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Isn't the economics of clean up that the government pays? Is there anywhere in the world where the private operator of a nuclear power plant if covering all th
by ljf 6y ago
Isn't the economics of clean up that the government pays?
Is there anywhere in the world where the private operator of a nuclear power plant if covering all their own costs for clean up and decommissioning? Genuine question - I am well aware I could be wrong.
My understanding is that nuclear is always about energy independence - not cheap energy. (Don't get me wrong, the sooner we remove coal, biomass, wood and gas from our energy mix the better.)
- redis_mlc 6y ago> Is there anywhere in the world where the private operator of a nuclear power plant if covering all their own costs for clean up and decommissioning? You have to be kidding me. No, in the US utilities are generally privately-owned, and are "responsible" for the cleanup. Their playbook is: 1) Extend the operating license for an additional 20 years, safe or not. 2) After that, declare bankruptcy.
- eru 6y agoWhat's bad about biomass and wood? A country like eg Finland could probably run on wood burning, couldn't they? > Is there anywhere in the world where the private operator of a nuclear power plant if covering all their own costs for clean up and decommissioning? Genuine question - I am well aware I could be wrong. It's surprisingly hard to (quickly) find who is paying for those decommissioning funds. I imagine there's a levy on active nuclear power plant operations that goes into these funds. You can find a lot of discussion online about whether those funds are big enough, and worries that they might not be. Perhaps the most quantitative treatment I found is from https://www.withouthotair.com/c24/page_167.shtml https://www.withouthotair.com/c24/page_167.shtml > Economics of cleanup > What’s the cost of cleaning up nuclear power sites? The nuclear decommissioning authority has an annual budget of £2 billion for the next 25 years. The nuclear industry sold everyone in the UK 4 kWh/d for about 25 years, so the nuclear decommissioning authority’s cost is 2.3 p/kWh. That’s a hefty subsidy – though not, it must be said, as hefty as the subsidy currently given to offshore wind (7 p/kWh).
- cycomanic 6y agoIIRC in Germany the nuclear power operators were essentially allowed to put aside large amount of money taxfree to be used for decommissioning. They used those funds to expand into many other areas (so they could use the funds for high risk investment). I will try to find a source.
- cycomanic 6y agoOk adding as another comment. The situation is actually more complicated than that see [1]. Essentially it comes to book keeping, however after 2017 the operators had to pay into a government fund to ensure sufficient funds to decommissioning (currently this holds 24 billion euro). Estimated decommissioning cost for a nuclear power plant are 1.2 billion euro (there is some dispute about the numbers though). This number does not include wast storage. [1] https://www.iwr-institut.de/de/presse/presseinfos-kernenergie/201-akw-abriss-von-rueckstellungen-gedeckt-milliardenrisiken-drohen https://www.iwr-institut.de/de/presse/presseinfos-kernenergi... (sorry only in German)
- eru 6y agoThanks! (I'm German as well. But for other people: Google Translate has gotten really good.)
- ljf 6y agoThanks - interested to read that. I also think people forget the hidden subsidies for oil in terms of the wars and peace keeping that we have to get involved in to keep the oil flowing. My understanding is that much of the wood that is burnt is actually shipped half way around the world to the UK and other countries just so it can earn 'carbon credits to be burnt there. I may be wrong, it was a while since I read the article. It also generates a lot of localised air pollution.