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>I keep thinking discussions are stacked against nuclear unfairly. Very fairly. Nuclear will always be many times more expensive than equivalent power hydrocar

>I keep thinking discussions are stacked against nuclear unfairly. Very fairly. Nuclear will always be many times more expensive than equivalent power hydrocarbon powerplant. It's not because of any manufacturing intricacies, but largely from just the material cost. It's not possible to "science it out" how to make ultra reliable pressure vessels with less steel, and metalworking, and large industrial building with less cement. Nuclear reactors are fairly dumb industrial implements, basically very huge, and expensive water boilers. The biggest advantage of nuclear is very cheap fuel, and fuel logistics. Nuclear fuel is cheaper than even coal. The price of transporting coal also makes not a small part of its cost. 40-50 years, that advantage was what pushed nuclear power to prominence. Now, the cost of fuel, and its transport is not considered that significant, and nuclear lost this advantage. Costs of some fuels actually went down as extraction scaled up, and itself became cheaper. Transport costs also went down. Power plants got more efficient. To regain this advantage, nuclear plants need to produce many times more electricity, and heat for their cost. This is why I was always telling people that scale is what is the real problem for nuclear now. Four, and up to ten+ gigawatt reactors is what will make difference for nuclear.

7952 6y ago
Delivering 4GW in a single project would certainly set it apart. Perhaps the sweet spot for nuclear is not the traditional 1GW level. Although that would create a very large single point of failure that would need peakers/batteries/pumped hydro to backup on failure. An interesting project would be to stick a 5GW reactor in the middle of the North Sea and run export cables to all the surrounding countries. Build near an old oil well for hydrogen storage and include a thermal hydrogen generator.
- baybal2 6y ago
  Yes, a 4GW reactor is certainly not for any country to build for above reasons (shut down a double digit of your generation every time you refuel.) Even moderately industrialised countries will think twice, but it is indeed very logical for top 10 economies. The biggest problem will be building a containment building this big. A dilemma it is. Containment building can't do anything about reactor explosion. Either steam explosion from Chernobil like event, or hydrogen explosion is not survivable by containment building of any reactor in service. And containment building for a reactor this big will be even less useful. This means abandoning them, and going for Chernobil like no containment building construction.
  - fuoqi 6y ago
    >hydrogen explosion is not survivable by containment building of any reactor in service Or you can simply include specialized hydrogen burners like in the modern VVER reactors, which have complied with the post-Fukushima requirements even before the event has happened. Also a Chernobyl-like event is simply impossible on PWR reactors.
    - baybal2 6y ago
      > simply impossible on PWR reactors. Easily possible. I'll give you a few scenarios I came up within just minutes. Loss of coolant -> drop in reactivity -> overheat of core -> core melts, and falls into puddle of remaining water at the bottom of the reactor -> instant reactivity boost -> boom Loss of coolant -> drop in reactivity -> overheat of core -> coolant comes back -> water spayed onto hot fuel -> steam flash -> steam-cladding reaction -> boom
      - fuoqi 6y ago
        I can reply to you with only one thing: please, learn more about modern reactor designs and their safety systems, don't embarrass yourself. Also learn why the Chernobyl event was so nasty and why its impact is significantly bigger compared to Fukushima (hint: graphite moderation).
        baybal2 6y ago
        Now, do us a favour, and tell us how that is not possible. You are embarrassing yourself here with lack of manners, and constant attacks. Behave yourself.
        fuoqi 6y ago
        It's unproductive to discuss such matters with a total layman who didn't bother to do even a basic research, but ok, I will play along. Let's start from the simplest thing: a Chernobyl-like event is impossible on PWR because they do not use graphite moderators. Simple, right? I could've finished on this, but let me educated you a bit more. Modern reactors have the following safety systems in place (it's not a full list): - Hydrogen burners (recombiners) mentioned in my previous comment, which significantly reduce amount of hydrogen inside containment. - Systems for fast automatic Boron injection. - Heat sink systems designed to work without electricity. - Passive cooling systems, which are significantly more reliable than the isolation condenser used on Fukushima-1. - A way of supplying additional coolant externally. - Core catchers which lead corium from the containment building. If you know Russian you can read for example this paper [0] from Gidropress (Rosatom subsidiary) to learn more about how modern nuclear reactors handle severe accidents associated with a total loss of electricity. It's about older VVER-1000 reactors, which are a bit less advanced than the newer VVER-1200 and TOI designs, but it should be a good starting point. [0]: http://www.gidropress.podolsk.ru/files/proceedings/mntk2019/documents/mntk2019-037.pdf http://www.gidropress.podolsk.ru/files/proceedings/mntk2019/...
- petre 6y ago
  No, the solution is building multiple sub 100 MW (NuScale Power and others) and a few sub 500 MW SMRs for major cities (think post VVER 440 designs and Rolls Royce SMRs). Gen VI+ has passive safety requirements that would render a multi GW plant too big and too expensive. Think huge tanks of water, double containment, passive circulation, gravitational safety features and minimal disruption of fisheries and habitats. We need smaller and more modular NPPs with reactor vessels built on an assembly line and QCed, good safety guarantees, minimal staff, minimal operational costs and the ability to regulate the energy output in a wider range.
  - baybal2 6y ago
    Building smaller reactors in not as solution to nuclear's cost for many reasons I wrote above. Economics of small reactors is unsound. A cult like group pushing "small modular reactors" pushes a very likely deliberately miscalculated pricing estimates for them.
    - 7952 6y ago
      Some of the designs seem to have high civil engineering costs. Digging big holes is not exactly a cheap thing to do.
webreac 6y ago
I do not think this is fair. Cost of fossil fuels is largely undervalued: most of the cost (wars and pollution) is not taken into account.
omgJustTest 6y ago
You don’t understand true costs, and carbon is not well priced right now. Ultimate costs of doing this will be: wildfires, floods, power outages, etc. even the commodity and exchanges commission (a us financial institution) is calling for orders of magnitude cost increase in carbon credit costs.
Accujack 6y ago
>Nuclear will always be many times more expensive than equivalent power hydrocarbon powerplant. No, you're behind the times. You're thinking of present nuclear plant technology, and in that you're correct. Newer plant designs solve most of the issues with construction and management cost, nuclear proliferation, and even reduce the waste that must be stored. Arguing for greater use of the 1960s technology that's presently in power plants is silly, and no one is really advocating that. Google "small modular reactors" and read up.
- baybal2 6y ago
  Please tell me how can you make reactor vessels cheaper by making 2 smaller vessels instead of 1 bigger one on current reactor scales. Their math is plainly wrong. The "small modular reactor" community is a bit of a cult. Be extra wary of everything they say.
  - 2trill2spill 6y ago
    The SMR community does have a lot of hype, but the general idea seems fairly sound. Instead of building huge reactors on site, as basically big one off projects. Instead, mass produce a bunch of smaller modular reactors at a factory. That doesn't seem much different than a modular home vs a custom home to me, with the modular home being way cheaper. But we will see if it actually works. But for me the biggest issue is, if fighting climate change is so important, why wouldn't we try everything possible? Why do so many people insist on only renewables?
    - baybal2 6y ago
      You have smaller logistics costs for smaller reactor, yes... But you don't have reduction in marginal logistics cost per unit of energy produced. While reactor vessels themselves are most expensive single piece in the nuclear power station, they are not going to save much on them by making them smaller, and they would not get any cheaper from mass manufacturing.
      - 6y ago

7952 6y ago

Delivering 4GW in a single project would certainly set it apart. Perhaps the sweet spot for nuclear is not the traditional 1GW level. Although that would create a very large single point of failure that would need peakers/batteries/pumped hydro to backup on failure. An interesting project would be to stick a 5GW reactor in the middle of the North Sea and run export cables to all the surrounding countries. Build near an old oil well for hydrogen storage and include a thermal hydrogen generator.

baybal2 6y ago
Yes, a 4GW reactor is certainly not for any country to build for above reasons (shut down a double digit of your generation every time you refuel.) Even moderately industrialised countries will think twice, but it is indeed very logical for top 10 economies. The biggest problem will be building a containment building this big. A dilemma it is. Containment building can't do anything about reactor explosion. Either steam explosion from Chernobil like event, or hydrogen explosion is not survivable by containment building of any reactor in service. And containment building for a reactor this big will be even less useful. This means abandoning them, and going for Chernobil like no containment building construction.
- fuoqi 6y ago
  >hydrogen explosion is not survivable by containment building of any reactor in service Or you can simply include specialized hydrogen burners like in the modern VVER reactors, which have complied with the post-Fukushima requirements even before the event has happened. Also a Chernobyl-like event is simply impossible on PWR reactors.
  - baybal2 6y ago
    > simply impossible on PWR reactors. Easily possible. I'll give you a few scenarios I came up within just minutes. Loss of coolant -> drop in reactivity -> overheat of core -> core melts, and falls into puddle of remaining water at the bottom of the reactor -> instant reactivity boost -> boom Loss of coolant -> drop in reactivity -> overheat of core -> coolant comes back -> water spayed onto hot fuel -> steam flash -> steam-cladding reaction -> boom
    - fuoqi 6y ago
      I can reply to you with only one thing: please, learn more about modern reactor designs and their safety systems, don't embarrass yourself. Also learn why the Chernobyl event was so nasty and why its impact is significantly bigger compared to Fukushima (hint: graphite moderation).
      - baybal2 6y ago
        Now, do us a favour, and tell us how that is not possible. You are embarrassing yourself here with lack of manners, and constant attacks. Behave yourself.
        fuoqi 6y ago
        It's unproductive to discuss such matters with a total layman who didn't bother to do even a basic research, but ok, I will play along. Let's start from the simplest thing: a Chernobyl-like event is impossible on PWR because they do not use graphite moderators. Simple, right? I could've finished on this, but let me educated you a bit more. Modern reactors have the following safety systems in place (it's not a full list): - Hydrogen burners (recombiners) mentioned in my previous comment, which significantly reduce amount of hydrogen inside containment. - Systems for fast automatic Boron injection. - Heat sink systems designed to work without electricity. - Passive cooling systems, which are significantly more reliable than the isolation condenser used on Fukushima-1. - A way of supplying additional coolant externally. - Core catchers which lead corium from the containment building. If you know Russian you can read for example this paper [0] from Gidropress (Rosatom subsidiary) to learn more about how modern nuclear reactors handle severe accidents associated with a total loss of electricity. It's about older VVER-1000 reactors, which are a bit less advanced than the newer VVER-1200 and TOI designs, but it should be a good starting point. [0]: http://www.gidropress.podolsk.ru/files/proceedings/mntk2019/documents/mntk2019-037.pdf http://www.gidropress.podolsk.ru/files/proceedings/mntk2019/...
petre 6y ago
No, the solution is building multiple sub 100 MW (NuScale Power and others) and a few sub 500 MW SMRs for major cities (think post VVER 440 designs and Rolls Royce SMRs). Gen VI+ has passive safety requirements that would render a multi GW plant too big and too expensive. Think huge tanks of water, double containment, passive circulation, gravitational safety features and minimal disruption of fisheries and habitats. We need smaller and more modular NPPs with reactor vessels built on an assembly line and QCed, good safety guarantees, minimal staff, minimal operational costs and the ability to regulate the energy output in a wider range.
- baybal2 6y ago
  Building smaller reactors in not as solution to nuclear's cost for many reasons I wrote above. Economics of small reactors is unsound. A cult like group pushing "small modular reactors" pushes a very likely deliberately miscalculated pricing estimates for them.
  - 7952 6y ago
    Some of the designs seem to have high civil engineering costs. Digging big holes is not exactly a cheap thing to do.

webreac 6y ago

I do not think this is fair. Cost of fossil fuels is largely undervalued: most of the cost (wars and pollution) is not taken into account.

omgJustTest 6y ago

You don’t understand true costs, and carbon is not well priced right now. Ultimate costs of doing this will be: wildfires, floods, power outages, etc. even the commodity and exchanges commission (a us financial institution) is calling for orders of magnitude cost increase in carbon credit costs.

Accujack 6y ago

>Nuclear will always be many times more expensive than equivalent power hydrocarbon powerplant. No, you're behind the times. You're thinking of present nuclear plant technology, and in that you're correct. Newer plant designs solve most of the issues with construction and management cost, nuclear proliferation, and even reduce the waste that must be stored. Arguing for greater use of the 1960s technology that's presently in power plants is silly, and no one is really advocating that. Google "small modular reactors" and read up.

baybal2 6y ago
Please tell me how can you make reactor vessels cheaper by making 2 smaller vessels instead of 1 bigger one on current reactor scales. Their math is plainly wrong. The "small modular reactor" community is a bit of a cult. Be extra wary of everything they say.
- 2trill2spill 6y ago
  The SMR community does have a lot of hype, but the general idea seems fairly sound. Instead of building huge reactors on site, as basically big one off projects. Instead, mass produce a bunch of smaller modular reactors at a factory. That doesn't seem much different than a modular home vs a custom home to me, with the modular home being way cheaper. But we will see if it actually works. But for me the biggest issue is, if fighting climate change is so important, why wouldn't we try everything possible? Why do so many people insist on only renewables?
  - baybal2 6y ago
    You have smaller logistics costs for smaller reactor, yes... But you don't have reduction in marginal logistics cost per unit of energy produced. While reactor vessels themselves are most expensive single piece in the nuclear power station, they are not going to save much on them by making them smaller, and they would not get any cheaper from mass manufacturing.
    - 6y ago