Living near nuclear power plant, are solar panels worthwhile?

I've been looking for a house and found one that fits my criteria and has good capacity for gardening and other projects I'm focused on.

This house is near a nuclear power plant, thankfully one of the relatively safer builds. I was unsure about that at first but am okay with it - anywhere in the range I am looking in would have me around 10mi from the plant, this house is more like 1 mile as the crow flies. I wonder other's thoughts on living near nuclear power plants, for or against or neutral, though I don't mean to make this a debate about that.

My main question is your thoughts on whether it is worthwhile to power one's home with solar or other on-site renewables, when nuclear power is provided to the grid this house is connected to?

I'd think any distributed energy resource is good, it reduces the burden on centralized power generation whether that's from nuclear, industrial solar farms, or natural gas power plants. There's also some resilience factor for generating power on site and having that redundancy when central power is unavailable, but that might be less important since nuclear plants operate more continuously than most other power generation.

R Spencer,

What a simple question but what a complex answer.  As far a putting solar on your proposed house, I don’t think it matters if you are 1, 10 or 100 miles from the nuclear source.  In any case, the grid-powered source will be Nuclear and proximity really does not enter the equation (as I see it, I could be wrong).

Good that you have done your homework and found that the reactor in your possible backyard is one of the safer ones.  BTW, I don’t suppose you can tell us which reactor you are talking about can you?  I might be able to explain what makes it safer if I knew more specifics.

I could go on and on about the energy balance, pro’s and con’s between solar, nuclear, coal, etc., etc. but I am pretty certain it would quickly descend into cider press territory quickly.

If you want a more specific answer, feel free to PM me and I can offer some better information.

Short version though, it is your choice.

Eric

There's going to be pros and cons of any property, I would guess there may be some more restrictions on the area due to the power station, but equally that will stop other things you might not want as neighbours as well.
The house will be cheaper, but it may be almost impossible to sell.

I used to live near a maximum security prison, and by near I mean less than 100ft from the walls. They were quiet neighbours except on the times someone was being moved with helicopter escorts. I suspect nucleor powerstations are also quiet neighbours.

I don't think proximity should make any different to weather you have solar or other generation capacity yourself, unless you get a subsidised rate on the power from the station.  The power station will indeed operate continuously but if the grid goes then you still won't get power no matter how close you are as it will be disconnected to protect those trying to get power back to everyone.

On a risk basis, you're probably safer than those of us who live on a main road or a railway line.

Only one thing I would look at, how old is the power station? I.e when is it scheduled to be decommissioned? That would be years of noise and dust or decades of old and decaying buildings.

I have been around the land surrounding a couple of nuclear plants and ironically (perhaps) they have a pristine, unspoiled look to them.  I believe the site you are looking at could be quite attractive.

Skandi makes good points about the property being easy to buy but potentially hard to sell.  I don’t know your plans but future value may be worth considering.

Eric

I'd think any distributed energy resource is good, it reduces the burden on centralized power generation whether that's from nuclear, industrial solar farms, or natural gas power plants. There's also some resilience factor for generating power on site and having that redundancy when central power is unavailable, but that might be less important since nuclear plants operate more continuously than most other power generation.

It would really depend on the planned solar configuration, and your personal metrics of what is "worthwhile".  

From a resilience viewpoint, solar panels would only provide redundancy under certain configurations:

1. In a normal grid-tie system, when the grid goes down, the panels cease to provide useful AC energy to your home's electrical system, because the solar inverter gets automatically shut down to protect linemen.  Panels thus become expensive decorations in a long term power blackout, unless you are able to redesign (hack) them into a different setup.

2. In a grid-tie plus solar battery system, redundancy is achieved for whichever circuits the battery is tied to.  The battery size, plus solar panel size and available solar energy, along with consumption, determines how long you can go it alone without the grid working.  Of note, there are now V2H (Vehicle to Home) intelligent home back-up systems where an electrical vehicle can serve as the battery bank for the home instead of a normal stand-alone battery, thereby powering a home's essential circuits for a few days to a week or so.

3. If the system is either a direct-drive system where the panels power machinery without needing batteries, or a standard off grid system with batteries, then a form of functional redundancy is achieved.  For instance, perhaps a solar panel runs a Sundanzer fridge/freezer directly, providing functional backup to the normally nuke-powered kitchen fridge.  Or perhaps a single room in the house or a workshop shed out back has its own mini solar system for lights and radio and device charging, running a well pump, etc.  

I like the idea of that 3rd setup: small, mobile, trucking away making some useful power without a care in the world.  So those are some configuration considerations for energy resilience when the grid goes down.

From an environmental perspective....

European Nuclear Society wrote:With a complete combustion or fission...1 kg natural uranium – following a corresponding enrichment and used for power generation in light water reactors – corresponds to nearly 10,000 kg of mineral oil or 14,000 kg of coal and enables the generation of 45,000 kWh of electricity. (Source)

So from there, if you had a totally arbitrary environmental metric, perhaps to offset the energy of 1 gram of natural uranium (the weight of a small paperclip) every week... your solar setup would need to produce 45kWh of electricity each week.  And if you live in NJ (4 good sun hours a day) and had typical (370w) solar panels producing ~1.5kWh a day, you'd need 4 or 5 panels.  One could calculate the number of panels to achieve environmental warm-fuzzies from there, if they were concerned with offsetting nuclear power.

Economics of energy cost, of course, is another metric, with net-metering regulations and policies being key elements, along with a host of other variables.  And that's worth its own unique discussion entirely.  But that info is out there everywhere already.  There are other reasons to do it or not, of course, but I think it's way more entertaining to talk in terms of nuclear paperclips a week :D  

On second thought, I think I like Eric's answer:

Short version though, it is your choice

Oh dear, reading the title of your post I thought you mean a nuclear bomb... as I just spoke with my student who is in Belarus :(

My main question is your thoughts on whether it is worthwhile to power one's home with solar or other on-site renewables, when nuclear power is provided to the grid this house is connected to?

I would probably just install a small solar panel with battery as a backup plan, if you have such efficient (and peaceful...) energy source nearby.

Flora Eerschay wrote:Oh dear, reading the title of your post I thought you mean a nuclear bomb... as I just spoke with my student who is in Belarus :(

Wow, sorry for the confusion! Will update title.


Thanks for the input everyone. Someone asked the power plant type. It is a boil water reactor with Mark II containment.

As for home value, it is near a big city so values are likely to continue going up. The area around the power plant is steadily becoming more developed, which is sad but also part of this house's history.

R Spencer wrote:I've been looking for a house and found one that fits my criteria and has good capacity for gardening and other projects I'm focused on.

This house is near a nuclear power plant, thankfully one of the relatively safer builds. I was unsure about that at first but am okay with it - anywhere in the range I am looking in would have me around 10mi from the plant, this house is more like 1 mile as the crow flies. I wonder other's thoughts on living near nuclear power plants, for or against or neutral, though I don't mean to make this a debate about that.

My main question is your thoughts on whether it is worthwhile to power one's home with solar or other on-site renewables, when nuclear power is provided to the grid this house is connected to?

I'd think any distributed energy resource is good, it reduces the burden on centralized power generation whether that's from nuclear, industrial solar farms, or natural gas power plants. There's also some resilience factor for generating power on site and having that redundancy when central power is unavailable, but that might be less important since nuclear plants operate more continuously than most other power generation.

Sooo easy to descend into a cider press here.
When all is said and done even if nuclear is part of your grid mix it will not be the only part. If you researched your local grid you will find out what the mix is. If your area allows grid tied systems that pay you to generate you can at least break even and add a green element to your grid. If it only allows you to bank kwhrs without renumeration as is the norm here in Ontario then it becomes about more than money. A grid tied system is basically locking in your utility prices. If you assume prices will go up you save money in the long run, if prices fall well you've locked in at a higher price. I see it as a kind of low interest low risk bond that is actually good for the planet. If you want resilience as mentioned above you will need to select a grid connected system with battery back up. That is my favorite option personally.
As to safety a well respected resilience source I've listened to's point of view is that most nuclear plant personel live close to the plants and in case something went wrong would most likely stay at their posts and shut it down since their families are on the line. With that mindset you are as safe there as anywhere else.
Cheers, David

George and David both have good suggestions, If you can do grid-tie with net-metering, then it's a simple math problem to calculate your payback period (system cost, utility rates, rebates), and if the utility pays (wholesale) for the extra production, then that helps too. In my area, I heard that overproduction can be reassigned to an additional property (same utility) which is a better deal than getting the wholesale price, if family/friends nearby could benefit. If you were considering an electric vehicle, then you might use more solar for charging.

Don't overlook SOLAR THERMAL! You could save on your heating/domestic hot water energy needs too. This could be a way to "decarbonize" those systems, or reduce your electric needs for those uses.

Another way to look at this is, how often does the power go out in that area? Nuke or not, the power is still going to cut out for various reasons in the local grid serving the house ... no grid has 100% uptime, and these days, power on the grid comes from many places (unless you are in TX?).

A nearby town to me has it's own power generating station; grid in that town goes down quite a few times per month ... brownouts to full blackouts. There is a co-op serving the rest of the county, and it is part of the national grid, and gets power from everywhere; same set of brownouts/blackouts. Could be a transformer, a power pole being taken out, lines down for some reason (ice to fire), and grid is down ... hours to days/weeks, depending on where one lives.

If financially feasible, you'll always want a buffer of some kind between you and your grid. Could be an inverter/battery/generator in a parallel system that you manage, or could be integrated automatically with the local grid being up or down. All kinds of systems to scale with the requirements and your budget. A simple battery generator box, to a full standby generator, or other grid-tie systems mentioned above.

IMO, you always want a buffer, in any system ... electricity, water, etc.

https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1209/ML120970422.pdf
Tis linke explains to whole process of Boiling Water reactors, its interesting.