Hinkley Point C - Oh Deary Me | Fully Charged

Chernobyl is NOT IN RUSSIA. I made a mistake. It was in the USSR when disaster happened. It's now in the Ukraine. Okay.
It's NOT IN RUSSIA! Got it!
The UK's brave step forward into a nuclear future.... oh dear.
There are nuclear alternatives which we'll look at in a future episode, and yes, there's Thorium, I know about Thorium, I'm always told Thorium is the future but for now, this one's a right mess.
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[TodayIFoundOut]

The Three Mile Island incident was wildly sensationalized. It led to no deaths and no injuries to plant workers or the nearby community. It was still rated a level 5 on the INES, even though it really should have just been rated a level 2. If you camped out at the plant at Three Mile Island during the accident that happened there in 1979, you’d have received only an additional 80 millirems of exposure during the duration of the accident.

For reference, if you’ve ever had your spine x-rayed, you’d have received about double that just during the few seconds of the x-ray. If you were around ten miles away from the reactor during the accident, you’d have received about 8 millirems or about the equivalent ionizing radiation of eating 800 bananas, which are naturally radioactive.

There are no known deaths/cancers/etc. that resulted from the Three Mile Island accident.

Public reaction to Three Mile Island went extremely overboard from what the actual event warranted. This was largely due to misinformation in the press; misunderstanding of ionizing radiation among the general public; and the fact that, not 12 days before it happened, the movie The China Syndrome was released.

The plot of the movie was how unsafe nuclear reactors were and just about everyone in the movie but one of the main characters was trying to cover it up. The China Syndrome movie title’s concept comes from the premise that if an American nuclear reactor core were to melt down, it would melt through the center of the Earth to China. Getting around the fact that it is actually the Indian Ocean that is on the opposite side of the Earth from the U.S., not China, and the obvious problems with the “melt through the Earth” premise, it couldn’t have been a better timed movie as far as free advertisement through the press due to the Three Mile Island incident. The movie was nominated for several academy awards, including best actress by Jane Fonda.

[Marks-Garage]

Funny how things change, when this video was made the price per KWH looked excessive. Now it looks like a bargain

[Kryptn]

You completely missed the fact that all nuclear stations are required to pay into the Nuclear Liability Fund for decommissioning and waste management costs. You also admitted nuclear is base load and then compared to 12GW of wind which is not base load so it's not even comparable. It is not possible to control when the wind blows and when the sun shines. Whilst you make a very convincing argument on the face of it; the factual basis of your argument is very weak. You make good points about project costs being too high though. The UK has a terrible track record of project management in general.

[hirofox]

I'm glad these videos are coming in again.

[IamTheSherm]

The only real issue I take with this is the so-called nuclear "disasters" you mentioned at the start. Chernobyl was a poorly run, poorly built soviet station that would never happen anywhere in the western world. Fukashima was an outdated reactor that was damaged by an earthquake and tsunami. Three-Mile Island was hardly a disaster. The plant is still in use today. The President of the United States was on site the following day, nobody died, and 35 years after the fact, people are still studying to see if there were even any serious health issues. Very good video otherwise!

[jonathancobb]

Hi, 3GW of wind with storage wouldn't generate same amount of electricity as 3GW of nuclear, as 3GW is peak output. You would need about 9GW to generate same number of kWh. By your costs that's £15bn for wind turbines, and then add cost for storage, it is going to be more.

The £92.5/kWh isn't the most expensive electricity. Higher prices have been agreed for offshore wind and solar through the CfDs (Contracts for difference) that are guaranteeing the price. Plus those strike prices fix what we the customer will pay, whatever the cost of the plant.

I support all the above, nuclear, wind and other renewables, plus storage, which will help us phase out fossil sooner.

[mattg]

“Rapidly emerging storage solutions”


4 years on from this statement, and still nothing.

All the talk of how good it is might be rapid, but the science is nowhere near working.

[ToumalRakesh]

No solition to the waste storage problem -> the true cost is just deferred and we tge taxpayers have to saddle it.

[The_Dark_Lord-]

4:50 3GW name plate capacity is not 24/7. People think that batteries eliminate capacity factor problems of wind. It does not.

For you to deliver 3GW 24/7, you have to build 3x wind capacity and levelize it with batteries. This is because Nuclear capacity factor is 3x that of wind.

For for 24/7 3GW power from wind, you need 9GW of Wind farms and associated 6GW batteries that will be able able to store 6GW during happy hours and supply during the 0 speed wind times.

We haven't even discussed the land issue. The land of storing 6GW power with batteries alone is bigger than the 3.3GW EPR being built. I can't even imagine the vast land for 9GW wind. The UK's off shore capacity of wind is barely more than 9GW (it's actually 11.3GW).

Also, you will be lucky if wind and batteries last more than 20 years. 3.3GW EPR plant last 3 times.
So that multiply that £5billion by 3 for 24/7 coverage and then by another 3 for 60 years.
The equivalent cost excluding land would be £45billion.
This would cost the Brits almost 2.5 times more if they went with nuclear. Considering that batteries and the whole farm would have to be replaced every 20 years, I haven't factored inflation. The reason why people say French are only benefitting in nuclear programme is because the built their infrastructure early.

Building big now will make Britain enjoy the benefits in the future too. Look how Russia is showing Europe some flames right now. Aren't you happy that you've already started with EPR?

[rogerstarkey]

And NOW (September 2017) we're told by the GOVERNMENT that wind power is THE cheapest power generation in the UK without question. Can be installed far faster, produced far more cheaply, stored as required and produces no waste.
BIG ROUND OF APPLAUSE for the government!!.... ONLY A YEAR LATE!
DUH!!

[ToniNiemi]

Great videos that are clear, informative and humorous, keep up the good work!

[orange_tree]

"But let's face it... coal is pretty shit"

lmao the delivery is spot on

[mercyreaper]

I live near a closed nuclear power plant in Scotland and it was total safe, if Hinckley point c can power 5 million homes then us in Scotland would just need one huge nuclear power plant like Hinckley point to power all of Scotland and with our wind turbines combined would power Scotland for years and years, let's get rid of Coal power like we are doing in Scotland and build one huge nuclear power plant for our future.

[craigduncan]

We should have built 3 of them and they should all be British made with the whole thing being a British endeavour. That way we would meet 50% of our energy needs 24/7/365 and it can be perfectly safe.
The other 50% could be renewables and a small amount of gas backup plants.
Nuclear waste is actually minimal - when you consider we already have selafield

[ewangimson]

Fantastic stuff, so happy to donate towards this show!

[brucewayne]

Brilliant Video! Couldn't agree more

[over]

Only one small observation. To match 3 GW nuclear with 3 GW Wind + storage, you actually need about 15GW wind and storage or 30GW of solar with storage. This is due to the inherent intermittent of those sources. You also need a LOT of storage to give a solid 3GW 24/7 power from such an array. 15GW from wind would require 30, 000 500kW wind turbines. Let that sink in, 30, 000. To store 3GW * 24 hours is a battery capable of storing 72 GWh. They don't exist.

[BooBaddyBig]

You mentioned, 3 Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima, also the Windscale Fire was 59 years ago, and it dumped fallout right across large swathes of the UK.

[barryh]

Inspired video, love it, gets the point across in such an effective way. Congrats, this will make a difference!!

By the way, love your show. Thanks for doing it!!

[blackrainbw]

Love the show and valuable information that your channel provides, all greatly presented.

Missing the scrapheap challenge programs on channel 4.