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EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

reuters.com

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Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#371

Post by pydry »

Swenrekcah wrote: post #337
pydry wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>While Nuclear is not cheap, it will be cheaper than the effects from un-softened climate change. Is it cheaper than demand shaping/wind/solar/grid-scale batteries though? That's the real question. As far as I can see that answer may be yes in one specific circumstance - when you already have a nuclear plant with another 5+ years of life left. i.e. when the insane capex is a sunk cost. In all other instances it only…

> Is it cheaper than demand shaping/wind/solar/grid-scale batteries though? That's the real question. I believe that’s the wrong question to ask. We need nuclear to be cheaper and more attractive than coal and oil (and later natural gas). If grid scale batteries ever become a viable thing and cheaper than nuclear then that’s just great and eventually the nuclear plants can be phased out in favour of those. In the mea…

>If grid scale batteries ever become a viable thing and cheaper than nuclear then that’s just great

Ok. So, what if that already happened?

>In the meantime however

The meantime is past. Arguably it lasted until latest 2020 which was the last time grid scale batteries were expensive. 2014 was the last time solar or wind were expensive.

Meanwhile, if you tried to commission a new nuclear plant now it wouldnt be running until 2030 earliest and possibly later (hinkley point C will take 20 years).

A new battery/wind/solar farm usually takes a year and theyre still plunging in price.

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#372

Post by SonicTheSith »

pydry wrote: post #279
SonicTheSith wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is, While Nuclear is not cheap, it will be cheaper than the effects from un-softened climate change. While Nuclear is difficult to maintain and if an accident happens it is bad, but the damage and affected area can be easily calculated. While Nuclear waste storage costs money and has to be secure for a long time, the chance that we as humans will be able to recycle the nuclear waste in 200-500 years is fair…

>While Nuclear is not cheap, it will be cheaper than the effects from un-softened climate change. Is it cheaper than demand shaping/wind/solar/grid-scale batteries though? That's the real question. As far as I can see that answer may be yes in one specific circumstance - when you already have a nuclear plant with another 5+ years of life left. i.e. when the insane capex is a sunk cost. In all other instances it only…

>Is it cheaper than demand shaping/wind/solar/grid-scale batteries though? That's the real question.

Hmm, I think one should also add other factors.

Space Requirements for Wind and solar. To generate the same amount of energy as a nuclear power plant a lot of space is needed for Wind and Solar.

Resources to Produce Batteries, Solar Panels and Wind mills. Battery production requires a fuck ton of water. With impeding Water shortages this is suboptimal.

How many Solar Panels and Wind mills can we produce daily? Not just construction and installation on site, but also mineral mining for the Solar panels. And then how many factories can produce these, and can that be scaled up? How many construction workers are there and how many on site installation can be completed.

We need 1200 wind turbines to replace an 30year old nuclear power plant. Windturbine = 3mW, Nuclear power plant = 1.2GW

Just to cover our current demand of electrical energy we need a ton of wind turbines and solar panels. Than add to that every other industry that needs to switch to electricity, Transportation, Chemical Industry, Steel Industry, heating etc. This would quintuple our electrical energy consumption.

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#373

Post by holoduke »

AstralStorm wrote: post #352
holoduke wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not true. We have 10kw solar panels with 64x ,280ah LIFO batteries. Even in the winter we manage for 90% using only solar/battery power. We have a detached family house in the Netherlands using slightly above average. Our monthly bill is about 20 euros max. I build the entire setup myself for about 10k euros.

90% is not good enough, when your total increased due to heating. Oh, you do not heat with electricity? I hope you counted that heat source in CO2e...

Well it's almost enough. we don't have gas. Everything in the house is powered by electricity. Either from solar, battery or grid. So 10% still from grid. I am going to solve that by putting another 20 panels on the Northside of the roof. Not efficient, but maybe enough to cover the last 10%

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#374

Post by pydry »

SonicTheSith wrote: post #372
pydry wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>While Nuclear is not cheap, it will be cheaper than the effects from un-softened climate change. Is it cheaper than demand shaping/wind/solar/grid-scale batteries though? That's the real question. As far as I can see that answer may be yes in one specific circumstance - when you already have a nuclear plant with another 5+ years of life left. i.e. when the insane capex is a sunk cost. In all other instances it only…

>Is it cheaper than demand shaping/wind/solar/grid-scale batteries though? That's the real question. Hmm, I think one should also add other factors. Space Requirements for Wind and solar. To generate the same amount of energy as a nuclear power plant a lot of space is needed for Wind and Solar. Resources to Produce Batteries, Solar Panels and Wind mills. Battery production requires a fuck ton of water. With impeding…

>We need 1200 wind turbines to replace an 30year old nuclear power plant. Windturbine = 3mW, Nuclear power plant = 1.2GW

Hornsea two provides as much as a nuclear plant, with vastly lower cost and built about 15x faster. It's 165 x 8 MW turbines.

It was planned, executed, built and brought online before Hinkley point C even laid the first brick at ~45% of the cost and a load factor of about 65% (to nuclears 80) due to the greater reliability of wind with large turbines.

>mineral mining for the Solar panels

You mean going to the beach?

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#375

Post by funklute »

locallost wrote: post #335
funklute wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Language is full of ambiguities that are only resolved by context. Both a relative increase and an absolute increase are increases, so saying that it has a "clear meaning" is fairly pointless here. And you're still ignoring my original question, which I asked from genuine curiosity. I'm getting a strong feeling you prefer to focus on a straw man, because if you look at relative changes your position falls apart. Do p…

I hope you're enjoying the increase in air temperature from 30 degrees in the summer, to 2 degrees today. The temperature for today was projected to be -3 two weeks ago, so we have a relative increase there. Is that how you think relative vs absolute works?

Again, *by context* this is precisely how you would *not* interpret "increase" here.

You've basically taken my point and turned it to mean the exact opposite, so that you can give a smart-ass reply while avoiding the actual question I'm asking. Well done.

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#376

Post by fulafel »

kebman wrote: post #72

Oh, this has probably nothing to do with the major energy deficit Europe is now experiencing. Sorry for the sarcasm, but people living here without a secondary source of heat are suffering ice cold houses because they have to choose between heat or food. The deficit has lead to record prices here in Norway, in the middle of winter, because power for 5 mill people is almost completely drained in order to meet the dema…

Sounds concerning that the famously good social safety net there is not protecting people from starving and freezing, is heating not covered by welfare programs?

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#377

Post by freeflight »

scrollaway wrote: post #39
retinaros wrote: post #23

in france gov passed a law that will give a bad grade to gas heated houses (if the grade is bad you cant rent your house) and a good one to electricity. oh and because of europe we import electricity from germany that is burning coal for it. we are really in the middle of a green idiocracy

This is misinformation in both paragraphs. The “bad grade” takes a lot into account and between all the exceptions it is primarily aimed at new constructions. As for your second paragraph, I have no idea what you’re smoking. We’re Europe’s largest exporter of electricity, thanks to our nuclear power.

> We’re Europe’s largest exporter of electricity, thanks to our nuclear power.

In 2020, it was Germany who was the largest electricity exporter on the planet [0], must be thanks to our nuclear power?

[0] https://www.worldstopexports.com/electricity-exports-country...

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#378

Post by moffkalast »

locallost wrote: post #293
AQuantized wrote: post #63

Nuclear investments desperately need to be recognized as green so you don't have oxymoronic policies similar to Germany's current plan where you're decommissioning nuclear to become more "green" yet producing much more carbon dioxide.

Germany's carbon dioxide emissions have been going down steadily since they started switching off their aging nuclear plants. It's amazing to me how people can think they have a rational argument that's based entirely on fiction. Data: https://www.umweltbundesamt.de/sites/default/files/medien/38...

Yeah, and the amount of power they export has about halved in the last year. They're just turning stuff off without a way to replace it which will bite us all in the ass in the long run.

It's the classic outsource stuff to other nations and claim victory tactic that helps nobody.

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#379

Post by freeflight »

Chyzwar wrote: post #16
hadrien01 wrote: post #4

Nuclear I can understand. But gas?

I think Germans hope that new generation gas plants could be powered by hydrogen in the future[1]. The idea is that once we have cheap energy from wind and solar, it can be stored in hydrogen. Problem is safe storage of hydrogen[2] and problematic relationship with Russia[3] [1] https://www.rechargenews.com/energy-transition/why-hydrogen-... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_storage [3] https://www.politico.…

It's even in the article;

> Investments in natural gas power plants would also be deemed green if they produce emissions below 270g of CO2 equivalent per kilowatt hour (kWh), replace a more polluting fossil fuel plant, receive a construction permit by Dec. 31 2030 and plan to switch to low-carbon gases by the end of 2035.

This is about keeping infrastructure in place that can be retooled for a hydrogen economy [0].

[0] https://www.reuters.com/business/cop/europes-gas-firms-prime...

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#380

Post by iso1210 »

xigoi wrote: post #203
Gwypaas wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. So close you can call it equal, unless future deaths from groundwater pollution where to happen from leakage. So lets discount that and focus on the side which allocates capital and brings projects to completion. The cheapest renewables are currently a magnitude cheaper per KWH.

Nuclear can be built anywhere and can provide power at any time. What renewable has these properties?

Nuclear can't seem to be built anywhen, it seems to take decades and cost an order of magnitude more per kWh than offshore wind.

It can't be built anywhere either, given the local protests (personally I'd rather have a nuclear plant than a coal plant a few miles away, but for some reason people don't like that idea)

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