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Natural gas and hydro are firm power. You're correct that nuclear is not a good backup power source, but that's not the suggestion. The question is whether addi

Natural gas and hydro are firm power. You're correct that nuclear is not a good backup power source, but that's not the suggestion. The question is whether adding high-capacity-factor firm generation reduces total system cost. In regions where hydro and geothermal are unavailable, nuclear is the next best low-carbon option. I think you're underestimating the costs and difficulties associated with 100% renewables, especially transmission capacity between regions.

bryanlarsen 19d ago
I think you're underestimating the costs and difficulties associated with 99.99% renewables and/or using it as a straw man against the highly inexpensive and achievable 95% renewables. You're also underestimating the costs of using nuclear to achieve 99.99% reliability on top of a grid with 95% renewables: in that scenario you need nuclear capable of supplying ~100% of your power. In which case you might as well ditch the renewables. But the world does not have the quadrillions needed to go 100% nuclear. The world does have the 10s of trillions needed to go 95-99% renewable.
- fasterik 19d ago
  >in that scenario you need nuclear capable of supplying ~100% of your power. Where are you getting that from? Again, nuclear doesn't need to be a full backup, and nobody is suggesting we ditch renewables for nuclear. A perfectly viable solution would be a grid with a majority of power coming from renewables and storage, with enough nuclear generation to reduce the amount of overbuild necessary and to stop burning natural gas. From this article: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666278721000234 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S266627872... >Individually, each firm technology delivers substantial cost reductions relative to portfolios restricted to wind, solar, and energy storage alone. Additionally, because each technology occupies a distinctive functional niche in the electricity system, having all of these technologies available optimizes the utilization rate of each resource and reduces system costs by up to 10% relative to cases with just one class of firm resource.
  - bryanlarsen 19d ago
    If you're using nuclear as a backstop in that way, you're using the same statistical techniques that let you use cheaper, less reliable sources of power for backstop.

bryanlarsen 19d ago

I think you're underestimating the costs and difficulties associated with 99.99% renewables and/or using it as a straw man against the highly inexpensive and achievable 95% renewables. You're also underestimating the costs of using nuclear to achieve 99.99% reliability on top of a grid with 95% renewables: in that scenario you need nuclear capable of supplying ~100% of your power. In which case you might as well ditch the renewables. But the world does not have the quadrillions needed to go 100% nuclear. The world does have the 10s of trillions needed to go 95-99% renewable.

fasterik 19d ago
>in that scenario you need nuclear capable of supplying ~100% of your power. Where are you getting that from? Again, nuclear doesn't need to be a full backup, and nobody is suggesting we ditch renewables for nuclear. A perfectly viable solution would be a grid with a majority of power coming from renewables and storage, with enough nuclear generation to reduce the amount of overbuild necessary and to stop burning natural gas. From this article: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666278721000234 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S266627872... >Individually, each firm technology delivers substantial cost reductions relative to portfolios restricted to wind, solar, and energy storage alone. Additionally, because each technology occupies a distinctive functional niche in the electricity system, having all of these technologies available optimizes the utilization rate of each resource and reduces system costs by up to 10% relative to cases with just one class of firm resource.
- bryanlarsen 19d ago
  If you're using nuclear as a backstop in that way, you're using the same statistical techniques that let you use cheaper, less reliable sources of power for backstop.