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Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

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Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#191

Post by elil17 »

cranx wrote: post #187
halfjoking wrote: post #166

No it isn’t. 500 million years ago when Earth’s CO2 level was 5000 ppm, did they have nuclear power? Is that what saved the planet to make it habitable for humans? No - the levels changed because of exposed olivine rocks that absorbed the CO2. That’s how nature fixes high CO2 levels. Why does the solution have to be anything other than that? If humanity spent $1 trillion per year on extracting olivine, and putting th…

We’d also die of mesothelioma. But hey, the co2 was captured.

As I understand it, olivine is not the same as asbestos and does not cause mesothelioma. Does the carbon capture reaction cause it to become dangerous?

Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#192

Post by elihu »

yCombLinks wrote: post #152
elihu wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine there are probably ways to make nuclear power cheaper than it is without sacrificing safety, but can it compete purely on cost with solar and wind, or even coal and natural gas? If you have a plan to fix the regulatory environment in a way that makes it cheaper than fossil fuels (ignoring long term hidden costs of fossil fuel use), then by all means advocate for that. I just think that we shouldn't assume t…

It is the solution to the climate change problem caused by coal and natural gas. Competing with their price should not be in the equation. Your second paragraph seems hostile, no, I don't have a plan and won't submit one.

Sadly competing with coal and natural gas on cost is relevant. I think we should close those plants as soon as possible even if it means replacing them with a more expensive option, but sometimes it's hard to get political traction on things that cost more. Solar and wind tends to be cheaper than fossil fuels, anyways, though that might not be true if you have to factor in batteries. (Whether that's an issue is geography-dependent: I'm in Oregon, and we get a lot of our power from hydroelectric, which means we can use bodies of water essentially as capacitors to buffer out the irregularities in wind and solar. The East coast doesn't really have that option.)

I don't mean to be hostile, I'm just saying that as far as I understand it, nuclear is expensive which means that people who are looking to get the most power for the least cost probably are going to go with wind and solar. If we can somehow make nuclear cost competitive then that's great but I don't know what's needed for that to happen and in the mean time I think the sensible thing is to treat nuclear as something that might work, but we aren't counting on it.

Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#193

Post by sfifs »

throwoutway wrote: post #156
sfifs wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear is socially and therefore politically non-viable because (1) When nuclear accidents happen, they suddenly overturn the lives of a LOT of commoners all at once as opposed to slow and creeping and often "statistically determined" impact of other energy tech (2) technocrats have consistently failed to demonstrate the ability to create organisations that over the long term prioritize safety and the ability to pre…

> (maybe with the exception of US Naval Reactors org - but who knows given the secracy) Then perhaps the US Navy and their US Navy Corps of Engineers need to be tasked with building & maintaining a system of land-based reactors

Yes in retrospect this was definitely a missed opportunity to not put Rickover's org in charge of civillian reactors. But then the problwm outside US would persist. However trust is now lost, will be very difficult ro regain

Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#194

Post by elihu »

rsj_hn wrote: post #146
lukeschlather wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear can compete purely on cost with coal. Which is fundamentally the problem. A decade ago nuclear was still legitimately the cheapest source of power but the economics have totally changed and now coal is not profitable and nuclear is likely on the way out.

how are you getting that coal is not profitable? Demand for coal is at an all time high. Check out coal prices. https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/coal We are also producing more coal than ever before (modulo the dip during covid lockdowns), and coal use is projected to increase: "Global coal production is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 2.3% between 2021 and 2025 to reach 8.8 billion…

By that chart it looks like mining coal is quite profitable. On the other hand, if you're generating electricity from coal, high coal prices make generating electricity from coal more expensive, and thus less competitive with nuclear or renewables.

Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#195

Post by elil17 »

I like nuclear and I used to think it was a silver bullet. I still believe that nuclear is very safe for life (in fact, it is even safer than solar on a per-kWh basis due to the high number of deaths associated with people falling off roofs while installing panels) and the enviroment, but I now understand more about some of it's disadvantages. Specifically:

1. It is very expensive. Nuclear has a levelized cost of over 10 cents per kilowatt hour, which is very high compared to solar and wind (not including energy storage). The levelized cost means that it is a cost which includes the costs of capital.

2. Load shifting can greatly reduce the need for energy storage. By shifting certain loads (e.g., some particularly energy intensive industrial processes) away from peak hours, we can greatly reduce the need for energy storage. Further, application tailored energy storage solutions (e.g., thermal energy storage for HVAC applications) can also be an effective solution.

3. While nuclear is not dangerous to humans anymore, the financial cost of accidents is huge. The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, while it only killed one person, cost one trillion dollars to contain and remediate. When you add it the probability of disasters and the cost of remediating them, the levelized cost of nuclear would be much, much higher.

Thus, while I don't oppose new nuclear power plants, I do think our society's resources are better spent on further research into nuclear (both fission and fusion) and lower cost energy options like wind and solar.

Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#196

Post by chii »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #190
sfifs wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear is socially and therefore politically non-viable because (1) When nuclear accidents happen, they suddenly overturn the lives of a LOT of commoners all at once as opposed to slow and creeping and often "statistically determined" impact of other energy tech (2) technocrats have consistently failed to demonstrate the ability to create organisations that over the long term prioritize safety and the ability to pre…

> (1) When nuclear accidents happen, they suddenly overturn the lives of a LOT of commoners all at once as opposed to slow and creeping and often "statistically determined" impact of other energy tech Hydroelectric dams have the same issue. I also bet, that if one of those gigawatt lithium battery storage facilities had a fire, it would be a very bad day for people around them.

the dam water would flow away at some point, and in a few years, the area would be fixed up and re-populated.

The fire at the lithium battery station would burn out after a while, and the area repopulated very soon.

The nuclear waste land like Chernobyl is uninhabitable for the foreseeable future.

Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#197

Post by elihu »

stjohnswarts wrote: post #80
elihu wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Solar farms can be pretty big, but we have the space for it. If you look at a map of the United States, there's a lot of land in the Southwest that gets a lot of sunlight and isn't usable for growing crops. It's an ecosystem, and anything that intrudes on that ecosystem will be somewhat disruptive, but as long as reasonable care is taken I don't see it as a problem to use a smallish fraction of that land for solar pr…

Not all of the United States is in the southwest, and why should the southwest destroy all their natural environments to power the rest of the rest of the country over lossy power lines when local nuclear could do it?

Decent high-voltage DC lines can move that power around with pretty small losses. (Wikipedia quotes about 3.5% per 1000km.) And the Southwest doesn't have to destroy all their natural environments; they just happen to have a natural advantage in power generation on land that otherwise isn't economically productive. (Not that all land has to be economically productive.)

This could be a major industry in those states.

Ecological impact should be looked into and installations should be done in a way that creates minimal environmental impact, but I'm not going to say that it should be an absolute showstopper if sagebrush is interspersed by the occasional array of black panels.

The environmental costs of major solar farms aren't going to be zero, but just because it's non-zero doesn't mean we shouldn't do it if it's environmentally preferable to burning coal and natural gas.

I'm also not against nuclear, I'm just not optimistic we can get the costs down.

Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#198

Post by tlb »

elihu wrote: post #197
stjohnswarts wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all of the United States is in the southwest, and why should the southwest destroy all their natural environments to power the rest of the rest of the country over lossy power lines when local nuclear could do it?

Decent high-voltage DC lines can move that power around with pretty small losses. (Wikipedia quotes about 3.5% per 1000km.) And the Southwest doesn't have to destroy all their natural environments; they just happen to have a natural advantage in power generation on land that otherwise isn't economically productive. (Not that all land has to be economically productive.) This could be a major industry in those states.…

While the losses aren't too big, transmission lines are very expensive and take many years of planning to get the land rights required if there isn't already a transmission line going there. There aren't currently a lot of lines going to the middle of nowhere, except for some hydroelectric dams.

Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#199

Post by shirro »

stjohnswarts wrote: post #72
shirro wrote: post #40

Nuclear is one of a number of alternatives that needs to be seriously considered but due to the long timelines and high costs of nuclear it is also one of the best stalling tactics for the fossil fuel industry seeking to extend the life of their assets. Possible increased adoption of nuclear in the future is not a reason to avoid setting sunset dates for emitting technologies now and commence transition to whatever l…

We can't afford to wait or not to hedge our bets. Nuclear is a hell of a hedge since we know it works. We know the French model works really well, but for some reason we, the country with the most heavily armed forces in the world, can't "protect" it. BS, moneyed interests and tree huggers are keeping us from fixing the problem until fusion comes along or uber cheap battery density 100x better than what we have curre…

Hedging bets is fine but there is a lot of money and influence using nuclear to muddy the climate debate and reframe the the issue as nuclear power vs greens/environmentalists. People should be aware of how the debate is being manipulated by fossil fuel apologists/lobbyists.

The moment people blame things on tree huggers they have fallen into the trap. Tree huggers are not the problem. The problem is carbon emissions. Tree huggers aren't stopping nuclear. They barely have any political power or representation. Nuclear's problems are the huge capital costs and the nimby attitude of the general public.

Nuclear is a clear win in countries like France with the capability and commitment. Climate change is a global problem and it doesn't matter where the nuclear reactors are as long as global emissions are reducing. Countries that can increase nuclear should. Those that can't may find it harder but they will have to innovate more and move faster.

Re: Nuclear power is the best climate-change solution

#200

Post by naasking »

rsj_hn wrote: post #189
natmaka wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, because building wind/solar/biomass/... production units took most of the investment capacity, while coping for variability was cheap because we already had thermal (fossil fueled) powerplants. Those are aging up and more and more expensive to use due to carbon taxes, therefore storage-related projects get boosted. H2 (and fuel cells), thermal and kinetic storage... are getting traction. The sheer amount of e…

All of the above facts are exactly correct. There is a huge financial incentive for storage. Right now. And yet the storage is not being built in any meaningful sense. At best we have "ideas" but these have not been actually deployed at scale. People keep throwing out ideas, but when there is a crunch they fly in diesel generators or add gas peaker plants. That alone should tell you how expensive the storage problem…

This just isn't correct. There are dozens of pilot projects for novel grid storage systems being built right now all around the world, and existing battery based grid storage like Tesla's megapack have multiple installations already in use, and dozens more planned this year. Pumped hydro alone is already in the hundreds of GW range.

The reason grid storage hasn't been built is because batteries were too expensive, but more importantly, grid storage was never needed. It takes 5-10 years for new tech to see widespread deployments, and it's only been a few years that grid storage had been getting this investment.

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