France to spend 30B Euros per year to move to renewables

France unveils ambitious energy bill for greener nation

Some quotes:

Yahoo said:

France on Wednesday unveiled a much-anticipated bill to reduce the country's dependency on nuclear energy and fossil fuels, after months of intense debate over one of the Socialist government's pet projects.

The planned law, presented to the cabinet by energy and environment minister Segolene Royal, seeks to make France a greener country and reduce the nation's energy bill.

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As with Germany, I wonder if it makes sense to transition so quickly. It seems like making a more modest investment allows one to plow the savings back into further investment in future years. The good news in France is that they have significantly more solar resources than Germany.

Yahoo said:

Experts estimate it will cost the country between 15 and 30 billion euros in investments every year until the so-called "energy transition" is completed.

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Someone has to pay that bill. We'll see if energy-intensive businesses cry foul as they have in Germany.

Interestingly, part of the plan is to move away from nuclear:

Yahoo said:

It also looks to reduce France's huge dependency on nuclear energy for electricity from 75 percent to 50 percent -- one of Hollande's campaign promises -- and to increase the use of renewables.

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But this can only be good for the Fluence and other Renault EVs!

Good news from France - thanks.

They are moving into the Third Industrial Revolution as well in harmony with Germany and the entire EU.

They're forced to reduce their nuke generation as they are no longer as reliable as they were on a cooler planet - it's harder to find enough cool water to feed the nukes, or to find a place to release hot water into the environment without cooking living things.

I hope they replace fossil fuels first - any cash saved by not buying oil, gas, or coal locks-in long term savings.


http://www.euractiv.com/innovation-enterprise/35-plan-third-industrial-revolut-news-530438
http://www.nordpasdecalaisthethirdindustrialrevolution.com/
http://www.thethirdindustrialrevolution.com/masterPlan.cfm
http://www.english.rfi.fr/economy/2...road-initiatives-improve-industry-create-jobs

French Nukes = Blackouts and Jellyfish?!
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2003/aug/13/france.internationalnews

In some regions, river water levels have dropped so low that the vital cooling process has become impossible, while elsewhere the water temperatures after the cooling process have exceeded environmental safety levels.

An exceptional exemption from the legal requirements was granted to six nuclear reactors and a number of conventional power stations, allowing them to discharge water one degree hotter than normal.

In another attempt to conserve energy for the nation, France, which is Europe's main electricity exporter, cut its power exports by more than half yesterday.

The environment minister, Roselyne Bachelot, said "sizeable blackouts" were still possible and called on consumers to cut back consumption. Air conditioning at her ministry was switched off as an example.

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http://www.forbes.com/sites/ceciliarodriguez/2012/07/19/the-jellyfish-are-attacking-or-are-they/

I miss France's high-speed trains...

AndyH said:

They're forced to reduce their nuke generation as they are no longer as reliable as they were on a cooler planet - it's harder to find enough cool water to feed the nukes, or to find a place to release hot water into the environment without cooking living things.

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:lol: :lol:

That's not remotely the issue with nuclear!

'A move away from nuclear' and 'a move to renewables' appears hopelessly misguided to me, and is driven purely by politics, not engineering nor environment. As mentioned, it was driven by a political pledge, not an environmental concern (at least, not directly).

But do bear in mind that they are still 'only' moving back to 50% nuclear (from 80~85% I think you'll actually find). Still so far ahead of anyone else that they are still the masters of that technology.

RegGuheert said:

But this can only be good for the Fluence and other Renault EVs!

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85% nuclear electricity was/is already good for that. Moving away is retrograde. Anyhow, no good for Fluence ZE anymore, they have stopped making it. They didn't bother advertising it, virtually no-one had heard of it, and when Betterplace failed they 'pulled the plug' (which has even more meaning for BEVs than usual!!).

They really messed that up. Fluence would arguably be the best EV out there if they put rapid charging in it, and it would sell if they actually bothered to advertise it, and maybe sell 'with' battery as most people seem to want.

I'm still trying to get my head around 30B Euros PER YEAR.

If we just take solar PV as an example, what does one year of 30B Euros buy you?

- A 10 GW PV array, grid-tied, maybe a bit more or less

How much electricty would such an array produce each year:

- Approximately 15 TWh per year.

Since France consumes approximately 600 TWh/year, that would equate to 2.5% of consumption.

O.K. I guess they could do that for a couple years before they started to overload the grid. Of course it won't all be PV.

Hopefully EVs are an important part of the mix, but I don't get the impression that Europe is purchasing many EVs today, even with the high cost of petrol. Is electricity very expensive, as well?

donald said:

AndyH said:

They're forced to reduce their nuke generation as they are no longer as reliable as they were on a cooler planet - it's harder to find enough cool water to feed the nukes, or to find a place to release hot water into the environment without cooking living things.

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:lol: :lol:

That's not remotely the issue with nuclear!

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Didn't you know that warm water from nuclear power plants is bad? BAD!!!

I guess animals down here didn't get the message.

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2011-12/nuclear-plants-cooling-canals-help-save-endangered-florida-crocodiles" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Weatherman said:

Didn't you know that warm water from nuclear power plants is bad? BAD!!!

I guess animals down here didn't get the message.

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2011-12/nuclear-plants-cooling-canals-help-save-endangered-florida-crocodiles" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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Agreed. And all thermal power plants that use water for cooling create the same type of "thermal pollution". The temperature rise in cooling lakes can be rather dramatic.

RegGuheert said:

Weatherman said:

Didn't you know that warm water from nuclear power plants is bad? BAD!!!

I guess animals down here didn't get the message.

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2011-12/nuclear-plants-cooling-canals-help-save-endangered-florida-crocodiles" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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Agreed. And all thermal power plants that use water for cooling create the same type of "thermal pollution". The temperature rise in cooling lakes can be rather dramatic.

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I guess you didn't catch the sarcasm. The warm water generated by the Turkey Point plant is South Florida is good. The plant is right next to Biscayne Bay National Park and a lot of animals hang around near the plant during the winter because the water is warm. If you wish to call it "pollution", I guess a lot of animals like the "pollution". An this is in a tropical location, where the surrounding water is already quite warm.

Weatherman said:

I guess you didn't catch the sarcasm. The warm water generated by the Turkey Point plant is South Florida is good. The plant is right next to Biscayne Bay National Park and a lot of animals hang around near the plant during the winter because the water is warm. If you wish to call it "pollution", I guess a lot of animals like the "pollution". An this is in a tropical location, where the surrounding water is already quite warm.

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I didn't.

Generally I agree that warming is good, but the amount of warming from a power plant can be quite significant. I suppose some wildlife like that. I assume some don't, but I could be wrong...

donald said:

AndyH said:

They're forced to reduce their nuke generation as they are no longer as reliable as they were on a cooler planet - it's harder to find enough cool water to feed the nukes, or to find a place to release hot water into the environment without cooking living things.

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:lol: :lol:

That's not remotely the issue with nuclear!

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Actually Donald it's a very real 'issue' with nuclear and all other thermal generation for a variety of reasons.

Global warming and it's handmaiden ocean acidification are resulting in an environment deadly to many fish and shellfish but is a perfect environment for jellyfish. Nukes in the US and Europe have had to either throttle back or shut down because jellyfish were restricting cooling water intakes.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/01/jellyfish-clog-swedish-nuclear-reactor-shutdown
http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/jellyfish-are-clogging-up-nuclear-power-plants-around-the-world

Global warming's droughts are reducing the volume of water available to cool power plants. When water's available, the cooling lakes that worked just fine in the 1950s can't provide enough cool water for the plant to continue to operate at 100%. In other areas, extreme flooding has forced power plant shut-down.

http://www.citizen.org/documents/HotNukesFactsheet.pdf
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/impacts-adaptation/energy.html
http://www.climatecentral.org/news/...lnerable-to-global-warming-related-cooling-wa
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warmin...e-change-risks-on-our-electricity-system.html


Back to France - you might have noticed the point in the article that nuclear power is no longer as reliable as it once was - things have to change as our engineers are still designing for the old planet but 21st century power plants are operating on Eaarth.

I can't speak for the screw-ups that the US creates for itself, but any such problems you're describing are not with nuclear power, it is to do with where you put the stations, planning and water management.

Could there be lakes that have dried up so you don't get enough water cooling without significant heat build-up? Sure. It might even be due to climate issues and reduced rainfall. That is no reason to back away from nuclear power, it is a reason to move your power station, and probably change the operating method.

RegGuheert said:

I'm still trying to get my head around 30B Euros PER YEAR.

If we just take solar PV as an example, what does one year of 30B Euros buy you?

- A 10 GW PV array, grid-tied, maybe a bit more or less

How much electricty would such an array produce each year:

- Approximately 15 TWh per year.

Since France consumes approximately 600 TWh/year, that would equate to 2.5% of consumption.

O.K. I guess they could do that for a couple years before they started to overload the grid. Of course it won't all be PV.

Hopefully EVs are an important part of the mix, but I don't get the impression that Europe is purchasing many EVs today, even with the high cost of petrol. Is electricity very expensive, as well?

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The study I posted elsewhere,

http://theicct.org/sites/default/files/publications/ICCT_EV-fiscal-incentives_20140506.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Shows the average cost of gas and electricity as well as four-year TCOs for Renault Zoes and Clios (gas equivalent). France has the least expensive electricity of any European country listed, 0.15 Euros/kWh. Even so, the study shows that even including all subsidies and costs, the gas Clio has a four year TCO about 900 euros less than the Zoe. By comparison, the two European countries with the highest electricity costs are Denmark and Germany, at 0.30 and 0.27 Euros/kWh respectively; I don't doubt that their high % of renewables and subsidies for same is responsible for that. Incentives aren't as good in Germany, so the four-year TCO advantage for the Clio is almost 8,350 Euros.

For comparison using the same conditions, the Clio also has a TCO advantage in California that looks to be about the same as in France, although I believe the 10,000 km (6,210 miles) yearly driving mileage assumed in the study for all countries/states is probably too low an average for California. I would guess 8,000 miles would be closer to average here, and maybe even 10,000, but don't have the data handy to back it up. The LEAF's avg. Ca. or even U.S. mileage would do.

AndyH said:

Global warming's droughts are reducing the volume of water available to cool power plants.

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I have no doubt that some plants must close when there are droughts. Fortunately, the proportion of the globe in drought has been going down over the past three decades:


Color scheme: D0 (yellow) = abnormally dry; D1 (orange) = moderate drought, D4 (red) is extreme drought.

From this paper published in the Nature publication Scientific Data on March 11, 2014.

AndyH said:

In other areas, extreme flooding has forced power plant shut-down.

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No increase in U.S. flooding since 1950:

donald said:

I can't speak for the screw-ups that the US creates for itself, but any such problems you're describing are not with nuclear power, it is to do with where you put the stations, planning and water management.

Could there be lakes that have dried up so you don't get enough water cooling without significant heat build-up? Sure. It might even be due to climate issues and reduced rainfall. That is no reason to back away from nuclear power, it is a reason to move your power station, and probably change the operating method.

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I didn't say anyone should 'back away' from functioning plants as long as they're functioning today and can continue to be until their licenses expire. The point of the article and many links is that can no longer be assumed. Texas, for example, has a mix of coal, gas, nuclear, hydro, solar, and wind. The thermal plants are cooled from rivers and ponds. We've had significant de-rating and/or shut-downs from the full mix of problems - not enough water in the rivers, output flow too hot for the environment, ponds too hot, etc. During those times the only thing that's saved our butts is our wind and solar.

Some of the power plants have adapted by moving from once-through cooling (intake from and expelling into rivers) to cooling towers - this works but increased the cost of electricity because it was a retrofit. Wind and solar is cheap - band-aids to keep coal, gas, and nukes operating past their design life are not.

Plants in operation today were designed using data that's at least 25 years old - and even plants being built right now are using yesterday's data - I can't find a single study, report, or mandate from any US state that requires them to look FORWARD to prepare the power plants for the 25-50 years period in which they'll be operating. If anyone else can I'd very much like to see the data.

http://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/s...prone-texas-a-threat-to-the-energy-supply.ece
http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/8/4/045033/article

In my experience as a grid operator, more renewables require more flexible generation which nuclear is not known for in this industry. Nukes are designed to run near full output almost all the time (at least in the US, France does have load following units). This goes up against the variable nature of wind power and solar power (to a lesser degree). Combined cycle natural gas is highly efficient, flexible, and the fuel happens to be inexpensive right now which is why that is the more predominate traditional form of generation being installed today.

Weatherman said:

RegGuheert said:

Weatherman said:

Didn't you know that warm water from nuclear power plants is bad? BAD!!!

I guess animals down here didn't get the message.

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2011-12/nuclear-plants-cooling-canals-help-save-endangered-florida-crocodiles" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Click to expand...

Agreed. And all thermal power plants that use water for cooling create the same type of "thermal pollution". The temperature rise in cooling lakes can be rather dramatic.

Click to expand...

I guess you didn't catch the sarcasm. The warm water generated by the Turkey Point plant is South Florida is good. The plant is right next to Biscayne Bay National Park and a lot of animals hang around near the plant during the winter because the water is warm. If you wish to call it "pollution", I guess a lot of animals like the "pollution". An this is in a tropical location, where the surrounding water is already quite warm.

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No, a "lot" of animals do not like it when the water's too hot. Some just die. Others can live just fine in warmer water but cannot reproduce because of the temperature. Water temperature can sometimes also be a problem when downstream water users include agriculture.

I guess we could move the nation's thermal generation to Florida. That way, folks wouldn't have to risk being bitten when they gathered their day's supply of parboiled croc.