Irish Govt agency floats the case for Nuclear Power

by Nuke power Fri Apr 07, 2006 13:21

The person referred to in your post is Professor Phillip Walton. I once attended some of his physics lectures. I must say he was one of the better lecturers I had on the subject at the time. His lectures were both illuminating and not at all condescending unlike some others. He was very much a gentleman to talk to.

He is related to Ernest Walton who shared the nobel prize for nuclear physics in 1951 which is why the media choose to wheel him out whenever there is a nuclear related controversy. I think he means well but is being manipulated. I wish he would have the good sense to decline such loaded invitations.

In my opinion, i think there is a lot of money to be made building a nuclear plant and the greedy people who ru(i)n our lives are testing the water to see if we are yet docile and apathetic enough to swallow this one. If we are it would mean there is one simple solution for the govt to the looming energy problem. Build one big plant to power the pale, make lots of money on the contract , make powerful friends very happy, and no hard messy thinking necessary on how to pursue a functional renewable program.

Its also interesting to note that there are certain areas of irish public life such as the science advisory where you cannot pursue freedom of information requests (even if you do have the exorbitant fee!!). This needs to be change as it is particularly relevant to important topics such as GM and energy policy and is an area ripe for corruption given the large corporations with huge vested interests involved.

Simple responsible personal choices would do a lot to slow the inevitable approach of an energy crisis.
When i look around me and see the waste, the rampant consumerism, all those stupid new SUVs driving around our cities and I read of our complete failure to meet emission standards I wonder do we just get the govt we deserve?

by MichaelY - iawm Fri Apr 07, 2006 13:52

In ref: to Terence's very timely article above, and as a citizen who was blessed enough to be part of that "very large and unexpected mass movement" against the Irish Government plans to build a nuclear power plant at Carnsore Point, two points for your consideration:

1. The attempt to soften us with talks of oil shortages, climate change etc so as to accept the 'inevitability' of nuclear power is intricately tied up with the issue of Irish governmental collaboration with the invasion/occupation of Iraq and the possibility that the Crusaders may attack Iran. Early days perhaps to elaborate on these issues in this thread - just a request for people to think about the links.
2. The Minister of Industry who was the main voice of the then Fianna Fail Government arguing for nuclear power was O'Malley...he absconded later and co-set up the PDs.....there was a short interlude when Garret became Taoiseach...I remember him saying to Gay Byrne on a Late Late that he would have no problem him and his family living in a house on top of or near a nuclear plant. A few weeks later came Three Mile Island and then Chernobyl.....FF,FG and PD will coalesce on this one - there is no doubt. Rabbitte, then was a young man in the Sticks - their line was that nuclear power under socialism was a positive force for humankind. Wonder what the line is today...Brendan, on the other hand, was with us in the anti-nuclear movement in his native Wexford. The Greens had not been thought of then....Sinn Fein thought that the whole campaign was "a bit of a diversion" from the "national struggle" but rowed behind us.

It took the anti-nuclear movement 4 years, from 1977 to 1981 to bury those plans. Mass agitation, occupation of the site four summers in a row, local groups everywhere, progressive musicians helping us all along. No violence, no shit, just people power. History repeating itself again? Who knows?

by h. simpson Fri Apr 07, 2006 17:00

Carnsore was a great campaign.
so was the international one that bruce springsteen was involved with.

by Terence Fri Apr 07, 2006 17:53

In many ways the issue of preventing nuclear power in the Ireland of today is like trying to prevent incinerators from being built.

The government no longers seems to pay any attention to protests of any kind and just goes ahead anyhow. And as with incinerators, we know what they solution is, which is to create a comprehensive recycling infrastructure including both the physical and the legisalative in the form of tax incentives and neither of which we have. It would basically require a move towards a more sustainable form of living and we all know that technically is very possible, but politically impossible because the status quo is way too dependent on the current setup. To guarantee a steady industry in collecting waste and then running the incinerators to burn it, makes more money than simply having less of it in the first place.

Likewise with nuclear power. The only sensible way to prevent it is to greatly reduce Ireland's energy dependency by building up a comprehensive public transport system, supporting energy conservation and efficiency throughout the residential, commercial and industrial sectors, again through grants, incentives and tax breaks and in this way actually reduce our national electrical energy usage. It would also greatly help by increasing the amount of renewable energy in the form of wind power, which to move to the next level really needs additional expenditure in the ESB electrical grid because of the nature and location of the power. In addition we also need to actually start a proper renewable energy campaign to encourage use of solar thermal heating (for water and space heating) and even solar photovoltaic installations, again to reduce our total demand of power.

However we know none of this is likely to happen because as one of the commentators above pointed out, the govt have no wish to make any well thought out decisions and would rather go for the easy option (of nuclear power) and at the same time keep their friends happy and themselves in power.

BTW, there is a protest tomorrow in Ringsend against the large incinerator planned for Dublin. Details at: http://www.indymedia.ie/article/75284

by Terence Fri Apr 07, 2006 18:08

For reference here's some figures related to electricity usage in Ireland:

Year Peak Power
--------------------------
1998 3,436 MW
1999 3,757 MW
2000 3,844 MW
2001 4,091 MW

Note: A typical nuclear reactor would be around 1 GW (= 1,000 MW) capacity which means it would come close to 25% capacity. This would then cause problems when it comes offline for scheduled maintenance and refuelling. Hence the govt or rather Forfas has talked about building a number of smaller reactors, which basically solves the above problem, but means you would have to build 2x or 3x power stations. It would be ideal for the brown envelope lads, because it would be much more expensive for the tax payer, but so much more lucrative for them.

And the breakdown of our energy sources for generating electricity, these are provided in the image. The figure for pump hydro probably means when it is running it can produce 6.5% of total capacity, but the actual station is a net user because not all the energy used to pump the water up to the top lake is recovered when it comes back down and used for generation. But it's value is that it can come on stream in seconds and overall saves power, since bringing thermal stations can take longer and you would need to have other stations running for the spare capacity in the system.

In the bottom part of the table (in image), the 7 offshore turbines at Arklow produce 25 MW, but the plan is to scale this up to produce up to 520 MW which is a significant amount of power.

Electricial power by energy source for Ireland

by Terence Sat Apr 08, 2006 23:28

Sinn Fein has responded to the news from the government via Forfas at the suggestion that we should consider nuclear power. Here's an extract from the response:

Deputy Morgan said, "For many years we have been warning of the dangers of over dependency on oil. The failure to make the transition away from the use of fossil fuels and towards renewable energy including, wind, wave and solar power has been highlighted by environmental groups, those seeking to develop renewable energy and technologies and by parties including my own. The Government has consistently dragged its feet. Only now are grants for householders seeking to install solar panels, geothermal heating system and wood pellet stoves coming on stream.

"I believe a kite is being flown in relation to nuclear power. The comments contained in the Forfás report come only a short time after the Government refused to join with Austria and Germany in opposing nuclear power at the recent European Council. This Government's support for the European Council's call for a new generation of nuclear power was highly significant indicator of a changing position in relation to nuclear power.

Full report at URL below

by Nuke power Sat Apr 15, 2006 16:48

When the debate hots up, you can bet the vested interests will whip out the idea of "pebble bed reactors as newer safer nuclear technology" as their ace in the hole. Activists should familiarise themselves with this technology in order to be in a position to counter this argument. here are 2 sites to get you started:

http://www.tmia.com/industry/pebbles.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_bed_reactor

by Terence Thu Apr 20, 2006 14:03

Some of you interested in the nuclear topic might be interested to know that this Sunday 23rd Apr and Monday, RTE 1 television are showing a recently produced two part drama documentary titled: "Fallout" that depicts the response in Ireland to a major nuclear accident at Sellafield.

Full details at the URL below

by reader Thu Apr 20, 2006 16:30

A prominent Londonderry businessman today unveiled proposals for the installation of a nuclear power plant in the city.

Robert Andrews, who claimed such a move will create up to 500 jobs, was due this afternoon to outline his plans before a special meeting of Derry City Council's Development Committee in the Guildhall.

Town Clerk and Chief Executive, Tony McGurk, said Mr Andrews would "address the committee on potential wealth-creating opportunities in Derry".

However, the suggestion by Mr Andrews - founder of the Andronics satellite products company - that such a plant would benefit the North West has angered environmentalists.

John Woods, of Friends of the Earth, said: "Any jobs will come at the expense of other jobs. And what will happen with the nuclear waste? Who is going to deal with that?"

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=...87696

by pat c Thu May 04, 2006 12:31

Yet another example of criminal behaviour by Sellafield workers and management. These people dont care about their own safetyor their familys safety let alone the safety of the people of Cumbria or Ireland.
Full story at link.

pat

"Criminal action over nuclear leak

The leak occurred at the Thorp complex at Sellafield
The operators of the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant in Cumbria are to face a criminal prosecution over the leak of tonnes of radioactive material. Acid containing 20 tonnes of uranium and 160kg of plutonium spilled from a ruptured pipe into a sealed cell at the site's Thorp complex.

The leak was discovered in April 2005, but investigators claimed it could have happened eight months earlier.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) says it is bringing the action. "