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You quote a PV-lobbying firm as your source, what do you expect? Also LCOE is just not adequate to compare these two, as you have additional storage and transm

You quote a PV-lobbying firm as your source, what do you expect? Also LCOE is just not adequate to compare these two, as you have additional storage and transmission costs for intermittent, weather-dependent sources, whereas most nuclear power plants can be online providing full capacity more than 90% of the time. LCOE does not account for that. This IEA report uses a metric that includes those system costs (value-adjusted LCOE, VALCOE) and it shows nuclear energy is definitely competitive. Especially if managed well and power plants aren't prematurely shut down due to political reasons, like they were in Germany. https://www.iea.org/reports/projected-costs-of-generating-electricity-2020 https://www.iea.org/reports/projected-costs-of-generating-el...

matthewdgreen 1y ago
Competitive now? Or competitive in the near future? All of the components of renewables, including PV modules and storage, seem to be following an inverse exponential in price. This does not seem to be true of nuclear. It's easy to make conservative assumptions that leave you with a bunch of financially unsustainable infrastructure. This would be a total disaster.
- chickenbig 1y ago
  > All of the components of renewables, including PV modules and storage, seem to be following an inverse exponential in price. Definitely not true of offshore wind. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44012502 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44012502 Also it seems like a fallacy of composition to believe that a cheap system is formed from cheap individual components.
  - matthewdgreen 1y ago
    A cheap system is a combination of cheap components, land, and the labor required to assemble it. But in terms of minimized labor costs, you just don’t get a lot better than PV and batteries. And there’s still room for cost reductions from technological improvements and more efficient PV.
    - chickenbig 1y ago
      > A cheap system is a combination of cheap components, land, and the labor required to assemble it. The point is that cheap components may require the use of other components to compensate for its deficiencies, and so on. Solar panels need batteries, synchronous condensers, more transmission capacity, electrolysers, hydrogen storage, backup power stations, demand side response, etc.
      - ViewTrick1002 1y ago
        And batteries are plummeting in cost as well. In Australia it was calculated that the extra grid upgrades for renewables comes out to $15B. That is less than the subsidies a single nuclear reactor needs. To electrify society and industry we need to expand our grids by 1.5-2.5x. Stringing an set of wires, using thicker ones or stepping up the voltage higher is a minuscule cost when already having to uprate the grid. Gas turbine emergency reserves would be $1B.
        chickenbig 1y ago
        > In Australia it was calculated that the extra grid upgrades for renewables comes out to $15B. AEMO report from 2024 [1] page 13 note 2 very carefully draws the line around what the extra 16B AUD will pay for. This value is the net present value of capital costs for transmission augmentation up to 2049-50 only, and does not include the cost of commissioned, committed or anticipated projects. Committed and anticipated ISP projects :- Project EnergyConnect cost has ~doubled to 4.1B AUD [2] Central West Orana REZ is around 5.45B AUD [3] CopperString has escalated to 14B AUD although that might be partly due to general inflation [4] > Gas turbine emergency reserves would be $1B. Gas turbines are now about 2400 USD/kW (3750 AUD/kW), so 1B AUD results in ~267 MW of capacity. [1] https://aemo.com.au/-/media/files/major-publications/isp/2024/2024-integrated-system-plan-isp.pdf?la=en https://aemo.com.au/-/media/files/major-publications/isp/202... [2] https://reneweconomy.com.au/deja-vu-on-transmission-project-cost-blowouts-as-price-of-energyconnect-doubles/ https://reneweconomy.com.au/deja-vu-on-transmission-project-... [3] https://www.energyco.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-05/cwo-rez-public-report-infrastructure-planner-recommendation-may-2024.pdf https://www.energyco.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-05/... [4] https://www.energyco.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-05/cwo-rez-public-report-infrastructure-planner-recommendation-may-2024.pdf https://www.energyco.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-05/... [5] https://gasoutlook.com/analysis/costs-to-build-gas-plants-triple-says-ceo-of-nextera-energy/ https://gasoutlook.com/analysis/costs-to-build-gas-plants-tr...
Arnt 1y ago
https://pris.iaea.org/pris/worldstatistics/threeyrsenergyavailabilityfactor.aspx https://pris.iaea.org/pris/worldstatistics/threeyrsenergyava... doesn't show many >90% numbers.
- chickenbig 1y ago
  > doesn't show many >90% numbers The US achieves over 90% capacity factor, as does Finland, and Germany used to. Also capacity and availability are different things; getting pre-empted by solar should not count against the nuclear plant.
  - ViewTrick1002 1y ago
    > getting pre-empted by solar should not count against the nuclear plant. But it makes an already horrifically bad economic calculus even worse.

matthewdgreen 1y ago

Competitive now? Or competitive in the near future? All of the components of renewables, including PV modules and storage, seem to be following an inverse exponential in price. This does not seem to be true of nuclear. It's easy to make conservative assumptions that leave you with a bunch of financially unsustainable infrastructure. This would be a total disaster.

chickenbig 1y ago
> All of the components of renewables, including PV modules and storage, seem to be following an inverse exponential in price. Definitely not true of offshore wind. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44012502 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44012502 Also it seems like a fallacy of composition to believe that a cheap system is formed from cheap individual components.
- matthewdgreen 1y ago
  A cheap system is a combination of cheap components, land, and the labor required to assemble it. But in terms of minimized labor costs, you just don’t get a lot better than PV and batteries. And there’s still room for cost reductions from technological improvements and more efficient PV.
  - chickenbig 1y ago
    > A cheap system is a combination of cheap components, land, and the labor required to assemble it. The point is that cheap components may require the use of other components to compensate for its deficiencies, and so on. Solar panels need batteries, synchronous condensers, more transmission capacity, electrolysers, hydrogen storage, backup power stations, demand side response, etc.
    - ViewTrick1002 1y ago
      And batteries are plummeting in cost as well. In Australia it was calculated that the extra grid upgrades for renewables comes out to $15B. That is less than the subsidies a single nuclear reactor needs. To electrify society and industry we need to expand our grids by 1.5-2.5x. Stringing an set of wires, using thicker ones or stepping up the voltage higher is a minuscule cost when already having to uprate the grid. Gas turbine emergency reserves would be $1B.
      - chickenbig 1y ago
        > In Australia it was calculated that the extra grid upgrades for renewables comes out to $15B. AEMO report from 2024 [1] page 13 note 2 very carefully draws the line around what the extra 16B AUD will pay for. This value is the net present value of capital costs for transmission augmentation up to 2049-50 only, and does not include the cost of commissioned, committed or anticipated projects. Committed and anticipated ISP projects :- Project EnergyConnect cost has ~doubled to 4.1B AUD [2] Central West Orana REZ is around 5.45B AUD [3] CopperString has escalated to 14B AUD although that might be partly due to general inflation [4] > Gas turbine emergency reserves would be $1B. Gas turbines are now about 2400 USD/kW (3750 AUD/kW), so 1B AUD results in ~267 MW of capacity. [1] https://aemo.com.au/-/media/files/major-publications/isp/2024/2024-integrated-system-plan-isp.pdf?la=en https://aemo.com.au/-/media/files/major-publications/isp/202... [2] https://reneweconomy.com.au/deja-vu-on-transmission-project-cost-blowouts-as-price-of-energyconnect-doubles/ https://reneweconomy.com.au/deja-vu-on-transmission-project-... [3] https://www.energyco.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-05/cwo-rez-public-report-infrastructure-planner-recommendation-may-2024.pdf https://www.energyco.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-05/... [4] https://www.energyco.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-05/cwo-rez-public-report-infrastructure-planner-recommendation-may-2024.pdf https://www.energyco.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-05/... [5] https://gasoutlook.com/analysis/costs-to-build-gas-plants-triple-says-ceo-of-nextera-energy/ https://gasoutlook.com/analysis/costs-to-build-gas-plants-tr...

Arnt 1y ago

https://pris.iaea.org/pris/worldstatistics/threeyrsenergyavailabilityfactor.aspx https://pris.iaea.org/pris/worldstatistics/threeyrsenergyava... doesn't show many >90% numbers.

chickenbig 1y ago
> doesn't show many >90% numbers The US achieves over 90% capacity factor, as does Finland, and Germany used to. Also capacity and availability are different things; getting pre-empted by solar should not count against the nuclear plant.
- ViewTrick1002 1y ago
  > getting pre-empted by solar should not count against the nuclear plant. But it makes an already horrifically bad economic calculus even worse.