Uranium is $128.30/kg

After enrichment, conversion and fabrication that's $3400/kg for 4.95% fuel.

At 36-45MWd/kg and a net thermal efficiency of 25% or $12.5/MWh up front.

With a 90 month lead time (72 month fuel cycle and 18 months inventory) at 3% this is $16.2/MWh

Which some solar projects are now matching

I'll note that right now, this is a seasonal issue, associated with moderate springtime temperatures when there is a lot of sunshine available.

As the title says, I'm interested in this community's perceptions on nuclear energy.

The energy suppliers in my area all have contracts I do not agree with. My gas & electric service may be cut in a couple weeks.

What’s my best move? I need enough electricity to power a mid-sized refrigerator (but could downgrade to a minifridge if needed), a few lights, router, laptop.

My boiler is gas but I have an old previously used mazut tank and furnice which I could possibly get working again with some effort.

Not sure what to do for cooking. Maybe use a portable electric cooktop.

(updates)

I’m favoring diesel over gasoline, for these reasons:

• My large mazut tank could store a year supply diesel but I doubt I could safely store gasoline in that quantity. It’s questionable though because it has mold or something growing in it so I’m not sure if it needs to be cleaned (or whether cleaning it is even possible). Or maybe the mold is harmless.

• Mazut and diesel may be compatible (not sure). That is, maybe a diesel generator can burn mazut or perhaps the mazut furnice can burn diesel. Guess I should find out how different they are.

• Clean biodiesel can be made in a basement from waste cooking oil and lye. I can probably get the waste oil at no cost.

W.r.t renewables, it’s in a densely packed city with a tiny terrace so wind turbines are probably impossible. Solar panels may be viable, I need to look into that. But I would be really surprised if solar could warm the house in the winter -- it’s not a passive house (in fact not even insulated). I think solar would be a nice clean & quiet supplement.

Camping propane or butane stove may be the way to go for cooking.

Just 10 years ago, landlords could ban you from putting solar cells on your balcony because it makes their building look "messy". Now Germany is really pushing forward to let everybody put solar modules on their balcony with these new laws. How is legalization of balcony solar cells in your country? Is setting up solar modules on your balcony easy or difficult law-wise?

According to the data gathered on energy-charts.info, the first half of 2023 saw the lowest production of electricity by fossil fuels since 2015. With 387 TWh (31.7% of load) from conventional sources it surpassed the previous low for a first half year of 400.9 TWh (32.1%) in 2020 by nearly 14 TWh or 3.5%.

At the same time renewables provided for more power than ever with 519.3 TWh providing 42.6% of the load.

Other records for a first half year in 2023 (see the bottom of the energy-charts page):

• lowest nuclear power production

• lowest fossil peat production

• lowest load

• highest pumped hydro usage (consumption+production)

• highest offshore wind production (23.922 TWh)

• highest onshore wind production (195.399 TWh)

• highest solar power production (98.698 TWh)

This marks a notable shift towards green energy compared to the first half of 2022: renewables increased from 488.8 TWh in the first half of 2022 to 519.3 TWh in the first half this year, while fossil fuels decreased from 475.3 TWh to 387 TWh.

Source

Does Nuclear count as Green Energy? I feel like it should, since it doesn't really pollute and lasts a lot.

Solar pumps are spreading rapidly among rural communities in many water-starved regions across India, Africa, and elsewhere. These devices can tap underground water all day long at no charge, without government scrutiny.

For now, they can be great news for farmers, with the potential to transform agriculture and improve food security. The pumps can supply water throughout the daylight hours, extending their croplands into deserts, ending their reliance on unpredictable rains, and sometimes replacing existing costly-to-operate diesel or grid-powered pumps.

But this solar-powered hydrological revolution is emptying already-stressed underground water reserves—also known as groundwaters or aquifers. The very success of solar pumps is “threatening the viability of many aquifers already at risk of running dry,” Soumya Balasubramanya, an economist at the World Bank with extensive experience of water policy, warned in January.

An innovation that initially looked capable of reducing fossil-fuel consumption while also helping farmers prosper is rapidly turning into an environmental time bomb.

Due to technological trajectories set in motion by past policy, a global irreversible solar tipping point may have passed where solar energy gradually comes to dominate global electricity markets, without any further climate policies

"Spanish consultancy AleaSoft Energy Forecasting recorded negative hourly electricity prices for all but one European energy market it analyzed during the first week of April, including in the Spanish and Portuguese markets for the first time. It also registered an all-time production record for photovoltaic energy in Portugal and the second highest value ever recorded in Italy"

For a country that people shat on a lot for closing their nuclear plants Germany is on the right track reducing their C02.

Short version: cheap electricity + water

Germany is struggling to get people on-board with a green energy movement that involves banning high footprint domestic heating systems (e.g. gas boilers)-- thus forcing people to migrate to heat pumps. A low-income family who was interviewed said it would cost €45k to install a heat pump in their terraced home in Bremen.

That price tag sounds unreal. I am baffled. What’s going on here? I guess I would assume an old terraced German home would likely have wall radiators that circulate hot water. Is the problem that a heat pump can’t generate enough heat to bring water to ~60°C, which would then force them to add a forced-air ducting infrastructure? Any guesses?

(note the link goes to a BBC program that looks unrelated, but at the end of the show they switch to this issue in Germany. I’m not sure if that show is accessible.. I see no download link but that could be a browser issue)

Let me know if this isnt appropriate for this community. Still new here, but I live in a place with a highly variable electricity grid.

Sometimes we're running mostly on coal, othertimes a good amount of wind generation kicks in and our grid runs cleaner. I've been using this site as a means of tracking when our grid is running on more renewable resources in order to make decisions about energy use (mostly when to plug my car in).

Keep in mind, there is a certain amount of estimation and assumptions going on here but the site shows stats like current generation, use, percent renewable, co2 emission estimates, etc.

Thought it might be useful to folks. Theres an app too for those interested.

A community turns on itself over the aptly named Mammoth solar project, a planned $1.5bn power field nearly the size of Manhattan

Solar panels — 80% of which are made in China — are so cheap that they're now being used to line garden fences in Germany and the Netherlands, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.