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> Nuclear is the quickest path to green, and it's staring us right in our faces. This is held as self-evident in all these discussions on HN and yet all the si

> Nuclear is the quickest path to green, and it's staring us right in our faces. This is held as self-evident in all these discussions on HN and yet all the simulations I've seen have nuclear as way too expensive compared to the alternatives. After someone points that out the discussion shifts to how it's also evident that nuclear is only expensive because of red tape but no one can explain how. We're stuck there as far as I can tell.

hunterb123 5y ago
> ... nuclear is only expensive because of red tape but no one can explain how. Noone ever or you haven't seen it? The over regulation by the NRC and EPA is well documented. https://www.americanactionforum.org/research/costs-benefits-nuclear-regulation/ https://www.americanactionforum.org/research/costs-benefits-...
- pedrocr 5y ago
  I was trying to synthesize the discussion I've seen here. Your link is interesting but still in line with the discussion I've seen so far. People can point out examples of excessive red-tape in some countries. But no one agrees how much can be removed, because everyone agrees the downside to failing nuclear is grave and needs to be regulated. And since nuclear needs something like a 5 to 10x improvement in cost to be competitive it doesn't seem feasible that just deregulation is the answer. My hypothesis is that nuclear was our best bet to decarbonize the grid 20 or 30 years ago but meanwhile wind and solar have improved so much and are still on such a steep improvement curve that nothing else makes sense. But I'm happy to be convinced otherwise. It would be cool to have a fourth good source of energy in the clean mix and SMRs do sound better than traditional plants.
fsflover 5y ago
> yet all the simulations I've seen have nuclear as way too expensive compared to the alternatives Links? There is evidence that it's expensive because nuclear has to compete with cheap, environment-damaging gas: https://whatisnuclear.com/economics.html#conclusions https://whatisnuclear.com/economics.html#conclusions.
- pedrocr 5y ago
  The comparison is with solar and wind, and there seem to be enough solutions between interconnects, overcapacity, batteries, demand modulations and others for nuclear to not be valuable even to solve intermittency. Here's a simulation for how an 100% solar+wind+battery grid would work and be cheap: https://www.rethinkx.com/energy https://www.rethinkx.com/energy And here's the same reasoning used to argue that even the already built gas, coal, nuclear and hydro assets are overvalued: https://www.rethinkx.com/energy-lcoe https://www.rethinkx.com/energy-lcoe I've seen other simulations that weren't as extreme and ended up keeping the hydro we have as generation as well as grid scale batteries and even some gas to fill a few moments in time. What I haven't seen is any simulation that makes new nuclear build make sense.
lm28469 5y ago
> nuclear as way too expensive compared to the alternatives Yet German electricity is two times more expensive than France's one. One is nuclear the other is """green""" And the worst part is that it doesn't work: their last two nuclear reactors (max output 4GW) often produce more than their entire sun+wind system (max output 122GW) so they end up buying electricity from nuclear powered countries and gas from Russia https://mobile.twitter.com/fmbreon/status/148058947971495936 https://mobile.twitter.com/fmbreon/status/148058947971495936...
- gefhfffh 5y ago
  > Yet German electricity is two times more expensive than France's one. One is nuclear the other is """green""" Please add more logical fallacies

hunterb123 5y ago

> ... nuclear is only expensive because of red tape but no one can explain how. Noone ever or you haven't seen it? The over regulation by the NRC and EPA is well documented. https://www.americanactionforum.org/research/costs-benefits-nuclear-regulation/ https://www.americanactionforum.org/research/costs-benefits-...

pedrocr 5y ago
I was trying to synthesize the discussion I've seen here. Your link is interesting but still in line with the discussion I've seen so far. People can point out examples of excessive red-tape in some countries. But no one agrees how much can be removed, because everyone agrees the downside to failing nuclear is grave and needs to be regulated. And since nuclear needs something like a 5 to 10x improvement in cost to be competitive it doesn't seem feasible that just deregulation is the answer. My hypothesis is that nuclear was our best bet to decarbonize the grid 20 or 30 years ago but meanwhile wind and solar have improved so much and are still on such a steep improvement curve that nothing else makes sense. But I'm happy to be convinced otherwise. It would be cool to have a fourth good source of energy in the clean mix and SMRs do sound better than traditional plants.

fsflover 5y ago

> yet all the simulations I've seen have nuclear as way too expensive compared to the alternatives Links? There is evidence that it's expensive because nuclear has to compete with cheap, environment-damaging gas: https://whatisnuclear.com/economics.html#conclusions https://whatisnuclear.com/economics.html#conclusions.

pedrocr 5y ago
The comparison is with solar and wind, and there seem to be enough solutions between interconnects, overcapacity, batteries, demand modulations and others for nuclear to not be valuable even to solve intermittency. Here's a simulation for how an 100% solar+wind+battery grid would work and be cheap: https://www.rethinkx.com/energy https://www.rethinkx.com/energy And here's the same reasoning used to argue that even the already built gas, coal, nuclear and hydro assets are overvalued: https://www.rethinkx.com/energy-lcoe https://www.rethinkx.com/energy-lcoe I've seen other simulations that weren't as extreme and ended up keeping the hydro we have as generation as well as grid scale batteries and even some gas to fill a few moments in time. What I haven't seen is any simulation that makes new nuclear build make sense.

lm28469 5y ago

> nuclear as way too expensive compared to the alternatives Yet German electricity is two times more expensive than France's one. One is nuclear the other is """green""" And the worst part is that it doesn't work: their last two nuclear reactors (max output 4GW) often produce more than their entire sun+wind system (max output 122GW) so they end up buying electricity from nuclear powered countries and gas from Russia https://mobile.twitter.com/fmbreon/status/148058947971495936 https://mobile.twitter.com/fmbreon/status/148058947971495936...

gefhfffh 5y ago
> Yet German electricity is two times more expensive than France's one. One is nuclear the other is """green""" Please add more logical fallacies