I found this interesting about the new Order issued by the Department of the Interior (DOI) on use of federal lands for energy projects:
“the Department shall consider energy projects’ capacity density in its decision-making, including when considering reasonable alternatives to a proposed energy project. For the purposes of this Order, capacity density is defined as the nameplate generation capacity of an energy project multiplied by its projected capacity factor, the product of which is then divided by the total acres of the project area.
… based on data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, one advanced nuclear plant (2 x AP1000) produces 33.17 megawatts (MW) per acre, while one offshore wind farm produces approximately 0.006 MW/acre, which is approximately 5,500 times less efficient than one nuclear plant.”
The Order included this table comparing capacity density of various technologies:
One thing that caught my eye is that energy types with carbon capture reduce the capacity density. I wonder why – does the carbon capture technology envisioned suck up that much power to create such a gap? Or is the difference due to how applicable acreage was determined (i.e., total acreage included the facility boundary versus just the footprint of how much is used for power generating processes). For example, I once visited a nuclear power plant located on 5,000 acres – most of which was used as a safety buffer.
Do the carbon capture processes need enough land to skew the numbers like this?
A puzzle to be solved.
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