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> A few more GW of nuke plants under construction would make exactly zero difference, Yes, it takes awhile. This is a problem we should be working on! And "i

by mlyle 5y ago

> A few more GW of nuke plants under construction would make exactly zero difference, Yes, it takes awhile. This is a problem we should be working on! And "it won't help for awhile" isn't great justification for not doing something forever. > but would suck up dollars that could otherwise be spent building out wind and solar that would produce immediately. Already argued against with no objection by you. > their power would then be unable to compete on price with wind I do not think it is feasible for California to deploy ~6x as much wind as we have now. And we might need significantly more than that (overprovisioning for reliability, increased nighttime demands). > storage Again, we have no clarity that grid-scale storage using batteries is realistic or sustainable, even assuming doing it with new technologies like smelting iron. We simply need to be betting on everything to get through this. Solar-thermal probably doesn't win either, but we should absolutely be doing more of it than we are now. > More likely, they would be cancelled first. Even if one cedes your point, and some capital costs need to get written down, so be it. You still get the power. The operating costs of nuclear are cheap: it's the capital costs that are problematic. France proves the point: the CO2 intensity of energy production in France is significantly lower than neighboring states that have bet heavily on renewables. And this was done with comparatively ancient technology. If France got it done in the past, why can't it be done now?

ncmncm 5y ago
Just operating a nuke plant, ignoring capital paydown, already costs more than building out and operating matching solar. A cancelled nuke plant generates zero watts, forever. And, nuke plant operation costs are only increasing. Reduced water availability increases this cost. Offshore wind is wholly untapped, in California. Installing solar over crop land reduces water and heat stress, both increasing yield and freeing up water for hydro storage. Iron-air batteries do not involve smelting (once produced). The iron oxidizes, yielding energy. Their advantage is extremely low cost per stored watt-hour.
- mlyle 5y ago
  > Just operating a nuke plant, ignoring capital paydown, already costs more than building out and then operating matching solar. Nuclear is about $30 operating/megawatt hour. Solar, counting capital costs, is about $40/megawatt hour for utility scale solar and about $150/megawatt hour for rooftop after subsidies... but this is just daytime power and not base load. You'd need to add the cost of storage. > And, nuke plant operation costs are only increasing. This is false. They'd gone up for awhile, but then started a powerful downward trend. 2019 was a record low value even before correcting for inflation. 2019 is also the most recent year for which we have full data. > Iron-air batteries do not involve smelting (once produced). The iron oxidizes, yielding energy. And then is reduced, to recharge. There's various approaches here, from nanoscale powder sintering and pure electrochemical reduction to literally just reducing the iron anode at temperature ("smelting").
  - ncmncm 5y ago
    What developments are there to drive nuke plant operating cost down?
    - mlyle 5y ago
      It looks like we're realizing some efficiencies from mechanization and automation. Newer generation designs will be a bit better, it looks like. But-- nuke operating cost is OK. The operating cost is not an issue with us having plenty of power when we want it even if the vast majority of our power mix was nuclear (and that's not something I advocate for: just an increased share of nuclear in the mix). The issue is the capital costs-- and as you say, they are awful right now because so few nuclear plants are being constructed, because: - They face an unclear and varying regulatory environment, where there have been plants fully completed and not granted a license to commence operation. - Natural gas is so damn cheap.
      - ncmncm 5y ago
        And so few nukes are built because capital costs are awful. It is hard to imagine any way out. I have been trying to understand nuke construction economics. Ultimately, it seems tied to our mode of government: for any entity smaller than the Feds to pull together the $billions for a nuke project takes enlisting a huge patronage network, who must then be ladled gravy. Most of the cost is not construction, as such, but gravy, disguised. It stretches to a decade and beyond because the moment it's finished, the gravy dries up. No one actually involved wants that ever to happen, not even if the stalling makes no one ever want to start another project like it. So, a nuke plant is like a bullet train or urban transit tunnel. The Feds might be able to build a nuke plant, but every detail of the industry, what there is of it, is tuned to extracting gravy, which I doubt even the Feds could overcome (presuming they would want to). An incremental nuke that grows in 100 MW units, and produces power very early, might work, adding capacity continually. (But turbines want economy of scale.) Or, a nuke to provide process heat for a cluster of industrial plants in the daytime, commissioned and managed by them, but generating regional power overnight. But the well seems too toxic. The purely incremental nature of solar, wind, and batteries leaves little room for corruption, making them tough competition. With HVDC transmission cost falling and efficiency rising, whoever builds out cheapest can prop up everybody for a thousand miles around. The thing about nukes is that the heat driving it seems free, but heat is pretty cheap. The cost of turning heat into power, and all the complications, dominates.

by mlyle 5y ago

ncmncm 5y ago

Just operating a nuke plant, ignoring capital paydown, already costs more than building out and operating matching solar. A cancelled nuke plant generates zero watts, forever. And, nuke plant operation costs are only increasing. Reduced water availability increases this cost. Offshore wind is wholly untapped, in California. Installing solar over crop land reduces water and heat stress, both increasing yield and freeing up water for hydro storage. Iron-air batteries do not involve smelting (once produced). The iron oxidizes, yielding energy. Their advantage is extremely low cost per stored watt-hour.

mlyle 5y ago
> Just operating a nuke plant, ignoring capital paydown, already costs more than building out and then operating matching solar. Nuclear is about $30 operating/megawatt hour. Solar, counting capital costs, is about $40/megawatt hour for utility scale solar and about $150/megawatt hour for rooftop after subsidies... but this is just daytime power and not base load. You'd need to add the cost of storage. > And, nuke plant operation costs are only increasing. This is false. They'd gone up for awhile, but then started a powerful downward trend. 2019 was a record low value even before correcting for inflation. 2019 is also the most recent year for which we have full data. > Iron-air batteries do not involve smelting (once produced). The iron oxidizes, yielding energy. And then is reduced, to recharge. There's various approaches here, from nanoscale powder sintering and pure electrochemical reduction to literally just reducing the iron anode at temperature ("smelting").
- ncmncm 5y ago
  What developments are there to drive nuke plant operating cost down?
  - mlyle 5y ago
    It looks like we're realizing some efficiencies from mechanization and automation. Newer generation designs will be a bit better, it looks like. But-- nuke operating cost is OK. The operating cost is not an issue with us having plenty of power when we want it even if the vast majority of our power mix was nuclear (and that's not something I advocate for: just an increased share of nuclear in the mix). The issue is the capital costs-- and as you say, they are awful right now because so few nuclear plants are being constructed, because: - They face an unclear and varying regulatory environment, where there have been plants fully completed and not granted a license to commence operation. - Natural gas is so damn cheap.
    - ncmncm 5y ago
      And so few nukes are built because capital costs are awful. It is hard to imagine any way out. I have been trying to understand nuke construction economics. Ultimately, it seems tied to our mode of government: for any entity smaller than the Feds to pull together the $billions for a nuke project takes enlisting a huge patronage network, who must then be ladled gravy. Most of the cost is not construction, as such, but gravy, disguised. It stretches to a decade and beyond because the moment it's finished, the gravy dries up. No one actually involved wants that ever to happen, not even if the stalling makes no one ever want to start another project like it. So, a nuke plant is like a bullet train or urban transit tunnel. The Feds might be able to build a nuke plant, but every detail of the industry, what there is of it, is tuned to extracting gravy, which I doubt even the Feds could overcome (presuming they would want to). An incremental nuke that grows in 100 MW units, and produces power very early, might work, adding capacity continually. (But turbines want economy of scale.) Or, a nuke to provide process heat for a cluster of industrial plants in the daytime, commissioned and managed by them, but generating regional power overnight. But the well seems too toxic. The purely incremental nature of solar, wind, and batteries leaves little room for corruption, making them tough competition. With HVDC transmission cost falling and efficiency rising, whoever builds out cheapest can prop up everybody for a thousand miles around. The thing about nukes is that the heat driving it seems free, but heat is pretty cheap. The cost of turning heat into power, and all the complications, dominates.