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There are good reasons to reject nuclear power on purely historic analyses of the projected vs actual costs of nuclear projects[0] It is very disheartening in

There are good reasons to reject nuclear power on purely historic analyses of the projected vs actual costs of nuclear projects[0] It is very disheartening in Australia to listen to the Nimby objections to wind and solar farms in a country that is almost uniquely empty. I cannot imagine that objections to the location of nuclear power here would be any different. [0] https://www.crikey.com.au/2023/08/29/nuclear-power-small-modular-reactors-climate-change/ https://www.crikey.com.au/2023/08/29/nuclear-power-small-mod...

sofixa 3y ago
> There are good reasons to reject nuclear power on purely historic analyses of the projected vs actual costs of nuclear projects That is if you forget to factor in the lifespan of nuclear projects, which is easily 2-3 times longer than solar and wind, and doesn't require associated (not yet existing) massive storage. (Not saying this for Australia specifically, there is no nuclear industry there whatsoever so any new project will have significant human resource obstacles on top of all others; just as a general point which is so often forgotten).
- invalidname 3y ago
  As far Storage has become very cheap at grid scale e.g. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09-12/is-renewable-power-cheaper-than-coal-nuclear-malcolm-turnbull/11495558 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09-12/is-renewable-power-ch... This is an older article. As far as I understand this is even more in favor of green energy now.
- hathchip 3y ago
  > and doesn't require associated (not yet existing) massive storage. That's not quite true. Nuclear generation is more flexible than wind and solar but much less flexible than thermal fuels, particularly gas. Although you can choose when you turn a nuclear power station on and off, you can't do so quickly, and your choices are somewhat constrained (regular downtime is required). Nuclear worked well in the energy mix when it supplied base load (ie generate roughly the minimum daily load at all times) while coal supplied predictable peak load and gas could supply unexpected peaking. As this mix changes, availability patterns of nuclear start to be more of a burden. In a system without fossil fuels, you would have to have (some) energy storage, regardless of the split between nuclear, solar and wind. The exact number for how much storage, how much overcapacity, or how much natural gas generation you would need vary with the proportions of solar, wind and nuclear of course, but it's an oversimplification to suggest that they are trivial if you use mainly nuclear.
  - MagnumOpus 3y ago
    To simplify without oversimplifying: Modern nuclear plants can change between 30% and 100% of nameplate capacity within half an hour, and that's how they operate in France for instance. While coal plants might rev up from 75% to 100% in a twice-daily shift change, but are clearly not set up to run at minimal loads. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load-following_power_plant#Nuclear_power_plants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load-following_power_plant#Nuc...
- sligor 3y ago
  > lifespan of nuclear projects, which is easily 2-3 times longer than solar and wind Not sure it is a really solid argument. For wind maybe yes, but life expectancy of solar panels is about 40 years (warranty are 25-30 years but are pessimistic with margins). And with very low maintenance during the lifespan and easy replacement. Nuclear reactors have 60 years lifespan yes, but with massive continuous maintenance during the life cycle.
- Retric 3y ago
  If people had been responsibly building nuclear 20 years ago the world would be better off today, but today ramping up storage and renewables seems like a better use of R&D investments and subsidies. Nuclear and solar can each scale to ~40% of the annual supply for most grids without storage, but for different reasons they both need increasing amounts of storage as you ramp them past that point. Solar because the sun doesn’t shine at night and peak consumption is mornings and evening, but Nuclear because demand varies though the day and season while the costs per kWh increase the more its capacity factor drops. France both had lower capacity factors and exchanged a great deal of power with its largely non nuclear neighbors. Exchanging power with less nuclear countries doesn’t scale to a worldwide increase in nuclear. However nuclear also costs more per kWh as a baseline and runs into similar problems as the percentage of solar energy increases. Without storage, a 20% solar 30% nuclear grid is less profitable for nuclear than a 10% solar 30% nuclear grid. Given the long lifespans of nuclear power plants nobody wants to invest in nuclear if it’s expected to be unprofitable 20+ years from now.
  - Ajedi32 3y ago
    > Nuclear and solar can each scale to ~40% of the annual supply for most grids without storage, but for different reasons they both need increasing amounts of storage as you ramp them past that point. Is that actually true for nuclear? I did a brief search and it seems like in France at least, many reactors can adjust their power output at a rate of about 1% per minute[1], with some even as high as 5% per minute, which seems like plenty to me. You'll probably need some storage, sure, but a heck of lot less when you only need <10 minutes of backup power before the reactors can kick back on (compared to a grid based entirely on unreliable energy sources like solar and wind, for which you could have occasional dry periods of low generation lasting days or weeks). [1]: https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2021-12/technical_and_economic_aspects_of_load_following_with_nuclear_power_plants.pdf https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2021-12...
    - Retric 3y ago
      The important bit here is capacity factor as someone is losing money when a nuclear reactor is sitting around not generating 100% power. Globally the majority of nuclear reactors have a capacity factor of around 90-92% which means the vast majority of the time they’re getting paid something for generating electricity. France varied quite a bit but was generally below 80%. Now that doesn’t sound that bad as their cost per kWh only went up by ~15%, but they where also exporting nuclear energy at a loss at night and the weekend to countries that didn’t use much nuclear. If every country tried to go 50+% nuclear then everyone would have a surplus on nights and weekends driving those capacity factors down even further and thus cost per kWh even higher. France massively subsidized consumer’s electricity prices using taxpayer money, so it wasn’t that obvious to the consumer how expensive it was. However, it’s hard to justify such expenses when there are cheaper alternatives.
- imtringued 3y ago
  I'm sorry but the lifespan of the power plant is irrelevant. LCoE is measured in dollars per MWh. If your powerplant is projected to go from $55/MWh to $110/MWh no amount of lifespan doubling is going to change that.
  - sofixa 3y ago
    It's not irrelevant. The cost to construct the nuclear power plant is very high, and is the main part of the price, and if it's amortised over 20 years, the cost of MWh produced is higher than if it's amortised over a more realistic 50 or 70 years.
    - Gwypaas 3y ago
      Locking up capital for 70 to 80 years? Do you know about the time value of money? [1] What you are proposing is FDR and Churchill sitting at the Casablanca Conference at the height of the second world war in 1943 [2] planning out economic investments that will be returned in 2023. Does that sound reasonable? Likewise, a renewable plant that makes the money back in ~25 years allows the investor to reconsider the investment decision and better optimize the capital allocation two times while the ones building nuclear are still paying for the nuclear plant. The renewable owner could after 50 years decide to invest in nuclear. I wonder which is more efficient? [1]: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/03/082703.asp https://www.investopedia.com/articles/03/082703.asp [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casablanca_Conference https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casablanca_Conference
- ZeroGravitas 3y ago
  The lifespan is included in these calculations already. This actually favours nuclear since they generally assume that a nuclear plant will be able to sell all its produced energy over many decades, even as solar is predicted to be cheaper than just their running costs for much of that time period.
WJW 3y ago
Sure but the objections Greenpeace has historically had with nuclear power have very little to do with how much it does or doesn't cost.
- smackeyacky 3y ago
  That is true
gonzo41 3y ago
I was at a dinner with people who were at the Franklin Dam protests. I remarked off hand that in hindsight it would have enabled a great pumped hydro opportunity for Tasmania. The looks were intense. There's a certain pragmatism that we need to adopt as we hurtle into the middle of the climate crisis. Seeing a lot of wind Tubines and solar panels on the landscape is a small sacrifice that we should be willing to pay. And it's not like they make the land unusable. Live stock don't mind turbine, and love to graze in the shade of solar panels.
djohnston 3y ago
You're conveniently omitting that a lot of these costs are driven by onerous regulations and delays put in place by the same anti-nuclear activists. You can't simultaneously lobby for bloating the costs and then use those bloated costs as evidence against nuclear's effectiveness.

sofixa 3y ago

> There are good reasons to reject nuclear power on purely historic analyses of the projected vs actual costs of nuclear projects That is if you forget to factor in the lifespan of nuclear projects, which is easily 2-3 times longer than solar and wind, and doesn't require associated (not yet existing) massive storage. (Not saying this for Australia specifically, there is no nuclear industry there whatsoever so any new project will have significant human resource obstacles on top of all others; just as a general point which is so often forgotten).

invalidname 3y ago
As far Storage has become very cheap at grid scale e.g. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09-12/is-renewable-power-cheaper-than-coal-nuclear-malcolm-turnbull/11495558 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09-12/is-renewable-power-ch... This is an older article. As far as I understand this is even more in favor of green energy now.
hathchip 3y ago
> and doesn't require associated (not yet existing) massive storage. That's not quite true. Nuclear generation is more flexible than wind and solar but much less flexible than thermal fuels, particularly gas. Although you can choose when you turn a nuclear power station on and off, you can't do so quickly, and your choices are somewhat constrained (regular downtime is required). Nuclear worked well in the energy mix when it supplied base load (ie generate roughly the minimum daily load at all times) while coal supplied predictable peak load and gas could supply unexpected peaking. As this mix changes, availability patterns of nuclear start to be more of a burden. In a system without fossil fuels, you would have to have (some) energy storage, regardless of the split between nuclear, solar and wind. The exact number for how much storage, how much overcapacity, or how much natural gas generation you would need vary with the proportions of solar, wind and nuclear of course, but it's an oversimplification to suggest that they are trivial if you use mainly nuclear.
- MagnumOpus 3y ago
  To simplify without oversimplifying: Modern nuclear plants can change between 30% and 100% of nameplate capacity within half an hour, and that's how they operate in France for instance. While coal plants might rev up from 75% to 100% in a twice-daily shift change, but are clearly not set up to run at minimal loads. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load-following_power_plant#Nuclear_power_plants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load-following_power_plant#Nuc...
sligor 3y ago
> lifespan of nuclear projects, which is easily 2-3 times longer than solar and wind Not sure it is a really solid argument. For wind maybe yes, but life expectancy of solar panels is about 40 years (warranty are 25-30 years but are pessimistic with margins). And with very low maintenance during the lifespan and easy replacement. Nuclear reactors have 60 years lifespan yes, but with massive continuous maintenance during the life cycle.
Retric 3y ago
If people had been responsibly building nuclear 20 years ago the world would be better off today, but today ramping up storage and renewables seems like a better use of R&D investments and subsidies. Nuclear and solar can each scale to ~40% of the annual supply for most grids without storage, but for different reasons they both need increasing amounts of storage as you ramp them past that point. Solar because the sun doesn’t shine at night and peak consumption is mornings and evening, but Nuclear because demand varies though the day and season while the costs per kWh increase the more its capacity factor drops. France both had lower capacity factors and exchanged a great deal of power with its largely non nuclear neighbors. Exchanging power with less nuclear countries doesn’t scale to a worldwide increase in nuclear. However nuclear also costs more per kWh as a baseline and runs into similar problems as the percentage of solar energy increases. Without storage, a 20% solar 30% nuclear grid is less profitable for nuclear than a 10% solar 30% nuclear grid. Given the long lifespans of nuclear power plants nobody wants to invest in nuclear if it’s expected to be unprofitable 20+ years from now.
- Ajedi32 3y ago
  > Nuclear and solar can each scale to ~40% of the annual supply for most grids without storage, but for different reasons they both need increasing amounts of storage as you ramp them past that point. Is that actually true for nuclear? I did a brief search and it seems like in France at least, many reactors can adjust their power output at a rate of about 1% per minute[1], with some even as high as 5% per minute, which seems like plenty to me. You'll probably need some storage, sure, but a heck of lot less when you only need <10 minutes of backup power before the reactors can kick back on (compared to a grid based entirely on unreliable energy sources like solar and wind, for which you could have occasional dry periods of low generation lasting days or weeks). [1]: https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2021-12/technical_and_economic_aspects_of_load_following_with_nuclear_power_plants.pdf https://www.oecd-nea.org/upload/docs/application/pdf/2021-12...
  - Retric 3y ago
    The important bit here is capacity factor as someone is losing money when a nuclear reactor is sitting around not generating 100% power. Globally the majority of nuclear reactors have a capacity factor of around 90-92% which means the vast majority of the time they’re getting paid something for generating electricity. France varied quite a bit but was generally below 80%. Now that doesn’t sound that bad as their cost per kWh only went up by ~15%, but they where also exporting nuclear energy at a loss at night and the weekend to countries that didn’t use much nuclear. If every country tried to go 50+% nuclear then everyone would have a surplus on nights and weekends driving those capacity factors down even further and thus cost per kWh even higher. France massively subsidized consumer’s electricity prices using taxpayer money, so it wasn’t that obvious to the consumer how expensive it was. However, it’s hard to justify such expenses when there are cheaper alternatives.
imtringued 3y ago
I'm sorry but the lifespan of the power plant is irrelevant. LCoE is measured in dollars per MWh. If your powerplant is projected to go from $55/MWh to $110/MWh no amount of lifespan doubling is going to change that.
- sofixa 3y ago
  It's not irrelevant. The cost to construct the nuclear power plant is very high, and is the main part of the price, and if it's amortised over 20 years, the cost of MWh produced is higher than if it's amortised over a more realistic 50 or 70 years.
  - Gwypaas 3y ago
    Locking up capital for 70 to 80 years? Do you know about the time value of money? [1] What you are proposing is FDR and Churchill sitting at the Casablanca Conference at the height of the second world war in 1943 [2] planning out economic investments that will be returned in 2023. Does that sound reasonable? Likewise, a renewable plant that makes the money back in ~25 years allows the investor to reconsider the investment decision and better optimize the capital allocation two times while the ones building nuclear are still paying for the nuclear plant. The renewable owner could after 50 years decide to invest in nuclear. I wonder which is more efficient? [1]: https://www.investopedia.com/articles/03/082703.asp https://www.investopedia.com/articles/03/082703.asp [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casablanca_Conference https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casablanca_Conference
ZeroGravitas 3y ago
The lifespan is included in these calculations already. This actually favours nuclear since they generally assume that a nuclear plant will be able to sell all its produced energy over many decades, even as solar is predicted to be cheaper than just their running costs for much of that time period.

WJW 3y ago

Sure but the objections Greenpeace has historically had with nuclear power have very little to do with how much it does or doesn't cost.

smackeyacky 3y ago
That is true

gonzo41 3y ago

I was at a dinner with people who were at the Franklin Dam protests. I remarked off hand that in hindsight it would have enabled a great pumped hydro opportunity for Tasmania. The looks were intense. There's a certain pragmatism that we need to adopt as we hurtle into the middle of the climate crisis. Seeing a lot of wind Tubines and solar panels on the landscape is a small sacrifice that we should be willing to pay. And it's not like they make the land unusable. Live stock don't mind turbine, and love to graze in the shade of solar panels.

djohnston 3y ago

You're conveniently omitting that a lot of these costs are driven by onerous regulations and delays put in place by the same anti-nuclear activists. You can't simultaneously lobby for bloating the costs and then use those bloated costs as evidence against nuclear's effectiveness.