51–60 of 134 posts
“Options include reserve thermal power plants, battery storage or cables for importing electricity from other markets.” Or nuclear. Sad that this isn’t seen as an option any longer.
Natural gas instead would really shine as a backup power source.
“Options include reserve thermal power plants, battery storage or cables for importing electricity from other markets.” Or nuclear. Sad that this isn’t seen as an option any longer.
Maybe someone can correct me, but I don't see how we're going to get out of climate change (generally, but also specifically) without nuclear power. We need something which can produce a reliable base load and I don't think there are any other widely available options which don't produce heaps of emissions.
In a way, my utility can do things that force this (voltage reductions), but it’s only really effective for resistive loads, and could increase resistive losses on the transmission/distribution network.
https://www.ieso.ca/en/Sector-Participants/IESO-News/2021/01...
One big problem is that transmission/distribution costs aren’t variable based on time-of-day, but they could be too.
It's weird that we have higher late-summer electricity prices that we did mid-winter this year. But all things considered, energy prices do in fact need to be high in order to support faster deployment of renewables and CO2-neutral energy. Sucks for everyone who has marginal incomes, but I'm sure we can make some adjustments to the safety net policies to mitigate that.
I wouldn't be surprised that if this trend increases and the push comes to shove, then the voters - especially those on marginal incomes - might decide that actually they much prefer lower energy prices instead of supporting renewables and CO2-neutral energy; and in democratic countries it's the general public who are entitled to make that choice for their country instead of accepting the decisions of elites/experts…
The people who can least afford to pay for clean energy etc are the ones who will also be most impacted by heat waves, declining air quality, and natural disasters.
So it's a similar "luxury good" as "functioning healthcare".
It's time for a nuclear expansion so we can transition out of our fossil dependency.
Nucler just works.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it's the general public who are entitled to make that choice for their country instead of accepting the decisions of elites/experts and waiting for safety net policies to compensate for the suck. Nah, people will do as they're told.
That sort of is the democratic principle. There are three alternatives: 1. This choice gets made in whatever way does get (at least passive) consent of the general public; 2. The leaders try to make a different choice and get promptly replaced in the next elections with whichever populists promise to ignore the elites and roll back these choices; 3. The leaders make a different choice and violently enforce them in an…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Or nuclear. Sad that this isn’t seen as an option any longer Is anti-nuclear sentiment consistent across Europe?
I think Fukushima killed much of the remaining enthusiasm, but really it's the high cost of building new nuclear plants across Europe that's keeping it from being an option. If building a new plant was cheap, I'm sure you'd see a lot more happening.
Not only that, but running it. No private company insures a nuclear power plant (at least in the densely populated Central Europe). We're talking about dozens of billions each year.
Currently the operator does a token insurance of a few hundred million but if things really go south it's essentially up to the society to absorb the costs of the aftermath.
If you can't socialize the risks and have to pay market price the "cheap" goes out of the window fast.
“Options include reserve thermal power plants, battery storage or cables for importing electricity from other markets.” Or nuclear. Sad that this isn’t seen as an option any longer.
It's weird that we have higher late-summer electricity prices that we did mid-winter this year. But all things considered, energy prices do in fact need to be high in order to support faster deployment of renewables and CO2-neutral energy. Sucks for everyone who has marginal incomes, but I'm sure we can make some adjustments to the safety net policies to mitigate that.
In this case, energy prices are (partially) high because of deployment of renewables (and not nuclear)
It's weird that we have higher late-summer electricity prices that we did mid-winter this year. But all things considered, energy prices do in fact need to be high in order to support faster deployment of renewables and CO2-neutral energy. Sucks for everyone who has marginal incomes, but I'm sure we can make some adjustments to the safety net policies to mitigate that.
I wouldn't be surprised that if this trend increases and the push comes to shove, then the voters - especially those on marginal incomes - might decide that actually they much prefer lower energy prices instead of supporting renewables and CO2-neutral energy; and in democratic countries it's the general public who are entitled to make that choice for their country instead of accepting the decisions of elites/experts…
While I sympathize with this view on a certain level, applying it to policy consistently and literally is a likely path towards chaos and immense death and suffering 70 years from now. That's a high cost to pay to consider climate policies an optional luxury good.
I'm increasingly convinced that bribing part of the voters with some sort of climate tax dividend is a sensible policy to keep society moving towards climate gas neutrality.
I certainly agree with the view that all climate policies are worthless if they don't take into account real-world considerations such as free will and what significant parts of society are able/willing to afford.
It's painful to watch this slow-motion tragedy play out. Certainly interested in hearing suggestions for improving it.