5 ms·

Nuclear Energy's Bottom Line: We used to build nuclear-power plants affordably

13 points by jseliger 2y ago

BMc2020 2y ago
TL:DR; As for how to make the economics work, there are two schools of thought...Both paths remain unproven. No one, not the Chinese, Russians, French, Koreans, Japanese, Isrealis or the Americans, has ever made civilian nuclear power profitable. It is always subsidised, typically for national security reasons. That's a perfectly legitimate reason. Energy security and food security is a very big deal to countries like Japan and Korea. Just stop spreading the zombie lie that nuclear is cheaper.
- throwaway1105q 2y ago
  Cheaper compared to what? In my country people recently installed a significant amount of small-scale solar (over 50k households in 2023 compared to 1000 in 2020), in addition to large scale solar and wind generators. Did our electricity get cheaper? No. It's more expensive than the worst year of the crisis after Russian invasion of Ukraine. Why? Because the national power grid operator had to increase their investment to stabilize the grid by 2 orders of magnitude, which means they will spend over 60% of the entire national budget during next 3 years - and somebody has to pay for that. That's a crazy amount and every single person here is unhappy about that. Nuclear might be more expensive per MWh pure electricity cost-wise, but the full system with storage, balancing and distribution costs is much more complicated=expensive now because of the renewables. It's funny that the same people who always talk about "hidden costs" and "unpriced externalities" of nuclear and fossil fuels never consider this. My country is backtracking its support for renewables and will build more nuclear instead. Unfortunately a lot of the damage is done and we can't stop all support as it's mandated by EU regulation. BTW why is Germany importing 2 GW of French nuclear electricity right now if it's so expensive and bad overall? And why is Germany burning so much coal it produces 9 GW right now, if renewables are so great? Let's not forget about the environment too - at this moment France is producing 16g of CO2/kWh, while Germany is at 375 average, and that coal burning causes 1000g/kWh. I hope they do pay for that, it seems kinda unfair that the French invested into clean energy but still have to breathe what the Germans are putting into the air...
  - tuatoru 2y ago
    It was always a silly idea to let domestic solar connect to the grid. Dual wiring systems inside the buildings was the way to go. But then I thought letting Turkey into NATO was stupid too, so what do I know?
    - addicted 2y ago
      Considering Turkey controls Black Sea access and it’s being in NATO meant that it was responsive to Western needs as opposed to being a Russian ally (which is what it’s naturally setup to do geographically, economically and politically) meant that Russia doesn’t have a full reign over the Black Sea and most obviously meant that Turkey was able to essentially force the grain deal which has kept the Ukrainian economy alive for a couple of years now. So including Turkey into NATO was a pretty great idea, both in the short and long terms simply because of their control over the Black Sea if nothing else (then producing some of the drones that probably kept the Ukrainians alive for months before the West really stepped in didn’t hurt either).
  - addicted 2y ago
    The only reason we have switching costs is that the grid system for nearly a century was designed for fossil fuels with essentially a hub and spoke system. This is an incredibly fragile system as we saw with the massive blackouts. Different technologies will obviously incur a switching cost. The reason Germany has to import that energy and burn coal is obvious. It decided to eliminate 30-40% of its power source nearly overnight. Is it really a shock that NEW renewables which are indeed that great but are barely a decade old in terms of being cost effective alternatives were not able to fully and immediately replace all that fossil fuel capacity and that Germany relied instead on existing decades old, existing but worse infrastructure.
    - throwaway1105q 2y ago
      There was no blackout in my country past 30 years. The last one was before the revolution, that was before we had enough nuclear. It's a shock that they have been investing incredible amounts of money into it for decades and still couldn't match the few nuclear reactors they turned off, indeed. At least they have the social/political argument - they turned the nukes off because they didn't like it. It's dumb but respectable. Lying about it being cheaper than nuclear is not respectable.
- Rury 2y ago
  To be fair, other forms of electricity generation are heavily subsidized as well. In fact, this is probably a large part in why nuclear needs subsidies in order to compete, as nuclear power receives very little of the total energy subsidies, at least in the US. [1] [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_subsidies_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_subsidies_in_the_United...
- smarm52 2y ago
  > That strain was further relieved by additional oil and gas production in many parts of the world and partial replacement of fossil fuels by nuclear power > In this changed balance between supply and demand, the cost to utilities of fossil fuels dropped substantially after the early 1980s. > In 2001, despite a very high price for natural gas during the first part of the year, the average fossil fuel cost to utilities—dominated by the price of coal—was less than one-half the cost in 1981, expressed in constant (i.e., inflation-adjusted) dollars. > During part of this period, nuclear power costs rose. > Thus, in many countries, including the United States, nuclear power lost its cost advantage over coal and even natural gas. Fascinatingly this work paints a different picture. Note the sequence of events: 1) Fossil fuel expensive. 2) OPEC (etc.) pumps more oil out of the ground to regulate prices. 3) At the same time some places in the world take steps to avoid using fossil fuels. 4) This increased supply, and lowering in demand, makes for accidental lower prices for fossil fuels. 5) This culminates in a reduced demand for the better energy production from nuclear power. Nuclear power wasn't made profitable in the US during this period because of the actions of other countries beyond the US and to a lesser extent the OPEC countries. Bodansky, D. (2007). Nuclear energy: principles, practices, and prospects. Springer Science & Business Media.
- credit_guy 2y ago
  > No one, not the Chinese, Russians, French, Koreans, Japanese, Isrealis or the Americans Not true for the Chinese. They figured out that in order to drive costs down you need to standardize and build the same reactor over and over again. The reactor is called Hualong One [1]. China has already built 4 domestically, 2 for Pakistan and has 11 under construction. 4 more such reactors were approved for the domestic market [2] and 4 other reactors are under contract for the foreign market (3 in Pakistan, 1 in Argentina). The 6 reactors that China has already built took between 5 and 8 years each. The average construction time is about 6.5 years. As for the cost, that is difficult to estimate for the domestic reactors but the 2 reactors built for Pakistan were delivered for $6.5 BN. They were delivered on time and on budget. Since each such reactor generates 1.1 GW of electricity, this comes to $3 billion per GW. This is definitely economically profitable. Now, if you want to reply that solar and wind are even more profitable, that is probably true, but that's moving the goal posts. Your claim was that nobody, including China, was able to build profitable nuclear at all, and that is patently not true. Second, the 2 reactors delivered to Pakistan were among the first wave of Hualong One reactors built. Three of the 4 finalized domestic reactors were delivered after the Pakistani ones. It is entirely possible that China has achieved some cost reductions through repetition, and the cost of the reactors currently under construction is significantly lower, and the future one will achieve still further efficiencies. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hualong_One https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hualong_One [2] https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/China-approves-construction-of-four-new-reactors https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/China-approves-const...
ZeroGravitas 2y ago
> For all the recent progress in wind and solar energy, renewables on their own almost certainly won’t be enough. Arguably, then, we have no choice but to figure out how to build nuclear plants affordably again. What's the logic behind this? Technology X and Y are making great progress but for unstated reasons won't be enough in some vague way so we need technology Z which is making much less progress. I can think of complicated arguments you could make to support this view, but I don't think they stand up so it's odd to see it just stated without support. Though maybe they start the sentence with "Arguably" because they don't really believe it either. For reference see the recent Australian CSIRO report where they asses nuclear and, even assuming they can build them as well as South Korea, finds it more expensive than continuing with renewables.
- mnky9800n 2y ago
  i think one issue is that nuclear power is always on while wind and solar can generate a lot of waste energy that isnt used then be unavailable during peak hours for whatever reason.
  - asadotzler 2y ago
    batteries are a thing.
    - mnky9800n 2y ago
      Yes, for example, Norway pumps water with extra power up to higher reservoirs so they can release it later when it's needed. But what if you are in the Netherlands where it's flat? Or northern Germany? Kansas? Batteries are not always feasible. Unless you mean like the ones in your phone then I guess you just don't realize that it's not currently feasible to have power grid sized batteries available.

13 points by jseliger 2y ago

BMc2020 2y ago

TL:DR; As for how to make the economics work, there are two schools of thought...Both paths remain unproven. No one, not the Chinese, Russians, French, Koreans, Japanese, Isrealis or the Americans, has ever made civilian nuclear power profitable. It is always subsidised, typically for national security reasons. That's a perfectly legitimate reason. Energy security and food security is a very big deal to countries like Japan and Korea. Just stop spreading the zombie lie that nuclear is cheaper.

throwaway1105q 2y ago
Cheaper compared to what? In my country people recently installed a significant amount of small-scale solar (over 50k households in 2023 compared to 1000 in 2020), in addition to large scale solar and wind generators. Did our electricity get cheaper? No. It's more expensive than the worst year of the crisis after Russian invasion of Ukraine. Why? Because the national power grid operator had to increase their investment to stabilize the grid by 2 orders of magnitude, which means they will spend over 60% of the entire national budget during next 3 years - and somebody has to pay for that. That's a crazy amount and every single person here is unhappy about that. Nuclear might be more expensive per MWh pure electricity cost-wise, but the full system with storage, balancing and distribution costs is much more complicated=expensive now because of the renewables. It's funny that the same people who always talk about "hidden costs" and "unpriced externalities" of nuclear and fossil fuels never consider this. My country is backtracking its support for renewables and will build more nuclear instead. Unfortunately a lot of the damage is done and we can't stop all support as it's mandated by EU regulation. BTW why is Germany importing 2 GW of French nuclear electricity right now if it's so expensive and bad overall? And why is Germany burning so much coal it produces 9 GW right now, if renewables are so great? Let's not forget about the environment too - at this moment France is producing 16g of CO2/kWh, while Germany is at 375 average, and that coal burning causes 1000g/kWh. I hope they do pay for that, it seems kinda unfair that the French invested into clean energy but still have to breathe what the Germans are putting into the air...
- tuatoru 2y ago
  It was always a silly idea to let domestic solar connect to the grid. Dual wiring systems inside the buildings was the way to go. But then I thought letting Turkey into NATO was stupid too, so what do I know?
  - addicted 2y ago
    Considering Turkey controls Black Sea access and it’s being in NATO meant that it was responsive to Western needs as opposed to being a Russian ally (which is what it’s naturally setup to do geographically, economically and politically) meant that Russia doesn’t have a full reign over the Black Sea and most obviously meant that Turkey was able to essentially force the grain deal which has kept the Ukrainian economy alive for a couple of years now. So including Turkey into NATO was a pretty great idea, both in the short and long terms simply because of their control over the Black Sea if nothing else (then producing some of the drones that probably kept the Ukrainians alive for months before the West really stepped in didn’t hurt either).
- addicted 2y ago
  The only reason we have switching costs is that the grid system for nearly a century was designed for fossil fuels with essentially a hub and spoke system. This is an incredibly fragile system as we saw with the massive blackouts. Different technologies will obviously incur a switching cost. The reason Germany has to import that energy and burn coal is obvious. It decided to eliminate 30-40% of its power source nearly overnight. Is it really a shock that NEW renewables which are indeed that great but are barely a decade old in terms of being cost effective alternatives were not able to fully and immediately replace all that fossil fuel capacity and that Germany relied instead on existing decades old, existing but worse infrastructure.
  - throwaway1105q 2y ago
    There was no blackout in my country past 30 years. The last one was before the revolution, that was before we had enough nuclear. It's a shock that they have been investing incredible amounts of money into it for decades and still couldn't match the few nuclear reactors they turned off, indeed. At least they have the social/political argument - they turned the nukes off because they didn't like it. It's dumb but respectable. Lying about it being cheaper than nuclear is not respectable.
Rury 2y ago
To be fair, other forms of electricity generation are heavily subsidized as well. In fact, this is probably a large part in why nuclear needs subsidies in order to compete, as nuclear power receives very little of the total energy subsidies, at least in the US. [1] [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_subsidies_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_subsidies_in_the_United...
smarm52 2y ago
> That strain was further relieved by additional oil and gas production in many parts of the world and partial replacement of fossil fuels by nuclear power > In this changed balance between supply and demand, the cost to utilities of fossil fuels dropped substantially after the early 1980s. > In 2001, despite a very high price for natural gas during the first part of the year, the average fossil fuel cost to utilities—dominated by the price of coal—was less than one-half the cost in 1981, expressed in constant (i.e., inflation-adjusted) dollars. > During part of this period, nuclear power costs rose. > Thus, in many countries, including the United States, nuclear power lost its cost advantage over coal and even natural gas. Fascinatingly this work paints a different picture. Note the sequence of events: 1) Fossil fuel expensive. 2) OPEC (etc.) pumps more oil out of the ground to regulate prices. 3) At the same time some places in the world take steps to avoid using fossil fuels. 4) This increased supply, and lowering in demand, makes for accidental lower prices for fossil fuels. 5) This culminates in a reduced demand for the better energy production from nuclear power. Nuclear power wasn't made profitable in the US during this period because of the actions of other countries beyond the US and to a lesser extent the OPEC countries. Bodansky, D. (2007). Nuclear energy: principles, practices, and prospects. Springer Science & Business Media.
credit_guy 2y ago
> No one, not the Chinese, Russians, French, Koreans, Japanese, Isrealis or the Americans Not true for the Chinese. They figured out that in order to drive costs down you need to standardize and build the same reactor over and over again. The reactor is called Hualong One [1]. China has already built 4 domestically, 2 for Pakistan and has 11 under construction. 4 more such reactors were approved for the domestic market [2] and 4 other reactors are under contract for the foreign market (3 in Pakistan, 1 in Argentina). The 6 reactors that China has already built took between 5 and 8 years each. The average construction time is about 6.5 years. As for the cost, that is difficult to estimate for the domestic reactors but the 2 reactors built for Pakistan were delivered for $6.5 BN. They were delivered on time and on budget. Since each such reactor generates 1.1 GW of electricity, this comes to $3 billion per GW. This is definitely economically profitable. Now, if you want to reply that solar and wind are even more profitable, that is probably true, but that's moving the goal posts. Your claim was that nobody, including China, was able to build profitable nuclear at all, and that is patently not true. Second, the 2 reactors delivered to Pakistan were among the first wave of Hualong One reactors built. Three of the 4 finalized domestic reactors were delivered after the Pakistani ones. It is entirely possible that China has achieved some cost reductions through repetition, and the cost of the reactors currently under construction is significantly lower, and the future one will achieve still further efficiencies. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hualong_One https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hualong_One [2] https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/China-approves-construction-of-four-new-reactors https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/China-approves-const...

ZeroGravitas 2y ago

> For all the recent progress in wind and solar energy, renewables on their own almost certainly won’t be enough. Arguably, then, we have no choice but to figure out how to build nuclear plants affordably again. What's the logic behind this? Technology X and Y are making great progress but for unstated reasons won't be enough in some vague way so we need technology Z which is making much less progress. I can think of complicated arguments you could make to support this view, but I don't think they stand up so it's odd to see it just stated without support. Though maybe they start the sentence with "Arguably" because they don't really believe it either. For reference see the recent Australian CSIRO report where they asses nuclear and, even assuming they can build them as well as South Korea, finds it more expensive than continuing with renewables.

mnky9800n 2y ago
i think one issue is that nuclear power is always on while wind and solar can generate a lot of waste energy that isnt used then be unavailable during peak hours for whatever reason.
- asadotzler 2y ago
  batteries are a thing.
  - mnky9800n 2y ago
    Yes, for example, Norway pumps water with extra power up to higher reservoirs so they can release it later when it's needed. But what if you are in the Netherlands where it's flat? Or northern Germany? Kansas? Batteries are not always feasible. Unless you mean like the ones in your phone then I guess you just don't realize that it's not currently feasible to have power grid sized batteries available.