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Two quotes from the article contradicting your outdated talking point: > “The battery pipeline has grown exponentially,” Dixon says > Other projects include t

Two quotes from the article contradicting your outdated talking point: > “The battery pipeline has grown exponentially,” Dixon says > Other projects include the 4GW Walcha project in NSW, proposed by Energy Estate and Mirus Wind, which aims to combine huge amounts of wind, solar and storage for the biggest project proposed so far for the main grid. Battery power has obviously been improving asymptotically towards zero (i. e. the inverse of power growing exponentially): https://www.google.com/search?q=costs+of+lithium+ion+batteries https://www.google.com/search?q=costs+of+lithium+ion+batteri... It's funny how the wider tech community has this obsession with nuclear technology. It's a sort of scientism, where the actual science has long moved on, but a certain group just clings to outdated ideas because they are still invested in a culture clash. It has gotten to the point where I think the potential danger of nuclear technology is actually appreciated, as a sort of sticking-it-to-the-environmentalists feature. Or it's a symptom of people growing up with science fiction culture prominently featuring nuclear power, unwilling to let their ideas of a glorious future go. But the facts have simply moved on, and renewable energy is now winning on economic arguments alone. Thanks to actual scientists, and to a significant degree politicians (especially Germany) offering magnificently effective subsidies, solar, wind, and storage are now competitive even with coal. Nuclear power is big hairy dangerous technology some people somehow adore, but it's also prohibitively expensive.

WhompingWindows 8y ago
People like the idea of nuclear, but none of these pro-nuclear advocates can make it cost-effective in practice. Look at South Carolina, what a debacle and the costs are being thrown onto rate-payers. New-build nuclear is just not working economically in the USA, we'd need a big change in policy, permitting, and willingness of the populace. In many ways, China's nuclear demonstrates the advantages of its authoritarian system; it can get some things done far better than democracies, willingness/permitting/policy being such non-concerns for their governmental system.
- avmich 8y ago
  We really need lots of good, verifiable data from both sides on comparison of nuclear vs. solar/wind technologies. Absent that, both approaches will probably develop naturally, as technology and political climate allows.
- DennisP 8y ago
  And nuclear power costs less than half as much in South Korea. An MIT study examined the reasons and suggested various changes to industry practice and regulations in the U.S. https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2018/10/02/4-ways-to-lower-nuclear-plant-construction-costs/#3fd9a67f54b8 https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2018/10/02/4-ways-t...

WhompingWindows 8y ago

People like the idea of nuclear, but none of these pro-nuclear advocates can make it cost-effective in practice. Look at South Carolina, what a debacle and the costs are being thrown onto rate-payers. New-build nuclear is just not working economically in the USA, we'd need a big change in policy, permitting, and willingness of the populace. In many ways, China's nuclear demonstrates the advantages of its authoritarian system; it can get some things done far better than democracies, willingness/permitting/policy being such non-concerns for their governmental system.

avmich 8y ago
We really need lots of good, verifiable data from both sides on comparison of nuclear vs. solar/wind technologies. Absent that, both approaches will probably develop naturally, as technology and political climate allows.
DennisP 8y ago
And nuclear power costs less than half as much in South Korea. An MIT study examined the reasons and suggested various changes to industry practice and regulations in the U.S. https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2018/10/02/4-ways-to-lower-nuclear-plant-construction-costs/#3fd9a67f54b8 https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2018/10/02/4-ways-t...