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Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

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Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

#521

Post by Ray20 »

ETH_start wrote: post #190
crote wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. Lead to basically zero direct deaths "Basically zero" is a funny way to spell "a few dozen". It also led to a $187 billion cleanup bill - which is expected to grow by a few more tens of billions over the next decades. > 2. Was caused by the forth most powerful earthquake to have ever been recorded in the world (since ~1900), and the most powerful earthquake ever recorded in Japan Sure, but Belgium has to be prep…

The impression I've gotten is that almost all of the massive bills associated with nuclear power are because of an irrational fear of the radiation. Factoring in all the nuclear disasters and the radiations released from them, nuclear causes something on the order of 10,000 times fewer deaths than coal per megawatt generated.

> nuclear causes something on the order of 10,000 times fewer deaths than coal per megawatt generated.

If we demonstrate scientific honesty and begin to apply the same level of techniques that are used to obtain the result of "10,000 times fewer deaths than coal per megawatt", we can come to the conclusion that even a small accident at a small nuclear power plant can destroy life on planet Earth as a phenomenon.

Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

#522

Post by setopt »

throwaway2037 wrote: post #409
Alexsky2 wrote: post #253

A bit unrelated to the Belgium story but I recently visited Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant near San Luis Obispo, CA and learned a ton about the technical details, safety systems, and policy decisions that go into operating a nuclear power plant. When operating at full capacity, it provides up to 10% of California power! While there is certainly always more such facilities can do for safety and efficiency, my impre…

I did some research about that nuclear power plant. In 1985 dollars, the total construction cost was 5.6B USD. That is an astonishing amount of money. That is at least 16B USD in 2026 money. If you also include decomissioning costs of about 4-5B USD... how the fuck does nuclear power make any economic sense? PV solar plus batteries: ALL THE WAY. To be clear, I am not anti-nuclear power by any means. I think it is a t…

It makes economic sense because they require a large initial investment (CAPEX), but low cost per year to keep functioning for many decades (OPEX). In contrast to say wind or solar, which are smaller CAPEX but higher OPEX.

So when you compare average cost per year over the complete expected lifetime of the plants, nuclear is good, but when you compare the up-front cost to build it, yeah it looks bad.

Another thing is that nuclear in the US is far more costly than in e.g. France. The key is that France standardized a few reactor designs that they kept building again and again, which made both construction and maintenance cheaper over time. While in the US, each nuclear plant is a unicorn, which can perhaps result in better individual designs but ends up more expensive.

Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

#523

Post by Moldoteck »

bobim wrote: post #405
mpweiher wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, nuclear is not way more expensive. And already-built nuclear is pretty much the cheapest power you can get.

It's cheap because we are offsetting the cost if its ultimate pollution onto future generations. We do this for everything else, and nuclear is our best chance for a liveable planet - if we don't want to make the slightest effort to give up on our comfort. But we have the belief that humanity will be able to manage nuclear waste for the next 100k years while we don't know how the pyramids were built... and it was onl…

nobody is offsetting anything, it's accounted, please dont spread this tired russian propaganda nonsense https://www.kkg.ch/de/uns/geschaefts-nachhaltigkeitsberichte... Or search what's onkalo. Or what we do with arsenic/cadmium/lead waste

Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

#524

Post by dalyons »

declan_roberts wrote: post #302

Nuclear energy is one of the few technologies that have big tent support. How many things can we get both the Rs and Ds to support? Build build build!!

Lip service support. Nukes are too expensive and too slow to build. in the 10 years it would take to get one producing power from today, they’ll be even more cost obsolete by the relentless progress of renewables and battery. When leaders see the bill, they baulk.

Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

#525

Post by throwaway2037 »

booi wrote: post #486
throwaway2037 wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did some research about that nuclear power plant. In 1985 dollars, the total construction cost was 5.6B USD. That is an astonishing amount of money. That is at least 16B USD in 2026 money. If you also include decomissioning costs of about 4-5B USD... how the fuck does nuclear power make any economic sense? PV solar plus batteries: ALL THE WAY. To be clear, I am not anti-nuclear power by any means. I think it is a t…

$5.6B actually sounds like a good deal. It outputs 2GW+ of power. While solar is definitely cheaper for 2GW of power, you still need batteries for when the sun is down. So you probably need approximately 30GWh of batteries to just replace this one power plant. The batteries alone would cost nearly $7B of grid-scale batteries that must be replaced every 20 years. Ignoring the fact that the nuclear plant already exists…

    > $5.6B actually sounds like a good deal. It outputs 2GW+ of power.
I don't understand. Are you talking about 1985 dollars of 2026 dollars?

After some research, I learned that thermal powerplants (coal/gas/oil) completed in 1985 cost about 0.8B to 1.2B USD per GW. 5.6B USD in 1985 for 2GW sounds like a terrible price -- at least twice the cost.

Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

#526

Post by Moldoteck »

Ray20 wrote: post #489
Moldoteck wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

decomissioning is embedded in opex cost and fairly cheap www.kkg.ch/de/uns/geschaefts-nachhaltigkeitsberichte.html The complexity now is doing it without delays. China shows that it can be built very cheap and fast with good supply chain

> China shows that it can be built very cheap and fast with good supply chain I mean, thank you, the USSR already showed this, no more is needed.

it's not about ussr, what a nonsense. It's about having good supply chain. Like France had during messmer or Korea now (albeit far from china). China is building the same ap1000 copycat much faster and cheaper

Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

#527

Post by peterfirefly »

bell-cot wrote: post #161
cbg0 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds like a "perfect is the enemy of good" situation. There are certain types of reactors that can reuse uranium to further reduce its half life to around 6000 years so the one million years legal requirement is an unreasonable target.

IIR, those "certain types of reactors" and their supporting infrastructure are (1) very handy for producing weapons-grade nuclear material, and (2) extremely difficult to operate (historically) without sundry environmental disasters. Which problems make them considerably hotter - politically - than no-reuse type reactors.

That's an argument in favour of using such reactors in the EU, isn't it?

We need EU-level nuclear missiles and we need them fast. We also need EU-level nuclear-powered submarines and maybe carrier groups.

Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

#528

Post by Gud »

belint wrote: post #369
Gud wrote: post #353

Yes. A nuclear power plant should be considered a national treasure, like a mine or hydro power plant, or any other large scale resource. To demolish a functional nuclear power facility is pure lunacy.

It is not lunacy. Polish professor Krzysztof Meissner ( https://www.fuw.edu.pl/~meissner/home.html ) in one of the interviews called the whole process of turning off nuclear power plants as result "of the pressure of the other forces". It was well crafted plan developed by Germany and Russia. According to this plan Germany suppose to be the hub for gas imported from Russia over Baltic Pipe - man in the middle for all…

I am sorry to hear that Belgium also has been sold out by its political elite.

Re: Belgium stops decommissioning nuclear power plants

#530

Post by peterfirefly »

belint wrote: post #369
Gud wrote: post #353

Yes. A nuclear power plant should be considered a national treasure, like a mine or hydro power plant, or any other large scale resource. To demolish a functional nuclear power facility is pure lunacy.

It is not lunacy. Polish professor Krzysztof Meissner ( https://www.fuw.edu.pl/~meissner/home.html ) in one of the interviews called the whole process of turning off nuclear power plants as result "of the pressure of the other forces". It was well crafted plan developed by Germany and Russia. According to this plan Germany suppose to be the hub for gas imported from Russia over Baltic Pipe - man in the middle for all…

Baltic Pipe is not destroyed (and it goes in the other direction and not even through Germany).

Nord Stream, on the other hand...

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