Saudi nuclear engineers on siting of Saudi nuclear desalination plants.

[NNadir]

An article discussing the seismic issues for the siting of Saudi nuclear power plants is available on line:

As early as the 1960s, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) investigated the feasibility of using nuclear reactors for seawater desalination. Due to the fact that Siting of nuclear desalination plants in saudi arabia, a seismic study 385 there is a growing environmental concern concerning the burning of fossil fuels, the IAEA and a number of member states have shown great interest in utilising nuclear energy for seawater desalination. Some of the reasons that in the past led to the development of nuclear power for electricity generation can now be applied for using nuclear energy to desalt seawater. Some of these reasons, for example, are: competitiveness with fossil fuels, promotion of technological development and protection of the environment.


Nowadays one can see a sensible expertise in the field of nuclear desalination International Atomic Energy Agency, 1992). Two countries have good expertise in operating nuclear reactors for seawater desalination. They are Kazakhstan and Japan. The liquid metal cooled fast reactor BN–350 has been operating since 1973 in Kazakhstan. In Japan, six pressurised water reactors (PWR) are operating since 1973, 1975, 1983, 1988, 1989, 1992, respectively. They are coupled with MSF, RO and MED desalination technologies.

Many papers have been published (Al-Sulaiman et al., 1995; Abdul-Fattah, 1978, 1981; Abdul-Fattah, Husseiny and Sabri, 1978; Abdul-Fattah and Husseiny, 1978, 1979; Abdul-Fattah, Hussieny and Sabri, 1978; El-Roumi, 1977; Kutbi, 1981, 1983; Kutbi and Abdul-Matin, 1984, 1986; Abulfaraj et al., 1987, 1990; Kutbi, Sabri and Husseiny, 1986; Hussein, 1988; Hussein, Obeid and El-Mallahy, 1987) which investigated and analysed the possibility of using nuclear energy in seawater desalination plants in Saudi Arabia. The purpose of this paper is to select a suitable site for proposed nuclear desalination plants in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia based on different selection criteria in general, and seismic criteria in specific.

Imagine that, Saudi scientists writing "...there is a growing environmental concern concerning the burning of fossil fuels..."

Oh well, the oil is going to be gone soon anyway.

Full article: http://www.inderscience.com/storage/f726101435129118.pdf

[benburch]

1. Oil soon gone?

Nope. Wish it were. It will merely be expensive to get. Between the rocky mountains that we could tear down for oil shale, the tar sands in Alberta, and the fact that most "depleted" wells still have more than half of their oil remaining, much of which is likely to be recovered with upcoming stripper well technology, we likely have at least 75 more years before true shortages arise. And even then you will be able to get it for a price. You see, we will NEVER run totally out of oil, but its price will geometrically increase.

[NNadir]

2. I should have said "cheap" oil.

Thanks for the correction.

My feeling is that if we never run out of oil however, we will probably run out of atmosphere.

[jpak]

3. Kazakhstan has shut its BN-350 (breeder) and is seeking foreign aid

decommission it (it suffered from frequent sodium fires).

It also has 3 tons of spent fuel stored at the site that could be easily used to produce nuclear weapons...

http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:5APnwrogDbkJ:armed-services.senate.gov/statemnt/2001/010515gordon.pdf+BN%E2%80%93350+Kazakhstan+seeks+international+help+decommission&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=7&ie=UTF-8

(scroll way down)

and I think that the highly saline brine discharged from nucular desalination plants is a good thing for local marine environments...

:)

[Dead_Parrot]

4. Whereas a Solar desalination plant...

...would turn the salt into magick moonbeams, of course ;)

But you're right - I think the trick to desalination is don't live in a fucking desert.

[dcfirefighter]

5. Don't live in a effing desert....

Yet, in order to live in a temperate zone, we have to 1) displace agriculture and 2) pay some dude top dollar for the right to live there.

In fact, lots of 'dudes' like buying up land where people like to live, and holding on to it. If taxes are low, they'll leave it bare. If taxes are little higher, they'll put up a 'taxpayer': a pay parking lot, a stripmall, etc. in order to cover the carrying costs. Enough of these 'dudes' buy enough of this land, and it makes available building sites rarer - and more expensive. It spreads everyone out a little, exacerbating traffic.

In response, the well-meaning but misguided voters choose to enact zoning restrictions: they'll place a greenbelt around their town, and say that 5 acres is the minimum lot size. This quickly becomes a 'minimum price' zone, effectively keeping the working, and even middle classes from owning homes there. The constrained building area of the existing town gets filled up, and more and more expensive, eventually displacing the working class from the entire metro area. (See Portland, for example).

In order for all of us to be able to find a place to live in an environmentally friendly area, we need access to the land. To guarantee permanent access to the land, and a permanent system of efficient land use, the land cannot be sold, nor can it simply be redistributed from the owner class to the working class. A permanent system of efficient land allocation would trade sale prices to individuals for rental prices to communities.

A practical and incremental shift to such a system would involve reducing the property tax rate against buildings and increasing it against land value.

[Dead_Parrot]

7. I think we just cause shit wherever we are

I think the only peoples who don't have a significant impact on their environment are the Kalahari bush tribes and those few aboriginal Australians who stick to the traditional method of living (and of course, they both live in near-desert conditions :o). I should have said something along the lines of "Don't live beyond the carrying capacity of your environment".

Since that's around 2 billion for the whole planet, we may be in trouble...

Sigh. I guess we might as well fuck up the desert as much as anywhere... :(

[dcfirefighter]

9. Every organism changes it's local environment

So a cost-benefit analysis must be done - and I'd include the analysis on a global scale. I believe the emphasis should be on sustainability, not necessarily on zero impact. And since I distrust central planners, I tend to really like Henry George's (and the Physiocrats before him) theories on land.

Put another way, NZ is a beautiful place. It could enact strict immigration and population controls, as well as other measures and become a little green nirvana. It would then be easy for Kiwis to tell the people of Saudi Arabia that they shouldn't pump their saline brines back into the ocean. It'd be easy, but it'd be unfair, unless NZ welcomed Saudi immigrants with open arms.

Often, people refer to an ethnicity's right to 'ancestral lands', and the like. I equate this with a priviledged birthright, and despise it. There is one race, one ancestry, one earth - it's all ours. In order for the right crops to grown on the right lands, and the right cities to form in the right places, and the fresh water gets used in the right places, and to generally bear as lightly as possible on our earth, I'm absolutely sure that our economic system has to change. The 'organic', decentralized, and freedom - friendly theories of geo-classical liberalism should have a strong future in a greener, more egalitarian, Democratic Party.

[Dead_Parrot]

10. As it happens...

...the "investor" immigration program probably would welcome them. The rich ones, anyway: No-one care about the poor ones ones of course.

But otherwise I agree. With a sigh, and probably another beer.

[NNadir]

6. I actually don't think that saline brines are good things for marine

environments. I'm going to do a rare thing and agree with you on that one.

In general I don't support desalination, but I fully accept and applaud wastewater treatment via nuclear means, such as that now practiced at the Palo Verde nuclear station in Arizona.

On the other hand, access to clean drinking water is a serious problem world wide. I know that the official Greenpeace position is to ignore poor people - but the Saudis are not poor people in any case. I can certainly understand that Moroccans, for whom the problem of access to drinking water is potentially life threatening.

Moroccans, who have no native energy resources other than their phosphate based uranium, feel very different than the managers of the boys and girls tour of Antarctica, where precocious boys and girls, funded by Mommy and Daddy, learn how to melt ice over the diesel powered heater and look at the water under the microscope. (It looks so good on your college application: I've been to Antarctica and I used a microscope there.)

But the point of my post was not about desalination so much as it was to demonstrate that the decision to reject anti-nuclear arguments is international. No one buys them any more. Everyone acknowledges that nuclear energy is the only realistic option in the face of global climate change. Renewables simply can't produce on scale. Many nations are looking seriously at nuclear power, because the wolf is at the door, and he's growling loudly.

Some nations will, in fact, desalinate irrespective of the environmental cost of salt dumping. Saudi Arabia, of course, has engaged in this practice for quite some time. I suspect that the decision of Mediterranean nations will be fairly catastrophic, since the Sea already has an influx of water. Nevertheless, desalination via nuclear means is preferable to desalination using fossil fuels. In this sense, the Saudi scientists have a point. Personally, I suspect that desalinated Persian Gulf water is problematic, given the amount of environmental damage that has been done to the gulf in oil operations and oil wars. Many aromatic compounds form azeotropes, and this can't really be a good thing.

Whether or not the breeder in Kazakhstan is shut, the fact is that the desalination plant their operated. (I note that the largest desalination plant in the US is the Diablo Canyon nuclear station near Morro Bay.) Morro Bay, the city, has the second largest plant in the US.

The contention by the way that nuclear weapons are "easily" made is pure nonsense, equivalent to all other anti-nuclear arguments in quality and substance. Like all anti-nuclear arguments it is a case of representing that improbable events are certainties simply because one can imagine them. Such an approach is absurd, because all statements about future events are inherently probabilistic. If nuclear weapons were easy to make many more countries would have them. The risk of nuclear war is very clearly lower than the risk of global climate change. Global climate change is a certainty since it is occurring already. There has been, on the other hand, no incidents of nuclear war since 1946. In fact many countries have sought to make nuclear weapons, including relatively wealthy countries like Libya. It was not "easy" to do.

[jpak]

8. Yes, Morocco has no indigenous energy resources

The sun does not shine there...

The wind doesn't blow...

Tides and waves are unknown there...

It can only be saved by nucular power.

:rofl:

[NNadir]

11. This is true. Renewable technologies are very expensive and are

not really suitable for poor countries, except at high environmental cost, like the deforestation, and deaths from air pollution.

(The exception, as always, is hydroelectric, but these resources are limited.)

If they were suitable, they would be widely used but as always, the renewable fantasy consists almost purely of hand waving and wishful thinking.

In fact, the wind energy industry has been unable to deliver much more than an exajoule of energy world wide and it is the best of the renewable technologies. Further, wind power always requires back up power, which in a poor country is not cheap. I thought everybody knew that.

In Morocco, the amount of non-hydro renewable energy produced is 0.00065 exajoules. As is the case in almost every country on the planet, this is hardly sufficient to address the demand. In fact, if solar energy were to work anywhere at affordable prices, Morocco would be that place. It's a desert near the equator. The fact that it is NOT widely used there is an indication of just how divorced from reality the solar fantasy is.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/table17.xls

[jpak]

12. Yes and modern nucular electric grids are so cheap

they's too cheap to meter - them nukies iz poppin' up like mushrooms all over sub-saharan Africa..

..and Haiti and the Dominican Republic too..

They's all gittin' safe cheap nucular power!!!!!!

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

But wait....wait...

Doesn't France git most of it u-ranium ex-o-jewels from its former African colonies???

(yup)

Have these people benefited from France's nucular power program???

(nope)

Can you say "French neocolonial exploitation of African poor people"??????

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[Dead_Parrot]

13. France's largest supplier is Canada

One of the first things people note about Canada, is that is is not in Africa. They may go on to notice that maps are a good source of geographic information, and that they are availible on line. ;)

[jpak]

14. They currently get ~40% from Canada but most the

uranium they have consumed has come from Africa...

[Dead_Parrot]

15. True, but

to answer your question 'Can you say "French neocolonial exploitation of African poor people"?' The answer would be 'Only if you can put it in the past tense while carefully sidestepping the issue of slaves taken to the USA', which is a bit of a mouthful.

I'm sure Niger does indeed get screwed over it's deposits (being the only African ex-French colony exporting uranium, ASAIK) but given that it's the mainstay of the ecomony, I'd suggest an overhaul of mine ownership (ie, nationisation) rather than a "it must die because it's evil" approach.

Edit: Unless we say "Fuck them, they're poor", which usually seems to be an option for energy policy. With a per capita gdp of under $900, I can't see them buying PV panels or hydrogen vehicles any time soon.

[jpak]

16. One of the consequences of ChimpCo's India nucular gambit

is that Australia might allow uranium exports to India and China (which they don't do now on account of those country's nuclear weapons programs).

If that happens, uranium mining will be allowed on Aboriginal land previously off limits.

How perfectly evil...

[Dead_Parrot]

17. Sounds likely

They usually get kicked off whenever someone finds something interesting underground in Oz. Makes me proud to be white, I can tell you. :(

[NNadir]

18. The nuclear exceptionalist argument lacks credibility.

All energy use effects the third world. The consequences of fossil fuel use far outstrip the effects of nuclear power.

In fact, because the renewable industry is in continous failure and/or denial mode, because it is incapable of producing much more than a single exajoule of energy, in spite of all kinds of positive public attitudes, belief or should we say "blind faith" in renewable energy is becoming morally pernicious. To the extent that people represent renewable energy as an alternative to nuclear energy rather than an alternative, albeit a weak one, to fossil fuel energy, they are promoting the impoverishment of the third world.

In fact, those who support nuclear energy are NOT hostile to renewable energy. We freely admit, for instance, that solar energy is suitable for peak loading and that nuclear energy generally is not so well suited for these purposes. However, since many people pretend that somehow renewable energy represents a baseload form of energy, and since some people, with a poor comprehension of the nature of energy believe that the goal of renewables should be to displace nuclear instead of the infinitely more dangerous fossil capacity, some renewable advocates are placing themselves in morally indefensible positions with respect to human rights. In any case, the point is moot, even if renewable energy's goal was to displace only fossil fuels, it cannot produce.

While waiting for the renewable future that never actually appears on an exajoule scale, people buy oil, which on a mass balance basis is a catastrophe. The politics and tragedy associated with the oil industry in Africa is well known to all people who actually care about the African situation. The situation in Nigeria, where per capita electrical use is 8 watts, is far worse than anything that has ever been connected with uranium in Africa.

One could argue that people who promote the fantasy that one exajoule of energy is somehow an acceptable alternative to nuclear energy, which produces 30 exajoules - or that it represents a solution to global climate change are completely indifferent to the third world. Africa, in the event of droughts, is already suffering on a large scale from global climate change. This is particularly the case for the large inland states of Africa, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Ethiopia, and other countries. This tragedy is connected with oil, coal and natural gas, and easily dwarfs any disingenous and dilatory pretense on the part of nuclear opponents about uranium in Africa.

I make this argument all of the time. I often argue that the renewable fantasy - which is in fact nothing more than a form of denial - is immoral and unethical. The fact is that renewable energy is not making an impact on saving the environment. We all wish it could or would, but - again the measure is exajoules - it is not.

This puts a higher onus or responsibility on the nuclear industry, which has shown itself ready to meet the challenge.

Most of the world reactors are running on inventory, which is a reflection of the high energy density of uranium: It would be impossible to run a fossil fuel industry on inventory for very long on an exajoule scale. (I note that the tiny solar PV energy industry is already in a state where it cannot meet demand or produce because of silicon shortages.)

This is shown graphically here, along with information on where, in fact, uranium comes from:



As for nuclear reactors in Africa, I note that South Africa plans 24 or more such reactors. These reactors are not of a type of which I necessarily approve, pebble beds of South African design, since the fuel is not easy to recycle - but the fact is that South Africa will build these reactors. The reactors are intended to be small and modular - they will only produce about 4000 MWe in total. Because they are high temperature reactors, they will be thermodynamically very efficient, about 45%, but still will represent about 10,000 MW of primary energy. The reactors are designed for continuous refueling, and as such, will probably operate at close to 100% capacity loading. On this basis, they will have an output equivalent to about 1/3 of an exajoule.

These reactors will easily exceed the non-hydro renewable output of the entire Africa, which is minuscule. This output, for the entire continent, was 0.03 exajoules in 2003. In fact, the two existing nuclear reactors in South Africa, the Koeberg reactors, outstrip renewable capacity of the rest of the African continent by a factor of 15. The reason for this dismal performance in the renewable energy field in Africa is that basically the renewable denial game is the province of rich white westerners who don't actually understand energy in any way except through the prism of wishful thinking. My opinion is that these distractable people neither understand nor care about the reality of Africans.

The new reactors are particularly welcome to all who approach the global climate change catastrophe with clear and sober eyes, since they will displace coal which now represents the majority of South African electrical generation under the status quo.

The figures for African renewable output can be found here:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/table17.xls

The intention to build 24 PBR reactors is discussed here, along with the Koeberg reactors:

http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf88.htm

The technical description of these reactors is found here:

http://www.eskom.co.za/nuclear_energy/pebble_bed/pebble_bed.html