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Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

spiegel.de

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Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#171

Post by iforgotpassword »

elefanten wrote: post #126
Kon5ole wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, see for example the Asse II mine, where taxpayers must pay for relocating nuclear waste since the operator no longer exists as a going concern. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asse_II_mine As far as I have been able to determine this is in fact how nuclear power is run in most of the world. Nuclear power is heavily subsidized by borrowing money from future generations. We are currently entering that future, as for…

But that dynamic is true of other energy sources too. We’ve never priced fossil fuels correctly vs their externalities. So doing that only for nuclear would be an even greater distortion.

Shouldn't we instead try to go for better solutions? What do those numbers look like for wind and solar?

Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#172

Post by frozencell »

aagd wrote: post #163

In Europe, France is the country, which put most of their eggs in the nuclear basket. They have a massive problem with that setup these days, 28 of 56 of the plants are down. Many of the remaining have serious cooling problems because huge rivers like the Loire, have almost dried out. Despite plans to fill all gas storage for next winter, German gas plants still run on full throttle to support France with their curre…

> serious cooling problems because huge rivers like the Loire, have almost dried out.

Mostly German lobbies right? Fancy isn’t it.

Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#173

Post by Jensson »

BonoboIO wrote: post #142
everyone wrote: post #118

I'm worried Russia will cause an "accident" at a nuclear power plant in Ukraine in order to make nuclear less popular with the EU public, and keep the EU dependant on oil. I definitely wouldn't put it past them, considering all the war crimes they have committed so far.

But nuclear is safe /s

They could just load up tons of nuclear waste in planes and sprinkle it over Ukraine to cause the same kind of damage, having a nuclear powerplant lying around in no way makes it easier to cause those disasters.

Terrorists doesn't target nuclear powerplants since bombing one doesn't do much, plenty of nuclear plants has been attacked to date and you didn't know since it doesn't cause any significant damage. Main damage from bombing a nuclear plant is that people die from the bombs and areas lose electricity.

Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#174

Post by _ph_ »

User23 wrote: post #122
tpmx wrote: post #15

And still the current plan is for Germany to shut down its few remaining nuclear reactors by the end of the year, while the company/companies maintaining them are saying they can keep them running? Please stop the shutdown, ffs, are you insane? Let's try to stop Germany from harming itself further via international pressure. Blame and shame. Call them idiots to their faces. Point fingers. They need to shocked. The ge…

> Let's try to stop Germany from harming itself further via international pressure. Blame and shame. Call them idiots to their faces. Point fingers. They need to shocked. Trump literally did exactly this. Needless to say they doubled down. Classic example of an inability to separate the value of a message from the messenger. The Greens are barking mad though, and not just about nuclear. Parliamentary democracy being…

The Greens are the one party not responsible for the current mess Germany is is (which is much less than people here think it is). It was the previous government which decided to cut the run time of the power plants short (it didn't have Greens in the government). The previous government didn't start to cut ties with Russia after 2014. The previous government curbed the buildup of renewable energy.

Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#175

Post by pyuser583 »

kergonath wrote: post #116
cycomanic wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well more of Europe's Uranium comes from Russia than Germanys gas. It is not like Germany has vast Uranium reserves. When the Green/Social Democrat coalition under Schröder decided on stopping nuclear the idea was to largely exchange that for renewables (and the German wind and solar industry was leading in the world at the time). This would have been a much bigger step toward energy independence. The coal, nuclear a…

> Well more of Europe's Uranium comes from Russia than Germanys gas. This is very misleading, comparing EU imports on one side and Germany on the other. The biggest uranium reserves are in Kazakhstan, Canada, and South Africa. At the moment, uranium used in Europe comes from Niger, Russia and Kazakhstan in about the same quantities (2500 tons each), followed by Canada (2300 tons) and Namibia (1600 tons). Overall, Rus…

I thought Germany and Czechia had large supplies of Uranium, is that not the case?

Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#176

Post by koonsolo »

KingOfCoders wrote: post #93

As a German I don't care. I just want two things: 1. The energy company pays market rate insurance for their nuclear plants. Not "we take the profit, taxpayers pay for the disaster" 2. The energy company sets up a trust to pay for the safe storage of nuclear waste and cleaning up the plant should they go bust (again "we take ...")

As a Belgian I only want 1 thing: no money going to Russia. I'm willing to pay the price for that.

Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#177

Post by Turing_Machine »

cycomanic wrote: post #16
cgb223 wrote: post #6

Can any Germans on HN explain why Germany finds it preferable to give up their energy independence in nuclear and instead buy it from their potential adversary in Russia? What possible advantages are there to buying the resource that literally keeps the lights on from a country that you have conflicts with?

Well more of Europe's Uranium comes from Russia than Germanys gas. It is not like Germany has vast Uranium reserves. When the Green/Social Democrat coalition under Schröder decided on stopping nuclear the idea was to largely exchange that for renewables (and the German wind and solar industry was leading in the world at the time). This would have been a much bigger step toward energy independence. The coal, nuclear a…

The situations aren't comparable.

One charge of fuel for a nuclear reactor lasts for years, while natural gas gets burned more or less as fast as it is produced (there's some storage, but it's certainly not measured in years).

If a bad actor cuts off the supply of uranium for your reactor, you have several years to find a new source. If a bad actor cuts off your supply of natural gas, you'll have a crisis in days or weeks at most.

Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#178

Post by pyuser583 »

schroeding wrote: post #23
cycomanic wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well more of Europe's Uranium comes from Russia than Germanys gas. It is not like Germany has vast Uranium reserves. When the Green/Social Democrat coalition under Schröder decided on stopping nuclear the idea was to largely exchange that for renewables (and the German wind and solar industry was leading in the world at the time). This would have been a much bigger step toward energy independence. The coal, nuclear a…

> It is not like Germany has vast Uranium reserves. ... actually we do, around 130.000 tonnes of it[1,2]. Of course not as vast as some other countries, but still substantial. We just don't mine and refine it anymore. I don't know if this should be an actual argument pro nuclear, but we have it. The GDR / DDR even supplied the Soviet Union with Uranium via SDAG Wismut[2]. [1] https://infcis.iaea.org/UDEPO/Statistics/…

I recently read “Fall of Berlin” - spends several chapters describing how one of the USSRs main goals was seizing German uranium for weapons.

Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#179

Post by goodpoint »

Jensson wrote: post #18
cgb223 wrote: post #6

Can any Germans on HN explain why Germany finds it preferable to give up their energy independence in nuclear and instead buy it from their potential adversary in Russia? What possible advantages are there to buying the resource that literally keeps the lights on from a country that you have conflicts with?

Left wing in Europe often has lots of Soviet sympathisers among their ranks. Basically USA=Bad, Russia=Good still lives on somehow. I don't know anything about the situation in Germany in particular though, but I wouldn't be surprised if they saw integration with Russia as a good thing rather than a bad thing.

> Left wing in Europe often has lots of Soviet sympathisers among their ranks.

Citation needed.

Re: Germany sees shift in sentiment toward atomic energy

#180

Post by hocuspocus »

LatteLazy wrote: post #128

I don't mind nuclear, as long as people are prepared to pay the price at the meter and dispose of the waste. But people aren't prepared to do either...

Recent electricity prices in Europe have proven that intermittent renewables backed by gas are way more expensive than nuclear, if it wasn't obvious already.

Nuclear waste disposal is a red herring. It's literally a rounding error compared to the environmental footprint of other means of energy production.

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