[deleted]
Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
471–480 of 1001 posts
Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
#472Strictly: France will no longer decommission Belgium's nuclear power plants, as Belgium will buy them. The current owner Engie are majority-owned by the French government. Apparently there also used to be a phaseout policy which is being rescinded: https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/other/belgium-and-czechia-ram... I'm not keen on new nuclear (time and cost as much as anything else), but it's a terrible idea to phase out…
> I'm not keen on new nuclear (time and cost as much as anything else), but it's a terrible idea to phase out operating nuclear plants which are still safe and within their planned lifetime. Funnily, I have almost the opposite view. I'm terrified of old nuclear because those first gen power plants are all missing a lot of safety lessons. Nuclear disasters happen at old plants. I want old nuclear plants to be either u…
safety is great and in some cases it can be improved. check out what great carenage is in france
Even assuming all bad stuff, nuclear is statistically ok https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy
Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
#473Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nuclear reactors are regularly maintained, tested and checked. When possible, old plants are upgraded to new safety standards. You can upgrade certain components, and safety systems. However things like the containment structure or pressure vessel can't be changed. You for example can't retrofit a core catcher, but you could improve the turbines, I think Steam Generators as well, replace PLC's, Tsunami proof your sit…
Belgium's reactors are really old, and have lots of issues. They have been dragging their feet for decades on the subject and instead of building new reactors 10-20 years ago, they are now un-decomissioning older reactors..
old!= bad. You fix stuff and you operate it safely. Running existing units for as long as possible is sensible.
Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
#474The environmentalist put a giant scam on Western nations
Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
#475Earlier quoted context omitted.
>I'm not keen on new nuclear (time and cost as much as anything else), but it's a terrible idea to phase out operating nuclear plants which are still safe and within their planned lifetime. Time and Cost seem like excellent reasons to get started now, so we can finish by 2035 and get some materials purchased before inflation gets even worse. All of the excellent arguments Pro-existing plants apply to new ones too.
Given Hinkley Point C, a plant approved now will be operational some time in the 2040s. I think people have missed how much of a hockey stick graph renewables deployment can look like. https://edition.cnn.com/2025/05/01/climate/pakistan-solar-bo...
Hinkley Point C is a prime example of regulation causing cost and schedule overruns.
"Fish disco", for example.
Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
#476Earlier quoted context omitted.
On the contrary, Japan is changing it's energy policy and restarting it's nuclear reactors. "Japan’s Energy Plan: New Policy Shifts Nuclear Power Stance from Reduction to Maximization" https://www.nippon.com/en/in-depth/d01195/ https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulat...
Hmm, I may have been too vague. When I stated "these" I was talking specifically about the Fukushima plants and not Japan's policy for reactors nationally. Are they planning on restarting the Fukushima plants? I didn't think they were.
Fukushima units were dismantled more from fear of public opinion. They could have operated unaffected units further safely with proper fixes
Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
#477Earlier quoted context omitted.
> A healthy social attitude to nuclear would be to require periodic upgrades or decommissions as the plant ages. Tell me you don't work in energy without telling me. Most heavily regulated industry on the planet - constant upgrades and safety reports.
Name a Gen II plant that was upgraded to a Gen III, III+ or Gen IV plant. There's a reason new Gen II plants cannot be built, and all the regulations and safety reports in the world will not fix the fundamental design flaw of these plants. We can mitigate and make meltdown less likely, we can't eliminate it without replacing the plants all together.
half of french fleet through carenage?
Gen 2 candus were recently allowed in Romania
Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
#478Earlier quoted context omitted.
We don't need baseload energy! That is something the coal lobby likes to repeat but it is false. We need enough energy to supply demand. These days gas peaker plants amortize cheaper to run 24x7 than a new baseload plant and so a lot of new "baseload" is actually covered by a peaker plant. Baseload doesn't have a consistent definition, but the general concept is some power plants are cheap at 100% output, but don't t…
Gas peak plants are neither clean nor economical stable in Europe. The war in Ukraine and now the war in Iran has demonstrated how extreme the price of energy can become if we allow demand to exceed supply for any extended period, and multiple European governments in the last few years got elected explicitly to solve this. Having a single month cost as much as a full year, or even multiple years, is a costly lesson f…
yes. The whole hopium strategy in countries like Germany is expand gas to replace it sometime with dirt cheap H2
Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
#479Earlier quoted context omitted.
> time and cost as much as anything else you people have been saying that for at least twenty years. In the meantime the renewables have failed to produce a noticeable change in my part of europe, sentiment is increasingly pro-nuke but your adage keeps things still. Of course yf you never start, you never finish.
> renewables have failed to produce a noticeable change in my part of europe More electricity in Europe comes from renewables than from either nuclear or fossil, with renewables rapidly approaching 50% market share. Several countries (even the non-hydro-heavy ones) are already showing multi-day periods where renewable electricity exceeds 100% of demand. If your part of Europe isn't showing a noticeable change, perhap…
Yes. On the other hand nuclear is still single biggest source of power in EU, despite german phaseout)
There is still not a single country matching french emissions with ren alone if it doesnt have hydro/geothermal
Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants
#480Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I'm not keen on new nuclear (time and cost as much as anything else), but it's a terrible idea to phase out operating nuclear plants which are still safe and within their planned lifetime. This is pretty much the summary of the whole discussion. Building new nuclear is a debate, seeing as renewables are dirt cheap it might or might not make sense to build new nuclear reactors that take a fuckton of money and many y…
The West built the existing rector fleet cheap and fast in the past, and those reactors have proven to be safe and reliable and maintainable. It’s a proven technology with decades decades in service. We actually don’t know m any of the long term risks and unintended consequences of providing wind / solar + batteries at scale. What rational is there to scrap the one and mandate the other?
thing is, when you look at what ABWR achieved, I wish we just thrown money at hitachi for a messmer like deployment in all EU countries that want nuclear