AIPG-TX

Henry Wise, P.G., CPG, President of the AIPG Texas Section, announced the Texas Board approval and appointment of Dr. Melissa Hill, P.G.,CPG as the new Vice-President for Western Texas. Dr. Hill began her professional career at Southwest Research Institute while working on her M.S. in Geology at the University of Texas at San Antonio. She pursued a Ph.D. in Geology at the University of South Florida while working as a hydrologist at the Southwest Florida Water Management District.

Her Ph.D. research focused on karst springs and numerical simulations of both laminar and turbulent flow in the Upper Floridan Aquifer. After earning her doctorate, Dr. Hill worked at the Texas Water Development Board, where she conducted predictive simulations using alternate recharge and pumping scenarios to estimate groundwater availability. After moving to Alaska, she served as the State Hydrologist and managed the Alaska Hydrologic Survey. She also served as an adjunct faculty member at the University of Alaska Anchorage.

Dr. Hill currently resides in San Antonio and works as an Environmental Specialist at the fourth largest school district in the state. She is a licensed professional geoscientist in the states of Texas, Florida, and Alaska (more).

Michael D. Campbell, I2M’s Chief Geologist (and VP-Eastern Texas – AIPG Texas Chapter), and Chairman of UCOM said in a recent AAPG – EMD virtual conference that serious competition is now underway to determine which energy source will dominate the power-grid of the foreseeable future. With coal declining rapidly, only natural gas, uranium (and nuclear power), hydroelectric power, and renewables (wind and solar) are in the running. Both natural gas and nuclear power are providing back-up to the power grid because of the inherent drawbacks of wind and solar, (where the former does not blow all the time and the latter is intermittent because there are cloudy days and the sun only shines during the day, of course). Because California and Germany  have retired many of their nuclear power plants, natural gas has taken their place in the power grid in supporting California’s renewable energy systems and may also in Germany.

Inherent Failings of Wind and Solar
Renewables’ inherent failings have been identified and this is made even more apparent by the need for back-up batteries during zero or low-power output, which are unusually expensive to buy and maintain. Furthermore, as recently constructed wind and solar projects mature, the cost of the electricity they are producing is going up rapidly, not only because of low energy conversion production efficiencies, but also because the costs of operation and maintenance of these projects have been overlooked and underestimated during the economic evaluations in the project design stages.

Campbell indicated that the Committee has concluded that nuclear power is a sustainable, reliable, climate- and business-friendly source of energy available at various scales to be fueled by current resources and new discoveries that will provide hundreds of years of available uranium supplies from a variety of secure sources.

For the rest of the UCOM report, see (here).  In the meantime, the World Nuclear News has reported on the UCOM report (here).