Germany is closing half of its reactors before the end of the year

Post by cmarschner » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 8:53 PM UTC

polotics wrote: post #97

cmarschner wrote: post #30

The sentiment on HN on this topic has traditionally been negative, and comments that support the move get downvoted. The fear of nuclear energy is deeply rooted in Germany and cannot be simply ignored. The "Anti AKW" (anti nuclear power) movement was huge since the 80s, it predates the fear of global warming, and it was at the core of what became the Green party. And Merkel, who has a doctorate quantum chemistry, cam…

Merkel... Did not come to the conclusion that nuclear power is too risky. She wanted to do more nuclear, well aware of CO2, but Fukushima happened (killing zero victims, but hey) and she saw her policy would get her voted out office, and no potential replacement was going to do better, so she folded, in the hope that large investment in renewables would help. It didn't, because a renewable world is a 18th century wor…

Post by barney54 » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 8:54 PM UTC

cmarschner wrote: post #78

fsh wrote: post #36

I am afraid this thread is going to be heavy on strongly held opinions and very light on facts and figures. In a futile attempt to compensate, here is the history of gross electricity production in Germany [1]. And here is the electricity import/export statistics [2]. [1] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/Energymi... [2] https://www.bmwi.de/Redaktion/DE/Infografiken/Energie/stroma...

So, to summarize, 1. Germany is a net exporter 2. Germany has reduced the production from fossil fuels from about 70% to about 37% within 30 years. 3. At the same time it cut nuclear power from around 28% to about 10. 4. It looks like without reducing nuclear power it could have replaced the equivalent amount of fossil fuels (achieving less than 20% fossil fuels by 2020). However, energy consumption has also gone up…

Post by uniqueuid » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 8:55 PM UTC

barney54 wrote: post #114

uniqueuid wrote: post #40

Please remember that nuclear energy makes up 12% of Germany's overall power production [1]. Yes we do import nuclear power from France. But this is not going to be a game-changer and might be even possible to offset with clean sources. [1] https://www.destatis.de/EN/Press/2021/09/PE21_429_43312.html

Averages do not matter when you need to keep the heat and lights on. Wholesale electricity rates are already 5 times as high as last winter. What matters is what generation can produce electricity when you need it and starting here in 10 days you will need more production.

Post by jhgb » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 8:57 PM UTC

polote wrote: post #119

king_phil wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One important thing to notice is that uranium is a finite non-renewable resource. The Red Book says there are about 3.3 million tons that are extractable for a price of 130 USD/ton. In 2017 the total uranium production was 60.000 tons. Thats about 55 years of uranium left at the current production rate. The Red Book assumes there are another 2.1 million tons likely to exist from geological data, but not found yet and…

> One important thing to notice is that uranium is a finite non-renewable resource. One important thing to notice is that place on earth to put wind turbines and solar panels is limited. Now imagine that electricity needs greatly increased ... At the end of the day, everything is finite

Post by merb » Wed, Dec 22, 2021, 8:57 PM UTC

loeg wrote: post #31

fsh wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany has never really used oil for producing electricity.

GP probably meant Russian gas. They are also going to become net buyers of coal electricity from neighboring countries as a result of this. It's not a good move for the environment.