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Nuclear power is used to provide baseline grid capacity. You can't just burn more or less uranium/plutonium as demand changes with the reactors that are in serv
by User23 3y ago
Nuclear power is used to provide baseline grid capacity. You can't just burn more or less uranium/plutonium as demand changes with the reactors that are in service. On the margins the surge demand largely comes from hydrocarbons, because you can just burn more or less coal, oil, or gas. Thus electric vehicles that tax the grid are going to result in new power being added as needed, and it will be nearly all from hydrocarbons.
- myself248 3y agoMost EVs charge at night, which is typically the time of lowest grid demand, and used to set the operating point of base-load plants like nuclear and coal. Raising the demand at night will disproportionately come from nuclear, and if anything by raising the baseline, it'll mean those nuclear plants are running more around the clock _decreasing_ the amount of gas peakers needed during the day.
- goodSteveramos 3y agoThis is totally wrong. Nuclear has a very low marginal operating cost and to maximize return on investment Nuclear plants run at 100% of their allowed output irrespective of demand. Increases in the price of baseload power are unlikely as intermittent sources like wind and solar contribute a higher fraction of power. In particular, midday solar output will lower the baseload far below the current low point at night.
- seanmcdirmid 3y agoYou can, however, charge your EV at night. Natural gas and hydro work well with nuclear, you can fire them up at peak and wind them down at night. Bonus if you can do pumped storage using extra power at night from the nuclear plant, but I don't hear that happening much in practice.