Sowell's Law Blog: June 2019

Saturday, June 22, 2019

Offshore Wind Sells Power at €44/MWh

Subtitle: Wind Industry Will Fly from here on.

The lowest price, so far, for offshore wind sales may just be the €44/ MWh that was announced this week. The project, offshore Dunkirk, France, will be 600 MW and employ wind turbines with 12-13 MW capacity each. Those are the largest at this point in time.
see link to article describing the project.

In US currency, that is approximately 5 cents per kWh delivered. As stated before on SLB, wind has won.

Future projects will most likely, almost assuredly, use the largest wind turbines available since the economics are overwhelmingly favorable. They cost less to install per MW, and have better output via higher capacity factors. Also, there are fewer of the larger turbines, so maintenance costs are lower.

This is beyond the turning point the industry has long sought: sales price of 10 cents per kWh.

From here on, the investments will be heavy into offshore wind. The prospects for onshore wind are more limited, since a large hurdle is transporting blades to the installation site. The very large turbine blades for 12 MW wind turbines simply cannot pass under the various bridges. Of course, the open ocean has no such restrictions.

It's a good day for the renewable energy industry.

Sandia National Lab, 50 MW offshore wind turbine concept
Blades are downwind of tower, blades flex in very high winds
to allow continued operation.

Update: 6-23-19; The offshore wind turbines are especially attractive in Europe, where the grid operators typically reduce natural gas-fired power plants as the wind power increases. That is a savings of very expensive LNG that is vaporized to provide fuel to the power plants. With LNG selling at $8 to $10 per million Btu, the electric customers should (and perhaps will) see a reduction in electric bills.

The future is very bright for offshore wind in many areas of the world. Northern Europe, US East Coast, US West Coast, and the East Coast of Asia are all developing wind projects offshore.

Floating Spar mooring system, artist's concept
for Hywind, Scotland offshore wind farm
credit: Statoil ASA Environmental Statement

The largest turbines are not yet here, as SLB reported earlier, Sandia National Labs has a design for a 50 MW wind turbine, with flexible blades that bend with the strongest winds. see link to SLB article, and see link to Sandia publication on the Segmented Ultralight Morphing Rotor. (see photo at right)

The economics of such a wind turbine will be very attractive. However, there are engineering issues to resolve with a large weight balanced at the top of a long and slender tower. I suspect the answer will be, at least in part, a tower that is designed to sway in the wind, like a palm tree.

Another very good possibility is to employ the floating spar mooring technology as the Hywind project in Scotland uses. The floating spars also sway in the strongest winds. See this link for the SLB article on the Hywind floating spar wind farm. -- end update

Roger E. Sowell, Esq.

Houston, Texas

Topics and general links:

Nuclear Power Plants.......here

Climate Change................here and here

Fresh Water......................here

Engineering......................here and here

Free Speech.................... here

Renewable Energy...........here

Sunday, June 2, 2019

Happy Day - Pilgrim Nuclear Plant Closes Forever

Subtitle: Uneconomic Nuclear Plants Should Close

It is always satisfying to watch predictions one has made come to pass. I am on record (see link) as stating half of the US nuclear power plants (at least, those still operating) will close in 10 years, with the other half closing in another 10 years. That works out to roughly 5 reactors per year, on average. This article is about one that closed just two days ago, the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant, Plymouth, MA -- photo from NRC

The current quote: "PLYMOUTH, Mass. (AP) — The Pilgrim nuclear power plant in Plymouth has permanently shut down after 47 years of generating electricity, bring to a close the era of nuclear power in Massachusetts. The final shutdown occurred at 5:28 p.m. Friday (31 May 2019)." see news article at this link.

My prediction from August 4, 2017: "The essential facts in the US are a great number of nuclear plants will retire; many coal-fired plants will retire, many natural gas plants will be built; and a great number of wind turbine generators will be built. Within 20 years, almost every one of the 98 nuclear plants in the US will retire. Half of those will be shut down within 10 years." (quoting the SLB article "Offshore Wind Turbine Project – Statoil’s Hywind Scotland; A Positive Viewpoint" see link)

So, what happened to cause the Pilgrim plant to shut down, nearly 13 years before its operating license expires? This plant was given the green light by the NRC to extend its operating life beyond the initial 40 years, with a 20 year extension. Nuclear cheerleaders often claim that nuclear plants run 60 years, yet we have never, ever, seen one operate that long. The usual circumstances occurred, the same ones that caused other plants to retire early. Those circumstances are an inability to operate profitably in the modern era with low natural gas prices, and very low renewable (wind especially) electricity. The news articles are filled with report after report of nuclear plants presenting their bid for future electricity to the grid, and not being competitive. The reasons, of course, are the high operating costs, even on a cash basis and not including capital charges.

The nuclear plant owners typically turn to the state governments to plead for yet more subsidies to keep their plants running, and sometimes, those pleas are successful. And then other times, they fail. Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant failed to obtain taxpayer subsidies, and it is now closed.

So, what alternatives to nuclear plant owners have? Can they invest a few billion to reduce operating costs, perhaps increase power output and produce more income from the same asset? Those have been tried, sometimes with success and at least one notable and dismal fiasco: the SONGS (San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station near San Diego, CA). The fiasco involved lies to the NRC about the new steam generators (four of them), when the design was very different but the owner lied to the NRC that the design had only minor changes and no need for the costly and lengthy review and approval process. (The new steam generators, vertical U-tube heat exchangers, had more tubes, tubes with smaller diameters, and a different vibration suppression design).

The problem Pilgrim had, as I see it, is too few years remaining in which to recover the investment from any effort to increase revenues.

The same scenario is playing out at the aging, inefficient, high-cost nuclear plants in the US. Plant after plant is crying to the government for more subsidies (on top of the numerous other subsidies already in place). As governments see that shutting a nuclear plant has very little impact, if any, on the local economy, the pleas for bailouts will be refused.

As an aside, no one granted the oil refineries any extensions, no subsidies, no fiscal help at all when nearly half the refineries shut down in the 1980s. There were thousands and thousands of jobs at stake there, too, just like the nuclear cheerleaders are claiming today as their big reason for more subsidies. The refineries shut down, nearly 150 of them across the country. There was a temporary difficulty for the workers, the engineers, and management, but we all survived. That's the way it is supposed to work in a market economy. The more efficient weed out the lesser.

Nuclear plants have had their day in the sunshine. The sunset is here for many, many of them.

It is indeed, a happy day.