Nuclear Energy Too Slow, Too Expensive To Save Climate, Says Report (reuters.com) 409
dryriver shares a report from Reuters: Nuclear power is losing ground to renewables in terms of both cost and capacity as its reactors are increasingly seen as less economical and slower to reverse carbon emissions, an industry report said. In mid-2019, new wind and solar generators competed efficiently against even existing nuclear power plants in cost terms, and grew generating capacity faster than any other power type, the annual World Nuclear Industry Status Report (WNISR) showed. "Stabilizing the climate is urgent, nuclear power is slow," said Mycle Schneider, lead author of the report. "It meets no technical or operational need that low-carbon competitors cannot meet better, cheaper and faster."
The report estimates that since 2009 the average construction time for reactors worldwide was just under 10 years, well above the estimate given by industry body the World Nuclear Association (WNA) of between 5 and 8.5 years. The extra time that nuclear plants take to build has major implications for climate goals, as existing fossil-fueled plants continue to emit CO2 while awaiting substitution. "To protect the climate, we must abate the most carbon at the least cost and in the least time," Schneider said. The WNA said in an emailed statement that studies have shown that nuclear energy has a proven track record in providing new generation faster than other low-carbon options, and added that in many countries nuclear generation provides on average more low-carbon power per year than solar or wind. It said that reactor construction times can be as short as four years when several reactors are built in sequence. According to the report, the cost of generating solar power ranges from $36 to $44 per MWh, while onshore wind power comes in at $29-$56 per MWh. Nuclear energy costs between $112 and $189.
"Over the past decade, the WNISR estimates levelized costs -- which compare the total lifetime cost of building and running a plant to lifetime output -- for utility-scale solar have dropped by 88% and for wind by 69%," reports Reuters. "For nuclear, they have increased by 23%, it said."
The report estimates that since 2009 the average construction time for reactors worldwide was just under 10 years, well above the estimate given by industry body the World Nuclear Association (WNA) of between 5 and 8.5 years. The extra time that nuclear plants take to build has major implications for climate goals, as existing fossil-fueled plants continue to emit CO2 while awaiting substitution. "To protect the climate, we must abate the most carbon at the least cost and in the least time," Schneider said. The WNA said in an emailed statement that studies have shown that nuclear energy has a proven track record in providing new generation faster than other low-carbon options, and added that in many countries nuclear generation provides on average more low-carbon power per year than solar or wind. It said that reactor construction times can be as short as four years when several reactors are built in sequence. According to the report, the cost of generating solar power ranges from $36 to $44 per MWh, while onshore wind power comes in at $29-$56 per MWh. Nuclear energy costs between $112 and $189.
"Over the past decade, the WNISR estimates levelized costs -- which compare the total lifetime cost of building and running a plant to lifetime output -- for utility-scale solar have dropped by 88% and for wind by 69%," reports Reuters. "For nuclear, they have increased by 23%, it said."
If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:4, Insightful)
Ya know, if you never ever try you never ever succeed. Perhaps we should start building and hope for the best rather than shrug and say it'll never work and do nothing.
(Of course, that presumes it is an attempt to solve a real problem mankind has even a vague prayer of doing something about.)
{o.o}
Re:If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:4, Informative)
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Re: If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:4, Informative)
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Oh yeah, that particular nuclear power plant is just like all the other big infrastructure builds - someone says "the government is paying" and adds a extra nought on to the cost.
But solar is the most obvious case in point: how much does solar energy cost, when its dark?
Until we have renewables that are pretty much guaranteed to generate all day long, in all kinds of weather, then we will be relying on fossil or nuclear fuels to make up the difference in demand, which can be as significant as "all of it" so
Re: If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:4, Informative)
If you are serious, yes you can buy them. Contact Innogy. They have several thousand turbines that will be decommissioned in 2023 in Germany because they will no longer be eligible for subsidized generation rates. There is a push to extend the subsidies, but if that fails they will be disassembled and the majority of the parts landfilled.
There is a catch to buying one. You have to hold funds in escrow to pay to dismantle it at end-of-life.
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China leads the world in on-shore wind deployment and heat peak coal 5-6 years ago. The reduction in coal is in part due to the availability of renewables, and in part due to old coal plants being replaced with more efficient ones.
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One of Germany's largest newspapers, Die Welt, summarized the findings of the McKinsey report in a single word: "disastrous."
But McKinsey issues its strongest warning when it comes to Germany's increasingly insecure energy supply due to its heavy reliance on intermittent solar and wind. For three days in June 2019, the ele
Re:If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:5, Insightful)
Net exports on average are meaningless for this because they import when their renewables do not meet demand. If all their neighbours were also running the same renewable generation, they'd be unable to export any of it, and they'd all go dark at the same times.
So Germany's massive renewable push only works because France has a shit-ton of nuclear and Poland has a ton of gas available for them to buy.
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"Net exports on average are meaningless for this because they import when their renewables do not meet demand. If all their neighbours were also running the same renewable generation, they'd be unable to export any of it, and they'd all go dark at the same times."
That's how solar works, but it's not how wind works. The wind is always blowing somewhere. Actually, it's not necessarily how solar works either, but that's how it works at night so at least some of the time it would be true.
You can also build rene
Re: If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, wind is always blowing, but unless you've built to like 5x capacity or more, you'll still experience weather events that cause regional blackouts.
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Which is where you either import power from somewhere else where the wind is blowing or the sun is shining, and/or you build batteries.
Note that "battery" in this case does not need to be small or react within milliseconds, nor do they need to actually store electricity. An example of the latter is that many countries use a significant amount of power for heating, so electricity converted to heat can be stored in buildings or by heating rock.
Re: If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:4, Informative)
Peak demand here in BC is consistently in the middle of winter (actually February last winter) after dark (evening) due to the need for heating. This is likely true for all northern areas though air conditioning is becoming a thing here as well.
We're also close to 100% hydro so other renewables would be ideal for keeping the reservoirs from emptying too quick, especially with the droughts that we've been experiencing and that are predicted to get worse.
Re: If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:4, Informative)
Almost nobody I know uses electricity for heating their house in Ontario if they can avoid it. Most people are on Natural Gas, and those in rural areas use propane. There are some older houses that still have baseboard electric heat than haven't been converted over yet, but the resale value on the houses reflects the fact that nobody wants to heat with electricity. It used to make much more sense but since electricity rates have gone up, it's way more expensive than using natural gas.
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They (well, so far I've seen Frigidaire but there's probably others) do make window mounted heat pumps, it seems. They cost more, and I can see why someone who already has a non-electric heating system might avoid that cost, but it seems like it would be an improvement over electric resistance heating.
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> Almost nobody I know uses electricity for heating their house in Ontario
My dad's house does. My cottage does. My wife's former condo was a air-based heat pump. My friends house is a open-cycle ground-return heat pump (~$500 per year heating AND cooling!)
Not nearly as rare as you might think.
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I think it is more common here. Doesn't get that cold in most winters and hydro is still cheap, though not as cheap as it was as the last government balanced the budget by borrowing billions from BC Hydro. Problem with public owned utilities, it just takes one government that doesn't believe in them to screw them up.
The City of Vancouver was actually talking about banning natural gas in new buildings the other year, though I don't think they followed through and lots of people do use gas for heating and her
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Re:If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:4, Informative)
Units are your friend.
Energy is not measured in terawatts. Terajoules, properly. Or even terawatt-hours, for the heathens who can't use SI as intended. But not terawatts, which is a measure of power, not energy.
Re: If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:3)
" A wind turbine is built within a week."
False. It takes more than that just for the concrete in the foundation to cure. And before that you had to dig the hole and set the rebar.
If you had said "A wind turbine can be erected in a week once the foundation is complete." then you would have been right. Even then you might have to wait for the other turbines in the group to be completed before you throw the switch to power them up.
It's still a whole lot faster than a nuclear plant.
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Yeah, they make estimates based on some of the highest regulated places in the world. I'm surprised they could even build a nuclear reactor at all in the EU.
The problem with nuclear is not its base cost, it's the regulation and NIMBY crowd that makes it very difficult. You also notice that in most of these reports, the actual production, space and lifecycle costs of are not included and simply take the values based on massive government intervention in both directions.
If we had "the government" funding nucl
Re:If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:5, Insightful)
"Ya know, if you never ever try you never ever succeed. Perhaps we should start building and hope for the best rather than shrug and say it'll never work and do nothing."
No, that would be very stupid. We keep doing studies and they keep saying nuclear doesn't make sense for a broad variety of reasons, including but not limited to initial costs, maintenance costs, fueling costs, refueling costs, decommissioning costs, site cleanup costs, waste handling, waste storage which is by the way still an unsolved problem, site protection, supply chain management, strip mining for fuel, the fact that there is not enough accessible fuel to replace our fossil fuel use with nuclear...
The urge to "do something" is self-destructive when not tempered with the wisdom to avoid doing things we KNOW won't work, let alone those things which almost certainly won't work. We've run the numbers time and again and this report only confirms what we already knew: nuclear power only ultimately benefits those who profit from its production. Everyone else would better be served with some other solution.
"Of course, that presumes it is an attempt to solve a real problem mankind has even a vague prayer of doing something about."
Science not only says that nuclear power is dumb, it also says that AGW is real. Why do you hate science?
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Ya know, if you never ever try you never ever succeed.
The Nuclear Industry has been trying for 50 years. It's revealed a lot of problems that are yet to be solved so stepping back from Nuclear whilst we sort out its issues is probably a good way to get a better understanding of the technology.
Re:If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:5, Informative)
Re:If you don't try it's a guaranteed failure (Score:5, Informative)
How this got to +5 Informative I don't know.
The World Nuclear Report's own summary contradicts AC's post.
Over the past decade, levelized cost estimates for utility-scale solar dropped by 88%, wind by 69%, while nuclear increased by 23%. New solar plants can compete with existing coal fired plants in India, wind turbines alone generate more electricity than nuclear reactors in India and China. But new nuclear plants are also much slower to build than all other options, e.g. the nine reactors started up in 2018 took an average of 10.9 years to be completed. In other words, nuclear power is an option that is more expensive and slower to implement than alternatives and therefore is not effective in the effort to battle the climate emergency, rather it is counterproductive, as the funds are then not available for more effective options.
The rather surprising outcome of the analyses is that even the extended operation of existing reactors is not climate effective as operating costs exceed the costs of competing energy efficiency and new renewable energy options and therefore durably block their implementation. Mycle Schneider concludes: “You can spend a dollar, a euro, a forint or a ruble only once: the climate emergency requires that investment decisions must favor the cheapest and fastest response strategies. The nuclear power option has consistently turned out the most expensive and the slowest.”
Go read it for yourself [worldnuclearreport.org]
Re: CO2 doesn't cause global warming. (Score:2)
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Re:CO2 doesn't cause global warming. (Score:5, Insightful)
A few millimeters of polycarbonate cannot possibly increase the temperature within a greenhouse? Well, obviously it does and if the 0.04% of CO2 from the atmosphere was compressed to a density similar polyethylene sheets then that would be enough to cover the Earth surface with a few millimeters of solid CO2. Do no underestimate the amount of CO2 in an atmosphere that is multiple kilometers high.
The math is not very difficult.
The mass of the atmosphere is M = 5.14e18 kg
The Earth surface is S = 510 million km = 510e6 km = 510e12 m
So 400ppm = 400e-6 of CO2 per surface area gives
400e-6 * M / S = 4.03 kg/m = 0.4 g/cm
Polycarbonate density is around 1.2 g/cm so the atmosphere CO2 compressed to the same density would have a thickness of 0.4 / 1.2 = 0.33 cm = 3.3 mm.
The polycarbonate sheets of a typical greenhouse are between 3 and 6mm so 3.3mm of CO2 is quite comparable. Of course, I am not claiming that CO2 and polycarbonate have the same green house effect but the important thing to understand here is that 0.04% of CO2 is not as small as it seems
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Well that's not the argument at all. How warm will the polonium make you?
Checkmate.
So we (Score:2, Interesting)
Wind power that fails when the wind is too low, fast? No wind for hours?
Solar that fails every night?
Pump some hydro? Every nation has the water and hills for that
Only do productive work during the day?
Import gas? Make more gas?
Stop jobs, growth and industry to use less and less power?
Stabilizing the climate is not urgent.
Stabilizing every advanced nations power grid is urgent after they try too much wind and solar.
Hydrogen every night?
Re:So we (Score:5, Insightful)
No complete ideas.
No research.
Maybe do some reading?
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Re:So we (Score:5, Informative)
Wind power that fails when the wind is too low, fast? No wind for hours?
Given a large grid this basically doesn't happen.
I'll bite. Is the UK's grid large enough for you? The data shows that wind output can reduce to less than 20% of its average output for up to 1 week at a time and less than 25% of the average for up to 3 weeks at a time. The parent poster was actually generous when he mentioned hours.
You can download the actual UK electricity production data at https://www.elexonportal.co.uk... [elexonportal.co.uk] - registration required if you don't believe me.
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and he forgets constraints in the grid itself - if your grid is large then so too is the demand from all the people everywhere, and if you have a country like America and its windy on the west cost, but not on the East and think that makes everything just tickety-boo as the excess western energy can be provided to those on the eastern coast, think again. the cabling for the grid isn't infinite, the power has to travel there and the grid just won't be able to transfer that much power.
In the UK, when its espe
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The UK is *tiny*.
Moral of the story: buy reactors from Russia (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't buy reactors from the US, as the US has lost engineering capability to build them.
Re:Moral of the story: buy reactors from Russia (Score:5, Interesting)
Yeah, much like India manages to build cars [wikipedia.org] on time and within a budget.
Which is great, until you have a problem [theguardian.com].
It's kinda like this [wikipedia.org] with Russian nuke plants.
Re:Moral of the story: buy reactors from Russia (Score:5, Insightful)
Never mind that the new reactors simply can not fail in the way Chernobyl reactor failed.
Re:Moral of the story: buy reactors from Russia (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, if you want to create wildlife preserves, you can do that a lot cheaper than building a nuke plant and let it cook off, ya know?
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Never mind that the new reactors simply can not fail in the way Chernobyl reactor failed.
How many reactors are still around that could fail catastrophically (not necessarily exactly like Chernobyl), and what should we do about them ?
Re:Moral of the story: buy reactors from Russia (Score:5, Informative)
How many reactors are still around that could fail catastrophically (not necessarily exactly like Chernobyl),
Zero.
and what should we do about them ?
We should have a plan to keep them operating safely and profitably for as long as we can. Since a large majority of the world's fleet of nuclear power plants were built decades ago then we must also have a plan for replacing these nuclear power plants for when they do reach the end of their operational life.
There's been a lot of work in improving the survivability of a nuclear power plant against natural events and human error. This is expressed as "core damage frequency".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Core damage frequency is not a measure of some kind of Chernobyl style event, although that would certainly be included. In this context "core damage" is something where there is a potential for radiation release, only severe events would mean radioactive material actually escapes containment.
A 2003 study commissioned by the European Commission remarked that "core damage frequencies of 5 Ã-- 10â'5 [per reactor-year] are a common result" or in other words, one core damage incident in 20,000 reactor years.[3] A 2008 study performed by the Electric Power Research Institute, the estimated core damage frequency for the United States nuclear industry is estimated at once in 50,000 reactor years, or 2 Ã-- 10â'5.[5]
Assuming there are 500 reactors in use in the world, the above CDF estimates mean that, statistically, one core damage incident would be expected to occur somewhere in the world every 40 years for the 2003 European Commission estimated average accident rate or every 100 years for the 2008 Electric Power Research Institute estimated average accident rate.
In the USA we have about 100 nuclear power reactors that provide about 20% of our electricity. That assumption used of having 500 nuclear power reactors means the potential for 100% of our electricity from nuclear power. That's not likely to be practical to get 100% of our electricity from nuclear power but nuclear power plants have uses beyond electricity production, one often proposed use is desalinating water to provide drinking water for large coastal cities.
A "core damage incident" would be something like at Three Mile Island, where the reactor is considered a total loss but there was little or no radiation released and no one injured or killed.
Re:Moral of the story: buy reactors from Russia (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody wants nukes you retard.
They will. Sooner or later they will want nuclear power. They will want nuclear power because the alternatives will be far less desirable.
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Modern reactor designs, including those build by Russia as referenced above, can
Re:Moral of the story: buy reactors from Russia (Score:5, Insightful)
Modern reactor designs, including those build by Russia as referenced above, cannot melt down or explode. If they fail, they simply shut down, they cannot sustain a reaction let alone a run-away reaction as needed for a Chernobyl or Fukushima style disaster.
But they've all got radioactive materials that emit radiation!
Can't you see!? They're trying to turn the freakin' frogs gay!! Aaaaaarrrggghhh! [rips shirt]
Oops, sorry! Channeled from the crackpot column on the right, not the left. My B.
The real reason there is so much opposition to nuclear (not talking about the useful idiots that repeat canned propaganda talking points like NPCs) is because first, cheap electricity will hurt a lot of long established moneyed interests and hinder using high priced electricity as a control on the economy, secondly, there is real fear that cheap electricity in the US would kick the US economy into hyperdrive threatening our foreign competitors and opponents, while also benefiting average people tremendously and thereby empower them and make them less reliant on government. How well can controlling the masses with entitlement programs and a welfare state work if only a few actually need such programs? Money and control.
Strat
Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
France managed to convert the large majority of its electricity production to nuclear in just 15 years [wikipedia.org]. Why can't we do the same thing now? Are we stupider than French people in the 70s-80s were?
Re:Really? (Score:5, Informative)
No, you just have a lot more NIMBYs.
Too many hands in the trough. (Score:5, Insightful)
First, every local pressure group, regulatory agency, and bureaucrat in the area will dig DEEPLY into the budget to squeeze out every dollar they can.
Then everyone who hates nuclear power will do their best to tie the project up in legal battles for ever.
And lastly you will then compete against other power sources that gave every growing subsidies to help them.
Hell, if the amount of radiation waste was directly charged against power stations - coal would be out of business overnight, as it produces about 100 TIMES the total radiation from its waste..
If energy sources were penalty taxed in proportion to related fatalities each year, then nuclear would be flying high.
But no, there seems to be no escaping the effect of the 'duck and cover' paranoia drilled into everyone during the cold war, that nuclear = whole cities or mutant zombies killing babies because the Russians are evil.
ANYONE who says that AGW is a critical problem, but does not say that nuclear is a critical SOLUTION is either incapable of basic critical thinking, or has a personal vested interest in something else.
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ANYONE who says that AGW is a critical problem, but does not say that nuclear is a critical SOLUTION is either incapable of basic critical thinking, or has a personal vested interest in something else.
... or thinks that a solution is only feasible if it's in concert with market forces and free market economics -- and sees that Nuclear hasn't in all its years managed to produce the economic returns that investors want to see. Now I know that government prop up some other industries with perpetual subsidies where the free market doesn't invest enough, e.g. the military and national rail networks. I have a hard time evaluating which things should get perpetual subsidies and which shouldn't. But no area feel
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Nuclear is great, until:
#1 The unexpected happens, earthquake, tsunami, terrorist attack, sabotage... and everything goes to shit.
#2 An old plant has to be decommissioned, and the energy companies no longer feel responsible for the radioactive pile of junk and offload the enormous cost of dismantling to the taxpayer [spiegel.de].
But it is really profitable for the utility companies to build and operate them, yes.
Re:Too many hands in the trough. (Score:4, Informative)
What about Hinkley C then?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
The only legal challenge was from the Irish complaining that the vast subsidies given to the plant amounted to state aid, and that was resolved within a few months.
No other lawsuits. No protests. No NIMBYs since the site was already in use as a nuclear power station. Planning approval quickly rubber stamped by the government.
What fucked it was the cost. Initial estimate was £24/MHh. By the time the contract was awarded that had gone up to £96/MWh, increasing with inflation and guaranteed for the life of the plant, and the only remaining bidder (EDF) still wasn't sure they wanted to build it. It took Chinese investment to get it off the ground.
Seems like nuclear power is expensive enough by itself without the need for the all powerful NIMBYs and environmental activists getting involved.
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Probably because building nukes the same way nowaydays would be illegal. And for a good reason.
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Why should it be illegal? It's safer than any other power source [ourworldindata.org].
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It seems like you've linked to a page comparing it to other non-renewable energy sources instead of "any other power source".
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If we calculate safety not in terms of people dying, but in terms of reactor-years per meltdown (or other catastrophic event of similar scale), how many reactor-years per incident would you consider acceptable ? How many reactor-years do you estimate the average person would find acceptable ? And what number is realistic based on various currently operating designs ?
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From the self-same article you linked to, it's not 1:50k, it's 1:1.3k. The 50k was a theoretical calculation. Theory is not more important than practice. And in practice, there have been 11 core damage incidents so far.
"According to a 2011 report by the National Resources Defense Council, about 14,400 reactor years of commercial power operation have been accrued worldwide for 582 reactors. Of these 582 reactors, 11 have suffered from serious core damage.[6] This historical data results in a 1954 to 2011 era
Re:Really? (Score:5, Funny)
Are we stupider than French people in the 70s-80s were?
Dude, even the French are stupider than they were in the 70s and 80s. The whole world has gone bananas, and as in all other things the US is the world leader.
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If you are still pushing for more nuclear power plants in the face of new data suggesting other methods are giving a quicker return, then yes, you are stupider than French people in the 70's-80's were.
Re:Really? (Score:5, Insightful)
in the face of new data
The supposed "data" we have here is highly suspect. This "World Nuclear Industry Status Report" is produced by Mycle Schneider, a professional anti nuclear activist [wikipedia.org].
It's bullshit IOW.
There is no technical reason a reactor need take 10-15 years to construct. If half the urgency and support given to wind/solar were available to nuclear all of the major industrial economies of the world could look like France, a nation with very low carbon emissions and cheap, reliable power. The CO2 and ocean acidification problems would be solved. Ontario is another excellent example.
It's not about actually "saving" the climate. The supposed climate savers are selective in their targets, ignoring huge emitters and opposing highly successful, cost effective solutions. A world of abundant, clean power at low cost has no appeal to these people; they want scarcity. Scarcity in all things.
I don't care anymore. I'm independent enough now that I don't need to worry about you and whatever stupid policies your endless peacetime anxieties have you supporting. Self inflict all the energy poverty you wish.
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I do have to wonder (Score:2)
Why construction contracts don't have late penalties built into them?
The companies building reactor sites always seem to want more money and more time...
And what about some changes in regulatory oversight? There also seem to be a large amount of palms waiting to be greased to approve sometimes simple things.
That being said, probably the biggest thing missing from the headline is the word "Current Designs" and current technology. I think the local reactor here is 50 or 60 years old at this point in time.
Buil
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Second best time is now (Score:5, Insightful)
Nuclear wasted it's potential when scaling up (Score:2)
Trying to build all these TerraWatt powerplants just didn't bring the economics of scale advantages that were promised.
We should have put way more effort into large amounts of small manageable reactors.
Technical hurdles (Score:2)
Increasing the number of nuclear powerplants would be a major undertaking. The industry is sized for the current market, and there are some unique items that are already difficult to source [slashdot.org], like the reactor vessel: only a few companies are capable of producing them, and they take a long time to build so the worldwide production is limited. A crash program to build nuclear reactors would have to start by expanding industries like these.
Careful with this kind of headline (Score:3)
You might give the blindseer a heart attack.
Re:Careful with this kind of headline (Score:5, Insightful)
You might give the blindseer a heart attack.
No, I'm just laughing to myself at the hysteria of it all. This hysteria is built upon a bunch of lies. The truth will come out in the end.
They say that it takes at least ten years to build a nuclear power plant? I've seen how quickly they can go up if there's enough motivation. The US military has built nuclear power plants in 18 months. When the rush for nuclear power was in full swing a civilian nuclear power plant could go from ground breaking to putting power on the grid in three years, give or take a few months.
There's nothing to get worried about. We got this. I thought Scott Adams spelled it out well on his blog.
https://www.scottadamssays.com... [scottadamssays.com]
Here's just one thing among many that I find amusing about this, nearly everyone is looking to the government to solve this problem. When has the government solved any problem? The solution will come from the private sector. There's a lot of money that can be made in solving this problem. The first one to prove all those lies wrong will be a very wealthy person.
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When the rush for nuclear power was in full swing a civilian nuclear power plant could go from ground breaking to putting power on the grid in three years, give or take a few months.
Why is that though? Let's look at the data: http://euanmearns.com/how-long... [euanmearns.com]
Turns out there is no correlation between age and built time, i.e. things were not better in the past. And in fact countries with less regulation don't do any better, they have as many problem reactors that take a long time to build as the OECD countries.
And all that despite the fact that modern designs are actually somewhat safe. All the ones built in 3 years have had extensive safety upgrades since.
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This sort of anti-government silliness really just throws anything else you might have to say in doubt, don't you know?
Re:Careful with this kind of headline (Score:4, Insightful)
And this was when? Back in the 1960s? ... 70s? ... with all the safety issues that came with it.
What safety issues?
In the last 40 years our computers got a lot faster, we have created better construction materials, and we also have a lot more experience in nuclear reactor design.
A build time of three years is certainly possible today but we must first have some experience and a sense of urgency. I expect we will find plenty of both in less than a decade. After a few drawn out and over budget nuclear power plants are built the rest should go up far more quickly, and with improved safety on each iteration. From designs that are already very safe.
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The report is written by anti-nuclear activists. Who has cognitive bias here ?
It does not matter who wrote it.
What matters is: is it scientifically true?
I can think of one (Score:4, Insightful)
Nuclear works at night, and when the wind stops blowing.
I can also think of hydro (Score:3)
works at night, and when the wind stops blowing
as does hydro to (and in turn, it can be switched off and its lake left to slowly fil back up when sun shine is back and wind blows again)
also solar works when the winds stop blowing
and wind still works at night
I am not saying that I'm against nuclear (I am not), just pointing out that investing in a as diverse energy mix as possible helps smoothing out the problems of every single one.
follow that idea, investing in renewable in the same time as nukes, would help smoothing out the slow deployment problem, a
Oh, so you finally noticed? (Score:2, Insightful)
To speak in the words of the great Vincent Hanna: "Well, I am over-f*cking-welmed.".
Nuclear Fission isn't cost effective. The Germans notices this when they stopped the Fast-Breeding-Reactor at Kalkar and replenishing plant Wackersdorf. back in the 80ies and early 90ies. Those weren't put down by a decade of "Tree-huggers" protesting, but finally by some beancounter sitting down, sharpening his pencil and doing the math and noticing that the numbers simply don't add up.
Nuclear Fission as we know it today is
Re:Oh, so you finally noticed? (Score:5, Informative)
That is not correct. Nuclear energy in Germany was put down because of the Greens, i.e. tree-hugging eco warrior types.
I grew up around that time in Germany. There were plenty of protests. You couldn't go anywhere without graffitis, stickers and posters from the Greens about nuclear power littering every public place.
Our whole energy policy was and still is focused on feel-good eco activism above all else.
Re:Oh, so you finally noticed? (Score:5, Insightful)
How much better off would we be regarding CO2 emissions today if that had happened?
Scott Adams says, "we got this". (Score:2)
No worries, child. We got this.
https://www.scottadamssays.com... [scottadamssays.com]
Really? (Score:2)
"Over the past decade, the WNISR estimates levelized costs -- which compare the total lifetime cost of building and running a plant to lifetime output"
Did they include the costs of stocking and guarding the remains and the ashes for 184000 years?
Re: (Score:3)
"Over the past decade, the WNISR estimates levelized costs -- which compare the total lifetime cost of building and running a plant to lifetime output"
Did they include the costs of stocking and guarding the remains and the ashes for 184000 years?
In view of the rest of that sentence:
for utility-scale solar have dropped by 88% and for wind by 69%," reports Reuters. "For nuclear, they have increased by 23%, it said.
Does it matter? ... and if they didn't it's just going to make nuclear look worse.
Nuclear energy has always been a lie (Score:2)
From the outset, nuclear reactors were about refining weapons-grade uranium. The first reactors never generated a single watt of electricity, they actually burned up a shit-ton on electricity on trying to keep the reactors cool. Promises of cheap electricity were a smoke-screen & a lie to get public support for the cold-war nuclear arms race. It's also why western governments are so opposed to the Iranian nuclear energy programme but they can't admit that publicly because it would expose the lie about t
Re: (Score:3)
They were using dual use technology.
Then they signed the non-proliferation treaty in bad faith.
They're borderd by two countries that the US has invaded, so it's not a surprise they get antsy. The only countries the US doesn't mess with are nuclear powers.
They can produce nuclear weapons if they want, they just shouldn't expect trade with the USA and it's allies while doing so. If they want to be left alone then it would also help if they wouldn't shoot down US surveillance drones that are flying in international airspace.
Iran did comply with these inspections until their deal with the US was off.
Building dual use reactors is not complying. They didn't have to sign the deal. They can leave the treaty at any time.
There are videos of members of the Iran parliament shouting
Please Quit Posting Anti Nuclear FUD Like Its Real (Score:5, Insightful)
"The World Nuclear Industry Status Report is a yearly report that explores the global challenges facing the nuclear power industry. It is produced by Mycle Schneider, a professional anti nuclear activist, and gives a detailed overview of the global nuclear industry and special analysis on key events and trends." -Wikipedia.
Sigh. The old vanguard of anti-nuke hippies is at it again. The numbers in that report are intentional distortions. Comparing a solar panel without storage in optimal conditions to a hypothetical nuclear plant is nonsense. I usually just gloss over this nonsense, but I'm grumpy this morning.
Show me numbers of what it would cost to power the whole of the US on renewable over the next hundred years versus nuclear, including full battery storage and replacement/maintenance costs. Keep in mind the existing nuclear fleet is likely to run 80 years (smaller older single reactors excluded), and an honest evaluation would likely put the lifetime of a plant at 100 years or more in terms of physical capability (in contrast to the bullshit 40 years most anti-nukes will quote). Use costs that reflect economy of scale on nukes, instead of falsely asserting that the few reactors in the US kicked off in the last decade are reflective of the cost of every nuke that will ever be built (they were always intended as loss leaders to re-grow the US construction expertise to build reactors, as the specifications are too exacting for "normal" construction techniques). If you aren't going to allow natural gas or nuclear to exist on an all renewable grid, you need to factor in the additional margin needed to survive disasters in your less diverse grid. What if a volcano on the west coast erupts again and reduces solar output by X% for an extended period? How much more margin do you need to cover it? If that doesn't sound fair, remember that the high cost of nuclear explicitly factors in those kinds of disasters and then some.
I can tell you flatly that the target generation cost in the southeast currently for nuclear is $25/mwh. It isn't quite there yet, but it's getting close. That does not factor in sunk capital costs over plant lifetime, but it does factor in major maintenance. I would be incredibly interested in an honest assessment of renewable with battery storage, but I haven't seen one. I really worry that the public is being sold a false bill of goods with the current renewable push, and the damage to society could be vast and last lifetimes. Renewables absolutely make sense regionally, and with a few decades of building out HVDC transmission and advancements in battery storage that reduce the amount of rare-earths required renewables may very well be the only things that make sense to build (outside of grid robustness... there is a very serious argument for paying a little more for electricity to have a lifeline in the volcano-type scenarios). But none of the honest numbers pan out on paper right now for building only renewables... which is why natural gas is largely displacing coal.
Renewables are living in the margins of most grid operators, because they're still such a small portion of generation overall that any given utility or RTO can just buy "dirty" power to cover for renewables when they have issues. That only works when a small portion of your wider grid infrastructure is renewable (excluding very specific exceptions, like parts of northern Europe). Past a certain percentage of renewables on the grid, you either have to have coupled battery storage systems or you have to have a massive overcapacity of renewables (wind/tidal). We're rapidly creeping up on the point when renewables are going to have to stand on their own two feet without baseload propping them up (or with the additional cost of a coupled peaking natural gas generation facility weighed in). It's time to start talking honestly about what those costs look like without subsidies, and whether we want the reliability of nuclear to be a part of that mix.
The serious climate change scholars I've seen pretty much all agree nuclear plays some part in the next hundred years of generation to meet climate targets, if only in a subsidized maintenance mode. Before you read crap like this and fall for it, you should ask yourself why that is.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh, you mean like this one? https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy19... [nrel.gov]
Its a year old, but we'll take it at face value for ease of talking. Take a good look at what that study is telling you. They took a 100MW nameplate solar facility, so in practical output chop the number in half for average (again back of the envelope). That's 50MW of power. They've got a 4 hour storage solution figured in. Power usage dips at night, and in a lot of places has a pretty good spike in the morning when people wake up (turn on li
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not aware that decommissioning costs for commercial generating facilities are higher than what was collected by law over the lifetime of the plants. Right now, the rights to decommission and manage long-term the most recent spate of US closures were actually sold off to private companies, because those companies believed the amount collected for decommissioning long-term were so high relative to the actual monetary reality that they could do it now (versus after an 80 year decay time) and still make ab
Doesn't account for 24x7 service (Score:3)
At that point, it's not obvious whether nuclear is significantly worse, assuming USians could build a reactor as if their lives depended on it, as opposed to feeling the need for greed.
What is faster? Nothing. (Score:3, Insightful)
Building out the equivalent solar or wind power to even a single nuclear pant is WAY slower.
Once again, if you don't support nuclear energy you don't really care about the climate, or Earth for that matter. Nuclear energy is magical gift from the cosmos and to ignore it is as spiteful as it is stupid.
"It meets no technical or operational need..." (Score:5, Insightful)
Sigh.
What a bunch of BS. It has long been understood that renewables are not suitable for base load. The sun is not always shining, the wind, not always blowing, Geo is too small and too unique, Hydro has largely been already exploited, Tidal has promise but has a lot of maintenance issues, bio too small. There are only so many suitable storage options, and reservoirs like hydro are similarly pretty tapped out. You are not going to store many multiple GW of energy in batteries.
That leaves Coal, Gas, Oil, and Nuclear for base. Pick one. Now pick one that doesn't emit CO2. Guess what's left?
Reminds me of a Ted talk (Score:3)
It's called David MacKay: A reality check on renewables.
The point made is an important one regarding renewables: if we were to be entirely wind or solar powered, say, how large an area would the wind turbines or solar farms take up? Nuclear has an important feature that it provides a large amount of power from a small area of land (small by comparison).
Re: (Score:3)
Onshore wind is just a weird term for wind that is on land. Kansas has at least 5GW peak of onshore wind power installed, with potential for a hundred times that.
If you were joking and I missed it, well played sir!
Re: :Onshore Wind" ogreat if you live close to a s (Score:5, Informative)
Fortunately, the plains states are among the windiest places in the country. WaPo sez:
"The top 5 windiest states are: Nebraska (1), Kansas (2), South Dakota (3), North Dakota (4), and Iowa (5)"
https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"The top 5 windiest states are: Nebraska (1), Kansas (2), South Dakota (3), North Dakota (4), and Iowa (5)"
When I was a kid I remember that being referred to as "tornado alley". Now they call it the "wind corridor".
I'm sure those windmills do fine most of the time. I'd like to see how they stand up to 90mph winds though.
Nuclear power plants are build to hold up to tornadoes, by the way. The power lines might end up in another state after a direct hit but it will be back on line soon enough. Those windmills? That's going to leave a big mess and take a long time to get back online.
Re: :Onshore Wind" ogreat if you live close to a s (Score:5, Informative)
"The top 5 windiest states are: Nebraska (1), Kansas (2), South Dakota (3), North Dakota (4), and Iowa (5)"
When I was a kid I remember that being referred to as "tornado alley". Now they call it the "wind corridor".
I'm sure those windmills do fine most of the time. I'd like to see how they stand up to 90mph winds though.
Nuclear power plants are build to hold up to tornadoes, by the way. The power lines might end up in another state after a direct hit but it will be back on line soon enough. Those windmills? That's going to leave a big mess and take a long time to get back online.
The survival speed of commercial wind turbines is in the range of 40 m/s (89 MPH) to 72 m/s (161 MPH) they have been built to survive wind speeds of 80 m/s (180 mph). That being said wind turbines wold be orders of magnitude less messy and way cheaper to replace than a blown nuclear reactor. Oh, and did I mention? Terrestrial wind plants have less than half the LCOE of nuclear.
Re: :Onshore Wind" ogreat if you live close to a s (Score:5, Informative)
90 MPH wind is on the very low end of the scale for wind turbine suitability. There are a few designs rated for only 90 MPH but they are older ones.
Most are rated for around 140 MPH, with some doing up to 180 MPH. At that point the bigger danger is flying debris hitting them.
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
It's like they just discovered a brand new oil field, except this one never runs out. Rather than building pipelines they just need to build some HVDC cables and start raking in the money.
In 2030 classic TV show Dallas will be re-made but with windmill billionaires.
Don't count out Alabama. (Score:3, Funny)
Re::Onshore Wind" ogreat if you live close to a sh (Score:5, Funny)
Well, Kansas has a history of having great winds [weather.gov], too.
Even though they're a bit like a marriage. It starts with a little bit of blowing and before you know it your house is gone.
Re: (Score:3)