General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Nuclear renaissance? US OKs new reactor design [View all]Bob Wallace
(549 posts)Covered elsewhere. We can move large amounts of power long distances if that turns out to be the least expensive, most reliable way to power ourselves.
Hydro, we've got something like 80,000 existing dams in the US and use only 2,500 for generation. Based on a 2007 review of dams on federal land a sizable portion of the remaining dams, perhaps as much as 10% are good candidates for power production.
We've got several existing dams in the process of conversion to producers and the Department of Agriculture just made funds available to convert four more.
We've already invented pump-up hydro storage. We built almost 25GW in order to shift nuclear-electricity from off-peak to peak hours. We've got thousands of existing dams that could be converted to pump-up storage if we desire. But it's more likely utility scale batteries are going to be cheaper.
Tides do ebb and flow, but they ebb and flow at different times along coasts and are very highly predictable, even hundreds of years into the future.
I don't think you've considered the fact that utility operators are constantly dealing with ebbs and flow in supply and demand. People wake up and turn on stuff, factories start a shift, retailers close down for the day, people turn stuff off and go to bed. Power plants go off line, sometimes scheduled but sometime unexpected. (Like the two reactors which went off line in Virginia last fall in the earthquake. And stayed off for months.)