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The deployment of solar is growing exponentially, with its total capacity doubling roughly every three years. Wind is growing at a similar rate. Renewables curr
by crote 1y ago
The deployment of solar is growing exponentially, with its total capacity doubling roughly every three years. Wind is growing at a similar rate. Renewables currently already account for 30% of the global electricity production, and we're seeing projections of over 45% in 2030.
Assuming the projected 2025-2030 installation speed is realistic and flattens out - bit "if", but not completely unrealistic - that means we'd be looking at 75% renewables in 2040 and 90% renewables in 2045.
Nuclear reactors take 15 to 20 years to build, and it'd take an additional year or 5-10 to scale up construction capacity. If we go all-out on nuclear now, that means significant nuclear power starts coming online in 20-25 years - so 2045-2050. At that point there is no more renewables gap left to bridge. There might be a small niche left for it if there is going to be essentially zero innovation in storage and short-term peaker plants, but who's going to bet billions on that?
Nuclear would've been nice if we built massive amounts of it 30 years ago, but we didn't. But starting a large-scale nuclear rollout in 2025? It just doesn't make sense.
- barbazoo 1y ago> Nuclear reactors take 15 to 20 years to build, and it'd take an additional year or 5-10 to scale up construction capacity. I just don't know if that assumption is true. Looking at https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/small-modular-reactor-nuclear-power-ontario-construction-1.7529338 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/small-modular-reactor... > The timeline is to finish construction of the first reactor by the end of 2029, and connect it to the grid in 2030. Sure, let's add 100% buffer because it's a major project, that's between 8-10 years from now. Not bad. Are we talking about different kinds of reactors maybe?
- notTooFarGone 1y agoI'm also building a nuclear power plant within the next 5 years. You can get 100% share for a mere 20.9 billion - trust me bro. That is what I read in this announcement. History will not be kind on taxpayer money > /dev/null