It's unlikely that renewable energy will meet needs for electricity
The New York Times has finally noticed the controversy over the Vermont Yankee reactor and positioned it in an article as a contest between "back to the land" Vermonters and the major utilities and large businesses in the state.
The romanticism of the piece is remarkable. It appears to be a case of goat cheese v. computer chips. IBM is one of the state's largest employers and relies on cheap electricity from Vermont Yankee.
Readers unfamiliar with the relationship of Vermont's bucolic landscape to the urban canyons of New York needs to read the Food pages of the NYT. There they will discover a passionate regard for the culinary adventures awaiting jaded New Yorkers in the green hills of Vermont.
This is likely one of the reasons why the newspaper may have finally tumbled to the energy controversy. With some many of its readers, if not also the paper's reporters and editors, being focused "foodies," it should come as no surprise that this story would eventually migrate from the local papers of Vermont to the NYT. Thankfully, today's article appears in the news section.
Here are a few highlights from the NYT article . . .
The NYT reports that anti-nuclear groups are faced with the unpleasant reality that closing Vermont Yankee will require the state to buy more electricity from fossil fuel plants with accompanying increases in greenhouse gases.
"Antinuclear groups that are arguing for closing the plant hope to replace the lost electricity with renewable generation from wind turbines, solar power and the combustion of plant material. Additionally, they cite the potential for cutting electrical demand by making homes and business more efficient.
Even so, some environmental advocates have reluctantly acknowledged that no combination of renewable power and improved efficiency can replace the plant, Vermont Yankee, at least in the near term. Instead, the state would probably have to tap the Northeastern grid — which derives more than half its energy from fossil fuels — for extra power."
. . . and despite being head over heels opposed to nuclear energy, Vermont's citizens are also shooting down the very "renewable" projects they speak so fondly of in testimony about energy futures for the state. The NYT reports,
"Vermont has only one commercial wind farm, 11 turbines along a mountain ridge. They have less than 1 percent of the capacity of Vermont Yankee, a relatively small nuclear plant.
Other proposed projects have been stalled by local opposition. One wind project would infringe on bear habitat. Another won approval from state regulators, but a local group filed a court appeal to block it."
The Times points out that the Vermont legislature is still determined to assert its authority over the plants NRC license renewal. Vermont's governor vetoed that last effort along those lines earlier this year. The state's Democratic legislative leadership has occasionally swerved into wing nut mode over Vermont Yankee which raises the question of whether Vermont voters will want to visit that issue at the polls next November.
State starts real energy planning
In the meantime, Vermont is doing some rational thinking about energy with the publication this week of a draft of long term energy plan.
In Vermont the debate over energy is about electricity supply because of the end of current power contracts which comes in 2012. The most significant milestone is the relicensing of the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant, and then with the massive network of Hydro-Quebec dams.
The first comprehensive energy plan to be drafted since 1998 also deals with issues around other energy needs, including transportation and home heating.
According to the plan half of Vermont's energy use is through the burning of petroleum fuels, including gasoline, diesel and heating oil. About 31 percent of Vermont's energy use - and 25 percent nationally - goes to transportation, the report notes.
Vermont use of energy has grown about 13 percent per capita between 1990 and 2004, while it has increased about 4 percent in New England overall and been stable nationally, according to the report by the Department of Public Service.
A state with energy intensive growth will have to think long and hard whether it wants its economy hobbled by a romantic desire for uncomplicated rural life. Eventually, even if it closes Vermont Yankee, there is always Bruce Power, a nuclear energy utility just over the border in Ontario, which might be interested in wheeling power to make all that goat cheese.
3 comments:
68-73% of Vermonters want Entergy's Nuclear Reactor Vermont Yankee shut down in 2012 when its license expires.
We don't want more radioactive waste in dry casks 1.5 ft above the 500 yr flood plain of the Connecticut River.
Vermont has MORE sun than Germany the world's leading installer of solar PV.
Decentralized, locally controlled, sustainable energy generation vs corporate profit driven non-renewable subsidized large centralized power?
Uranium is a finite resource.
Only after 17 yrs of operating will a new nuke generate electricity to compensate for its construction. and cost $5-10 billion.
Conservation and efficiency costs are still going down. The negawatt is the still the cheapest.
Conservation and energy efficiency are the easiest and most cost effective. We can REDUCE our energy demands by at least 30-40% TODAY.
This is not a dream. This is not new technology that we need. This is REAL.
Change ALL your light bulbs.
Turn lights off that are not being used.
Plug appliances into power strips that are REALLY shut OFF. TV, DVD, Stereo, Computer...
Turn up the AC.
Turn down the heat.
Insulate, Insulate, Insulate
Hang clothes out to dry.
Install solar thermal hot water collectors.
Install solar PV.
Setup a water collection system with the rain gutters. use for the garden and lawn.
Grow vegetables for food. organically.
Recycle everyting.
Buy used.
Don't buy from overseas.
Eat locally.
Reduce Meat consumption.
Drive 55mph, if we all did, we would not need oil from the Middle East.
Drive less.
Walk, ride a bike to shop, work, play.
Don't fly.
Take the train.
We all need to take a BIG part.
We all need to be responsible personally.
We all need to start today and everyday.
We all live on the same planet.
Start at home, work and play.
Claire,
You are speaking like a true collectivist, dictating to others what WE ought to do.
This is not Soviet Russia or China. This is the US, the land of individualism.
If you want to diminish your standard of living, you have the freedom to do so. However, as long as I don't hurt anyone, I have the RIGHT to use as much energy as I'm willing to pay for. Nuclear power poses NO safety risk, as long as engineers are thoughtful about design and recycling.
Nuclear power is far cheaper than solar or wind. I'll buy my power from them. And if the lawyers and environmentalists didn't interfere, nuclear power would cost even less and still be perfectly safe.
There is enough nuclear power to last at least a million years.
Greg
Greg and Claire,
I am strongly pro-nuclear, but it's interesting to see the different arguments people are having, which have nothing to do with nuclear vs not.
For example, I hear Claire's argument to be, if we are all moral (moral is good, I agree), then we do not have to take collective action to create a better infrastructure. Similar to the argument, just educate your child at home, and then we don't need to worry about schools.
Then there is Greg's argument that asking people to behave like most people of the world, and turn out the lights in unused rooms, is an imposition. I've never met people from other countries who leave the lights blasting, though I do hear that in Saudi Arabia, people leave air conditioning on even when out of town. But most of the world, nope. It's an argument I've run into frequently on blogs or op-eds, that asking us to contribute a little or a lot is not right. I happen to react strongly to the individualism argument because I ran into it frequently from students' parents--students were just expressing their individualism, rather than making education hard for everyone.
Addressing climate change will go better if we make the right individual choices and the right collective choices. So I agree with both of you in part.
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