4 ms·

1. China bought 4x nuclear plants from Westinghouse. It was clear to everyone involved that China was going to clone their design. Everything had to be built wi

1. China bought 4x nuclear plants from Westinghouse. It was clear to everyone involved that China was going to clone their design. Everything had to be built with Chinese labor and engineers and the entire blueprints were handed over to the Chinese. After those 4 are built, China will build as many as they want themselves, likely royalty-free. 2. the 3.3Gw is 24x7 minus downtime/maintenance. The 53GW is less than 12h/day, depending on how it is installed it may well be far less than 12h/day of peak output. So likelier to be ~ 12-18Gw on a continuous basis given night time, cloud cover, rain, efficiency losses, etc. I agree the solar is still significant but it is less than the raw numbers make it appear.

jabl 8y ago
1. For the near future, it seems China is planning to build lots of their own designs (which AFAIU are improved versions of previous generation French designs (not EPR)). https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/07/03/russia-and-china-consolidate-new-nuclear-around-standardized-water-cooled-designs/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2018/07/03... 2. Some quick duckduckgo'ing suggests average capacity factor of Chinese utility solar is around 15%. (Really good locations like SW USA can reach up to 27%) . With a capacity factor of 90% for nukes, it's 3 GW nukes and 8 GW solar.