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> There are good reasons to question renewable energy: the cost picture doesn't make sense right now, it has intermittency problems, etc. You seem to rely on q

> There are good reasons to question renewable energy: the cost picture doesn't make sense right now, it has intermittency problems, etc. You seem to rely on quite outdated information. Renewables are the cheapest source of energy in human history. The recent explosive growth is fueled by pure economics rather than feelgood. The same thing is happening with storage with the prices plummeting. With the recent auctions landing at $50-60/MWh. https://www.ess-news.com/2025/06/26/china-energy-engineering-launches-record-25-gwh-storage-tender-as-prices-hit-historic-low/ https://www.ess-news.com/2025/06/26/china-energy-engineering... In many regions unsubsidized renewables + storage are now the cheapest source of energy, undercutting coal and gas. Nuclear power does not even enter the picture due to the absolutely insane costs involved.

anovikov 1y ago
OK but what are the prices at which storage auctions land OUTSIDE of China?
- ViewTrick1002 1y ago
  > That means it’s fully within China’s purchasing power parity advantage sphere, where everything costs 40% less than in the west. That means zero tariffs. Something like $70-80 per MWH. https://medium.com/the-future-is-electric/grid-storage-at-66-kwh-the-world-just-changed-c2f39f42f09f https://medium.com/the-future-is-electric/grid-storage-at-66... Archive: https://archive.is/UXcdL https://archive.is/UXcdL
  - anovikov 1y ago
    It's not at all convincing. Recent announced deals in Portugal are over 1000 EUR per MWH which doesn't make any economic sense at all.
arcticbull 1y ago
Renewables really aren't that cheap unless you view them entirely in isolation. Sun doesn't shine all night and wind doesn't blow continuously, it needs to be viewed with storage to represent a complete picture. Rooftop solar is more expensive than nuclear due to the zero economies of scale, residential storage is staggeringly expensive, and utility scale solar + storage only became less expensive than nuclear power a couple of years ago. Solar and wind both have significant sovereignty issues. The entire solar supply chain is in China where they're heavily subsidized so the PRC can corner the market -- and substantially all the rare earths in wind turbines come from China. Generally recycling costs aren't considered and at least in the west there's no plan to recycle at least the fiberglass in turbine blades, leaving them to be buried. I'm all for renewables but the way they're positioned is unrealistic. Nuclear is only expensive because of the way it's built in the US, relying on the few locations made available (if any) to build basically fully customized installations. If we copy-pasted reactors onto sites that suit them it would be very competitive, don't take my word for it. Jigar Shah who headed the DOE loans program said the exact same thing during his term. If we're being pedantic, nuclear is renewable too thanks to seawater extraction. There's a practically unlimited amount of uranium in the ocean and the rock underneath it.
- ViewTrick1002 1y ago
  Which is why I also added that the costs for storage are absolutely plummeting? What problem are you solving? The final bit of emergency reserves? > Solar and wind both have significant sovereignty issues. The entire solar supply chain is in China where they're heavily subsidizes so the PRC can corner the market -- and substantially all the rare earths in wind turbines come from China. This seems like hand wringing over a nothing burger? Compare the dynamics with fossil fuels: If the fossil fuel supply chain is disrupted we get an energy crisis within weeks. What happens if the renewable supply chain is disrupted? Well.... all existing installations keeps working for decades and in the meantime we need to figure out an alternative. After a couple of years our emergency reserves would start to work harder due to old installations aging out but the impact would be near zero. > Nuclear is only expensive because of the way it's built in the US, relying on the few locations made available (if any) to build basically fully customized installations. If we copy-pasted reactors onto sites that suit them it would be very competitive, don't take my word for it, Jigar Shah who headed the DOE loans program said the exact same thing during his term. Which is of course why all western reactors are struggling with cost. You do know that modular reactors has been a talking point for the nuclear industry since the 1950s? That is what the industry generally bounces to when large scale projects balloon in cost. They just never deliver. https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-forgotten-history-of-small-nuclear-reactors https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-forgotten-history-of-small-nuc... But somehow if we magically handout another trillion in tax money to the nuclear industry they will fix it this time!! > If we're being pedantic, nuclear is renewable too thanks to seawater extraction With the minor caveat that you can't even drive the pump from the electricity final electricity you get out due to the volumes involved. I love how the solution to horrifically expensive new built nuclear power is an even more economically infeasible technical solution. Or you know, just diversify renewable supply chains?
  - arcticbull 1y ago
    > This seems like hand wringing over a nothing burger? Compare the dynamics with fossil fuels: I'm not comparing to fossil fuels, so it's not really relevant. > Or you know, just diversify renewable supply chains? That's happening about as fast as seawater extraction. There's good reasons why, at least for wind the extraction and processing of rare earths is an environmental catastrophe and only China is willing to pay the environmental price. Regardless fuel costs for nuclear plants are roughly zero, about $0.0015/kWh, and there is more than enough uranium on land. And of course reprocessing spent fuel is a totally viable solution; most of France's uranium is closed loop. The entirety of the cost is in building and financing, which can be solved with policy changes.
beefnugs 1y ago
Everything you are saying means that the government can keep their damn claws off of it, because its entirely self economically viable
belorn 1y ago
I would nothing more than to enjoy those cheap prices. Here in Sweden (and EU in general), while energy prices has drop in response to renewables, grid fees and energy taxes has increased more than to cover any savings. Grid fees are now the wast majority off the bill, which pays for grid stability and transmissions that is required to operate a much more variable energy production. grid stability and transmissions are primarily a government responsibility, and when cost goes up they forward that costs as grid fees and taxes. To put some numbers down, a quertly bill recent had $1400 usd as grid fees, while the energy consumption came down to $300. Those numbers could be specific to that house, that energy company, but it is a story echoed by more and more people in this region. The consumption cost could be $0/MWh, and the grid fees alone would still be way more expensive compared to the full bill just a couple of years ago.
- ViewTrick1002 1y ago
  Generally when organizations has attempted to put a number on "grid fees" it is quite small in the grand scheme of things. For Australia CSIRO found this number to be €9B. [1] Vastly lower than the subsidies a single large scale new built reactor would need. [2]: https://www.csiro.au/-/media/Energy/GenCost/GenCost-2024-25-Final_20250728.pdf https://www.csiro.au/-/media/Energy/GenCost/GenCost-2024-25-... In Sweden we have recently seen an explosion on costs for ancillary services as new markets has been added which needs to be built out. But they have lowered in cost after a year or two. The same will happen for the most recent markets. Then Sweden has a problem with low population density, large grid and high wages which makes labor intensive infrastructure like the grid cost more.
  - belorn 1y ago
    We can hope/pray/predict that prices will go down in a year or two. I have yet to see any politician or providers give that promise. The government have approved new grid stability power plants (based on natural gas), and those have both investment costs and operational costs that the government want consumers to pay for in the next decade/s. In addition, the hydro power plants that already exist and was built during the 20th century need to either be refitted or removed in order to comply with EU environmental standards (and prevent mass extinction of several endangered species). That will also increase costs for grid stability for the next several decades. On top there are plans for new transmission to even out the difference between the north and south part of the country, and those are predicted to take a decade or so to build. They are not short term projects with short term price hikes.

anovikov 1y ago

OK but what are the prices at which storage auctions land OUTSIDE of China?

ViewTrick1002 1y ago
> That means it’s fully within China’s purchasing power parity advantage sphere, where everything costs 40% less than in the west. That means zero tariffs. Something like $70-80 per MWH. https://medium.com/the-future-is-electric/grid-storage-at-66-kwh-the-world-just-changed-c2f39f42f09f https://medium.com/the-future-is-electric/grid-storage-at-66... Archive: https://archive.is/UXcdL https://archive.is/UXcdL
- anovikov 1y ago
  It's not at all convincing. Recent announced deals in Portugal are over 1000 EUR per MWH which doesn't make any economic sense at all.

arcticbull 1y ago

Renewables really aren't that cheap unless you view them entirely in isolation. Sun doesn't shine all night and wind doesn't blow continuously, it needs to be viewed with storage to represent a complete picture. Rooftop solar is more expensive than nuclear due to the zero economies of scale, residential storage is staggeringly expensive, and utility scale solar + storage only became less expensive than nuclear power a couple of years ago. Solar and wind both have significant sovereignty issues. The entire solar supply chain is in China where they're heavily subsidized so the PRC can corner the market -- and substantially all the rare earths in wind turbines come from China. Generally recycling costs aren't considered and at least in the west there's no plan to recycle at least the fiberglass in turbine blades, leaving them to be buried. I'm all for renewables but the way they're positioned is unrealistic. Nuclear is only expensive because of the way it's built in the US, relying on the few locations made available (if any) to build basically fully customized installations. If we copy-pasted reactors onto sites that suit them it would be very competitive, don't take my word for it. Jigar Shah who headed the DOE loans program said the exact same thing during his term. If we're being pedantic, nuclear is renewable too thanks to seawater extraction. There's a practically unlimited amount of uranium in the ocean and the rock underneath it.

ViewTrick1002 1y ago
Which is why I also added that the costs for storage are absolutely plummeting? What problem are you solving? The final bit of emergency reserves? > Solar and wind both have significant sovereignty issues. The entire solar supply chain is in China where they're heavily subsidizes so the PRC can corner the market -- and substantially all the rare earths in wind turbines come from China. This seems like hand wringing over a nothing burger? Compare the dynamics with fossil fuels: If the fossil fuel supply chain is disrupted we get an energy crisis within weeks. What happens if the renewable supply chain is disrupted? Well.... all existing installations keeps working for decades and in the meantime we need to figure out an alternative. After a couple of years our emergency reserves would start to work harder due to old installations aging out but the impact would be near zero. > Nuclear is only expensive because of the way it's built in the US, relying on the few locations made available (if any) to build basically fully customized installations. If we copy-pasted reactors onto sites that suit them it would be very competitive, don't take my word for it, Jigar Shah who headed the DOE loans program said the exact same thing during his term. Which is of course why all western reactors are struggling with cost. You do know that modular reactors has been a talking point for the nuclear industry since the 1950s? That is what the industry generally bounces to when large scale projects balloon in cost. They just never deliver. https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-forgotten-history-of-small-nuclear-reactors https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-forgotten-history-of-small-nuc... But somehow if we magically handout another trillion in tax money to the nuclear industry they will fix it this time!! > If we're being pedantic, nuclear is renewable too thanks to seawater extraction With the minor caveat that you can't even drive the pump from the electricity final electricity you get out due to the volumes involved. I love how the solution to horrifically expensive new built nuclear power is an even more economically infeasible technical solution. Or you know, just diversify renewable supply chains?
- arcticbull 1y ago
  > This seems like hand wringing over a nothing burger? Compare the dynamics with fossil fuels: I'm not comparing to fossil fuels, so it's not really relevant. > Or you know, just diversify renewable supply chains? That's happening about as fast as seawater extraction. There's good reasons why, at least for wind the extraction and processing of rare earths is an environmental catastrophe and only China is willing to pay the environmental price. Regardless fuel costs for nuclear plants are roughly zero, about $0.0015/kWh, and there is more than enough uranium on land. And of course reprocessing spent fuel is a totally viable solution; most of France's uranium is closed loop. The entirety of the cost is in building and financing, which can be solved with policy changes.

beefnugs 1y ago

Everything you are saying means that the government can keep their damn claws off of it, because its entirely self economically viable

belorn 1y ago

I would nothing more than to enjoy those cheap prices. Here in Sweden (and EU in general), while energy prices has drop in response to renewables, grid fees and energy taxes has increased more than to cover any savings. Grid fees are now the wast majority off the bill, which pays for grid stability and transmissions that is required to operate a much more variable energy production. grid stability and transmissions are primarily a government responsibility, and when cost goes up they forward that costs as grid fees and taxes. To put some numbers down, a quertly bill recent had $1400 usd as grid fees, while the energy consumption came down to $300. Those numbers could be specific to that house, that energy company, but it is a story echoed by more and more people in this region. The consumption cost could be $0/MWh, and the grid fees alone would still be way more expensive compared to the full bill just a couple of years ago.

ViewTrick1002 1y ago
Generally when organizations has attempted to put a number on "grid fees" it is quite small in the grand scheme of things. For Australia CSIRO found this number to be €9B. [1] Vastly lower than the subsidies a single large scale new built reactor would need. [2]: https://www.csiro.au/-/media/Energy/GenCost/GenCost-2024-25-Final_20250728.pdf https://www.csiro.au/-/media/Energy/GenCost/GenCost-2024-25-... In Sweden we have recently seen an explosion on costs for ancillary services as new markets has been added which needs to be built out. But they have lowered in cost after a year or two. The same will happen for the most recent markets. Then Sweden has a problem with low population density, large grid and high wages which makes labor intensive infrastructure like the grid cost more.
- belorn 1y ago
  We can hope/pray/predict that prices will go down in a year or two. I have yet to see any politician or providers give that promise. The government have approved new grid stability power plants (based on natural gas), and those have both investment costs and operational costs that the government want consumers to pay for in the next decade/s. In addition, the hydro power plants that already exist and was built during the 20th century need to either be refitted or removed in order to comply with EU environmental standards (and prevent mass extinction of several endangered species). That will also increase costs for grid stability for the next several decades. On top there are plans for new transmission to even out the difference between the north and south part of the country, and those are predicted to take a decade or so to build. They are not short term projects with short term price hikes.