Electric Car Economics

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by S/V Adeline

The problem with nuclear, which should be obvious but apparently is being overlooked by many here, is that it is radioactive and kills you.
...
3 Mile Island, Chernobyl, Japan... it's like russian roulette on grand scale. It's only a matter of time

That's a sad story and I'm of course sorry for what you went through. And it underscores that we cannot be cavalier or careless with any aspect of nuclear energy.

But the numbers clearly show that per watt generated, and even counting Chernobyl, Fukushima, fossil fuel is still several orders of magnitude more lethal than nuclear to generate with.


We need energy. Nuclear power has too many good points to ignore.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

The problem with taxes that are multiples of the cost of the product itself is several fold, but first where does the tax go? Don’t tell me how it will be spent for lofty goals because I can name all kind of examples to show you it won’t be.
Then by excessively taxing a product what about the companies who in good faith have spent billions to produce enormous quantities to satisfy the demand.
They aren’t stupid, they could easily have played like the Arabs in the 70’s and not spent those Billions to increase production and instead just let the price escalate, and probably made more money.
Would have wrecked the economy though, small problem there.

You have any idea what a more than 300% increase in fuel costs would do to the cost of well, everything, everything food included burned fuel to produce it and fuel to transport it.
You would instantly be in a recession, guaranteed.
So what you would have is enormously complex government subsidies for farmers, public transportation and Lord only knows what, every single politician would have his favorite poster child that needed subsidies.
CAFE isn’t silly or intrusive, and yes it would reward companies that primarily produce cars that use less fuel, isn’t that exactly the point?

It was working, history proves it was working, but exempting Pick up trucks and SUV’s from CAFE and gas guzzler tax is exactly why they are so popular in the US. That and big, expensive cars have a higher profit margin, and before you slam Detroit look up the numbers, the biggest, heaviest and least efficient SUV’s are not US vehicles they are Japanese.

Look here to see which vehicles pay a guzzler tax and the BS reason why some do not.
https://www.epa.gov/fueleconomy/gas-guzzler-tax

So CAFE and the gas guzzler tax is still alive and it works, but was castrated by making SUV’s and Pick up trucks exempt.
So do you have to ask why these two extremely inefficient vehicles are the most popular?
The answer is simple, don’t make them exempt. Make them play by the same rules as all other vehicles, and then watch and see how long they remain so popular.
Your not punishing them, just making them play by the same rules is all.

Taxing anything is hazardous, and also MORALLY hazardous. I'm a libertarian; acutely conscious of these hazards.


You have to be careful with it, and you are absolutely right about the hazards with regard to companies who invested billions in producing something which everyone needs.



But it is also not right to allow the commons to be used for free, or damaged, and allowing people to spew carbon and pollution into the atmosphere causes a cost that everyone pays, whether they drive or not. Carefully taxing this is the right thing to do.



CAFE merely penalizes companies which happen to only make bigger cars, without changing the behavior of companies who happen to make small cars. It is truly a silly approach; just window dressing as far as I can see, particularly with the absurd exemption of SUVs and pickups.



Taxing fuel won't destroy the economy if it is done carefully, without big shocks, and without overdoing it. Most of the world pays 3x or 4x more for fuel than Americans do, and get along just fine. They make different choices -- like not driving a 3 tonne SUV to the corner to buy milk -- like driving more reasonable cars, like living closer to work, like using public transport more, like INVESTING in excellent public transport, etc etc etc, choices which incidentally mean that Finnish people, for example, emit 4x less carbon than Americans do, per capita. I mention Finns not only because I happen to spend a lot of time there, but Finns like Americans love wide open spaces and fishing and hunting and many of them have country houses even if they live mostly in a city. So cannot live by public transport alone and have similar needs to Americans.



Where do the taxes go? Good question. I am not generally in favor of shovelling windfalls to the government to add to bloat and waste (starve the beast is a better policy as far as I'm concerned), but part of the policy making can be to designate specifically what the tax money can be used for. In many countries, fuel taxes are used specifically for roads and to fund public transport.



Can also be used to fund a needed tax cut somewhere else. Corporate income taxes in Finland, for example, are half of what corporations pay in the U.S. -- word to the wise.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by S/V Adeline

The problem with nuclear, which should be obvious but apparently is being overlooked by many here, is that it is radioactive and kills you.
As OTR drivers who cleared all the background checks to haul for the US military and nuclear services, my wife and I learned to hate it.
I supplied many loads (12 enriched weapons grade rods, 6 matching sets per load) to several of the nuclear power plants in the north east states. Two in NY I visited many times. Sometimes we would have multiple trucks at once, all delivering, no picking up 'spent' rods as it was at that time illegal to transport them to the storage caves out west... all the spent rods being stored in the cooling ponds on site at the reactors. Two rods in use, how many waiting for use? How many in the cooling ponds 'spent'? Three of us delivered 36 rods in one day to the same reactor plant....

Do some math and think if ANYTHING goes wrong at just one site.

Not to mention we were responsible for making sure nobody got cozy near our truck. Paying attention no pregnant women got near us if we stopped at a restroom.

After several years trying to have a child, and giving up, we found out she was pregnant one week after hauling to Peach Bottom. It was our first nuclear load. GE said if they even suspected she was pregnant they would have never let her in the yard. The doctor said our baby never stood a chance.

Good thing those rods are sealed in containers guaranteed to contain the contents. Yeah, right

Sorry, I am bitter. $10,000 medical bills, losing our child, knowing first hand (now) just how much radioactive material is around me on the road and surprisingly in major cities and I know how unsafe it is.

3 Mile Island, Chernobyl, Japan... it's like russian roulette on grand scale. It's only a matter of time

I'm awfully sorry to hear your story, which is really awful.


But this is not inherent to nuclear power. Nuclear fuel can be transported without unreasonable exposure of truck drivers or people around, and I've never heard about a case like yours. Exposing people to that kind of radiation is certainly illegal today, if it was not back then.



You say "it's only a matter of time", but the world has been using nuclear power commercially for more than 60 years by now, generating presently 10% of worldwide consumption, and even with the technology in its infancy, including safety technology, nuclear power accidents have killed less people, over 60 years, than get killed in coal mines every year, and we don't even get into the lives which have been shortened by breathing the combustion products of coal power plants. As the world has gained experience and technology has advanced, nuclear power has become even much safer.

[Belezar]

Dockhead is correct. Taxing anything is morally hazardous. But we live in a society, which needs funding. Taxes are ultimately the funding source for our spending, and are really just a set of incentives.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

That's a sad story and I'm of course sorry for what you went through. And it underscores that we cannot be cavalier or careless with any aspect of nuclear energy.

But the numbers clearly show that per watt generated, and even counting Chernobyl, Fukushima, fossil fuel is still several orders of magnitude more lethal than nuclear to generate with.


We need energy. Nuclear power has too many good points to ignore.

The quoted article usefully underlines how deadly fossil fuel burning is. Putting aside climate change, there are several other good reasons to transition away from fossil fuels as soon as reasonably practical.


Nuclear power is incredibly safe compared to coal, oil, or even natural gas. Nuclear power -- even with Chernobyl and Fukushima -- is almost twice as safe as even wind power, and 5 times safer than solar.



We have to continue improving the safety of it, particularly dealing with the waste, and we have to be awfully careful not to let nuclear material fall into the hands of bad actors, but every coal or oil or natural gas powerplant replaced with a nuclear one is a vast boon in terms of safety, health, and climate. The world needs more of it, as enlightened countries like Finland and Sweden have figured out in a big way.

[Lake-Effect]

In case anyone needs more reasons for moving away from fossil fuels:

Impact of air pollution on health may be far worse than thought, study suggests

[S/V Adeline]

My comments were not posted to derail the thread, nor were they intended as a 'sad story' in any way. My apologies if that is how it came across.
My point was regardless of 'cleanliness numbers', you are only swapping one disaster for another.
In 1986 our teacher brought in a geiger counter and we measured the ionized radiation. Natural radiation is everywhere, however, the increase in detection when the device was aimed towards Chernobyl was eye opening. (first true complete memory I have using lat/long, bearings, compass headings on a global scale)
As with everything, it's all good, until it isn't.

Having seen and inspected a hydrogen fuel cell I can't understand why people are not pushing for advancements in that field. Working models suggest they would be the perfect solution.

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by S/V Adeline

... 3 Mile Island, Chernobyl, Japan... it's like russian roulette on grand scale. It's only a matter of time

I'm so sorry for your travails, Adeline.


Although nuclear power is one of the cleanest and most efficient methods of energy production, it also poses great environmental risks.
The NRX reactor in Chalk River holds the distinction of having the world’s first meltdown of a nuclear reactor.
In 1952, a loss of coolant caused uranium rods to overheat. This resulted in a massive hydrogen explosion and the leakage of tonnes of radioactive water. Future president Jimmy Carter took part in the clean up operation as a U.S. Navy officer.

Canada’s NRX reactor began operating, at Chalk River in 1947, to produce plutonium for the United States weapons program. In 1952, the world’s first nuclear reactor meltdown took place at AECL’s Chalk River site.
The NRX reactor underwent a violent power excursion that destroyed the core of the reactor, causing some fuel melting. The shut-off rods failed to fully descend into the core. A series of hydrogen gas (steam) explosions hurled the four-ton gasholder dome four feet through the air, where it jammed in the superstructure.
Thousands of curies of fission products were released into the atmosphere, and a million gallons of radioactively contaminated water had to be pumped out of the basement and 'disposed of' in shallow sandy trenches not far from the Ottawa River. The core of the NRX reactor could not be decontaminated, and had to be buried as radioactive waste

A second reactor accident took place in 1958, when an irradiated fuel rod caught fire. Several metallic uranium fuel rods in the NRU reactor overheated and ruptured inside the reactor core. One of the damaged rods caught fire and was torn in two as it was being removed from the core by a robotic crane. As the remote-controlled crane passed overhead, carrying the larger portion of the damaged rod, a three-foot length of fiercely burning uranium fuel broke off and fell into a shallow maintenance pit. The burning fuel lay there, spreading deadly fission products and alpha-emitting particles throughout the reactor building. The ventilation system was jammed in the 'open' position, thereby contaminating the accessible areas of the building as well as a sizable area downwind from the reactor site. A relay team of scientists and technicians eventually extinguished the fire by running past the maintenance pit at top speed wearing full protective gear, dumping buckets of wet sand on the burning uranium fuel.

Those wastes are still at Chalk River. Radioactive particles have half-lives of up to millions of years

MUCH More ➥ https://ottawacitizen.com/news/chalk...4-1e4416fbacfc

And ➥ https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottaw...tice-1.4369187

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by S/V Adeline

My comments were not posted to derail the thread, nor were they intended as a 'sad story' in any way. My apologies if that is how it came across.

Your story is relevant and not any kind of derailing.

Originally Posted by S/V Adeline

My point was regardless of 'cleanliness numbers', you are only swapping one disaster for another.
In 1986 our teacher brought in a geiger counter and we measured the ionized radiation. Natural radiation is everywhere, however, the increase in detection when the device was aimed towards Chernobyl was eye opening. (first true complete memory I have using lat/long, bearings, compass headings on a global scale)
As with everything, it's all good, until it isn't.

The cumulative long term health effects of Chernobyl are considered in the safety statistics. It is fairly well known how much radiation causes what damage to health; ironically (see previous post) this is better understood than the effects of air pollution from fossil fuel burning. Even if we had another Chernobyl every single year, the total health effects would still be less than the world's coal burning. That's the whole point. But we don't have a Chernobyl every year and we are unlikely to have another one.

Originally Posted by S/V Adeline

Having seen and inspected a hydrogen fuel cell I can't understand why people are not pushing for advancements in that field. Working models suggest they would be the perfect solution.

A perfect solution to what? Where are you going to get the hydrogen? Most hydrogen today is a produced by steam reforming methane, so basically breaking natural gas down into hydrogen and CO2, a hugely carbon intensive process which will go away when we stop using fossil fuels. The other way to make it is with electrolysis, and for that you need electrical power generated somehow. Hydrogen is better thought of as a battery, in competition with lithium, not as a source of primary energy. It is certainly not an alternative to nuclear, wind, and solar.


As an alternative to lithium, hydrogen has some big advantages and maybe we'll see it in cars. BMW and Hyundai have invested a lot into hydrogen vehicles. But if we have a big technological breakthrough and see a lot of hydrogen powered cars, we will need nuclear plants to generate the power to make the hydrogen.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by GordMay

I'm so sorry for your travails, Adeline.


Although nuclear power is one of the cleanest and most efficient methods of energy production, it also poses great environmental risks.
The NRX reactor in Chalk River holds the distinction of having the world’s first meltdown of a nuclear reactor.
In 1952, a loss of coolant caused uranium rods to overheat. This resulted in a massive hydrogen explosion and the leakage of tonnes of radioactive water. Future president Jimmy Carter took part in the clean up operation as a U.S. Navy officer.

Canada’s NRX reactor began operating, at Chalk River in 1947, to produce plutonium for the United States weapons program. In 1952, the world’s first nuclear reactor meltdown took place at AECL’s Chalk River site.
The NRX reactor underwent a violent power excursion that destroyed the core of the reactor, causing some fuel melting. The shut-off rods failed to fully descend into the core. A series of hydrogen gas (steam) explosions hurled the four-ton gasholder dome four feet through the air, where it jammed in the superstructure.
Thousands of curies of fission products were released into the atmosphere, and a million gallons of radioactively contaminated water had to be pumped out of the basement and 'disposed of' in shallow sandy trenches not far from the Ottawa River. The core of the NRX reactor could not be decontaminated, and had to be buried as radioactive waste

A second reactor accident took place in 1958, when an irradiated fuel rod caught fire. Several metallic uranium fuel rods in the NRU reactor overheated and ruptured inside the reactor core. One of the damaged rods caught fire and was torn in two as it was being removed from the core by a robotic crane. As the remote-controlled crane passed overhead, carrying the larger portion of the damaged rod, a three-foot length of fiercely burning uranium fuel broke off and fell into a shallow maintenance pit. The burning fuel lay there, spreading deadly fission products and alpha-emitting particles throughout the reactor building. The ventilation system was jammed in the 'open' position, thereby contaminating the accessible areas of the building as well as a sizable area downwind from the reactor site. A relay team of scientists and technicians eventually extinguished the fire by running past the maintenance pit at top speed wearing full protective gear, dumping buckets of wet sand on the burning uranium fuel.

Those wastes are still at Chalk River. Radioactive particles have half-lives of up to millions of years

MUCH More ➥ https://ottawacitizen.com/news/chalk...4-1e4416fbacfc

And ➥ https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottaw...tice-1.4369187

That's horrible, Gord, and should never be allowed to happen again.


But can you QUANTIFY that "great environmental risk" you are talking about? How much health damage was done by that horrible accident, compared to a year's worth of coal burning in Canada? How many people were killed? How many people died of cancer over the intervening decades?



Without numbers, it's just emotions, and emotions are not a good basis for making policy.

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

... Where are you going to get the hydrogen? Most hydrogen today is a produced by steam reforming methane, so basically breaking natural gas down into hydrogen and CO2, a hugely carbon intensive process, which will go away when we stop using fossil fuels. The other way to make it is with electrolysis, and for that you need electrical power generated somehow. Hydrogen is better thought of as a battery, in competition with lithium, not as a source of primary energy. It is certainly not an alternative to nuclear, wind, and solar...

Hydrogen can be produced using a number of different processes.
Thermochemical processes use heat and chemical reactions to release hydrogen from organic materials such as fossil fuels and biomass.
But, water (H2O) can also be split into hydrogen (H2) and oxygen (O2) using electrolysis, or solar energy.
And, microorganisms such as bacteria and algae can produce hydrogen through biological processes.
Hydrogen production, via electrolysis, may offer opportunities for synergy with variable power generation, which is characteristic of some renewable energy technologies.

For example, though the cost of wind power has continued to drop, the inherent variability of wind is an impediment to the extensive use of wind power. Hydrogen fuel and electric power generation could be integrated at a wind farm, allowing flexibility to shift production, to best match resource availability with system operational needs, and market factors. Also, in times of excess electricity production from wind farms, instead of curtailing the electricity as is commonly done, it is possible to use this excess electricity to produce hydrogen through electrolysis.

Direct solar water splitting, or photolytic, processes use light energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. These processes are currently in the very early stages of research but offer long-term potential for sustainable hydrogen production with low environmental impact.

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

That's horrible, Gord, and should never be allowed to happen again.

But can you QUANTIFY that "great environmental risk" you are talking about? How much health damage was done by that horrible accident, compared to a year's worth of coal burning in Canada? How many people were killed? How many people died of cancer over the intervening decades?

Without numbers, it's just emotions, and emotions are not a good basis for making policy.

Points taken.
What's, perhaps, most notable about the stories, is that almost nobody knows (or remembers) them. The world’s first nuclear reactor meltdown, and it remains (mostly) unknown.

[ctl411]

Originally Posted by S/V Adeline

My comments were not posted to derail the thread, nor were they intended as a 'sad story' in any way. My apologies if that is how it came across.
My point was regardless of 'cleanliness numbers', you are only swapping one disaster for another.
In 1986 our teacher brought in a geiger counter and we measured the ionized radiation. Natural radiation is everywhere, however, the increase in detection when the device was aimed towards Chernobyl was eye opening. (first true complete memory I have using lat/long, bearings, compass headings on a global scale)
As with everything, it's all good, until it isn't.

Having seen and inspected a hydrogen fuel cell I can't understand why people are not pushing for advancements in that field. Working models suggest they would be the perfect solution.

I went to a energy research lab years back. They studied alternative and fossil fuel systems. They had/have wind ,solar fuel cell and mini natural gas turbines.
The director of the labs take of the fuel cell was that it didn't respond to varied loads well. Does fine steady state.
May have improved in this regard.
Nuclear power has newer options being developed.
Bill Gates Netflix show goes into this a little.

[S/V Adeline]

The only reference I personally have to a hydrogen fuel cell was a unit that used water, seperation of the hydrogen atoms from the oxygen atom.
They were displayed and advertised to be available within 3-4 years at a unit price of around $7000 (generator sized unit designed to replace the $3800 diesel generator) They had working models.
That was in 2007, I'm still waiting.
As for nuclear services, I only hauled for 6 months. I delivered to the same reactor plant three times during those months. One specific time there were 3 trucks on the same day (6 matched rod sets per truck is 12 rods = 36 in one day)
That doesn't include the 4 rods in use (plant had two reactors) or the unknown to us number of spent rods in the cooling ponds.
How many total rods are on sight? A single meltdown involves two rods. I know it's unthinkable and that would never happen to us (cause we are so superior it seems) but what if...
Reactor goes critical and is unstoppable, unlikely but very possible(history proves this). Twin reactor is next door. Both have cooling ponds holding spent rods. 36 new rods ready for use on site (that specific day)
People believe it's safe because so far the worst has never happened. What would Chernobyl have been if there were 36 more rods involved?
There has never been a disaster of that scale and I hope there never is...but to discount the possibility is willfully being blind.
The space shuttle had multiple launches well below the design temperature specs of the o-rings. There was never a problem...until there was.

Why did I change jobs after only 6 months? Felt effects during every haul. Headaches, tingling extremities, queasy, fatigue, etc.
Regulations require no more than X amount of radiation be emitted forward, rearward, left, right, and upward within a specific amount of feet... notice any direction missing?

[a64pilot]

Doc it seems we mostly disagree only on CAFE, there are no companies that just happen to make bigger vehicles, there are companies that switched to bigger vehicles to increase profits, and if you remove these profits they will switch to whatever is more profitable.
The Japanese were the kings of smaller more efficient vehicles in the US and only switched to big SUV’s and Pickups because that is where the money is.
Reinstate CAFE and don’t allow any exclusions and we will return to smaller more efficient vehicles.
People that want and can pay for a Rolls Royce or Bentley can simply pay the guzzler tax, actually they already do, it’s only SUV’s and trucks that get the free ride.
But I don’t see surface mass transit working in the US outside of major metropolitan areas, and even there I’d expect to see self driving electric cabs, that you schedule the pickup and destination and payment via your cell phone.
When that day comes it will be foolish to own a private vehicle except for unusual circumstances.
I don’t know what the usage rate for private vehicles is, but I bet it’s not very high, and that’s inefficient.