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Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

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Re: Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

#61

Post by gruturo »

JohnHaugeland wrote: post #49
tucosan wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the meantime, a barebones crew operates Chernobyl infrastructure, while the sacrophagus was shelled by Russian troops. Europes nuclear power Zaporizhzhia plant is surrounded by Russian troops and sustained damage: > At 11:28pm local time on the 3 March 2022, a column of 10 Russian armored vehicles and two tanks cautiously approached the Power Plant.[18][19][20] The action commenced at 12:48am on the 4 March when U…

> In the meantime, a barebones crew operates Chernobyl infrastructure, while the sacrophagus was shelled by Russian troops. and even under these conditions, once again, zero deaths the point you're trying to make actually works against you

> and even under these conditions, once again, zero deaths

I agree with your point, but for the record there's apparently been one death due to radiation (and possibly more to come): After the fighting was over, the russian soldiers seem to have camped in the Red Forest (absolutely the most contaminated area after the reactor structure itself https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Forest ), dug trenches and eaten local animals. And continued doing so for a month.

Re: Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

#62

Post by natmaka »

JohnHaugeland wrote: post #48
renox wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In France the new nuclear reactors have been plagued by hardware issue, delays.. So no, it isn't 'easy' to predict the building costs, it's easy only when you're replicating an already existing reactor and only if it was built recently!

> In France the new nuclear reactors have been plagued by hardware issue, delays That's odd, can you show me some evidence of that?

The new type of nuclear reactor is the "EPR".

The first project, in Finland (Olkiluoto-3) was a disaster: massive overcosts, 12 years late, customer lost, penalties paid, builder (Areva) saved thanks to public money. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olkiluoto_Nuclear_Power_Plant#...

The second project, in France (Flamanville-3) is an ongoing disaster: massive overcosts (from 3,3 to 19,4 billions €, and counting), aleady 10 years late and counting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flamanville_Nuclear_Power_Plan...

The third project, in China (Taishan-1 & -2) was officially 5 years late and 60% overcosts (and very probably not break even for the builder). After 1 year one of the 2 reactors was stopped mid-2021 after an incident.

The fourth project, in the U.-K. (Hinkley-Point C), started in 2018 and already announced overcosts and late delivery.

Old reactors: https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/frances-chinon-3-rea...

Decommission costs: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18686703

Re: Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

#63

Post by jsnodlin »

Manuel_D wrote: post #12
Archelaos wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now for some extra fun, overlay this with graphs over CO2 emissions. Some other fun: Overlay this with a graph of nuclear waste production.

France produces ~2kg of nuclear waste per person per year [1]. Most of that waste is recycled into fuel. 1. https://www.orano.group/en/unpacking-nuclear/all-about-radio...

No post body was provided.

Re: Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

#64

Post by natmaka »

JohnHaugeland wrote: post #47
pydry wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every nuclear disaster is unique yet nobody is willing to bet on any of them being the last. Fukushima was also unique in that it caused coal usage to skyrocket in Japan - a problem Germany is not currently suffering from. To me, the way to prove that something ISNT safe is to shout loudly about how safe it is and to absolutely refuse to shoulder the costs of anything going wrong. This is what the nuclear industry do…

> Every nuclear disaster is unique No nuclear disaster in history has added up to a bad single bus accident. . > and to absolutely refuse to shoulder the costs of anything going wrong. \n This is what the nuclear industry does This is, of course, the exact opposite of true. Nuclear power is the only kind of power expected to carry full disaster insurance (not even dams, which have death counts in the six digits.)

Victims: there are dissenting opinions, for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl:_Consequences_of_the...

No, nuclear isn't fully insured, in any nation (there are funds, providing for damages up to a low-caped total amount).

Power-producing dams failures are very rare and preventable, and albeit they are way more numerous and old than nuclear reactors the history path is clear: https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy

> dams, which have death counts in the six digits

This Banqiao case is a fluke, in similar conditions anything would go boom with way less latency: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24301436

Re: Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

#65

Post by natmaka »

JohnHaugeland wrote: post #34
pydry wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or insurance. If another fukushima strikes it's taxpayers on the hook for the $800 billion cleanup bill. Makes all the propaganda about how safe it truly is ring a bit hollow when they dont pay for their own damn insurance.

The Fukushima cleanup, unique in history and resulting from radically unlikely natural disasters, cost less than half what the fuel it replaced that decade would have This is without considering the cost of climate change or all those prevented deaths

The tsunami was the secondary cause, and believing that no-one could predict such a tsunami is misleading.

Proof: another nuclear plant was less distant from the tsunami and survived, because someone (Y. Hirai) foresaw it and could impose his views: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onagawa_Nuclear_Power_Plant#20...

The hard truth is: even a predictable cause can trigger a disaster. And many aren't predictable.

Fukushima is by many criteria a "lucky" case, as many reactors were properly shutdown when the wave came, operators reacted globally adequately...

The question isn't "is a disaster possible?" but "when, and of which magnitude?".

This patently insufficient ability to foresee also sheds a light towards the "we know that dangerous nuclear waste will not be a problem for anyone during the next 100000 years or so".

Renewables can do the trick without all those threats.

Re: Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

#66

Post by dx034 »

Interestingly, it looks like Italy is the real culprit here. France can import enough but still exports significantly to Italy (directly and indirectly via Switzerland). If you look at Northern Italy's mix [1], the explanation is simple. They are so reliant on Gas, that importing at any price is cheaper. So all neighbors of Italy (especially France and Switzerland( suffer from high prices as well.

The only solution is to increase transmission capacity, but that's not easy with NIMBY challenges.

[1] https://app.electricitymap.org/zone/IT-NO

Re: Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

#67

Post by kataklasm »

gruturo wrote: post #61
JohnHaugeland wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In the meantime, a barebones crew operates Chernobyl infrastructure, while the sacrophagus was shelled by Russian troops. and even under these conditions, once again, zero deaths the point you're trying to make actually works against you

> and even under these conditions, once again, zero deaths I agree with your point, but for the record there's apparently been one death due to radiation (and possibly more to come): After the fighting was over, the russian soldiers seem to have camped in the Red Forest (absolutely the most contaminated area after the reactor structure itself https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Forest ), dug trenches and eaten local an…

Most (if not all) nuclear scientists and radiation experts I've seen tslking about this say this is a wrong assumption. Cheryl Rofer, former nuclear scientist, made a napkin calculation and suggested it would need about 57 years of camping in the hottest (= most irradiated) parts of the red forest to acquire ARS (acute radiation syndrome). Even if the digging and kicking up dust there elevated the radioactivity levels, it would take a hell of a lot to get from 57 years to one month. Keep in mind that the most radioactive snd thus dangerous elements also decay the quickest, because of course both properties stem from the same thing, redioactive decay. The more dangerous the quicker it's gone.

Re: Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

#68

Post by mritun »

tonyedgecombe wrote: post #59
marbu wrote: post #9

About 1/2 of nuclear power plants in France are down because of maintenance and/or repairs[1][2]: > France's nuclear fleet has been hit by unprecedented outages this winter with half of its 56 reactors currently unavailable. This is happening in a country where most people use electric heating[3] while the temperatures dropped a bit recently (minimal temperatures are mostly below zero centigrade, while max. doesn't g…

Yet another reason that nuclear isn't the panacea it is presented as here.

Which technology doesn’t need maintenance?

Re: Exchange electricity prices in France go through the roof

#69

Post by gruturo »

kataklasm wrote: post #67
gruturo wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and even under these conditions, once again, zero deaths I agree with your point, but for the record there's apparently been one death due to radiation (and possibly more to come): After the fighting was over, the russian soldiers seem to have camped in the Red Forest (absolutely the most contaminated area after the reactor structure itself https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Forest ), dug trenches and eaten local an…

Most (if not all) nuclear scientists and radiation experts I've seen tslking about this say this is a wrong assumption. Cheryl Rofer, former nuclear scientist, made a napkin calculation and suggested it would need about 57 years of camping in the hottest (= most irradiated) parts of the red forest to acquire ARS (acute radiation syndrome). Even if the digging and kicking up dust there elevated the radioactivity level…

Radiation in the red forest is supposedly not terrible _ if you don't disturb the soil _

All the nastier bits are under a layer of "clean" soil and you would have no contact with them ordinarily.

These soldiers actually dug down to the nasty bits and likely breathed some of the dust in.

Between that, and eating wildlife (which acts as a powerful concentrator), I'm not surprised they died. The exposure must have been thousands of times above the already non-insignificant baseline.

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