Reply #37: Where did you get that number.

[kristopher]

Current estimates place the lasets current and already outdated cost at $6000/kw for overnight cost. Once you add int the interest on the financing, the overrun and delays, you are going to be closer to $11Billion for your 1 GW reactor. Then we have to get fuel and find a way to deal with the waste, all the while maintaining tighter security and higher levels of personnel training that any other method of energy produciton.

Nuclear is also rated as one of the most undesirable of the available choices. The paper has been accepted but not yet published:


15. Summary This paper evaluated nine electric power sources
(solar-PV, CSP, wind, geothermal, hydroelectric, wave, tidal, nuclear, and coal with CCS) and two liquid fuel options (corn-13 E85, cellulosic E85) in combination with three vehicle technologies (BEVs, HFCVs, and 14
E85 vehicles) with respect to their effects on global-warming-relevant emissions, air 15
pollution mortality, and several other factors. Twelve combinations of energy source-16
vehicle type were considered in all. Among these, the highest-ranked (Tier 1 17
technologies) were wind-BEVs and wind-HFCVs. Tier 2 technologies were CSP-BEVs, 18
Geo-BEVs, PV-BEVs, tidal-BEVs, and wave-BEVs. Tier 3 technologies were hydro-19
BEVs, nuclear-BEVs, and CCS-BEVs. Tier 4 technologies were corn- and cellulosic-20
E85. 21 22

Wind-BEVs performed best in six out of 11 categories, including mortality, 23
climate-relevant emissions, footprint, water consumption, effects on wildlife, thermal 24
pollution, and water chemical pollution. The footprint area of wind-BEVs is 5.5-6 orders 25
of magnitude less than that for E85 regardless of its source, 4 orders of magnitude less 26
than those of CSP-BEVs or solar-BEVs, 3 orders of magnitude less than those of nuclear- 27
or coal-BEVs, and 2-2.5 orders of magnitude less than those of geothermal, tidal, or wave 28
BEVs. 29 30

The intermittency of wind, solar, and wave power can be reduced in several ways: 31
(1) interconnecting geographically-disperse intermittent sources through the transmission 32
system, (2) combining different intermittent sources (wind, solar, hydro, geothermal, 33
tidal, and wave) to smooth out loads, using hydro to provide peaking and load balancing, 34
(3) using smart meters to provide electric power to electric vehicles at optimal times, (4) 35
storing wind energy in hydrogen, batteries, pumped hydroelectric power, compressed air, 36
or a thermal storage medium, and (5) forecasting weather to improve grid planning. 37 38

Although HFCVs are less efficient than BEVs, wind-HFCVs still provide a 39
greater benefit than any other vehicle technology aside from wind-BEVs. Wind-HFCVs 40
are also the most reliable combination due to the low downtime of wind turbines, the 41

distributed nature of turbines, and the ability of wind’s energy to be stored in hydrogen 1
over time. 2 3

The Tier 2 combinations all provide outstanding benefits with respect to climate 4
and mortality. Among Tier 2 combinations, CSP-BEVs result in the lowest CO2e 5
emissions and mortality. Geothermal-BEVs requires the lowest array spacing among all 6
options. Although PV-BEV result in slightly less climate benefit than CSP-BEVs, the 7
resource for PVs is the largest among all technologies considered. Further, much of it can 8
be implemented unobtrusively on rooftops. Underwater tidal powering BEVs is the least 9
likely to be disrupted by terrorism or severe weather. 10 11

The Tier 3 technologies are less beneficial than the others. However, 12
hydroelectricity is an excellent load-balancer and cleaner than coal-CCS or nuclear with 13
respect to CO2e and air pollution. As such, hydroelectricity is recommended ahead of 14
these other Tier-3 power sources. 15 16

The Tier-4 technologies (cellulosic- and corn-E85) are not only the lowest in 17
terms of ranking, but may worsen climate and air pollution problems. They also require 18
significant land relative to other technologies Cellulosic-E85 may have a larger land 19
footprint and higher upstream air pollution emissions than corn-E85. Mainly for this 20
reason, it scored lower overall than corn-E85. Whereas cellulosic-E85 may cause the 21
greatest average human mortality among all technologies, nuclear-BEVs cause the 22
greatest upper-estimate risk of mortality due to the risk of nuclear attacks resulting from 23
the spread of nuclear energy facilities that allows for the production of nuclear weapons. 24
The largest consumer of water is corn-E85. The smallest consumers are wind-BEVs, 25
tidal-BEVs, and wave-BEVs. 26 27

In sum, the use of wind, CSP, geothermal, tidal, solar, wave, and hydroelectric to 28
provide electricity for BEVs and HFCVs result in the most benefit and least impact 29
among the options considered. Coal-CCS and nuclear provide less benefit with greater 30
negative impacts. The biofuel options provide no certain benefit and result in significant 31
negative impacts. Because sufficient clean natural resources (e.g., wind, sunlight, hot 32
water, ocean energy, gravitational energy) exists to power all energy for the world, the 33
results here suggest that the diversion of attention to the less efficient or non-efficient 34
options would represent an opportunity cost that will delay solutions to climate and air 35
pollution health problems. 36 37

The relative ranking of each electricity-BEV option also applies to the electricity 38
source when used to provide electricity for general purposes. The implementation of the 39
recommended electricity options for providing vehicle and building electricity requires 40
organization. Ideally, good locations of energy resources would be sited in advance and 41
developed simultaneously with an interconnected transmission system. This requires 42
cooperation at multiple levels of government. 43 44

Acknowledgment 45
I would like to thank Cristina Archer, Ben Carver, Ralph Cavanagh, Bethany Corcoran, 46
Mike Dvorak, Eena Sta. Maria, Diana Ginnebaugh, Graeme Hoste, Holmes Hummel, 47
Earl Killian, Jon Koomey, Gilbert Masters, Eric Stoutenburg, Ron Swenson, John Ten 48
Hoeve, and Joe Westersund for helpful suggestions and comments. This work was not 49
funded by any interest group, company, or government agency. 50 51

Review of Solutions to Global Warming, Air Pollution, and Energy Security 2 3

Mark Z. Jacobson 4
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, 5
Environ. Sci., 2008, doi:10.1039/b809990C In press, October 30, 2008 9