The Ontario government says its new Green Energy Act, if passed, will help Ontario become "North America's leader in renewable energy." But since most of this new renewable energy will be from wind, it may not be the smartest move for Ontario because its large hydro and nuclear capacity is not compatible with wind generation. Wind requires natural gas-fired generation for support and natural gas will be a most precarious fuel for Ontario.
The future of industrial wind power in Ontario is tied to natural gas-fired electricity generation and that, as will be seen, is unsustainable. The Ontario power grid needs flexible support to keep supply and demand in balance, and providing this support will be made more difficult when we add the vagaries of wind.
Although nuclear units can handle the daily and weekend changes in electricity demand, they have limited capability for the kind of frequent power-up and power-down requirements that would be needed for this support. Furthermore, hydroelectric plants may not always be available due to fluctuations in water supply and water management agreements.
Even without restrictions on nuclear and hydro, it makes little economic sense to run reliable suppliers of steady power, with high fixed costs and low operating costs, at reduced output to support the expensive, intermittent and varying output from wind farms.
So, with coal being phased out by 2014, natural gas-fired generation will have to be used to support wind. Due to the simultaneous demands of home heating and electricity generation in the winter, that may lead to gas shortages. So some of these plants may be dual fuelled with gas and oil, which is not a pleasant thought.
The government's power plan envisages nuclear supplying 40 per cent of electricity demand by 2027. This should be raised to more than 70 per cent, with hydro supplying most of the remainder. If there is no market for nuclear-generated electricity during off-peak and overnight hours (for power exports, recharging electric cars, producing hydrogen and/or compressed air for generating clean peaking power and other uses), the plants can reduce their output to meet the demand. This means that even if practical wind energy storage were available, wind still would not be needed on a future all nuclear/hydro grid.
The demand on the grid from recharging electric cars should not be underestimated. The president and CEO of French nuclear giant Areva said that it would take an additional 6,400 megawatts of electricity if just 10 per cent of France's cars were electrically powered. That translates into about 1,700 megawatts (two Darlington-size units) for Ontario.
The technical, economic and environmental issues associated with wind power have not been fully explored. Let's hope the Ontario Energy Board will give them due consideration when it reconvenes so that money can be put where it will do Ontario the most long-term good.
Read more of the 'nuke option' article from thestar.com
What do you expect from a nuclear engineer?
It was inevitable that someone would attack Don Jones for his background rather than his message. Using this rationale, only people who have never worked in the energy industry should be qualified to talk about it. Fortunately you need look no further than "green" Germany if you want data to back up Mr. Jones' arguments ( see http://www.iea.org/textbase/stats/pdf_graphs/DEELEC.pdf). About 10 years ago they started adding huge quantities of wind power to the point that their wind generation capacity (though not actual generation) now exceeds their nuclear capacity. Guess what? They burn as much coal and natural gas as they ever have. Maybe this has a lot to do with the interdepedence of fossil fuel fired generation with wind power, which is one of the main points of Mr. Jones' argument.
A Simple Challenge to nuclear supporters
Nuclear is the gift that keeps on taking. Disregarding the obscene expense involved in constructing every reactor Canada has ever built (the only country I know of that has built a reactor on time and on budget is China). And disregarding the costs involved in running and maintaining the reactor (perfection is expensive). And disregarding the obscene cost of decommissioning a reactor at the end of its life cycle (can’t just lock the door and walk away). No one, on these boards, or in this or any article I have ever read on the subject is willing to explain how we manage spent nuclear fuel (SNF) in a safe and responsible manner. And of course does the cost per kW include the storage and essential monitoring of SNF for 10,000 yrs (projected) because perfection is expensive to attempt and generally accepted as not humanly possible. With nuclear fission it is simply impossible to control all the variables because of volume and life (12,000 tonnes/yr @ 10,000 year lifetime). Prove me wrong.
Geothermal Energy Facts
I agree with Bill L re: Enhanced Geothermal Systems. The Geothermal Education Office is a good place to learn more about harnessing enormous amounts of clean, cost efficient and sustainable energy. It's already being used successfully: http://geothermal.marin.org/geoenergy.html