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At least Sweden is struggling a lot with scaling its power production, to the point where it's a problem for existing and new industries and causing some rather

At least Sweden is struggling a lot with scaling its power production, to the point where it's a problem for existing and new industries and causing some rather extreme price volatility. A lot of the green energy is from hydro dams and you can't really add new rivers to the geography to support additional industry.

trhway 15d ago
>you can't really add new rivers to the geography to support additional industry. yes, you can - with all those fiords surrounded by mountains you can use excess wind/solar (your own as well as German, etc.) and pump water up a dammed fiord to generate the electricity later when no cheap excess available.
- Oh-Kay_Labs 15d ago
  Well, we don't have fjords or mountains in Sweden, otherwise a great plan.
  - jplrssn 15d ago
    There are both mountains [0] and fjords [1] in Sweden, but not of the Norwegian kind they were probably picturing. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scandinavian_Mountains https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scandinavian_Mountains [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gullmarn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gullmarn
    - warpech 15d ago
      Build a dam in the fjord and pump the water out from it with excess electricity! Profit
- prerok 15d ago
  This assumes that there is excess power at some point. This will soon become unrealistic: we either need power for data centers during the day or charging vehicles during the night. The solution works only to keep a steady production of electricity, but if the demand would require full output all the time then these "mechanical batteries" don't help.
throwaway473825 15d ago
With hindsight, it wasn't a very good idea to shut down 6 of 12 nuclear reactors. Still much better than the situation in Germany, but that's a very low bar. It will be interesting to see how the Rolls-Royce SMR project works out. Since it appears to be impossible to build anything cheaply in the UK, this will be the real test.
- londons_explore 15d ago
  > Since it appears to be impossible to build anything cheaply in the UK The solution is to build nuclear power stations on ships in China, then sail them to the UK and plug them in. If power prices elsewhere in the world become advantageous, sail them elsewhere and plug them in there. You still have the interconnection costs, but seaside places sometimes have high voltage connections for existing or historic power plants (who themselves are water cooled)
  - exe34 15d ago
    A Chinese nuke on the coast of Britain might be hard politically. Even if it's benign, you can bet the US will run an expensive campaign to discredit it in public opinion.
    - Heliosmaster 15d ago
      It doesn't come preloaded with fuel.
    - defrost 15d ago
      There's a special line crossed by a 100% Chinese owned floating nuclear power plant, as opposed to a 24% Chinese owned fixed in place nuclear power plant like the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station?
      - JumpCrisscross 15d ago
        You wouldn't even need it to be Chinese owned. Just Chinese built and indemnified. Hell, I'd take a guarantee from a consortium of Chinese SoE banks over the U.S. government today. (I'm American.)
cineticdaffodil 15d ago
[dead]
cpach 15d ago
I’m starting to think that perhaps the government here in .se should support new reactors. It won’t be cheap though…
- T-A 14d ago
  https://www.ans.org/news/2026-06-18/article-8133/new-sweden-developments/ https://www.ans.org/news/2026-06-18/article-8133/new-sweden-...
throwaway2037 15d ago
> Sweden is struggling a lot with scaling its power production, to the point where it's a problem for existing and new industries Some light research shows that Sweden has annual electricity exports of about 30 TWh (equiv to 2x EPR nuclear reactors). Sweden has plenty of excess power. Also, Sweden is part of Nord Pool. Its neighbor, Norway, also has massive annual electricity exports of about 30 TWh. Again: Plenty of excess capacity to supply Sweden. Do you have any evidence to support your claim?
- marginalia_nu 15d ago
  Excess power is unevenly distributed both geographically and temporally. In the SE1 region, which is the least populated and probably best candidate for a data center, there was a 400% price drop between February and March this year, then up 100% in May, then down 50% in July. Between summer 2025 and winter 2026, the same region saw a price hike of nearly 1000%. https://data.nordpoolgroup.com/auction/day-ahead/prices?deliveryDate=2026-09- https://data.nordpoolgroup.com/auction/day-ahead/prices?deli... 12&currency=EUR&aggregation=MonthlyAggregate&deliveryAreas=SE1,SE2 https://data.nordpoolgroup.com/auction/day-ahead/prices?deliveryDate=2025-09-12&currency=EUR&aggregation=MonthlyAggregate&deliveryAreas=SE1,SE2 https://data.nordpoolgroup.com/auction/day-ahead/prices?deli... I guess if you want a data center that only operates some months of the year that's fine.
plufz 15d ago
Is that really it? I thought Sweden was a net exporter and that the price volatility was much more related to the eu pricing and distribution?
- dijit 14d ago
  the north exports, the south imports. If you run datacenters in the north its substantially cheaper. Places like Malmö have had issues with power costs, even though there's a lot of generation... because that generation happens in the north.
  - plufz 14d ago
    But isn’t that also because of not investing in the grid more than a production problem? Not cheap to upgrade the grid of course but having good transmission capacity makes a more stable and efficient energy system. Not saying we shouldn’t produce more electricity. But from what I have understood it’s mainly about other factors than production.
bjourne 14d ago
The bottleneck is the grid, not the production centers. Volatility is not more extreme in Sweden than other connected (Nord Pool) countries. Companies lament the lack of grid connectivity all the time. Then they get the offer "Pay for the cost of grid expansion to connect you" and they are not so interested anymore.

trhway 15d ago

>you can't really add new rivers to the geography to support additional industry. yes, you can - with all those fiords surrounded by mountains you can use excess wind/solar (your own as well as German, etc.) and pump water up a dammed fiord to generate the electricity later when no cheap excess available.

Oh-Kay_Labs 15d ago
Well, we don't have fjords or mountains in Sweden, otherwise a great plan.
- jplrssn 15d ago
  There are both mountains [0] and fjords [1] in Sweden, but not of the Norwegian kind they were probably picturing. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scandinavian_Mountains https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scandinavian_Mountains [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gullmarn https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gullmarn
  - warpech 15d ago
    Build a dam in the fjord and pump the water out from it with excess electricity! Profit
prerok 15d ago
This assumes that there is excess power at some point. This will soon become unrealistic: we either need power for data centers during the day or charging vehicles during the night. The solution works only to keep a steady production of electricity, but if the demand would require full output all the time then these "mechanical batteries" don't help.

throwaway473825 15d ago

With hindsight, it wasn't a very good idea to shut down 6 of 12 nuclear reactors. Still much better than the situation in Germany, but that's a very low bar. It will be interesting to see how the Rolls-Royce SMR project works out. Since it appears to be impossible to build anything cheaply in the UK, this will be the real test.

londons_explore 15d ago
> Since it appears to be impossible to build anything cheaply in the UK The solution is to build nuclear power stations on ships in China, then sail them to the UK and plug them in. If power prices elsewhere in the world become advantageous, sail them elsewhere and plug them in there. You still have the interconnection costs, but seaside places sometimes have high voltage connections for existing or historic power plants (who themselves are water cooled)
- exe34 15d ago
  A Chinese nuke on the coast of Britain might be hard politically. Even if it's benign, you can bet the US will run an expensive campaign to discredit it in public opinion.
  - Heliosmaster 15d ago
    It doesn't come preloaded with fuel.
  - defrost 15d ago
    There's a special line crossed by a 100% Chinese owned floating nuclear power plant, as opposed to a 24% Chinese owned fixed in place nuclear power plant like the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station?
    - JumpCrisscross 15d ago
      You wouldn't even need it to be Chinese owned. Just Chinese built and indemnified. Hell, I'd take a guarantee from a consortium of Chinese SoE banks over the U.S. government today. (I'm American.)

cineticdaffodil 15d ago

[dead]

cpach 15d ago

I’m starting to think that perhaps the government here in .se should support new reactors. It won’t be cheap though…

T-A 14d ago
https://www.ans.org/news/2026-06-18/article-8133/new-sweden-developments/ https://www.ans.org/news/2026-06-18/article-8133/new-sweden-...

throwaway2037 15d ago

> Sweden is struggling a lot with scaling its power production, to the point where it's a problem for existing and new industries Some light research shows that Sweden has annual electricity exports of about 30 TWh (equiv to 2x EPR nuclear reactors). Sweden has plenty of excess power. Also, Sweden is part of Nord Pool. Its neighbor, Norway, also has massive annual electricity exports of about 30 TWh. Again: Plenty of excess capacity to supply Sweden. Do you have any evidence to support your claim?

marginalia_nu 15d ago
Excess power is unevenly distributed both geographically and temporally. In the SE1 region, which is the least populated and probably best candidate for a data center, there was a 400% price drop between February and March this year, then up 100% in May, then down 50% in July. Between summer 2025 and winter 2026, the same region saw a price hike of nearly 1000%. https://data.nordpoolgroup.com/auction/day-ahead/prices?deliveryDate=2026-09- https://data.nordpoolgroup.com/auction/day-ahead/prices?deli... 12&currency=EUR&aggregation=MonthlyAggregate&deliveryAreas=SE1,SE2 https://data.nordpoolgroup.com/auction/day-ahead/prices?deliveryDate=2025-09-12&currency=EUR&aggregation=MonthlyAggregate&deliveryAreas=SE1,SE2 https://data.nordpoolgroup.com/auction/day-ahead/prices?deli... I guess if you want a data center that only operates some months of the year that's fine.

plufz 15d ago

Is that really it? I thought Sweden was a net exporter and that the price volatility was much more related to the eu pricing and distribution?

dijit 14d ago
the north exports, the south imports. If you run datacenters in the north its substantially cheaper. Places like Malmö have had issues with power costs, even though there's a lot of generation... because that generation happens in the north.
- plufz 14d ago
  But isn’t that also because of not investing in the grid more than a production problem? Not cheap to upgrade the grid of course but having good transmission capacity makes a more stable and efficient energy system. Not saying we shouldn’t produce more electricity. But from what I have understood it’s mainly about other factors than production.

bjourne 14d ago

The bottleneck is the grid, not the production centers. Volatility is not more extreme in Sweden than other connected (Nord Pool) countries. Companies lament the lack of grid connectivity all the time. Then they get the offer "Pay for the cost of grid expansion to connect you" and they are not so interested anymore.