Japan

[Typhoon]

Japan climbing in bed with Russia - From Kuriles with love


Russia, just next door to Japan, will take care of Japan's energy needs

and

China will be natural market for Japanese industry, know-how and goods

meaning

America losing influence

Don't hold your breath about the last bit.

[Typhoon]

Tokyo Governor Quits to Form Political Party

Shintaro Ishihara, who recently played a key role in reviving a bitter territorial dispute with China, told a packed news conference that he wants to fix the nation's fiscal and political problems.

[..]

Ishihara, 80, angered China earlier this year when he proposed that Tokyo buy and develop a cluster of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea controlled by Japan but also claimed by China. The national government responded by buying some of the islands from their private owner, saying it would not develop them.

[..]

Ishihara is renowned for his outbursts against China, North Korea, foreigners, immigrants, women and even the French language. He once told reporters he "hates" the American icon Mickey Mouse for not having the "unique sensibility that Japan has."

Ishihara wrote the 1989 book, "The Japan that Can Say No," a best-selling paean to ultra-patriotism. He also has tried his hand at screen writing, authoring a film, released in 2007, "I Go to Die For You," that glorified so-called "kamikaze" pilots who flew suicide missions in the ending months of World War II.

Don't know good or bad

Good. Tokyo needs a governor who is living in the 21st century, not the mid 20th.

My guess is that he is resigning under pressure from the national govt and other groups [keidanren] for stirring up the Senkaku islands issue.

The talk about forming a new national party is probably a face saving excuse. It's too little too late for him.

[monster_gardener]

Japan climbing in bed with Russia - From Kuriles with love


Russia, just next door to Japan, will take care of Japan's energy needs

and

China will be natural market for Japanese industry, know-how and goods

meaning

America losing influence

Don't hold your breath about the last bit.

Thank you VERY Much for your post, Typhoon.

What I note about this is that the Russians may be going about this halfway Right while the Chinese IMVHO are not......

The Russians are talking about giving back half of the Kuril Islands while the Chinese saying pretty much that the whole South China Sea is theirs..... Would be a little like Uz saying that the Caribbean is all ours and that Castro and Mexico can't drill for oil there......

When you add in the rioting and IIRC "Death to Japan" signage at Dealerships.......

It makes noisy clumsy Uncle Uz and Slow Uncle Boris look not so bad......... Uncle Uz did hand back Okinawa even if he gets still gets too noisy there....... If the Japanese (as opposed to the Okinawans) really want him gone, he'll go..........

Remembering the last time it seemed that Russia might hand over the Kurils.......... Population boom of Russians wanting a back door way of becoming Japanese residents.......

[Jnalum Persicum]

.

.. Chinese saying pretty much that the whole South China Sea is theirs..... Would be a little like Uz saying that the Caribbean is all ours and that Castro and Mexico can't drill for oil there......

.

What are Brits doing in Malvinas ? ? why they drilling in Argentinian territory ?

Come on Monster, South China Sea is what is says, CHINA

Don't tell me you siding with that "Made in England" rubbish

brunei2e.jpg (60.56 KiB) Viewed 2558 times

.

[monster_gardener]

.

.. Chinese saying pretty much that the whole South China Sea is theirs..... Would be a little like Uz saying that the Caribbean is all ours and that Castro and Mexico can't drill for oil there......

.

What are Brits doing in Malvinas ? ? why they drilling in Argentinian territory ?

Come on Monster, South China Sea is what is says, CHINA

Don't tell me you siding with that "Made in England" rubbish

brunei2e.jpg

.

Thank You Very Much for your post, Azari.

What are Brits doing in Malvinas ? ? why they drilling in Argentinian territory ?

If the Brits are drilling there, IMVHO the smart thing to do would be to figure out some way to share the wealth either directly (profit sharing) or indirectly....... see that Argentinian firms get business from it.........

Same for South "China" Sea........ Share it around some.....

Better than a war..............

[Jnalum Persicum]

.

Same for South "China" Sea........ Share it around some.....

Better than a war.............

.

Monster,

CCC, Mr. Ching Chiag Chung, hates joke, even if not meant


China's once-cuddly "soft power" panda has grown fangs

.

. . little-noticed concurrent visit to Asia of a high-powered team of retired US diplomats.

The team, a bipartisan affair consisting of Richard Armitage, Stephen Hadley, James Steinberg and Joseph Nye, had a tough task.

.

well

fasten your seat belts


.

[monster_gardener]

.

Same for South "China" Sea........ Share it around some.....

Better than a war.............

.

Monster,

CCC, Mr. Ching Chiag Chung, hates joke, even if not meant


China's once-cuddly "soft power" panda has grown fangs

.

. . little-noticed concurrent visit to Asia of a high-powered team of retired US diplomats.



The team, a bipartisan affair consisting of Richard Armitage, Stephen Hadley, James Steinberg and Joseph Nye, had a tough task.

.

well

fasten your seat belts


.

Thank you VERY much for your post.

CCC, Mr. Ching Chiag Chung, hates joke, even if not meant

Was NOT a joke......... Looks like I am going to have to use more emoticons to show when I am joking.........

IMVHO - NO JOKE- I think it would be better for the Brits and Argentines to come to some sort of sharing agreement over the Falklands/Malvinas.

Better than a war.......... Still remember it........ Lots of people died needlessly as the Junta tried to harness "patriotism" to stay in power......

Same for South China Sea etc.......

May be it is near inevitable........ China has a big surplus of males.........

Thanks for the Link but IMVHO it did NOT support your idea that the Japanese, Chinese and Russians are going to make nice........

It's a shame....... World does NOT need another war........

[Jnalum Persicum]

.


increasingly accepted — school of thought about Japan : The country is not just in a prolonged slump but also in an inescapable decline.

.

There’s frequent evidence for that in economic data, and in the country’s destiny to become ever-smaller, doomed by demographics that will shrink the population from about 127 million today to 47 million in 2100, according to government data.

[..]

By 2050, Japan “will be the oldest society ever known,” with a median age of 52, according to the recent book “Megachange,” published by the Economist magazine. Even over the next decade, Japan’s aging population will drag down the gross domestic product by about 1 percent every year. That will further strain Japan’s economy, which in 2010 lost its status as the world’s second-largest, a position now claimed by China.

“If you speak optimistically about Japan, nobody even believes it,” Koll said. “They say, ‘Oh, in 600 years there will be 480 Japanese people left. The Japanese are dying out and debt is piling up for future generations.’ Japan is an easy whipping boy.”


much more @ link


.

Look, Colonel,

West itself is in decline, economic and otherwise

Japan must step back, redefine Japan's future

China-Russia-Japan should be the focus


.

[Typhoon]

. . .

Look, Colonel,

West itself is in decline, economic and otherwise

Japan must step back, redefine Japan's future

China-Russia-Japan should be the focus

Reminds of an old Soviet joke a colleague once told me years ago.

After a nearly infinite amount of bureaucratic red tape, a Soviet physicist is finally permitted to attend a major physics conference in the West after he had been invited to give a keynote address.

Upon his return, his grad students and other physicists cannot contain their curiousity about life outside of the Iron Curtain.

One indiscreetly asks, "Is it really true, as Pravda says, that the West is rotting away?"

The physicist ponders this loaded question for a moment, then replies, "Yes, it's true, . . . but does it ever smell good."

Moral: don't hold your breath

[Typhoon]

Consumer Rep | Japanese brands tops in Consumer Reports' 2012 Car Reliability Survey

I know that Hyundai has been doing well recently. Wonder how they rank.

[Jnalum Persicum]

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Japan has decided to gracefully withdraw from the world stage


sleepin @ the wheel

.

“That’s about right,” he said, “battered by deflation and a overly strong currency, the Japanese have concluded that they can’t compete with a rising China and are withdrawing into themselves.”

.

Colonel, not looking into reality and not predicting what's coming has a cost 2B paid

As said, Japan must rethink all

IMVHO, world needs MULTI-Polarity

Japan could disengage from America and lead a group .. Iranians, Turkey, Egypt, Brazil and and

Things do not work as it is , that for sure

.

[noddy]

10% of chinas population working in dodgy factories pretty much put the entire planet out of work - this issue is not japans problem per se.
you could argue that germany only thrives currently because they sell the parts for factories and china isnt going to need to buy them forever.

the funny part is that china itself is currently having employment problems due to the fact it overproduces and doesnt have enough customers.

we have been discussing this in many ways over the years azari - the options are go internal/local and produce for yourself or one-world-communism it seems

[monster_gardener]

.


Japan has decided to gracefully withdraw from the world stage


sleepin @ the wheel

.

“That’s about right,” he said, “battered by deflation and a overly strong currency, the Japanese have concluded that they can’t compete with a rising China and are withdrawing into themselves.”

.

Colonel, not looking into reality and not predicting what's coming has a cost 2B paid

As said, Japan must rethink all

IMVHO, world needs MULTI-Polarity

Japan could disengage from America and lead a group .. Iranians, Turkey, Egypt, Brazil and and

Things do not work as it is , that for sure

.

Thank you Very Much for your post, Azari.

IMVHO selling Brazil to the Japanese should be fairly easy with Carnival, Tanga Clad Beauties on the Beaches and lots of land to develop if you are of sterner stuff......... AIUI....Brazil has more tha a few Japanese immigrants including the last Japanese WW2 officer to cease hostilities......

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiroo_Onoda

Plus it is in the Southern Hemisphere which will probably be a better place to be if Iran, Egypt, Israel and maybe Turkey blow up the Northern one.......

[Antipatros]

Eliza Strickland, Can Japan Phase Out Nuclear Power?

The country wants to go nuclear-free, but many obstacles remain

http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/nuclear ... lear-power

Before the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear accident of 2011, Japan was the third largest producer of nuclear power in the world. Its 54 reactors had a capacity of about 50 gigawatts. Now the Japanese government is contemplating whether it can scale down from 50 GW to zero by 2040 without crippling its economy in the process. 


A government policy paper [PDF] released in September called for the elimination of all nuclear power by 2040, and public opinion polls have shown that the majority of citizens favor a phaseout. But the matter is far from settled: The policy paper elicited strong protests from business groups, and consequently the Cabinet, the executive branch of Japan’s government, declined to endorse the zero-nuclear goal. 


Here are the sticking points in the ongoing debate over whether Japan can eliminate nuclear power.
...

[monster_gardener]

Eliza Strickland, Can Japan Phase Out Nuclear Power?

The country wants to go nuclear-free, but many obstacles remain

http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/nuclear ... lear-power

Before the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear accident of 2011, Japan was the third largest producer of nuclear power in the world. Its 54 reactors had a capacity of about 50 gigawatts. Now the Japanese government is contemplating whether it can scale down from 50 GW to zero by 2040 without crippling its economy in the process. 


A government policy paper [PDF] released in September called for the elimination of all nuclear power by 2040, and public opinion polls have shown that the majority of citizens favor a phaseout. But the matter is far from settled: The policy paper elicited strong protests from business groups, and consequently the Cabinet, the executive branch of Japan’s government, declined to endorse the zero-nuclear goal. 


Here are the sticking points in the ongoing debate over whether Japan can eliminate nuclear power.
...

Thank you Very Much for your post, Antipatros.

IMVHO would be MUCH better to Have a CANDU attitude and Worship Thor--ium

Safety features

The CANDU includes a number of active and passive safety features in its design. Some of these are a side-effect of the physical layout of the system.

CANDU designs have a positive void coefficient as well as a small power coefficient, normally considered bad in reactor design. This implies that steam generated in the coolant will increase the reaction rate, which in turn would generate more steam. This is one of the many reasons for the cooler mass of moderator in the calandria, as even a serious steam incident in the core would not have a major impact on the overall moderation cycle. Only if the moderator itself starts to boil would there be any significant effect, and the large thermal mass ensures this will occur slowly. The deliberately "sluggish" response of the fission process in CANDU allows controllers more time to diagnose and deal with problems.[2]

The fuel channels can only maintain criticality if they are mechanically sound. If the temperature of the fuel bundles increases to the point where they are mechanically unstable, their horizontal layout means they will bend under gravity, shifting the layout of the bundles and reducing the efficiency of the reactions. Because the original fuel arrangement is optimum for a chain reaction and the natural uranium fuel has little excess reactivity, any significant deformation will stop the inter-fuel pellet fission reaction. This will not stop heat production from fission product decay, which would continue to supply a considerable heat output. If this process further weakens the fuel bundles, they will eventually bend far enough to touch the calandria tube, allowing heat to be efficiently transferred into the moderator tank. The moderator vessel has a considerable thermal capability on its own, and is normally kept relatively cool.[2]

Heat generated by fission products would initially be at about 7% of full reactor power, which requires significant cooling. The CANDU designs have several emergency cooling systems, as well as having limited self-pumping capability through thermal means (the steam generator is well above the reactor). Even in the event of a catastrophic accident and core meltdown, it is important to remember that the fuel is not critical in light water.[2] This means that cooling the core with water from nearby sources will not add to the reactivity of the fuel mass.

Normally the rate of fission is controlled by light-water compartments called liquid zone controllers, which absorb excess neutrons, and by adjuster rods which can be raised or lowered in the core to control the neutron flux. These are used for normal operation, allowing the controllers to adjust reactivity across the fuel mass as different portions would normally burn at different rates depending on their position. The adjuster rods can also be used to slow or stop criticality. Because these rods are inserted into the low-pressure calandria, not the high-pressure fuel tubes, they would not be "ejected" by steam, a design issue for many pressurized-water reactors.

There are two independent, fast-acting safety shutdown systems as well. Shutoff rods are held above the reactor by electromagnets, and drop under gravity into the core to quickly end criticality. This system works even in the event of a complete power failure, as the electromagnets only hold the rods out of the reactor when power is available. A secondary system injects a high-pressure gadolinium nitrate neutron absorber solution into the calandria.[3]
Fuel cycles
Range of possible CANDU fuel cycles: CANDU reactors can accept a variety of fuel types, including the used fuel from light-water reactors

A heavy water design can sustain a chain reaction with a lower concentration of fissile atoms than light water reactors, allowing it to use some alternative fuels, e.g., "recovered uranium" (RU) from used LWR fuel can be used. CANDU was designed for natural uranium with only 0.7% U-235, so RU with 0.9% U-235 is a rich fuel. This extracts a further 30–40% energy from the uranium. The DUPIC (Direct Use of spent PWR fuel In CANDU) process under development can recycle it even without reprocessing. The fuel is sintered in air (oxidized), then in hydrogen (reduced) to break it into a powder, which is then formed into CANDU fuel pellets. CANDU can also breed fuel from the more abundant thorium. This is being investigated by India to take advantage of its natural thorium reserves.[4]

Even better than LWRs, CANDU can burn a mix of uranium and plutonium oxides (MOX fuel), the plutonium either from dismantled nuclear weapons or reprocessed reactor fuel. The mix of isotopes in reprocessed plutonium is not attractive for weapons, but can be used as fuel (instead of being simply nuclear waste), while burning weapons-grade plutonium eliminates a proliferation hazard. If the aim is explicitly to burn plutonium or other actinides from spent fuel, then special inert-matrix fuels are proposed to do this more efficiently than MOX. Since they contain no uranium, these fuels do not breed any extra plutonium.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CANDU_reactor

Build new CANDUs or other new safe reactors and shut down the old ones as the new ones come online......

Would give employment to workers doing something useful....... instead of Bridges to Nowhere....... Which IIRC Uz also do.... In Alaska......

Oops...... Seems that one got stopped......

BUT they are STILL FUNDING it!!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravina_Is ... 1_activity





Foot Note.....
Thor was rowdy.... Sort of like a miltant Fred Flinstone* on Steroids...... But he was a good guy at heart.....

Hot tempered but could even forgive to a degree when his goats were hurt by humans......

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%9Ej%C3%A1lfi

IIRC Thor's worship involved having a goat roast ..... as opposed to Odin's which involved hanging humans on trees. ....

*Even had to get up in drag once just like Fred & Barney.... but for a more serious purpose.......

As a result, the gods and goddesses meet and hold a thing to discuss and debate the matter. At the thing, the god Heimdallr puts forth the suggestion that, in place of Freyja, Thor should be dressed as the bride, complete with jewels, women's clothing down to his knees, a bridal head-dress, and the necklace Brísingamen. Thor rejects the idea, yet Loki interjects that this will be the only way to get back Mjöllnir. Loki points out that, without Mjöllnir, the jötnar will be able to invade and settle in Asgard. The gods dress Thor as a bride, and Loki states that he will go with Thor as his maid, and that the two shall drive to Jötunheimr together.[37]

After riding together in Thor's goat-driven chariot, the two, disguised, arrive in Jötunheimr. Þrymr commands the jötnar in his hall to spread straw on the benches, for Freyja has arrived to be his wife. Þrymr recounts his treasured animals and objects, stating that Freyja was all that he was missing in his wealth.[38]

Early in the evening, the disguised Loki and Thor meet with Þrymr and the assembled jötnar. Thor eats and drinks ferociously, consuming entire animals and three casks of mead. Þrymr finds the behaviour at odds with his impression of Freyja, and Loki, sitting before Þrymr and appearing as a "very shrewd maid", makes the excuse that "Freyja's" behaviour is due to her having not consumed anything for eight entire days before arriving due to her eagerness to arrive. Þrymr then lifts "Freyja's" veil and wants to kiss "her". Terrifying eyes stare back at him, seemingly burning with fire. Loki says that this is because "Freyja" has not slept for eight nights in her eagerness.[38]

The "wretched sister" of the jötnar appears, asks for a bridal gift from "Freyja", and the jötnar bring out Mjöllnir to "sanctify the bride", to lay it on her lap, and marry the two by "the hand" of the goddess Vár. Thor laughs internally when he sees the hammer, takes hold of it, strikes Þrymr, beats all of the jötnar, kills their "older sister", and so gets his hammer back.[39

[Typhoon]

Eliza Strickland, Can Japan Phase Out Nuclear Power?

The country wants to go nuclear-free, but many obstacles remain

http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/nuclear ... lear-power

Before the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear accident of 2011, Japan was the third largest producer of nuclear power in the world. Its 54 reactors had a capacity of about 50 gigawatts. Now the Japanese government is contemplating whether it can scale down from 50 GW to zero by 2040 without crippling its economy in the process. 


A government policy paper [PDF] released in September called for the elimination of all nuclear power by 2040, and public opinion polls have shown that the majority of citizens favor a phaseout. But the matter is far from settled: The policy paper elicited strong protests from business groups, and consequently the Cabinet, the executive branch of Japan’s government, declined to endorse the zero-nuclear goal. 


Here are the sticking points in the ongoing debate over whether Japan can eliminate nuclear power.
...

Nuclear power generation has historically been unpopular in Japan.

Even the nuclear medicine depts in hospitals are often listed by the acronym R.I. [for radioisotope] to avoid alarming members of the public.
Posters everywhere with happy cartoon characters emphasizing how safe are the procedures.

However, given the lack of natural resources, it is very difficult to imagine an alternative solution.
Re Germany with their skyrocketing cost of electricity due to subsidization of green, so-called, power generation and ramping up coal plant construction.

With the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, just as NY would have benefited from floodgates, the money spent on bridges and highways to nowhere Japan should have been better spent on a national nuclear reactor project - an advanced design that switches off - goes non critical - in the event of a power failure.

[Antipatros]

Eliza Strickland, Can Japan Phase Out Nuclear Power?

The country wants to go nuclear-free, but many obstacles remain

http://spectrum.ieee.org/energy/nuclear ... lear-power

Before the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear accident of 2011, Japan was the third largest producer of nuclear power in the world. Its 54 reactors had a capacity of about 50 gigawatts. Now the Japanese government is contemplating whether it can scale down from 50 GW to zero by 2040 without crippling its economy in the process. 


A government policy paper [PDF] released in September called for the elimination of all nuclear power by 2040, and public opinion polls have shown that the majority of citizens favor a phaseout. But the matter is far from settled: The policy paper elicited strong protests from business groups, and consequently the Cabinet, the executive branch of Japan’s government, declined to endorse the zero-nuclear goal. 


Here are the sticking points in the ongoing debate over whether Japan can eliminate nuclear power.
...

Nuclear power generation has historically been unpopular in Japan.

Even the nuclear medicine depts in hospitals are often listed by the acronym R.I. [for radioisotope] to avoid alarming members of the public.
Posters everywhere with happy cartoon characters emphasizing how safe are the procedures.

However, given the lack of natural resources, it is very difficult to imagine an alternative solution.
Re Germany with their skyrocketing cost of electricity due to subsidization of green, so-called, power generation and ramping up coal plant construction.

With the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, just as NY would have benefited from floodgates, the money spent on bridges and highways to nowhere Japan should have been better spent on a national nuclear reactor
project - an advanced design that switches off - goes non critical - in the event of a power failure.

Nuclear power certainly has an image problem, and room for technical and safety improvements. One can only hope that people eventually realise none of the alternatives are trouble-free either.

[Zack Morris]

Solar is trouble free. Its only drawback is cost... for now.

[Antipatros]

Solar is trouble free. Its only drawback is cost... for now.

Solar is far from trouble-free. Photovoltaic cells are not terribly efficient; supplying enough power even for a small city requires an enormous array of collectors on land for which the highest and best use is probably something else.

[Typhoon]

Solar is trouble free. Its only drawback is cost... for now.

A slogan, not a statement of fact.

The daily average irradiance for the Earth: ~ 250 W/m^2

[less for Japan, but I can't find the numbers at the moment]

Electric power generation capacity of Japan: ~ 282 GW ~ 2.8 x 10^11 W

The most efficient solar cells in the lab today: ~ 30%

http://goo.gl/UZOHE

Effective irradiance ~ 75 W/m^2

Area required to meet power requirements in Japan: ~ 3.7 x 10^9 m^2 ~ 3.7 x 10^3 km^2 ~ 3,700 km^2

To place this area in perspective, the largest plain in Japan is the Kanto Plain with a total area of 17,000 km^2

Tokyo, Yokohama, and Chiba to name a few cities are located on this plain along with ~ 1/3 of the population of Japan.

Solar irradiance varies by over a factor of 2 for a city such as Kyoto between May and December.

Also the problem of power storage as backup for periods of extended cloudiness has yet to be solved.

[Zack Morris]

All sound points but none of these obstacles seem particularly more difficult than the challenges facing large-scale nuclear power adoption. To my knowledge, there aren't any fool-proof reactor designs ready to be deployed en masse. DC transmission lines exist for relatively low-loss long-distance power distribution, allowing solar cells to be installed in remote desert areas with consistent sunshine, like Nevada. According to a presentation I once attended, cloud cover was a non-issue if the cells were distributed properly. Long-term energy storage is still an issue.

It's clear that our energy needs will be best met in the medium term by a diversified portfolio of technologies. Last I checked, the cost of solar was gaining on existing nuclear plants. While the US average cost is about double, in some cases, the minimum cost approaches the minimum cost for nuclear. So I wouldn't poo poo it just yet. Rather, more research is needed to address your concerns.

[noddy]

i was thinking geothermal made most sense to japan when it comes to non fossil, non nuclear energy sources, they have plenty of hot rocks and its good for industry because its runs 24/7 unlike solar.

lo and behold.

http://japandailypress.com/government-t ... nt-1515899

Analysts believe Japan has the potential to generate 23,470 MW of electricity from geothermal resources, making the third-largest in the world, however the country has been as slow to make developments in comparison with the rest of the world. Some of the challenges that Japan faces include strict environmental restrictions on where sites can be built, as well as having to gain the consent of local communities. But I bet if you went to the communities hosting nuclear power plants and asked if they’d be interested in geothermal instead, they would be more than willing to make the necessary sacrifices.

20 gigawatts doesnt provide 280 gigawatts of power for industry - however it does give cheaper and safer alternatives for residential.

solar is best left for those of us in the red/orange zones on this map, its less relevant to the greener/bluer regions.

[Antipatros]

All sound points but none of these obstacles seem particularly more difficult than the challenges facing large-scale nuclear power adoption. To my knowledge, there aren't any fool-proof reactor designs ready to be deployed en masse. DC transmission lines exist for relatively low-loss long-distance power distribution, allowing solar cells to be installed in remote desert areas with consistent sunshine, like Nevada. According to a presentation I once attended, cloud cover was a non-issue if the cells were distributed properly. Long-term energy storage is still an issue.

It's clear that our energy needs will be best met in the medium term by a diversified portfolio of technologies. Last I checked, the cost of solar was gaining on existing nuclear plants. While the US average cost is about double, in some cases, the minimum cost approaches the minimum cost for nuclear. So I wouldn't poo poo it just yet. Rather, more research is needed to address your concerns.

I am sorry to persist, but this clearly illustrates the obstacles nuclear power must overcome. They are not questions of engineering or science. They are issues of gullibility and anti-nuclear hysteria in the populace. But people want to believe they're being progressive and ecofriendly, and are therefore likely to fall for the blandishments of solar energy hucksters, particularly when supported and insulated from reality by government subsidies.

Bill Sweet, Photovoltaic Grid Parity

http://spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/ene ... rid-parity

In the world of solar energy, "grid parity" generally refers to the point and time when photovoltaic electricity—whether centrally generated or distributed—will be competitive with other sources of electricity. A recent report done by researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory finds that the installed cost of photovoltaic systems declined by more than 30 percent from 1998 to 2008, from $10.80 per watt to $7.50/W. That may sound like very encouraging news but in fact is not, however you look at it.

According to one eye-catching allegation, there's a kind of Moore's law in photovoltaics, which holds that costs come down by 20 percent with every doubling of installed capacity. Rates of installation have varied in the last decade, of course, both year-to-year and world region to world region. What is more, the very idea of a photovoltic Moore's law is a bit slippery—and has tripped me up at least once. But if one postulates conservatively that the installed PV base has doubled roughly every two and a half years in the last decade, then average photovoltaic costs should have come down by close to 60 percent since 1998, not 30 percent.

Generally speaking, grid parity—the point where photovoltaic electricity could compete without subsidies with electricity generated from coal, natural gas, wind, or nuclear—is put at $1/W. That may be a somewhat too demanding standard, considering that photovoltaics work best on rooftops or integrated into construction material, so that electricity is consumed at the point of production, eliminating transmission and distribution costs. But even if grid parity were put at $2/W and installation costs declined at a rate of 30 percent per decade from the currently estimated $7.50/W, it would take PV electricity until roughly mid-century to become economically competitive.

Energy planners with the European Union expect photovoltaic grid parity to be reached around 2015 in Europe's southern-most countries such as Spain and Portugal—at least when PV materials are used in solar concentrating systems. But is there any basis for expecting conventional PV to become competitive that soon?

There's not. Not only are photovoltaics manufacturing costs not in the ballpark right now, they're so far from the ballpark, there's no way of knowing whether they'll ever be in the ballpark.

Having said that, let me introduce a major qualification. Installation costs are not the best way of evaluating the cost-effectiveness of PV or any other electricity generating system. The generally accepted and standard measure of generating costs is the levelized busbar cost—that is, the cost of electricity at the point where it is fed into the grid, taking all cost factors into account (investment, financing, operation, maintenance, and so on). Ideally, to evaluate claims made about grid parity or a PV Moore's law, we would want to measure performance in terms of levelized costs and in the same units we all see on our monthly utility bills, namely cents per kilowatt-hours.

As it happens, however, there are at least two insurmountable obstacles to our actually doing that. One is that photovoltaic electricity is too new and its cost elements are changing too fast for anybody to make reliable estimates of its average levelized costs over time. Just as importantly, operators of PV plants are often very cagey about how much it is costing them to run the installations (a problem I ran into earlier this year, when I tried to assess the the biggest new little plant in the East, on the Pennsylvania-New Jersey border).

That leaves us for better or worse with estimated installed costs. The good thing about using them as a metric is that the size and cost of any given PV plant is generally a matter of public record. So there are a lot of trade groups and energy monitoring organizations that add up the wattage and costs every year, on a global basis. The bad thing is that it would be a full-time job to figure out whose estimates are most reliable. Frankly, I tend to dip around somewhat randomly, following my instincts.

For example, Daniel Yergin's Cambridge Energy Research Associates estimated aggregate world PV installation costs at about $7/W in 2004, wind at a bit under $1/W. According to Marketbuzz/Solarbuzz, average world PV installation costs came to about $6.2/W in 2008, four years later. That's an improvement of 11.5 percent in four years, much too slow a rate of improvement to give us grid parity any time in the foreseeable future.

(1) The Advanced CANDU design is capable of rapid construction. .

(2) Photovoltaic systems are best suited for remote areas where the power is produced and consumed on site. The second best option is feeding power into a local city grid. Long-distance transmission magnifies the inefficiencies inherent in solar generation.

(3) Cloud is not a non-issue. As with wind, it means that full photovoltaic generation capacity is only avaIlable part time. Unlike wind power, photovoltaics are not available at night. With either wind or solar power, that means engineering your generating capacity so that other sources are fully capable of supplying peak load. Wind and solar are necessarily relegated to a secondary role.

(4) Even when it is sunny, dust is the enemy of photovoltaic systems. Just ask Spirit and Opportunity. Solar panels must be scrubbed regularly or their generating capacity will be impaired by dust, dirt, salt, etc.

[noddy]

for industry and megacities its pretty much nuclear or fossil fuels only.

im not so convinced thats true for house & land burbia but this is a japan thread so the former is the more relevant

[Juggernaut Nihilism]

By the end of the year, Japan's public debt will officially post over 1 quadrillion yen. At what point do we just start making numbers up? I will be the first in line for the $1 bajillion bond issued by the UST.