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DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

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Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#101

Post by tb_technical »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #98
tb_technical wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Frankly, the reason China is the last man standing on solar was their aggressive subsidy in the 2010s. Killed all of the American and European manufacturers, then the subsidy ended and they were the last man standing. The other things you are said are also true, I just wanted to provide a little historical context.

Chinese subsidies were smaller than European and American subsidies on a relative basis. (but not absolute). The difference was that European and American subsidies also subsidized Chinese panels.

Interestig, so you could say that the European and American governments share blame in this development. A shame.

Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#102

Post by bryanlarsen »

tb_technical wrote: post #101
bryanlarsen wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chinese subsidies were smaller than European and American subsidies on a relative basis. (but not absolute). The difference was that European and American subsidies also subsidized Chinese panels.

Interestig, so you could say that the European and American governments share blame in this development. A shame.

Depends what your goals are. We're sitting in a fabulous position now. Solar is by far the cheapest energy available, which is and will continue to accelerate our transition away from fossil fuels. China is essentially giving the panels away for basically no profit, and supporting very few jobs doing so. America & Europe are getting huge benefits for those subsidies.

Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#103

Post by UltraSane »

triceratops wrote: post #90
UltraSane wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear power is reliable 24/7 while wind and solar are not and handling this costs money. Microsoft has said that they have more GPUs than electricity to run them so even at $110/MWh it makes sense for them.

Is new nuclear cheaper than new batteries for 24/7 power?

If built by South Korea or China then yes. If built by the US then probably not. But three mile island is already built.

Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#104

Post by triceratops »

UltraSane wrote: post #103
triceratops wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is new nuclear cheaper than new batteries for 24/7 power?

If built by South Korea or China then yes. If built by the US then probably not. But three mile island is already built.

China's building a lot more solar than nuclear. You'd think if nuclear was cheaper it would be the other way around.

Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#105

Post by tb_technical »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #102
tb_technical wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestig, so you could say that the European and American governments share blame in this development. A shame.

Depends what your goals are. We're sitting in a fabulous position now. Solar is by far the cheapest energy available, which is and will continue to accelerate our transition away from fossil fuels. China is essentially giving the panels away for basically no profit, and supporting very few jobs doing so. America & Europe are getting huge benefits for those subsidies.

Never thought of it that way. I like the positive framing.

Oftentimes I worry about industrial pollution, unsafe and unfair working conditions, and a loss of relevance in high technology.

But in this case, the factories are not widely staffed - so there's reduced chances of accidents.

The future is now, and I'm the old man.

Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#106

Post by UltraSane »

triceratops wrote: post #104
UltraSane wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If built by South Korea or China then yes. If built by the US then probably not. But three mile island is already built.

China's building a lot more solar than nuclear. You'd think if nuclear was cheaper it would be the other way around.

They are still building lots of nuclear reactors including liquid salt thorium reactors. They aren't irrationally scared of nuclear energy.

Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#107

Post by UltraSane »

ViewTrick1002 wrote: post #63
mikeyouse wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

France’s nuclear fleet has an average capacity factor of ~75%… so less “24/7” and more like 18/7 or 24/5.25 or something..

And had half their fleet offline at the peak of the energy crisis caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/15/business/nuclear-power-fr... In Sweden this year we’ve had 2 separate instances of 50% of the fleet being offline. With one reactor having a 7 month unscheduled outage. I just don’t get where this ”100% reliable!!!!” is coming from.

That is just plain incompetence. These are recent US nuclear capacity factors

2023: 93.0%

2022: 92.1%

2021: 92.7%

2020: 92.5%

Nuclear has the highest capacity factor of any other energy source—producing reliable and secure power more than 92% of the time in 2024. That’s nearly twice as much as a coal (42.36%) or natural gas (59.9%) plant that are used more flexibly to meet changing grid demands and almost 3 times more often than wind (34.3%) and solar (23.4%) plants

Nuclear power plants had a 8% share of the total U.S. generation capacity in 2023 but actually produced 18% of the country’s electricity due to its high capacity factor.

Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#108

Post by stonogo »

UltraSane wrote: post #41
stonogo wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know where this '24/7' stuff comes from; they have maintenance outages like anything else. Refueling takes months every couple years, so you're going to have to "handle this" even with nuclear.

"they have maintenance outages like anything else" not often and most importantly they are PREDICTABLE. You do understand why being able to control when a power plant is operating is a very important thing, right?

The point here being that every single datacenter that's running off nuclear also has a natural gas pipeline running to it or else a massive propane infrastructure because nuclear alone can't get the job done. If your 'clean energy' solution requires a gas pipe, you're misrepresenting its ability to drive the datacenter.

Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#109

Post by ViewTrick1002 »

UltraSane wrote: post #107
ViewTrick1002 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And had half their fleet offline at the peak of the energy crisis caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/15/business/nuclear-power-fr... In Sweden this year we’ve had 2 separate instances of 50% of the fleet being offline. With one reactor having a 7 month unscheduled outage. I just don’t get where this ”100% reliable!!!!” is coming from.

That is just plain incompetence. These are recent US nuclear capacity factors 2023: 93.0% 2022: 92.1% 2021: 92.7% 2020: 92.5% Nuclear has the highest capacity factor of any other energy source—producing reliable and secure power more than 92% of the time in 2024. That’s nearly twice as much as a coal (42.36%) or natural gas (59.9%) plant that are used more flexibly to meet changing grid demands and almost 3 times mor…

I think you are missing the forest for the trees.

You can have a 93% capacity factor and still have short time periods with 45% of the fleet offline simultaneously.

Another example is when half the French nuclear fleet was offline at the height of the energy crisis.

Are you saying that a grid collapse is acceptable if outages correlate for nuclear plants?

Re: DOE gives Microsoft partner $1B loan to restart Three Mile Island reactor

#110

Post by triceratops »

UltraSane wrote: post #106
triceratops wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China's building a lot more solar than nuclear. You'd think if nuclear was cheaper it would be the other way around.

They are still building lots of nuclear reactors including liquid salt thorium reactors. They aren't irrationally scared of nuclear energy.

Yes but they're building more solar. Which they wouldn't do if, as you claimed, nuclear was cheaper.
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