5 ms·
We have yet to see, as they've yet to truly enter the market. So far, the record's not been good for large plants -- they tend to go way over budget and schedu
by pstuart 3y ago
We have yet to see, as they've yet to truly enter the market.
So far, the record's not been good for large plants -- they tend to go way over budget and schedule. Case in point: Vogtle.
- Animats 3y agoNuScale's price has already gone 60%-70% over budget, and they haven't even built anything yet.[1] [1] https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/Are-Small-Scale-Modular-Reactors-Becoming-Too-Expensive.html https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/Are-Sm...
- pstuart 3y agoThe factors cited were inflation and higher interest rates, which are going to be universally applicable. Cost overruns at Vogtle and others had inflation as a partial factor but the bigger issues, per the DOE: "Work began with incomplete designs and managers repeatedly failed to realistically schedule tasks. Experienced workers were in short supply and defective work often had to be redone. Workers quit for other jobs and the COVID-19 pandemic led to high absenteeism." So a pass on Covid impact but the rest is the result of building a huge bespoke power plant. SMRs change all of that to units of mass production. I'm sure there's still issues to solve there but if nuclear has a future competing against low cost renewables then that SMRs seem to be the only way forward.
- fodkodrasz 3y agoThat is mostly because there are no more large scale nuclear investments, lot of knowhow has been lost, everything is custom built now on every level of implementation (which SMRs promise to solve), and because people care about the initial investments, not for the TCO. Oh, and politically motivated NIH red-tape for getting some votes on the cost of whole society.
- cinntaile 3y agoNuclear benefits from stable output, but the world we're in doesn't require stable output so the economics become difficult.
- fodkodrasz 3y agoThis is not true.
- cinntaile 3y agoYou really refuted my argument there.
- fodkodrasz 3y agoI'm simply tired of wasting time on renewable-energy-battery-storage fan service. We need stable power output.
- cinntaile 3y agoI don't get it, I didn't mention any of that? You're refusing to answer due to an imaginary reason you yourself came up with... Alright then.
- kwhitefoot 3y agoYou didn't make an argument, you merely stated something that the respondent disputes. There is a very stable base load in most countries that can be well provided with nuclear. This is especially the case when there are good interconnections between neighbouring countries.
- cyberax 3y agoRosatom is exporting nuclear power plants within budget and (mostly) on time. It's simply a question of expertise and experience. The US and Europe have ignored nuclear power for so long, that most expertise was lost long ago. And each new nuclear power plant becomes a unique snowflake.