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All I am seeing is a ton of reasons to build an absolute boat load of cheap nuclear power. None of these processes are even remotely possible without abundant e
by jpgvm 4y ago
All I am seeing is a ton of reasons to build an absolute boat load of cheap nuclear power. None of these processes are even remotely possible without abundant essentially free energy.
- laurencerowe 4y agoIf only nuclear power were cheap!
- jpgvm 4y agoIt is! Just not in Western countries sadly. China is building a ton of nuclear at very good prices.
- TaylorAlexander 4y agoI’m curious how Chinese nuclear power plant prices compare to Chinese solar panel prices. They are both cheaper than in western countries.
- chii 4y agothe question is whether it's cheaper because labour costs are cheaper or is something being compromised to make it cheaper (such as safety)?
- mjevans 4y agoDidn't China build a huge hydropower dam because the government dictated it would happen ? Even over the people that had to move and the changes to their environment? Nuclear power is expensive in the US because of stringent regulations, most of which should be kept. However there are lessons from existing installations, newer designs, and better technology to help design things now, than in the 50s and 60s.
- dontlaugh 4y agoThat dam was necessary primarily to stabilise the path of a historically very destructive river. Many of the people that moved had suffered through floods in the past.
- jpgvm 4y agoChinese don't compromise on safety. Their Gen 4 reactor designs are probably some of the safest to be built. They actually bought said design from Germany when they abandoned their nuclear aspirations. Instead it mostly comes down to: a) China being a frankly fucking massive place so land is already much cheaper than the US/EU/etc. b) More realistic regulations on waste processing/storage etc. China isn't scared of nuclear waste because it's not stigmatized as it is in the West and they are able to handle transportation/storage/plan for reprocessing with logic rather than emotion. c) CCP having a simple and importantly efficient system of requisitioning land from citizens (essentially they buy them out for above market and set them up somewhere new). The latter one is the big thing that really sets them apart when it comes to infrastructure projects. Yes building a huge dam displaces like 250k people but they do it anyway and move everyone to new homes. There also isn't a process for saying no or negotiating so said process doesn't get dragged out. In practice that isn't usually a huge problem because in China it's considered like a lottery win if the government decides to build a highway/railway through your house because they will pay much more than the house is worth on the open market. Obviously such a system would never fly in the West though. b) is also pretty important. If you keep hand wringing about waste even when the amounts really are inconsequential then you are going to make things really expensive for no real reason. China also has a huge desert they can use to store waste essentially indefinitely if they really can't find a way to reprocess it. Though that seems pretty damn unlikely.
- CorrectHorseBat 4y agoSafe design doesn't mean safely built or operated. I don't doubt they are technically capable of doing it, I'm not convinced they will. They aren't really known for not compromising on safety. And seeing the direction they are going to I think that's not going to improve. >China being a frankly fucking massive place so land is already much cheaper than the US/EU/etc. China is virtually the same size as the US with 4x the population and more unhabitable land.
- nickserv 4y agoSo basically things are easier when you're running a brutal dictatorship.
- hyperbovine 4y agoMany things could be made cheaper by eliminating liability risk.
- pydry 4y agoChina builds nuclear power not because it is cheap but because it shares a lot of the costs and skills base of their nuclear military. Iran builds it because it wants the option of having a bomb. Take out military concerns and it is economic for neither of them. Every country who builds nuclear power stations is either a nuclear power sharing military costs (France, UK, China...) or is taking out an option on quickly developing a bomb (Sweden, Iran, Japan, South Korea) against geopolitical concerns that are glaringly obvious.
- m348e912 4y ago>>China builds nuclear power not because it is cheap but because it shares a lot of the costs and skills base of their nuclear military. One of the previous commenters above mentioned that China abandoned their own plans bought their design from Germany, so it's conceivable that if China had no military nuclear program they could have still built a reactor. (That's of course if the western world allowed it)
- pydry 4y agoOf course they could. Almost any country could. Nonetheless, the cost to the constructor is such that without a military reason it doesn't make any sense to build one. I expect North Korea will turn its attention to civilian nuclear power fairly soon now that the race to become a fully fledged nuclear power is complete. It would make economic sense to them given the industrial capacity, skills and resource base it has accumulated in the process of building the bomb. For most other countries? Not so much.
- Accujack 4y agoMy thoughts as well. It's too bad so many people are indoctrinated to think the way they do about nuclear power in the US.
- TaylorAlexander 4y agoI am curious if these processes need continuous power or if they would work okay if most of their power was delivered during the daytime.
- Gibbon1 4y agoI suspect that you don't need that with aqueous electrolysis. I think the advantage is the electrolytic cells are cheap. Problem with solar is intermittent power means intermittent use of capital equipment. How much an issue that is depends on the ratios of electricity cost, capital cost and depreciation.
- mkj 4y agoIf you only run in daytime you have the same capital costs for half the output - a lot harder to make viable. Might be OK if the energy cost dominates anything else?
- monotux 4y agoSSAB has located it’s H2 plants near several large hydroelectric power plants, so in Sweden’s case we have to build nuclear power plants further south to provide power to the bulk of the population.
- the_third_wave 4y agoThat should happen anyway since the transport capacity between the hydropower-rich north and the power-hungry south and west is not sufficient and there do not seem to be plans to change this situation markedly - possibly because the state (in the form of Svenska Kraftnät [2]) makes a pretty penny on the "flaskhalsavgifter" [1]. They can start by correcting the mistakes made by the previous governments in closing half of the available nuclear power generation capability, repeal the law which states that no new nuclear facilities can be built in locations other than those where one already exists and get serious in establishing new locations close to where the power is needed, preferably chosen so that waste heat can be used as well. [1] https://www.dn.se/ekonomi/elprischock-kan-ge-aterbaring-pa-natavgift-miljardrullning-till-svenska-kraftnat/ https://www.dn.se/ekonomi/elprischock-kan-ge-aterbaring-pa-n... [2] https://www.svk.se/ https://www.svk.se/
- kolinko 4y agoRenewables are way cheaper and easier to scale.
- bell-cot 4y agoBig picture, yes. Though they generally need much more power storage/distribution grid construction per GW, to actually deliver a reliable supply to users. Then you get to countries where the NIMBYs fight tooth & nail over even tiny grid construction projects...
- chii 4y agowait till you fight with the NIMBYs on nuclear projects...
- bell-cot 4y agoAh. Those fights I mostly put in the same category as "fights with NIMBYs over building new 8-track factories", "fights with NIMBYs over digging the Mississippi-Yukon shipping canal", etc. (Vs. the NIMBYs are pretty much fine with 100%-carbon steel.)
- pydry 4y agoBig picture is that theyre not just cheaper but 5x cheaper. In fact it's so much cheaper that it's even more economic to use solar/wind to synthesize natural gas and burn that to generate electricity. Never mind all of the cheaper short term storage options (pumped storage, batteries). And this doesnt even account for the storage nuclear power would need (it's even less economic to use it for load following) or the need for taxpayer indemnification against catastrophe cleanup costs.
- m348e912 4y ago>> In fact it's so much cheaper that it's even more economic to use solar/wind to synthesize natural gas and burn that to generate electricity. Interesting. Never heard of this being done in practice before, do you have references of what you're referring to?
- locallost 4y agoCheap nuclear is an oxymoron. Germany dropped it and now the tax payers are hit with over 100 billion in nuclear waste disposal costs. The operators paid 23 billion to legally wash their hands of the mess [1]. The worst part even the green party accepted it because they feared the operators would simply declare bankruptcy since there was no way for them to handle it themselves. This on top of the hundreds of billions of subsidies that in the end didn't accomplish anything. But at least they are not in South Carolina where the consumers are still paying for the 9 billion wasted on VC Summer before they concluded "this project will never be in the black" and quit [2]. Nuclear's tagline since the beginning was "energy too cheap to meter" which turned out to be one of the biggest frauds in the history of mankind. [1] https://www.dw.com/en/german-government-does-nuclear-waste-deal-with-energy-companies/a-36089376 https://www.dw.com/en/german-government-does-nuclear-waste-d... [2] https://theintercept.com/2019/02/06/south-caroline-green-new-deal-south-carolina-nuclear-energy/ https://theintercept.com/2019/02/06/south-caroline-green-new...
- nickpp 4y agoMost of those costs are because of onerous regulations and lack of competition due to... you guessed it: onerous governmental regulations.
- pydry 4y agoIf the ~$800 billion cleanup costs of a Fukushima event werent fully borne by taxpayers then maybe the safety regulations wouldnt have to be as onerous. But they are, and Ive never heard of a single pro nuclear advocate ever argue that nuclear power is safe enough that this enormous subsidy should be unwound. They generally pretend it doesnt exist. Meanwhile solar/wind/storage is a lot cheaper even without taking this subsidy into account.
- nickpp 4y agoThe cleanup after a nuclear incident is also regulated through the wazoo. Thus it's expensive, deeply corrupted and probably unnecessary. We'd probably be better off simply closing the area for a couple hundred years until the most radioactive (and thus dangerous) stuff half-lifes away. Meanwhile coal plants keep spewing slightly radioactive ash into the air and into our lungs and the cost is paid by us all in life expectancy. And soon by our whole civilization in global warming.