3 ms·

Agree, but the snark against nuclear is unwarranted. As the author said, we don't need 100% today. And he acknowledge that problems exist, and they have to be

by orwin 5y ago

Agree, but the snark against nuclear is unwarranted. As the author said, we don't need 100% today. And he acknowledge that problems exist, and they have to be solved. Wehn reading him, i have the impression that he acknowledge that some issues/blocks can take some time to clear. Why gamble? Just take nuclear as a crutch, plan for 100 year of pilatable nuclear + hydro baseload and 30 year of gaz peakers, to clear the blocks in front of renewables, and if the issues are fixed in the next 30-50 years, great, you can decommission the nuclear plants early! If you really think GW is the biggest issue of this century, not using all available tools, however dangerous you think they might be, to help you with your issue is plain dumb.

blumio 5y ago
I'm trying to understand from what you got your snark from. Do you refer to: "I think the renewable industry will end up better and cheaper than the current system but if I'm wrong about the renewables industry being good at optimising that bundle of benefits, problems and"? As far as I know, nuclear fuel is rare and we don't have a solution to thorium reactors yet. I would personally not mind more nuclear were it makes sense though. Germany is not very suited though as it's quite populated but there is plenty of empty space in USA. There is a risk though as current nuclear power station have issues in drought situations. Nonetheless I haven't read is arguments. Perhaps he wrote about it.
- FabHK 5y ago
  > I'm trying to understand from what you got your snark from. Do you refer to [...] I think GP might refer to footnote 1 in the article: > [...] one could technically replace fossil fuels with nuclear power. it would just be more expensive, more dangerous and slower - so probably only a few billion dead. Personally, I think modern nuclear reactors (that are optimised for safety and efficiency, not for generating nuclear weapons material) and a tad more sensible regulation could make nuclear power safe and cheap, and turn nuclear (together with renewables, of course) into a formidable weapon against global warming.
Aachen 5y ago
What is GW? Something to do with nuclear I presume but I'm not sure who you're calling dumb.
- DFHippie 5y ago
  Global warming.
  - Aachen 5y ago
    Ah, I was thinking in the wrong direction. Thanks.
- dredmorbius 5y ago
  Given that in energy discussion, "GW" usually means gigawatt, appropriating it for "global warming" as OP did was a poor choice.
lukeschlather 5y ago
What do you think nuclear costs? I think you are probably unintentionally operating on a fallacy in this article, which is using decade-old costs. Renewables and storage have fallen in price massively. Nuclear was a great idea a decade ago but when you look at the costs there's no reason anymore. It's just too expensive.
- acidburnNSA 5y ago
  Not really true when you consider systems costs [1]. The way Korea and China and Russia are making nuclear plants right now, nuclear still has a huge role to play. If you look at the current boondoggles only then I could see why you'd think what you say. [1] https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joule.2018.08.006 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joule.2018.08.006
- Manuel_D 5y ago
  Nuclear's cost is substantially less when built at scale. During serial production during the 1960s and 70s nuclear power costs averaged about $1B per GW of capacity[1]. And with a capacity factor of near 100% versus ~30% for renewables other than hydro this is very cost competitive. Furthermore the question of storage to make renewables feasible is typically met with assumptions that batteries will scale by a factor of 100, or that a breakthrough will be made in another form of storage like liquid metal batteries, hydrogen, compressed air, or something else. None of these have been deployed at scale. 1. https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Overnight-Construction-Costs-of-Global-Nuclear-Reactors-in-USD2010-Costs-are-adjusted-by_fig1_292964046 https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Overnight-Construction-C...
- andromeduck 5y ago
  Renewables are only cheap because they can freeload on the variability of coal and gas. Start pricing carbon and QoS and things will change quickly.

by orwin 5y ago

blumio 5y ago

I'm trying to understand from what you got your snark from. Do you refer to: "I think the renewable industry will end up better and cheaper than the current system but if I'm wrong about the renewables industry being good at optimising that bundle of benefits, problems and"? As far as I know, nuclear fuel is rare and we don't have a solution to thorium reactors yet. I would personally not mind more nuclear were it makes sense though. Germany is not very suited though as it's quite populated but there is plenty of empty space in USA. There is a risk though as current nuclear power station have issues in drought situations. Nonetheless I haven't read is arguments. Perhaps he wrote about it.

FabHK 5y ago
> I'm trying to understand from what you got your snark from. Do you refer to [...] I think GP might refer to footnote 1 in the article: > [...] one could technically replace fossil fuels with nuclear power. it would just be more expensive, more dangerous and slower - so probably only a few billion dead. Personally, I think modern nuclear reactors (that are optimised for safety and efficiency, not for generating nuclear weapons material) and a tad more sensible regulation could make nuclear power safe and cheap, and turn nuclear (together with renewables, of course) into a formidable weapon against global warming.

Aachen 5y ago

What is GW? Something to do with nuclear I presume but I'm not sure who you're calling dumb.

DFHippie 5y ago
Global warming.
- Aachen 5y ago
  Ah, I was thinking in the wrong direction. Thanks.
dredmorbius 5y ago
Given that in energy discussion, "GW" usually means gigawatt, appropriating it for "global warming" as OP did was a poor choice.

lukeschlather 5y ago

What do you think nuclear costs? I think you are probably unintentionally operating on a fallacy in this article, which is using decade-old costs. Renewables and storage have fallen in price massively. Nuclear was a great idea a decade ago but when you look at the costs there's no reason anymore. It's just too expensive.

acidburnNSA 5y ago
Not really true when you consider systems costs [1]. The way Korea and China and Russia are making nuclear plants right now, nuclear still has a huge role to play. If you look at the current boondoggles only then I could see why you'd think what you say. [1] https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joule.2018.08.006 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joule.2018.08.006
Manuel_D 5y ago
Nuclear's cost is substantially less when built at scale. During serial production during the 1960s and 70s nuclear power costs averaged about $1B per GW of capacity[1]. And with a capacity factor of near 100% versus ~30% for renewables other than hydro this is very cost competitive. Furthermore the question of storage to make renewables feasible is typically met with assumptions that batteries will scale by a factor of 100, or that a breakthrough will be made in another form of storage like liquid metal batteries, hydrogen, compressed air, or something else. None of these have been deployed at scale. 1. https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Overnight-Construction-Costs-of-Global-Nuclear-Reactors-in-USD2010-Costs-are-adjusted-by_fig1_292964046 https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Overnight-Construction-C...
andromeduck 5y ago
Renewables are only cheap because they can freeload on the variability of coal and gas. Start pricing carbon and QoS and things will change quickly.