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Storage, transmission lines, and over provisioning are also alternatives. Still blows my mind that Germany and other countries are closing nuclear facilities t

by wffurr 5y ago

Storage, transmission lines, and over provisioning are also alternatives. Still blows my mind that Germany and other countries are closing nuclear facilities though.

chmod775 5y ago
> Still blows my mind that Germany and other countries are closing nuclear facilities though. That's kind of a misconception. Germany isn't (and wasn't) closing any nuclear plants that weren't about to closed anyways - it was all old plants. What Germany did was not bringing online new ones and instead choosing to invest that money elsewhere.
- HyperRational 5y ago
- wffurr 5y ago
  That's one way to spin choosing not to extend the operating licenses of existing plants operating safely.
- tempnow987 5y ago
  Haha. For those not following this post Fukushima germany basically cancelled / shortened the permits for a bunch of plants. This had nothing to do with plants being in such bad condition they would have closed anyways, that's a total lie in almost all cases. Germany is shutting down pretty nice later gen plants commissioned in 1989. The US is still operating much older designs commissioned in 1969 (20 years older).
- aktenlage 5y ago
  Do you have sources? If I remember correctly the closing of nuclear facilities (that weren't about to be closed anyways) was decided in the beginning of the century, when the green party was in the government the last time. Then a Merkel-led government dropped that decision. Then the Fukushima catastrophe happened and Merkel reinstated the exit from nuclear power. What blows my mind is that by using nuclear power and creating nuclear waste for a few decades, society created a problem that coming generations have to take care of for millenia.
tempnow987 5y ago
Angela Merkal called this a destruction of national property, and they (CDU) extended life of plants 8-14 years. There were 17 plants at the time. Total production that has been shutdown (baseload power) is around 19,689MW now post fukushima. They've been able to replace maybe 4MW's with solar at this point? It's kind of mind boggling how much was shut down - the problem this has caused for electrification in germany is significant as now german electric prices are actually very high not low. Annual contracts for electricity are running 46 cents / kwH which is CRAZY if you want to electrify your country. France which is right next door, has much more annoying labor laws / high cost of labor is perhaps half that price.
- orwin 5y ago
  it was 21cts/kwH last year (but sold 18cts to EDF own competitors, the liberalizations laws in europe make no sense) so i guess less than half that price.
  - tempnow987 5y ago
    My pricing was in US Dollars, so the french cost (if in euros) would be 24 cents or so. Still an amazing difference.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  > They've been able to replace maybe 4MW's with solar at this point? Germany has 5.3 GW of installed solar, how can you be off by a factor of 1200?
  - tempnow987 5y ago
    Sorry - yes, should be 5,800MW. They produced 51Twh/365/24 = 5.8GW in avg delivery. Nuclear generated it's power around the clock. I'm not sure solar is covering the evening peaks and the prices for electricity make going to things like heat pumps and electric dryers much more expensive than you'd expect in germany so the economic case for electrification in germany has started to run way way behind the case in other places that have kept nuclear in the mix.

by wffurr 5y ago

Storage, transmission lines, and over provisioning are also alternatives. Still blows my mind that Germany and other countries are closing nuclear facilities though.

chmod775 5y ago

> Still blows my mind that Germany and other countries are closing nuclear facilities though. That's kind of a misconception. Germany isn't (and wasn't) closing any nuclear plants that weren't about to closed anyways - it was all old plants. What Germany did was not bringing online new ones and instead choosing to invest that money elsewhere.

HyperRational 5y ago
wffurr 5y ago
That's one way to spin choosing not to extend the operating licenses of existing plants operating safely.
tempnow987 5y ago
Haha. For those not following this post Fukushima germany basically cancelled / shortened the permits for a bunch of plants. This had nothing to do with plants being in such bad condition they would have closed anyways, that's a total lie in almost all cases. Germany is shutting down pretty nice later gen plants commissioned in 1989. The US is still operating much older designs commissioned in 1969 (20 years older).
aktenlage 5y ago
Do you have sources? If I remember correctly the closing of nuclear facilities (that weren't about to be closed anyways) was decided in the beginning of the century, when the green party was in the government the last time. Then a Merkel-led government dropped that decision. Then the Fukushima catastrophe happened and Merkel reinstated the exit from nuclear power. What blows my mind is that by using nuclear power and creating nuclear waste for a few decades, society created a problem that coming generations have to take care of for millenia.

tempnow987 5y ago

Angela Merkal called this a destruction of national property, and they (CDU) extended life of plants 8-14 years. There were 17 plants at the time. Total production that has been shutdown (baseload power) is around 19,689MW now post fukushima. They've been able to replace maybe 4MW's with solar at this point? It's kind of mind boggling how much was shut down - the problem this has caused for electrification in germany is significant as now german electric prices are actually very high not low. Annual contracts for electricity are running 46 cents / kwH which is CRAZY if you want to electrify your country. France which is right next door, has much more annoying labor laws / high cost of labor is perhaps half that price.

orwin 5y ago
it was 21cts/kwH last year (but sold 18cts to EDF own competitors, the liberalizations laws in europe make no sense) so i guess less than half that price.
- tempnow987 5y ago
  My pricing was in US Dollars, so the french cost (if in euros) would be 24 cents or so. Still an amazing difference.
jacquesm 5y ago
> They've been able to replace maybe 4MW's with solar at this point? Germany has 5.3 GW of installed solar, how can you be off by a factor of 1200?
- tempnow987 5y ago
  Sorry - yes, should be 5,800MW. They produced 51Twh/365/24 = 5.8GW in avg delivery. Nuclear generated it's power around the clock. I'm not sure solar is covering the evening peaks and the prices for electricity make going to things like heat pumps and electric dryers much more expensive than you'd expect in germany so the economic case for electrification in germany has started to run way way behind the case in other places that have kept nuclear in the mix.