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I am rooting for lots and lots of new nuclear, but this piece is silly. Let's dig in: "But what if there were sources of zero-carbon electricity that didn’t re

I am rooting for lots and lots of new nuclear, but this piece is silly. Let's dig in: "But what if there were sources of zero-carbon electricity that didn’t require heavy-handed regulation to make them viable in the marketplace? ..." Wind and solar are cheaper now than nuclear advocates hope nuclear will be by 2030. 1.https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/pdf/electricity_generation.pdf https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/pdf/electricity_generation.... 2. https://cleantechnica.com/2019/10/30/latest-bnef-report-finds-levelized-cost-of-renewables-continues-to-fall/ https://cleantechnica.com/2019/10/30/latest-bnef-report-find... "... What if we could produce more power—and do it affordably, with minimal environmental impact? That’s the almost utopian vision that some backers see for the next generation of nuclear power. ..." Utopian?! We are adding gigawatts of wind and solar this year, and modulo coronavirus we'll add more next year. New geothermal plants are measured in dozens of megawatts: * https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2020-01-22/california-needs-clean-energy-after-sundown-geothermal-could-be-the-answer https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2020-01-22/califor... "According to Ted Nordhaus, founder of the “eco-modernist” Breakthrough Institute, SMRs could offer a more decentralized, entrepreneurial approach to reducing CO2 emissions without hobbling the economy." Wind and solar are extremely de-centralized and competitive. The economies that install them at scale—China, California—are doing as well as any. “Will any of them ultimately be a success in the marketplace? You can’t say for sure,” he said. “But I think a bunch of them will get licenses to build test plants.”" While we are waiting, offshore wind farms will continue to be installed at hundred-megawatt scale: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_offshore_wind_farms#Largest_operational_offshore_wind_farms https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_offshore_wind_farms#La... Please continue promoting new nuclear; we could really use it. But please stop with the anti-variable-renewable BS, and FFS stop giving Nordhaus airtime when he insist on talking like this.

seanmcdirmid 7y ago
Wind and solar still don't scale as well as a nuclear plant. It is the the most compact way to generate a few gigawatts of energy in one place without re-routing a huge river. Likewise, the big problem with wind and solar is that the areas where they are economical to install (e.g. Western China) are often far away from where the energy is needed (e.g. Eastern China), and transmission over long distances still hasn't been worked out.
- spenrose 7y ago
  Wind and solar don't scale as well as the nuclear plants that aren't being built would scale, if they were being built at scale, but they're not. Wind and solar scaled better in 2019 than the Chinese were hoping nuclear would scale when they made big plans c. 2015. Those plans weren't realized: https://twitter.com/sampenrose/status/1162772916125126656 https://twitter.com/sampenrose/status/1162772916125126656 Again, I am rooting for nuclear to take off. The best realistic plans are that low gigawatts will start to arrive towards the end of this decade. Meanwhile, wind and solar will be added at that scale every year in between, and more and more of it will be used to create liquid fuel: https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/mega-projects-help-double-green-hydrogen-pipeline-in-just-five-months https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/mega-projects-h... Advocating for clean power is good. Failing to update the priors that Stewart Brand et alia formed 15 years ago when wind and solar were an order of magnitude more expensive and three orders of magnitude less deployed is not good.
DeathArrow 7y ago
"The US Energy Information Administration has recommended that levelized costs of non-dispatchable sources such as wind or solar may be better compared to the avoided energy cost rather than to the LCOE of dispatchable sources such as fossil fuels or geothermal. This is because introduction of fluctuating power sources may or may not avoid capital and maintenance costs of backup dispatchable sources. Levelized avoided cost of energy (LACE) is the avoided costs from other sources divided by the annual yearly output of the non-dispatchable source." See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source So, is LCOE for wind and solar higher than LACE for nuclear power?
- spenrose 7y ago
  Great question. Some points: 1. That source is a mess; three of us spent a couple years trying to update it only to be foiled by classic alpha Wikipedians who are happy to see an article rely on 10 year old price estimates, but not to see standard industry terms used. Note the age of the LACE sources. 2. The LACE frame is an important complement to LCOE, but also imperfect. Take California's recent decision to require solar PV on new homes. Really high LACE, right?: California is already being forced to pair marginal PV additions with gigawatts of rapid response gas to handle the "neck of the duck curve" when the sun goes down but LA is still using gigawatts of electricity to power AC. Well, the LACE of that low-marginal-value PV is dependent on how many batteries we add, how much offshore wind appears, etc. 3. The people who promote LACE won't let you include the social cost of carbon as part of the discussion. They'd rather see the page wither.

seanmcdirmid 7y ago

Wind and solar still don't scale as well as a nuclear plant. It is the the most compact way to generate a few gigawatts of energy in one place without re-routing a huge river. Likewise, the big problem with wind and solar is that the areas where they are economical to install (e.g. Western China) are often far away from where the energy is needed (e.g. Eastern China), and transmission over long distances still hasn't been worked out.

spenrose 7y ago
Wind and solar don't scale as well as the nuclear plants that aren't being built would scale, if they were being built at scale, but they're not. Wind and solar scaled better in 2019 than the Chinese were hoping nuclear would scale when they made big plans c. 2015. Those plans weren't realized: https://twitter.com/sampenrose/status/1162772916125126656 https://twitter.com/sampenrose/status/1162772916125126656 Again, I am rooting for nuclear to take off. The best realistic plans are that low gigawatts will start to arrive towards the end of this decade. Meanwhile, wind and solar will be added at that scale every year in between, and more and more of it will be used to create liquid fuel: https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/mega-projects-help-double-green-hydrogen-pipeline-in-just-five-months https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/mega-projects-h... Advocating for clean power is good. Failing to update the priors that Stewart Brand et alia formed 15 years ago when wind and solar were an order of magnitude more expensive and three orders of magnitude less deployed is not good.

DeathArrow 7y ago

"The US Energy Information Administration has recommended that levelized costs of non-dispatchable sources such as wind or solar may be better compared to the avoided energy cost rather than to the LCOE of dispatchable sources such as fossil fuels or geothermal. This is because introduction of fluctuating power sources may or may not avoid capital and maintenance costs of backup dispatchable sources. Levelized avoided cost of energy (LACE) is the avoided costs from other sources divided by the annual yearly output of the non-dispatchable source." See here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source So, is LCOE for wind and solar higher than LACE for nuclear power?

spenrose 7y ago
Great question. Some points: 1. That source is a mess; three of us spent a couple years trying to update it only to be foiled by classic alpha Wikipedians who are happy to see an article rely on 10 year old price estimates, but not to see standard industry terms used. Note the age of the LACE sources. 2. The LACE frame is an important complement to LCOE, but also imperfect. Take California's recent decision to require solar PV on new homes. Really high LACE, right?: California is already being forced to pair marginal PV additions with gigawatts of rapid response gas to handle the "neck of the duck curve" when the sun goes down but LA is still using gigawatts of electricity to power AC. Well, the LACE of that low-marginal-value PV is dependent on how many batteries we add, how much offshore wind appears, etc. 3. The people who promote LACE won't let you include the social cost of carbon as part of the discussion. They'd rather see the page wither.