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Funny article in that it doesn't discuss lifecycle costs. A side-by-side comparison of the cost of grids powered by nuclear power plant relative to those power

Funny article in that it doesn't discuss lifecycle costs. A side-by-side comparison of the cost of grids powered by nuclear power plant relative to those powered by wind/solar/storage is what I'd expect to see from a 'paper of record' like the NYTimes. Except in some specific cases (Finland, other Arctic regions with long periods of low sunlight) I'm pretty sure this cost comparison comes down firmly on the side of wind/solar/storage. Storage is the main cost barrier for 100% renewable-powered grids, but this is also an area where technological development is possible. Much of the discussion of energy in the American media is pretty poor these days. For example, the solar tariff issue on China sourced PV - there are simply no US companies making panels of comparable quality (monocrystalline Si lasts longer and is more efficient). Concepts like requiring Chinese manufacturers to open factories in the USA if they want to sell in US markets would make sense but probably would violate some trade provision or other. Another factor that this article should have mentioned is the reliability of the global uranium ore -> fuel rods supply chain. Costs vary significantly based on the purity of the ore (18% is the top, 0.1% is the economically viable limit) and like oil, uranium ore is not globally distributed (unlike sunlight and wind). As far as Russia/Ukraine, the real agenda the US government seems to be pushing there is using that conflict to rapidly increase LNG exports to Europe from the US West/South coast, even though energy prices are spiking due to inflation (and plausibly due to exports of crude oil from the USA, allowed under that 2015 bill lifting that restriction). A far better plan for Europe would be to go 100% renewable asap, meaning no need for fossil fuel imports from any party. Yes, that's technologically possible, but would require massive economic investment.

nonethewiser 4y ago
Sunlight and wind distribution is quite uneven.
- adrianN 4y ago
  Uranium ore distribution is also quite uneven. Fossil fuel distribution is also quite uneven.
  - goneri 4y ago
    Thorium is an abundant alternative to uranium, and the technology to use it has existed since the 1960s.
    - adrianN 4y ago
      Thorium reactors never worked very well unfortunately.
      - JoeAltmaier 4y ago
        What? They worked reliably and efficiently, and cost very little.
        adrianN 4y ago
        Maybe I'm misinformed. Which Thorium reactors worked reliably and cheaply?
        nazgulnarsil 4y ago
        You're not misinformed. Commercial thorium doesn't exist and prototypes have issues with proliferation risks and the lifecycle of the materials used to build the primary containment. It is promising and there are several groups working on these problems but it's a hard sell given that recent gen uranium reactors aren't gated by fuel costs and have established supply chains.
        ncmncm 4y ago
        Indian Point tried thorium. They abandoned it, for reasons.
    - forgetfulness 4y ago
      I'm a layman so I'm trusting the smarty sounding guy on Reddit and his elaborate arguments, but it seems like Thorium reactors, while delivering on the promise of not being able to physically explode, involve materials so nightmarish to work with that it's been impossible to create one that's safe to operate by nuclear worksers https://np.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/9unimr/dutch_satirical_news_show_on_why_we_need_to_break/e95mvb7/?context=3 https://np.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/9unimr/dutch_satiric...
- pfdietz 4y ago
  Heavy industry is going to tend to move away from places with inadequate renewable energy. Why should they stay where energy is more expensive?
- goodpoint 4y ago
  ...and yet you'll find that there are very few people living in places with insufficient sun, insufficient wind and no geothermal/tidal sources.
philwelch 4y ago
> ... I'm pretty sure this cost comparison comes down firmly on the side of wind/solar/storage. Storage is the main cost barrier for 100% renewable-powered grids, but this is also an area where technological development is possible. Sure, if you handwave the unsolved-at-scale technical problems with grid energy storage and make a series of generous assumptions about future technology, that's probably true. Nuclear technology has been up to the task for the past fifty years. > Another factor that this article should have mentioned is the reliability of the global uranium ore -> fuel rods supply chain. Seawater extraction is an option if that's ever a real concern, as is using breeder reactors to reprocess spent fuel. And the exact same issues apply to storage.
- adrianN 4y ago
  How is energy storage at scale unsolved when we can synthesize Methane quite easily? Grid scale storage is just a matter of cost. It's unclear which technology will be the most cost effective, but if we wanted to we could just store energy as Methane and pay the 50% efficiency cost.
  - pdabbadabba 4y ago
    If this is so simple, why don't we do it? Or is that the question you're asking? Of course, that 50% efficiency cost seems like a bit of a bear in itself. If you lose half of the stored power, that would seem to significantly drive up the total lifecycle cost of a Watt of wind power. (Recognizing, of course, that not all of it must be stored.) The cost and inefficiency (==cost) of storage seems like an unfortunate thing to handwave away in a conversation about relative costs.
    - adrianN 4y ago
      No, it's obvious why we don't do it: it's fairly expensive and we currently don't have enough renewable supply to fill tanks with Methane. Grids can easily be 70+% renewable without any storage at all. Money is currently better spent increasing supply than building storage.
    - 4y ago
politician 4y ago
Is the environmentalist lobby ready to allow the amount of mining required to produce the copper, nickel, cobalt, and aluminum needed to support going "100% renewable asap"?
- atlasunshrugged 4y ago
  They are happy to support it when it is done outside their own country (speaking as an American)
  - politician 4y ago
    By the number of downvotes, I'm going to take away the idea that, no, the environmentalist lobby does not approve of the increases in mining required to support going 100% renewable ASAP.
    - ncmncm 4y ago
      You would have concluded that regardless. And, regardless of any other facts.
      - politician 4y ago
        It's an honest question, but I would challenge you to examine your response critically.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  The environmentalist lobby doesn't allow or forbid. It has overwhelmingly less power than is projected on it by nuke advocates. Nukes are losing wholly on their own. Aluminum is the most abundant metallic element on earth. Cobalt demand is already peaking. Copper and nickel have been produced in the millions of tons annually for a century, and will not slow down.
- pfdietz 4y ago
  Cobalt is used in certain vehicle batteries. Are you assuming nuclear isn't going to do this, say by putting a nuclear reactor in each car?
simion314 4y ago
>Except in some specific cases (Finland, other Arctic regions with long periods of low sunlight) I'm pretty sure this cost comparison comes down firmly on the side of wind/solar/storage. Storage is the main cost barrier for 100% renewable-powered grids, but this is also an area where technological development is possible. Why the progress is possible only for Solar and storage and in your opinion not possible for nuclear? Nuclear could be cheaper if people would not be paranoid about it. What I think could happen is this new smaller reactors could be deployed in countries more rational, irrational countries will have to buy energy from the others.
- AlanSE 4y ago
  Small reactors are not expected to be any cheaper than traditional reactors. They are a better bet right now because the traditional reactors keep getting mothballed in developed nations, and they have some clever technical innovations, but these are not complete game changers. Each decade, nuclear builds also trend towards getting more expensive. Like it or not, it at least partially Fukushima Daiichi that killed the nuclear expansion US. The AP1000 had new missile shield requirements that was slowing it down before that happened, and then the Japan accident added even more regulation. There was an anti-nuclear chair of the regulatory commission at the time, and yes, this is fundamentally political, but it's hard to push back on these specifics.
  - simion314 4y ago
    Countries will rational regulation will enjoy the nuclear progress, the others will buy from them or throw a lot of money on expensive batteries that will also cause problems with extraction, recycling, fires etc. My bet is US will use fosil fuel for a few decades still since is cheap.
    - ncmncm 4y ago
      Only a negligible fraction of storage will be batteries. They cost more. Only lithium, the most expensive, is fire-prone, among battery tech. The alternatives are cheaper and cause no such problems.
Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
> I'm pretty sure this cost comparison comes down firmly on the side of wind/solar/storage. Very unlikely. Nuclear costs are sky high only because in the last decades it was suppressed rather than invested in and improved. Had it seen the same level of support the wind and solar energy have, we'd have a dirt-cheap abundance of nuclear power, with very little carbon emissions. Take away the red tape and scaremongering, and wind/solar/storage combination will be left very far behind in costs and efficiency.
- colinmhayes 4y ago
  South Korea has been constantly building nuclear for decades. The price has come down marginally, renewables are still far cheaper. Yes, the problem is largely political, I don't see a solution to that though.
  - q1w2 4y ago
    This is like saying that the solution to climate change is largely political and you don't see that changing, so you don't think you need to be part of solving that. In fact, it's quite exactly like saying that, because nuclear is the fastest path to solving climate change.
    - ncmncm 4y ago
      No, nukes are the slowest, and worst performing. Starting a nuke, we get no power out for a decade or more, and get much less power at the end than building renewables with the same money, which furthermore start displacing carbon immediately.
      - Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
        You are missing the point. With continued investment and improvements to technology nuclear will be much cheaper and faster to deploy. Compare wind/solar prices from the year 2000, and imagine we've spent the last 22 years giving nuclear the same level of attention and promotion as them.
phil21 4y ago
The primary cost of nuclear is politically driven. I don't know if that matters in a world of actual energy scarcity, I guess we'll be finding out. If you remove liability and the insanity of our current methods of waste storage the costs become outright cheap, especially in an imagined future where there is massive investment into new nuclear infrastructure. By the metrics people use to judge nuclear, hydro would be the most expensive power source known to man if you were to build one today. Just the land costs would make the entire project nonsensical if viewed solely in that frame. Those are just artificial constructs though. In a world where there is actual human suffering (in the west) due to physical energy shortages the politics (and thus cost models) may shift rapidly.
- photochemsyn 4y ago
  When you say 'primary cost' do you mean construction cost? Again, utility managers will be looking at lifecycle costs, from the cradle (construction) through use (fueling, security, cooling water, maintenance) to the grave (decomissioning). The reason costs are high is not political, it's that the systems involved need to be over-engineered relative to say, a coal-fired power plant, where a breakdown or fire will create a big mess, but not a 100-year exclusion zone. Water pumps for nuclear reactor cooling systems, for example, are the most robustly engineered (and expensive) pumps ever built, as far as I know. For example, California's decision to close the San Onofre reactor was mostly related to maintenance costs, as their steam generator system was shaking itself to pieces and had to be shut down due to the radioactive loop leaking into the non-radioactive steam generation system. The rational conclusion is that long-term maintenance of nuclear reactors is an expensive proposition, due to catastrophic failure modes: https://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/san-onofre-bad-vibrations https://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/san-onof...
  - philwelch 4y ago
    > Water pumps for nuclear reactor cooling systems, for example, are the most robustly engineered (and expensive) pumps ever built, as far as I know. Which is not an issue with newer reactor designs, which are no less proven than grid storage.
fallingknife 4y ago
Everybody always says that solar + storage is cheaper. And sometimes there are even studies to support it. But if that's true where is it?
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  China mostly: 2021 figures: > China was the biggest contributor, adding 121 GW to the continent’s new capacity. Europe and North America—led by the USA—took second and third places respectively, with the former adding 39 GW, and the latter 38 GW. 81% of new electricity generaton build globally was renewables last year.
  - fallingknife 4y ago
    I don't dispute the economics of renewable generation on the existing grid. I'm talking about storage as replacement for baseload, which is purely hypothetical at this point. Right now we have very small scale storage as peaker capacity, but not as a baseload replacement.
    - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
      Storage doesn't replace baseload. Did the pumped hydro dams they built alongside nuclear power plants replace the baseload? No, they took the cheap energy that was produced at times when it wasn't needed and provided it back at peak times. They literally increased the base load by propping it up when it would otherwise droop at night (mostly).
      - ncmncm 4y ago
        Storage does, in fact, supply base load. That is its purpose.
        ZeroGravitas 4y ago
        Today, storage runs (i.e. supplies) when electricity prices peak, which broadly matches high demand. It charges, when electricity prices are low, which generally means off peak overnight. In a future renewable grid, with zero dispatchable power it might be used on occaision to help meet the baseload, but it's almost certainly going to be used more during demand peaks, because that's when most electricity is used. Maybe in equatorial regions with a lot of solar, not much wind and no other energy sources it'll share baseload duties with the solar that charges it during the day, but unless the term baseload has lost all meaning (which I fear it has) storage is not ever providing baseload, since that would imply supplying that amount constantly and storage needs to absorb more energy than it returns. I can't see a definition of 'baseload' provider that storage meets that solar doesn't for example.
CaptArmchair 4y ago
As far as life-cycle costs go: what about end of life? That's the big elephant in the room. Over the past decades, a couple of hundreds of plants have been build globally. Doing nuclear fission safely is a massively complex technological undertaking. While the basic principles are by and large the same, the concrete designs of each of those plants aren't similar. Therefor, decommissioning a nuclear plant is equally complex and expensive, and requires a per-case approach. And currently, there is a growing number of plants which are pretty much EOL, where upkeep costs outstrip revenue. Sure, there's an argument to be made about the operational costs per kWh between solar / wind / nuclear relative to the revenue they generate over their lifespan. But compared to solar / wind, the perceived economical benefits of those solutions are also offset by their initial cost of construction and their decommissioning. If consumers / voters / taxpayers assume that they get to enjoy cheap power while the costs of those won't ever land on their doorstep, they are in for a surprise.
- acidburnNSA 4y ago
  Nuclear plants pay a fraction of their revenue through their life into special decommissioning funds that have so far been more than enough to perform full greenfield decommissioning. For waste, there's a separate fund called the Nuclear Waste Fund in the US (and other nuclear-operating countries) that has a current balance of $55B.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    False. They are collecting from the fund, instead.
- q1w2 4y ago
  > Doing nuclear fission safely is a massively complex technological undertaking. Finland has proven this to be false. ...and frankly, so did the US even in the 1980s. The roadblock to storage misguided activism, not science or tachnology. Reopen the Yucca storage facility. It has the space for literally ALL the US's spent fuel storage.
  - 4y ago
MisterTea 4y ago
> A far better plan for Europe would be to go 100% renewable asap, Something I've been thinking about for a while: the best course of action to secure a nation is to build out renewables until the need for external fossil fuels is zero. Even if that means using renewables to make fossil fuels via a process like Fischer–Tropsch as a stop gap. I also think it would be advantageous to start thinking about how to drive the cost of generation and distribution down until electricity is free or nearly free. This might sound utopian but imagine how secure and prosperous a society could be if energy was super cheap or free? We are moving towards an electrified future and at some point we will have to heat homes and charge cars with electric that will place significant demand on an ageing grid.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  It will be cheaper to synthesize and burn ammonia or hydrogen. Which is, therefore, what will happen, anywhere it works at all. Freight shipping, first. Probably the last big holdout for hydrocarbons will be aviation, but anywhere LH2 airframes start to move in, the old stuff will be wholly unable to compete. Transitioning the whole fleet will take a long time, though.
- jokethrowaway 4y ago
  I don't think you understand the cost of implementing such a solution. "Free" (as in, your taxes) energy for all is very likely to entirely wreck the economy. Not to mention there are costs involved with maintenance which make that energy not free. Even ignoring the huge debt incurred by implementing such a solution, who will pay for the maintenance? Our taxes again? What are the benefits of not paying energy? What innovation is not happening because the pesky electricity has a cost? Most likely it would just become the country of choice to run computations (whether meaningful research or pointless crypto mining) - if we ignore the gargantuan tax rate this country will have. Being independent is valuable, that's why I think everybody should source their electricity independently (eg. solar)
tomp 4y ago
> A far better plan for Europe would be to go 100% renewable asap, meaning no need for fossil fuel imports from any party. “asap” LOL Here in the real world, we have Germany, which has the strongest pro-green anti-nuclear agenda in Europe, but is (1) building coal plants, (2) financing Russian war and (3) blocking sanctions on Russia to save its economy (along with Hungary who are doing it for political reasons). The green agenda is a massive failure in the real world. Maybe it will work in 50 years (when “possible technological development” in batteries catches up) but not right now.
- dane-pgp 4y ago
  > Germany ... is (1) building coal plants That claim may be a little out of date, especially as the new government plans to phase out coal by 2030. It's true that a new coal power plant was opened in 2020, but it was "expected to be the last"[0]. Admittedly, it's also true that the country is temporarily reactivating old coal power plants to reduce Russian gas imports.[1] [0] https://ifrf.net/combustion-industry-news/new-coal-power-plant-opens-in-germany-expected-to-be-the-last/ https://ifrf.net/combustion-industry-news/new-coal-power-pla... [1] https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy/news/germany-reactivates-coal-power-plants-amid-russian-gas-supply-threats/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy/news/germany-reactiv...
- pydry 4y ago
  Germany is not building more coal plants it it shutting them down.
  - elteto 4y ago
    What are they going to do then? Go back to candles?
    - pydry 4y ago
      I assume theyll continue to source power from the wind and the sun.
  - tomp 4y ago
schroeding 4y ago
> A far better plan for Europe would be to go 100% renewable asap, meaning no need for fossil fuel imports from any party. Yes, that's technologically possible, but would require massive economic investment. I agree, but: It's 100% impossible to replace the need for gas in the short timespan of five months until the next winter, no matter how much money or resources we throw at the problem. The absolute majority of heating is done with gas and major parts of the electrical grid depend on it. We cannot replace it with renewables in time. We need gas or people will freeze to death in the worst case, there are no alternatives to the LNG imports in the short-term, IMO. And the countries that can export LNG, including the US, are aware of their strong negotiating position and want long-term contracts. Europe may not have a choice. :/
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
01100011 4y ago
> A far better plan for Europe would be to go 100% renewable asap, How is this possible, technologically or economically? It sounds like absolute fantasy in anything less than a decade. > plausibly due to exports of crude oil from the USA Our refineries are at max capacity. How is hoarding crude going to help anything? Exporting crude allows foreign refineries to assist with relieving the global shortage of refined products.
- april_22 4y ago
  I also don't think that Europe will and can go 100% renewable within a decade, though the current development of breeder reactors seem promising. When the technology will be ready, it can scale (relatively) fast and help get us off coal and gas way faster than wind and energy could. https://you.com/search?q=Thorium%20breeder%20reactors https://you.com/search?q=Thorium%20breeder%20reactors
  - april_22 4y ago
    edit: wind and solar of course
hushpuppy 4y ago
> Funny article in that it doesn't discuss lifecycle costs. A side-by-side comparison of the cost of grids powered by nuclear power plant relative to those powered by wind/solar/storage is what I'd expect to see from a 'paper of record' like the NYTimes. If you eliminate gas and coal powered plants then the costs of nuclear plant lifecycle is incidental compared to economic losses that a country would encounter if they relied on solar and wind. The dirty secret about "clean energy" is that it isn't actually very clean. When you eliminate big coal plants and try to use solar or wind, what you are actually doing is moving your dependence from coal to natural gas. Those wind farms and solar farms require significant investment in numerous smaller style natural gas plants in order to function correctly. So, right now, when people think they are moving away from fossil fuels they are really just moving to natural gas that is supplanted by solar and wind when conditions are ideal for them to work properly. If you want to eliminate your dependence on natural gas, then, the only feasible option is nuclear.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  False.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- merb 4y ago
  > If you want to eliminate your dependence on natural gas, then, the only feasible option is nuclear. no. you need gas for nuclear AND renewables. it really does not matter. it's bullshit to argue against it unless you show the world a way to have an on/off button for a nuclear plant. (if you do, you might be very very very rich)
  - Krssst 4y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load-following_power_plant#Nuclear_power_plants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load-following_power_plant#Nuc...
ElectronCharge 4y ago
The problem with a cost comparison is that currently renewables account for less than ten percent of global energy generation. What do you think will happen to the cost there as available resources dwindle, and demand for equipment increases? Also, I’m not sure those comparisons take into account the ~20 year lifespan of solar panels and windmills, versus the ~40-50 year lifespan of nuclear plants. Finally, another factor that may drastically reduce the cost of nuclear is the fabrication of small modular reactors which eliminate custom construction/permitting and simplify installation.
- pfdietz 4y ago
  They'll build more factories to make the renewable equipment. What, you think there's some inherent limit on the number of factories that can be built?
  - xienze 4y ago
    > What, you think there's some inherent limit on the number of factories that can be built? No, but there are limits on the amount of raw materials that said factories can use to produce equipment.
    - pfdietz 4y ago
      Which raw material are you talking about? Be specific. I believe a global renewable energy system can be constructed using only elements available in essentially unlimited amounts, and using those elements at a modest scale compared to industrial society as a whole.
      - xienze 4y ago
        > Which raw material are you talking about? Be specific. Uh Lithium?
        pfdietz 4y ago
        It's as if you think Li-ion batteries are the only kind that can exist. This is a generic problem with anti-renewable arguments: they argue against specific technologies rather than the entire class of possible technologies. (And then they go and posit all sorts of as-yet unbuilt reactor types, blithely ignoring the irony.)
atleta 4y ago
The problem with comparing the cost of different energy production means is that most of these have huge externalities. After all, this is why we're still burning hydrocarbons, because they seem cheap compared to anything else, except that we have massed up a huge debt by accelerating climate change. Something that may turn out to be nearly infinitely expensive. Now the problem with solar and wind is that those also have pretty large energy investment needs at the beginning and given that we still mostly run on hydrocarbons these will also look cheap (include a sizeable amount of externalities). Other than that, you're right that these articles rarely mention the problem of the fissile uranium supply. From what I've read and heard, without breeder reactors, the known U235 reserves won't last long if we plan to switch the world over. (Not that it's a viable plan to build so many reactors in time.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_uranium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_uranium
Melatonic 4y ago
I think the thing I never hear people talk about however is redundancy and consistency. Wind and Solar are great and likely should be a huge huge portion of our power production. Something like Nuclear though we can project huge consistency (assuming the plant does not get destroyed by a giant natural disaster) long term and day to day. Personally though I really have always liked Geothermal!
- ncmncm 4y ago
  Nukes and geothermal both depend on steam turbines, which are down for very expensive maintenance 10-20% of the time. That is why those can't compete with 0% opex renewables + storage. Nukes, of course, have lots of other opex on top of the turbines, and also crippling capex. Geothermal might be able to compete at very high latitudes where the alternative is shipping in synthetic ammonia from the tropics when wind flags and transmission lines don't deliver. But steam turbine s are absolutely not getting any cheaper or more reliable.
_0w8t 4y ago
The gasoline prices in US have little to do with price of oil. In 2008 oil was 140 USD while gasoline was much cheaper. The real problem is underutilization of refineries . Some of them reduced output during Covid and was not able to restore production. Some where closed due to environmental regulations.
- themitigating 4y ago
  To add to your comment: "U.S. oil refiners’ margins smash records, but few plan to build more plants" https://www.marketplace.org/2022/05/23/u-s-oil-refiners-margins-smash-records-but-few-plan-to-build-more-plants/ https://www.marketplace.org/2022/05/23/u-s-oil-refiners-marg...
themitigating 4y ago
As far as Russia/Ukraine, the real agenda the US government seems to be pushing there is using that conflict to rapidly increase LNG exports to Europe from the US West/South coast, even though energy prices are spiking due to inflation (and plausibly due to exports of crude oil from the USA, allowed under that 2015 bill lifting that restriction)" How are they pushing this and you claim it's "the real agenda", what are they claiming instead? Are you claiming the US got involved with the Ukrainian conflict in order to sell LPG to other countries?
polote 4y ago
The problem with storage is that it needs to be planned for the worst case. Imagine three weeks without sun nor wind, even if that happens only once every 5 years it should be planned. And the cost of having batteries that can produce energy during 3 weeks is unlikely to be cheaper than nuclear
- ncmncm 4y ago
  No. You need only enough storage to last until an order of fuel arrives. Which is what everybody does literally all the time, now. There is little storage, yet, because it would be stupid to build out storage there is not enough renewable generating capacity, yet, to charge up. When there is, then storage will be built. All without you lifting a finger.
smohare 4y ago
You’re completely ignoring infrastructure. No serious debate of a green future precludes nuclear in the next 30–50 years.
- epistasis 4y ago
  But conversely, no serious debate about nuclear would include new nuclear within 20 years. There's no way that nuclear can scale and contribute in any meaningful way before then.
notabothonest 4y ago
> Except in some specific cases (Finland, other Arctic regions with long periods of low sunlight) I'm pretty sure this cost comparison comes down firmly on the side of wind/solar/storage. On what basis do you make this assertion? Because when it comes to renewables, I very rarely see any inclusion of the costs of additional large scale energy storage (probably because it still remains an unsolved issue) and I never see any inclusion of the cost of new transmission lines from any new renewables site. The Germans have invested billions upon billions in becoming wholly renewable, with miles of new grid infrastructure (but next to no energy storage) and they are still at the mercy of Russian gas supplies... and dependant upon French nuclear power. It's time to face reality and start investing in fission again, at least until fusion becomes a viable alternative.
- redisman 4y ago
  Controversial opinión: we should invest heavily into nuclear and renewables as they seem to synergize quite well
  - notabothonest 4y ago
    I agree we should invest in both. The issue comes when people think that renewables are a panacea, and we should start building renewables capacity where it doesn't even make sense. For example; wind power is great in and around the North Sea, but makes little sense in central and eastern Europe. Solar power is great in Spain, Portugal and Italy, but the ROI is very poor anywhere north of the Alps.
  - pfdietz 4y ago
    It's not a controversial opinion, it's an incorrect opinion. Nuclear and renewables (except for hydro) synergize poorly in most cases.
runlevel1 4y ago
Overview of the economics of a nuclear reactor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbeJIwF1pVY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbeJIwF1pVY Duration: 23 min Speaker: David Ruzic, Prof of Nuclear Engineering at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Jistern 4y ago
Paradigma11 4y ago
What I'd expect to see from wind/solar/storage proponents is studies/simulations how much of each you would need based on actual historical weather data. It should be possible to say, given that power grid and this amount of solar, wind..... this would have happened in this region during that year.
flocu 4y ago
Those comparisons have been done and they always end up with an energy mix between hydro, nuclear, solar and wind - not 100% wind/solar. It isn't enough to build solar and wind, you also have to build backup. This is currently done by coal and gas but in the future it has to switch to climate friendly sources of energy. A hydrogen economy is very very expensive. Here's an example: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2542435118303866 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S254243511...

nonethewiser 4y ago

Sunlight and wind distribution is quite uneven.

adrianN 4y ago
Uranium ore distribution is also quite uneven. Fossil fuel distribution is also quite uneven.
- goneri 4y ago
  Thorium is an abundant alternative to uranium, and the technology to use it has existed since the 1960s.
  - adrianN 4y ago
    Thorium reactors never worked very well unfortunately.
    - JoeAltmaier 4y ago
      What? They worked reliably and efficiently, and cost very little.
      - adrianN 4y ago
        Maybe I'm misinformed. Which Thorium reactors worked reliably and cheaply?
        nazgulnarsil 4y ago
        You're not misinformed. Commercial thorium doesn't exist and prototypes have issues with proliferation risks and the lifecycle of the materials used to build the primary containment. It is promising and there are several groups working on these problems but it's a hard sell given that recent gen uranium reactors aren't gated by fuel costs and have established supply chains.
        ncmncm 4y ago
        Indian Point tried thorium. They abandoned it, for reasons.
  - forgetfulness 4y ago
    I'm a layman so I'm trusting the smarty sounding guy on Reddit and his elaborate arguments, but it seems like Thorium reactors, while delivering on the promise of not being able to physically explode, involve materials so nightmarish to work with that it's been impossible to create one that's safe to operate by nuclear worksers https://np.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/9unimr/dutch_satirical_news_show_on_why_we_need_to_break/e95mvb7/?context=3 https://np.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/9unimr/dutch_satiric...
pfdietz 4y ago
Heavy industry is going to tend to move away from places with inadequate renewable energy. Why should they stay where energy is more expensive?
goodpoint 4y ago
...and yet you'll find that there are very few people living in places with insufficient sun, insufficient wind and no geothermal/tidal sources.

philwelch 4y ago

> ... I'm pretty sure this cost comparison comes down firmly on the side of wind/solar/storage. Storage is the main cost barrier for 100% renewable-powered grids, but this is also an area where technological development is possible. Sure, if you handwave the unsolved-at-scale technical problems with grid energy storage and make a series of generous assumptions about future technology, that's probably true. Nuclear technology has been up to the task for the past fifty years. > Another factor that this article should have mentioned is the reliability of the global uranium ore -> fuel rods supply chain. Seawater extraction is an option if that's ever a real concern, as is using breeder reactors to reprocess spent fuel. And the exact same issues apply to storage.

adrianN 4y ago
How is energy storage at scale unsolved when we can synthesize Methane quite easily? Grid scale storage is just a matter of cost. It's unclear which technology will be the most cost effective, but if we wanted to we could just store energy as Methane and pay the 50% efficiency cost.
- pdabbadabba 4y ago
  If this is so simple, why don't we do it? Or is that the question you're asking? Of course, that 50% efficiency cost seems like a bit of a bear in itself. If you lose half of the stored power, that would seem to significantly drive up the total lifecycle cost of a Watt of wind power. (Recognizing, of course, that not all of it must be stored.) The cost and inefficiency (==cost) of storage seems like an unfortunate thing to handwave away in a conversation about relative costs.
  - adrianN 4y ago
    No, it's obvious why we don't do it: it's fairly expensive and we currently don't have enough renewable supply to fill tanks with Methane. Grids can easily be 70+% renewable without any storage at all. Money is currently better spent increasing supply than building storage.
  - 4y ago

politician 4y ago

Is the environmentalist lobby ready to allow the amount of mining required to produce the copper, nickel, cobalt, and aluminum needed to support going "100% renewable asap"?

atlasunshrugged 4y ago
They are happy to support it when it is done outside their own country (speaking as an American)
- politician 4y ago
  By the number of downvotes, I'm going to take away the idea that, no, the environmentalist lobby does not approve of the increases in mining required to support going 100% renewable ASAP.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    You would have concluded that regardless. And, regardless of any other facts.
    - politician 4y ago
      It's an honest question, but I would challenge you to examine your response critically.
ncmncm 4y ago
The environmentalist lobby doesn't allow or forbid. It has overwhelmingly less power than is projected on it by nuke advocates. Nukes are losing wholly on their own. Aluminum is the most abundant metallic element on earth. Cobalt demand is already peaking. Copper and nickel have been produced in the millions of tons annually for a century, and will not slow down.
pfdietz 4y ago
Cobalt is used in certain vehicle batteries. Are you assuming nuclear isn't going to do this, say by putting a nuclear reactor in each car?

simion314 4y ago

>Except in some specific cases (Finland, other Arctic regions with long periods of low sunlight) I'm pretty sure this cost comparison comes down firmly on the side of wind/solar/storage. Storage is the main cost barrier for 100% renewable-powered grids, but this is also an area where technological development is possible. Why the progress is possible only for Solar and storage and in your opinion not possible for nuclear? Nuclear could be cheaper if people would not be paranoid about it. What I think could happen is this new smaller reactors could be deployed in countries more rational, irrational countries will have to buy energy from the others.

AlanSE 4y ago
Small reactors are not expected to be any cheaper than traditional reactors. They are a better bet right now because the traditional reactors keep getting mothballed in developed nations, and they have some clever technical innovations, but these are not complete game changers. Each decade, nuclear builds also trend towards getting more expensive. Like it or not, it at least partially Fukushima Daiichi that killed the nuclear expansion US. The AP1000 had new missile shield requirements that was slowing it down before that happened, and then the Japan accident added even more regulation. There was an anti-nuclear chair of the regulatory commission at the time, and yes, this is fundamentally political, but it's hard to push back on these specifics.
- simion314 4y ago
  Countries will rational regulation will enjoy the nuclear progress, the others will buy from them or throw a lot of money on expensive batteries that will also cause problems with extraction, recycling, fires etc. My bet is US will use fosil fuel for a few decades still since is cheap.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    Only a negligible fraction of storage will be batteries. They cost more. Only lithium, the most expensive, is fire-prone, among battery tech. The alternatives are cheaper and cause no such problems.

Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago

> I'm pretty sure this cost comparison comes down firmly on the side of wind/solar/storage. Very unlikely. Nuclear costs are sky high only because in the last decades it was suppressed rather than invested in and improved. Had it seen the same level of support the wind and solar energy have, we'd have a dirt-cheap abundance of nuclear power, with very little carbon emissions. Take away the red tape and scaremongering, and wind/solar/storage combination will be left very far behind in costs and efficiency.

colinmhayes 4y ago
South Korea has been constantly building nuclear for decades. The price has come down marginally, renewables are still far cheaper. Yes, the problem is largely political, I don't see a solution to that though.
- q1w2 4y ago
  This is like saying that the solution to climate change is largely political and you don't see that changing, so you don't think you need to be part of solving that. In fact, it's quite exactly like saying that, because nuclear is the fastest path to solving climate change.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    No, nukes are the slowest, and worst performing. Starting a nuke, we get no power out for a decade or more, and get much less power at the end than building renewables with the same money, which furthermore start displacing carbon immediately.
    - Andrew_nenakhov 4y ago
      You are missing the point. With continued investment and improvements to technology nuclear will be much cheaper and faster to deploy. Compare wind/solar prices from the year 2000, and imagine we've spent the last 22 years giving nuclear the same level of attention and promotion as them.

phil21 4y ago

The primary cost of nuclear is politically driven. I don't know if that matters in a world of actual energy scarcity, I guess we'll be finding out. If you remove liability and the insanity of our current methods of waste storage the costs become outright cheap, especially in an imagined future where there is massive investment into new nuclear infrastructure. By the metrics people use to judge nuclear, hydro would be the most expensive power source known to man if you were to build one today. Just the land costs would make the entire project nonsensical if viewed solely in that frame. Those are just artificial constructs though. In a world where there is actual human suffering (in the west) due to physical energy shortages the politics (and thus cost models) may shift rapidly.

photochemsyn 4y ago
When you say 'primary cost' do you mean construction cost? Again, utility managers will be looking at lifecycle costs, from the cradle (construction) through use (fueling, security, cooling water, maintenance) to the grave (decomissioning). The reason costs are high is not political, it's that the systems involved need to be over-engineered relative to say, a coal-fired power plant, where a breakdown or fire will create a big mess, but not a 100-year exclusion zone. Water pumps for nuclear reactor cooling systems, for example, are the most robustly engineered (and expensive) pumps ever built, as far as I know. For example, California's decision to close the San Onofre reactor was mostly related to maintenance costs, as their steam generator system was shaking itself to pieces and had to be shut down due to the radioactive loop leaking into the non-radioactive steam generation system. The rational conclusion is that long-term maintenance of nuclear reactors is an expensive proposition, due to catastrophic failure modes: https://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/san-onofre-bad-vibrations https://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/san-onof...
- philwelch 4y ago
  > Water pumps for nuclear reactor cooling systems, for example, are the most robustly engineered (and expensive) pumps ever built, as far as I know. Which is not an issue with newer reactor designs, which are no less proven than grid storage.

fallingknife 4y ago

Everybody always says that solar + storage is cheaper. And sometimes there are even studies to support it. But if that's true where is it?

ZeroGravitas 4y ago
China mostly: 2021 figures: > China was the biggest contributor, adding 121 GW to the continent’s new capacity. Europe and North America—led by the USA—took second and third places respectively, with the former adding 39 GW, and the latter 38 GW. 81% of new electricity generaton build globally was renewables last year.
- fallingknife 4y ago
  I don't dispute the economics of renewable generation on the existing grid. I'm talking about storage as replacement for baseload, which is purely hypothetical at this point. Right now we have very small scale storage as peaker capacity, but not as a baseload replacement.
  - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
    Storage doesn't replace baseload. Did the pumped hydro dams they built alongside nuclear power plants replace the baseload? No, they took the cheap energy that was produced at times when it wasn't needed and provided it back at peak times. They literally increased the base load by propping it up when it would otherwise droop at night (mostly).
    - ncmncm 4y ago
      Storage does, in fact, supply base load. That is its purpose.
      - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
        Today, storage runs (i.e. supplies) when electricity prices peak, which broadly matches high demand. It charges, when electricity prices are low, which generally means off peak overnight. In a future renewable grid, with zero dispatchable power it might be used on occaision to help meet the baseload, but it's almost certainly going to be used more during demand peaks, because that's when most electricity is used. Maybe in equatorial regions with a lot of solar, not much wind and no other energy sources it'll share baseload duties with the solar that charges it during the day, but unless the term baseload has lost all meaning (which I fear it has) storage is not ever providing baseload, since that would imply supplying that amount constantly and storage needs to absorb more energy than it returns. I can't see a definition of 'baseload' provider that storage meets that solar doesn't for example.

CaptArmchair 4y ago

As far as life-cycle costs go: what about end of life? That's the big elephant in the room. Over the past decades, a couple of hundreds of plants have been build globally. Doing nuclear fission safely is a massively complex technological undertaking. While the basic principles are by and large the same, the concrete designs of each of those plants aren't similar. Therefor, decommissioning a nuclear plant is equally complex and expensive, and requires a per-case approach. And currently, there is a growing number of plants which are pretty much EOL, where upkeep costs outstrip revenue. Sure, there's an argument to be made about the operational costs per kWh between solar / wind / nuclear relative to the revenue they generate over their lifespan. But compared to solar / wind, the perceived economical benefits of those solutions are also offset by their initial cost of construction and their decommissioning. If consumers / voters / taxpayers assume that they get to enjoy cheap power while the costs of those won't ever land on their doorstep, they are in for a surprise.

acidburnNSA 4y ago
Nuclear plants pay a fraction of their revenue through their life into special decommissioning funds that have so far been more than enough to perform full greenfield decommissioning. For waste, there's a separate fund called the Nuclear Waste Fund in the US (and other nuclear-operating countries) that has a current balance of $55B.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  False. They are collecting from the fund, instead.
q1w2 4y ago
> Doing nuclear fission safely is a massively complex technological undertaking. Finland has proven this to be false. ...and frankly, so did the US even in the 1980s. The roadblock to storage misguided activism, not science or tachnology. Reopen the Yucca storage facility. It has the space for literally ALL the US's spent fuel storage.
- 4y ago

MisterTea 4y ago

> A far better plan for Europe would be to go 100% renewable asap, Something I've been thinking about for a while: the best course of action to secure a nation is to build out renewables until the need for external fossil fuels is zero. Even if that means using renewables to make fossil fuels via a process like Fischer–Tropsch as a stop gap. I also think it would be advantageous to start thinking about how to drive the cost of generation and distribution down until electricity is free or nearly free. This might sound utopian but imagine how secure and prosperous a society could be if energy was super cheap or free? We are moving towards an electrified future and at some point we will have to heat homes and charge cars with electric that will place significant demand on an ageing grid.

ncmncm 4y ago
It will be cheaper to synthesize and burn ammonia or hydrogen. Which is, therefore, what will happen, anywhere it works at all. Freight shipping, first. Probably the last big holdout for hydrocarbons will be aviation, but anywhere LH2 airframes start to move in, the old stuff will be wholly unable to compete. Transitioning the whole fleet will take a long time, though.
jokethrowaway 4y ago
I don't think you understand the cost of implementing such a solution. "Free" (as in, your taxes) energy for all is very likely to entirely wreck the economy. Not to mention there are costs involved with maintenance which make that energy not free. Even ignoring the huge debt incurred by implementing such a solution, who will pay for the maintenance? Our taxes again? What are the benefits of not paying energy? What innovation is not happening because the pesky electricity has a cost? Most likely it would just become the country of choice to run computations (whether meaningful research or pointless crypto mining) - if we ignore the gargantuan tax rate this country will have. Being independent is valuable, that's why I think everybody should source their electricity independently (eg. solar)

tomp 4y ago

> A far better plan for Europe would be to go 100% renewable asap, meaning no need for fossil fuel imports from any party. “asap” LOL Here in the real world, we have Germany, which has the strongest pro-green anti-nuclear agenda in Europe, but is (1) building coal plants, (2) financing Russian war and (3) blocking sanctions on Russia to save its economy (along with Hungary who are doing it for political reasons). The green agenda is a massive failure in the real world. Maybe it will work in 50 years (when “possible technological development” in batteries catches up) but not right now.

dane-pgp 4y ago
> Germany ... is (1) building coal plants That claim may be a little out of date, especially as the new government plans to phase out coal by 2030. It's true that a new coal power plant was opened in 2020, but it was "expected to be the last"[0]. Admittedly, it's also true that the country is temporarily reactivating old coal power plants to reduce Russian gas imports.[1] [0] https://ifrf.net/combustion-industry-news/new-coal-power-plant-opens-in-germany-expected-to-be-the-last/ https://ifrf.net/combustion-industry-news/new-coal-power-pla... [1] https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy/news/germany-reactivates-coal-power-plants-amid-russian-gas-supply-threats/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy/news/germany-reactiv...
pydry 4y ago
Germany is not building more coal plants it it shutting them down.
- elteto 4y ago
  What are they going to do then? Go back to candles?
  - pydry 4y ago
    I assume theyll continue to source power from the wind and the sun.
- tomp 4y ago

schroeding 4y ago

> A far better plan for Europe would be to go 100% renewable asap, meaning no need for fossil fuel imports from any party. Yes, that's technologically possible, but would require massive economic investment. I agree, but: It's 100% impossible to replace the need for gas in the short timespan of five months until the next winter, no matter how much money or resources we throw at the problem. The absolute majority of heating is done with gas and major parts of the electrical grid depend on it. We cannot replace it with renewables in time. We need gas or people will freeze to death in the worst case, there are no alternatives to the LNG imports in the short-term, IMO. And the countries that can export LNG, including the US, are aware of their strong negotiating position and want long-term contracts. Europe may not have a choice. :/

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

01100011 4y ago

> A far better plan for Europe would be to go 100% renewable asap, How is this possible, technologically or economically? It sounds like absolute fantasy in anything less than a decade. > plausibly due to exports of crude oil from the USA Our refineries are at max capacity. How is hoarding crude going to help anything? Exporting crude allows foreign refineries to assist with relieving the global shortage of refined products.

april_22 4y ago
I also don't think that Europe will and can go 100% renewable within a decade, though the current development of breeder reactors seem promising. When the technology will be ready, it can scale (relatively) fast and help get us off coal and gas way faster than wind and energy could. https://you.com/search?q=Thorium%20breeder%20reactors https://you.com/search?q=Thorium%20breeder%20reactors
- april_22 4y ago
  edit: wind and solar of course

hushpuppy 4y ago

> Funny article in that it doesn't discuss lifecycle costs. A side-by-side comparison of the cost of grids powered by nuclear power plant relative to those powered by wind/solar/storage is what I'd expect to see from a 'paper of record' like the NYTimes. If you eliminate gas and coal powered plants then the costs of nuclear plant lifecycle is incidental compared to economic losses that a country would encounter if they relied on solar and wind. The dirty secret about "clean energy" is that it isn't actually very clean. When you eliminate big coal plants and try to use solar or wind, what you are actually doing is moving your dependence from coal to natural gas. Those wind farms and solar farms require significant investment in numerous smaller style natural gas plants in order to function correctly. So, right now, when people think they are moving away from fossil fuels they are really just moving to natural gas that is supplanted by solar and wind when conditions are ideal for them to work properly. If you want to eliminate your dependence on natural gas, then, the only feasible option is nuclear.

ncmncm 4y ago
False.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
merb 4y ago
> If you want to eliminate your dependence on natural gas, then, the only feasible option is nuclear. no. you need gas for nuclear AND renewables. it really does not matter. it's bullshit to argue against it unless you show the world a way to have an on/off button for a nuclear plant. (if you do, you might be very very very rich)
- Krssst 4y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load-following_power_plant#Nuclear_power_plants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load-following_power_plant#Nuc...

ElectronCharge 4y ago

The problem with a cost comparison is that currently renewables account for less than ten percent of global energy generation. What do you think will happen to the cost there as available resources dwindle, and demand for equipment increases? Also, I’m not sure those comparisons take into account the ~20 year lifespan of solar panels and windmills, versus the ~40-50 year lifespan of nuclear plants. Finally, another factor that may drastically reduce the cost of nuclear is the fabrication of small modular reactors which eliminate custom construction/permitting and simplify installation.

pfdietz 4y ago
They'll build more factories to make the renewable equipment. What, you think there's some inherent limit on the number of factories that can be built?
- xienze 4y ago
  > What, you think there's some inherent limit on the number of factories that can be built? No, but there are limits on the amount of raw materials that said factories can use to produce equipment.
  - pfdietz 4y ago
    Which raw material are you talking about? Be specific. I believe a global renewable energy system can be constructed using only elements available in essentially unlimited amounts, and using those elements at a modest scale compared to industrial society as a whole.
    - xienze 4y ago
      > Which raw material are you talking about? Be specific. Uh Lithium?
      - pfdietz 4y ago
        It's as if you think Li-ion batteries are the only kind that can exist. This is a generic problem with anti-renewable arguments: they argue against specific technologies rather than the entire class of possible technologies. (And then they go and posit all sorts of as-yet unbuilt reactor types, blithely ignoring the irony.)

atleta 4y ago

The problem with comparing the cost of different energy production means is that most of these have huge externalities. After all, this is why we're still burning hydrocarbons, because they seem cheap compared to anything else, except that we have massed up a huge debt by accelerating climate change. Something that may turn out to be nearly infinitely expensive. Now the problem with solar and wind is that those also have pretty large energy investment needs at the beginning and given that we still mostly run on hydrocarbons these will also look cheap (include a sizeable amount of externalities). Other than that, you're right that these articles rarely mention the problem of the fissile uranium supply. From what I've read and heard, without breeder reactors, the known U235 reserves won't last long if we plan to switch the world over. (Not that it's a viable plan to build so many reactors in time.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_uranium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_uranium

Melatonic 4y ago

I think the thing I never hear people talk about however is redundancy and consistency. Wind and Solar are great and likely should be a huge huge portion of our power production. Something like Nuclear though we can project huge consistency (assuming the plant does not get destroyed by a giant natural disaster) long term and day to day. Personally though I really have always liked Geothermal!

ncmncm 4y ago
Nukes and geothermal both depend on steam turbines, which are down for very expensive maintenance 10-20% of the time. That is why those can't compete with 0% opex renewables + storage. Nukes, of course, have lots of other opex on top of the turbines, and also crippling capex. Geothermal might be able to compete at very high latitudes where the alternative is shipping in synthetic ammonia from the tropics when wind flags and transmission lines don't deliver. But steam turbine s are absolutely not getting any cheaper or more reliable.

_0w8t 4y ago

The gasoline prices in US have little to do with price of oil. In 2008 oil was 140 USD while gasoline was much cheaper. The real problem is underutilization of refineries . Some of them reduced output during Covid and was not able to restore production. Some where closed due to environmental regulations.

themitigating 4y ago
To add to your comment: "U.S. oil refiners’ margins smash records, but few plan to build more plants" https://www.marketplace.org/2022/05/23/u-s-oil-refiners-margins-smash-records-but-few-plan-to-build-more-plants/ https://www.marketplace.org/2022/05/23/u-s-oil-refiners-marg...

themitigating 4y ago

As far as Russia/Ukraine, the real agenda the US government seems to be pushing there is using that conflict to rapidly increase LNG exports to Europe from the US West/South coast, even though energy prices are spiking due to inflation (and plausibly due to exports of crude oil from the USA, allowed under that 2015 bill lifting that restriction)" How are they pushing this and you claim it's "the real agenda", what are they claiming instead? Are you claiming the US got involved with the Ukrainian conflict in order to sell LPG to other countries?

polote 4y ago

The problem with storage is that it needs to be planned for the worst case. Imagine three weeks without sun nor wind, even if that happens only once every 5 years it should be planned. And the cost of having batteries that can produce energy during 3 weeks is unlikely to be cheaper than nuclear

ncmncm 4y ago
No. You need only enough storage to last until an order of fuel arrives. Which is what everybody does literally all the time, now. There is little storage, yet, because it would be stupid to build out storage there is not enough renewable generating capacity, yet, to charge up. When there is, then storage will be built. All without you lifting a finger.

smohare 4y ago

You’re completely ignoring infrastructure. No serious debate of a green future precludes nuclear in the next 30–50 years.

epistasis 4y ago
But conversely, no serious debate about nuclear would include new nuclear within 20 years. There's no way that nuclear can scale and contribute in any meaningful way before then.

notabothonest 4y ago

> Except in some specific cases (Finland, other Arctic regions with long periods of low sunlight) I'm pretty sure this cost comparison comes down firmly on the side of wind/solar/storage. On what basis do you make this assertion? Because when it comes to renewables, I very rarely see any inclusion of the costs of additional large scale energy storage (probably because it still remains an unsolved issue) and I never see any inclusion of the cost of new transmission lines from any new renewables site. The Germans have invested billions upon billions in becoming wholly renewable, with miles of new grid infrastructure (but next to no energy storage) and they are still at the mercy of Russian gas supplies... and dependant upon French nuclear power. It's time to face reality and start investing in fission again, at least until fusion becomes a viable alternative.

redisman 4y ago
Controversial opinión: we should invest heavily into nuclear and renewables as they seem to synergize quite well
- notabothonest 4y ago
  I agree we should invest in both. The issue comes when people think that renewables are a panacea, and we should start building renewables capacity where it doesn't even make sense. For example; wind power is great in and around the North Sea, but makes little sense in central and eastern Europe. Solar power is great in Spain, Portugal and Italy, but the ROI is very poor anywhere north of the Alps.
- pfdietz 4y ago
  It's not a controversial opinion, it's an incorrect opinion. Nuclear and renewables (except for hydro) synergize poorly in most cases.

runlevel1 4y ago

Overview of the economics of a nuclear reactor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbeJIwF1pVY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbeJIwF1pVY Duration: 23 min Speaker: David Ruzic, Prof of Nuclear Engineering at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Jistern 4y ago

Paradigma11 4y ago

What I'd expect to see from wind/solar/storage proponents is studies/simulations how much of each you would need based on actual historical weather data. It should be possible to say, given that power grid and this amount of solar, wind..... this would have happened in this region during that year.

flocu 4y ago

Those comparisons have been done and they always end up with an energy mix between hydro, nuclear, solar and wind - not 100% wind/solar. It isn't enough to build solar and wind, you also have to build backup. This is currently done by coal and gas but in the future it has to switch to climate friendly sources of energy. A hydrogen economy is very very expensive. Here's an example: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2542435118303866 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S254243511...