EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green • Hacker News Board

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#201

Post by diordiderot » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:49 AM UTC

heartbeats wrote: post #178

hammock wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When did "green" get co-opted to mean low CO2 emissions? It wasn't that long ago we used to worry about whether fuel was renewable or not, and about particulate pollution, acid rain, habitat destruction and other environmental externalities in general, not just CO2. This global warming-driven definition of "green" ignores all of that.

Because we have specific environmental problems right now, that are quite serious and worth focusing on? You do this stuff because you want to accomplish something. If animals go extinct, that is obviously unfortunate, but it pales in comparison to the prospect that we do so. The EU isn't trying to accomplish some type of perfect environmental justice, they're trying to keep the world habitable.

That is counter productive to keeping the earth habitable. This "considered middle ground" ideology is more dangerous than denial. Like MLK said about "white moderates".

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#202

Post by diffeomorphism » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:51 AM UTC

hammock wrote: post #165

nathan_phoenix wrote: post #12

For anyone wondering why gas, it's gas only in specific cases. > Investments in natural gas power plants would also be deemed green if they produce emissions below 270g of CO2 equivalent per kilowatt hour (kWh), replace a more polluting fossil fuel plant, receive a construction permit by Dec. 31 2030 and plan to switch to low-carbon gases by the end of 2035.

When did "green" get co-opted to mean low CO2 emissions? It wasn't that long ago we used to worry about whether fuel was renewable or not, and about particulate pollution, acid rain, habitat destruction and other environmental externalities in general, not just CO2. This global warming-driven definition of "green" ignores all of that.

> This global warming-driven definition of "green" ignores all of that.

No, it just shows that one needs to read more than the headline. It does take all that into account as well, hence all the "if"s and the "transitional" label.

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#203

Post by xigoi » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:53 AM UTC

Gwypaas wrote: post #64

kergonath wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Go on, then, compare away. Both in terms of deaths/kWh and CO2/kWh, nuclear is equivalent or better than most renewable you could name. There are arguments against nuclear, but these aren’t them.

Yep. So close you can call it equal, unless future deaths from groundwater pollution where to happen from leakage. So lets discount that and focus on the side which allocates capital and brings projects to completion. The cheapest renewables are currently a magnitude cheaper per KWH.

Nuclear can be built anywhere and can provide power at any time. What renewable has these properties?

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#204

Post by varajelle » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:53 AM UTC

kennywinker wrote: post #192

nine_k wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Methane can be very much renewable. Its energy is "greener" than that of coal, or heavy oil: more energy is released per a CO₂ molecule produced. Also, unlike coal, it does not produce radioactive ashes. But it's not carbon-neutral, of course. I'd call this "olive" or "lime" energy: greenish but not wholly green.

This is as close to arguing about what colour to paint the deck chairs on the titanic as I can imagine. A non-carbon neutral source of energy is not any shade of green, until we’ve averted the upcoming climate disaster. And then maybe we can debate about how to spend our limited carbon budget.

> until we’ve averted the upcoming climate disaster

Realistically, not going to happen. We might be able to mitigate it, but not avert it. The best strategy is to plan it live with it rather than trying to avert it.

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#205

Post by Daniel_sk » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:53 AM UTC

Bayart wrote: post #143

Just replace "gas" and "nuclear" with "German" and "French".

Not really true - France was the loudest voice but they were representing a lot of other EU countries. E.g. Slovakia (50% nuclear today, 70% nuclear production next year) was also a big proponent, or Czech republic...

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#206

Post by disgruntledphd2 » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:54 AM UTC

vlovich123 wrote: post #122

tshaddox wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it a problem to give funding or tax advantages to projects that actively reduce emissions?

The argument would be that if you didn’t provide that out market forces would force us into renewables more quickly.

Sure yeah. The politics of that (i.e. pretty much everyone seeing massive increases in their heating, electricity and fuel costs) would lead to a backlash and actually lead to less action over the longer term.

That's the theory anyway, and if we look at what happened in France with fuel taxes, it seems pretty plausible to me.

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#207

Post by acd » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:54 AM UTC

Very good news!

We need to build fast breeder reactors which burns up the nuclear waste that we have created through older reactors. Ie in normal nuclear reactirs only about 1% of nuclear fuel is converted into energy, the rest is waste. Breeder reactors can take the nuclear waste and convert it into useful energy.

BioGas which is methane gas extracted from waste is also very green.

Fast Breeder Reactor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeder_reactor

Nuclear reaction is naturally occurring in nature: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_nuclear_fission_reacto...

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#208

Post by Joeri » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:57 AM UTC

squarefoot wrote: post #195

It's absolutely crazy, but in line with what's going on with energy demand out of control due to cryptocurrencies sprouting everywhere: some countries banned non green energy sources, so we redefine the word green. Bravo! That's exactly what one can expect from corrupt politicians. I would accept to go back to nuclear only in one case: whoever is pushing for it will build their house within 10 Km of either a nuclear…

I’m in favor of the eventual phase out of nuclear fission power but we have to be pragmatic about the situation we are in.

Reaching 1.5 degrees of warming is all but impossible by now because we’ve waited too long. We no longer have the luxury of making choices between approaches. By now we have to do everything we can, and doing so we will still fall short. There’s a nuclear industry ready and willing to be a part of the (temporary) solution, and that’s why the IPCC’s evaluation a few years ago of 85 plans to reach 1.5 degrees of warming noted that nearly all involve nuclear energy and on average a doubling of the nuclear energy share to around 5%. Since that report we are even further from where we need to be. So we need to put the nuclear industry to work and I think everyone looking at the climate crisis pragmatically can see that this is necessary.

Other pragmatic choices are replacing coal with gas in the short term (because it can be built rapidly and produces far less emissions) and globally outlawing proof of work crypto.

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#209

Post by sideshowb » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:57 AM UTC

squarefoot wrote: post #195

It's absolutely crazy, but in line with what's going on with energy demand out of control due to cryptocurrencies sprouting everywhere: some countries banned non green energy sources, so we redefine the word green. Bravo! That's exactly what one can expect from corrupt politicians. I would accept to go back to nuclear only in one case: whoever is pushing for it will build their house within 10 Km of either a nuclear…

checks map. I live within 10k of a nuke. Never really think about it tbh. Happy to take more nukes over global warming, though more wind/solar plus storage would beat either, so whatever works really.

Calling gas green though? Screw that, unless it's got 100 percent carbon capture or something.

Re: EU drafts plan to label gas and nuclear investments as green

#210

Post by adrianN » Sun, Jan 02, 2022, 8:57 AM UTC

varajelle wrote: post #204

kennywinker wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is as close to arguing about what colour to paint the deck chairs on the titanic as I can imagine. A non-carbon neutral source of energy is not any shade of green, until we’ve averted the upcoming climate disaster. And then maybe we can debate about how to spend our limited carbon budget.

> until we’ve averted the upcoming climate disaster Realistically, not going to happen. We might be able to mitigate it, but not avert it. The best strategy is to plan it live with it rather than trying to avert it.

The best strategy is to stop CO2 emissions as fast as possible. We already did enough damage that we'll need mitigation strategies in the future, every ton of CO2 we add to the atmosphere makes mitigation more expensive. Climate change is not some binary thing which you either prevent completely or don't. It just gets worse and worse proportional to how long we keep burning fossil fuels.