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That's simply not true. Nuclear has always and is still receiving significant indirect subsidies. A huge subsidy that nuclear power gets is that plants are not
by cycomanic 6y ago
That's simply not true. Nuclear has always and is still receiving significant indirect subsidies. A huge subsidy that nuclear power gets is that plants are not insured against incidents (because essentially nobody is willing to sell them insurance), so it's essentially the state that does it. Also many argue that the nuclear waste storage costs are significantly underestimated, I mean I understand estimating cost for safe storage for thousands of years is difficult.
Interesting you mentioned France, the only project they are building is Flammanville 3 which started in 2007 with an estimated cost of ~3 billion euros, it is now estimated to go online in 2022 with an estimated cost of 19 billion euros. That's just construction cost.
Regarding the cost for decommissioning, the European commission has actually called out France for currently significantly underfunding the cost by a factor of 3 or 4.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- trashface 6y agoI used to hear stories about using a breeder reactor to recycle used waste, which reduces the storage requirements for the remainder to a few centuries. Not sure if that is a pipe dream though.
- pfdietz 6y agoNuclear is uneconomical even if you totally ignore waste disposal costs.
- PoignardAzur 6y agoPart of the problem with Flamanville is notoriously that France hasn't built a new nuclear reactor for 20 years, and a lot of the expertise has been lost; also, the ASN's safety regulations have become a lot stricter in that time. So I think overall GP's points apply.