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Public financial and in-kind support for nuclear power is transferring wealth from taxpayers to large corporations. Nuclear might be worth it to reduce climate

Public financial and in-kind support for nuclear power is transferring wealth from taxpayers to large corporations. Nuclear might be worth it to reduce climate change (a discussion for a different subthread) but let's be careful of corporate welfare. At least, find a way for that wealth transfer to reach the public, not the shareholders.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
Lonestar1440 3y ago
Couldn't we say the same about any public subsidy for climate-friendly technology (or anything at all)? What makes Nuclear special, and worth singling out?
- wolverine876 3y ago
  Two reasons: First, nuclear requires very large corporations. Other energy sources don't require size to the same degree. Solar panels can be purchased by the homeowner and installed by a local Mom-and-Pop shop. Second, it depends on how we define 'public subsidy'. If we accurately price externalities, such as climate impact, then we are effectively reducing subsidies (i.e., letting people use the commons for free is a subsidy).
  - Sanzig 3y ago
    > First, nuclear requires very large corporations. Nuclear power plants can be state-owned, and commonly are outside the US. For example, all Canadian nuclear power reactors are owned by provincial governments (about half of Ontario's reactors are on long term lease to a private operator under a public-private partnership deal, but the reactors are still government owned). In France, the company which owns and operates all the reactors in the country is majority owned by the French state. Requiring generating assets to be owned and operated by private enterprises seems to be a primarily American phenomenon.
    - wolverine876 3y ago
      Yes, good point, and IMHO that solves the problem I raised in the root comment: Instead of public funding going to private corporations' assets, the public keeps the assets.
xxpor 3y ago
The TVA exists. Only reason we can't do more of that is politics.
- Sanzig 3y ago
  All of Canada's power reactors are government owned, with about half of them operated by a private operator under long-term lease (Bruce Power) and the other half operated directly by provincial crown corporations. Additionally, essentially all of Canada's large hydroelectric facilities (gigawatt scale) are also owned and operated by provincial crown corporations. Some projects are simply too large with too long a payback period for private investment.
crhulls 3y ago
I see this comment regularly. I also see the complete opposite comment regularly (that even the unsubsidized fully loaded cost with current technology is far cheaper than anything else). It is usually stated as fact with no backup. I’m open to being swayed either way by evidence. Do you have a link that represents the data that leads you to this conclusion? And ditto for those who disagree with you. Otherwise it’s just random people saying the other person is wrong.
- wolverine876 3y ago
  I don't understand your comment. > even the unsubsidized fully loaded cost with current technology is far cheaper than anything else What in the GP addresses that question? What I mean to say doesn't require data, but perhaps I didn't communicate well.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > usually stated as fact with no backup It usually comes down to two factors. One, the time horizon over which we observe and discount the levelised cost of energy (unsubsidised) relative to the plant’s lifetime. Nukes’ long lives mean their tremendous capital costs’ amortisation matters. In this, the anti-nuke tends to fudge its numbers. Two, the degree to which we believe the Nth model will be cheaper than the 1st. We’ve built two AP1000s in America, both in the same series. China has built four, one in just nine years (multi-year delay for coolant pumps), in two roughly-parallel series. So the anti-nukes’ too-slow argument is bunk. But the pro-nuke team needs a learning curve barely demonstrated in another country to continue. The meta-debate, however, is between and and or. I’ve seen no good reason not to pursue both building nukes, where the cost curve is unknown, and building wind and solar, where the details around storage (and how we’ll pay for it) is unknown.
  - ViewTrick1002 3y ago
    > One, the time horizon over which we observe and discount the levelised cost of energy (unsubsidised) relative to the plant’s lifetime. Nukes’ long lives mean their tremendous capital costs’ amortisation matters. In this, the anti-nuke tends to fudge its numbers. What long economic payback time means is that the risks are huge. A 15 year construction and 40 year payback time and we are in the 1960s. A 60 year payback time and it's 1940s and the second world war is raging. How reasonable is it for Churchill, FDR and Stalin to predict energy investments that they only expect to get returns on in the 2020s? All while competing solutions are already eating nuclear energy's lunch. Trying to use long amortization is simply a crutch by people who do not understand basic economics. You can extend the amortization for renewables power plants with similar effects. The chosen 20 years are simply because it is more economically efficient to replace them early, because what we expect to have available in 20 years are so much better that the economic efficiency gains are worth it. Engineering a renewable plant for 40 or 60 years is trivial, it simply is not worth it. A read for you is: "Understanding the Time Value of Money" https://www.investopedia.com/articles/03/082703.asp https://www.investopedia.com/articles/03/082703.asp
thelastgallon 3y ago
Can we start with corporate welfare of fossil fuel companies? Fossil fuel companies take in welfare of trillions of dollars per year and cause 10 million deaths/year from air pollution. Deaths per TWH is negligible from nuclear or renewables, compared to fossil fuels.[1-5] And then ethanol subsidies. 40m acres are subsidies to grow corn for ethanol, which is a net energy loss. [6,7] 1) https://e360.yale.edu/digest/fossil-fuel-subsidies-2022 https://e360.yale.edu/digest/fossil-fuel-subsidies-2022 2) Last year, fuels that drive climate change and pollute the air were underpriced to the tune of $7 trillion. It’s hard to think of a more misguided policy: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-10-16/climate-change-why-are-governments-still-subsidizing-fossil-fuels https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-10-16/climat... 4) Air Pollution Kills 10 Million People a Year. Why Do We Accept That as Normal?: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/08/opinion/environment/air-pollution-deaths-climate-change.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/08/opinion/environment/air-p... 5) https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-production-per-twh https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-p... 6) Ethanol is a net energy-loser. According to their calculations, ethanol contains about 76,000 BTUs6per gallon, but producing that ethanol from corn takes about 98,000 BTUs: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2005/07/the-stupidest-federal-subsidy.html https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2005/07/the-stupidest-fe... 7) https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/acre-corn-grown-ethanol-vs-solar-panels-environment-farmers-nussey/ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/acre-corn-grown-ethanol-vs-so...
- wolverine876 3y ago
  I'm not sure I understand. Of course we should cut corporate welfare to fossil fuel companies. Does that somehow mean we should supply it to nuclear power companies?
  - peterfirefly 3y ago
    It matters for cost comparisons.
  - thelastgallon 3y ago
    How do you level the playing field of past 100 years of fossil fuel subsidies? I think its fair to subsidize nuclear, wind and solar. If renewables + nuclear are subsidized to the same level as fossil fuels (trillions/year), in 10 years we'll have super cheap, clean, abundant energy.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

Lonestar1440 3y ago

Couldn't we say the same about any public subsidy for climate-friendly technology (or anything at all)? What makes Nuclear special, and worth singling out?

wolverine876 3y ago
Two reasons: First, nuclear requires very large corporations. Other energy sources don't require size to the same degree. Solar panels can be purchased by the homeowner and installed by a local Mom-and-Pop shop. Second, it depends on how we define 'public subsidy'. If we accurately price externalities, such as climate impact, then we are effectively reducing subsidies (i.e., letting people use the commons for free is a subsidy).
- Sanzig 3y ago
  > First, nuclear requires very large corporations. Nuclear power plants can be state-owned, and commonly are outside the US. For example, all Canadian nuclear power reactors are owned by provincial governments (about half of Ontario's reactors are on long term lease to a private operator under a public-private partnership deal, but the reactors are still government owned). In France, the company which owns and operates all the reactors in the country is majority owned by the French state. Requiring generating assets to be owned and operated by private enterprises seems to be a primarily American phenomenon.
  - wolverine876 3y ago
    Yes, good point, and IMHO that solves the problem I raised in the root comment: Instead of public funding going to private corporations' assets, the public keeps the assets.

xxpor 3y ago

The TVA exists. Only reason we can't do more of that is politics.

Sanzig 3y ago
All of Canada's power reactors are government owned, with about half of them operated by a private operator under long-term lease (Bruce Power) and the other half operated directly by provincial crown corporations. Additionally, essentially all of Canada's large hydroelectric facilities (gigawatt scale) are also owned and operated by provincial crown corporations. Some projects are simply too large with too long a payback period for private investment.

crhulls 3y ago

I see this comment regularly. I also see the complete opposite comment regularly (that even the unsubsidized fully loaded cost with current technology is far cheaper than anything else). It is usually stated as fact with no backup. I’m open to being swayed either way by evidence. Do you have a link that represents the data that leads you to this conclusion? And ditto for those who disagree with you. Otherwise it’s just random people saying the other person is wrong.

wolverine876 3y ago
I don't understand your comment. > even the unsubsidized fully loaded cost with current technology is far cheaper than anything else What in the GP addresses that question? What I mean to say doesn't require data, but perhaps I didn't communicate well.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> usually stated as fact with no backup It usually comes down to two factors. One, the time horizon over which we observe and discount the levelised cost of energy (unsubsidised) relative to the plant’s lifetime. Nukes’ long lives mean their tremendous capital costs’ amortisation matters. In this, the anti-nuke tends to fudge its numbers. Two, the degree to which we believe the Nth model will be cheaper than the 1st. We’ve built two AP1000s in America, both in the same series. China has built four, one in just nine years (multi-year delay for coolant pumps), in two roughly-parallel series. So the anti-nukes’ too-slow argument is bunk. But the pro-nuke team needs a learning curve barely demonstrated in another country to continue. The meta-debate, however, is between and and or. I’ve seen no good reason not to pursue both building nukes, where the cost curve is unknown, and building wind and solar, where the details around storage (and how we’ll pay for it) is unknown.
- ViewTrick1002 3y ago
  > One, the time horizon over which we observe and discount the levelised cost of energy (unsubsidised) relative to the plant’s lifetime. Nukes’ long lives mean their tremendous capital costs’ amortisation matters. In this, the anti-nuke tends to fudge its numbers. What long economic payback time means is that the risks are huge. A 15 year construction and 40 year payback time and we are in the 1960s. A 60 year payback time and it's 1940s and the second world war is raging. How reasonable is it for Churchill, FDR and Stalin to predict energy investments that they only expect to get returns on in the 2020s? All while competing solutions are already eating nuclear energy's lunch. Trying to use long amortization is simply a crutch by people who do not understand basic economics. You can extend the amortization for renewables power plants with similar effects. The chosen 20 years are simply because it is more economically efficient to replace them early, because what we expect to have available in 20 years are so much better that the economic efficiency gains are worth it. Engineering a renewable plant for 40 or 60 years is trivial, it simply is not worth it. A read for you is: "Understanding the Time Value of Money" https://www.investopedia.com/articles/03/082703.asp https://www.investopedia.com/articles/03/082703.asp

thelastgallon 3y ago

Can we start with corporate welfare of fossil fuel companies? Fossil fuel companies take in welfare of trillions of dollars per year and cause 10 million deaths/year from air pollution. Deaths per TWH is negligible from nuclear or renewables, compared to fossil fuels.[1-5] And then ethanol subsidies. 40m acres are subsidies to grow corn for ethanol, which is a net energy loss. [6,7] 1) https://e360.yale.edu/digest/fossil-fuel-subsidies-2022 https://e360.yale.edu/digest/fossil-fuel-subsidies-2022 2) Last year, fuels that drive climate change and pollute the air were underpriced to the tune of $7 trillion. It’s hard to think of a more misguided policy: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-10-16/climate-change-why-are-governments-still-subsidizing-fossil-fuels https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-10-16/climat... 4) Air Pollution Kills 10 Million People a Year. Why Do We Accept That as Normal?: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/08/opinion/environment/air-pollution-deaths-climate-change.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/08/opinion/environment/air-p... 5) https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-production-per-twh https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/death-rates-from-energy-p... 6) Ethanol is a net energy-loser. According to their calculations, ethanol contains about 76,000 BTUs6per gallon, but producing that ethanol from corn takes about 98,000 BTUs: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2005/07/the-stupidest-federal-subsidy.html https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2005/07/the-stupidest-fe... 7) https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/acre-corn-grown-ethanol-vs-solar-panels-environment-farmers-nussey/ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/acre-corn-grown-ethanol-vs-so...

wolverine876 3y ago
I'm not sure I understand. Of course we should cut corporate welfare to fossil fuel companies. Does that somehow mean we should supply it to nuclear power companies?
- peterfirefly 3y ago
  It matters for cost comparisons.
- thelastgallon 3y ago
  How do you level the playing field of past 100 years of fossil fuel subsidies? I think its fair to subsidize nuclear, wind and solar. If renewables + nuclear are subsidized to the same level as fossil fuels (trillions/year), in 10 years we'll have super cheap, clean, abundant energy.