere else far away?