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> We don't need nuclear, because we have other options for firm low-carbon energy (geothermal) and energy storage of surplus and super-cheap intermittent renewa

> We don't need nuclear, because we have other options for firm low-carbon energy (geothermal) and energy storage of surplus and super-cheap intermittent renewables (lithium ion, flow batteries, hydrogen, methane, compressed air, liquid air...). Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power. Alternative renewables (e.g. wind, solar) require fossil fuels to power the electrical grid when they are not able to generate power. The sources you mention are also substantial less effective from an energy density perspective. The amount of energy they output, relative to the energy input to construct them and the amount of land they consume, is orders of magnitude less than that produced by nuclear. Storing energy is incredibly expensive. If we were to use lithium ion batteries to store electricity, it would cost trillions of dollars to produce and maintain the batteries. This does not include the immense environmental damage that would occur as a consequence of this policy (land usage, mining, waste products, etc.) > If nuclear could compete on cost, we should go for it, but it can't without a major tech breakthrough Nuclear energy is more cost effective than alternatives. The main issue is that antinuclear activists, funded by the fossil fuel industry, have lobbied to make it cost prohibitive to build nuclear power plants by way of onerous regulation and prolonged legal battles. Countries that have reduced their reliance on nuclear power, for example France, have seen their electricity prices and carbon emissions rise as a consequence. We also know that nuclear power plants can operate for longer than previously believed — at least 80 years, as opposed to the 40 years that was previously assumed. This understanding further drives down the cost of electricity derived from nuclear energy, as it reduces the need to construct new facilities. > For example, we will definitely need to start producing hydrogen Why? Producing hydrogen is inefficient and unnecessary if you have a consistent source of energy, which nuclear provides. > As it is, it's a dinosaur from the past, a legacy of a time before we had better tech. Nuclear energy is safe, causing fewer deaths and adverse health impacts than alternative sources of energy. It is cleaner, cheaper, and more reliable than alternatives while also being far more environmentally friendly. If it is a dinosaur, then so are the transistors that make up computer processors, which are roughly as old and somehow are still the subject of cutting edge research.

epistasis 6y ago
Nuclear requires a lot of concrete and steel, both sources of carbon emissions (at least until the rest of the economy is decarbonized). The other "low carbon" sources are similar, they have carbon emissions only because the rest of the economy that manufactures them produces carbon. As for cost, you are contradicting yourself when you say it's cheap (it's not), and when you say that it's expensive because of anti-nuclear activists. See, for example, France, whose new nuclear projects are not cost competitive despite having a strongly pro-nuclear regulatory situation. As for the "efficiency" of hydrogen, the only efficiency that matters is economic efficiency, and all indications point to hydrogen storage of wind/solar to be more economically efficient than nuclear. (And for the record, for energy efficiency both nuclear and hydrogen are about 50% efficient, but like I said the only efficiency that matters for deployment is cost efficiency.
- nickles 6y ago
  > Nuclear requires a lot of concrete and steel, both sources of carbon emissions Alternative sources of energy also require materials to produce them. Natural gas plants require similar amounts of concrete and steel but have lower energy yields. Renewable sources like wind and solar require immense amounts of materials, including heavy metals and other toxic, non-recyclable materials. Because they are far less dense (~50 watts per sq. meter versus 2000-6000 watts per sq. meter from nuclear), they have a substantially greater environmental impact. > As for the "efficiency" of hydrogen, the only efficiency that matters is economic efficiency, and all indications point to hydrogen storage of wind/solar to be more economically efficient than nuclear. Solar and wind are heavily subsidized, at least in the United States, while nuclear is subject to expensive and arbitrary regulatory burdens. There’s not a level playing field to support the argument that nuclear energy is not economically competitive. From the perspective of physics, hydrogen is necessarily less efficient than other energy sources. Generating the initial source of electricity to produce the hydrogen has a given level of inefficiency. Then actually producing the hydrogen compounds the amount of energy wasted. Finally, utilizing the hydrogen as an energy source also loses some energy. There’s no scenario where it’s more efficient to use hydrogen as an intermediary than it is to use the original source.
  - 6y ago
nl 6y ago
> Storing energy is incredibly expensive. This isn't true. Pump solar/wind is cheaper than gas plants.
- tempestn 6y ago
  Is this if you already have a basin to pump into? You can't just build pumped hydro anywhere. Do you have a reference you could share?
- ncmncm 6y ago
  There are numerous cheap storage forms. LH2. Ammonia. Underground pressurized air. Underwater pressurized air. Molten salt. Mineshaft gravitational.
ta2234234242 6y ago
> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power. Gaseous, sure. It also emits radioactivity.
- epistasis 6y ago
  Nuclear has lifecycle emissions about equals to wind: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse_gas_emissions_of_energy_sources#2014_IPCC,_Global_warming_potential_of_selected_electricity_sources https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse_gas_emis... Until we decarbonize construction, mining, and other energy needed to produce energy sources, everything still has a carbon emussions footprint.
  - bb88 6y ago
    So... it's not zero emissions then. Or at least that's what parent was saying.
    - acidburnNSA 6y ago
      By this argument, nothing is zero emissions and the phrase zero emissions is worthless. The process of nuclear fission is zero-carbon (unlike combustion) and the lifecycle carbon emissions for nuclear are 12 gCO2-eq/kWh compared to 40 for solar, 490 for fracked natural gas, and 820 for coal. It's easier and meaningful in my opinion to just call nuclear zero carbon.
      - cycomanic 6y ago
        I don't think that is a valid argument. Take the extreme case of that some energy source requires huge amount of CO2 to build, but produces no emissions during operation. Is that a zero emission source? Also for nuclear we need to include the uranium mining, and ideally we would account for waste storage as well (not sure if that goes into current estimates). Now the OP argument disingenuous because he also included emmissions of other sources into wind and solar. However as many have already pointed out it would be much easier to run a grid on renewables only than at nuclear only, because for renewables you only need a large enough grid and overprovisioning. Nuclear on the other hand is very bad at handling variable loads, so you will essentially have to overprovision to the the peak demand and run your plants at that demand and burn the energy somehow. Note that Belgium used to do that by illuminating all their highways at night.
bryanlarsen 6y ago
> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power. Alternative renewables (e.g. wind, solar) require fossil fuels to power the electrical grid when they are not able to generate power. Renewables are about an order of magnitude cheaper than nuclear. $15/MWh vs $112/MWh. So what you do is overprovision your renewables. In other words, build more than you need. The major reason to do this is so that when the wind is barely blowing and/or it's a cloudy day you still get enough power to supply your needs without peakers. Then on the days when you're producing excess power (ie, most of them), you use that excess energy to produce methane from CO2. Use that methane to run your natural gas peakers, making them carbon neutral. This is likely much cheaper than batteries, certainly if you already have the gas peakers. You'll have to overprovision to cover the very unlikely time that both the wind and sun disappear for a long stretch, so you'll be overprovisioned all other times. Methane production takes Hydrogen as an input, so you can use some of that excess energy to create extra Hydrogen. Or you can turn methane into plastic for use or storage. Or just sell the extra electricity, there are several industries that can soak up cheap electricity (please not to bitcoin miners though). > Nuclear energy is more cost effective than alternatives. The main issue is that antinuclear activists, funded by the fossil fuel industry, have lobbied to make it cost prohibitive to build nuclear power plants by way of onerous regulation and prolonged legal battles. Even in China, nuclear is incredibly expensive and takes a long time. So I don't think regulation is the main problem. > Why? Producing hydrogen is inefficient and unnecessary Clean steel & cement.
- gravypod 6y ago
  > Renewables are about an order of magnitude cheaper than nuclear. I think there are a lot of complications that are encountered when doing this sort of calculation. You might get a max output of "$15/MWh" or "$112/MWh" but that's only a portion of the picture. Firstly Nuclear is X amount of power essentially on tap 24/7 where X is between some Min and Max value. From what I understand this makes grid management much simpler and reduces storage, transmission, and conversion losses. Even in the best case situation of "renewable" energy you'll see, in the absolute best case claimed by pumped hydro storage, you're seeing about an 87% efficiency. Suppose you had a nuclear power plant that could output 100W consistently. Suppose you wanted to build a similarly efficient "renewable" energy source. How much more peak power would it need to output to be competitive? If we assume the power source is 0% efficient at night and 100% efficient during the day, off the bat, you'd need to generate 200W continuously during the day. Then you'd need to generate an extra 13% on those extra 100Ws to make up for storage losses (1.13*100 ~= 113). That means 100W from Nuclear is ~= 213W "renewable". Obviously this is a terrible calculation and not at all accurate but it's just a sample of some of the math that needs to be done. Another factor that I've been skirting around is that "renewable" sources of energy are often not so renewable. Specifically things like like solar require a huge amount of rare metals & complex fabrication. Right now none of those externalizations are represented in the price of solar because there are no carbon taxes in countries that manufacture them. Money in this case is a proxy of what needs to be measured and should not be the only factor we optimize for.
pfdietz 6y ago
> Why? Producing hydrogen is inefficient and unnecessary if you have a consistent source of energy, which nuclear provides. Renewables + short term storage + hydrogen will likely be cheaper than a grid based on nuclear, even with the inefficiency of hydrogen. One contributing reason for that (for the hydrogen) is that a simple cycle combustion turbine power plant is 1/20th the capital cost per MW of a nuclear power plant. You can check this out with some plausible assumptions for 2030 technologies and real climate data at https://model.energy/ https://model.energy/
- wp381640 6y ago
  They’re also more profitable since they can respond to price hikes during peak demand Nuclear requires a contract to buy all of that energy all of the time - and nobody really does that anymore at nuclear output levels. It’s the reason many large coal plants died of natural causes, nuclear is 2-3x worse
  - jnxx 6y ago
    Actually, the economics of nuclear and wind and solar energy is quite similar in one important aspect: You have a huge upfront cost for building the plant, and then when it is running, relatively little, or very little cost for generating any additional kWh of energy. The funny thing is that when you run an energy market, what determines the market price is the marginal cost, that is, the cost for generating that additional unit! It is the same as when you run a car factory, people are going to give you money for the one car you produce, not for building the factory. Now, with the marginal cost being near zero, that means that the market price is near zero as well. The price on the energy market goes to near zero. (And this is a very good thing because fossil energy has a much higher marginal cost and is competed out of the market, which is good for our planet's climate). https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/08/wind-power-prices-now-lower-than-the-cost-of-natural-gas/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/08/wind-power-prices-no... With the consequence that both nuclear and renewable need some kind of subsidy or other mechanism which makes sure that the upfront cost is somehow financed. What's also nice is that much of the subsidy goes in advance. And specifically with renewable power, it is very predictable and can be planned well. You cannot promise, as in so many other areas where government money is spent, that you build it at a cheap price, and then come back and demand more. And the latter is one reason why big nuclear energy constructors, like Westinghouse, appear to go bust one after another.
pvaldes 6y ago
> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power Is more a mushroom shape than a zero shape.
- shard 6y ago
  Only if you are generating the power in a weaponized form.
Krasnol 6y ago
> Nuclear power is often promoted as one of the best ways to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels to generate the electricity we need, but new research suggests that going all-in on renewables such as wind and solar might be a better approach to seriously reducing the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. https://www.sciencealert.com/here-s-why-nuclear-won-t-cut-it-if-we-want-to-drop-carbon-as-quickly-as-possible https://www.sciencealert.com/here-s-why-nuclear-won-t-cut-it...
- stjohnswarts 6y ago
  Sciencealert isn't really a viable academic source. Most of the time its sources are reasonable though. Renewables won't cut it and we don't have a whole lot of time left for people to figure that out.
  - Krasnol 6y ago
    > Renewables won't cut it and we don't have a whole lot of time left for people to figure that out. If we don't have lot of time left, than we don't need to waste money on nuclear.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
jodrellblank 6y ago
> Nuclear energy is more cost effective than alternatives. The UK's first nuclear power plant cost half a billion in today's money. The current (and only) one being built in the UK is up to 23Bn for construction, plus ~50Bn in electricity subsidies, and is overbudget and delayed. > cost prohibitive to build nuclear power plants by way of onerous regulation > It is cheaper You can't have it both ways. Everything is cheap if you exclude the costs which are annoying. Where, and how, is this regulation going to be removed, and how cheaply and how quickly? The fossil fuel lobbyists aren't going to roll over cheaply and let it happen. Nor are they going to agree to disallow lobbying for the greater good. They should, but they won't. Then what?
natmaka 6y ago
> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power Nuclear and offshore wind are equivalent (median: 12 gCO2eq/kWh) Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse_gas_emissions_of_energy_sources#2014_IPCC,_Global_warming_potential_of_selected_electricity_sources https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse_gas_emis... > Alternative renewables (e.g. wind, solar) require fossil fuels to power the electrical grid when they are not able to generate Overprovision is part of a solution. Storage may tackle part of the challenge ( https://www.nrel.gov/news/features/2020/declining-renewable-costs-drive-focus-on-energy-storage.html https://www.nrel.gov/news/features/2020/declining-renewable-... ). On a large geographic scale renewables are able to continuously generate enough energy. We know how to transport energy (and nuke plants also need it), and interconnecting grid is considered a win whatever the type of source used (nuclear, wind...). See https://www.cell.com/one-earth/fulltext/S2590-3322(19)30225-8 https://www.cell.com/one-earth/fulltext/S2590-3322(19)30225-... , which doesn't seem to me more ambitious than hoping to quickly multiply by 10+ the existing nuclear power generation capacity, and hoping that there will be enough practically available combustible for them. > The amount of energy they output, relative to the energy input to construct The net outcome is positive. Moreover renewables don't need fuel, and therefore there is no need to worry about cost/reserves/geopolitical turmoil/terrorist actions/waste. > amount of land they consume For solar there are many adequate deserts and unused surfaces. For offshore wind there are huge pertinent areas. > Nuclear energy is safe, causing fewer deaths and adverse health impacts There are many ways to consider this. Here is one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl:_Consequences_of_the_Catastrophe_for_People_and_the_Environment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl:_Consequences_of_the... > If it is a dinosaur, then so are the transistors Transistors sci/tech made and makes huge progress. The nuke promises/dreams (fusion, no-waste...), albeit massively subsidized for decades, are stuck.
- ethanwillis 6y ago
  So many workarounds and engineering tasks just to be competitive with the simplicity of Nuclear.
  - pfdietz 6y ago
    Nuclear is simple in the same sense mainframe computers are simple. Solar and wind are like blades in a server farm; if one goes down it's no problem. In a nuclear power plant, all the parts (aside from some limited redundancy) damned well better work or the whole system is in jeopardy.
joe_the_user 6y ago
Storing energy is incredibly expensive. Hmm, did you ever consider that ... nuclear power involves storing a huge amount of energy! Those huge cement walls and vassals require huge investments of money, energy, and materials. Just as much, that is energy invested in a particular location and assuming that location will continue to require energy. That's energy that's wasted if something goes wrong the construction or operation of the plant and that's energy that's gone at the end of life of the plant. If you just require energy storage, it may be expensive but there are a number of flexible methods, some of which scale very easily (and others are cheaper but only at large scale, etc).
jnxx 6y ago
> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power. That's not exactly true, apart from mining for example the construction of a reactor building requires huge amounts of concrete. Also, mined uranium needs to enriched by centrifuges before it becomes usable, which is a process that requires a lot of energy.
- pfdietz 6y ago
  Centrifuge enrichment is actually quite energy efficient, using just 2% of the energy of enrichment by gaseous diffusion.
  - jnxx 6y ago
    That diffusion isn't efficient is not surprising as it's an almost purely entropy-generating process. But does centrifuge enrichment not use still, in absolute terms, a large amount of energy? Looking at the EROEI numbers of different enrichment levels: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EROEI#EROEI_and_payback_periods_of_some_types_of_power_plants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EROEI#EROEI_and_payback_period...
    - pfdietz 6y ago
      Your link shows it's a trivial amount of energy compared to what the reactor will produce. As a criticism of nuclear it's a non-starter.

epistasis 6y ago

Nuclear requires a lot of concrete and steel, both sources of carbon emissions (at least until the rest of the economy is decarbonized). The other "low carbon" sources are similar, they have carbon emissions only because the rest of the economy that manufactures them produces carbon. As for cost, you are contradicting yourself when you say it's cheap (it's not), and when you say that it's expensive because of anti-nuclear activists. See, for example, France, whose new nuclear projects are not cost competitive despite having a strongly pro-nuclear regulatory situation. As for the "efficiency" of hydrogen, the only efficiency that matters is economic efficiency, and all indications point to hydrogen storage of wind/solar to be more economically efficient than nuclear. (And for the record, for energy efficiency both nuclear and hydrogen are about 50% efficient, but like I said the only efficiency that matters for deployment is cost efficiency.

nickles 6y ago
> Nuclear requires a lot of concrete and steel, both sources of carbon emissions Alternative sources of energy also require materials to produce them. Natural gas plants require similar amounts of concrete and steel but have lower energy yields. Renewable sources like wind and solar require immense amounts of materials, including heavy metals and other toxic, non-recyclable materials. Because they are far less dense (~50 watts per sq. meter versus 2000-6000 watts per sq. meter from nuclear), they have a substantially greater environmental impact. > As for the "efficiency" of hydrogen, the only efficiency that matters is economic efficiency, and all indications point to hydrogen storage of wind/solar to be more economically efficient than nuclear. Solar and wind are heavily subsidized, at least in the United States, while nuclear is subject to expensive and arbitrary regulatory burdens. There’s not a level playing field to support the argument that nuclear energy is not economically competitive. From the perspective of physics, hydrogen is necessarily less efficient than other energy sources. Generating the initial source of electricity to produce the hydrogen has a given level of inefficiency. Then actually producing the hydrogen compounds the amount of energy wasted. Finally, utilizing the hydrogen as an energy source also loses some energy. There’s no scenario where it’s more efficient to use hydrogen as an intermediary than it is to use the original source.
- 6y ago

nl 6y ago

> Storing energy is incredibly expensive. This isn't true. Pump solar/wind is cheaper than gas plants.

tempestn 6y ago
Is this if you already have a basin to pump into? You can't just build pumped hydro anywhere. Do you have a reference you could share?
ncmncm 6y ago
There are numerous cheap storage forms. LH2. Ammonia. Underground pressurized air. Underwater pressurized air. Molten salt. Mineshaft gravitational.

ta2234234242 6y ago

> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power. Gaseous, sure. It also emits radioactivity.

epistasis 6y ago
Nuclear has lifecycle emissions about equals to wind: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse_gas_emissions_of_energy_sources#2014_IPCC,_Global_warming_potential_of_selected_electricity_sources https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse_gas_emis... Until we decarbonize construction, mining, and other energy needed to produce energy sources, everything still has a carbon emussions footprint.
- bb88 6y ago
  So... it's not zero emissions then. Or at least that's what parent was saying.
  - acidburnNSA 6y ago
    By this argument, nothing is zero emissions and the phrase zero emissions is worthless. The process of nuclear fission is zero-carbon (unlike combustion) and the lifecycle carbon emissions for nuclear are 12 gCO2-eq/kWh compared to 40 for solar, 490 for fracked natural gas, and 820 for coal. It's easier and meaningful in my opinion to just call nuclear zero carbon.
    - cycomanic 6y ago
      I don't think that is a valid argument. Take the extreme case of that some energy source requires huge amount of CO2 to build, but produces no emissions during operation. Is that a zero emission source? Also for nuclear we need to include the uranium mining, and ideally we would account for waste storage as well (not sure if that goes into current estimates). Now the OP argument disingenuous because he also included emmissions of other sources into wind and solar. However as many have already pointed out it would be much easier to run a grid on renewables only than at nuclear only, because for renewables you only need a large enough grid and overprovisioning. Nuclear on the other hand is very bad at handling variable loads, so you will essentially have to overprovision to the the peak demand and run your plants at that demand and burn the energy somehow. Note that Belgium used to do that by illuminating all their highways at night.

bryanlarsen 6y ago

> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power. Alternative renewables (e.g. wind, solar) require fossil fuels to power the electrical grid when they are not able to generate power. Renewables are about an order of magnitude cheaper than nuclear. $15/MWh vs $112/MWh. So what you do is overprovision your renewables. In other words, build more than you need. The major reason to do this is so that when the wind is barely blowing and/or it's a cloudy day you still get enough power to supply your needs without peakers. Then on the days when you're producing excess power (ie, most of them), you use that excess energy to produce methane from CO2. Use that methane to run your natural gas peakers, making them carbon neutral. This is likely much cheaper than batteries, certainly if you already have the gas peakers. You'll have to overprovision to cover the very unlikely time that both the wind and sun disappear for a long stretch, so you'll be overprovisioned all other times. Methane production takes Hydrogen as an input, so you can use some of that excess energy to create extra Hydrogen. Or you can turn methane into plastic for use or storage. Or just sell the extra electricity, there are several industries that can soak up cheap electricity (please not to bitcoin miners though). > Nuclear energy is more cost effective than alternatives. The main issue is that antinuclear activists, funded by the fossil fuel industry, have lobbied to make it cost prohibitive to build nuclear power plants by way of onerous regulation and prolonged legal battles. Even in China, nuclear is incredibly expensive and takes a long time. So I don't think regulation is the main problem. > Why? Producing hydrogen is inefficient and unnecessary Clean steel & cement.

gravypod 6y ago
> Renewables are about an order of magnitude cheaper than nuclear. I think there are a lot of complications that are encountered when doing this sort of calculation. You might get a max output of "$15/MWh" or "$112/MWh" but that's only a portion of the picture. Firstly Nuclear is X amount of power essentially on tap 24/7 where X is between some Min and Max value. From what I understand this makes grid management much simpler and reduces storage, transmission, and conversion losses. Even in the best case situation of "renewable" energy you'll see, in the absolute best case claimed by pumped hydro storage, you're seeing about an 87% efficiency. Suppose you had a nuclear power plant that could output 100W consistently. Suppose you wanted to build a similarly efficient "renewable" energy source. How much more peak power would it need to output to be competitive? If we assume the power source is 0% efficient at night and 100% efficient during the day, off the bat, you'd need to generate 200W continuously during the day. Then you'd need to generate an extra 13% on those extra 100Ws to make up for storage losses (1.13*100 ~= 113). That means 100W from Nuclear is ~= 213W "renewable". Obviously this is a terrible calculation and not at all accurate but it's just a sample of some of the math that needs to be done. Another factor that I've been skirting around is that "renewable" sources of energy are often not so renewable. Specifically things like like solar require a huge amount of rare metals & complex fabrication. Right now none of those externalizations are represented in the price of solar because there are no carbon taxes in countries that manufacture them. Money in this case is a proxy of what needs to be measured and should not be the only factor we optimize for.

pfdietz 6y ago

> Why? Producing hydrogen is inefficient and unnecessary if you have a consistent source of energy, which nuclear provides. Renewables + short term storage + hydrogen will likely be cheaper than a grid based on nuclear, even with the inefficiency of hydrogen. One contributing reason for that (for the hydrogen) is that a simple cycle combustion turbine power plant is 1/20th the capital cost per MW of a nuclear power plant. You can check this out with some plausible assumptions for 2030 technologies and real climate data at https://model.energy/ https://model.energy/

wp381640 6y ago
They’re also more profitable since they can respond to price hikes during peak demand Nuclear requires a contract to buy all of that energy all of the time - and nobody really does that anymore at nuclear output levels. It’s the reason many large coal plants died of natural causes, nuclear is 2-3x worse
- jnxx 6y ago
  Actually, the economics of nuclear and wind and solar energy is quite similar in one important aspect: You have a huge upfront cost for building the plant, and then when it is running, relatively little, or very little cost for generating any additional kWh of energy. The funny thing is that when you run an energy market, what determines the market price is the marginal cost, that is, the cost for generating that additional unit! It is the same as when you run a car factory, people are going to give you money for the one car you produce, not for building the factory. Now, with the marginal cost being near zero, that means that the market price is near zero as well. The price on the energy market goes to near zero. (And this is a very good thing because fossil energy has a much higher marginal cost and is competed out of the market, which is good for our planet's climate). https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/08/wind-power-prices-now-lower-than-the-cost-of-natural-gas/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/08/wind-power-prices-no... With the consequence that both nuclear and renewable need some kind of subsidy or other mechanism which makes sure that the upfront cost is somehow financed. What's also nice is that much of the subsidy goes in advance. And specifically with renewable power, it is very predictable and can be planned well. You cannot promise, as in so many other areas where government money is spent, that you build it at a cheap price, and then come back and demand more. And the latter is one reason why big nuclear energy constructors, like Westinghouse, appear to go bust one after another.

pvaldes 6y ago

> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power Is more a mushroom shape than a zero shape.

shard 6y ago
Only if you are generating the power in a weaponized form.

Krasnol 6y ago

> Nuclear power is often promoted as one of the best ways to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels to generate the electricity we need, but new research suggests that going all-in on renewables such as wind and solar might be a better approach to seriously reducing the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. https://www.sciencealert.com/here-s-why-nuclear-won-t-cut-it-if-we-want-to-drop-carbon-as-quickly-as-possible https://www.sciencealert.com/here-s-why-nuclear-won-t-cut-it...

stjohnswarts 6y ago
Sciencealert isn't really a viable academic source. Most of the time its sources are reasonable though. Renewables won't cut it and we don't have a whole lot of time left for people to figure that out.
- Krasnol 6y ago
  > Renewables won't cut it and we don't have a whole lot of time left for people to figure that out. If we don't have lot of time left, than we don't need to waste money on nuclear.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

jodrellblank 6y ago

> Nuclear energy is more cost effective than alternatives. The UK's first nuclear power plant cost half a billion in today's money. The current (and only) one being built in the UK is up to 23Bn for construction, plus ~50Bn in electricity subsidies, and is overbudget and delayed. > cost prohibitive to build nuclear power plants by way of onerous regulation > It is cheaper You can't have it both ways. Everything is cheap if you exclude the costs which are annoying. Where, and how, is this regulation going to be removed, and how cheaply and how quickly? The fossil fuel lobbyists aren't going to roll over cheaply and let it happen. Nor are they going to agree to disallow lobbying for the greater good. They should, but they won't. Then what?

natmaka 6y ago

> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power Nuclear and offshore wind are equivalent (median: 12 gCO2eq/kWh) Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse_gas_emissions_of_energy_sources#2014_IPCC,_Global_warming_potential_of_selected_electricity_sources https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life-cycle_greenhouse_gas_emis... > Alternative renewables (e.g. wind, solar) require fossil fuels to power the electrical grid when they are not able to generate Overprovision is part of a solution. Storage may tackle part of the challenge ( https://www.nrel.gov/news/features/2020/declining-renewable-costs-drive-focus-on-energy-storage.html https://www.nrel.gov/news/features/2020/declining-renewable-... ). On a large geographic scale renewables are able to continuously generate enough energy. We know how to transport energy (and nuke plants also need it), and interconnecting grid is considered a win whatever the type of source used (nuclear, wind...). See https://www.cell.com/one-earth/fulltext/S2590-3322(19)30225-8 https://www.cell.com/one-earth/fulltext/S2590-3322(19)30225-... , which doesn't seem to me more ambitious than hoping to quickly multiply by 10+ the existing nuclear power generation capacity, and hoping that there will be enough practically available combustible for them. > The amount of energy they output, relative to the energy input to construct The net outcome is positive. Moreover renewables don't need fuel, and therefore there is no need to worry about cost/reserves/geopolitical turmoil/terrorist actions/waste. > amount of land they consume For solar there are many adequate deserts and unused surfaces. For offshore wind there are huge pertinent areas. > Nuclear energy is safe, causing fewer deaths and adverse health impacts There are many ways to consider this. Here is one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl:_Consequences_of_the_Catastrophe_for_People_and_the_Environment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl:_Consequences_of_the... > If it is a dinosaur, then so are the transistors Transistors sci/tech made and makes huge progress. The nuke promises/dreams (fusion, no-waste...), albeit massively subsidized for decades, are stuck.

ethanwillis 6y ago
So many workarounds and engineering tasks just to be competitive with the simplicity of Nuclear.
- pfdietz 6y ago
  Nuclear is simple in the same sense mainframe computers are simple. Solar and wind are like blades in a server farm; if one goes down it's no problem. In a nuclear power plant, all the parts (aside from some limited redundancy) damned well better work or the whole system is in jeopardy.

joe_the_user 6y ago

Storing energy is incredibly expensive. Hmm, did you ever consider that ... nuclear power involves storing a huge amount of energy! Those huge cement walls and vassals require huge investments of money, energy, and materials. Just as much, that is energy invested in a particular location and assuming that location will continue to require energy. That's energy that's wasted if something goes wrong the construction or operation of the plant and that's energy that's gone at the end of life of the plant. If you just require energy storage, it may be expensive but there are a number of flexible methods, some of which scale very easily (and others are cheaper but only at large scale, etc).

jnxx 6y ago

> Nuclear power is a zero emissions source of power. That's not exactly true, apart from mining for example the construction of a reactor building requires huge amounts of concrete. Also, mined uranium needs to enriched by centrifuges before it becomes usable, which is a process that requires a lot of energy.

pfdietz 6y ago
Centrifuge enrichment is actually quite energy efficient, using just 2% of the energy of enrichment by gaseous diffusion.
- jnxx 6y ago
  That diffusion isn't efficient is not surprising as it's an almost purely entropy-generating process. But does centrifuge enrichment not use still, in absolute terms, a large amount of energy? Looking at the EROEI numbers of different enrichment levels: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EROEI#EROEI_and_payback_periods_of_some_types_of_power_plants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EROEI#EROEI_and_payback_period...
  - pfdietz 6y ago
    Your link shows it's a trivial amount of energy compared to what the reactor will produce. As a criticism of nuclear it's a non-starter.