8 ms·

Reliable and predictable at 2x the cost. Saving 50% on generation gives you a lot of options in terms of demand shaping and storage. It's also far, far less c

Reliable and predictable at 2x the cost. Saving 50% on generation gives you a lot of options in terms of demand shaping and storage. It's also far, far less capital intensive and doesn't require an uncapped disaster insurance subsidy from the taxpayer.

Scea91 7y ago
1) Increased investment in nuclear energetics should bring the cost down 2) 2x cost for these attributes does not seem particularly bad to me. 3) I am not aware of any production ready options that have been deployed at scale somewhere. I know there are a lot of ideas however. If you have time can you please point me to the most promising ones? I am genuinely interested.
- crdoconnor 7y ago
  Nuclear has shown no particular inclination to come down in price whereas renewables have. It's just not cost effective without both massive implicit and explicit government subsidies. Renewables are cost effective now and will only become more so.
  - acidburnNSA 7y ago
    They're cost effective when the sun is shining or wind is blowing but are strongly tied to increased high carbon fracked natural gas otherwise. When batteries are used the Energy Return on Investment drops below what's necessary to sustain industrialized civilization (around 5:1). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.esr.2019.100399 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.esr.2019.100399
    - bildung 7y ago
      Even without including cost overruns and decomissioning, wind energy costs the same per kilowatt of capacity[0,1]. And the actually produced energy as share of capacity (= the capacity factor) is way better than most think. For the nuclear plants in France it currently is just over 70%, while it is about 50% globally for offshore wind parks [2,3] [0] http://www.windustry.org/how_much_do_wind_turbines_cost http://www.windustry.org/how_much_do_wind_turbines_cost [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-edf-nuclear-epr/frances-edf-expects-six-new-nuclear-reactors-to-cost-46-billion-euros-le-monde-idUSKBN1XJ074 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-edf-nuclear-epr/frances-e... [2] http://css.umich.edu/factsheets/wind-energy-factsheet http://css.umich.edu/factsheets/wind-energy-factsheet [3] https://www.worldnuclearreport.org/IMG/pdf/20170912wnisr2017-en-lr.pdf https://www.worldnuclearreport.org/IMG/pdf/20170912wnisr2017... Edit: Changed phrasing because it apparently sounded like the 50% capacity factor also referred to France.
      - hokkos 7y ago
        You are completely wrong on your numbers, in France in 2018 nuclear has a capacity factor of 71% and wind of 21,1% https://bilan-electrique-2018.rte-france.com/eolien/ https://bilan-electrique-2018.rte-france.com/eolien/ Also there is currently no offshore wind park, as only offshore would approach the 50% capacity factor, but they won't, they will be in the 43% as estimated by renewables.ninja The price of the MWh of offsore park will be from 44 to 150€/MWh, where EDF is forced to sell its nuclear at 42€/MWh, average price of wind in 2020 93€/MWh.
        kragen 7y ago
        It sounds like you confirmed their nuclear capacity factor ("just over 70%") and pointed out that French wind farms have a lower capacity factor (21.1%) than wind farms on average. I don't think that constitutes evidence that they are "completely wrong on [their] numbers".
        hokkos 7y ago
        Price and capacity factor where completely wrong for wind, also current wind subsidies are about 93€/MWh.
        kragen 7y ago
        They were citing worldwide capacity factors and prices for wind, not French ones, which I agree are much worse.
        hokkos 7y ago
        That was not obvious, it was written like a French nuclear with French wind comparison. And also that is misleading because comparing the low capacity factor of French nuclear because it is used for load following and curtailed in summer because it is scaled for winter usage using restive heating. And comparing it to offshore with intermittent power, not dispatchable in the best location, does not make sense. With penetration wind will also be curtailed, and is already happening in china and Germany.
- bildung 7y ago
  Nuclear is way too expensive, it essentially has lost. It will certainly will play a part for decades, but e.g. wind turbine parks are already at the same price level and have none of the disadvantages of nuclear. Plus several wind parks in a grid work just fine as base load providers, see e.g. https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.475.4620 https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.475...
  - acidburnNSA 7y ago
    The intermittency is the one thing nuclear does better than wind. Nuclear can run 24/7 for multiple years on one fuel load on a tiny land footprint with very few raw materials. No other low-carbon source can do that.
    - bildung 7y ago
      But real world nuclear plants seldomly run for years. I just posted links in another comment, nuclears capacity factor in France (the country with a high nuclear buildout) is about 72%, while that of wind is about 50%. The nuclear plants in France routinely have to be shut down / throttled during the summer heat - just at the times of high energy demands.
      - acidburnNSA 7y ago
        In the US the nuclear capacity is over 90% across 100 plants. Just because France chooses to curtail doesn't mean they have to. Wind cannot be higher than the wind itself. The characteristic of coming on and off when you want is called being dispatchable. In the us northwest there's a fairly regular 2-week wind outage across a 4 state area each winter.
        kragen 7y ago
        It's unavoidable that if you get almost all of your power from some source, but demand varies, you will have a lower capacity factor for that source, unless you have utility-scale power. France does indeed have to curtail nuclear power plant output, because they get almost all their electrical power from nukes, and they don't have big enough resistors to burn up the excess electrical energy that would be produced otherwise. The US has a higher nuclear capacity factor because it gets most of its power from other sources. > This characteristic is called being dispatchable. While I mostly appreciate your contributions to this conversation as being informative, a dispatchable plant is one that you can turn on and off to respond to demand, not one that cannot be higher than the wind itself.

Scea91 7y ago

1) Increased investment in nuclear energetics should bring the cost down 2) 2x cost for these attributes does not seem particularly bad to me. 3) I am not aware of any production ready options that have been deployed at scale somewhere. I know there are a lot of ideas however. If you have time can you please point me to the most promising ones? I am genuinely interested.

crdoconnor 7y ago
Nuclear has shown no particular inclination to come down in price whereas renewables have. It's just not cost effective without both massive implicit and explicit government subsidies. Renewables are cost effective now and will only become more so.
- acidburnNSA 7y ago
  They're cost effective when the sun is shining or wind is blowing but are strongly tied to increased high carbon fracked natural gas otherwise. When batteries are used the Energy Return on Investment drops below what's necessary to sustain industrialized civilization (around 5:1). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.esr.2019.100399 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.esr.2019.100399
  - bildung 7y ago
    Even without including cost overruns and decomissioning, wind energy costs the same per kilowatt of capacity[0,1]. And the actually produced energy as share of capacity (= the capacity factor) is way better than most think. For the nuclear plants in France it currently is just over 70%, while it is about 50% globally for offshore wind parks [2,3] [0] http://www.windustry.org/how_much_do_wind_turbines_cost http://www.windustry.org/how_much_do_wind_turbines_cost [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-edf-nuclear-epr/frances-edf-expects-six-new-nuclear-reactors-to-cost-46-billion-euros-le-monde-idUSKBN1XJ074 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-edf-nuclear-epr/frances-e... [2] http://css.umich.edu/factsheets/wind-energy-factsheet http://css.umich.edu/factsheets/wind-energy-factsheet [3] https://www.worldnuclearreport.org/IMG/pdf/20170912wnisr2017-en-lr.pdf https://www.worldnuclearreport.org/IMG/pdf/20170912wnisr2017... Edit: Changed phrasing because it apparently sounded like the 50% capacity factor also referred to France.
    - hokkos 7y ago
      You are completely wrong on your numbers, in France in 2018 nuclear has a capacity factor of 71% and wind of 21,1% https://bilan-electrique-2018.rte-france.com/eolien/ https://bilan-electrique-2018.rte-france.com/eolien/ Also there is currently no offshore wind park, as only offshore would approach the 50% capacity factor, but they won't, they will be in the 43% as estimated by renewables.ninja The price of the MWh of offsore park will be from 44 to 150€/MWh, where EDF is forced to sell its nuclear at 42€/MWh, average price of wind in 2020 93€/MWh.
      - kragen 7y ago
        It sounds like you confirmed their nuclear capacity factor ("just over 70%") and pointed out that French wind farms have a lower capacity factor (21.1%) than wind farms on average. I don't think that constitutes evidence that they are "completely wrong on [their] numbers".
        hokkos 7y ago
        Price and capacity factor where completely wrong for wind, also current wind subsidies are about 93€/MWh.
        kragen 7y ago
        They were citing worldwide capacity factors and prices for wind, not French ones, which I agree are much worse.
        hokkos 7y ago
        That was not obvious, it was written like a French nuclear with French wind comparison. And also that is misleading because comparing the low capacity factor of French nuclear because it is used for load following and curtailed in summer because it is scaled for winter usage using restive heating. And comparing it to offshore with intermittent power, not dispatchable in the best location, does not make sense. With penetration wind will also be curtailed, and is already happening in china and Germany.
bildung 7y ago
Nuclear is way too expensive, it essentially has lost. It will certainly will play a part for decades, but e.g. wind turbine parks are already at the same price level and have none of the disadvantages of nuclear. Plus several wind parks in a grid work just fine as base load providers, see e.g. https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.475.4620 https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.475...
- acidburnNSA 7y ago
  The intermittency is the one thing nuclear does better than wind. Nuclear can run 24/7 for multiple years on one fuel load on a tiny land footprint with very few raw materials. No other low-carbon source can do that.
  - bildung 7y ago
    But real world nuclear plants seldomly run for years. I just posted links in another comment, nuclears capacity factor in France (the country with a high nuclear buildout) is about 72%, while that of wind is about 50%. The nuclear plants in France routinely have to be shut down / throttled during the summer heat - just at the times of high energy demands.
    - acidburnNSA 7y ago
      In the US the nuclear capacity is over 90% across 100 plants. Just because France chooses to curtail doesn't mean they have to. Wind cannot be higher than the wind itself. The characteristic of coming on and off when you want is called being dispatchable. In the us northwest there's a fairly regular 2-week wind outage across a 4 state area each winter.
      - kragen 7y ago
        It's unavoidable that if you get almost all of your power from some source, but demand varies, you will have a lower capacity factor for that source, unless you have utility-scale power. France does indeed have to curtail nuclear power plant output, because they get almost all their electrical power from nukes, and they don't have big enough resistors to burn up the excess electrical energy that would be produced otherwise. The US has a higher nuclear capacity factor because it gets most of its power from other sources. > This characteristic is called being dispatchable. While I mostly appreciate your contributions to this conversation as being informative, a dispatchable plant is one that you can turn on and off to respond to demand, not one that cannot be higher than the wind itself.