Re: Norm avoids nothing!/Swedish nuclear phase-out

["Bjorn Cedervall" <bcradsafers@HOTMAIL.COM>]

Comments:



1. The total energy supply in Sweden is around 450 TWh.



2. At least 65 percent of the Swedes support nuclear power - it may be 

closer to 80 percent depending on how you formulate the question. 20 % want 

to see all nuclear power phased out.



3. About half of the electricity generated in Sweden comes from nuclear 

power (11 NPPs - 8.8 million people). One NPP (Barseback 1) has been shut 

down for political reasons (all Swedish NPPs have mitigating filtra systems 

- should a severe accident occur - most people in Sweden don't even seem to 

know about the filtra). The rest of the electricity is essentially 

hydropower.



4. The biofuels are to some extent in conflict with land use for 

agricultural and forestry/paper mill/pulp industry purposes. Biofuels 

increased from 43 to 90 (92?) TWh from 1970 to 2000 - most of this comes 

from the forestry industry. Some of the future alternatives that were talked 

about in the late 1970:s seem so new and modern that we haven't seen them 

yet. Solar power is indicated by 0.0 TWh per year in one of my sources 

(round-off problem!?).



BTW: Our oil consumption 23 years ago was also a heavy part of our national 

burden (4 tons of oil per capita and year - 74 % of all energy we used - 

counted as thermal TWh I believe). Highest oil consumption per capita in the 

world by that time. Since 1970 the annual fossil fuel consumption (all 

imported) has decreased from 368 TWh to about 240 TWh. 94 TWh of this is oil 

today. Nuclear power supplies us with about 70 TWh electricity per year.



5. 0.3 TWh of our electricity from wind power. Some concern about wind power 

has been about esthetics. A psychological problem is that many people think 

that they generate much more than they do - just because they can see them - 

like in Denmark - but their coal is what can be important for us. I wonder 

where the Danes put the solid waste from their coal - haven't seen any 

discussion about it (Lars P. who may read this probably knows). The airborne 

waste is transported to... guess it!



6. Swedes should be lucky because we have had relatively mild winters the 

two past years.



7. We had some capitalist governments over the last 20 years but they 

weren't able to change the fundamental energy equations either. One 

political "capitalist" party - the Center Party (C) has consistently been 

against anything "nuclear&radiation" over the past 25 years. Their 

performance in terms of support is essentially a line downhill (from 25 % to 

4 or 5 %). I argued a few times with some of their leaders - a low level of 

debate. One of them got mad at me because I explained that krypton and freon 

were different things and therefore nuclear power does not destroy the ozone 

layer (this argument nevertheless entered the Parliament level with no other 

politician reacting). The same C-person (may have been a former income tax 

declaration inspector or something similar) must reasonably also have 

confused radiative with radioactive.



8. The future points at more natural gas in Sweden. About 9 TWh per year 

today.



My personal ideas and reflections only - please correct or modify if needed,



Bjorn Cedervall    bcradsafers@hotmail.com

http://www.geocities.com/bjorn_cedervall/

-----------------------------------------



How about a Swedish phase-out?  We don't have any experience yet with a

German phase out. But we do have many years of experience with the Swedish 

phase-out of nuclear power. The Swedes voted to phase-out nuclear power in 

1980. Nuclear power was to be replaced with other, cleaner alternative 

sources of electricity. They have been working on it now for 20 years. 

Sweden is a good example because it is a technically advanced society. Also, 

with a solidily socialist economic system, the Swedes don't have to worry 

about being controlled by evil capitalists who conspire to suppress all the 

great new earth-friendly energy technologies. In addition, Sweden has 

substantial hydro-electric and tidal energy resources.



In Sweden today, they are making more electricity with nuclear power than 

they were in 1980. If the US were to match the Swedish phase-out in terms of 

percentage of nuclear-generated electricity today, we would have to build 

about 100 new nuclear power plants.



Of course, replacing nuclear power with alternative energy would do nothing 

to improve people's health because such an action would result in more 

electricity being generated by coal and natural gas.  Those methods combined 

kill thousands of Americans each year while increasing background radiation 

levels and spreading toxic waste.





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