New at Reason
From our May issue, Brian Doherty asks what happens when creative consumers decide to generate their own energy.
Comments to "New at Reason":
Jozef | April 28, 2008, 3:25pm | #
Soooo... When can we expect the artist community to be sued into oblivion for failing to pay fuel taxes?Ken Shultz | April 28, 2008, 3:34pm | #
That was an awesome article. Loved it!I'm sending links to all my green power buddies.
I've looked at the process for using gas from burning wood to power cars, like many Europeans did during World War II. Technologies which were once common, like that, were abandoned not just because it's easier to buy petrol from a service station, but because the new technologies were more efficient in other ways. My understanding is that using gasification like that in a car used to clog up people's fuel systems, etc. with sludge after only a few years. When gasoline goes up over a certain price, and the R&D dollars go into developing generators and engines that are made to use those fuel sources, some of those old technologies will make a lot more sense again.
In regards to energy becoming more or a distributed phenomenon, I thought immediately of Toshiba's new mini-nuclear reactors...
"Toshiba has developed a new class of micro size Nuclear Reactors that is designed to power individual apartment buildings or city blocks."
--20 feet by 6 feet
--200 kilowatts
--fail-safe and totally automatic, will not overheat.
--no control rods
--self sustaining process lasts 40 years
--half the cost of grid energy.
"Toshiba expects to install the first reactor in Japan in 2008 and to begin marketing the new system in Europe and America in 2009."
I think some Hit & Runner first cued me onto the Toshiba mini-reactors. Hat tip to whomever that was, but it looks like exactly the kind off grid, local, distributed power Doherty is talking about.
Ken Shultz | April 28, 2008, 3:38pm | #
Okay, here's a link that should actually work for those mini reactors.ed | April 28, 2008, 3:47pm | #
designed to power individual apartment buildingsWhoo, I can just imagine the condo association meetings.
GRUMPY OLD MAN 1: You want to put WHAT in our building?!
HIS WIFE: Oh my gaawwwd!
GRUMPY OLD MAN 2: I survived Treblinka for this?
PRESIDENT: Order, order!
ALL: No nukes! No nukes!
e | April 28, 2008, 4:02pm | #
As interesting and colorful as the characters in this article are, I wonder if we might also look into redesigning communities so that people don't have to get in their cars and drive for miles to get to the grocery store or run other errands. Or maybe orient communities around public transportation?Oops, sorry, I am a victim of the centralized, bureaucratic culture, typified by stagnant cultures found in Europe and Japan. Fortunately, the Free Market (TM) has rendered this culture obsolete. Let's just get to work retooling our SUVs to run on coffee grounds; then we won't have to go through the painful process of changing our suburban-oriented communities.
Ken Shultz | April 28, 2008, 4:03pm | #
Here in California, former governor, and now Attorney General, Jerry Brown sued, I believe it was both, Riverside and San Bernardino Counties for not including greenhouse gases in their CEQA approval processes.http://www.cp-dr.com/node/1901
Nevermind that people still argue about how to measure global warming world wide and no one can really say what the effect of your five acre development project will be on climate change--if it's in CEQA, you have to account for it. So if you're a developer what do you do?
A mini-nuclear reactor might be one solution.
I would also guess that these would be great for people who live way off in the boonies too. They can sell you 40 years worth of power and you can take it pretty much anywhere?
Never mind looking for the pony, I don't see any horse puckey.
Kolohe | April 28, 2008, 4:18pm | #
The main issue is the smaller the reactor the less negative reactivity is available (i.e. a large reactor can be 'really shut down,' as you get smaller, the difference between max s/d and criticallity gets smaller). This is the reason I am somwhat skeptical of 'fail-safe' from a 200 kw reactor (and is that thermal power or electical output?)The army tried small 'field portable' reactors decades ago at the dawn of the atomic age. Unlike TMI, it actually did kill more people than Ted Kennedy's car
robc | April 28, 2008, 4:31pm | #
This propelled the control rod and the entire reactor vessel upwards, which killed the operator who had been standing on top of the vessel, leaving him pinned to the ceiling by a control rod.I was just making sure this was in Kolohe's link.
Well, the good thing about Carbon Monoxide poisoning is that you end up a nice pink color. No need for toxic embalming fluids to give your corpse that rosy glow.
Kolohe | April 28, 2008, 4:36pm | #
The 200 kilowatt Toshiba designed reactor is engineered to be fail-safe and totally automatic and will not overheat. Unlike traditional nuclear reactors the new micro reactor uses no control rods to initiate the reaction. The new revolutionary technology uses reservoirs of liquid lithium-6, an isotope that is effective at absorbing neutrons. The Lithium-6 reservoirs are connected to a vertical tube that fits into the reactor core.First a nitpick - control rods do not per se initiate the reaction - they stop the reaction; you remove them to bring a PLWR critical.
For failsafe criteria, I am curious-
1) How they handle Lithium's *chemical* reactivity - although sodium moderated reactors are not uncommmon, they are hardly 'maintenance free' like this one is supposed to be.
2) I am presuming that the the lithium is also used as coolant in addition to being the moderator (as with sodium reactors - and you absolutely cannot use water). I wonder how they handle a loss of coolant casualty.
bubba | April 28, 2008, 4:38pm | #
Doesn't the military routinely use cargo containers to build forward bases?alan | April 28, 2008, 4:40pm | #
Welcome back, Mr. Doherty.Who'd have thought they'd lead ya (Who'd have thought they'd lead ya)
Here where we need ya (Here where we need ya)
robc | April 28, 2008, 4:42pm | #
I wonder how they handle a loss of coolant casualty.From the reactor side, the loss of coolant is same as loss of moderator, which should power things down. How to keep the coolant from interacting with the environment would be my worry. Im guessing the containment vessel keeps water away.
I always thought sodium cooled/moderated subs was a crazy idea too. I guess you were already screwed if sea water was getting to the reactor core.
Kolohe | April 28, 2008, 4:53pm | #
robc-Ah you're right about the locc; I was thinking of chernobyl whereby it's design (graphite moderation?) a locc caused a postive reactivity insertion.
It's been at least 8 years since I studied this stuff in any detail.
robc | April 28, 2008, 5:18pm | #
Kolohe,17 years since I got my NukE degree, 14 since I used it.
Im surprised I remember anything.
Bobster | April 28, 2008, 5:23pm | #
To light your living room, you can flick a switch on your wall, completing a flow of electrons that began at a giant (usually coal-powered) plant hundreds of miles away.Actually power flows from hundreds of miles away but the electrons are already in the wire and are not going anywhere. They just move back and forth 120 times a second. Thats one way for 1/60 of a second for the positive alternation and the other way for the negative 1/60 of a second alternation.
(Talk about nit picky!)
Douglas Gray | April 28, 2008, 5:42pm | #
Click on the link below to read about a company that has created a smaller scale wind power technology that can be used on buildings.Unlike the conventional wind power gizmos which are these huge things on towers, this is a smaller scale device that blends in with
the architecture of the building.
I hope the Toshiba thing is safe. Even for
conventional reactors who work fine, the cancer rates downwind are 50-80% higher as compared to the normal population. Something that the nuclear power industry does not like to publicize.
http://www.avinc.com/wind.asp
Kolohe | April 28, 2008, 5:48pm | #
Now that I've RTFA, I also agree: awesome article. Best non-Balko one I've seen so far this year.Dello | April 28, 2008, 6:36pm | #
e,"As interesting and colorful as the characters in this article are, I wonder if we might also look into redesigning communities so that people don't have to get in their cars and drive for miles to get to the grocery store or run other errands. Or maybe orient communities around public transportation?"
Been done, with some not-so-great results:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_Block_(Judge_Dredd)
Dello | April 28, 2008, 6:40pm | #
Ken,"I would also guess that these would be great for people who live way off in the boonies too. They can sell you 40 years worth of power and you can take it pretty much anywhere?"
Keeping in mind that it puts out 200 KW, it would the you, the boonies, and 40 of your closest friends. I checked our usage, and even with the hot tub and sauna, we only average about 4 KW.
Dello | April 28, 2008, 6:45pm | #
Bobster,"Actually power flows from hundreds of miles away but the electrons are already in the wire and are not going anywhere. They just move back and forth 120 times a second. Thats one way for 1/60 of a second for the positive alternation and the other way for the negative 1/60 of a second alternation."
Unless its the very first time electricity was put through the wire...no really.
Kwix | April 28, 2008, 7:21pm | #
Dello | April 28, 2008, 6:45pm | #Errm, no Bobster has it right. Conductive wire relies on the principal that electrons in certain materials (Cu, Al, Si, etc.) are easily moved from their orbital fields.Actually power flows from hundreds of miles away but the electrons are already in the wire and are not going anywhere. They just move back and forth 120 times a second.Unless its the very first time electricity was put through the wire...no really.
When you flip the switch the power plant supplies electricity one electron at a time. That first electron bumps an electron in an atom of copper from its spot into the outer field of another atom which in turn bumps its electron into another and so forth. Think of it as an atomic domino cascade.
It is this "domino effect" that allows electricity to travel at nearly the speed of light and is why no matter how far you are from the power source your action is, effectively, instantaneous. When the power switch is off, there is no electron flow and there is no difference in the wire whether it is connected to power or not.
You don't need to "prime" wire like you would a water pipe attached to a wellhead.
pEEf | April 28, 2008, 7:31pm | #
Brian, Good job, but your figure of 70% transmission line loss is off by a factor of 10. Typical loss is around 7% not 70%!-pEEf
Kwix | April 28, 2008, 7:51pm | #
Good article Brian!I have to admit that I hadn't heard what happened to The Shipyard after it's notice to evacuate. The artists there have put out some interesting stuff including the Neverwas Haul.
Guy Montag | April 28, 2008, 8:33pm | #
Hey Kramer,I've looked at the process for using gas from burning wood to power cars, like many Europeans did during World War II. Technologies which were once common, like that, were abandoned not just because it's easier to buy petrol from a service station, but because the new technologies were more efficient in other ways. My understanding is that using gasification like that in a car used to clog up people's fuel systems, etc. with sludge after only a few years. When gasoline goes up over a certain price, and the R&D dollars go into developing generators and engines that are made to use those fuel sources, some of those old technologies will make a lot more sense again.
Did you forget about your Seinfeld episode where you were cooking food on Jerry's car engine? Oh yea, that was an accident.
Dello | April 28, 2008, 8:57pm | #
Kwix,"Errm, no Bobster has it right. Conductive wire relies on the principal that electrons in certain materials (Cu, Al, Si, etc.) are easily moved from their orbital fields."
My "no really" wasn't hint enough? : )
Jack in Danville | April 28, 2008, 9:31pm | #
"I wonder if we might also look into redesigning communities..."Nice to let the authoritarians into a libertarian conversation.
The Bearded Hobbit | April 28, 2008, 9:44pm | #
.. can't believe that I'm the pedant here .... said electrons described above move back and forth every 1/60th of a second .. 60Hz .. the spend 1/120th of a second in the positive side and 1/120th of a second in the negative side ..
.. Hobbit the Electrical Engineer
e | April 29, 2008, 3:49am | #
"Nice to let the authoritarians into a libertarian conversation."'cuz sprawl is teh freedoms!!!11
Frank_EP | May 4, 2008, 6:44pm | #
Based on a decade or so of working on the idea of distributedpower, my take is the State of California really dislikes the idea.
Sure, we have net metering, but with a limit. No large (>10KW)
generators. State-wide cap is 2.3% of total power. Myriad restrictions
on home-power production.
Consider a thought experiment. If aliens from a distant world were
to drop off a magic, non-polluting 1GW power plant in your backyard,
could you hook it to the grid, and let all the world enjoy the benefit?
The answer is NO! You would have to pay the cost for the power that publicly-regulated monopolies _would_ have generated. The idiocy
of this situation even made it into Forbes Magazine. Can a company run a natural gas peaker plant to trim off the Tier 3 or Tier 4 power costs? No!
Rogue solar is the safe way to go. A sad fact.