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> Nuclear is a more expensive sources of energy than our alternatives Not in the very long term. Upfront it's really expensive yeah. >(uranium ore is a small

> Nuclear is a more expensive sources of energy than our alternatives Not in the very long term. Upfront it's really expensive yeah. >(uranium ore is a small proportion of the cost stack, and Australia would still need to import nuclear fuel) A very small portion and isn't Australia a big exporter? Might as well set up refinement capabilities. >with very high levels of variable renewable energy where they have to be economically curtailed on an almost daily basis (our coal plants are all closing for this reason) I went to check gov sources and it still seems to be mainly fossil fuels tho renewables are growing. What will be kept as backup for days with little production btw? Here our greens are pushing for gas.

flgb 4y ago
> What will be kept as backup for days with little production btw? Australia is different to Germany. We get high solar output every day, even in winter, and while we do get some wind droughts, they are less long and widespread than in Europe. We don't need to 'back up' anything close to 100% of our renewable capacity, and we don't need 'back up' for very long durations.
- modo_mario 4y ago
  > We get high solar output every day, even in winter Doesn't electricity usage vary quite a lot throughout the day? Especially in the evening.
mrep 4y ago
You can make gas with electricity [0], it does not have to come from the ground. Here in the states nuclear is now about 3x as expensive as wind/solar [1]! And to make matters even worse, you generally want to run nuclear at 100% all the time because of the high initial costs but summer peaks can be twice winter lows which means you would need to have a ton capacity that hardly ever gets used whereas gas is by far the cheapest option for handling variable demand. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power-to-gas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power-to-gas [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source#...
- modo_mario 4y ago
  >You can make gas with electricity [0] And it is still extremely inefficient to my knowledge with some roadblocks towards improvement that are hard to overcome. Hydropump storage doesn't seem grand from an intuitive perspective but probably ends up doing better. >Here in the states nuclear is now about 3x as expensive as wind/solar Now spread that costs over a proper lifetime, calculate in the costs of storage and/or variable demand backup and the adjusted distribution infrastructure and don't ban things like fuel reuse technology to reduce waste at the behest of fossil fuel industry and it looks a lot better. https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/image/png/2020-12/lco_by_technology_egc_2020_2020-12-07_12-10-45_613.png https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/image/png/2020-12/lco_b... >but summer peaks can be twice winter lows Is this in Arizona and the likes? I feel like America really need to get it's head out of it's ass and dis-incentivise living in deserts with water problems to boot as well as some other common sense things. The CO2 output per capita being twice that of the EU and a bunch of other countries and that after a whole lot of improvement on the US front makes it clear this is not just a developed world thing but rather that some core issues are not being looked at. >whereas gas is by far the cheapest option for handling variable demand. And a fossil fuel with a climate change impact much much higher than most people expect.
  - mrep 4y ago
    > Now spread that costs over a proper lifetime, calculate in the costs of storage and/or variable demand backup and the adjusted distribution infrastructure and don't ban things like fuel reuse technology to reduce waste at the behest of fossil fuel industry and it looks a lot better. The link I posted is from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) published the Annual Energy Outlook (AEO) which uses LCOE. It doesn't include hydrogen/methane storage but we are talking 3 times the cost which leaves a lot of room to come out ahead. > Is this in Arizona and the likes? I feel like America really need to get it's head out of it's ass and dis-incentivise living in deserts with water problems to boot as well as some other common sense things. The CO2 output per capita being twice that of the EU and a bunch of other countries and that after a whole lot of improvement on the US front makes it clear this is not just a developed world thing but rather that some core issues are not being looked at. Um, like almost everywhere? Honestly, west coast places like SF/LA are pretty unique in not having as much variable temperatures. We definitely get heat waves here in the midwest and it is definitely not a desert. And now that I think about it, if we are truly to decarbonize that includes heating and heat waves [0] would be childs play compared to polar vortexes [1]. Good luck building enough spare nuclear to heat the entire continent by 40-90 degrees. [0]: https://cw39.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/NATL-HIGHS-TODAY-1.png https://cw39.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/NATL-HI... [1]: https://mashable.com/article/polar-vortex-2021-cold-temperatures https://mashable.com/article/polar-vortex-2021-cold-temperat...

flgb 4y ago

> What will be kept as backup for days with little production btw? Australia is different to Germany. We get high solar output every day, even in winter, and while we do get some wind droughts, they are less long and widespread than in Europe. We don't need to 'back up' anything close to 100% of our renewable capacity, and we don't need 'back up' for very long durations.

modo_mario 4y ago
> We get high solar output every day, even in winter Doesn't electricity usage vary quite a lot throughout the day? Especially in the evening.

mrep 4y ago

You can make gas with electricity [0], it does not have to come from the ground. Here in the states nuclear is now about 3x as expensive as wind/solar [1]! And to make matters even worse, you generally want to run nuclear at 100% all the time because of the high initial costs but summer peaks can be twice winter lows which means you would need to have a ton capacity that hardly ever gets used whereas gas is by far the cheapest option for handling variable demand. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power-to-gas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power-to-gas [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_electricity_by_source#...

modo_mario 4y ago
>You can make gas with electricity [0] And it is still extremely inefficient to my knowledge with some roadblocks towards improvement that are hard to overcome. Hydropump storage doesn't seem grand from an intuitive perspective but probably ends up doing better. >Here in the states nuclear is now about 3x as expensive as wind/solar Now spread that costs over a proper lifetime, calculate in the costs of storage and/or variable demand backup and the adjusted distribution infrastructure and don't ban things like fuel reuse technology to reduce waste at the behest of fossil fuel industry and it looks a lot better. https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/image/png/2020-12/lco_by_technology_egc_2020_2020-12-07_12-10-45_613.png https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/image/png/2020-12/lco_b... >but summer peaks can be twice winter lows Is this in Arizona and the likes? I feel like America really need to get it's head out of it's ass and dis-incentivise living in deserts with water problems to boot as well as some other common sense things. The CO2 output per capita being twice that of the EU and a bunch of other countries and that after a whole lot of improvement on the US front makes it clear this is not just a developed world thing but rather that some core issues are not being looked at. >whereas gas is by far the cheapest option for handling variable demand. And a fossil fuel with a climate change impact much much higher than most people expect.
- mrep 4y ago
  > Now spread that costs over a proper lifetime, calculate in the costs of storage and/or variable demand backup and the adjusted distribution infrastructure and don't ban things like fuel reuse technology to reduce waste at the behest of fossil fuel industry and it looks a lot better. The link I posted is from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) published the Annual Energy Outlook (AEO) which uses LCOE. It doesn't include hydrogen/methane storage but we are talking 3 times the cost which leaves a lot of room to come out ahead. > Is this in Arizona and the likes? I feel like America really need to get it's head out of it's ass and dis-incentivise living in deserts with water problems to boot as well as some other common sense things. The CO2 output per capita being twice that of the EU and a bunch of other countries and that after a whole lot of improvement on the US front makes it clear this is not just a developed world thing but rather that some core issues are not being looked at. Um, like almost everywhere? Honestly, west coast places like SF/LA are pretty unique in not having as much variable temperatures. We definitely get heat waves here in the midwest and it is definitely not a desert. And now that I think about it, if we are truly to decarbonize that includes heating and heat waves [0] would be childs play compared to polar vortexes [1]. Good luck building enough spare nuclear to heat the entire continent by 40-90 degrees. [0]: https://cw39.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/NATL-HIGHS-TODAY-1.png https://cw39.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/06/NATL-HI... [1]: https://mashable.com/article/polar-vortex-2021-cold-temperatures https://mashable.com/article/polar-vortex-2021-cold-temperat...