4 ms·

Precisely. France already has precedent for this, with their 49-employee companies: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-05-03/why-france-has-so-many-49

Precisely. France already has precedent for this, with their 49-employee companies: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-05-03/why-france-has-so-many-49-employee-companies https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-05-03/why-franc.... On the surface, covering parking lots with solar panels seems like a good idea since it would both generate electricity and provide shade for the cars, but I'm not sure if the same resources won't be better spent on building more nuclear plants, which is something France already leads the world in. As a driver I certainly wouldn't complain about the shade, but were I a French taxpayer I would perhaps ask more questions.

toomuchtodo 4y ago
These are the same nuclear power plants they have a challenge maintaining adequately and building new ones, yeah? And take a decade to build? And solar and batteries are cheaper than nuclear on a levelized per kWh basis. So slap the panels on top of mandatory carports and call it a day. > That’s 11GW of new solar (same as 10 new nuclear reactors) powering millions of home - zero new land needed 11GW of generation on top of land already utilized and distributed. If I were a French taxpayer who just paid €10B to nationalize EDF, I would absolutely ask why you’d prioritize nuclear. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jul/19/france-to-pay-nearly-10bn-to-fully-nationalise-edf https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jul/19/france-to-p...
- IanCal 4y ago
  > So slap the panels on top of mandatory carports and call it a day Particularly given that one of the new and growing consumers of large amounts of electricity is cars.
- prottog 4y ago
  > And solar and batteries are cheaper than nuclear on a levelized per kWh basis So I would expect to see countries with higher share of solar generation and less nuclear would have lower wholesale electricity prices than ones with less solar and more nuclear? This data isn't easy to find for a layperson like myself, but I'd be surprised if such a correlation existed. > If I were a French taxpayer who just paid €10B to nationalize EDF EDF was state-owned to begin with, and was only partially privatized in 2004 with the French state still retaining 80%+ ownership. The recent re-nationalization was only an acquisition by the state of the remainder. The French taxpayer was paying for it all along.
  - Kon5ole 4y ago
    You will not see lower prices because the true costs of nuclear are hidden in centuries to come and not included in the costs shown today. Nobody presents the actual cost of nuclear because nobody knows. Estimating costs even decades in the future is impossible, let alone centuries. EDF had 50 bn euros in debt and also needs to spend unknown bns more to fix aging plants. This means that nuclear power in France has operated with an average of at least 1 billion euros in losses per year for as long as it has existed. The costs per kWh for French nuclear power have never been correct, since they have obviously not covered the actual costs. You are correct in that the taxpayers pay for nuclear, and this is on top of and in addition to what they directly pay for the electricity. What they pay for the actual electricity is way too little to cover the costs of nuclear. The rest of the costs are hidden in general taxes. Everybody pays for nuclear in France, and they will pay for as long as they live and as long as their children live and so on for generations. The same is true for coal and oil etc of course. We have no idea how much it actually cost humanity to release fossil carbon into the atmosphere, but it's pretty clear by now that it was much more expensive in reality than what we paid when it happened.
  - bryanlarsen 4y ago
    In a free market, price is set by the marginal cost, which in 2022 is almost always power from natural gas generators. Any difference between marginal and actual cost results in profits for the producer rather than price reduction for the consumer.
    - prottog 4y ago
      > In a free market Utilities are one of the least free markets ;-) especially in France, where EDF had a legal monopoly on generation for decades. > results in profits for the producer Not necessarily a bad thing; it allows for further investments in capacity and signals new capital to come in and compete. Provided, of course, that it could be a free(ish) market.
  - pydry 4y ago
    >So I would expect to see countries with higher share of solar generation and less nuclear would have lower wholesale electricity prices than ones with less solar and more nuclear? Not necessarily. Subsidies and taxes and debt throw everything out of whack as does every other form of power. You have to analyze on a more granular level than that to see the true picture. Additionally, solar has only been the cheapest form of energy for about 6-7 years and it usually takes 10-15 years to transition away from existing energy to a new form. In France specifically the plants were mostly built in the 70s and 80s at great expense and are paid off now but nearing EOL. Maintenance has also been neglected saving additional costs. Meanwhile Germany has incurred most of the capital costs on its renewable generation capacity in the last 15 years. It's like living in a neglected, crumbling old mansion with a paid off mortgage and claiming that it's cheaper than living in an average 2 bedroom semi because your outgoings are lower... for now. >EDF was state-owned to begin with Because unless you firehose the private sector with subsidies it'll never build an NPP.
- ohgodplsno 4y ago
  >If I were a French taxpayer who just paid €10B to nationalize EDF, I would absolutely ask why you’d prioritize nuclear. Hi, French taxpayer. Because nuclear _is_ our future. Not unreliable solar panels made with resources that are kind of very limited in their amounts, that need to be changed every 10 years and that only produce electricity during the day. Pushing for all renewables and no more nuclear is pushing for keeping gas power plants open. Also because holy fuck you could stack 10 nuclear power plants side by side and they'd barely cover the space needed for a single one of these gigantic IKEA parking lots. Land use is not a problem in France, we can find it.
  - Schroedingersat 4y ago
    How much electricity did Flamanville 3 generate last night? Or Civaux?
    - ohgodplsno 4y ago
      As much as the not running solar panels. And when it does produce (99% of the time), it absolutely crushes any amount of solar panels.
      - Schroedingersat 4y ago
        Civaux 1 has been down for over a year and Flamanville hasn't produced a single joule in the ten years since it was scheduled to be finished in 2012
  - pjc50 4y ago
    > need to be changed every 10 years This is just false. The design life is 20-25 years, and the system on my roof is approaching year 7 with zero maintenance and no noticeable drop in output. The inverters may need slightly more frequent changes on the 10-15year scale, but a solar panel? It's a big flat diode, guys. There's no moving part larger than an electron, and you don't need to oil electrons.
- arkh 4y ago
  > If I were a French taxpayer who just paid €10B to nationalize EDF, I would absolutely ask why you’d prioritize nuclear. Because we have Spain and Germany next to us going for full wind and solar. Let's see how it goes and use their experience if it goes well instead of putting all the European eggs in the same basket.
  - kkfx 4y ago
    > Spain and Germany next to us going for full wind and solar. Actually they going full coal and oil and gas since they need electricity and hydro suffer from drought and wind does not produce much AND in general without massive storage no grid can work on renewables... Oh, I say that as one who have p.v., with (little) storage at home, and I see how the frequency suffer from irregular loads even at that small scale.
    - barbazoo 4y ago
      > Actually they going full coal and oil and gas since they need electricity and hydro suffer from drought and wind does not produce much AND in general without massive storage no grid can work on renewables... I very much doubt that much of that is true, at least for Germany. Could you share the source for that claim?
      - kkfx 4y ago
        For instance https://theobjective.com/economia/2022-08-04/espana-carbon-gobierno/ https://theobjective.com/economia/2022-08-04/espana-carbon-g... "energy crisis force Spain to increment 108% coal electricity generation" or for Germany, in English https://reneweconomy.com.au/in-germany-a-wind-farm-is-dismantled-to-make-way-for-expanded-lignite-coal-mine/ https://reneweconomy.com.au/in-germany-a-wind-farm-is-disman... 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... And also https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220620-dutch-join-germany-austria-in-reverting-to-coal https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220620-dutch-join-ge... https://www.dw.com/en/germanys-energy-u-turn-coal-instead-of-gas/a-62709160 https://www.dw.com/en/germanys-energy-u-turn-coal-instead-of... https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20220627-france-may-restart-coal-fired-power-plant-ahead-of-winter-energy-spike https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20220627-france-may-restart-coa...
- Kuinox 4y ago
  > If I were a French And if you were French you would knew solar output is bad there. 11GW of installed solar, equate to 2GW of actual solar output at the time of writing this comment, 16h37, due to solar outputing only 18% of the installed capacity. Meanwhile nuclear plants are currently at 50% of installed capacity in the middle of maintenances downtimes.
  - Schroedingersat 4y ago
    Presumably that 11GW is net. France has around 38 million cars. America has around 8 parking spots per car. Assuming there are enough spots that fall under this scheme for 0.5 surface parking spaces per car at the average of 40m^2 per spot that's around 26GW net at 14% capacity or about the same as the current nuclear fleet. Conveniently france is one of the many countries where wind is anti-correlated with sun, so add some wind and you've covered half your energy.
    - Kuinox 4y ago
      > Presumably that 11GW is net. For solar, Net unit is not W but Wc. You are asking to do what Germany has been doing, and they showed to everyone how bad this strategy was. Since the 90s, more than 40% of france primary energy is low carbon. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/low-carbon-share-energy?tab=chart https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/low-carbon-share-energy?t...
      - Schroedingersat 4y ago
        > For solar, Net unit is not W but Wc. Journalists can't even get Wh vs W right. > You are asking to do what Germany has been doing, How was I suggesting cancelling renewables so your country's leader could get a job at a russian gas company?
        Kuinox 4y ago
        Germany cancelled and closed lot of nuclear plants to go "fully renewable" years ago, as it's not possible today, they compensated lack of base-load with natural gas, and bought France electricity in the winter (well, sun is not strong in the winter).
- mytailorisrich 4y ago
  Something mentioned in the French article quoted by the tweet is industrial policy. Right now a new nuclear power plant in France means French jobs, French technology, and French industry. A solar panel most likely means an import from China. IMHO this highlights the need for a country like France to invest in producing its own solar panels.
  - philipkglass 4y ago
    IMHO this highlights the need for a country like France to invest in producing its own solar panels. They are: https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/07/13/french-hjt-solar-plant-battery-projects-land-eu-funding/ https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/07/13/french-hjt-solar-plan... France deployed 2.68 GW of new solar capacity in 2021 [1], so this 2 GW factory will cover more than 70% of domestic demand at 2021 installation rates. [1] https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/02/17/france-deployed-2-68gw-of-solar-in-2021/ https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/02/17/france-deployed-2-68g...
mytailorisrich 4y ago
On the surface this will not cost anything to the taxpayer since the cost will be borne by the carparks' owners. But this being France, my cynical side thinks that the next step is lobbying and complaints by businesses until the government comes up with subsidies. On the other hand, that's not completely unreasonable since this new law means businesses will have to shell out hundreds of thousands of euros...
pydry 4y ago
>I'm not sure if the same resources won't be better spent on building more nuclear plants Who doesn't love spending 5x as much per megawatt hour and getting it delivered in 20 years instead of 3 months? The answer is usually somebody who wildly overestimates how much storage is needed and wildly underestimates the feasibility of delivering that.
tzs 4y ago
> but I'm not sure if the same resources won't be better spent on building more nuclear plants Which same resources?
lumost 4y ago
also, there is a presumption that all parking lots make good solar installations throughout all of France. I'm sure there are a number of "parking lots" which are little more than dirt fields for events in remote locations.
- Scoundreller 4y ago
  And there are rainy parts of France. Been in Paris in January… didn’t see the sun for 2 continuous weeks. Would make more sense to install panels in the south where days are longer and sky is clearer instead of sprinkling them around where the parking lots are.
Glawen 4y ago
Why not both? Here it is the company owning the parking lot which is impacted, and it will generate money in three long run for them. There is no relation with a budget required to build a nuclear reactor

toomuchtodo 4y ago

These are the same nuclear power plants they have a challenge maintaining adequately and building new ones, yeah? And take a decade to build? And solar and batteries are cheaper than nuclear on a levelized per kWh basis. So slap the panels on top of mandatory carports and call it a day. > That’s 11GW of new solar (same as 10 new nuclear reactors) powering millions of home - zero new land needed 11GW of generation on top of land already utilized and distributed. If I were a French taxpayer who just paid €10B to nationalize EDF, I would absolutely ask why you’d prioritize nuclear. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jul/19/france-to-pay-nearly-10bn-to-fully-nationalise-edf https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jul/19/france-to-p...

IanCal 4y ago
> So slap the panels on top of mandatory carports and call it a day Particularly given that one of the new and growing consumers of large amounts of electricity is cars.
prottog 4y ago
> And solar and batteries are cheaper than nuclear on a levelized per kWh basis So I would expect to see countries with higher share of solar generation and less nuclear would have lower wholesale electricity prices than ones with less solar and more nuclear? This data isn't easy to find for a layperson like myself, but I'd be surprised if such a correlation existed. > If I were a French taxpayer who just paid €10B to nationalize EDF EDF was state-owned to begin with, and was only partially privatized in 2004 with the French state still retaining 80%+ ownership. The recent re-nationalization was only an acquisition by the state of the remainder. The French taxpayer was paying for it all along.
- Kon5ole 4y ago
  You will not see lower prices because the true costs of nuclear are hidden in centuries to come and not included in the costs shown today. Nobody presents the actual cost of nuclear because nobody knows. Estimating costs even decades in the future is impossible, let alone centuries. EDF had 50 bn euros in debt and also needs to spend unknown bns more to fix aging plants. This means that nuclear power in France has operated with an average of at least 1 billion euros in losses per year for as long as it has existed. The costs per kWh for French nuclear power have never been correct, since they have obviously not covered the actual costs. You are correct in that the taxpayers pay for nuclear, and this is on top of and in addition to what they directly pay for the electricity. What they pay for the actual electricity is way too little to cover the costs of nuclear. The rest of the costs are hidden in general taxes. Everybody pays for nuclear in France, and they will pay for as long as they live and as long as their children live and so on for generations. The same is true for coal and oil etc of course. We have no idea how much it actually cost humanity to release fossil carbon into the atmosphere, but it's pretty clear by now that it was much more expensive in reality than what we paid when it happened.
- bryanlarsen 4y ago
  In a free market, price is set by the marginal cost, which in 2022 is almost always power from natural gas generators. Any difference between marginal and actual cost results in profits for the producer rather than price reduction for the consumer.
  - prottog 4y ago
    > In a free market Utilities are one of the least free markets ;-) especially in France, where EDF had a legal monopoly on generation for decades. > results in profits for the producer Not necessarily a bad thing; it allows for further investments in capacity and signals new capital to come in and compete. Provided, of course, that it could be a free(ish) market.
- pydry 4y ago
  >So I would expect to see countries with higher share of solar generation and less nuclear would have lower wholesale electricity prices than ones with less solar and more nuclear? Not necessarily. Subsidies and taxes and debt throw everything out of whack as does every other form of power. You have to analyze on a more granular level than that to see the true picture. Additionally, solar has only been the cheapest form of energy for about 6-7 years and it usually takes 10-15 years to transition away from existing energy to a new form. In France specifically the plants were mostly built in the 70s and 80s at great expense and are paid off now but nearing EOL. Maintenance has also been neglected saving additional costs. Meanwhile Germany has incurred most of the capital costs on its renewable generation capacity in the last 15 years. It's like living in a neglected, crumbling old mansion with a paid off mortgage and claiming that it's cheaper than living in an average 2 bedroom semi because your outgoings are lower... for now. >EDF was state-owned to begin with Because unless you firehose the private sector with subsidies it'll never build an NPP.
ohgodplsno 4y ago
>If I were a French taxpayer who just paid €10B to nationalize EDF, I would absolutely ask why you’d prioritize nuclear. Hi, French taxpayer. Because nuclear _is_ our future. Not unreliable solar panels made with resources that are kind of very limited in their amounts, that need to be changed every 10 years and that only produce electricity during the day. Pushing for all renewables and no more nuclear is pushing for keeping gas power plants open. Also because holy fuck you could stack 10 nuclear power plants side by side and they'd barely cover the space needed for a single one of these gigantic IKEA parking lots. Land use is not a problem in France, we can find it.
- Schroedingersat 4y ago
  How much electricity did Flamanville 3 generate last night? Or Civaux?
  - ohgodplsno 4y ago
    As much as the not running solar panels. And when it does produce (99% of the time), it absolutely crushes any amount of solar panels.
    - Schroedingersat 4y ago
      Civaux 1 has been down for over a year and Flamanville hasn't produced a single joule in the ten years since it was scheduled to be finished in 2012
- pjc50 4y ago
  > need to be changed every 10 years This is just false. The design life is 20-25 years, and the system on my roof is approaching year 7 with zero maintenance and no noticeable drop in output. The inverters may need slightly more frequent changes on the 10-15year scale, but a solar panel? It's a big flat diode, guys. There's no moving part larger than an electron, and you don't need to oil electrons.
arkh 4y ago
> If I were a French taxpayer who just paid €10B to nationalize EDF, I would absolutely ask why you’d prioritize nuclear. Because we have Spain and Germany next to us going for full wind and solar. Let's see how it goes and use their experience if it goes well instead of putting all the European eggs in the same basket.
- kkfx 4y ago
  > Spain and Germany next to us going for full wind and solar. Actually they going full coal and oil and gas since they need electricity and hydro suffer from drought and wind does not produce much AND in general without massive storage no grid can work on renewables... Oh, I say that as one who have p.v., with (little) storage at home, and I see how the frequency suffer from irregular loads even at that small scale.
  - barbazoo 4y ago
    > Actually they going full coal and oil and gas since they need electricity and hydro suffer from drought and wind does not produce much AND in general without massive storage no grid can work on renewables... I very much doubt that much of that is true, at least for Germany. Could you share the source for that claim?
    - kkfx 4y ago
      For instance https://theobjective.com/economia/2022-08-04/espana-carbon-gobierno/ https://theobjective.com/economia/2022-08-04/espana-carbon-g... "energy crisis force Spain to increment 108% coal electricity generation" or for Germany, in English https://reneweconomy.com.au/in-germany-a-wind-farm-is-dismantled-to-make-way-for-expanded-lignite-coal-mine/ https://reneweconomy.com.au/in-germany-a-wind-farm-is-disman... 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... And also https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220620-dutch-join-germany-austria-in-reverting-to-coal https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20220620-dutch-join-ge... https://www.dw.com/en/germanys-energy-u-turn-coal-instead-of-gas/a-62709160 https://www.dw.com/en/germanys-energy-u-turn-coal-instead-of... https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20220627-france-may-restart-coal-fired-power-plant-ahead-of-winter-energy-spike https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20220627-france-may-restart-coa...
Kuinox 4y ago
> If I were a French And if you were French you would knew solar output is bad there. 11GW of installed solar, equate to 2GW of actual solar output at the time of writing this comment, 16h37, due to solar outputing only 18% of the installed capacity. Meanwhile nuclear plants are currently at 50% of installed capacity in the middle of maintenances downtimes.
- Schroedingersat 4y ago
  Presumably that 11GW is net. France has around 38 million cars. America has around 8 parking spots per car. Assuming there are enough spots that fall under this scheme for 0.5 surface parking spaces per car at the average of 40m^2 per spot that's around 26GW net at 14% capacity or about the same as the current nuclear fleet. Conveniently france is one of the many countries where wind is anti-correlated with sun, so add some wind and you've covered half your energy.
  - Kuinox 4y ago
    > Presumably that 11GW is net. For solar, Net unit is not W but Wc. You are asking to do what Germany has been doing, and they showed to everyone how bad this strategy was. Since the 90s, more than 40% of france primary energy is low carbon. https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/low-carbon-share-energy?tab=chart https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/low-carbon-share-energy?t...
    - Schroedingersat 4y ago
      > For solar, Net unit is not W but Wc. Journalists can't even get Wh vs W right. > You are asking to do what Germany has been doing, How was I suggesting cancelling renewables so your country's leader could get a job at a russian gas company?
      - Kuinox 4y ago
        Germany cancelled and closed lot of nuclear plants to go "fully renewable" years ago, as it's not possible today, they compensated lack of base-load with natural gas, and bought France electricity in the winter (well, sun is not strong in the winter).
mytailorisrich 4y ago
Something mentioned in the French article quoted by the tweet is industrial policy. Right now a new nuclear power plant in France means French jobs, French technology, and French industry. A solar panel most likely means an import from China. IMHO this highlights the need for a country like France to invest in producing its own solar panels.
- philipkglass 4y ago
  IMHO this highlights the need for a country like France to invest in producing its own solar panels. They are: https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/07/13/french-hjt-solar-plant-battery-projects-land-eu-funding/ https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/07/13/french-hjt-solar-plan... France deployed 2.68 GW of new solar capacity in 2021 [1], so this 2 GW factory will cover more than 70% of domestic demand at 2021 installation rates. [1] https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/02/17/france-deployed-2-68gw-of-solar-in-2021/ https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/02/17/france-deployed-2-68g...

mytailorisrich 4y ago

On the surface this will not cost anything to the taxpayer since the cost will be borne by the carparks' owners. But this being France, my cynical side thinks that the next step is lobbying and complaints by businesses until the government comes up with subsidies. On the other hand, that's not completely unreasonable since this new law means businesses will have to shell out hundreds of thousands of euros...

pydry 4y ago

>I'm not sure if the same resources won't be better spent on building more nuclear plants Who doesn't love spending 5x as much per megawatt hour and getting it delivered in 20 years instead of 3 months? The answer is usually somebody who wildly overestimates how much storage is needed and wildly underestimates the feasibility of delivering that.

tzs 4y ago

> but I'm not sure if the same resources won't be better spent on building more nuclear plants Which same resources?

lumost 4y ago

also, there is a presumption that all parking lots make good solar installations throughout all of France. I'm sure there are a number of "parking lots" which are little more than dirt fields for events in remote locations.

Scoundreller 4y ago
And there are rainy parts of France. Been in Paris in January… didn’t see the sun for 2 continuous weeks. Would make more sense to install panels in the south where days are longer and sky is clearer instead of sprinkling them around where the parking lots are.

Glawen 4y ago

Why not both? Here it is the company owning the parking lot which is impacted, and it will generate money in three long run for them. There is no relation with a budget required to build a nuclear reactor