"Paul M. Eldridge" wrote:

On Sun, 20 Apr 2008 12:44:13 -0400, Marissa Payton
wrote:

"Paul M. Eldridge" wrote:

On Sun, 20 Apr 2008 12:09:29 -0400, Marissa Payton
wrote:

What a crazy idea, producing electricity from plants that release Mercury!!
Mercury from thermometers, CFLs, old thermostat switches, etc. goes into the
environment in the form of landfill leachate or incinerator releases. That's
assuming the bulbs are not broken first, including dropped on your kitchen floor.

Hi Marissa,

I'm not sure how to interpret what you've just said. Are you
suggesting coal-fired generating plants do not release mercury into
the atmosphere, or are you saying that it's foolish for us to be
burning coal to generate electricity because of these emissions? Can
you clarify this for me?

Ideally it would make sense to follow the lead of countries such as France, who make
almost all of their electricity without burning any fossil fuels. But the US has
reversed its (temporary) earlier leadership in this area and continues to depend more
and more on fossil fuels, including coal.

Burning coal isn't optimal, but newer technologies can at least remove major
pollutants, including mercury. Unfortuanately a lot of plants are old and emit a lot
more mercury than newer technology plants. Public policy that permits these emissions
and does not discourage them to phase out is bad public policy. Unfortunately US
energy policy has been bad public policy for decades and no relief is in sight during
my lifetime.

Thanks. I agree with much of what you say but I would caution that
France's near total dependency upon nuclear power places that country
at enormous risk should a common fault emerge with their reactor
design. Ontario's experience with its CANDU reactors has been a
decidedly mixed bag and I'm trying hard to be kind here. As someone
who in a previous (half-)live worked in the regulatory field, I've
witnessed enough to convince me that nuclear does not always live up
to its promise.

The common reactor design risk is certainly a good point. Originally France was designing
gas cooled reactors and built quite a few. The agressive design didn't meet the needs for
reliability and efficiency. Eventually they threw in the towel and started
hiring/licensing Westinghouse Company pressurized light water technology, which is the same
(darn close to) most PWRs in the United States.

The French engineers didn't just sit around after deploying the current generation, and
have been actively designing the next (third) generation of reactors using their
experience. They are building one now in Bretagne/Brittany and it will have much for
capacity and efficiency than the second generation. So I think the common design risk is
mitigated by usingn proven designs and learning from them before duplicating en masse.

The Canadian CANDU design is very interesting because it doesn't require uranium enrichment
for electricity generation (take that, Iran!) at the expense of using heavy water. India
was licensing the design/expertiese for a while before they just said thanks, we'll take
it from here.