In the 15 (-ish) years I've hung around this sink of... *ahem* *ahem* Why am I here anyway? ;-) I've almost never started a thread. This arises out of a discussion (argument!) with a Fb friend. I thought it might exercise some intellects (or verbiage, at least... :p ) here... Jim, by the by, is the chap whose post provoked the response. His original post was anti-nuclear, anti-Hinckley. It had 7 points; point 7 was the same as point 6 (7 being we don't know how to decommission - yes we do; we don't know how to deal with the waste; which was point 6). Point 6 I allowed; the rest I told him were either highly dubious / arguable or not allowed because they weren't unique to the nuclear power industry.

Baseload

This comes not just from a post of Jim's, but because someone else said something recently about incipient energy storage technology. Baseload power is your "always on". If you wake up in the middle of the night & flick the light on... That's baseload, right there. There are fluctuations in demand (remember all those stories about a surge in demand when the kettles go on at half/full-time / end of Dr Who?), but there has to be enough power generation available that the lights never go off. Even when they're off! If you see what I mean.

Now, Jim's post was about nuclear energy, and (I suppose) about the planned new Hinckley plant. And Jim, most definitely, is anti-Hinckley. I'm not pro-nuclear, myself. But I am pro-baseload. My view of human history is that, essentially, we are all about energy thresholds. We started out as hunter-gatherers. At some point, we sort-of learnt that fire could be harnessed. It was, perhaps, the first threshold, but a very small one. Control was erratic, knowledge was erratic; to the species as a whole, it made precious little difference, even on an evolutionary timescale.

The REAL first step was agriculture. Suddenly, there is a lot more personal energy available. We have more to eat, we don't simply follow the herds / whatever in small family groups. We stay in one place & we farm.Population expands, civilisation (such as it is) begins. The second step very quickly follows – animal husbandry. We start to domesticate. Some of those animals are food animals. Some of those animals help us look after our food (dogs & cats). Some of those animals help us produce more (ploughs, beasts of burden). And so on & so forth.

Work out your own steps. Mechanical power was probably the next one – Archimedes' Screw, Mill wheels & windmills. The Industrial Revolution the next – not just steam engines & the like, but systematic, scientific improvements in food production as well as industrial. Then the Infernal Combustion engine. I mean, of course, the utilisation of oil & gas; more energy dense & convenient than coal. And then you get to nuclear... Well, fission nuclear isn't really a step. It hasn't added much to the energy pool, just another way of filling it. Same as renewables (so far) haven't added anything to the pool. The next step is nuclear FUSION. Yet to be conquered...

All of which is a lengthy preamble. We are, I think, on a cusp right now. We still NEED baseload. Our world demands it. Renewables (which aren't as green as some people think) can't supply it. The sun doesn't shine at night, the wind doesn't always blow, the tide... Well, actually, you can make use of it both ways, but it doesn't always flow fast enough in either direction.

So we need, still, baseload. Yet fossil fuels are evil (all that CO2!), nuclear is evil (need I say more), energy storage is the future! Well, yes, it is. The advances in technology are such that it's a pretty good bet that over the next half-century or so, we'll master the art of storing that pesky, intermittent renewable stuff, so that our need for baseload... Well, only stabilises, probably. We live in an energy-hungry world that grows ever more ravenous. I've got me doubts about whether we can ever do away with old-skool, always on baseload plants!

But, in theory, renewable energy & battery / energy technology more than fill the need / gap until fusion power is mastered (which, very definitely, is the next leap). The problem is, of course, that energy storage tech isn't here NOW. How long will it take? We'll have good energy storage tech in the next decade or so? So say some... And if we don't? If it takes 20, 40, 80 years? Bearing in mind the energy ravenous world we live in, how long will it take storage tech and renewables to catch up? Also bearing in mind, of course, that renewable energy tech also grows more efficient as time goes by... Jim's argument is that it is "criminal irresponsibility of the highest order" to go ahead with building new nuclear plants.

Really? I can't agree. It would be criminally irresponsible to assume that energy storage technology will provide an economic, viable (never mind ecologically justifiable) solution to our energy needs now or soon. Energy infrastructure, be it conventional or nuclear, is not built in a day, any more than Rome was. I favour renewables (and fusion), as anyone one sane & sensible presumably does. But you can't make a plan for the next 30 years (which is "short term" in power terms) on the basis that "It'll be alright, renewables & energy storage will be sorted by then". What if they're not? Will you be sticking your hand up, saying "I'm sorry about the brown / black- outs, I'm sorry your freezer is defrosting; oh dear, I'm going to die shortly because the various hospital gizmos I'm connected to have just switched off for lack of power"? Yes, Jim, I'm looking at you. :p

In short, we still need baseload power. Energy storage will eventually reduce / remove the need for it, but it isn't here now, none of the green lobby actually knows what the environmental cost of it is anyway, and we are majorly, majorly screwed, as a world, without sufficient power. So power plants have to be built now to cover the needs of the next few decades.

Which do you LEAST prefer? Fossil fuel plants? Or (allegedly) carbon-neutral nuclear? I'm willing to bet that whatever your choice is, you really don't want to go back to horse & cart and candles...