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This is the classic anti-nuclear rhetoric Always bring up the cost of nuclear power plants and the time to build them, but ignore that all the power plants bui

This is the classic anti-nuclear rhetoric Always bring up the cost of nuclear power plants and the time to build them, but ignore that all the power plants built in the US in recent years use 1950s technology and are made expensive by 50 years of excessive regulation driven by fear.

pstuart 3y ago
Theoretically the regulation was known at bidding time and factored in. Or they didn't understand them and were caught by surprise. Or perhaps they did understand and lied by underbidding? I was anti-nuke when I was younger but recognize we fucked up terribly by not getting nuclear right and have now cooked the planet. The appealing solution (to me) is to get SMRs into play with their associated promises of cost control and safety. My understanding is the blocker is really the existing insiders of the nuclear industry who see it as a threat to their work.
- imperfectcats 3y ago
  I wish regulation worked that way! Regulations change all the time - if not in law certainly in practice/interpretation. That is what makes industries with heavy regulation such risky investments.
  - pstuart 3y ago
    I searched for info on the cost overruns and it appears that management failures contributed significantly. An anti-nuke lawsuit didn't help but appeared to be $1B in impact. We see consistently that big projects never come in on time and budget, which is why SMRs are the only economical way forward.
BenFranklin100 3y ago
To further your point, almost all nuclear power plants to date have essentially been customized, one-off projects built by inexperienced teams. If we built exactly the same design tens to the low hundreds of times by the same handful of teams, the cost per unit would be dramatically lower. This is especially true of the modern, safer, and more cost effective designs.
- laurencerowe 3y ago
  Have any of these modern cost effective designs been built yet? All of the third generation EPR projects being built in Europe have run hugely over budget. I really thought if anyone could build nuclear plants cost effectively it would have been France so it's really made me lose hope in nuclear power.
  - ETH_start 3y ago
    Wind and especially solar were massively subsidized for decades before accumulated innovations from the subsidized at-scale manufacturing, and economies of scale, pushed prices per unit down to levels that are competitive in the market. What nuclear needs is massive subsidies, especially in reactors using small modular designs that are more amenable to mass-manufacturing techniques and transportability, and it needs them sustained for decades until the competitive forces of the large market for SMRs has brought the price of reactors down to levels where they're competitive in the market without subsidies, at which point the growth of privately funded nuclear power would be self-sustaining.
    - laurencerowe 3y ago
      The question is will these massive subsidises be better spent on nuclear or renewables and storage? Over the years nuclear has enjoyed enormous subsidies. If it were not for the huge decrease in costs for renewables over the past couple of decades and huge increase in cost for nuclear I’d be much more enthusiastic about nuclear power.
      - Gud 3y ago
        On both. Oil, gas and coal are the enemy here, not nuclear. I can’t believe that people are still arguing against nuclear. It’s an extremely proven technology. It can be built fast, cheap and safely.
        laurencerowe 3y ago
lamontcg 3y ago
> made expensive by 50 years of excessive regulation driven by fear. they're expensive because we can't build ANYTHING big in this country without cost overruns.
paulddraper 3y ago
Correct. All the "cost estimates" are far higher than the ACTUAL COSTS with 70-year-old technology. Maddening.

pstuart 3y ago

Theoretically the regulation was known at bidding time and factored in. Or they didn't understand them and were caught by surprise. Or perhaps they did understand and lied by underbidding? I was anti-nuke when I was younger but recognize we fucked up terribly by not getting nuclear right and have now cooked the planet. The appealing solution (to me) is to get SMRs into play with their associated promises of cost control and safety. My understanding is the blocker is really the existing insiders of the nuclear industry who see it as a threat to their work.

imperfectcats 3y ago
I wish regulation worked that way! Regulations change all the time - if not in law certainly in practice/interpretation. That is what makes industries with heavy regulation such risky investments.
- pstuart 3y ago
  I searched for info on the cost overruns and it appears that management failures contributed significantly. An anti-nuke lawsuit didn't help but appeared to be $1B in impact. We see consistently that big projects never come in on time and budget, which is why SMRs are the only economical way forward.

BenFranklin100 3y ago

To further your point, almost all nuclear power plants to date have essentially been customized, one-off projects built by inexperienced teams. If we built exactly the same design tens to the low hundreds of times by the same handful of teams, the cost per unit would be dramatically lower. This is especially true of the modern, safer, and more cost effective designs.

laurencerowe 3y ago
Have any of these modern cost effective designs been built yet? All of the third generation EPR projects being built in Europe have run hugely over budget. I really thought if anyone could build nuclear plants cost effectively it would have been France so it's really made me lose hope in nuclear power.
- ETH_start 3y ago
  Wind and especially solar were massively subsidized for decades before accumulated innovations from the subsidized at-scale manufacturing, and economies of scale, pushed prices per unit down to levels that are competitive in the market. What nuclear needs is massive subsidies, especially in reactors using small modular designs that are more amenable to mass-manufacturing techniques and transportability, and it needs them sustained for decades until the competitive forces of the large market for SMRs has brought the price of reactors down to levels where they're competitive in the market without subsidies, at which point the growth of privately funded nuclear power would be self-sustaining.
  - laurencerowe 3y ago
    The question is will these massive subsidises be better spent on nuclear or renewables and storage? Over the years nuclear has enjoyed enormous subsidies. If it were not for the huge decrease in costs for renewables over the past couple of decades and huge increase in cost for nuclear I’d be much more enthusiastic about nuclear power.
    - Gud 3y ago
      On both. Oil, gas and coal are the enemy here, not nuclear. I can’t believe that people are still arguing against nuclear. It’s an extremely proven technology. It can be built fast, cheap and safely.
      - laurencerowe 3y ago

lamontcg 3y ago

> made expensive by 50 years of excessive regulation driven by fear. they're expensive because we can't build ANYTHING big in this country without cost overruns.

paulddraper 3y ago

Correct. All the "cost estimates" are far higher than the ACTUAL COSTS with 70-year-old technology. Maddening.