6 ms·

Except it’s not remotely cheap. Guaranteeing rates on new build nuclear is like 6x more expensive than wind resources and at least 4x higher than say combined c

Except it’s not remotely cheap. Guaranteeing rates on new build nuclear is like 6x more expensive than wind resources and at least 4x higher than say combined cycle natural gas. If the new reactor at Hinkley is ever completed, it’s going to cost over $0.15/kWh wholesale which is more than I’m paying retail at the moment.

tcoff91 4y ago
Man I’m paying 0.33 to $0.52 per kWh. I’d love to pay 0.15
- GoOnThenDoTell 4y ago
  I think my generator in santa clara charges something like 15c (flat) before distribution, which gets to 31c/41c/49cents depending on usage level. Nuclear seems like a normal price for the bay area
  - zbrozek 4y ago
    That sounds like PG&E pricing, not SVP pricing. Anybody on PG&E should have solar panels. Hang them off your balcony if you have to. The electricity rates are astronomical. http://zlnp.net/serve/pge_rates/pge-electric-rates.png http://zlnp.net/serve/pge_rates/pge-electric-rates.png
    - hedora 4y ago
      Also, demand California implement community net metering (allowing you to buy a percentage ownership of panels in a nearby parking lot, etc, and applying their generation to your power bill.)
- mikeyouse 4y ago
  In honesty, I was being modest with my "under $0.15/KWh" -- it's actually fixed price at $0.114/KWh. So I can run my heat pump to cool my house, my heat pump to warm my pool, and my electric car charger at 1pm on July 4th and still pay $0.114. It's a really great deal from a well-run local power company in the Midwest US. There is a fair amount of coal in the mix still (about 1/3 of summer generating capacity) which is being phased out over the next few years so we'll see what happens to rates.
JanSt 4y ago
In Germany we have massive wind and solar capacity (120GW) and phased out nuclear. Energy prices have constantly risen to above 35c/kwh and our dependeny on gas grew. At the moment it‘s above 55c/kwh for new contracts. We still have very dirty electricity because so much coal and gas have to be burned
- adrianN 4y ago
  It would of course have been better for the climate to turn off the coal plants first, but it's fallacious to judge the cost of different electricity sources by the retail price of electricity.
- olau 4y ago
  No, the wind and solar capacity is not massive, in fact it is far too small. If it were much bigger, you would have much lower prices. Electricity in Europe is expensive at the moment because of fuel prices. Also, I don't have the numbers nearby, but I believe gas is mostly used for heating in Germany. Your heating system is outdated - you just didn't care because of the cheap gas from the east. Stop blaming the technologies that can actually fix this.
  - zaarn 4y ago
    The Schröder Government pushed for massive reforms to install Gas heating in homes. At the time this was more efficient than nighttime electric boiler heating, wood heaters or oil boilers. A modern caloric gas oven is fairly efficient overall. Of course, one most realize that Schröder left the office having signed Nord Stream I only days prior and then immediately proceeded to join the Gazprom Board of Directors as well as serving as Director for the Nord Stream I Ltd. company and later Nord Stream II Ltd. That might be a minor case of corruption, possibly. Who knows, courts haven't decided yet. The Merkel cabinet I-IV never really pushed to change it, since gas was working fine for the status quo.
  - u320 4y ago
    Gas is used to cover for wind and solar when that is not delivering. You cannot replace that by more wind and solar.
adastra22 4y ago
1. Most of that cost is an apples to oranges comparison as the nuclear plants are required to fully fund decommissioning upfront, whereas dismantling a wind farm (even if just turbine by turbine as they break down) isn’t priced into that alternative. apples-to-apples it’s not that much more expensive upfront cost, and significantly cheaper over 50+ years of operation. 2. Most of the real costs that exist for nuclear are construction. Repurposing coal plants saves a good chunk of that.
- adrianN 4y ago
  Dismantling a couple hundred wind turbines seems like a significantly easier job than dismantling a nuclear power plant. You also don't need state-funded insurance against catastrophic failure for wind turbines. Normal insurance can be bought.
  - Huh1337 4y ago
    You decommission a nuclear plant only once, after 60-100 years of operation (or even later). You need to replace the wind turbine blades every 15-25 years - the blades could literally fly apart if you didn't. And there's no good way to recycle them, so it goes into landfill. Not great.
    - Reason077 4y ago
      Not many nuclear plants last for 60-100 years. Most existing ones have an operational life of about 40 years. Those that run longer have invariably received an extensive (and expensive) mid-life refurbishment. Then they are left in a shutdown, de-fuelled state (safe storage) for 60 years or so before they can be safely dismantled. This whole process is very expensive, in part because you have to pay to manage and maintain the site for such a long time. Decommissioning all the UK’s existing civil nuclear sites is estimated to cost taxpayers over £132bn, and the work will not be complete for 120 years.
      - Huh1337 4y ago
        Sure, refurbishment is necessary - my country just went through the process after 35 years of operation of the oldest reactors, now it's certified for 50 years more and another refurbishment is expected after that - not decommissioning. It wasn't that bad. We pay more for maintenance of the little wind power we have (less than 15% of our energy production on windy days) than we pay for nuclear reactor refurbishment (>30% of our baseload, works all day and night, all year).
danw1979 4y ago
Yup but you won’t be paying less than £0.30/kWh flat-rate pretty soon. Hinkley is stupidly expensive and I doubt the capacity factor will turn out any better than wind and batteries, but I still think we should build a few more nuclear power stations - the public will turn hard against renewables at the first sniff of power outages being caused because the wind wasn’t blowing, and we’re less likely to run into that with some nuclear baseload in the mix.
- adrianN 4y ago
  How? Economics strongly suggest to run nuclear plants at maximum output whenever you can. So you wouldn't be able to use them as backups when there is a lack of wind power.
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  Using that money to build more wind and supporting infrastructure would make it much less likely. People don't talk about it much, but CfD has killed nuclear. It lays the long term costs and risks bare. Hinckley is going to overrun it's already high cost, and France will be left picking up the tab for any cost overruns. I wonder if their contract lets them just build the equivalent wind power to save money? Or just shut it down and walk away. At some point the cost of subsidizing expensive energy for another country is going to become untenable.
  - u320 4y ago
    There is no "equivalent wind power". They perform different roles on the grid.
    - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
      Yes, and it's probably cheaper to emulate that role with other tech. Not sure the contract would allow for it though.
      - finikytou 4y ago

tcoff91 4y ago

Man I’m paying 0.33 to $0.52 per kWh. I’d love to pay 0.15

GoOnThenDoTell 4y ago
I think my generator in santa clara charges something like 15c (flat) before distribution, which gets to 31c/41c/49cents depending on usage level. Nuclear seems like a normal price for the bay area
- zbrozek 4y ago
  That sounds like PG&E pricing, not SVP pricing. Anybody on PG&E should have solar panels. Hang them off your balcony if you have to. The electricity rates are astronomical. http://zlnp.net/serve/pge_rates/pge-electric-rates.png http://zlnp.net/serve/pge_rates/pge-electric-rates.png
  - hedora 4y ago
    Also, demand California implement community net metering (allowing you to buy a percentage ownership of panels in a nearby parking lot, etc, and applying their generation to your power bill.)
mikeyouse 4y ago
In honesty, I was being modest with my "under $0.15/KWh" -- it's actually fixed price at $0.114/KWh. So I can run my heat pump to cool my house, my heat pump to warm my pool, and my electric car charger at 1pm on July 4th and still pay $0.114. It's a really great deal from a well-run local power company in the Midwest US. There is a fair amount of coal in the mix still (about 1/3 of summer generating capacity) which is being phased out over the next few years so we'll see what happens to rates.

JanSt 4y ago

In Germany we have massive wind and solar capacity (120GW) and phased out nuclear. Energy prices have constantly risen to above 35c/kwh and our dependeny on gas grew. At the moment it‘s above 55c/kwh for new contracts. We still have very dirty electricity because so much coal and gas have to be burned

adrianN 4y ago
It would of course have been better for the climate to turn off the coal plants first, but it's fallacious to judge the cost of different electricity sources by the retail price of electricity.
olau 4y ago
No, the wind and solar capacity is not massive, in fact it is far too small. If it were much bigger, you would have much lower prices. Electricity in Europe is expensive at the moment because of fuel prices. Also, I don't have the numbers nearby, but I believe gas is mostly used for heating in Germany. Your heating system is outdated - you just didn't care because of the cheap gas from the east. Stop blaming the technologies that can actually fix this.
- zaarn 4y ago
  The Schröder Government pushed for massive reforms to install Gas heating in homes. At the time this was more efficient than nighttime electric boiler heating, wood heaters or oil boilers. A modern caloric gas oven is fairly efficient overall. Of course, one most realize that Schröder left the office having signed Nord Stream I only days prior and then immediately proceeded to join the Gazprom Board of Directors as well as serving as Director for the Nord Stream I Ltd. company and later Nord Stream II Ltd. That might be a minor case of corruption, possibly. Who knows, courts haven't decided yet. The Merkel cabinet I-IV never really pushed to change it, since gas was working fine for the status quo.
- u320 4y ago
  Gas is used to cover for wind and solar when that is not delivering. You cannot replace that by more wind and solar.

adastra22 4y ago

1. Most of that cost is an apples to oranges comparison as the nuclear plants are required to fully fund decommissioning upfront, whereas dismantling a wind farm (even if just turbine by turbine as they break down) isn’t priced into that alternative. apples-to-apples it’s not that much more expensive upfront cost, and significantly cheaper over 50+ years of operation. 2. Most of the real costs that exist for nuclear are construction. Repurposing coal plants saves a good chunk of that.

adrianN 4y ago
Dismantling a couple hundred wind turbines seems like a significantly easier job than dismantling a nuclear power plant. You also don't need state-funded insurance against catastrophic failure for wind turbines. Normal insurance can be bought.
- Huh1337 4y ago
  You decommission a nuclear plant only once, after 60-100 years of operation (or even later). You need to replace the wind turbine blades every 15-25 years - the blades could literally fly apart if you didn't. And there's no good way to recycle them, so it goes into landfill. Not great.
  - Reason077 4y ago
    Not many nuclear plants last for 60-100 years. Most existing ones have an operational life of about 40 years. Those that run longer have invariably received an extensive (and expensive) mid-life refurbishment. Then they are left in a shutdown, de-fuelled state (safe storage) for 60 years or so before they can be safely dismantled. This whole process is very expensive, in part because you have to pay to manage and maintain the site for such a long time. Decommissioning all the UK’s existing civil nuclear sites is estimated to cost taxpayers over £132bn, and the work will not be complete for 120 years.
    - Huh1337 4y ago
      Sure, refurbishment is necessary - my country just went through the process after 35 years of operation of the oldest reactors, now it's certified for 50 years more and another refurbishment is expected after that - not decommissioning. It wasn't that bad. We pay more for maintenance of the little wind power we have (less than 15% of our energy production on windy days) than we pay for nuclear reactor refurbishment (>30% of our baseload, works all day and night, all year).

danw1979 4y ago

Yup but you won’t be paying less than £0.30/kWh flat-rate pretty soon. Hinkley is stupidly expensive and I doubt the capacity factor will turn out any better than wind and batteries, but I still think we should build a few more nuclear power stations - the public will turn hard against renewables at the first sniff of power outages being caused because the wind wasn’t blowing, and we’re less likely to run into that with some nuclear baseload in the mix.

adrianN 4y ago
How? Economics strongly suggest to run nuclear plants at maximum output whenever you can. So you wouldn't be able to use them as backups when there is a lack of wind power.
ZeroGravitas 4y ago
Using that money to build more wind and supporting infrastructure would make it much less likely. People don't talk about it much, but CfD has killed nuclear. It lays the long term costs and risks bare. Hinckley is going to overrun it's already high cost, and France will be left picking up the tab for any cost overruns. I wonder if their contract lets them just build the equivalent wind power to save money? Or just shut it down and walk away. At some point the cost of subsidizing expensive energy for another country is going to become untenable.
- u320 4y ago
  There is no "equivalent wind power". They perform different roles on the grid.
  - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
    Yes, and it's probably cheaper to emulate that role with other tech. Not sure the contract would allow for it though.
    - finikytou 4y ago