5 ms·

If California invested a quarter of it renewable investments into nuclear, there would not be rolling blackouts today.

acidburnNSA 6y ago
We have a bunch of full-scale 24/7 low-carbon success stories (France, Ontario, Finland, Sweden) that rely heavily on nuclear. It's abundantly clear that nuclear is a climate champion when comparing live carbon emissions data on this map [1]. Compare Germany (who is phasing out nuclear) to nuclear-dominant France. [1] https://www.electricitymap.org/map https://www.electricitymap.org/map And before anyone says nuclear is too expensive, know that nuclear costs today are about on par with all other future low-carbon grid proposals. While wind and solar generators are dirt cheap, adding the extra transmissions lines, vast energy storage, smart grids, etc. adds $40-$60/MWh when done at levels that actually decarbonize, which makes nuclear already competitive. Right now the dirt cheap renewables are riding on the back of a natural gas powered grid that can handle their intermittency, (except sometimes in California).
- pedrocr 6y ago
  All you said is true, but I wouldn't still bet against the renewables because we're probably very early in the cost-curve of storage still. In the last 10 years lithium batteries have become 10x cheaper for example. Nuclear was by far our best technical option for the last 20 years. I'm not so sure about the next 20 though. I ran the math this week on powering the house off-grid with solar and batteries. We even have a stream going through the property that could easily power all our needs throughout the year. The solar install is just so much simpler and lower maintenance though. With current available batteries going 100% solar already has a positive return on ~12k€ total investment. But it still makes more sense to only do a 1 to 3k€ investment in solar with no batteries, even giving away the rest of the power to the power company as we have no net-meetering. If we had net-meetering for the next 5 years it would boost the solar installs while the batteries keep going down in price. Within 10 years we can cover all the rooftops with solar. And with the distributed generation and storage we'd probably need less of a grid than we have now, not more.
  - hairytrog 6y ago
    The battery/solar/storage costs are near material costs already. And the material costs are artificially low. If you wanted to scale up production to match demand, prices will have to increase so that mines can extract worse ores in harder to reach places.
    - pedrocr 6y ago
      From what I've seen there's enough known advancements coming to make the cost of the type of lithium battery I'd need to at least half of what it is right now. There's also the growing market for second-lives of EV batteries. So I expect to turn the house effectively off-grid within 5 years, keeping the traditional grid as backup and occasional filler. In rural areas with crappy power that's an improvement over the existing grid. Even today if I valued the insurance against power cuts enough to buy a generator just doing the battery install today would make sense instead. From what I've read lithium itself is plentiful, it's the other stuff that goes into batteries, and is actively being engineered out, that's a problem, like cobalt. So I wouldn't bet for a rise in the price of the needed raw materials, but insight into the cost curves of mining would be cool to see.
      - erentz 6y ago
        I think the point he is making is that battery metals as a commodity have been unusually cheap. As have a lot of commodities for a while now. Commodity prices are expected by many to go up as demand increases. It’s why people are investing in companies that mine battery metals. As that happens the input costs of batteries will increase and given how massive the component of batteries is in the wind/solar green grid scenario that could change the economics considerably. FWIW uranium is also expected by many to undergo a big surge in price in the next few years with refueling contracts coming due in the US and the growth of nuclear overseas. But the fuel costs for a nuclear plant are a much smaller component compared to other sources, and I am guessing also compared to the battery metals component of the alternate solar/wind/battery/new grid system.
        6y ago
- hairytrog 6y ago
  If renewables growth continues and expands (as in the multi Trillion Green Deal lol), different nuclear thrusts will probably not require any government assistance or support. The money making potential will completely outweigh any other concerns like high capital costs and risk. It's getting there. A carbon tax would be the cherry on top.
  - thinkcontext 6y ago
    > different nuclear thrusts will probably not require any government assistance or support The 2 recent projects in the US came about because of loan guarantees passed under Obama, a form of subsidy. Both have been miserable financial failures going 2-3x over budget on money and time. One was cancelled after spending $9b on a hole in the ground, the other should be coming online soon. Given how badly the projects went no utility in their right mind would order a reactor without even more subsidy to remove risk. There are also other forms of subsidy, notably the $450m per reactor cap on liability. That's a $3b/yr subsidy to the industry.
- guerby 6y ago
  New offshore wind will soon change the renewable electricity production landscape. I recommend watching the two NREL videos on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58EYcYbRKqk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58EYcYbRKqk NREL Overview of Floating Offshore Wind https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdKvmwsFGPE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdKvmwsFGPE NREL Grand Challenges in the Science of Wind Energy As for comparing with nuclear for the past two years (2018 2019) capacity factor of nuclear power in France has been around 70% mainly due to maintenance according to RTE (1) For reference best UK offshore wind farm had 55.3% capacity factor in 2019 and UK offshore wind average capacity factor was 40.6% in 2019 (2) (1) https://media.rte-france.com/bilan-electrique-2019-2/ https://media.rte-france.com/bilan-electrique-2019-2/ 379.5 Twh produced, 63.1 GW installed, 68.7% capacity factor (2) https://energynumbers.info/uk-offshore-wind-capacity-factors https://energynumbers.info/uk-offshore-wind-capacity-factors Not far from so-called "baseload".
kurthr 6y ago
Well, unless they installed the power near point of use there would still be blackouts for power line distribution issues due to fire danger. I'm a nuclear proponent, because I believe it can be as safe (safer than coal and carbon free), but multi-GW plants have their downsides as well.
- khuey 6y ago
  Last night's issue was not curtailed transmission capacity, there simply isn't enough electricity for everyone in the western US to run their air conditioners at these temperatures.
  - jeffbee 6y ago
    That's interesting that you tie it to the region, rather than the state. I was wondering why they had to shed load when the demand according to the CAISO dashboard was only about 90% of the all-time record demand (which was set in 2006).
    - khuey 6y ago
      California imports a lot of electricity (18% of consumption at this moment) so we can be affected by what's going on in nearby states (particularly in the Pacific NW where we draw a lot of hydropower from). Installed generating capacity is probably down from 2006 too. Electricity usage is flat or declining and old coal power stations have been phased out in CA.
CameronNemo 6y ago
California is in an earthquake zone, and as I understand it that makes nuclear somewhat risky.
- ip26 6y ago
  Didn't stop them from building Diablo Canyon, of course.
  - ghouse 6y ago
    But it is why in 2018 they (CPUC) decided that Diablo Canyon will be retired in 2025. edit: missing space between words.
    - mikeyouse 6y ago
      Also because nuclear operators are completely incompetent and can’t manage their investment without catastrophic construction issues.. a good friend of mine was involved in trying to fix San Onofre after their failed turbine upgrade. It would be good for the future of the industry if they didn’t keep having billion dollar safety critical mistakes. https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/watchdog/sdut-san-onofre-anniversary-2016jan30-htmlstory.html https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/watchdog/sdut-san-...
      - ghouse 6y ago
        I think it was the steam generator, not the turbine. Or maybe both? The failed steam generator is an incredible story. And the litigation on with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) is also interesting. But terrible for the industry.
- p1mrx 6y ago
  Risk is not a fixed number; it's an engineering problem. I'm sure humanity can design a power plant that doesn't blow up when you shake it.
ghouse 6y ago
It's important to distinguish between energy and capacity. And recognize the operating flexibility of different resources. While if a 1/4 of the CapEx for renewables were invested in fission, California would have more capacity, the energy cost would also increase. Fission has considerable operating expenses, which is why it has been displaced by both gas generation and renewable generation throughout the United States.

We have a bunch of full-scale 24/7 low-carbon success stories (France, Ontario, Finland, Sweden) that rely heavily on nuclear. It's abundantly clear that nuclear is a climate champion when comparing live carbon emissions data on this map [1]. Compare Germany (who is phasing out nuclear) to nuclear-dominant France. [1] https://www.electricitymap.org/map https://www.electricitymap.org/map And before anyone says nuclear is too expensive, know that nuclear costs today are about on par with all other future low-carbon grid proposals. While wind and solar generators are dirt cheap, adding the extra transmissions lines, vast energy storage, smart grids, etc. adds $40-$60/MWh when done at levels that actually decarbonize, which makes nuclear already competitive. Right now the dirt cheap renewables are riding on the back of a natural gas powered grid that can handle their intermittency, (except sometimes in California).

pedrocr 6y ago
All you said is true, but I wouldn't still bet against the renewables because we're probably very early in the cost-curve of storage still. In the last 10 years lithium batteries have become 10x cheaper for example. Nuclear was by far our best technical option for the last 20 years. I'm not so sure about the next 20 though. I ran the math this week on powering the house off-grid with solar and batteries. We even have a stream going through the property that could easily power all our needs throughout the year. The solar install is just so much simpler and lower maintenance though. With current available batteries going 100% solar already has a positive return on ~12k€ total investment. But it still makes more sense to only do a 1 to 3k€ investment in solar with no batteries, even giving away the rest of the power to the power company as we have no net-meetering. If we had net-meetering for the next 5 years it would boost the solar installs while the batteries keep going down in price. Within 10 years we can cover all the rooftops with solar. And with the distributed generation and storage we'd probably need less of a grid than we have now, not more.
- hairytrog 6y ago
  The battery/solar/storage costs are near material costs already. And the material costs are artificially low. If you wanted to scale up production to match demand, prices will have to increase so that mines can extract worse ores in harder to reach places.
  - pedrocr 6y ago
    From what I've seen there's enough known advancements coming to make the cost of the type of lithium battery I'd need to at least half of what it is right now. There's also the growing market for second-lives of EV batteries. So I expect to turn the house effectively off-grid within 5 years, keeping the traditional grid as backup and occasional filler. In rural areas with crappy power that's an improvement over the existing grid. Even today if I valued the insurance against power cuts enough to buy a generator just doing the battery install today would make sense instead. From what I've read lithium itself is plentiful, it's the other stuff that goes into batteries, and is actively being engineered out, that's a problem, like cobalt. So I wouldn't bet for a rise in the price of the needed raw materials, but insight into the cost curves of mining would be cool to see.
    - erentz 6y ago
      I think the point he is making is that battery metals as a commodity have been unusually cheap. As have a lot of commodities for a while now. Commodity prices are expected by many to go up as demand increases. It’s why people are investing in companies that mine battery metals. As that happens the input costs of batteries will increase and given how massive the component of batteries is in the wind/solar green grid scenario that could change the economics considerably. FWIW uranium is also expected by many to undergo a big surge in price in the next few years with refueling contracts coming due in the US and the growth of nuclear overseas. But the fuel costs for a nuclear plant are a much smaller component compared to other sources, and I am guessing also compared to the battery metals component of the alternate solar/wind/battery/new grid system.
      - 6y ago
hairytrog 6y ago
If renewables growth continues and expands (as in the multi Trillion Green Deal lol), different nuclear thrusts will probably not require any government assistance or support. The money making potential will completely outweigh any other concerns like high capital costs and risk. It's getting there. A carbon tax would be the cherry on top.
- thinkcontext 6y ago
  > different nuclear thrusts will probably not require any government assistance or support The 2 recent projects in the US came about because of loan guarantees passed under Obama, a form of subsidy. Both have been miserable financial failures going 2-3x over budget on money and time. One was cancelled after spending $9b on a hole in the ground, the other should be coming online soon. Given how badly the projects went no utility in their right mind would order a reactor without even more subsidy to remove risk. There are also other forms of subsidy, notably the $450m per reactor cap on liability. That's a $3b/yr subsidy to the industry.
guerby 6y ago
New offshore wind will soon change the renewable electricity production landscape. I recommend watching the two NREL videos on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58EYcYbRKqk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58EYcYbRKqk NREL Overview of Floating Offshore Wind https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdKvmwsFGPE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdKvmwsFGPE NREL Grand Challenges in the Science of Wind Energy As for comparing with nuclear for the past two years (2018 2019) capacity factor of nuclear power in France has been around 70% mainly due to maintenance according to RTE (1) For reference best UK offshore wind farm had 55.3% capacity factor in 2019 and UK offshore wind average capacity factor was 40.6% in 2019 (2) (1) https://media.rte-france.com/bilan-electrique-2019-2/ https://media.rte-france.com/bilan-electrique-2019-2/ 379.5 Twh produced, 63.1 GW installed, 68.7% capacity factor (2) https://energynumbers.info/uk-offshore-wind-capacity-factors https://energynumbers.info/uk-offshore-wind-capacity-factors Not far from so-called "baseload".

kurthr 6y ago

Well, unless they installed the power near point of use there would still be blackouts for power line distribution issues due to fire danger. I'm a nuclear proponent, because I believe it can be as safe (safer than coal and carbon free), but multi-GW plants have their downsides as well.

khuey 6y ago
Last night's issue was not curtailed transmission capacity, there simply isn't enough electricity for everyone in the western US to run their air conditioners at these temperatures.
- jeffbee 6y ago
  That's interesting that you tie it to the region, rather than the state. I was wondering why they had to shed load when the demand according to the CAISO dashboard was only about 90% of the all-time record demand (which was set in 2006).
  - khuey 6y ago
    California imports a lot of electricity (18% of consumption at this moment) so we can be affected by what's going on in nearby states (particularly in the Pacific NW where we draw a lot of hydropower from). Installed generating capacity is probably down from 2006 too. Electricity usage is flat or declining and old coal power stations have been phased out in CA.

CameronNemo 6y ago

California is in an earthquake zone, and as I understand it that makes nuclear somewhat risky.

ip26 6y ago
Didn't stop them from building Diablo Canyon, of course.
- ghouse 6y ago
  But it is why in 2018 they (CPUC) decided that Diablo Canyon will be retired in 2025. edit: missing space between words.
  - mikeyouse 6y ago
    Also because nuclear operators are completely incompetent and can’t manage their investment without catastrophic construction issues.. a good friend of mine was involved in trying to fix San Onofre after their failed turbine upgrade. It would be good for the future of the industry if they didn’t keep having billion dollar safety critical mistakes. https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/watchdog/sdut-san-onofre-anniversary-2016jan30-htmlstory.html https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/watchdog/sdut-san-...
    - ghouse 6y ago
      I think it was the steam generator, not the turbine. Or maybe both? The failed steam generator is an incredible story. And the litigation on with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) is also interesting. But terrible for the industry.
p1mrx 6y ago
Risk is not a fixed number; it's an engineering problem. I'm sure humanity can design a power plant that doesn't blow up when you shake it.

ghouse 6y ago

It's important to distinguish between energy and capacity. And recognize the operating flexibility of different resources. While if a 1/4 of the CapEx for renewables were invested in fission, California would have more capacity, the energy cost would also increase. Fission has considerable operating expenses, which is why it has been displaced by both gas generation and renewable generation throughout the United States.