Energy Policy - Planning to Fail?

Brian Catt MBA, CEng, CPhys, MCIM

brian.catt@physics.org

IET London Network – 1st February 2012

Whose talking?

• Chartered physicist, electrical engineer and MBA

• 7 years in radiation physics and electronics at NPL, RPS and NRPB

• 2 in chemical engineering research at Imperial College

• 32 years creating new technology business

• Now consulting in high tech marketing, supporting science education and promoting scientific understanding to lay audiences

• 4 year study of energy policy

• Now promoting rational science over dogma working with leading academics and journalists

Searching for simple, quantifiable, communicable truths............and audiences to debate them with

The Rules

• No opinion unless I say so• Hypothesis, test, repeat• Numbers are round, 10 - 20%• All are sourced from established reports• DECC, RAE, OECD, as stated• Set phasers to stun please

Arm Exercises - Belief Review“What is wanted is not the will to believe, but the wish to find out, which is its exact opposite”

UK’s energy objectives are adequate, affordable, zero carbon, sustainable energy.

Who thinks alternatives as prescribed by government:

meet these criteria?

are a sustainable solution for our long term energy supply?

a planned avoidable waste of £100s of Billions that threatens our economic future?

My Hypothesis is that only the last is the case

300 years of US renewable energies

...renewables inadequate for an industrialising society

Renewables History

energy use per person vs. income

Why It Matters

.......economic development directly proportional to energy use

Asia & N Korea

US energy consumption per capita

The Energy GapPlanning for less when more is needed

massive policy and planning failure – next government...

The Word from Westminster..

• Tony Blair: “The choices are stark.....nuclear power is back on the agenda with a vengeance”

• Ed Balls: “Its anti social to oppose wind farms”• David Cameron: “Climate change is the greatest

challenge we face” (but can’t do anything about)

• DECC Rhetoric wind will work, get cheaper, etc.

RECENT GOVERNMENT QUESTIONS:

• What’s the difference between power and energy?• Confused between rated power and delivery capability

..........but legislating the laws of physics

The Prescribed Solutionthe iconography of alternative power

Too weak for the industrial revolution

Powering the next agrarian revolution?

...........what changed?

The Greatest Challenge We Face?

• No energy, no GDP, no anything

• Developed economies require cheap, plentiful, controllable, energy

• expensive, rationed, uncontrollable weak won’t work

• We get this from intense fossil fuel, but its finite and being consumed at an accelerating rate........ scare story?

• Around 1.5B live in developed economies

• Billions more expect to reach developed status by 2050

• Requires x100 increase in energy use per capita

• So 1.5B more developed people doubles energy use

• Fossil resources will be exhausted at an accelerating rate

• Most of what took millions of years concentrating weak alternatives has already been extracted in 160 years

• At least twice as much base load energy needed to replace direct fossil use by 2050 DECC, I say 3 x for fuel and other chemical synthesis

......is energy sufficiency

Climate Change Alternative Realities

• We are 2% of human combustion emissions

• US and China nearly 50%, with large coal reserves left

• We cleaned up our emissions after acid rain

• Its unproven that CO2 levels are dangerously high. They are historically LOW, we are between ice ages and the coldest the Earth has ever been

• Politicians and economists don’t understand energy basics, the media and Greens lied to the public on nuclear power(George Monbiot, Mark Lynas ref)

• Language and law have been distorted to prefer the incapable

• A PC Energy Inquisition supports the energy ideology• e.g. “Its anti social to oppose wind farms” - Milliband

• Global warming should be a small factor in UK energy planning

...... policy from Brussels, out of Green politics, by media sensationalism

CO2 Levels and Temperature in History”in the midst of the third major cooling period, that began around 3 years ago"

Rational Criteria

– Do alternatives replace fossil?• Adequate• Controllable• + Sustainable

– Are they environmentally friendly?• Zero carbon• Minimal impact• Safe

– Are they economically robust?• Affordable• Long term price stability• Independent

What determines what’s best?

Adequacycan alternatives meet our needs?

• Huge networks are required to collect enough weak energy

– same for all alternatives, remote locations, massive collection costs

• 300,000 of biggest 1MW turbines to deliver 60GW current peak demand

– 3 per Square mile across the whole UK assuming 20% of rated delivery (optimistic)

• Subsidies can’t make energy sources more intense or less variable

– just more expensive

• Wind technology – the best - is 30 years old, is mature not developing

– Alternatives developed to offset coal emissions, not to replace fossil

• 100% “Spinning reserve” fossil back up is essential – fossil prolonged

• Grid distributes intense controllable sources where people are– vs: aggregating weak uncontrollable remote energy sources

• Smart grid doesn’t make energy – just adds more cost

.....”woefully inadequate”, unacceptably expensive, prolongs fossil use

Some Core Facts ...scoping the problem

• Electrical energy use currently 314TWH pa , peak 60GW

• Domestic gas use + road transport = current electricity use

• Electrical energy demand by 2050 expected to double @ minimum at the end of fossil = 700TWh with conservation Source: DECC

• With other uses it could treble e.g: fuel synthesis, de-salination

• Plus just moving from gas to electricity quadruples today’s heating bills

• Tripling prices further with “alternatives” is an avoidable stupidity

• We will need and can have much more cheap electricity

• We plan less more expensive – and massively subsidise its production

.........................planning to fail?

The ROC: Prescription by Subsidy

Result: Generators are exploiting ROCs by maximising their quotas of “renewables” using most subsidised and profitable generation, at consumer’s accelerating expense.

.......ideological subsidies driving infrastructure build the wrong way

Renewable Obligations Certificates - ROC Negotiable credits currently worth £45/MWh, unblessed power is £45/MWhROC qualification is political decision - Green politics exploited by lobbyist generators

Some Simple Costed Consequences

• 400TWh costs the grid c.£20B,( indicate unit cost)

• Each 1p on 400TWh is £4B pa cost to UK plc, £200 pa per household

• Working cost assumptions (cost to grid):• Nuclear, coal, gas are same £45/MWh cost to the grid or 4.5p/KWh.

• 1 ROC tacks base load grid price at £45/MWh

• On shore wind 2 times this including subsidies

• Offshore wind 3 times including subsidies

• Adding offshore wind power to the grid with Double ROCs

• 140% of today’s prices at 20% Wind (0.8x1)+(0.2x3) = 1.4 = £400 per household pa

• 260% of today’s prices at 80% wind = £1,600 per household per annum - for 20 yrs

• Each 1GWyr of OS wind power built in preference to nuclear wastes £1B pa

• Every 1MWyr of offshore generation wastes c.£1M pa for 20 years vs. nuclear,

When you need twice as much energypreferring a 4x as expensive alternative to the nuclear solution is dumb

Adequacy and Controllability

ANALYSIS OF UK WIND POWER GENERATION NOVEMBER 2008 TO DECEMBER 2010

Stuart Young Consultants for John Muir Trust - March 2011 nb: Power output is proportional to wind speed cubed

Renewable/Sustainable/Independent?

Alternatives cannot power the real time grid on their own• Base load fossil generation in spinning reserve is mandatory

• Backup when fossil’s gone demands pumped storage for stability – which makes alternatives more inadequately expensive = 120 GW of hydro AND wind turbines?

• Alternatives are almost 100% dependent on their fossil backup

• Alternatives prolong the use of fossil power and its emissions. Not zero carbon.

• Alternatives are obsolete at the end of fossil. Not sustainable.

Nuclear energy is 40% renewable now, it can be close to 100%, no backup required

• Fits straight on the grid as a more intense upgrade to coal then gas

• Both powered Fusion and Fast Breeder reactors can enable sustainability

• The TWR fission reactor will consume depleted Uranium fuel, including Plutonium

• There is a LOT of Uranium to get through the development phase – then Thorium

• A serious nuclear program will include fuel reprocessing and waste transmutation.

• We are not short of solutions, just investment in what will work

.........only nuclear is truly independent & sustainable long term

Sources: PB Power, 2011, Electricity Generation Cost Model Update 2011. Arup, 2011, Review of the Generation Costs and Deployment Potential of Renewable Electricity Technologies in the UK

* Nuclear (NOAK) estimate is based on a 2017 project start date at projected prices, 10% discount rate

The basics: the costLevelised costs of electricity generation, £/MWh

Nuclear Safety?

Current Knowledge on Background Radiation

• No radiation is best Linear no Threshold “LNT” Hypothesis discredited• Product of cold war – basis of Green anti nuclear assertion• No basis in fact and is comprehensively disproved • ref: Dr Bernard Cohen 1995, Dr T.D. Luckey, Dr R.Scott, Dr W. Allison, et al.

• We evolved in radioactive world and are ourselves radioactive • we get 86 Million hits per day• 12% of that is from radio isotopes inside us (Bananas)• Man made radiation < 0.5% of natural background at 2.5mSv• Natural background varies from 1mSV to 1Sv pa (x1000)• SW France at 80mSv pa is 4 x NYC/Fukushima evacuation level

• Ideal rate appears to be c.100mSV• Less is worse, more is worse• There is probably a “best” level immunologically• Certainly a threshold• Think sun exposure...

100 mSv

Cancer Risk

Alternative Reality

Criteria Government’s Alternative Nuclear Alternative

Zero Carbon X Fossil backup essential 70-80% √ Totally

Adequate X energy sources too weak √ All you can eat

Controllable X No – random √ Totally

Cheap X Still expensive after 30 yrs. Will always need too much equipment

√ Intense, fuel cheap, Today’s prices maintained

Renewable X No. Dependent on fossil backup √ 40% now, can be 100%

“Eco” X Plague on countryside. Prolongs fossil emissions, will obsolete to junk

√ Smallest footprint

Safe √ ‘ish. Still kills more than nuclear √ Safest of all!

Alternative (to fossil) X Inadequate, uncontrollable, too expensive, doesn’t fit the grid

√ inevitable base load replacement for fossil

Independent √ ‘ish √ 100% with re processing

......we are building the wrong thing through bad policy and worse law

Current energy policy and language reverses reality for ideology and profit

What’s our competition doing?

• China plans 132 nuclear plants by 2030 – several at a time - primary base load

• Korea plan to be 50% nuclear by 2020, Japan did, probably will still

• Russia will double its nuclear base by 2030 from 23GW to 51GW– including Gen 4 Fast Breeders

• Japan, China and Russia have all built new 500 Tonne PWR foundries

• America has watched too many Simpsons and still has loads’a fossil– Also has the best nuclear power up time and close to best safety record in the World

• France: Already there, 80% nuclear, electric long haul TGV, advanced fuel and waste processing, laughing up its sleeve at neighbours as it also acquires ITER out of JET – and prepares to power its backward industrial neighbours

• Germany is going back to fossil fuel, Polish Coal and Russian gas– the ones who pushed for expensive carbon reduction, driven by Grün Politics

• We plan Ten nuclear power stations by 2020, basically replacement

• Need at least 20 to replace retiring coal and existing nuclear to meet 2020 20%

... UK still has no realistic strategy

The Truth

• Only nuclear can take us past the end of fossil

• Alternatives cannot power even current 60GW

• We will need 2-3 times that

• Alternatives are fossil dependent and inherently expensive

• Subsidies are wasting increasing £ Billions pa pointlessly

• Only Nuclear meets all the objectives

– cheap, zero emissions, plentiful, controllable, independent, sustainable, safest

• The maximum ROI is nuclear

• We are broke, every £ should count

• Capital rationing should apply = common sense

The Choice...........lobbyist enriching waste or economic survival?

“Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones”

An Action Plan?1. Tell the public the truth

2. Prefer what works best, forget energy multiculturalism AKA “In The Mix”

3. Change Law to level subsidies for carbon reducing technologies - Invest in nuclear waste and fuel processing R&D program + MAST, ITER

4. Replace all current nuclear plant with proven nuclear upgrades

5. Replace 2015 coal with proven nuclear or gas (already grid connected)- Meet 2020 20% obligations at today’s prices without rationing using nuclear and gas

6. Start trebling the current grid capacity in situ for the end of gas - NOW

7. Replace remainder of coal power with nuclear (about 50% of 60 GW)

8. Replace gas fired last - can keep going with shale gas and LNG tankers

9. Gap fill with Gas turbine - on old grid connected city power station sites etc.

10. 700TWh minimum nuclear by 2050 requires 120 1GW power stations

11. All you can eat, Zero emission, independent, sustainable at today’s prices

No new science, some process development, reactors are proven safe designs

The logical and inevitable alternative to fossil energy for a developed economy

PS: Build more LNG Terminals in case

Work in Progress300MW Fission To Go

JET, ITER (& DEMO)

Fusion on Earth - JET

x10

MAST & TWR

Thank you – Questions?

Possible Topics:•Why?•Safety•Nuclear transmutation•What is waste?•Fusion•speaking opportunities?

Comparison of Build and Power Generation Costs from multiple sourcesnb: Each independent source has been "levelised" to reflect a consistent approach to costings and includes all cost from green field to decommissioning, so are directly comparable within a column.

Costings of Main Generation Modalities

(i) 1p/kWh=£10/MWh (ii) included in unit cost

Carbon cycle, billions tonnes carbon

CO2 in the atmosphere

Its Getting Warmer

We are using oil faster than we can find it

References and Further Data

• References and Further Data

•  

• The Royal Accademy of Engineers: (i)

• The Costs of Generating Electricity, ISBN 1-903496-11-X ,March 2004 Best detailed levelised comparitive costings across modalities

•  

• UK DECC DUKES Statistics on Energy Use

•  

• UK DECC Minister response in Parliamentary Questions on Energy Costs 2008

•  

• H.Douglas Lightfoot

• http://www.nobodysfuel.com/intro.html

• Doug has it nailed and his work the best joined up approach I’ve seen. We need a lot more energy, more cheaply, sustainably and zero carbon. We can do it with nuclear power, not other ways. Doug has done the huge task of macro level data collection presented in one self consistent format to show the truth.

•  

• Professor MichaelLaughton

• 2020 and the realities of electrical power supply NEW POWER / ISSUE 9/ OCTOBER 2009

•  Why the grid can’t handle much wind power

•  

• Coal Combustion: Nuclear Resource or Danger?

• Alex Gabbard http://www.ornl.gov/ORNLReview/rev26-34/text/coalmain.html

• Emissions from burning coal include uranium and other nuclear materials—potential hazards and resources.

• Oak Ridge National Laboratory REVIEW Volume 26 Numbers Three and Four, 1993

•  

• The World Nuclear Association:

• http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf02.html

•  While not independent they have an excellent comparison of costs and all other factors globally, which is not very different in relative magnitude from the RAE or the DTI’s own.

•  

• Sen Lamar Alexander, Tennessee;

• http://alexander.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?p=GoingToWarInSailboats

•  One of many papers offering clear analysis for the lay person and politicians

•  

• Rate of Decarbonisation:  

• We are 2% of global combustion emissions. USA and China are 50% Ref:

• We must not hurry into expensive rationed energy as a short term fix led by bad prescriptive law at huge avoidable cost. We must take the cost competitive route for UK plc as are others. A committed programme to replace coal directly then gas with nuclear energyand minimal CCS will achieve emission reductions to the larger percentages far faster than prolonging fossil power as backup for wind farms. Also cheapest in capital and energy costs.

•  

• Some countries have large coal reserves they would like to burn cheaply before biting the inevitable bullet of exhaustion, they can control prices and enjoy cheap fossil energy while moving more slowly to nuclear, China and America with half global combustion emissions being the major factors here. We are 2%.

•  

• Others without reserves like S.Korea, Vietnam and Japan are going cheap nuclear ASAP. France is already there, We will have to be able to compete with all the above with their continual plentiful cheap energy from fossil and nuclear sources, so must take the best route to nuclear energy for UK plc, a few % of our emissions short term will make no diference to what happens to the climate in the couple of decades it will take us to nuclearise while US and China are still belting them out.