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Discussion question- do folkx here consider nuclear clean and/or green? (self.energy)

submitted 2 years ago by Nirile to c/energy

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

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[–] Nirile 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I appreciate the comment on what waste we're willing to deal with. It's also important to look at the embedded energy of the process, the energy return on investment, and the overall ecological footprint.

[–] greengnu 3 points 2 years ago

Completely fair.

An EROI of about 7 is considered break-even economically for developed countries and the US average EROI across all generating technologies is about 40 (and going down as the EROI of coal and oil is going down due to increasing energy requirements). The current estimated EROI for current generation nuclear reactors (that have huge rooms for improvement thanks to nuclear recycling being currently banned) is 80 for their operational lifetime (Which is actually a fraction of its estimated safe lifetime which further reduces the net EROI artificially to increase safety margins).