Will nuclear energy replace fossil fuels? #AskAFuturist

Tim Panton (@steely_glint) asks: “Will nuclear energy replace fossil fuels? If so, will it be fission or fusion?”This is one of those questions that is hard to answer accurately without sounding like you are trying to fudge it. Because the answers are ‘yes, but only some’ and ‘both, but not at the same time’. And also, ‘it depends what application you’re talking about’, and ‘over what time frame?’

One of many

The first challenge in answering this question comes back to one of the five major trends I track that I see popping up in every domain I examine: choice. We live in an age of low-friction innovation, where building novel solutions to problems is easier than it ever has been. That does not mean it is easy, but it does mean that the turnover of new technologies is faster, and that the variety of technological solutions is wider.The adoption of these technologies is also easier and cheaper. With lower barriers to entry, people can afford to experiment more. And with lower innovation and production costs, suppliers can afford to support smaller niches.The result is that there is rarely one answer to any problem. It is impossible to say that nuclear will replace fossil fuels because LOTS of things will replace fossil fuels. Indeed, they already are. Check out this chart from the IEA’s 2019 World Energy Outlook report: https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/installed-power-generation-capacity-by-source-in-the-stated-policies-scenario-2000-2040This is specifically for the power generation market – electricity, in other words. What it shows is that coal consumption has flattened, and oil is down, while gas continues to grow. Meanwhile, solar and wind are on incredible growth trajectories. Hydro and other renewables are also growing. In the IEA’s projections, nuclear is fairly flat. This is all over a 20-year time frame with projected global energy consumption continuing to rise.

Fission flat

These projections seem plausible to me. We might hope to see a faster decline in gas and coal offset by even more dramatic shifts to solar and battery storage. This is possible with large infrastructure investment in those countries with highly centralised grids. Given the noises about economic stimulus investment in the UK and elsewhere, we might just see some of this. But it is hard to see the nuclear picture being anything other than (largely) flat.This is not because there will not be new nuclear. But lots of reactors in places like the UK and France are ageing and well beyond their original design life. So even large-scale development will only hit replacement levels. There is some hope for smaller scale nuclear systems that might fit well into a more distributed grid infrastructure as a back up to primarily renewable generation, or that could be clustered to replace coal or ageing nuclear plants. Certainly, lots of investors, including governments, think this idea has strong prospects. But it is hard to see it growing at a rate that makes it a serious candidate for replacing the majority of fossil fuel consumption, even just for energy generation.

Commercial fusion?

Meanwhile, fusion research continues to make slow progress. It is hard to see it hitting commercialisation at any real scale in the 20-year IEA time frame. Even if the model is proven, it is unlikely anyone in the west would be able to build out a reactor within another decade. China is a different matter and there, practical fusion power might be a valuable alternative to the country’s enormous reliance on coal. But still, it is hard to see it making a serious impact in the next twenty years.

Renewables

Meanwhile, solar, wind, hydro and tidal power advance apace. As does the storage technology to offset their intermittent feed. Done at very large scale, these projects require very large investment – the sort that takes years to assemble or that has to be underwritten by governments. But done at smaller scale, they can be rolled out relatively quickly and cheaply. This feels like the best bet for a lot of fossil fuel replacement.Roughly two thirds of grid energy consumption in the UK is in residential and commercial venues, where small scale renewables and storage might present an opportunity to shift away from grid power for at least a proportion of usage. The shift to electric vehicles means that these sources might also power a lot of our transport. Only in large scale industry like steel manufacturing does small scale renewables and storage feel less practical – though I would be delighted to be proven wrong on this. Perhaps here is the opportunity for small scale nuclear? Single or clustered plants could be used to provide consistent, clean(er) energy to major consumers and the surround areas.

Looking beyond

In the longer term, fission feels like a dead technology. It is cleaner than coal but still leaves a lot of radioactive mess behind that we don’t have a good solution for. I do believe we will one day crack the fusion challenge, allowing us to generate a lot of energy in a small space. But remember: however sophisticated the heat source, nuclear fusion would still be used to make steam to spin a turbine. This is the same way we have been generating power for 140 years or so. Even the Romans were using steam to make stuff spin. It feels a little old fashioned. The sci-fi nerd in me wants something solid-state, more like Iron Man’s arc reactor. But sadly no-one outside of the fictional universe knows how that might work.So, will nuclear energy replace fossil fuels? Yes, but only some.

Five trends for the future of energy

Tonight I’m at Nabarro [now CMS] in London, launching the Future of Energy report. It’s a great example of how the Intersections process can give you rapid insight into the future of a market.Here are the five conclusions we’ve reached about the future shape of the UK energy market:

• The future is electric
• Energy is local, not national
• Access, not supply
• Disruptive business models explode
• Economy and ecology align

The future is electric

Sometimes you reach a conclusion that sounds blindingly obvious, and you have to check with people that it is even worth saying. I checked, and apparently, this remains a conclusion that will surprise many: tomorrow’s world is powered by limitless, cheap, clean, energy.If that sounds like the wishful thinking of some dope-addled, eco-hippy, it’s quite the opposite. Green energy — particularly solar — wins not because it is in some way the ‘right’ option, but because it is by some margin both the cheapest and most secure form of energy.The cost per kilowatt hour of solar energy is falling dramatically based solely on the incredible volumes of solar cells being produced and deployed. Factor in advances in the cells’ efficiency, new manufacturing techniques, and new formats (not just big square panels), and it’s easy to see that fall accelerating rather than slowing.At the same time, gas supplies are starting to look at serious risk from declining production and growing political instability. Factor in the rapid advances coming in battery technology — overcoming the inherently intermittent nature of solar — and it’s clear: the future is electric.

Local, not national

The problems of securing new national generating capacity to replace Britain’s ageing coal and nuclear stations are well-documented. Building large new plants requires huge investments. If those investments are going to come from private sources then they want a guarantee on their returns, going as we are into an increasingly uncertain environment. The result is that the tax payer ends up paying well over the odds for security of supply.Centralised generation and a largely one-way system of distribution just doesn’t make sense any more, when generation and storage technology is increasingly commoditised and even consumerised. The future grid is not big plants pumping power over long distances to the cities where it is consumed. It’s a hugely diverse picture of small scale generation and storage in close proximity to where the energy is consumed.This does not mean that every home and business will provide its own power. Neither the economics nor the demographics stack up for this. Setting up generation and storage behind the meter requires capital a lot of people and businesses lack. Renting is on the rise and many landlords won’t take the risk of entering into the energy business for a long time — despite the potential returns. Many homes and businesses alike will lack the space for the relevant equipment. There will be a behind-the-meter market but also a sizeable opportunity for more small-scale local generation and storage.

Access, not supply

Even years after the advent of more small-scale generation, the overwhelming picture of the national electricity network is of a one-way, supplier/consumer relationship. This concept will be destroyed by the fundamental shift to more distributed generation: no longer is the grid about getting energy to us, it’s about balancing supply and demand across micro and macro regions.Instead of a network of networks, as the national grid is now, it will become a network of networks of networks of networks: diverse and complex with fast-changing and multi-directional flows of energy.

Disruptive business models explode

As the flow of energy changes, so too will the flow of information through the network. Intelligence about availability and demand will feed into much more dynamic shifts in pricing and create entirely new billing models.New businesses will spring up to capitalise on the complex flows and increased availability of information. The comparison sites are only the beginning of what is to come as smart homes, meters, grids, factories and vehicles come online.

Economy and ecology align

Look at any chart of global temperatures and it’s pretty clear that we have so far singularly failed to address climate change. Given the political winds across the Atlantic, it seems unlikely we’ll see renewed impetus any time soon from the biggest polluters.The continued existence of our species has failed to motivate us into change. But the opportunity to save a few quid might succeed. Clean, green energy is cheap. Bringing supply closer to the consumer makes more transparent the economics of efficiency: it’s an awful lot cheaper to consume the energy you generate than it is to buy it in. For the first time the middle-class masses may be compelled to consume within their means.Even if they don’t, our consumption is contracting, not climbing. Appliances of all kinds are increasingly efficient — so much so that their increasingly prevalence can’t offset the gains. One desktop PC consumes as much energy as 40 tablet chargers.Perhaps technology will save us after all…

If The State Can't Keep the Lights On, Who Will?

The Daily Telegraph covered Britain’s energy shortage recently with the headline “Britain could face blackouts if the wind doesn’t blow”. Clear about where the responsibility lay for the small margin between our generating capacity and consumption, the article went on to state that “the margin has eroded in recent years as environmental regulations force the closure of old coal-fired power plants.”

In case you didn’t know, since I wrote this piece last year, the forecast margin between our peak consumption and demand for electricity has fallen to 1.2%. To cope, National Grid has taken a number of emergency measures to boost this to 5.1%, such as paying large consumers to reduce their usage at peak times. But as The Guardian pointed out last year, “The now dismantled state-owned Central Electricity Generating Board at one time used to argue that a minimum capacity to cope with peak demand should not be less than 25%. “#How did we get into this situation? Well you could point to environmental legislation: the EU Large Combustion Plants Directive has played a role in the recent closure of coal and oil-fired power plants. But few would argue with the reasoning behind it — to cut emissions of sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides. As the DEFRA website puts it: “These pollutants are major contributors to acid deposition, which acidifies soils and freshwater bodies, damages plants and aquatic habitats, and corrodes building materials. Nitrogen oxides react with volatile organic compounds in the presence of sunlight to form ozone that can adversely affect human health and ecosystems.”Those evil Eurocrats. Who would want to stop that?Of course it is not only coal and oil fired power stations that have shut, or are scheduled to shut. By my count (using this source and news stories), two nuclear stations have closed already and a further six are due to close in the next ten years.Is this more green Eurocracy?Nope. The LCPD doesn’t apply to nuclear power stations. So what do these stations that are closing or scheduled for closure have in common with the coal and oil plants that have shut?Age.The newest of these plants began delivering power to the grid in 1988, 27 years ago. The oldest? 1967.When companies say that they have had to shut their plants because of environmental legislation, what they mean is that the technologies at the core of these stations is so old that it is uneconomic to control their very harmful pollution. The reason we might not be able to keep the lights on is this: whether or not the wind blows, we simply haven’t built enough generating capacity in the last twenty years. Now what happened twenty years ago that might mean we stopped building so much generating capacity? Privatisation.This isn’t a tirade against privatisation — I try to stay away from the ‘big P’ politics in this blog. Rather it is a statement of fact: the state no longer has the powers it needs to keep the lights on for its citizens.It’s not for lack of trying. Take the first new nuclear plant to be built in the UK, scheduled for completion some time in the mid 2020s at Hinkley Point in Somerset. The government has had to guarantee the operator of this plant a minimum price of £92.50 per megawatt hour, inflation linked, for 35 years. Similar prices have had to be provided to renewable energy companies to support their investment. Yet every year the margin of safety seems to fall.It appears the private sector doesn’t want to take the risk on the long term returns a power station might provide. The government doesn’t seem to be able to offer sufficient guarantees to the private sector to make it attractive. And even when it does, it faces challenges over state aid rules.None of the scenarios for future energy produced recently by National Grid suggest the construction of more than one gas turbine plant. There’s notionally more nuclear capacity planned but only one of National Grid’s scenarios shows anything like the total capacity proposed being available. It seems likely that only a couple of these stations will be completed and most likely not before their predecessors are due to be shut down.So where’s the light at the end of the tunnel? Who is going to build the generating capacity to keep the lights on?Firstly, it’s bad news for the Telegraph: wind power walked away with the biggest subsidies in the recent ‘Contracts for Difference’ auction, meaning new on and offshore plants will be constructed. But this only accounts for about 2GW of capacity, and I estimate we’re losing more than ten times that between 2012 and 2023. The total budget for the CfD programme (around £325m) is a fraction of what might be needed to support this scale of generation.What’s going to make up the difference?Well we already import energy from Europe. And most scenarios produced by National Grid recently suggest this will continue.But the big increases? It looks like it’s going to have to come from us folks: small scale generation. Combined heat and power. Community waste projects. Solar panels on your roof and batteries in your basement(Elon Musk will be delighted). And, of course, the continuing decline in demand.This all presents a big challenge for the grid, which wasn’t designed for energy storage or distributed generation and will need major investment to transform. A level of investment the private sector will bear? That’s a post for another day.

Could Corrie Cause a Blackout?

Surprise surprise, our national generating capacity is a little shy of what it should be. This winter even with contingency plans activated, we will only be producing 6% more electricity than we consume. That’s not a great margin for error. Three years ago the figure was 17%.To put this into context, a popular episode of Eastenders or Corrie can cause power consumption to spike by around 4.5% of the currently estimated peak capacity for winter (53.6 Gigawatts). I’m not suggesting for a second that the National Grid haven’t thought of this, or that blackouts are actually likely — most experts agree they are not.But still: a single-digit margin for error on one of the most crucial resources to our physical well being, national security and economic activity is not exactly reassuring.

No blackouts...yet

The National Grid has known for some years that this situation would arise, as is shown in this slide deck from 2009: https://www.exeter.ac.uk/few/2009/documents/presentations09/lewis_dale.pdf. What this also shows is the level of work required just to keep the lights on — literally. What it doesn’t show is that the very principles on which our national energy infrastructure is built are wrong.180 or so large power stations and a giant grid to distribute the power they generate is an outdated model for this century. Domestic energy consumption has been falling slowly but steadily for the last few years, in part due to the economic downturn but also thanks to increasingly efficient homes and appliances. We can now generate an increasing proportion of our needs in a distributed fashion through solar and wind. What we need is a grid that supports our increasingly distributed generation and low energy needs.

Turbine whine

There’s a lot of whining about renewable energy sources. Wind turbines are ugly. Solar panels aren’t as efficient as promoted. Blah blah blah. The debate sounds very much like the current one about the Human Rights Act. Who’d want to protect those, right? And who’d want a source of energy that renewed itself? That sounds like a terrible idea…The economics of renewables are undeniable — particularly solar. All around the world solar energy generation is overtaking fossil fuels in cost effectiveness. Whatever your opinion on the matter, renewable energy sources are winning the fact war. Though it will be a long time until they are the whole story, to bet against them over that long term is plain daft.Given that this is clear to anyone willing to look at the evidence, we should be making our bets as a nation there. Investing in a grid that supports distributed generation and particularly storage: the challenge of renewables is that you can’t spin them up when you want them like a generator, so we need means of storing energy — again in a distributed fashion. The answer could be batteries, it could be flywheels, it could be something we haven’t invented yet: a healthy dose of investment here would be very, very wise both for national security and international competitiveness.With every home and enterprise in the country contributing its roof space to energy generation, and a sensible investment programme in the grid, we would have cheap, secure power for years to come. And no worries about whether one too many mid-Corrie cuppas would take the country offline.