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1 +1AC Grid Modernization
2 +I. Framework
3 +The Standard is maximizing expected utility.
4 +Util ensures that governments are responsive to peoples’ needs and is best for coordinating the actions of groups.
5 +Goodin ’95 - Robert E. Goodin. Philosopher of Political Theory, Public Policy, and Applied Ethics, Utilitarianism as a Public Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, 1995. p. 26-7
6 +The great advantage of Utilitarianism as a guide to public conduct is that it avoids gratuitous sacrifices, it ensures as best we are able to ensure in the uncertain world of public policy-making that policies are sensitive to people’s interests or desires or preferences. The great failing of more deontological theories, applied to those realms, is that they fixate upon duties done for the sake of duty rather than for the sake of any good that is done by doing one’s duty. Perhaps it is permissible (perhaps even proper) for private individuals in the course of their personal affairs to fetishize duties done for their own sake. It would be a mistake for public officials to do likewise, not least because it is impossible. The fixation on motives makes absolutely no sense in the public realm, and might make precious little sense in the private one even, as chapter 3 shows. The reason public action is required at all arises from the inability of uncoordinated individual action to achieve certain morally desirable ends. Individuals are rightly excused from pursing those ends. The inability is real; the excuses, perfectly valid. But libertarians are right in their diagnosis, wrong in their prescription. That is the message of chapter 2. The same thing that makes those excuses valid at the individual level – the same thing that relieves individuals to organize themselves into collective units that are capable of acting where they are isolated as individuals are not. When they organize themselves into these collective units, those collective deliberations inevitable take place under very different circumstances, and their conclusions inevitably take very different forms. Individuals are morally required to operate in that collective, in certain crucial respects. But they are practically circumscribed in how they can operate, in their collective mode. And those special constraints characterizing the public sphere of decision-making give rise to the special circumstances that make utilitarianism peculiarly apt for public policy-making, in ways set out more fully in chapter 4. Government house utilitarianism thus understood is, I would argue, a uniquely defensible public philosophy.
7 +
8 +II. Advocacy
9 +Text: Countries will phase-out large scale commercial nuclear power plants.
10 +To clarify, the plan is to phase-out traditional baseload nuclear power plants that typically generate 1000 megawatts of electricity or more.
11 +The plan has worked in California, which shows transition to a modern, renewables-driven electrical grid is more economical than reliance on nuclear. The technology is here now.
12 +Smeloff on 6/29 - Ed Smeloff 30 years of experience in energy policy and solar business development, “The End of the Era of Baseload Power Plants,” Green Tech Media (Web). June 29, 2016. Accessed October 7, 2016. http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/the-end-of-the-era-of-baseload-power-plants AT
13 +PGandE’s plan to close the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant ~-~- a facility that currently provides about 10 percent of California’s electricity ~-~- marks a historic transition for the electric power industry. Not only does it signal the end of nuclear power in California, but it also ushers in a new way of thinking about the very foundations of our electric system.¶ Much has (rightly) been made of PGandE’s commitment to close the nuclear facility without increasing greenhouse gas emissions. This low-carbon future is now possible because the costs of solar and wind power have declined dramatically over the past five years, while the performance and reliability of these technologies have been proven, and they are attracting more and more investment. ¶ Less commented on is that closing Diablo Canyon, coming on top of the shutdown of the San Onofre nuclear power plant three year ago, means that California’s electric grid will be largely free of baseload power plants. Going forward, California’s electric power system will be operated in a very different manner than it has been for the last 100 years.¶ Since the days of Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse, the foundation of the electric grid has been power plants that run flat-out 24 hours a day for most of the year. Throughout the 20th century, these baseload power plants became ever bigger, with nuclear power plants like Diablo Canyon capable of producing thousands of megawatts. ¶ Starting in the 1980s, solar and wind power plants, driven forward by national energy policies like the Public Utilities Regulatory Policy Act (PURPA) and state-enacted renewable portfolio standards, began to be connected to the electric grid. Early on, many utilities warned that these variable output technologies would make the grid unstable and couldn’t be counted on to provide reliable power around the clock. ¶ The PGandE agreement to close Diablo Canyon shows that those fears have been outpaced by innovation. It is now possible to envision an energy future where the grid will be balanced moment to moment by a combination of energy storage, responsive load and fast-ramping technologies like fuel cells. In fact, an entire section of the agreement PGandE reached with environmental groups like Friends of the Earth, Environment California and the Natural Resources Defense Council addresses the issue of grid stability and reliability through resource integration and energy storage.¶ This key section of the agreement acknowledges that the removal of a large baseload unit during periods of peak solar production will reduce the need for the periodic curtailment of renewable resources. It also calls on regulators to give serious consideration to PGandE’s development of large-scale energy storage projects, including pumped hydro storage like the Helms Pumped Storage Plant located 50 miles east of Fresno.¶ The Helms project, which began operating in 1984, was supported by regulators because it was assumed there would be excess power at night from California’s baseload nuclear power plants. Now the opposite is occurring. As more and more solar power gets connected to the grid both in front of and behind the meter, there is the potential for excess power being generated in the middle of the day. The 1,212-megawatt Helms project and other sources of energy storage can be used to absorb excess solar power and dispatch it later in a flexible manner when consumers need the power. ¶ The success of California’s transition to a more flexible and resilient power system should be seen as a model for the rest of the country. It has become increasingly obvious over the last few years that nuclear power is an economic albatross. Utilities in the Midwest, Mid-Atlantic and Northeast can no longer economically operate many plants. Meanwhile, many coal plants have reached the end of their useful lives, and others will need to be retired early to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. ¶ With the plan to close Diablo Canyon and PGandE’s commitment to reach 55 percent carbon-free power by 2031, it should be increasingly clear to those responsible for electric resource planning at the state, regional and national levels that the era of baseload power is coming to an end. Utility regulators and energy policymakers across the country should take notice of what’s happening in California and set in place processes that take full advantage of the modern, low-cost clean energy options available throughout the United States.
14 +III. Advantages
15 +1. Grid Modernization
16 +A. Nuclear focus directly trades off with grid modernization efforts. They compete for investment funds and are designed differently for both flexibility and capacity.
17 +Froggatt and Schneider 2010 – Antony Froggatt Senior Research Fellow at Chatham House; For over 20 years he has worked extensively on EU energy policy for NGOs and think tanks and as a consultant to European governments, the European Commission and Parliament and commercial bodies and Mycle Schneider Independent international consultant on energy and nuclear policy. He is currently advising the USAID funded program ECO-Asia on energy efficiency and renewable energy policy., “Systems for Change: Nuclear Power vs. Energy Efficiency + Renewables?” Brussels: Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung and Green European Foundation (March 2010) pp. 46-47. https://pl.boell.org/sites/default/files/froggatt-schneider_systems_for_change.pdf AT
18 +Global experience of nuclear construction shows a tendency of cost overruns and delays. The history of the world’s two largest construction programs, that of the United States and France, shows a five and threefold increase in construction costs respectively. This cannot be put down to first of a kind costs or teething problems, but systemic problems associated with such large, political and complicated projects. Recent experience, in Olkiluoto in Finland and the Flamanville project in France, highlight the fact that this remains a problem. The increased costs and delays with nuclear construction not only absorb greater and greater amounts of investment, but the delays increase the emissions from the sector. From a systemic point of view the nuclear and energy efficiency+renewable energy approaches clearly mutually exclude each other, not only in investment terms. This is becoming increasingly transparent in countries or regions where renewable energy is taking a large share of electricity generation, i.e., in Germany and Spain. The main reasons are as follows. • Competition for limited investment funds. A euro, dollar or yuan can only be spent once and it should be spent for the options that provide the largest emission reductions the fastest. Nuclear power is not only one of the most expensive but also the slowest option. • Overcapacity kills efficiency incentives. Centralized, large, power‐generation units tend to lead to structural overcapacities. Overcapacities leave no room for efficiency. • Flexible complementary capacity needed. Increasing levels of renewable electricity sources will need flexible, medium‐load complementary facilities and not inflexible, large, baseload power plants. • Future grids go both ways. Smart metering and smart grids are on their way. The logic is an entirely redesigned system where the user gets also a generation and storage function. This is radically different from the top‐down centralized approach. For future planning purposes, in particular for developing countries, it is crucial that the contradictory systemic characteristics of the nuclear versus the energy efficiency+renewable energy strategies are clearly identified. There are numerous system effects that have so far been insufficiently documented or even understood. Future research and analysis in this area is urgently needed. This is particularly important at the current time because the next decade will be vital in determining the sustainability, security and financial viability of the energy sector for at least a generation. Three key policy drivers and considerations have come together that must transform the way in which energy services are provided and energy carriers (electricity, hydrogen…) and fuels are generated, transported and used. These are:
19 +
20 +B. Europe proves that nuclear investments trade off with renewables and smart-grid.
21 +Gauntlett 2012 - Dexter Gauntlett principal research analyst contributing to Navigant Research’s Energy Technologies program, leading the company’s Distributed Generation research service with a focus on global renewable energy markets including solar, wind, inverters, microgrids, energy storage, and other enabling technologies. Gauntlett has extensive experience in the cleantech industry in the United States and internationally in both the private and non-profit sectors, including a background working with development agencies, development banks, and government programs intended to catalyze cleantech projects in urban and off-grid settings., “Renewables in U.K. at a Turning Point,” Navigant Research Blog (Web.) April 18, 2012. Accessed October 7, 2016. https://www.navigantresearch.com/blog/renewables-in-u-k-at-a-turning-point AT
22 +No doubt the financial crisis has changed the equation for many U.K. political leaders, and each country will choose its own carbon reduction path – but members of Parliament must keep in mind that there are trade-offs. The most critical trade-offs include the possibility that tying up precious capital on nuclear could reduce investment in smart-grid/transmission infrastructure required to realize the ambitious offshore targets and to enable distributed generation to succeed at scale. Opting out of new nuclear, of course, is the path that Spain, Sweden, Denmark and Germany decided to take, instead doubling down on renewables (Germany’s reduction in solar feed-in tariff rates notwithstanding). That’s why they’re in the starting line-up.
23 +
24 +C. Reliance on nuclear locks in a centralized power grid as companies focus on larger plants. The state has to subsidize the industry to make it viable.
25 +Cooper 2010 - Mark Cooper Senior Fellow For Economic Analysis Institute For Energy And The Environment Vermont Law School, “Policy Challenges Of Nuclear Reactor Construction: Cost Escalation And Crowding Out Alternatives Lessons From The U.S. And France for the Effort To Revive The U.S. Industry With Loan Guarantees And Tax Subsidies,” Physicians for Social Responsibility (September 2010). Accessed October 7, 2016. http://www.psr.org/nuclear-bailout/resources/policy-challenges-of.pdf AT
26 +The commitment to nuclear reactors in France and the U.S appears to have crowded out alternatives. The French track record on efficiency and renewables is extremely poor compared to similar European nations, as is that of the U.S.¶ States where utilities have not expressed an interest in getting licenses for new nuclear reactors have a better track record on efficiency and renewable and more aggressive plans for future development of efficiency and renewables, as shown in Exhibit ES-3. These states:¶ had three times as much renewable energy and ten times as much non-hydro renewable energy in their 1990 generation mix and¶ set RPS goals for the next decade that are 50 percent higher;¶ spent three times as much on efficiency in 2006;¶ saved over three times as much energy in the 1992-2006 period, and¶ have much stronger utility efficiency programs in place.¶ The cost and availability of alternatives play equally important roles. In both nations, nuclear reactors are substantially more costly than the alternatives. The U.S. appears to have a much greater opportunity to develop alternatives not only because the cost disadvantage of nuclear in the U.S. is greater, but also because the portfolio of potential resources is much greater in the U.S. The U.S. consumes about 50 percent more electricity per dollar of gross domestic product per capita than France, which have the highest electricity consumption among comparable Western European nations (see Exhibit ES-4).¶ The U.S. has renewable opportunities that are four times as great as Europe.¶ Design problems and deteriorating economic prospects have resulted in a series of setbacks for nuclear construction plans and several utilities with large nuclear generation assets who had contemplated building new reactors have shelved those plans because of the deteriorating economics of nuclear power relative to the alternatives.¶ POLICY IMPLICATIONS¶ The two challenges of nuclear reactor construction studied in this paper are linked in a number of ways. Nuclear reactors are extremely large projects that tie up managerial and financial resources and are affected by cost escalation, which demands even greater attention. The reaction to cost escalation has been to pursue larger runs of larger plants in the hope that learning and economies of scale would lower costs. In this environment, alternatives are not only neglected, they become a threat because they may reduce the need for the larger central station units.¶ The policy implications of the paper are both narrow and broad.¶ Narrowly, the paper shows that following the French model would be a mistake since the French nuclear reactor program is far less of a success than is assumed, takes an organizational approach that is alien to the U.S., and reflects a very different endowment of resources. Broadly the paper shows that it is highly unlikely that the problems of the nuclear industry will be solved by an infusion of federal loans guarantees and other subsidies to get the first plants in a new building cycle completed. If the industry is relaunched with massive subsidies, this analysis shows the greatest danger is not that the U.S. will import French technology, but that it will replicate the French model of nuclear socialism, since it is very likely that nuclear power will remain a ward of the state, as has been true throughout its history in France, a great burden on ratepayers, as has been the case throughout its history in the U.S., and it will retard the development of lower cost alternatives, as it has done in both the U.S. and France.
27 +
28 +D. Reliance on nuclear leads to overcapacity that is costly and pushes us to increase consumption rather than improve efficiency.
29 +Cooper 2010 - Mark Cooper Senior Fellow For Economic Analysis Institute For Energy And The Environment Vermont Law School, “Policy Challenges Of Nuclear Reactor Construction: Cost Escalation And Crowding Out Alternatives Lessons From The U.S. And France for the Effort To Revive The U.S. Industry With Loan Guarantees And Tax Subsidies,” Physicians for Social Responsibility (September 2010). Accessed October 7, 2016. http://www.psr.org/nuclear-bailout/resources/policy-challenges-of.pdf AT
30 +A costly technology suffering from severe cost escalation puts pressure on those involved in developing and deploying it. With large commitments of financial and institutional resources to the construction of reactors, there is a tendency to press projects ahead in spite of adverse economics. We have already seen an indication of this in the failure of price projection to reflect reality. The dysfunction of the system had other substantial impacts, especially on the choice of alternatives.¶ FRANCE¶ The French program suffered from demand reduction brought on by the oil price shocks of the 1970s. Much like the industry in the U.S., it did not adjust rapidly or well, instead building up excess capacity. Grubler notes the tension between the stimulus for more capacity to reduce dependence on oil and the demand reduction induced by the oil price shock, not unlike the tensions between climate change policy and the current recession-induced demand reduction.¶ This period is overshadowed by the unfolding of the consequences of the two "oil shocks" that reinforced the political legitimacy of the ambitious nuclear investment program. The oil shocks also paved the way for the subsequent nuclear overcapacity, as slackening demand growth remained unreflected in the bullish demand and capacity expansion projections and orders.¶ Thus the French PWR program remained at full throttle regardless of external circumstances. Orders of 5-6 reactors per year, supplemented by grid-connections of the first reactors commissioned in the previous period, and first operating experiences from initial reactors became available in the late 1970s.55¶ The PEON Commission report in 1973 projected France‘s electricity demand as 400 TWh in 1985 and 750 TWh in 2000, compared to actual numbers of 300 and 430 TWh respectively (G-M-T, 2000:373). These over-projections of demand growth led subsequently to substantial (and costly) overcapacity in orders and construction, requiring not un-painful adjustments.56¶ The highly centralized French state monopoly was able to force projects through to completion.57The ability of the centralized system to force reactors online also had the effect of justifying policies to promote wasteful use of electricity to absorb the surplus. These difficulties cascade and distort policy choices. The result was excess capacity that placed a burden on taxpayers and consumers. Schneider argues that as many as one-fifth to one-quarter of the reactors was not needed. The push to absorb the large excess of baseload capacity caused the abandonment of efficiency and conservation and created a peak load problem.¶ In the 1980s significant overcapacities were built up in the power sectors as well as in refineries and nuclear fuel industries and most of the energy intelligence initiatives based on efficiency and conservation were abandoned. … ¶ Rather than downsizing its nuclear extension program, EDF develop a very aggressive two-front policy: long-term baseload power export contracts and dumping of electricity into competitive markets like space heating and hot water generation…¶ France increasingly lacks peak load power whose consumption skyrocketed in the 1980s and 1990s in particular as a consequence of massive introduction of electric space heating…¶ Today, per capita electricity consumption in France is almost a quarter higher than in Italy (that phased out nuclear energy after the Chernobyl accident in 1986) and 15 higher than the EU27 average.58¶ The dysfunctionalities of the system in France may be somewhat less apparent than in the U.S. (discussed below), but they are just as real.¶ The system is entirely exempt from influential corrective elements. Once a decision is taken, there is no way back or out. Examples include the large overbuilding of nuclear capacity… By the middle of the 1980s, it was perfectly clear that the nuclear program was vastly oversized by some 12 to 16 units. But while 138 reactor orders were cancelled in the U.S. at various stages of implementation, absolutely no changes were made to the planning, even when electricity consumption did not even nearly follow forecasts. The reaction was to develop power export for dumping prices and to stimulate electricity consumption by any possible means (in particular thermal uses like heating, hot water production and cooking).59¶ The drive for policies that would increase consumption to absorb excess capacity had a side effect. There was little inclination to pursue alternative sources of generation. Consequently, ―the energy efficiency + renewables efforts in France have remained severely underdeveloped…. In 2008 Spain added more wind power capacity (4,600 MW) than France had installed in total by 2007 (4,060 MW).60
31 +E. Renewables and distributed power generation are the only way to guarantee grid stability and flexibility.
32 +Diesendorf 2016 - Mark Diesendorf Assoc. Prof. of Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies, UNSW Australia. Previously, a Principal Research Scientist in CSIRO, Prof. of Environmental Science and Founding Director of the Institute for Sustainable Futures at University of Technology Sydney, “Dispelling the nuclear baseload myth: nothing renewables can’t do better,” Energy Post (Web). March 23, 2016. Accessed October 7, 2016. http://energypost.eu/dispelling-nuclear-baseload-myth-nothing-renewables-cant-better/
33 +The main claim used to justify nuclear is that it’s the only low carbon power source that can supply ‘reliable, base load electricity. But not only can renewables supply baseload power, they can do something far more valuable: supply power flexibly according to demand, writes Mark Diesendorf, Associate Professor of Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies at UNSW Australia. That, says Diesendorf, makes nuclear power really redundant. (This article was first published in Ecologist.) ¶ We have all heard the claim. We need nuclear power because, along with big hydropower, it’s the only low carbon generation technology that can supply ‘reliable baseload power’ on a large scale. ¶ For example, the UK Energy Secretary Amber Rudd, attempted to justify the decision to build the proposed Hinkley Point C nuclear power station on the grounds that “we have to secure baseload electricity.” ¶ Similarly, former Australian Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane recently claimed at a uranium industry conference: “Baseload, zero emission, the only way it can be produced is by hydro and nuclear.” ¶ Underlying this claim are three key assumptions. First, that baseload power is actually a good and necessary thing. In fact, what it really means is too much power when you don’t want it, and not enough when you do. What we need is flexible power (and flexible demand too) so that supply and demand can be matched instant by instant. ¶ “In the words of former Green Senator Christine Milne, ‘We are now in the midst of a fight between the past and the future.’ The refutation of the baseload fairy tale and other myths falsely denigrating renewable energy are a key part of that struggle.” ¶ The second assumption is that nuclear power is a reliable baseload supplier. In fact it’s no such thing. All nuclear power stations are subject to tripping out for safety reasons or technical faults. That means that a 3.2GW nuclear power station has to be matched by 3.2GW of expensive ‘spinning reserve’ that can be called in at a moments notice. ¶ The third is that the only way to supply baseload power is from baseload power stations, such as nuclear, coal and gas, designed to run flat-out all the time whether their power is actually needed or not. That’s wrong too. ¶ Practical experience and computer simulations show it can be done ¶ But first, take a look at Figure 1, which shows the daily variation of electricity demand in summer in a conventional large-scale electricity grid without much solar energy. Baseload demand is the pale blue region across the bottom of the graph. ¶ ‘Baseload power stations’ are inflexible in operation, in the sense that they are unsuitable for following the variations in demand and supply on timescales of minutes and hours, so they have to be supplemented with flexible peak-load and slightly flexible intermediate-load power stations. ¶ Peak-load power stations are hydro-electric systems with dams and open-cycle gas turbines (OCGTs), essentially jet engines set up for power generation rather than aircraft propulsion. They can respond to variations in demand and supply on timescales of minutes. ¶ The assumption that baseload power stations are necessary to provide a reliable supply of grid electricity has been disproven by both practical experience in electricity grids with high contributions from renewable energy, and by hourly computer simulations.¶ In 2014 the state of South Australia had 39 of annual electricity consumption from renewable energy (33 wind + 6 solar) and, as a result, the state’s base-load coal-fired power stations are being shut down as redundant. For several periods the whole state system has operated reliably on a combination of renewables and gas with only small imports from the neighbouring state of Victoria.¶ The north German states of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Schleswig-Holstein are already operating on 100 net renewable energy, mostly wind. The ‘net’ indicates trading with each other and their neighbours. They do not rely on baseload power stations.¶ A host of studies agree: baseload power stations are not needed¶ “That’s cheating”, nuclear proponents may reply. “They are relying on power imported by transmission lines from baseload power stations elsewhere.” Well, actually the imports from baseload power stations are small.¶ For countries that are completely isolated (e.g. Australia) or almost isolated (e.g. the USA) from their neighbours, hourly computer simulations of the operation of the electricity supply-demand system, based on commercially available renewable energy sources scaled up to 80-100 annual contributions, confirm the practical experience.¶ In the USA a major computer simulation by a large team of scientists and engineers found that 80-90 renewable electricity is technically feasible and reliable (They didn’t examine 100.) The 2012 report, Renewable Electricity Futures Study. Vol.1. Technical report TP-6A20-A52409-1 was published by the US National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). The simulation balances supply and demand each hour.¶ The report finds that “renewable electricity generation from technologies that are commercially available today, in combination with a more flexible electric system, is more than adequate to supply 80 of total U.S. electricity generation in 2050 while meeting electricity demand on an hourly basis in every region of the United States.”¶ Drawing on diverse renewable energy sources, with different statistical properties, provides reliability. This means relying on multiple technologies and spreading out wind and solar PV farms geographically¶ Similar results have been obtained from hourly simulation modeling of the Australian National Electricity Market with 100 renewable energy (published by Ben Elliston, Iain MacGill and I in 2013 and 2014) based on commercially available technologies and real data on electricity demand, wind and solar energy. There are no baseload power stations in the Australian model and only a relatively small amount of storage. Recent simulations, which have yet to be published, span eight years of hourly data.¶ These, together with studies from Europe, find that baseload power stations are unnecessary to meet standard reliability criteria for the whole supply-demand system, such as loss-of-load probability or annual energy shortfall.¶ Furthermore, they find that reliability can be maintained even when variable renewable energy sources, wind and solar PV, provide major contributions to annual electricity generation, up to 70 in Australia. How is this possible?¶ Fluctuations balanced by flexible power stations¶ First, the fluctuations in variable wind and solar PV are balanced by flexible renewable energy sources that are dispatchable, i.e. can supply power on demand. These are hydro with dams, Open Cycle Gas Turbines (OCGTs) and concentrated solar thermal power (CST) with thermal storage, as illustrated in Figure 2. It ‘s not essential for every power station in the system to be dispatchable.¶ Incidentally the gas turbines can themselves be fuelled by ‘green gas’, for example from composting municipal and agricultural wastes, or produced from surpluses of renewable electricity. More on this below …¶ All energy use in the USA, including transport and heat, could be supplied by renewable electricity¶ Second, drawing on diverse renewable energy sources, with different statistical properties, provides reliability. This means relying on multiple technologies and spreading out wind and solar PV farms geographically to reduce fluctuations in their total output. This further reduces the already small contribution from gas turbines to just a few percent of annual electricity generation.¶ Third, new transmission lines may be needed to achieve wide geographic distribution of renewable energy sources, and to multiply the diversity of renewable energy sources feeding into the grid. For example, an important proposed link is between the high wind regions in north Germany and the low wind, limited solar regions in south Germany. Texas, with its huge wind resource, needs greater connectivity with its neighbouring US states.¶ Fourth, introducing ‘smart demand management’ to shave the peaks in electricity demand and to manage periods of low electricity supply, can further increase reliability. This can be assisted with smart meters and switches controlled by both electricity suppliers and consumers, and programmed by consumers to switch off certain circuits (e.g. air conditioning, water heating, aluminium smelting) for short periods when demand on the grid is high and/or supply is low.¶ As summarized by the NREL study: “RE (Renewable Energy) Futures finds that increased electricity system flexibility, needed to enable electricity supply-demand balance with high levels of renewable generation, can come from a portfolio of supply- and demand-side options, including flexible conventional generation, grid storage, new transmission, more responsive loads, and changes in power system operations.”¶ A recent study by Mark Jacobson and colleagues went well beyond the above studies. It showed that all energy use in the USA, including transport and heat, could be supplied by renewable electricity. The computer simulation used synthetic data on electricity demand, wind and sunshine taken every 30 seconds over a period of six years.¶ Storage or ‘windgas’ could also manage fluctuations¶ The above ‘flexible’ approach may not be economically optimal for the UK and other countries with excellent wind resource but limited solar resource. Another solution to managing fluctuations in wind and solar is more storage, e.g. as batteries or pumped hydro or compressed air.¶ The whole system creates grid stability and cannot drop out all at once like a nuclear plant¶ A further alternative is the ‘windgas’ scenario recently advocated by Energy Brainpool as a greener and lower cost alternative to the UK’s Hinkley C nuclear project. The idea is to use excess wind energy to produce hydrogen gas by electrolysing water and then convert the hydrogen to methane that fuels combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) power stations.¶ In fact, not all the hydrogen needs to be converted into methane, and it’s more efficient to keep some of it as hydrogen, a useful fuel in its own right. Another option is to use the hydrogen to make ammonia (NH3) which can both be used as a fuel, and as a feedstock for the fertiliser industry, displacing coal or natural gas.¶ In Brainpool’s scenario, the system is used to replicate the power output of the 3.2GW Hinkley C nuclear power station, and shows it can be done at a lower cost. But in fact, it gets much better than that:¶ as each wind turbine, CCGT, gas storage unit and ‘power to gas’ facility is completed, its contribution begins immediately, with no need for the whole system to be built out;¶ the system would in practice be used to provide, not baseload power, but flexible power to meet actual demand, and so would be much more valuable;¶ as solar power gets cheaper, it will integrate with the system and further increase resilience and reduce cost;¶ the whole system creates grid stability and cannot drop out all at once like a nuclear plant, producing negative ‘integration costs’.¶ But in all the flexible, renewables-based approaches set out above, conventional baseload power stations are unnecessary. In the words of former Australian Greens’ Senator Christine Milne: “We are now in the midst of a fight between the past and the future”.¶ The refutation of the baseload fairy tale and other myths falsely denigrating renewable energy are a key part of that struggle.
34 +
35 +F. A distributed power system is more stable and energy efficient, produces higher quality power, provides myriad economic benefits to consumers, helps protect the grid from terrorism, provides reliable emergency power for critical infrastructure, and is better for the environment than baseload plants.
36 +CER 2007 - Consortium on Energy Restructuring, Virginia Tech, “1.3 Benefits of Distributed Generation,” Distributed Generation: Education Modules, Virginia Tech. (2007). http://www.dg.history.vt.edu/ch1/benefits.html AT
37 +Consumer advocates who favor DG point out that distributed resources can improve the efficiency of providing electric power. They often highlight that transmission of electricity from a power plant to a typical user wastes roughly 4.2 to 8.9 percent of the electricity as a consequence of aging transmission equipment, inconsistent enforcement of reliability guidelines, and growing congestion. At the same time, customers often suffer from poor power quality—variations in voltage or electrical flow—that results from a variety of factors, including poor switching operations in the network, voltage dips, interruptions, transients, and network disturbances from loads. Overall, DG proponents highlight the inefficiency of the existing large-scale electrical transmission and distribution network. Moreover, because customers’ electricity bills include the cost of this vast transmission grid, the use of on-site power equipment can conceivably provide consumers with affordable power at a higher level of quality. In addition, residents and businesses that generate power locally have the potential to sell surplus power to the grid, which can yield significant income during times of peak demand. Industrial managers and contractors have also begun to emphasize the advantages of generating power on site. Cogeneration technologies permit businesses to reuse thermal energy that would normally be wasted. They have therefore become prized in industries that use large quantities of heat, such as the iron and steel, chemical processing, refining, pulp and paper manufacturing, and food processing industries. Similar generation hardware can also deploy recycled heat to provide hot water for use in aquaculture, greenhouse heating, desalination of seawater, increased crop growth and frost protection, and air preheating. Beyond efficiency, DG technologies may provide benefits in the form of more reliable power for industries that require uninterrupted service. The Electric Power Research Institute reported that power outages and quality disturbances cost American businesses $119 billion per year. In 2001, the International Energy Agency (2002) estimated that the average cost of a one-hour power outage was $6,480,000 for brokerage operations and $2,580,000 for credit card operations. The figures grow more impressively for the semiconductor industry, where a two hour power outage can cost close to $48,000,000. Given these numbers, it remains no mystery why several firms have already installed DG facilities to ensure consistent power supplies.
38 +Perhaps incongruously, DG facilities offer potential advantages for improving the transmission of power. Because they produce power locally for users, they aid the entire grid by reducing demand during peak times and by minimizing congestion of power on the network, one of the causes of the 2003 blackout. And by building large numbers of localized power generation facilities rather than a few large-scale power plants located distantly from load centers, DG can contribute to deferring transmission upgrades and expansions—at a time when investment in such facilities remains constrained. Perhaps most important in the post-September 11 era, DG technologies may improve the security of the grid. Decentralized power generation helps reduce the terrorist targets that nuclear facilities and natural gas refineries offer, and—in the event of an attack—better insulate the grid from failure if a large power plant goes down.
39 +Environmentalists and academics suggest that DG technologies can provide ancillary benefits to society. Large, centralized power plants emit significant amounts of carbon monoxide, sulfur oxides, particulate matter, hydrocarbons, and nitrogen oxides. The Environmental Protection Agency has long noted the correlation between high levels of sulfur oxide emissions and the creation of acid rain. Because they concentrate the amount of power they produce, large power plants also focus their pollution and waste heat, frequently destroying aquatic habitats and marine biodiversity. On the other hand, recent studies have confirmed that widespread use of DG technologies substantially reduces emissions: A British analysis estimated that domestic combined heat and power technologies reduced carbon dioxide emissions by 41 in 1999; a similar report on the Danish power system observed that widespread use of DG technologies have cut emissions by 30 from 1998 to 2001. Moreover, because DG technologies remain independent of the grid, they can provide emergency power for a huge number of public services, such as hospitals, schools, airports, fire and police stations, military bases, prisons, water supply and sewage treatment plants, natural gas transmission and distribution systems, and communications stations. Finally, DG can help the nation increase its diversity of energy sources. Some of the DG technologies, such as wind turbines, solar photovoltaic panels, and hydroelectric turbines, consume no fossil fuels, while others, such as fuel cells, microturbines, and some internal combustion units burn natural gas, much of which is produced in the United States. The increasing diversity helps insulate the economy from price shocks, interruptions, and fuel shortages.
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