this post was submitted on 22 Aug 2023
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Because uranium appears out of thin air and it's not being extracted in politically volatile areas. Every Euro that's spent on a nuclear reactor is an euro that would be better spent on renewable energies.
And of course, the materials that go into solar panels and other renewable tech (lithium ion batteries) also appear out of thin air and isn't extracted in environmentally degrading ways...
Depends. Renewables are faster at decarbonising than nuclear. Only if we're starting from scratch. They're also cheaper, and at scale, more reliable. Difference here was, Germany shut down existing nuclear before they could ramp up renewables. I will add that this is the most generous argument to maintain nuclear.
That's true but couldn't that also be said for the rare earth metals used in batteries to power phones and EVs?
No energy production is perfect. Just good to look at the pros and cons.
So we should back ourselves into a corner when we have alternatives, because we don't have alternatives for everything?
Clearly that only matters with nuclear and magically doesn't happen in any other case
People also think that nuclear is some sort of magical thing that provides cheap unlimited energy on demand, when really it's an expensive, lumbering option, that is slow to construct and difficult to maintain. There's a reason why even China prefers renewables over nuclear, and they have reactors for military research.
You should probably tell China that, then...
https://www.iaea.org/bulletin/how-china-has-become-the-worlds-fastest-expanding-nuclear-power-producer
I don't have to tell China they're finding it out themselves. Yes, China leads in deploying nuclear, for various reasons. Energy, research, military. But despite this, renewables represents by far the largest investment and growth. Though China's nuclear energy ambitions seem large, don't forget, it's a huge country. It's just a small piece of the pie, the pie being dominated by renewables.
Ah yes... The classic primary source of an op ed from CU Boulder, which isn't exactly known for having a great Asian Studies program.
And yet, it's backed up by studies showing that nuclear is faster for decarbonisation, S&P Global's estimates for the massive growth of renewables vs nuclear indicating China's preferences. But really, this is all part of China's infrastructure push. The funding is going to renewables, but China is keeping a foot in the door for nuclear. At best, nuclear would work, in a majority renewables grid if they cut about 25% off the cost.
And this relates to China in particular, how? Chinese infrastructure is substantially cheaper than abroad because NIMBYs get fucked.
This relates to China because they're literally by far have invested the heaviest in renewable energy. A good amount of their nuclear reactors are experimental and for research, some are looking at military applications for ships. Renewables growth in China far outstrips their nuclear efforts. As per what the original article I mentioned indicates. China isn't serious about their nuclear plans, it's a combined research, military, national pride thing. Unlike their renewables investments, which you can see outstrips nuclear today, and in the future from sources given, backed by scientific papers also given.
It's almost as if that's why the gold standard is a nuclear baseline with renewable to meet demand spikes.
That's not how renewables work. They don't produce electricity on demand (at least not solar and wind), their energy output is dependent on the weather. If there's no wind and no sun, they won't cover any demand spikes. Which is why baseload power like nuclear is pretty much useless in combination with renewables.
What is actually needed is flexible power that can be quickly adapted to the varying output from solar and wind. This is currently mostly done with natural gas, which we're trying to get away from. In the future, biomass, water and storage will cover that part, while demand response strategies will help reduce demand peaks during times of low energy production.
If there is no wind or sun, we're facing a global apocalypse. There's always wind or sun. You just need to capture it. Nuclear is not on demand either, most plants aren't designed to be. Nuclear is designed to be baseload energy, which, for decades, has fallen out of favour in lieu of more flexible doctrines. Octopus Energy is doing quite a bit of work with AI and energy demand, using incentives to control public energy consumption, which reduces the backup you would need for renewables. Also, that study I referenced, presumes about a 25% decrease in cost of nuclear. Again, best case scenario for nuclear.
No, we're facing nighttime. That happens literally every day.
So who goes around switching off the sun and turning off the wind?
You could actually use nuclear for stabilizing the grid. The reason no one does so is that you need to run nuclear power plants at reduced power, rendering them even less economical.
Oh good, biomass. Because there aren't enough starving people in the world already.
Growing plants just to use them for energy production is absolutely stupid and incredibly harmful, agreed. But there are types of biomass that are basically waste from food production or forestry. It's not a ton of energy, but it may play a part somewhere.
Two problems with that:
Man, the existence of batteries is going to blow your mind
Edit: Just realized I think you missed the main point. You want a (functionally) 100% reliable baseline to meet your energy needs. That's why you don't use renewables, at the moment anyway. You want as much renewable as possible on top of that.
First of all, nuclear is anything but reliable. Germany had to supply huge amounts of electricity to France last year because half of their nuclear plants had to be shut down. They would have had major blackouts without support from their European neighbors.
But my main point is that baseload power does not mix with renewable sources at all. Using batteries and other solutions to store renewable energy during times of little wind or sunlight is actually the goal. But that also eliminates the need for baseload.
Baseload was never really a feature anyway, it was a necessity. Nuclear and certain types of coal power plants were unable to follow demand, they had to be run at close to full load all the time, either for technical or for economic reasons. To compensate for that, other more expensive plants had to be used to cover times of higher demand.
Batteries, at the colossal capacity required for this purpose, are nowhere even close to existing.
There is some evidence to suggest a small nuclear presence in an otherwise majority renewables grid, can be ideal. But this is the most generous position you can have for nuclear.