Nuclear power is over half the carbon-free electricity in the U.S. and the Exelon will retire over 4 GW would eliminate 2% of U.S. carbon-free electricity in 2021 without increased subsidies. The US electrical utility, Exelon, announced that they will shutdown four nuclear reactors in 2021. Four reactors at the Byron and Dresden nuclear power plants will be retired in 2021. Those reactors provide 30% of the clean energy in Illinois. Energy auction rules favor fossil fuel power plants and this is causing the nuclear reactors to lose hundreds of millions of dollars each year.
An Exelon Illinois nuclear reactor shutdown would remove about 32 Terawatt hours of clean electricity. Exelon is needing a further subsidy of one or two cents per kilowatt hour of clean electricity generation.
Solar Energy in the US has 22-26% tax credits for new solar build. The energy investment tax credit provides this credit for utilities.
China has approved construction of four new Hualong One nuclear reactors and the projects will have $10 billion in investment. China approved twelve new nuclear reactors from 2015-2019. Eight of those reactor approvals were in 2015.
There are seven Hualong One nuclear units being built in China at this time. Concrete was poured for the second Hualong One unit at the Zhangzhou nuclear power plant in Fujian province. Two Hualong One units being built at Karachi in Pakistan.
The Hualong One is mainly based on modifications to the standard 900 MWe French pressure water reactor design. The Hualong One power output will be 1170 MWe gross, 1090 MWe net. It has a 60-year design life.
SOURCES – Energy.gov, Utility Dive, World Nuclear News
Written By Brian Wang, Nextbigfuture.com
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.
A frequent speaker at corporations, he has been a TEDx speaker, a Singularity University speaker and guest at numerous interviews for radio and podcasts. He is open to public speaking and advising engagements.
All three headliner meltdowns were blown out of all proportions. No one died of radiation from the worst case total meltdowns of Fukushima. Meanwhile thousands die annually from black lung from coal mining, and all the other types of power: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2012/06/10/energys-deathprint-a-price-always-paid/#542e8b87709b
No one died of cancer because of the The Mile Island partial meltdown and release. Anti-nukes projected tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of casualties. The media ate it up. But just garbage. Almost 40 years now…squat.
Chernobyl is unknown. All the statistics are fabricated as no one has actually done the real footwork. It likely caused cases of thyroid cancer because people were very iodine deficient so their bodies Hovered-up all the iodine they breathed in, ate or touched. But we can cure thyroid cancer: "Overall, the 5-year survival rate for people with thyroid cancer is 98%." https://www.cancer.net/cancer-types/thyroid-cancer/statistics
The terror is generated by ignorance and the media. Our bodies are designed to deal with radiation, as long as the rate does not exceed some threshold. There are still people living near Chernobyl. Just a few, but they seem to be fine. The animals are fine. And this was, by very far, the worst meltdown disaster ever. My guess is around 200-800 deaths from radiation effects. And people don't realize that nuclear weapons testing exposed many more people to similar levels of radiation.
So, what is the power? That was the question, BTW. "31.5 TWhr of power generated over a year" would make sense if it were "energy" generated over a year, BTW. Once you get the "per year" part, you can calculate the power, but that is where we started. I'll start saying that Criswell's LSP, which has a proposed POWER of 20-200 TWe, will provide 175320-1753200 TWe-h of clean electricity, with your permission.
The power is as the first answer stated, the quote, per year. All one needs to do now is know how many hours are in a year, remove the reuslt, and things are looking normal again. Also, when discussing grid electricity, whether it is t or e matters, often again shaded to make the nukes look bigger to the unobservant power deciders. Reminds me of when the South Texas Nuclear Project was renamed the South Texas Project, or when the U Texas "Run Around" race was scheduled to be at the same time as the already set South Texas Nuclear Cost Over Run. You have to trust these people. It is the law.
Thorium molten salt reactors have absolutely everything we have been hoping to get from fusion power plants and more. No meltdowns as they are already molten, they can use all the fuel rather than 3% like current fission power plants. They can fuel while running like fossil. Thorium is abundant. We have enormous amounts stockpiled as a byproduct from other mining. It can even eat the "waste" from previous generations of nuclear power plants…using the remaining 97% of the energy still in those pellets.
If fusion experiments are any indication, the reactors would be incredibly expensive, and I see no reason they would have massive outputs. They can't even break even, after how many decades? If the only way they can make power is to invest $30 billion each, what good are they? In my opinion, the magnetic plasma confinement approach is simply a failure, as it will never be cost effective. Other approaches? Jury is still out. Some modest investment in those may be justified, but not this ludicrously expensive magnetic plasma confinement stuff. Long past time to pull the plug on this.
If that investment had gone into safe fission design technology instead, we would be in a much better place today.
You can shove those enormous particle accelerators as well. Make better smaller ones. I believe they could. They just have not had any reason to, to this point. They just keep getting blank checks.
Actually Fuku never hurt a soul and at worst the radiation at the front gate was about what you'd get on a beach vacation in Brazil. By Japanese standards Denver would have to evacuated and the Topsoil removed because of background rads.
Meanwhile every year idiots delay the nuke solution demonstrated by France decades ago, millions die from fossil and wind/solar backed with fossil. Never found a fossil or wind/solar nut that gave a rat's behind for the dead.
Brian, I found the writing in this piece not up to your usual standards. Its hurts the impact and credibility for sure. You might want to take another pass or get an advanced grammar checker.
FFS put down the crazy pills and do some math:
4 reactors X 1GW x 24hr x 365.25 days * 0.9 capacity factor = 31.5 TWhr of power generated over a year. Aka equal to the power production of 30% of all the solar power we've installed over the last quarter century.
While you are correct from experience, the *right* answer is "total", as it is the only one that has the right dimensions. Remember this when taking quizzes! Now, in order to compare with most of reality, what IS the power?
Don't forget Fukushima. I know this is a very pro fission site but man, when stuff goes bad with current fission tech it goes really bad making a large area uninhabitable and polluting the environment for generations. Fission is not the answer, fusion is. Fusion is where we need to be pumping (more) money for rapid development. I could tolerate molten salt reactors in the mean time I guess but no more legacy fission.
Per year.
Rightly or wrongly, the ghost of Chernobyl still haunts the nuclear power industry.
Hey Brian — the headline for this article seems badly messed up.
For one thing, there seems to be a verb missing.
For another things, I think the headline was trying to say that the U.S. might lose 30% of its clean energy, but the article talks about losing 30% of the clean energy in Illinois. Last I checked, Illinois is not the U.S.
"Energy auction rules favor fossil fuel power plants and this is causing
the nuclear reactors to lose hundreds of millions of dollars each year."
*Corruption intensifies* cough cough
The nuke industry now measures energy rather than power, as it looks good with bigger numbers. However, one must now define the time, so is it "An Exelon Illinois nuclear reactor shutdown would remove about 32 Terawatt hours" per year, or total, or per month?