The South Texas Project is already one of the most successful nuclear generating stations in the world. It is a dual reactor power plant with 2 Westinghouse Pressurized Water Reactors (PWR) providing 2,500 Megawatts of electricity to the Texas power gird.
In 2006, NRG Energy filed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a combined construction and operating license to build two additional reactors at the site. The proposed new reactors would be Advanced Boiling Water Reactors (ABWR) each capable of generating an additional 1358 Megawatts of electricity.
These new reactors would result in a combined capacity of 5,200 Megawatts of electricity. That is enough to power 4,160,000 homes without generating one molecule of greenhouse gasses!
In typical fashion, environmentalists are rallying to Texas in opposition to the expansion. The arguments are the same tired old excuses to ignore nuclear as the only viable option to achieve energy independence.
One of these nuts, Cindy Wheeler of the Consumers’ Energy Coalition in San Antonio, actually went so far as to make the following comment:
“With the economic downturn, we shouldn’t generate power that’s not needed.”
So let me get this straight, Cindy: America and the rest of the globe is NOT in the middle of an energy crisis? America does NOT need the thousands of new jobs this expansion would generate?
This comment is breaking new ground in the stupidity these idiots will go to in order to make sure we remain dependent on foreign oil for another century.
Luckily, I believe the people of Texas are intelligent enough to not listen to Wheeler and her band of merry tree huggers. I think Texas would welcome the opportunity to generate new energy and new jobs without sacrificing their environment.
The proposed site will only cost $6 billion compared to some plants that would cost far more to build even a single reactor. What’s more, NRG is willing to finance this expansion without the aid of federal bailouts, state funding, or loan guarantees.
~Man Overboard
Image Used in this Post
Power Lines in Plano TX image courtesy of Flickr user Ben Morrow published under the CC license.
28 Comments
Jack, do you know what the time frame, on average, for a newly constructed and privately funded nuclear plant would be for it to become profitable?
Also, from an economic standpoint does it make more financial sense to perform upgrades and expansions to existing sites as we are seeing here in Texas?
Greg,
If the NRC granted the combined operating and construction lisence then:
1. Break ground in 2012
2. Complete construction in 2017 (estimated)
3. Instantly profitable considering the low operating costs relative to dirt burners.
4. Approx 10 years for the plant to pay for itself considering today’s energy costs (which will only rise during that time).
Please allow the nut (Cindy above) to reply. No jobs will occur in San Antonio, which wants to build these reactors. None. According to the Nuclear Energy Institute, the lobbying arm of the nuclear industry, the U.S. does not have workers with the skills to do the work required at new plants, and it will take years to train them. The first round of these workers will have to come from Japan, France, or Russia.
I won’t even bother to address the idea that we should be producing energy that isn’t needed.
I found this page while googling for an answer to how much water STP Units 1 and 2 use per year. Imagine my surprise at seeing my name.
I don’t mind criticism, and am rather delighted to be called a nut by the author of this page, but I mind terribly when people don’t do their research and sound hysterical and silly.
Cindy,
You can’t use phrases like “energy that isn’t needed” and expect people to take you seriously. What planet are you on where there is not an energy crisis and how can we get 1/2 of the world’s population there? Should we wait until oil is $150/barrel again to do anything about energy costs?
Also, your claim that there is no one to fill those jobs is equally unfounded. There are thousands in college or trade school right now who, with a bit more training, would easily qualify for those jobs. There is, afterall, a bit of an unemployment thing going on right now in case you hadn’t noticed.
Cindy may be right about the jobs in San Antonio, since the reactors aren’t IN San Antonio. There will be plenty of jobs for Texas, however. Nice demonstration of how to split hairs to spin an argument though.
I was curious to see where the NEI stated the U.S. doesn’t have the skilled workers, but was unable to find it. Can you point me in the right direction, Cindy?
Energy that isn’t needed… Where to begin. If it isn’t needed, why are importing so much? Technically, I suppose, you could argue NO energy is needed. You could wrap yourself in more blankets and not ever use a heater, for instance. You could go back to using homing pigeons for longer range communication. I see that you are using energy, however, to spout senseless arguments on the Internet, which is in turn consuming energy. Have you thought about joining the Amish?
I continue to be astounded by peoples’ refusal to accept that nuclear power is the optimal choice CURRENTLY available.
Jack: Minor correction – It’s Cindy Weehler, not Wheeler, according to her seriously-in-need-of-artistic-touch, nutjob website. Hire a web designer, girl! Jeez! You expect ANYONE to take that site seriously?
If I held her in any manner of regard or thought her deserving of dignity then I would bother to speel her name right. Until then, Ms. Whealar.
As to the workers comment – completely false. A nuclear technician can be trained in less than a year and the United States Navy continously provides a flow of qualified and experienced Nuclear Reactor Operators. This is just another lame comment by some nut that doesn’t bother to check her facts.
Hey Mark, do you have a problem with the Amish.
I am still in shock over the whole producing energy that is not needed thing. Fine, you don’t want to produce more energy to meet an ever-increasing demand (economic suicide), at least we could migrate some coal-burning plants to a new nuclear facility.
The more I read about this project the better it sounds. Apparently these guys are the cream of the crop, as they say, for nuclear energy production, cost control, environmental safety, and environmental protection. Producing energy that isn’t needed….sigh….
No one trained on how to operate reactors!? I am currently a 23 year old college student who has spent the last 4 years learning about and training on a 1 MW TRIGA type research reactor. I have used this opportunity to become a federally licensed reactor operator, and the whole licensing process took just 6 months.
My previous supervisor (as well as 4 other staff members) just recently left to go work at power reactors in North Carolina and Washington. Their training programs takes approximately two years, and each of them has reported a training class size of 20+ operators. That is 80 new operators that will be available in 2011 (they left last year) well before the 2017 (estimated) completion date of the reactor.
As for workers coming from other countries? that is insane. We don’t even allow non-american citizens to get licenses at a research reactor, do you think power reactor security is less stringent?
You are also not taking into account two other factors. You say there will be no jobs for San Antonio. What about construction jobs? those are usually contracted out to local agencies. You are trying to make us believe there are no concrete, steel, electrical, or general contracting companies in San Antonio? In addition to the construction jobs, the work force at an operational reactor is nearly 1000 people (including security, janitors, plumbers, electricians, etc…) I’m sorry your right, that influx of 1000 well-paid workers will in no way affect the economy of the city at all.
The real problem here is that you are afraid of nuclear energy. The usual two arguments are:
1. Its not safe (believe me it is) since the inception of nuclear power in the united states not one single person has died or even received a dangerous dose of radiation from them, not even at 3 mile island.
2. it produces mass amount of dangerous waste (98% of which can be reprocessed) and even right now, the total amount of nuclear waste produced in this country since the first power reactor came online in the 1940’s would cover one single football field 9 feet thick. That is half a century of waste. enough said.
Fear is the single largest reason that nuke is being hindered, fear out of ignorance. If everyone understood the science behind reactor technology they would say “put it in my backyard!” I would. Cindy you should do your research before you even form an opinion. Learn a little bit about how a reactor works, and why they are safe. Look up the terms ‘under-moderated’ ,’void coefficient’ ,and ‘negative temperature coefficient’ those will explain it the best.
Enjoy the air on your strange little planet, tell the bunnies and unicorns hi for me.
A licensed reactor operator at age 23 might literally make you the Doogie Howser of Nuclear Energy. Can I be your sidekick named Vinnie and later on surpass you with a minor role in Sopranos?
Oh yeah, I feel so much safer now, knowing a bunch of 23 year old’s; Who’s prime directive is to drink beer and fantasize of having sex with playboy models; are guarding and operating nuclear reactors, Oh yes, makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, now I can sheep at night and dream of buying tickets on the Titanic.
Licensed Reactor Operators are slightly more disciplined than that. Most of them are Navy Verterans who have already spent thousands of hours operating the nuclear reactors on board subs and aircraft carriers.
Nice Star Trek reference though.
The young men are very Proud of their Licensed ability to play with Fire. please don’t get the rest of us Burned, just because you think you know it all.
In Greek mythology, Icarus, son of Daedalus, who, escaping with his father from Crete by means of “artificial” wings, flew so high that the sun melted the wax that fastened the wings and he fell into the sea and drowned. His father warned him about flying to close to the sun. Don’t like that one, how about this one.
Also In Greek mythology, Pandora, the first mortal woman, sent to earth as a punishment to man for Prometheus’ theft of the “fire”. She brought with her a box containing all human ills which, when she opened the lid, escaped into the world, leaving only hope at the bottom of the box.
Nobody is blaming you guys, your just ex-military, who’s job is to take orders, and not to be big thinkers.
In all the history of mankind, it has been the goal of man to pursue freedom from all constraints. to keep us chained to a grid just because you think you have a better mouse trap, is just more of the same, chained! If solar and wind power can free us from the grid, that, should be the pursuit of man.
oh!? Jack, what’s a Verteran?
You want to use mythology for an argument, great. But I’ll use history. People were afraid to try something new for a thousand years, it was called the dark ages. It didn’t really work out.
I’m not ex military by the way. But I’m sure you can look up veteran in a dictionary.
How exactly is wind and solar going to free you from the grid? If you mean catastrophically fail the entire power grid, then sure. Have fun eating your neighbor because the trucks stopped rolling and there’s no food anywhere. Now winter is coming and your starving. Oh yea and you’re about to be killed because Lord of the Wasteland Humongous is in town and he wants what you got…”Just walk away.”
Hey JACK! I wasn’t using mythology as an argument, but as a Metaphor, to show how silly and stupid it is for people to think technology is going to save them. you might be able to manage it, but you will never be able to control it 100%. Your to young to even realize that it was technology that put the world in the situation its in anyway. Go back to watching television, kid.
What situation? You mean the one where we wiped out starvation on half of the planet, cured plagues, and explored space? What a fiasco, I know. Perhaps we should degenerate this debate into yet more vague terms until you find a more comfortable topic. Or are you too old to handle a technical topic?
Michael, just out of curiosity what is your insistence on belittling people because of their youth? Believe me I understand and respect the virtue of age, experience, and in the best cases the presence of wisdom greatly, but it is pure folly to immediately denounce someone and declare superiority on the sole basis of age. Much has been accomplished in this world by great individuals when they were very young. Yes, youthful exuberance and the all too unfortunate presence of immaturity can get in the way but it does not mean there is not great worth and talent.
There are numerous qualified operators coming out of the Nuclear Navy. I myself was trained in the military and am now an Authorized Nuclear Inspector for an ASME Authorized Inspection Agency. I departed the navy under the Clinton administration. I would guess that there will be several nuclear trained men departing the Navy under the Obama administration as well. We will have trained, experienced, intelligent young men willing and able to fill those operator positons.
Energy use in the United States and in Texas is down, in fact, and it has been determined by our own CPS Energy right here in San Antonio, Tx, that what will be needed to meet future energy needs would be peak energy plants like combined cycle natural gas, not nuclear. Our city is looking at a pretty steep rate increase because CPS can’t sell the excess energy it produces right now. It’s probably giving it away, in fact, because you can’t ramp a nuclear plant up and down like you can a natural gas facility. Nuclear plants are just always on. How is that cost-effective? Money would be better spent on more and updated transmission lines. It would be interesting to see the congestion data from the region.
1. Your assuming energy demand will not increase, which is wrong of course. The drop in consumption in 2009 was the first in decades and was caused by the economic collapse. Industry will recover and when that happens they will need more power.
2. You are ignoring transportation energy. With electric of H2 cars you will have plenty of thirsty batteries or electrolysis facilities to send that power to. Unless you prefer oil of course.
3. Nuclear plants absolutely can come down in power. Anything over 50% is fine if necessary, but you can’t seriously beleive that will happen frequently.
Your assumption that energy demand will increase is also still just an assumption. If anyone says that they know what will happen in the next few years, much less beyond that, with regard to energy consumption they’re just full of it. Efficiency and conservation measures are already taking hold and becoming policy in places like California, which is the state that usually becomes the bellwether for the rest of the nation with regard to energy policy–that, and if any kind of climate bill gets passed that contains building efficiency standards, not to mention some sort of carbon tax, and energy consumption may very well drop, if not at least preclude the need for new production. You’ve got to take into account the strength of the dollar, as well, when you start talking about manufacturing goods, and it has been very strong as of late. Look at how railroad shipments are down. Railroad transport of goods is an indicator of the health of the manufacturing sector and it’s been dismal for a while now. And I’m not ignoring electric cars, but unless they start selling them in the way less than $20, 000 range, I just don’t see fleets of them being sold and bought in any way that would significantly affect energy consumption. I see more and more cities talking about light rail systems, actually, and less people moving away from the city center. So which future is the most likely, Jack?
The decline of civilization is not an acceptable resolution to the energy crisis.
Am I full of it or are you just burying your head in the sand about the rise in energy consumption for the last thirty years? Seriously, one single year out of 31 when energy demand does not rise and you want to act like all the energy problems of the world just disappeared. How forward looking of you.
A real solution allows for the betterment of civilization with reduced impact to the environment, and sane people know that for the next hundred years at least, that means nuclear fission.
Energy consumption will definitely increase because the population is increasing at a rate faster than the per capita energy usage is decreasing (if it is at all – one year, as you note, is not enough to define a broader trend). Simple math.
Agreed, one year does not provide anywhere near a substantial enough sample size to justify a trend.
oops, meant to say that the dollar “hasn’t” been very strong as of late.
Your points are solid, but one thing your argument ignores is that over 60% of current energy production is from CO2 intense coal plants. And it really isn’t just the emissions that are harmful-it is also the large-scale, extremely environmentally devastating coal mining. So why not replace some of those old coal plants with new nuclear?
Unfortunately, nuclear just robs Peter to pay Paul. The waste is a problem that burying it in the ground doesn’t solve. So it’s left for future generations–which is what has now happened with fossil fuel use, only we’re that era’s future generation. A couple other points about nuclear: one, uranium. The World Nuclear Association has put out a paper stating that the current supply of uranium will run out around 2017/20 if no new nuclear mines come into operation as of now. And it takes time to license, permit, start a new nuclear mine. Two, the current technology for enriching uranium will be phased out around 2017/20 (I can’t remember which number is for mining and which for enrichment technology; my apologies.). Currently, I believe there is only one (maybe two) facility in the United States that enriches uranium. The United States imports around 80-90% of the uranium it uses in its reactors. That’s dependency on a foreign fuel source, and I believe most of it now comes from Russia. Also, uranium enrichment is a source of greenhouse gas emissions because, as someone pointed out, most of the world burns fossil fuels and the technology for enriching uranium involves centrifuges powered by electricity. Even lasers, which is the technology I believe they’re looking at for future enrichment, require electricity; again, most of which will be fossil fuel. The New York Times just ran a story about all of the aging plants in the U.S. that are leaking tritium into the groundwater… So, while I acknowledge that the world’s population is increasing, I do not acknowledge that nuclear is the solution to its energy needs. Even if you can ramp down a nuclear power plant to 50% at times, it’s still always either on or off. It’s baseload, not peak, and a lot of the problems, I believe, that are encountered with transmission loss with regard to wind power are due to the grid. In fact, the grid causes most of the power that we generate here in the United States to be lost. It’s highly inefficient, old, and insufficient. I think we’d do far better to update to a smart grid system than to build new plants, quite frankly, of any kind–that, and behavior modification techniques like smart meters that let a consumer know how and when they are using more energy. I drive a hybrid civic and that little instant mpg readout has made me aware of how my driving habits affect my gas mileage. I’ve modified them to help maximize efficiency. So, just because the population will increase doesn’t mean that there is only one way to meet its energy needs. And, quite frankly, nuclear energy seems overkill. Oh, and I didn’t even talk about the environmental damage that uranium mining inflicts…
You are forgetting the 16 locations discovered worldwide were 1 billion years ago the fission reaction was sustained for over 100,000 years. You already read about those I’m sure…didn’t you?
If the fission process was carried out, uncontrolled, for hundreds of millenia, before the first multi-cellular lifeforms ever even evolved on this planet, then where is that damage to the world? Those fission products are underground, not in hardened bunkers, not in lead boxes, and unguarded. If this is such a plague as you describe, then where is the damage? Why don’t you dig it up and put it in above ground concrete boxes? That is what you’re proposing with the same man made material isn’t it?
Also, two new Uranium mines are about to enter sevice in Utah…here in the US. So that lame argument is defunct already. Try again and do better research first.
Also, construction of solar panels and windmills…what powers that? Hamster wheels? Nope it’s electricity…ahem Carbon. Mining the materials for hundreds of square miles of solar panels…what powers that? What do you have to cut down entire forests of to make room for those panels? What is the carbon foot print of that? What toxic materials are those solar panels full of? Another pathetic attempt at arguing. Stop wasting my time if you’re not going to bother to present a rational argument that doesn’t insult the intelligence of my readers!
The New York Times? Nice unbiased source. I’m sure the New York Times mentioned that ten gallons of the tritium leaked at those plants is about as radioactive as a single banana? Right? I’m sure you already took the time to do your homework on the subject prior to comment instead of reciting a NYT article as gospel of science…right? Didn’t you? So are you ready to protest the operation of banana farms worldwide? Doesn’t make sense does it? Again, stop wasting my time.
The time it takes to license and build a plant is the result of YOUR PROTESTS. So don’t be so lame as to cite an argument that you are the cause of. Get out of the way and let the scientists and engineers solve your problems already. The Arabs just love you. You keep them employed!
If you think my comment is made to insult you personally and make you look stupid, then that is the first correct assumption you have made since the beginning of this debate. I feel obliged to point out just how stupid your position is. If you want to argue with me, then do me the courtesy of presenting a researched, thought out, science-backed argument, hard as that may be to find.