Integrating fusion power into the present electrical grid

[rashidas]

A lot of articles discussing renewable enrgy production from solar and wind power discuss the intermittent nature of power produced by solar and wind. Because of this storage via batteries, flywheels or other technoloigies become important. In particular several writers mention that our present electricity grid is designed for central power plant generation distributed by wires to dispersed consumers, not rooftop solar panels on consumers homes generating intermittent power. They conclude that the present elctrical grid could not make use of more than 30% of its energy from renewable sources. How does Focus Fusion or aneutronic fusion interact with the present elcetrical grid?

[vansig]

unlike traditional nuclear, which runs the plant continuously, focus fusion will consist of an array of small reactors, which could be switched on or off based on needed load.

[zapkitty]

vansig wrote: unlike traditional nuclear, which runs the plant continuously, focus fusion will consist of an array of small reactors, which could be switched on or off based on needed load.

… and those modules need not all be located in one building.

So FF units would be suitable for both integration into the current grid and infrastructure [em]and[/em] for helping to develop the distributed grid that, in the U.S. at least, is long overdue.

[tcg]

The distributed nature of FF power generation would also eliminate most of the colossal losses of power associated with long distance transmission. It has been estimated that 40% of the power sent five hundred miles from Boulder dam to Los Angeles is lost as heat in the conductors. More local generation would eliminate these losses.

I have also blocked out how my own small, ocean front town could at very reasonable cost generate enough electricity for its inhabitants. We would not only become independent of the grid, but also we could use the waste heat from the generators to purify enough seawater for our water needs, making us no longer dependent on thousand mile long distribution networks.

The presence of intermittent sources of power, such as wind or solar, would be useful during daytime peak usage when air conditioners are running at full blast. The net result would be to smooth out the demand from FF sources and make the use of them more efficient.

I see a very workable future in all of this.

[Patientman]

The issue of what local power companies and cites allow for power generation is a part of this question. In Minnesota, generation of more than 5 MW of electricity requires public hearings and a great deal of red tape. How do you tap into the system without a distribution station nearby? Do you incorporate it into the reactor building?

Taping into a local access point for distributed electricity also brings up questions. If a 4.99 MW reactor provide power to 1500 homes in a town of 10,000 homes you may need to have those reactors in neighborhoods. A positive campaign of community education would be needed to convince people of the safe operation of aneutronic reactors. And, there is always the possibility of misinformation campaigns by those who do not like competition.

[zapkitty]

Patientman wrote: The issue of what local power companies and cites allow for power generation is a part of this question. In Minnesota, generation of more than 5 MW of electricity requires public hearings and a great deal of red tape. How do you tap into the system without a distribution station nearby? Do you incorporate it into the reactor building?

A 5MWe FF unit, which would be housed in a building about the size of a two-car garage, could be lost in one of the larger urban distribution yards 🙂

Such yards tend to combine a lot of latticework and empty space in between its massive components.

Attached find my rough idea of a “standard” 5MWe FF housing with an even rougher transformer set ready to feed to the current grid.

Attached files

[nakile]

Well, if focus fusion lives up to everything that its promised to be, it more or less takes the current electric grid and flips it on its head instead of integrating with it. There will still be grids, just not the ones we have now.

I think at first power companies will just hook these up at their existing power stations. At this point, everything is the same, minus the pollution and fuel cost taking up most of the power bill. Once they get the thumbs up from government and society, they’ll move to the substation level. When that happens, no more power transmission, only distribution. With transmission becoming depreciated, most renewables, aside from roof top solar and residential wind, will simply be done for. No more long distance transmission to move the renewable energy around. Less grid to support means that now even the distribution cost will start to drop. A total cost at or less than 3 cents per kw/h delivered would make electric heating competitive with the current cost of natural gas.

Over time, things will get even more distributed. Every several blocks will be a reactor station. I imagine at this point that pretty much all the distribution wiring will be underground, too. That’s the current trend at this moment will new grid work and since the current grid is very undersized for the demand that we’ll be seeing with this type of energy source (electric heat, electric cars, and some other unimaginable things) I’m sure the whole thing will end up being rebuilt.

I think for residential and light commercial use there will still be a local sort of grid since you can’t put one of these in your basement for both size and cost reasons. Even if you could get around those issues, it would still have to be maintained and managed and most people don’t have time for that, even if it was done by door to door professionals. Here, it’s a resource best shared.

But large commercial and industrial entities will most likely just have their own units on location. They’ll be able to get the super cheap energy directly from the reactor. When they want to do something new that requires more energy they can just go and do it, their system, their rules. Upgrade as necessary and move forward. It will definitely change how they use energy.

Of course, this all assuming that regulation and environmentalism moves in favor of distributed aneutronic fusion. As much as I like renewable energy, they have their own lobbyist now. And most environmentalist have been thinking that fusion is always 30-50 years away for so long that if comes earlier they simply might now know how to react. [em]All[/em] environmental policy that we have has been written around energy becoming more scarce and expensive.

[Patientman]

I was considering suburban systems, because that is were I live. Hypothetically, I have a (coal, gas, or nuclear) 500 MW plant which generates a $1 million a day. The thing is paid for and you come along with a fusion generator. It has a lot of cost saving and money generating advantages. I need to spend
$30 million to replace that unit (plus I have to get permits, buy land, construct a building for it, and a new (suburban) distribution station at each location. Suddenly, my cost has gone up,
300K per reactor
100 -200K per lot land purchase
50K Building a house for the reactor
??? Distribution for 1500 homes
20K for Permits etc (not sure)
________________
600,000 each approximately. My cost has doubled
I still have to purchase ten units to replace the one. A normal capitalist would say, “screw the extra cost of multiple units in multiple places. I will just gang them up in one place and save the bucks. I also don’t have to worry about them in multiple places.” Remember, they play by their own rules. You can’t assume they will gravitate to a distributive network, just because it is the right thing to do. They also hate it when other people “tell” them how it should be done. (I’m just playing the devil’s advocate.) Thinking though capitalist tendencies requires painful brain mechanisms and sometimes it hurts. 😉

Also, in an urban setting you could house them in office tower basements. You wouldn’t need to use the current distribution networks. The electricity would back feed out of each tower into nearby towers or they could sell excess to each other. Those dang capitalists 🙂

[tcg]

The ease of introduction of FF power into existing grids will vary from state to state. Governmental red tape and political opposition from vested interests will provide obstacles in some states. In California and possibly many other states the process may not be so difficult.

During one of our many energy crises, California lawmakers passed legislation permitting private entities and individuals to generate electricity and requiring the power companies to buy it at the rate that it would cost the power companies to generate it themselves. The results have been multifold. Power companies have not built any major generating stations since the Diablo Canyon nuclear facility almost thirty years ago, even though the population of the state has increased by thirty percent since then. The law has allowed a competition among sources of electricity which has resulted in about forty percent of our power coming from these private entities, which generally burn natural gas. I have not heard of any significant bureaucratic hurdles to their proliferation.

This legal framework and the history of power generation in this state would indicate that FF power might find a ready entry point here and perhaps in a number of other states. The low projected cost of generation (did I hear .2 cent/kwh?) would be a powerful selling point.

[nakile]

Patientman wrote: I was considering suburban systems, because that is were I live. Hypothetically, I have a (coal, gas, or nuclear) 500 MW plant which generates a $1 million a day. The thing is paid for and you come along with a fusion generator. It has a lot of cost saving and money generating advantages….A normal capitalist would say, “screw the extra cost of multiple units in multiple places. I will just gang them up in one place and save the bucks. I also don’t have to worry about them in multiple places.” Remember, they play by their own rules. You can’t assume they will gravitate to a distributive network, just because it is the right thing to do. They also hate it when other people “tell” them how it should be done. (I’m just playing the devil’s advocate.) Thinking though capitalist tendencies requires painful brain mechanisms and sometimes it hurts. 😉

I agree, but I think a distributed system *might* be favored more by capitalism over time. Here’s another few hypothetical situations.

If you have a 500MW plant of any type, that thing is making a lot of power that needs to be sent to a lot of people. Enter step-up transformers, step down transformers, high voltage transmission, thick conductors, substations, and all the other things that need to be done to send a lot of power even a moderate distance. Now, of course, all these are currently paid for, but they’re also old, as is most of the existing grid, and need to be replaced. Our current grid is also designed to, I believe, handle an average household demand of about 5KW.

Enter focus fusion. Electricity is dirt cheap. All of sudden, people want to start heating their homes with electricity. I believe that the common furnace size is around 50,000 btu, which about equals a 15KW furnace. That’s just home heating, electric cars will be another huge demand on the grid, too. And I’m sure many people will come up with other crazy uses for electricity that we can’t even think of.

The energy density of our current grid is low. With this, it will have to go up. The whole things need rebuilt. If you want to stay centralized, this gets really complex because your 500MW plant has become at least 1.5GW now. You’ll have to expand it majorly, build a heftier cooling system because your stuffing a lot of things that make a lot of heat in a tight spot. You also have to start working with much higher voltages to make things efficient. I call it the tragedy of centralization. With centralization, a centralized facility gets increasingly complicated very quick even if all the users surrounding it aren’t trying to do much more.

All of a sudden, buying all those small properties and building all those tiny plants doesn’t sound too bad. With generation capacity spread throughout the area it’s needed in, you can work with moderate voltages, air cooling becomes possible, smaller conductors can be used, even perhaps eliminate most transformers. There’s work being done now to build inverters that directly output at 13.8kv distribution voltages with 2.4kv models already on the market. At this point, the only transformers you need are on the customers site. We’re talking, mechanically, a rather simple system.

Now I’m going to put my capitalism hat on. If there’s anything that I see happening, it’s that, yes, current power companies just retrofit their plants to save money, then to prevent a hugh demand spike that would make their aging network crumble, keep prices that same they are now as a form of demand control. Of course, this will lead to public outcry very quickly as they start collecting billions in cash while providing an old out of date grid that prevents anybody from doing anything new. If their smart, they’ll take those cash pools and start upgrading their network and that’s what I hope they do and think they most likely will. If they don’t somebody else will come along and do it, be it the municipalities or other companies, and put them out of business.

Now I’m going to put my evil capitalism hat on and get a little crazy. The larger power companies that retrofit first will do it to drum up capital to buy the smaller guys who aren’t as flexible and form an oligopoly.

Now we have pretty much the same situation we have with ISPs right now. Charging huge service cost on something that doesn’t cost them much while using the excuse “People seem to be doing fine with 10Mb connections, we see no need to go bigger” with the issue being that because people [em]don’t have[/em] bigger connectons they don’t know the possibilities that one brings.

But electricity is different from Internet. One is 100 years old, the other isn’t. One our older politicians understand, the other not so much. One the general public understands the great things that would come if it became cheaper, the other not so much.

So at this point you have either the current fray of power companies or a small group of oligopolized electric companies absolutely profiting off their customers with a cheap and clean state of the art energy source that would be wonderful to power everything off of, but we can’t. We still have to burn natural gas to heat our homes (and put CO2 into the air) and gasoline to power our cars (and put CO2 into the air).

In a very short period of time the fight for clean energy has gone from being a huge civil engineering and social challenge that would take half a century to becoming a messy political issue. With that, we’ll probably see a huge DOJ antitrust case come along, leading to a huge breakup and restructuring of the electrical supply system. Or like in the other scenario, others will simply come along and build a distributed grid anyway.

Those are some of my best guesses. Though I think it really depends more on how different political and environmental groups will react to aneutronic fusion, since it really is a complete 180 from the direction we’ve been going in with energy policy.

[vansig]

Patientman wrote: How do you tap into the system without a distribution station nearby?

various parts of the system normally act like a vibrating spring, with low loss; adding power converts this circumstance into negative loss.
so really,
you tap in at any place that can handle a negative loss of 5 MW.

[nakile]

Before I make anymore assumptions, what exactly is our current grid capable of? I know that every summer the thing is being pushed to its limit, at least that’s the story. Is this really the case or is the problem being overblown?

If not, is it anything that can be fixed with just new equipment? I know that quite a few transformers are undersized (I see 10-15kva units on 200a services all the time) and I’m going to guess that since those are undersized that substations most likely are too, but what about the conductors themselves? Were they sized with the foresight to accept more load if newer equipment was attached or does the whole grid really just need to be torn down and rebuilt if any major upgrade is needed?

My main worry is that the electric car is shaping up the be clean energy’s first killer app. If the current grid really is on the brink of failing then its simply going to be a disaster for electric car proliferation. Especially with fast/super charging. I can see those who oppose alternative energy will use this as yet another beating point to hold it back. “Your gas lines to your home never failed.” or “When was the last time you couldn’t fill up your old gas car?” These folks are relentless.

Except they’ll partially have a good point, which is the problem. I feel like in the alternative energy world all I tend to see is “developing new energy sources” and too little “how to get it where it needs to go.” I don’t know if that means everything is fine on the distribution/transmission side, or if that will be the easy part to fix/build when the time comes, or if nobody is thinking of that part and the switchover to an all electric world will end up being a disaster because no one did.

[vansig]

nakile,
a properly designed grid would assure multiple redundancy and nominal load of no more than about 1/3 of the maximum capacity. in such a fail-safe design, when a link fails, power would get routed around the bad spot.

but the North American system isn’t really a power grid. it is an ad-hoc collection of separate companies, that trade power with each other. no one is in charge of assuring that nominal load never gets above 50%. so cascading failures can occur, like the northeastern blackout of 2003.

[annodomini2]

If the pulse rate can be efficiently varied, it may even be able to load balance at the generation point.

[vansig]

annodomini2 wrote: If the pulse rate can be efficiently varied, it may even be able to load balance at the generation point.

it may be somewhat variable, but there are constraints: firstly, on waste heat dissipation, which tends to reduce the pulse rate; and on efficiency, since the gases in the chamber will remain ionized only for short intervals (at most 1 ms), and re-heating them costs energy, so this tends to increase the pulse rate.

lots of our back-of-the-envelope calculations assumed a rate that was divisible by both 50 and 60 Hz, to accommodate both north american and European systems;
consequently you will see the number 3000 pulses/second tossed around in the forums. but any number > 1000 that’s divisible by 300 would meet all these criteria.
so, 1200, 1500, 1800, 2100, … etc with upper bound fixed by heat dissipation.

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