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While I would agree that it is regrettable Germany sunset their nuclear early when they should've extended the runtime for another 5-10 years to avoid excess ca

While I would agree that it is regrettable Germany sunset their nuclear early when they should've extended the runtime for another 5-10 years to avoid excess carbon emissions since shutdown, but clean energy has already surpassed coal in Germany and they will likely hit net zero in the next decade at current deployment rates of renewables and batteries. [My note: The US states of Illinois and California got this right, subsidizing their existing merchant nuclear generator fleets until more renewables can replace them] Largest battery storage in Germany set for partial commissioning - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49104584 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49104584 - July 2026 Analysis: Wind and solar power overtake fossil fuels in Germany for first time ever - https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-wind-and-solar-power-overtake-fossil-fuels-in-germany-for-first-time-ever https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-wind-and-solar-power-ov... - July 28th, 2026 > Germany has various targets in place that require a rapid expansion of wind and solar power, including cutting economy-wide emissions to net-zero by 2045. The nation is also aiming to increase renewables’ share of electricity consumption to 80% by 2030 to achieve a “largely climate neutral” power system by 2035. It's time to get over the nuclear issue, it's history. It takes ~10 years to build a new nuclear generator from breaking ground to first kw to the grid, and tens of billions of dollars or euros. Germany deploys ~2GW/month of solar. Total global nuclear generation capacity is ~380GW as of this comment. At current global solar PV deployment rates, even assuming capacity factor delta between solar and nuclear, you could replace total global nuclear generation with ~18 months of solar PV deployment. Batteries and solar will continue to rapidly decline in cost, nuclear will not. (total annual solar PV deployment is approaching, but not quite yet, at 1TW/year, and continues to increase year over year) https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/solar-energy-consumption https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/solar-energy-consumption https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capacity https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/installed-solar-pv-capaci...

realusername 3mo ago
> they will likely hit net zero in the next decade at current deployment rates of renewables and batteries. X to doubt, I'll believe it when I see it, for now they are like a galaxy away from that goal. And also that'll be even harder to reach if they want to improve their atrociously low electricity heating rate.
- toomuchtodo 3mo ago
  You're free to doubt, healthy skepticism is a good thing imho, there is no will to spend what nuclear would cost and renewables and batteries keep getting cheaper. We're locked on a hockey stick trajectory of their uptake purely through the economics. Spain is phasing out the last of their nuclear for more renewables, for example. Fossil gas will fill the gap until solar, wind, batteries, and transmission push the last of fossil generation out of the mix, and every year less and less gas will be used until remaining fossil gas generators sit idle. Spain’s Nuclear Shutdown Set to Test Renewables Success Story - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-11/spain-s-nuclear-shutdown-set-to-test-renewables-success-story https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-11/spain-s-n... | https://archive.today/4fB7K https://archive.today/4fB7K - April 11th, 2025 (“Spain is a postcard, a glimpse into the future where you’re not going to need baseload generators from 8am to 5pm” with solar and wind providing all of the grid’s needs during that time, said Kesavarthiniy Savarimuthu, a European power markets analyst with BloombergNEF. Still, she said, there is a reasonable chance this goal may take longer than expected and “extending the life of the nuclear fleet can prove as an insurance for these delays.”) (My note: As of this comment, Spain has 7.12GW of nuclear generation capacity per ree.es, and assuming ~2GW/month deployment rate seen in Germany, could replace this capacity with solar and batteries in ~17 months; per Electricity Maps, only 18.79% of Spain's electrical generation over the last twelve months has been sourced from this nuclear: https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/ES/12mo/monthly https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/ES/12mo/monthly)
dncornholio 3mo ago
You realize that "green energy" in EU is dependent on gas and/or coal? When there's no wind or sun, we will gladly burn gas or coal, and call it green energy. Nuclear doesn't have this requirement. It's truly zero carbon. Unless you can show me plans to fill this gap with batteries on a national scale, renewables < nuclear
- toomuchtodo 3mo ago
  Enough sunlight falls on the Earth in 30 minutes to power humanity for a year. We have solved fusion at a distance with solar and batteries. We're arguing speed and cost of deployment for the collection and storage system. The technology drops in cost rapidly, it lasts for decades with no moving parts and minimal maintenance. It can be trivially recycled today with no further technology advancements needed. It fails gracefully. Yes, some fossil fuels will be burned to fill energy consumption gaps until we have fully replaced all fossil generation with that produced from the sun. Again, remember the fact that every year we are adding ~1TW of solar that can account for energy consumption growth and push out fossil generation. We won't know until we look back over time, but we are very likely at peak fossil fuel consumption globally. New generation will be clean tech simply out of economics, and old fossil generation will be replaced eventually with clean tech, because it cannot last forever. https://ourworldindata.org/data-insights/solar-panel-prices-have-fallen-by-around-20-every-time-global-capacity-doubled https://ourworldindata.org/data-insights/solar-panel-prices-... (solar panel prices have fallen by around 20% every time global capacity doubled) https://ourworldindata.org/battery-price-decline https://ourworldindata.org/battery-price-decline (lithium-ion battery prices fell by 19% every time global cumulative production doubled) Ember Energ: Solar electricity every hour of every day is here and it changes everything - https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-every-hour-of-every-day-is-here-and-it-changes-everything/ https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-e... - June 21st, 2025 The Economist: The exponential growth of solar power will change the world - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40746617 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40746617 - June 2024 (66 comments) > To call solar power’s rise exponential is not hyperbole, but a statement of fact. Installed solar capacity doubles roughly every three years, and so grows ten-fold each decade. Such sustained growth is seldom seen in anything that matters. That makes it hard for people to get their heads round what is going on. When it was a tenth of its current size ten years ago, solar power was still seen as marginal even by experts who knew how fast it had grown. The next ten-fold increase will be equivalent to multiplying the world’s entire fleet of nuclear reactors by eight in less than the time it typically takes to build just a single one of them. > Solar cells will in all likelihood be the single biggest source of electrical power on the planet by the mid 2030s. By the 2040s they may be the largest source not just of electricity but of all energy. On current trends, the all-in cost of the electricity they produce promises to be less than half as expensive as the cheapest available today. This will not stop climate change, but could slow it a lot faster. Much of the world—including Africa, where 600m people still cannot light their homes—will begin to feel energy-rich. That feeling will be a new and transformational one for humankind. > To grasp that this is not some environmentalist fever dream, consider solar economics. As the cumulative production of a manufactured good increases, costs go down. As costs go down, demand goes up. As demand goes up, production increases—and costs go down further. This cannot go on for ever; production, demand or both always become constrained. In earlier energy transitions—from wood to coal, coal to oil or oil to gas—the efficiency of extraction grew, but it was eventually offset by the cost of finding ever more fuel. (think in systems)
tremon 3mo ago
I think that's net zero for electricity only, not net zero for all power generation. It excludes heavy industry and freight shipping, which still have a projected investment window of at least 25 years. Heavy industry in particular would have benefitted from the predictable high-power output of nuclear energy.
- zer00eyz 3mo ago
  This needs to be higher up. Nuclear is an amazing solution for industrial steady state demand... This is data centers, smelters (glass and metal), lots of industrial processes (think auto plants). But nuclear is terrible at TV pickup situations because it is simply not that responsive. Delivery to industrial customers (regardless of source) is also much simpler than it is to domestic - and I don't think that were even beginning to address the issues there.
modo_mario 3mo ago
> and they will likely hit net zero in the next decade at current deployment rates of renewables and batteries. In and around winter? I think that's a fantasy.

realusername 3mo ago

> they will likely hit net zero in the next decade at current deployment rates of renewables and batteries. X to doubt, I'll believe it when I see it, for now they are like a galaxy away from that goal. And also that'll be even harder to reach if they want to improve their atrociously low electricity heating rate.

toomuchtodo 3mo ago
You're free to doubt, healthy skepticism is a good thing imho, there is no will to spend what nuclear would cost and renewables and batteries keep getting cheaper. We're locked on a hockey stick trajectory of their uptake purely through the economics. Spain is phasing out the last of their nuclear for more renewables, for example. Fossil gas will fill the gap until solar, wind, batteries, and transmission push the last of fossil generation out of the mix, and every year less and less gas will be used until remaining fossil gas generators sit idle. Spain’s Nuclear Shutdown Set to Test Renewables Success Story - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-11/spain-s-nuclear-shutdown-set-to-test-renewables-success-story https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-11/spain-s-n... | https://archive.today/4fB7K https://archive.today/4fB7K - April 11th, 2025 (“Spain is a postcard, a glimpse into the future where you’re not going to need baseload generators from 8am to 5pm” with solar and wind providing all of the grid’s needs during that time, said Kesavarthiniy Savarimuthu, a European power markets analyst with BloombergNEF. Still, she said, there is a reasonable chance this goal may take longer than expected and “extending the life of the nuclear fleet can prove as an insurance for these delays.”) (My note: As of this comment, Spain has 7.12GW of nuclear generation capacity per ree.es, and assuming ~2GW/month deployment rate seen in Germany, could replace this capacity with solar and batteries in ~17 months; per Electricity Maps, only 18.79% of Spain's electrical generation over the last twelve months has been sourced from this nuclear: https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/ES/12mo/monthly https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/ES/12mo/monthly)

dncornholio 3mo ago

You realize that "green energy" in EU is dependent on gas and/or coal? When there's no wind or sun, we will gladly burn gas or coal, and call it green energy. Nuclear doesn't have this requirement. It's truly zero carbon. Unless you can show me plans to fill this gap with batteries on a national scale, renewables < nuclear

toomuchtodo 3mo ago
Enough sunlight falls on the Earth in 30 minutes to power humanity for a year. We have solved fusion at a distance with solar and batteries. We're arguing speed and cost of deployment for the collection and storage system. The technology drops in cost rapidly, it lasts for decades with no moving parts and minimal maintenance. It can be trivially recycled today with no further technology advancements needed. It fails gracefully. Yes, some fossil fuels will be burned to fill energy consumption gaps until we have fully replaced all fossil generation with that produced from the sun. Again, remember the fact that every year we are adding ~1TW of solar that can account for energy consumption growth and push out fossil generation. We won't know until we look back over time, but we are very likely at peak fossil fuel consumption globally. New generation will be clean tech simply out of economics, and old fossil generation will be replaced eventually with clean tech, because it cannot last forever. https://ourworldindata.org/data-insights/solar-panel-prices-have-fallen-by-around-20-every-time-global-capacity-doubled https://ourworldindata.org/data-insights/solar-panel-prices-... (solar panel prices have fallen by around 20% every time global capacity doubled) https://ourworldindata.org/battery-price-decline https://ourworldindata.org/battery-price-decline (lithium-ion battery prices fell by 19% every time global cumulative production doubled) Ember Energ: Solar electricity every hour of every day is here and it changes everything - https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-every-hour-of-every-day-is-here-and-it-changes-everything/ https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-e... - June 21st, 2025 The Economist: The exponential growth of solar power will change the world - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40746617 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40746617 - June 2024 (66 comments) > To call solar power’s rise exponential is not hyperbole, but a statement of fact. Installed solar capacity doubles roughly every three years, and so grows ten-fold each decade. Such sustained growth is seldom seen in anything that matters. That makes it hard for people to get their heads round what is going on. When it was a tenth of its current size ten years ago, solar power was still seen as marginal even by experts who knew how fast it had grown. The next ten-fold increase will be equivalent to multiplying the world’s entire fleet of nuclear reactors by eight in less than the time it typically takes to build just a single one of them. > Solar cells will in all likelihood be the single biggest source of electrical power on the planet by the mid 2030s. By the 2040s they may be the largest source not just of electricity but of all energy. On current trends, the all-in cost of the electricity they produce promises to be less than half as expensive as the cheapest available today. This will not stop climate change, but could slow it a lot faster. Much of the world—including Africa, where 600m people still cannot light their homes—will begin to feel energy-rich. That feeling will be a new and transformational one for humankind. > To grasp that this is not some environmentalist fever dream, consider solar economics. As the cumulative production of a manufactured good increases, costs go down. As costs go down, demand goes up. As demand goes up, production increases—and costs go down further. This cannot go on for ever; production, demand or both always become constrained. In earlier energy transitions—from wood to coal, coal to oil or oil to gas—the efficiency of extraction grew, but it was eventually offset by the cost of finding ever more fuel. (think in systems)

tremon 3mo ago

I think that's net zero for electricity only, not net zero for all power generation. It excludes heavy industry and freight shipping, which still have a projected investment window of at least 25 years. Heavy industry in particular would have benefitted from the predictable high-power output of nuclear energy.

zer00eyz 3mo ago
This needs to be higher up. Nuclear is an amazing solution for industrial steady state demand... This is data centers, smelters (glass and metal), lots of industrial processes (think auto plants). But nuclear is terrible at TV pickup situations because it is simply not that responsive. Delivery to industrial customers (regardless of source) is also much simpler than it is to domestic - and I don't think that were even beginning to address the issues there.

modo_mario 3mo ago

> and they will likely hit net zero in the next decade at current deployment rates of renewables and batteries. In and around winter? I think that's a fantasy.