Nuclear power

[keithwalton]

Originally Posted by AndrewJames

plenty of sea though eh ?

There has been several designs attempting to extract kinetic energy from waves, I cant remember how well they work probably not to good since we havent seen them around much!

[AndrewJ]

Why not use the underwater currents?

[Pierre]

Originally Posted by kronas

what about hydro electricty ?

As mentioned not enough fast rivers or Dams with with a large enough bank of water.

There are several "fast response" hydro power station like the one in Dinorwic in Snowdonia. These instantly respond to large sudden demand such as everybody putting the kettle on during the ad-break in a Coronation St special, but they can only maintain the power for a few hours at most.

Hydro stations such as the Hoover dam in the USA have massive lakes behind them (Lake Eerie) so they can maintain constant flows even in times of low rainfall.

The best eco-friendly power available to us is wind power. We should be building hundreds of massive offshore wind farms.

But you always get the NIMBY crowd objecting.

[keithwalton]

Originally Posted by Pierre

As mentioned not enough fast rivers or Dams with with a large enough bank of water.

There are several "fast response" hydro power station like the one in Dinorwic in Snowdonia. These instantly respond to large sudden demand such as everybody putting the kettle on during the ad-break in a Coronation St special, but they can only maintain the power for a few hours at most.

Hydro stations such as the Hoover dam in the USA have massive lakes behind them (Lake Eerie) so they can maintain constant flows even in times of low rainfall.

The best eco-friendly power available to us is wind power. We should be building hundreds of massive offshore wind farms.

But you always get the NIMBY crowd objecting.

You also get the problem that more power / materials and stuff that goes into wind turbines is needid than the power output over its entire lifetime

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by Pierre

The best eco-friendly power available to us is wind power. We should be building hundreds of massive offshore wind farms.

But you always get the NIMBY crowd objecting.

I have actually seen a couple of windfarms in Wales. One on land quite near Tenbeigh (hope I spelled that correctly) and one just off the coast a few miles from Prestatyn.. I think they actually look quite hypnotic, but they make and extremely loud and wierd noise..

I personally believe that we should switch to nuclear power as our main source of electricity, but I think that these plants should be government run and not privatised. With privatisation, the plant would be running to make profit so corners are more likely to be cut and when you are dealing with nuclear power this can only be a bad thing. Governments must own it and run it, with plenty of funding.

If possible, the plant(s) should be underground or even better on one of the small British offshore islands which are uninhabited, with good military patrolling.

It would take an effort to do it safely, but it is possible.

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by keithwalton

You also get the problem that more power / materials and stuff that goes into wind turbines is needid than the power output over its entire lifetime

I think that as we develop windfarms, the efficiency will go up.
____________

I have actually voted Yes. I think it will be good as long as corners aren't cut..

Under normal circumstance, Nuclear Energy is far more efficient (and cleaner) than fossil fuels for electricity production. The only slight hitch is when you get a major accident. As the people of Chernobyl will probably agree, you end up with a large uninhabitable chunk of land..

Unfortunately its not just low carbon emissions from power stations that need to be addressed. We also burn fossil fuels in our favourite form of transport, so there is IMHO a need to invest in research into Fuel Cells. Or at the very least, a much more efficient electric motor for transport. In Toronto the TTC use streetcars (trams), and if memory serves, electric buses with an overhead power pickup. Why dont more cities invest in this sort of technology? By improving the public transport infrastructure, and at the same time using motors that dont poison both the people and the environment we start getting a win/ win mindset going. Offcourse, by the time politicians start thinking this way, london might be under several feet of water.

Edit : forgot to say, I'm in favour of switching to Nuclear Power, But only in the hands of government. Private industry IMHO cant be trusted to run nuclear plant without the profit margin as the be-all and end-all for their thinking.

[keithwalton]

There is only so much kinetic energy in wind, yes the amount extracted could go up some, total kinetic is in the age old form of 1/2.m.v^2
Unfortunutly wind turbines because of operating ranges imposed on them they have quite a low max spin speed. so in high winds they have to lock down. All in all, we're talking KW tops here, whilst nuke plants and such are in the MW and even GW. You'll need a heck of alot of wind generators to produce the power we need.
Somthing i did think off was putting mass solar generators in deserts and stuff and piping the power back, only problem is the pesky sand

Originally Posted by keithwalton

Somthing i did think off was putting mass solar generators in deserts and stuff and piping the power back, only problem is the pesky sand

Well in that case you could employ the locals to maintain, and clean the solar pannels. In doing so you create jobs in the third world, and spread a bit of goodwill to the natives.

[keithwalton]

Originally Posted by Earl of Bronze

Unfortunately its not just low carbon emissions from power stations that need to be addressed. We also burn fossil fuels in our favourite form of transport, so there is IMHO a need to invest in research into Fuel Cells. Or at the very least, a much more efficient electric motor for transport. In Toronto the TTC use streetcars (trams), and if memory serves, electric buses with an overhead power pickup. Why dont more cities invest in this sort of technology? By improving the public transport infrastructure, and at the same time using motors that dont poison both the people and the environment we start getting a win/ win mindset going. Offcourse, by the time politicians start thinking this way, london might be under several feet of water.

The main advantage of the internal combustion engine is the fact you dont carry the majourity of the working fluid with you. Idealy an IC engine uses 14.7x more air than fuel. Fuel cell's are pretty much a waste of space, they're worse than steam in terms of power per kg carried! They do have range though. somthing everything else pretty much lacks.
There is developments coming but dont hold your breath for them

[AndrewJ]

The is a car from Toyota which I am seriously interested in buying.

http://www.toyota.com/prius/

Both me and my gf are due to move soon so put holds on that, but thankfully I have a old dear grand mother who wants me to have a " clean and modern and safe car for that lovely gf of yours" so ahem one Prius please .

[Shaun]

Originally Posted by Chris T

I think nuclear has its place in the mix of different electricity producing methods at our disposal. That means I should vote 'no never' in the poll, because the question is should we move entirely to nuclear, but I haven't voted because to vote for 'no, never' would give a misleading impression of what I think.

Sorry the second option was suppose to be along the lines of "no - I'm happy to keep replacing the ones we have."

Well I've heard that our last nuclear plant is being shut down soon.

[etccarmageddon]

this is the way forward:-

http://www.npower.com/At_home/Juice-...out_Juice.html

http://www.npower.com/At_home/Juice-...Wind_Farm.html


http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/content...20041005181339