[p2p-research] Mini nuclear plants to power 20,000 homes

[Kevin Carson]

On 11/11/08, M. Fioretti <mfioretti at nexaima.net> wrote:

> http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/nov/09/miniature-nuclear-reactors-los-alamos

>From the article:

> "Our goal is to generate electricity for 10 cents a watt anywhere in
> the world [said the CEO]... It's leapfrog technology"

Thanks for posting this, Marco.  I admit I'm extremely skeptical about
fission power, and view traditional nuclear reactors as pretty much a
corporate welfare dinosaur that couldn't survive without massive
government subsidies to almost every single step in the supply and
production chain.

But I have no principled objection to it, if a fission technology is
discovered which is genuinely economical in EROEI terms, without
subsidies, and deals adequately with safety and waste disposal issues.

A lot of propaganda about saving the
>  planet by producing your home power by renewables merrily ignores the
>  truth that only relatively rich guys with a single home and (at least)
>  their own yard can actually install enough PV or thermal solar/wind
>  generators to be independent.

Well, a lot of the problem is scaling back the demand side, as per the
arguments of Lovins et al, by ceasing to use electricity for things
like heating water and space that could be more efficiently handled by
direct use of passive solar heat or even burning the fuel.  It would
take a lot less power if electricity were used only for powering only
electric motors and electronic appliances.

And what about the version of solar power they're working on at OSE,
based on direct use of solar heat to power a steam turbine generator,
instead of photovoltaics?  Unless the new kinds of paint-on PV
technology Vinay writes about, or something like it, pan out,
photovoltaic power may be a dead end.  But I have a lot more hope for
lower-tech direct and indirect uses of the sun's heat as the primary
source of power.

-- 
Kevin Carson
Mutualist Blog:  Free Market Anti-Capitalism
http://mutualist.blogspot.com
Studies in Mutualist Political Economy
http://www.mutualist.org/id47.html
Anarchist Organization Theory Project
http://mutualist.blogspot.com/2005/12/studies-in-anarchist-theory-of.html