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Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

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Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#651

Post by ncmncm »

Manuel_D wrote: post #645
ncmncm wrote: post #628

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You insist, vociferously, that renewable energy storage infrastructure has not been built out yet. But we all knew that already . It has already been explained to you numerous times that spending on storage would be foolish until we have enough renewables built out to charge it while also meeting demand; for now, money is much better spent on generation capacity. When it does become useful, storage will be radically…

The gating condition has been met several different places. California, Hawaii, and parts of the southwest. But the assured transition to energy storage has not happened, despite energy prices going negative on a regular basis. Why? Because storage remains nowhere near cost effective. Batteries and hydroelectric storage aren't cheap enough, and the former is actually getting more expensive as supply chains get clogge…

As you are surely already well aware, "going negative" for short moments does not indicate enough surplus renewable generating capacity to charge up storage.

Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#652

Post by RingoStar »

eukgoekoko wrote: post #430
jillesvangurp wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany can't wave a magic wand and switch off Russian imports overnight. But they did just commit a few hundred billion to accelerate their plans to get rid of coal and gas based generation. That's a direct consequence of the Ukrainian situation. Like the US, Germany was overly depending on cheap gas until recently. Now that it has to import the gas in liquid form from the US (and a few other places), it's going to…

> Nuclear in Germany was always pretty minor. This is simply not true. According to https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/29295/umfrage... nuclear's share in Hermany's total power generation was 30,6% in 2000, staying around 30% until 2009.

No. Its not total power generatian its only nuclear energy's share of electricity generation in Germany from 2000 to 2020.

From 2000 to 2009, 6 years were below 30%, 5 years below 28% and 2 years below 27%, with a low of 25.9% and a high of 32.1%. If you take the 32.1% as the maximum value with 100%, that is a little over 20% fluctuation with a clear, negative trend.

Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#653

Post by TrispusAttucks »

Krasnol wrote: post #621
TrispusAttucks wrote: post #612

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. I guess energy markets competing is a conspiracy. Pretty low bar. Here you go: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31474041 Dig away

> Since fossil fuels campaigning against nuclear is a "conspiracy theory". Here are some threads to pull on. This is not what OP said. Also: those "sources" are all right from the nuclear circle jerk...lol

Okay. Enjoy your alternate reality.

Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#654

Post by Manuel_D »

ncmncm wrote: post #651
Manuel_D wrote: post #645

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The gating condition has been met several different places. California, Hawaii, and parts of the southwest. But the assured transition to energy storage has not happened, despite energy prices going negative on a regular basis. Why? Because storage remains nowhere near cost effective. Batteries and hydroelectric storage aren't cheap enough, and the former is actually getting more expensive as supply chains get clogge…

As you are surely already well aware, "going negative" for short moments does not indicate enough surplus renewable generating capacity to charge up storage.

As early as 2017, California started seeing hours of surplus electricity prices. Not minutes. Yet even after half a decade, the assurances that people would start storing and reselling this energy have not panned out. It turns out that white papers and prototypes are different from building the real thing.

You can keep telling yourself that cheap, scalable energy storage is just around the corner. But fantasy is not reality, and energy storage remains a fantasy.

Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#655

Post by ncmncm »

Manuel_D wrote: post #654
ncmncm wrote: post #651

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As you are surely already well aware, "going negative" for short moments does not indicate enough surplus renewable generating capacity to charge up storage.

As early as 2017, California started seeing hours of surplus electricity prices. Not minutes. Yet even after half a decade, the assurances that people would start storing and reselling this energy have not panned out. It turns out that white papers and prototypes are different from building the real thing. You can keep telling yourself that cheap, scalable energy storage is just around the corner. But fantasy is not…

Yet, money in California is still better spent on renewable generating capacity, because there is is not enough of it yet to wholly displace fossil fuels. And, in fact, that is where money is still being spent, because they have a grid to run and nothing to prove to you.

Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#656

Post by cycomanic »

pdonis wrote: post #614
cycomanic wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a myth. Regulatory requirements for all large scale power generation have to deal with very similar regulatory requirements, which typically scales with size of the project. In fact wind had likely to deal with more restrictions than nuclear (largely to protect the nuclear investments of operators), let's not even talk about certain housing communities not allowing rooftop solar for aesthetic reasons.

> Regulatory requirements for all large scale power generation have to deal with very similar regulatory requirements As far as the general regulatory requirements for large scale power generation, that may be true. But there are additional requirements that nuclear has to meet that no other power source does. One is the completely irrational requirement for a waste disposal plan that has to last ten thousand years o…

> As far as the general regulatory requirements for large scale power generation, that may be true. But there are additional requirements that nuclear has to meet that no other power source does. One is the completely irrational requirement for a waste disposal plan that has to last ten thousand years or more--instead of just reprocessing the waste, which is what every other country that uses nuclear energy does. That requirement alone basically killed nuclear power in the US for several decades.

What do you mean? There does not exist a fully worked out waste disposal plan anywhere in the world AFAIK. All larger long-term deposits are still in the investigation phase. So by that argument no nuclear power plants should have every been built. Also saying it is irrational to require this, why should nuclear be exempt from requirements that everyone else has to follow? If I build a house I have to specify what I'm going to do with the waste. Regarding reprocessing, unless you plan to make nuclear bombs, reprocessing is uneconomical. Moreover it actually increases the amount of waste. The produced waste is lower grade, but still needs special long-term disposal, especially because its half-life is typically very long.

Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#657

Post by trashtester »

jhgb wrote: post #642
trashtester wrote: post #637

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you scroll up the thread a bit, the context was that someone claimed that Germany would be less dependent on Germany if they had kept more of their nuclear power plants. That is something they might have figured out in 2014. Going as heavy on natural gas as they have over the last generation, more or less ensures that they are in Russia's pocket. Shutting down nuclear plants does not make that better. In fact, I a…

> the context was that someone claimed that Germany would be less dependent on Germany if they had kept more of their nuclear power plants Except I'd already refuted that claim, so it didn't make sense to labor under this misconception any further to begin with.

It seems to me that your argument is circular.

Your refutation of the possibility of to use Nuclear power to gain independence of Russian energy seems to depend on German inability to achieve indepencende of Russian fuel by setting up a stockpile(1).

Which in turn is justified by claiming that the stockpile would not be needed, since they would shut down their nuclear plants(2).

Which is justified by (1), which is justified by (2) and so on.

My argument is that, had Germany decided in 2014 to increase, rather than decrease their use of nuclear power, with the aim to reduce dependence on Russia, it could be done. But given that, they would have to start looking for (possibly in cooperation with their allies) other sources of fuel to really become independent, in other words, set up agreements to buy fuel from countries like Australia and Canada, on top of whatever fuel was being bought from Russia before 2022.

Basically, my argument requires BOTH of these steps to be taken:

- Decide to keep or increase energy production from nuclear

- Decide to work towards independence of Russia by funding alternative sources + by putting any extra fuel they purchase into a strategic stockpile.

(Edit: formatting.)

These are clearly decisions that were available to Germany (as a country, provided the public had been primed to support them). I don't find the spot in your argument that refutes any of them, without already assuming that the other is impossible.

Also, I don't find where in your argument, in what way these decisions, if taken together, would NOT ensure that Germany would have more energy production capacity in 2022 than they have now.

Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#658

Post by gcanyon »

bbu wrote: post #283
gcanyon wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Non-nuclear power kills far more people each year than nuclear has killed during its entire existence. "...before having the slightest idea what to do with nuclear waste." implies that there is some way to do so that will result in a hundred thousand deaths annually. I don't know of a way to botch the job that badly?

Solid whataboutism.

That’s not how whataboitism works. When you are choosing between two options, you are inherently deciding based on the pros and cons of each. You might claim false dilemma by saying that we don’t need either nuclear or fossil fuels, but it’s perfectly valid to say that if the choice is between “what exists now” and nuclear, fossil fuels kill far more people.

Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#659

Post by jhgb »

trashtester wrote: post #657
jhgb wrote: post #642

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the context was that someone claimed that Germany would be less dependent on Germany if they had kept more of their nuclear power plants Except I'd already refuted that claim, so it didn't make sense to labor under this misconception any further to begin with.

It seems to me that your argument is circular. Your refutation of the possibility of to use Nuclear power to gain independence of Russian energy seems to depend on German inability to achieve indepencende of Russian fuel by setting up a stockpile(1). Which in turn is justified by claiming that the stockpile would not be needed, since they would shut down their nuclear plants(2). Which is justified by (1), which is ju…

> Your refutation of the possibility of to use Nuclear power to gain independence of Russian energy seems to depend on German inability to achieve indepencende of Russian fuel by setting up a stockpile(1).

No, my refutation hinged on 1) the fact that German nuclear power is NOT a substitute for the vast majority of German uses of natural gas (chemical and other industry, residential heaters -- neither of which is near-term replaceable with nuclear power without massive investments in electrolysis), and 2) the fact that German nuclear power has the cheapest substitute in form of unused capacity of coal plants (which recently massively dropped in their capacity factor) and accelerated expansion of renewable generation. There is no circularity in this that I see. 1) means that keeping or expanding the nuclear fleet does not decrease dependency on Russian gas, and 2) means that ditching it does not increase dependency on anything else coming from Russia.

So ditching the German nuclear fleet has no downside in terms of reducing dependency on Russia. In fact ditching the German nuclear fleet might somewhat reduce the dependency on Russia on part of the remaining global users of nuclear power, owing to the reduction of uranium fuel consumption in light of the fact that Russia possesses 46% of world's uranium enrichment capacity -- any enriched uranium on the global market that Germany would have to use in their reactors could be used by someone else at that poitnt, with less money paid for enriched uranium flowing into Russia.

> My argument is that, had Germany decided in 2014 to increase, rather than decrease their use of nuclear power, with the aim to reduce dependence on Russia, it could be done.

They could have certainly acted in that direction with such an aim, but since such actions would not have lead to achieving this aim (see above), it would have been a completely irrational course of action.

Re: Why is the nuclear power industry stagnant?

#660

Post by trashtester »

jhgb wrote: post #659
trashtester wrote: post #657

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to me that your argument is circular. Your refutation of the possibility of to use Nuclear power to gain independence of Russian energy seems to depend on German inability to achieve indepencende of Russian fuel by setting up a stockpile(1). Which in turn is justified by claiming that the stockpile would not be needed, since they would shut down their nuclear plants(2). Which is justified by (1), which is ju…

> Your refutation of the possibility of to use Nuclear power to gain independence of Russian energy seems to depend on German inability to achieve indepencende of Russian fuel by setting up a stockpile(1). No, my refutation hinged on 1) the fact that German nuclear power is NOT a substitute for the vast majority of German uses of natural gas (chemical and other industry, residential heaters -- neither of which is nea…

The vast majority of German natural gas use, is for the energy.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1293065/natural-gas-cons...

Only a tiny sliver is for non-energy, and that part could easily be purchased from other countries.

In Norway, a large percentage of heating used to come from oil, but in 2020 any fossil fuel for residential heating was banned. As long as the power is cheap, electric heating is affordable. And if the electricity is slightly less cheap, heating is still affordable if one installs a heat pump (even a cheap air-to-air pump helps a lot).

And even if you were correct in your claim that a large part of the natural gas could not be replaced by nuclear (which is just lack of imagination), your argument would be flawed.

From the link I sent, only 2% of the consumption is non-energy use, but even if that were 50%, reducing dependency by 50% is still a big deal.

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