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Hi All
Out here in Australia you are not allowed to build a nuclear reactor. Even talking about it brings out the nut cases saying really intellectual carefully considered comments - Oh no not another nuclear nut. Further discussion usually indicates they don't even know the difference between Fusion and Fission so I usually just laugh and leave them to their ignorance,
However recently some opinion shows are now, horror of horrors, actually discussing nuclear because the voices wanting low emission base load power at prices compatible with coal is becoming louder. I of course agree this is needed - but as I explained it has in the past been shut down. I need to mention Australia is lucky we have plenty of Uranium, Thorium and Coal, plus huge amount of dessert well away from civilization to store waste. It's a standing joke here in Australia if anyone attacked us they would have to face General Outback and his troops the SASR, also known as the Phantoms of the Jungle - just a bit of humor.
One proposal struck me was talk of using Pebble Bed Reactors which I had never head of. I now have learned about them, and the articles said they produce electricity for about the same price as gas. But in the discussion it was mentioned while expensive to build initially compared to coal powered plants, the new ones have a life of 100 years making it the cheapest form of base-load power generation over its life cycle.
Is this true? If true for me its a no brainer solution to our power generation issues.
Thanks
Bill
Out here in Australia you are not allowed to build a nuclear reactor. Even talking about it brings out the nut cases saying really intellectual carefully considered comments - Oh no not another nuclear nut. Further discussion usually indicates they don't even know the difference between Fusion and Fission so I usually just laugh and leave them to their ignorance,
However recently some opinion shows are now, horror of horrors, actually discussing nuclear because the voices wanting low emission base load power at prices compatible with coal is becoming louder. I of course agree this is needed - but as I explained it has in the past been shut down. I need to mention Australia is lucky we have plenty of Uranium, Thorium and Coal, plus huge amount of dessert well away from civilization to store waste. It's a standing joke here in Australia if anyone attacked us they would have to face General Outback and his troops the SASR, also known as the Phantoms of the Jungle - just a bit of humor.
One proposal struck me was talk of using Pebble Bed Reactors which I had never head of. I now have learned about them, and the articles said they produce electricity for about the same price as gas. But in the discussion it was mentioned while expensive to build initially compared to coal powered plants, the new ones have a life of 100 years making it the cheapest form of base-load power generation over its life cycle.
Is this true? If true for me its a no brainer solution to our power generation issues.
Thanks
Bill
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