3 ms·

> So it's supposed to be impossible to get the 3 hours or 9TWh (12 years of 2022 production) of battery.. but scaling Uranium production and the entire reactor

> So it's supposed to be impossible to get the 3 hours or 9TWh (12 years of 2022 production) of battery.. but scaling Uranium production and the entire reactor and enrichment supply chain 10x with no significant pipelined expansion is trivial Yes, that is exactly right! Energy density of natural, raw, unenriched uranium is 1,000,000 MJ/KG, and energy density of a lithium battery is 0.46 MJ/KG. 1 kilo of uranium gives you 1,000 times more energy than a kilo of lithium will be able to 'process' over the entire 10-year life expectancy of the battery. You will need 1,000 fewer excavators, dump trucks and people involved in mining if you choose uranium. If price of uranium increases 3x nobody cares, fuel is like 5% of cost for nuclear. If price of lithium increases 3x it's a disaster, the entire transition to electric vehicles will fail. We don't even have enough batteries for vehicles, the grid needs another solution, either hydro + hydrogen storage or nuclear.

Schroedingersat 4y ago
Now do it again with the electricity output of fuel cycles that actually exist and the amount of lithium in a new battery. The only density here is that required to mindlessly parrot factoids about the theoretical thermal energy content fertile material as if they were relevant to electricity output of fissile content. > If price of uranium increases 3x nobody cares, fuel is like 5% of cost for nuclear. If price of lithium increases 3x it's a disaster, the entire transition to electric vehicles will fail. If the price of Uranium triples, the raw Uranium becomes as expensive as renewables' LCOE in one year rather than 5. If the price of lithium triples, it's still irrelevant because PHES still exists and so do Sodium Ion, Zinc Bromide and Iron batteries. > We don't even have enough batteries for vehicles, the grid needs another solution, either hydro + hydrogen storage or nuclear. The amount of batteries required for >90% renewables is tiny compare to the amount needed for overly large EVs everywhere. If you're going to change one of these variables to stop climate change faster, far better to unban light electric vehicles in countries with mandatory monster trucks and spend a few percent of that nuclear reactor money on transit, low speed roads and pedestrianisation.

Schroedingersat 4y ago

Now do it again with the electricity output of fuel cycles that actually exist and the amount of lithium in a new battery. The only density here is that required to mindlessly parrot factoids about the theoretical thermal energy content fertile material as if they were relevant to electricity output of fissile content. > If price of uranium increases 3x nobody cares, fuel is like 5% of cost for nuclear. If price of lithium increases 3x it's a disaster, the entire transition to electric vehicles will fail. If the price of Uranium triples, the raw Uranium becomes as expensive as renewables' LCOE in one year rather than 5. If the price of lithium triples, it's still irrelevant because PHES still exists and so do Sodium Ion, Zinc Bromide and Iron batteries. > We don't even have enough batteries for vehicles, the grid needs another solution, either hydro + hydrogen storage or nuclear. The amount of batteries required for >90% renewables is tiny compare to the amount needed for overly large EVs everywhere. If you're going to change one of these variables to stop climate change faster, far better to unban light electric vehicles in countries with mandatory monster trucks and spend a few percent of that nuclear reactor money on transit, low speed roads and pedestrianisation.