What Is the Most Efficient and Safest Method to Generate Electricity?

[wolram]

What is the best way to produce electricity?
Nuclear : people are afraid of leaks and waste storage problems.
Coal: People are afraid of smoke pollution, and it may run out soon.
Oil same as above.
Wind inefficient and to costly.
Wave renewable but again too costly
Solar: it takes up to much land.

What do you think?

 

[jerromyjon]

Solar orbital is the way to go.

 

[Enigman]

I think the ideal way to get about it would be to phase out oil and coal, maximize wind and solar, and let nuclear pick up the slack.

 

[Jobrag]

There's plenty of coal left, but emissions are a problem, fusion if we can get it to work would be a great solution but ever since I was a lad it has been twenty years away, and still is, hydro is good but as soon as you suggest flooding a valley eco fundamentalists will find a rare type of frog and put a kibosh on it, so the only solution is millions of hamster wheels hooked up to the grid.

 

[russ_watters]

"Best" in what context? It sounds like you mean utility scale. With what constraints? Money? Availability? Pollution? In what country/area? If you have a gigantic river available, it's hydro.

I do have an aging thread in the General Engineering section on this topic...

 

[wolram]

"Best" in what context? It sounds like you mean utility scale. With what constraints? Money? Availability? Pollution? In what country/area? If you have a gigantic river available, it's hydro.

I do have an aging thread in the General Engineering section on this topic...

To be specific i mean a small country like England, where we have to import oil and coal and we have no hydro electric plants, and some of our nuclear plants are due to be shut down. one idea is to harvest wave power but this would come at at cost, we have a very small amount of solar power but in this country we can not rely on the sun to shine.

 

[votingmachine]

What is the best way to produce electricity?
Nuclear : people are afraid of leaks and waste storage problems.
Coal: People are afraid of smoke pollution, and it may run out soon.
Oil same as above.
Wind inefficient and to costly.
Wave renewable but again too costly
Solar: it takes up to much land.

What do you think?

That leaves out hydroelectric and geothermal.

Personally I favor:
Nuclear: new uranium plants are safer. There is still plenty reason to believe an improved thorium reactor might be very safe. Waste storage is solve-able.
Hydroelectric: Also provides water reservoirs. Does alter natural water flow and it bothers salmon (and any other dumb bass) to run into a dam.
Geothermal: Needs the right heat sources, and can be expensive to build.
Solar: Rooftop solar within the grid helps a lot with high load requirements.
Wind: In the right places it is economical.

I like the pie-in-the-sky plans for power generation in near-earth-orbit, with transmission down a space elevator to an Earth grid. Nuclear fusion has been so technically difficult that it now also has to be in the pie-in-the-sky category.

I think that the fossil fuels are more valuable in portable power applications, and the greenhouse gas model of climate indicates that electric utility reductions will be ecologically beneficial.

Generally, the preferred electric power plant is the one that is already built. For nuclear, that is especially problematic, as the last plants commissioned are already very old.

 

[phinds]

Solar orbital is the way to go.

Do you have any evidence for that or is that just a personal opinion?

 

[jerromyjon]

Do you have any evidence for that or is that just a personal opinion?

Sorry, I blurted out a global solution as a response to a vague question with a list of environmental difficulties. I forgot what planet I am on.

 

[phinds]

Sorry, I blurted out a global solution as a response to a vague question with a list of environmental difficulties. I forgot what planet I am on.

I have no idea whether you are being sarcastic, passive-aggressive, or what. So do you or do you not consider your solution to be technically viable and a serious proposal.

 

[jerromyjon]

I retract my statement as it does not apply to the OP's situation. I don't care to dredge up an old thread it was discussed in, but I was stating it as common sense that it would not infringe on Earth's natural resources. It obviously has not been accomplished to my knowledge.

 

[phinds]

I retract my statement as it does not apply to the OP's situation. I don't care to dredge up an old thread it was discussed in, but I was stating it as common sense that it would not infringe on Earth's natural resources.

OK

It obviously has not been accomplished to my knowledge.

You think maybe there's a reason for that?

 

[jerromyjon]

You think maybe there's a reason for that?

Because space is almost as ruined as the planet?

 

[phinds]

Because space is almost as ruined as the planet?

I have no idea what you are talking about. Yes, there's a lot of space junk floating around in near-Earth orbit but what does that have to do with your "solution". Sounds to me like you have an ax to grind.

 

[jerromyjon]

Sounds to me like you have an ax to grind.

The way I look at it I have a planet to save. Not saying I'm any more or less to blame for the reckless abandon that is leading to its demise. Resources are running out. Scientific fact. If science's #1 goal isn't preserving its laboratory what good will it be.

 

[phinds]

The way I look at it I have a planet to save. Not saying I'm any more or less to blame for the reckless abandon that is leading to its demise. Resources are running out. Scientific fact. If science's #1 goal isn't preserving its laboratory what good will it be.

Sure, but what does that have to do with your "solution"? My point is that idealistic solutions that are not technically and/or economically viable are not actually solutions at all.

 

[jerromyjon]

In my opinion then, the "best" in the title should have been stated

technically and/or economically viable

ways to produce electricity.

 

[phinds]

In my opinion then, the "best" in the title should have been stated

ways to produce electricity.

Since other ways are de facto useless, I think that it's a reasonable assumption that that's what he meant, and in the post he is clearly addressing real-world issues which also leads to the conclusion that he wants a real-world discussion.

 

[jerromyjon]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-based_solar_power
Probably not profitable but probable. Junk in space would be the worst unless it had self replicating panels. Perhaps piezoelectric crystalline structures coupled with nano webbing. I don't know what is being worked on specifically but I'm sure it would be top secret, huh?

 

[phinds]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-based_solar_power
Probably not profitable but probable. Junk in space would be the worst unless it had self replicating panels. Perhaps piezoelectric crystalline structures coupled with nano webbing. I don't know what is being worked on specifically but I'm sure it would be top secret, huh?

Uh ... why would it be top secret?

 

[jerromyjon]

Because R&D is expensive.

 

[tom aaron]

What is the best way to produce electricity?
Nuclear : people are afraid of leaks and waste storage problems.
Coal: People are afraid of smoke pollution, and it may run out soon.
Oil same as above.
Wind inefficient and to costly.
Wave renewable but again too costly
Solar: it takes up to much land.

What do you think?

As a geologist I'd say definitely what is used today, natural gas and coal. These are going to be the most efficient for the next half century.

 

[wolram]

As a geologist I'd say definitely what is used today, natural gas and coal. These are going to be the most efficient for the next half century.

50yrs is a short term fix, one must look to the next generation, building a power station with only a 50yr life is wasteful in my humble opinion.

 

[votingmachine]

Uh ... why would it be top secret?

Are you from another planet?

1. Anything remotely defense related, or connected to national security actually might have justifiable reasons for secrecy.
2. We have a bunch of paranoid nuts that don't require justifiable reasons to demand secrecy.

The most common reason for secrecy is that anything that large and powerful built for ordinary domestic utility purposes would also make a very fine space weapon.

Obviously, I have no idea what secrets are being kept ... if I did, I am honest enough that I would not even be posting conjecture. But to ask why governments would keep something secret ... the Pentagon would classify what they had for lunch.

I'm not sure that the topic of space solar was raised as anything important, and has thoroughly derailed the original post. The idea that in the future, we will be able to collect energy in space, and then get it to Earth is one that continues to inspire and continues to be impossible. I'm not sure why this dead horse is getting beat.

The thread topic is a bit ambiguous. I think best is a vague sort of criteria: cleanest? cheapest capital costs? cheapest operating costs? safest? lowest environmental impact? lowest greenhouse gas? I would say we should mostly stick with the toolkit of available technically feasible options, rather than hypothetical ones that are still unknown.

I agree with the comment that the situation matters. I put geothermal up in the ranking, but that has to be in the right situation. I was recently in Costa Rica, and they have several volcanoes, but they are all declared as national parks areas. So geothermal is both a practical answer for them ... the heat is right there, and impractical ... the heat is in valuable preserves. People constantly look at Yellowstone and think about the free heat. But the one-of-a-kind free heat is also a one-of-a-kind environmental wonder.

Environmental impact is one of my highest priorities. Cost would be next. Robustness of the grid would be 3rd (I do hate micro-outages).

 

[votingmachine]

50yrs is a short term fix, one must look to the next generation, building a power station with only a 50yr life is wasteful in my humble opinion.

I think 50 years is a pretty good bit of long range planning. Businesses need to apply a life-of-plant number to calculate the economic costs. And things that are 50 years old are often quite out of date. Obviously this is opinion, but 50 years seems long enough. 40 years seems long enough. 20 years is not a bad number for a reasonable replacement time. Shorter times than that seem like they would need some extraordinary circumstances (say power for a World Cup, or an Olympics, or ...).

 

[rootone]

Because R&D is expensive.

Which is why the biggest and most ambitious research is usually done as an open international collaboration as opposed to in secret.
ISS, CERN, ITER, Genome research ... etc.

There is probably not a definitive answer to what is the best source of power supply, it's dependent to some extent on what is most available, but a mix of different sources is probably optimum with some sources providing continuously while others go online only at times of peak load.

I had thought a very good local source for UK could be tidal, but sadly it seems there is not as much energy in tidal as I had imagined and the infrastructure required has to be very large scale if it is to be efficient.

 

[phinds]

Are you from another planet?

No, I'm from this one but I"m not big on conspiracy theories. As rootone pointed out, this is the kind of project that much more likely to be done out in the open.

 

[phinds]

Because R&D is expensive.

Right. So we had this hugely expensive project called NASA and we kept it top secret, right?

 

[wolram]

Which is why the biggest and most ambitious research is usually done as an open international collaboration as opposed to in secret.
ISS, CERN, ITER, Genome research ... etc.

There is probably not a definitive answer to what is the best source of power supply, it's dependent to some extent on what is most available, but a mix of different sources is probably optimum with some sources providing continuously while others go online only at times of peak load.

I had thought a very good local source for UK could be tidal, but sadly it seems there is not as much energy in tidal as I had imagined and the infrastructure required has to be very large scale if it is to be efficient.

The UK is in the planing stage for tidal

Which is why the biggest and most ambitious research is usually done as an open international collaboration as opposed to in secret.
ISS, CERN, ITER, Genome research ... etc.

There is probably not a definitive answer to what is the best source of power supply, it's dependent to some extent on what is most available, but a mix of different sources is probably optimum with some sources providing continuously while others go online only at times of peak load.

I had thought a very good local source for UK could be tidal, but sadly it seems there is not as much energy in tidal as I had imagined and the infrastructure required has to be very large scale if it is to be efficient.

IIRC we have a site piked out for our first tidal power station, if it ever comes to fruition is another thing.

 

[votingmachine]

No, I'm from this one but I"m not big on conspiracy theories. As rootone pointed out, this is the kind of project that much more likely to be done out in the open.

I'm very opposed to conspiracy theories. But I think there are a bunch of people, both in private industry, and in defense related government jobs that want to stamp everything confidential. Or maybe those are just people I've run into. It can drive you crazy. A simple conversation turns into a dance of lawyers and signed confidentiality agreements, and non-disclosure agreements.

I don't think there is anyone doing more than hypothesizing at this point. Building in space is extraordinarily expensive. The transmission issues are considerable. I think the idea is one that could one day, with enough technological progress be realistic. I doubt any work is being done directly on that idea, as a system. There are just too many hurdles still to clear.

But if there was a group working on technology design of such a system, and they were a government group, it would not surprise me in the least if they were operating under some information restrictions. Just because that is how some government work is used to operating. If you have not bumped into defense department things, let me tell you ... the sheer nonsense of the bureaucracy is just mind-boggling. And I've found industry to be as paranoid about information also.

I agree about conspiracy theories ... I wasn't implying there is a big secret cabal. I don't think there is any big R&D work going on secretly. But I've seen enough stuff get stamped confidential that I don't need any special explanation ... so count that as half agreement. I agree about the conspiracy end of your comment, but I don't need much convincing about general stupid and excessive secrecy going on.

 

[phinds]

I agree w/ you about the excessive secrecy in government these days. If there were active work going on regarding power collection in space beamed to Earth, I would be surprised if the DOD did not piggyback on the project to get some military aspect done, but the main project would be completely out in the open. That's exactly how it worked with NASA ocassionally putting up secret satellites for the military and the NSA.

 

[mheslep]

...common sense that it would not infringe on Earth's natural resources.

Space based solar? Not a the level of, say, coal combustion, but sure it would have an effect. Large land areas taken up with ground antenna arrays along with possible harm to birds, energy to launch and maintain, minerals mining for SB array.

 

[mheslep]

Resources are running out. Scientific fact.

The fact is that Earth based resources are finite. Whether or not they are "running out" is far more complicated, depending on many factors like demand, the availability of cheaper alternatives, and the feasibility of recycling.

 

[mheslep]

As a geologist I'd say definitely what is used today, natural gas and coal. These are going to be the most efficient for the next half century.

Eliminate the political aspect and nuclear is easily preferable to coal, and outside the US with its cheap shale gas nuclear beats gas too. I think the 24 nuclear reactors under construction in China is a confirmation.

 

[tom aaron]

50yrs is a short term fix, one must look to the next generation, building a power station with only a 50yr life is wasteful in my humble opinion.

It's not wasteful or efficient. It depends on capital investment and operating costs. Thus why nuclear is not feasible in most western nations. Even France is phasing out its percent of nuclear generated electricity. Germany, etc. are going to be replacing imported electricity with fossil fuels.

The majority of new capacity in the world will be what is being built now...as will be built in a decade...coal and natural gas generating stations. Solar, wind, etc. are feel good minor tinkering around the edges. The inefficiencies, capital costs, operating costs of alternative energy make them no more more than a footnote to energy needs.