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Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

constructionphysics.substack.com

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Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#161

Post by pclmulqdq »

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #138
pclmulqdq wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what is supposed to replace all of these obsolete technologies that currently account for the vast majority of energy generation? Lithium batteries, solar power, and offshore wind power? There are so many problems with this scheme, not least of which is that you have pretty much no base load and batteries can't be manufactured at anywhere near enough scale to successfully do this "transition" for at least the next…

In the US, we already have about ~25% of power coming from nuclear and Hydro. That's a huge chunk of our base load. Add in ~7% offshore wind, ~4% for onshore, and ~4% storage for pumped hydro, and we would be just fine with the rest coming from solar & a hodge podge of other renewables. And we'll have natural gas power plants in commission for another 30 years. Why shut them down? We can use them in the Winter. 30 ye…

I was informed by the parent comment that Nuclear and Hydro were obsolete too. Not just natural gas and coal.

Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#162

Post by Schroedingersat »

willis936 wrote: post #112
crote wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- Nuclear power plants are rare enough that each project is basically unique. - Nuclear power plants are very complex. They are more "engineered" than "constructed", with hundreds of kilometers of tubes and wires. Pouring the concrete is the easy part. - Nuclear power plants deal with an incredibly dangerous environment: high pressures, high temperatures, radioactivity, hazardous chemicals. Everything has to be teste…

Jumbojets are hugely complex with hundreds of kilometers of pipes and wires and yet a thousand of them are in the air right this second. Complexity is a nothingburger.

A jumbo jet has countless failure modes that are completely fine where something analogous happening in a nuclear plant would wipe a city off the map.

Their core backup safety feature of being roughly bird shaped requires only a few moving parts, none of which are operating at extreme temperature or require cooling.

Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#163

Post by dylan604 »

crote wrote: post #74
virissimo wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our nations were far less wealthy when the existing stock of nuclear power plants were built, the technology available for building them have improved since then, and the raw resources needed as their inputs aren't a constraint, so why have costs risen so much relative to what we are willing to spend on it? Environmental and safety regulations are supposed to be explanations for this rise in cost, not rival explanati…

- Nuclear power plants are rare enough that each project is basically unique. - Nuclear power plants are very complex. They are more "engineered" than "constructed", with hundreds of kilometers of tubes and wires. Pouring the concrete is the easy part. - Nuclear power plants deal with an incredibly dangerous environment: high pressures, high temperatures, radioactivity, hazardous chemicals. Everything has to be teste…

>things can get way worse than a big explosion.

Total meltdown to a China Syndrome with the slag melting its way to the water table is pretty much the worst I can imagine.

Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#164

Post by ncmncm »

credit_guy wrote: post #137

Whenever we talk about nuclear power on HN, people are split in two groups: those who'd love to see nuclear power succeeding, and those who are against it and who support solar and wind. I am pro both nuclear and renewables. Solar and wind have been on an absolute tear lately. At least in the US (where I live) new solar and wind construction has been growing at a breathtaking pace during the last decade. Take a look…

There has never been a nuke plant operated without subsidies, anywhere in the world, and probably never will be. In the US, taxpayers pick up the tab for disaster insurance because no private insurer is big enough. No reactor would be left enough to operate, paying the premiums on that policy.

By 2040, all the existing nukes will have been shut down, unable to deliver enough power at the spot price to continue operating. The less each sells, the more each kWh it delivers has cost. When shut down early, the cost of every kWh it ever delivered jumps up as construction cost is amortized over less lifetime output.

So, no, the only way to figure commercially competitive nuke power is by cooking the books.

Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#165

Post by lotsofpulp »

towaway15463 wrote: post #52
KptMarchewa wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>the technology available for building them have improved since then Broadly, construction is the singular industry where productivity hasn't improved with modern technology. https://constructionphysics.substack.com/p/sketch-of-a-theor...

Concrete infrastructure projects in particular seem to have gotten more expensive and time consuming.

I imagine moving all that mass and the energy intensive process to form and break concrete directly scale with rising oil prices. Plus price of labor going up.

Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#166

Post by Schroedingersat »

pfdietz wrote: post #140
nine_k wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

* Technology makes machines cheaper, and makes human work more expensive in comparison. Nuclear projects involve a lot of highly qualified human work. * Technology makes repetitive operations cheaper. You build a factory for hundred million dollars, make a billion gadgets on it, and every gadget costs you ten cents to make. Nuclear projects lack the economy of scale: even the Navy is going to order reactors by a doze…

Solar experience relentless experience effects, with cost dropping by about 20% for each doubling of cumulative production. Nuclear has not shown good experience effects.

Nuclear's learning rate is about the same magnitude!

...In the opposite direction, but about the same magnitude.

Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#167

Post by onlyrealcuzzo »

pclmulqdq wrote: post #161
onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US, we already have about ~25% of power coming from nuclear and Hydro. That's a huge chunk of our base load. Add in ~7% offshore wind, ~4% for onshore, and ~4% storage for pumped hydro, and we would be just fine with the rest coming from solar & a hodge podge of other renewables. And we'll have natural gas power plants in commission for another 30 years. Why shut them down? We can use them in the Winter. 30 ye…

I was informed by the parent comment that Nuclear and Hydro were obsolete too. Not just natural gas and coal.

Obsolete means we're unlikely to add a lot more energy generation from them - but not that we'll decommission what we have or stop maintaining them. This is especially true for Hydro.

I doubt we'll ever add much more nuclear if not mini nuclear reactors - that's why I'm really excited about the possibilities for them.

Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#168

Post by ncmncm »

YurgenJurgensen wrote: post #110
mkoubaa wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Burning coal instead of nuclear seems to be a rather unsophisticated example of cutting off your nose to spite your face

Or, to snark on the other half of that post: Instead of building power plants that are deadly when they fail, we'll just build power plants which are deadly all the time.

Hint: no one is building coal plants. Coal is being phased out. Your competition is not coal.

Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#169

Post by pclmulqdq »

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #167
pclmulqdq wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was informed by the parent comment that Nuclear and Hydro were obsolete too. Not just natural gas and coal.

Obsolete means we're unlikely to add a lot more energy generation from them - but not that we'll decommission what we have or stop maintaining them. This is especially true for Hydro. I doubt we'll ever add much more nuclear if not mini nuclear reactors - that's why I'm really excited about the possibilities for them.

That's not usually what the word "obsolete" means, but thanks for clearing that up.

Re: Why are nuclear power construction costs so high? Part III – the nuclear navy

#170

Post by Schroedingersat »

jjk166 wrote: post #55
tomComb wrote: post #34

Yes, cost is the issue. Everyone assumes that anyone hesitant about Nuclear power is focussed on the environmental or safety concerns, but that is wrong. The costs (and cost overruns) of the construction and maintenance of Nuclear reactors have been enough reason on their own to be bearish on Nuclear. I'm hopeful that new technologies, such as small nuclear reactions that can be built in a factory, will address this.

Nuclear is not fundamentally expensive[0], and most nuclear power plants currently in operation were cheap when they were built. The high costs of building new powerplants is a result of going decades without building any, leading to a loss of experience. Even still, nuclear remains competitive with other traditional power generation technologies like coal. Only with recent advancements in fracking did natural gas su…

> The high costs of building new powerplants is a result of going decades without building any, leading to a loss of experience

Cool, let's get the price ratio between the early PWR reactors in the west and the ones started in the early 90s (just after the peak of spending) then and multiply it by current costs to get a enstimate.

That comes to what, $20000/kWe?

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