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Yes, nuclear power is less cost effective than fossil fuels. But nuclear, when built at scale in serialized production, can be cost effective. France generates

Yes, nuclear power is less cost effective than fossil fuels. But nuclear, when built at scale in serialized production, can be cost effective. France generates it's electricity at half the cost of Germany, while simultaneously emitting less carbon. The total cost of the nuclear transition program was 400 billion 1993 francs which is ~150 billion USD according to my conversions: https://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/countries-a-f/france.aspx#ECSArticleLink2 https://www.world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-pr... One of the crucial things to account for is that nuclear's cost is overwhelming overhead cost. So prematurely closing plants vastly inflates the price of nuclear power. This is why nuclear energy costs are so much more expensive in the US, Japan, and Germany. These countries prematurely closed nuclear plants, thus increasing $/MHW.

robocat 7y ago
Germany shows that even if your cost of building a reactor was zero, you could still have the reactor shut down due to other issues. "Following the March 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, Germany has permanently shut down eight of its 17 reactors and pledged to close the rest by the end of 2022." - Wikipedia Edit: This might just be because Germany is as close to the Ukraine as California is to Texas. Also removed dumb sentence.
- manfredo 7y ago
  That's a problem caused by politicians. The same could be said of any energy source.
beat 7y ago
There are nuclear reactors closing in the US not because of regulation, but because they cannot compete with much cheaper wind and fracked gas sources. There is little difference in operational cost between running a nuclear plant at 50% and running it at 100%. So when they start losing key customers to cheaper power, pretty soon they're operating the plant in the red. The real interesting part of this is that modern power is so much cheaper that it's less expensive to eat the capital losses and shut down nuclear plants early than it is to continue to operate them.
- manfredo 7y ago
  > There are nuclear reactors closing in the US not because of regulation, but because they cannot compete with much cheaper wind and fracked gas sources The former is intermittent, and the latter emits carbon. > There is little difference in operational cost between running a nuclear plant at 50% and running it at 100%. So when they start losing key customers to cheaper power, pretty soon they're operating the plant in the red. Yes, and we're replacing nuclear plants with fossil fuel plants because of it. When California shut down its second to last nuclear plant, it's carbon emissions from electricity generation rose by 35%. And now we're poised to shut down the Diablo canyon plant with solar during the day and natural gas during the evening. If we cared about reducing carbon, we'd keep the nuclear plant operating and shut down a fossil fuel plant with the surplus energy.
  - Retric 7y ago
    IMO, the most interesting power source mid term is tracking solar power. https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy19osti/72399.pdf https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy19osti/72399.pdf At grid scale 1 access tracking is ~7% higher per watt which works out to about 2.14c/kWh in an ideal location. https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2019/06/28/los-angeles-seeks-record-setting-solar-power-price-under-2¢-kwh/ https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2019/06/28/los-angeles-seeks-rec... However, these systems produces ~30% more power outside of the normal range for solar systems. This effectively squashes much of the duck curve and with the right mix and wide geographic distribution work well with nuclear power and modest energy storage systems.
    - ZeroGravitas 7y ago
      Technically, this makes the duck curve worse, because the actual "problem" the duck curve presents is solar ramplong down in the evening faster than gas can ramp up. But trackers (or west facing panels) make that more like a square wave so it lasts longer but then falls faster than a static south facing panel. But, the duck curve isn't a real problem anyway. Worst case scenario, some solar gets curtailed , creating an opportunity for storage solutions.

robocat 7y ago

Germany shows that even if your cost of building a reactor was zero, you could still have the reactor shut down due to other issues. "Following the March 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, Germany has permanently shut down eight of its 17 reactors and pledged to close the rest by the end of 2022." - Wikipedia Edit: This might just be because Germany is as close to the Ukraine as California is to Texas. Also removed dumb sentence.

manfredo 7y ago
That's a problem caused by politicians. The same could be said of any energy source.

beat 7y ago

There are nuclear reactors closing in the US not because of regulation, but because they cannot compete with much cheaper wind and fracked gas sources. There is little difference in operational cost between running a nuclear plant at 50% and running it at 100%. So when they start losing key customers to cheaper power, pretty soon they're operating the plant in the red. The real interesting part of this is that modern power is so much cheaper that it's less expensive to eat the capital losses and shut down nuclear plants early than it is to continue to operate them.

manfredo 7y ago
> There are nuclear reactors closing in the US not because of regulation, but because they cannot compete with much cheaper wind and fracked gas sources The former is intermittent, and the latter emits carbon. > There is little difference in operational cost between running a nuclear plant at 50% and running it at 100%. So when they start losing key customers to cheaper power, pretty soon they're operating the plant in the red. Yes, and we're replacing nuclear plants with fossil fuel plants because of it. When California shut down its second to last nuclear plant, it's carbon emissions from electricity generation rose by 35%. And now we're poised to shut down the Diablo canyon plant with solar during the day and natural gas during the evening. If we cared about reducing carbon, we'd keep the nuclear plant operating and shut down a fossil fuel plant with the surplus energy.
- Retric 7y ago
  IMO, the most interesting power source mid term is tracking solar power. https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy19osti/72399.pdf https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy19osti/72399.pdf At grid scale 1 access tracking is ~7% higher per watt which works out to about 2.14c/kWh in an ideal location. https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2019/06/28/los-angeles-seeks-record-setting-solar-power-price-under-2¢-kwh/ https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2019/06/28/los-angeles-seeks-rec... However, these systems produces ~30% more power outside of the normal range for solar systems. This effectively squashes much of the duck curve and with the right mix and wide geographic distribution work well with nuclear power and modest energy storage systems.
  - ZeroGravitas 7y ago
    Technically, this makes the duck curve worse, because the actual "problem" the duck curve presents is solar ramplong down in the evening faster than gas can ramp up. But trackers (or west facing panels) make that more like a square wave so it lasts longer but then falls faster than a static south facing panel. But, the duck curve isn't a real problem anyway. Worst case scenario, some solar gets curtailed , creating an opportunity for storage solutions.