This white paper is the result of our analysis of the cost advantages of the LFTR design architecture that we have chosen.
1-The LFTR Pwr Generator and Cost-Effectiveness
Many Renewable Energy Arguments are predicated on AGW…These are 10 failures to which we pay attention: 10 Failures – 1 Apr 2011
ADDITIONAL COST STUFF FOR
ENERGY ALTERNATIVES…
W I N D E N E R G Y C O S T S
This following excerpt from the Cato Institute’s Policy Analysis No. 280, “Renewable Energy: ‘Not Cheap, Not “Green’” of 27 August 1997, analyzes the Problems of Wind Power as ‘the cost of generating electricity from wind remains stubbornly uneconomical in an increasingly competitive electricity market.”
Cato Inst. Problems with Wind Power
The most common wind energy question deals with the cost of wind electricity. Estimates provided by wind industry enterprise, U.S. federal and state agencies and contractors, as well as the media understate the true cost and ignore the fact of wind electricity’s low value. The true financial wind electricity cost is huge compared to other generating sources. Wind electricity cost should not be compared with the cost of electricity from reliable generating sources. This paper by Glenn R. Schleede sets out to analyze “six points critical to an accurate understanding of the high true cost / low value of wind electricity.”
Wind generated electricity must have back-up capacity that’s required to deliver electricity to consumers when wind supply is falling short. To have backup generators ramp up or down causes extra efficiency loss. How much efficiency is lost plus how much extra fuel’s required is the purpose of this paper by K. de Groot & C. le Pair. They find that based on the Germans’ 23 GW of installed wind power, it is doubtful whether wind energy results in any fuel savings and CO2 emission reduction.
Efficiency & Fuel required by Wind Electricity
An Engineering News Online (SA) columnist makes a stark recommendation: “In fact, it is my opinion that all grid-related wind energy projects should be cancelled immediately. There is currently talk of paying a subsidy to the producers of wind-generated electricity of something like six times the actual selling price of electricity in South Africa. Imagine buying a pair of shoes for R 600 and then reselling them for R 100 in the interests of the people of South Africa. The people of South Africa would be paying the ‘missing R 500.”
This 4 Oct 10 Boston Herald news story investigates the cost of Cape Wind, an off-shore wind farm near Hyannisport, Cape Cod for the energy consumers of Massachusetts.
How much will they have to pay again…?
Consumption of electricity accounts for about 39% of all energy use in the United States. We expect electricity to be reliable, affordable, and secure, which is made difficult because supply and demand must be kept in continuous balance. Unlike the water supply, large-scaled electrical power can’t be stored – except behind hydroelectric dams. Large wind turbines don’t produce energy until wind speeds reach 5-6 mph and are shut down for safety approaching 55 mph. They produce their Rated Capacity at 29-35 mph. No one can be sure how much of their energy will be available at 4:00PM tomorrow, much less next week, or next month. This represents a major problem for the electrical power distribution grid.
How Hard Will Wind Work?
Scotland has outlawed new nuclear plants once the two remaining ones have been shuttered, soon. In the meantime, however, the Scots are having problems with their Big Wind projects:
Denmark’s Center for Politiske Studier put out an analysis of the Danish experience with wind power. Denmark generates the equivalent of about 19% of its electricity demand with wind turbines, but wind power contributes far less than 19% of the Nation’s electricity demand. The claim that Denmark derives about 20% of its electricity from wind overstates matters: Being highly intermittent, wind power has recently (2006) met as little as 5% of Denmark’s annual electricity consumption with an average over the last five years of 9.7%.
“Economic impacts from the promotion of renewable energies: The German experience – Final Report” was published by Rheinisch-Westfalische Institut fur Wirtschaftsforschung. ‘The allure of an environmentally behign, abundant, and cost-effective energy source has led an increasing number of industrialized countries to back public financing of renewable energies…We argue that German renewable energy policy, and in particular the adopted feed-in tariff scheme, has failed to harness the market incentives needed to ensure a viable and cost-effective introduction of renewable energies into the country’s energy portfolio.” This report set out the Institut’s bases for this conclusion.
This research paper, “Study of the effectives on employment of public aid to renewable energy sources”, by G.C. Alvarez, R. M. Jara, J. R. R. Julian, and J. I. G. Bielsa of the Universidad Rey Juan Carlos was considered so controversial by the U.S. Dept. of Energy (although it only covered the Spanish Experience in its scope of research) that it put out a hasty response to it as a protest. “Europe’s current policy and strategy for supporting the so-called ‘green jobs’ or renewable energy dates back to 1997, and has become one of the principal justifications for U.S. ‘green jobs’ proposals. Yet an examination of Europe’s experience reveals these policies to be terribly economically counterproductive.” This report sets out to provide the extensive analysis that leads Dr. Alvarez and his colleagues to this conclusion.
S O L A R E N E R G Y C O S T S
How Solar PhotoVoltaic cell generate electricity.
Florida, with its bounty of sun-soaked land, might be left behind in the great solar race. It’s not that Florida isn’t a player in solar energy. Overall, Florida ranks fifth in the nation for its total grid-connected solar capacity.
Money is stopping it,” said Nancy argenziano, chairwoman of the Florida Public Service Commission…To be sure, solar energy is not cheap. It costs utility companies nearly 70% more than coal and gas, and personal equipment still requires a hefty investment from businesses and homeowners. Such ‘market factor’ have hindered the industry’s growth…
To maintain a global population in a condition resembling a modern 21st Century standard of living will require an installed electrical generating capacity of at least 3 to 5 kilowatts per capita. Today, only the United States, Japan, and a few countries of western Europe even approximate this level of generating capacity.
Could solar or wind power possible address the world electricity deficit?
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN used to be a great magazine. Now, it’s become a shameless, uncritical cheerleader for a world run on renewable energy.
The authors premise is this: In order to free ourselves from fossil fuels and nuclear power, theauthors postulate, all we need to do over the next 20 years is build the following:
§ 490,000 tidal turbines of 1 megawatt apiece (<1 percent of which are now in place).
§ 5,350 geothermal plants of 100 MW (< 2 percent in place).
§ 900 hydroelectric dams of 1300 MW (70 percent in place),
§ 3,800,000 windmills of 5 MW (1 percent in place).
§ 720,000 wave converters (ocean turbines driven by waves rather than the tide), 0.75 MW (< 1 percent in place).
§ 1,700,000,000 rooftop solar voltaic systems, 0.003 MW (< 1 percent in place).
§ 49,000 solar thermal plants (mirror arrays that heat a fluid), 300 MW (< 1 percent in place).
§ 40,000 photovoltaic power plants (sunlight directly into electricity), 300 MW (<1 percent in place).
….Something called density of energy
Society depends heavily on fossil fuels. Unfortunately, fossil fuels are not a sustainable energy source and the possibility of a fuel shortage is quickly becoming a reality. Scientists and developers have been looking toward renewable energy sources, such as solar thermal energy, to replace fossil fuels.
With more than 10 months of sun a year and vast tracts of desert, Arizona is seemingly ideal for solar power, aside from the fact that solar isn’t cost-competitive with conventional fuels. So, in a preview of the “renewable portfolio standard” that Democrats want to impose nationwide in the U.S., the state mandated that utilities produce 15% of their electricity from green sources by 2025. Scores of solar projects are thus under review by federal and state regulators, with some of the applications fast-tracked so developers can qualify for tax credits in the stimulus.
It is not always about capital expenditure. There is more than enough capital expenditure crowding its way hurriedly into Consolidated Solar Power projects in remote arid areas of South Africa. But South Africa has this other problem…
I was introduced about LFTR Energy by a brother Mr. Pol Rivera through Mr. Paul Kibranian, and I found this subject very interesting.
Technically, I am zero knowledge but somehow trying to understand the benefits it can give to the whole human race. Interested as I am, I am now viewing many youtube videos regarding Thorium as a source of energy, and how this technology did not push through when Mr. Alvin Weinberg left the ORNL.
We hope really that by your initiatives and programs, this technology will be resurrected and be of use for the benefit of the next generations to come.