3 ms·

And after those subsidies stopped, the progress of nuclear power also stopped, naturally. If the subsidies continued, we could have had scalable, sustainable an

by donny2018 3y ago

And after those subsidies stopped, the progress of nuclear power also stopped, naturally. If the subsidies continued, we could have had scalable, sustainable and affordable nuclear. I believe that Renewables should be subsidized, and current progress is great, but total decarbonization is easier to realistically achieve together with nuclear energy. If you support renewables, you don’t have to be anti-nuclear at all.

kragen 3y ago
agreed about being anti-nuclear. probably it is not in the interest of life forms made of atoms to be anti-nuclear it's plausible that further subsidies could have made nuclear power cheap. the long pole in the tent seems to be the cost of the steam turbine generator, though, which isn't cost-competitive with pv even if the heat to make the steam is free. this is after a century of improvements, and the steam turbine is the main electric power source of every rich economy in the world and most of the poor ones. so i'm not sure a few trillion dollars more in subsidies would change that
- donny2018 3y ago
  >the long pole in the tent seems to be the cost of the steam turbine generator And yet some "renewables-only" people want to rely on gas turbines for the times of unfavorable weather conditions. And, the turbines are still more efficient (46% efficiency with modern Siemens turbines), and the heat that isn't going into the turbine steam can still be used elsewhere, like for district heating or for industrial purposes, which makes the overall system very high yield. In comparison, photovoltaics is currently at 20% efficiency. Wind is at 60% but it's quite intermittent and unpredictable.
  - kragen 3y ago
    agreed a couple of quibbles, tho the efficiency of photovoltaics and wind is only relevant here if you're powering them from stored energy, such as white-hot graphite blocks, rather than from the sun. or in the far future when human energy consumption has grown by two orders of magnitude gas turbines are only 'renewables-only' if you make the gas from renewable energy
    - donny2018 3y ago
      >gas turbines are only 'renewables-only' if you make the gas from renewable energy There are ways to make hydrocarbons from atmospheric carbon (using any energy, including renewable) but that is nightmarishly inefficient. Anti-nuclear people's plan though is to use good ol' fossil gas for the times when the weather is unsuitable for renewables. >the efficiency of photovoltaics and wind is only relevant here if Agreed, you can disregard its efficiency if the source energy is free. Fission energy is so high yield that it's also basically free, just like the Sun or wind, with the difference of being able to increase/decrease production on demand. It's the infrastructure to extract that energy that costs money, and those costs could be improved with proper R&D, investments, subsidies and economies of scale, just like with renewables. I do believe nuclear is the part of the Solution together with renewables. At least we will need nuclear before solar extraction and storage are so advanced that they can power the grid all the time by themselves. Yes, that future is certainly is not very far away, but we can't afford much time to start decarbonizing.
      - kragen 3y ago
        fischer-tropsch is about 60% efficient https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer%E2%80%93Tropsch_process#Process_efficiency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer%E2%80%93Tropsch_proces... but that's being fed from energy that's already in the form of carbon water electrolysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolysis_of_water#Efficiency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolysis_of_water#Efficien... is about 80% efficient, except that there's an experimental capillary-fed process that is supposedly 98% efficient i wouldn't call that 'nightmarishly inefficient', particularly if you can do it at hours when electricity prices would otherwise be zero or negative because of abundant solar or wind power but i don't know how efficient carbon dioxide reduction is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_capture_and_utilization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_capture_and_utilization nuclear power plants are not normally highly dispatchable, though obviously the naval ones are
        donny2018 3y ago
        >water electrolysis ... 80% efficient It's only to get hydrogen, also there is cost to make it liquid, to store it (it's neither trivial nor cheap) and to extract energy from it in fuel cells. >i don't know how efficient carbon dioxide reduction is If we want to capture carbon from atmosphere and turn it back into hydrocarbon fuel like gas or diesel, thus achieving net zero emissions, that process is still "nightmarishly inefficient". There is a startup that I'm watching (Prometheus Fuels) that promises to do that cheaply, but there haven't been any positive news from them recently

kragen 3y ago

agreed about being anti-nuclear. probably it is not in the interest of life forms made of atoms to be anti-nuclear it's plausible that further subsidies could have made nuclear power cheap. the long pole in the tent seems to be the cost of the steam turbine generator, though, which isn't cost-competitive with pv even if the heat to make the steam is free. this is after a century of improvements, and the steam turbine is the main electric power source of every rich economy in the world and most of the poor ones. so i'm not sure a few trillion dollars more in subsidies would change that

donny2018 3y ago
>the long pole in the tent seems to be the cost of the steam turbine generator And yet some "renewables-only" people want to rely on gas turbines for the times of unfavorable weather conditions. And, the turbines are still more efficient (46% efficiency with modern Siemens turbines), and the heat that isn't going into the turbine steam can still be used elsewhere, like for district heating or for industrial purposes, which makes the overall system very high yield. In comparison, photovoltaics is currently at 20% efficiency. Wind is at 60% but it's quite intermittent and unpredictable.
- kragen 3y ago
  agreed a couple of quibbles, tho the efficiency of photovoltaics and wind is only relevant here if you're powering them from stored energy, such as white-hot graphite blocks, rather than from the sun. or in the far future when human energy consumption has grown by two orders of magnitude gas turbines are only 'renewables-only' if you make the gas from renewable energy
  - donny2018 3y ago
    >gas turbines are only 'renewables-only' if you make the gas from renewable energy There are ways to make hydrocarbons from atmospheric carbon (using any energy, including renewable) but that is nightmarishly inefficient. Anti-nuclear people's plan though is to use good ol' fossil gas for the times when the weather is unsuitable for renewables. >the efficiency of photovoltaics and wind is only relevant here if Agreed, you can disregard its efficiency if the source energy is free. Fission energy is so high yield that it's also basically free, just like the Sun or wind, with the difference of being able to increase/decrease production on demand. It's the infrastructure to extract that energy that costs money, and those costs could be improved with proper R&D, investments, subsidies and economies of scale, just like with renewables. I do believe nuclear is the part of the Solution together with renewables. At least we will need nuclear before solar extraction and storage are so advanced that they can power the grid all the time by themselves. Yes, that future is certainly is not very far away, but we can't afford much time to start decarbonizing.
    - kragen 3y ago
      fischer-tropsch is about 60% efficient https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer%E2%80%93Tropsch_process#Process_efficiency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer%E2%80%93Tropsch_proces... but that's being fed from energy that's already in the form of carbon water electrolysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolysis_of_water#Efficiency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolysis_of_water#Efficien... is about 80% efficient, except that there's an experimental capillary-fed process that is supposedly 98% efficient i wouldn't call that 'nightmarishly inefficient', particularly if you can do it at hours when electricity prices would otherwise be zero or negative because of abundant solar or wind power but i don't know how efficient carbon dioxide reduction is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_capture_and_utilization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_capture_and_utilization nuclear power plants are not normally highly dispatchable, though obviously the naval ones are
      - donny2018 3y ago
        >water electrolysis ... 80% efficient It's only to get hydrogen, also there is cost to make it liquid, to store it (it's neither trivial nor cheap) and to extract energy from it in fuel cells. >i don't know how efficient carbon dioxide reduction is If we want to capture carbon from atmosphere and turn it back into hydrocarbon fuel like gas or diesel, thus achieving net zero emissions, that process is still "nightmarishly inefficient". There is a startup that I'm watching (Prometheus Fuels) that promises to do that cheaply, but there haven't been any positive news from them recently