France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors • Hacker News Board

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#61

Post by TulliusCicero » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:51 PM UTC

valarauko wrote: post #51

Teknoman117 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, that one just boggles my mind. A few huge PV solar projects out in the desert in southern California and Nevada got stalled by environmentalists complaining about increased shading cooling down the desert. At this point, even if solar panels in the desert kill off a few species of lizards, seriously, what's the alternative? More damage will occur if we don't. It needs to be about minimizing total damage, even i…

> It needs to be about minimizing total damage, even if it means damaging isolated areas intentionally. I think that's an arithmetic everyone largely accepts, but they just don't want to be the specific ones paying the price while others seemingly get only the benefits. NIMBYism, if you will.

It's 100% NIMBYism.

Just like the complaints about how higher-density housing may hurt 'the environment' for whatever city people live in. Like, if everyone blocks high density housing, those people don't just disappear, they're gonna end up living in low density housing, and that's obviously much worse for the environment: takes up more space, which means cutting into nature more, and generally takes more energy for the lifestyle too.

But that doesn't matter to NIMBY's -- the important thing is that they don't have to see the environment changing where they live in particular.

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#62

Post by Gwypaas » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:51 PM UTC

neamar wrote: post #44

megaman821 wrote: post #25

This will provide a nice data-point for those who argue nuclear makes more financial sense over wind/solar/battery, but some anti-nuclear cabal is stopping their construction. Maybe they are right and France will make lots of money selling energy to its neighbors, or they are wrong, and France will be stuck with some of the highest energy prices in the euro region.

France has historically been a net exporter of its mostly nuclear electricity. Electricity price is average compared to the rest of Europe, https://strom-report.de/electricity-prices-europe/

With government subsidies everything can be made to look cheap. Not saying we should not subsidize some energy production, but nuclear seems like a woefully inefficient use of it.

>In 2010, as part of the progressive liberalisation of the energy market under EU directives, France agreed the Accès régulé à l'électricité nucléaire historique (ARENH) regulations that allowed third party suppliers access up to about a quarter of France's pre-2011 nuclear generation capacity, at a fixed price of €42/MWh from 1 July 2011 until 31 December 2025.[47][48][49]

> As of 2015, France's household electricity price, excluding taxation, is the 12th cheapest amongst the 28 member European Union and the second-cheapest to industrial consumers.[50] The actual cost of generating electricity by nuclear power is not published by EDF or the French government but is estimated to be between €59/MWh and €83/MWh.[51]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_France

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#63

Post by lb0 » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:51 PM UTC

nexuist wrote: post #50

tomdell wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Extract value and leave the locals alone to deal with the consequences - how progressive.

Great job moving those goal posts when your original premise was called out. What exactly do you want France to do in Niger to atone for their sins? Build infrastructure, fund businesses, make deals with their government? In other words, you want to solve colonialism with more colonialism?

How cynical, if that was what how colonialism there and everywhere else was like, wow..

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#64

Post by Manuel_D » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:55 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #14

HideousKojima wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Environmentalists are blocking construction of more wind power Environmentalists really are their own worst enemies. When I was in high school near San Diego about 15 years ago, there was a huge amount of opposition to a solar power project. From environmentalists. There was a solar power plant out in Imperial County and the environmentalists were protesting the high voltage lines that would bring the power into San…

Isn't environmentalists' argument that we should reduce our power consumption, rather than destroying the environment to keep providing so much power? That's not as crazy a position as you make it out to be is it?

Standards of living are highly connected to energy consumption. Reducing power consumption without also reducing living standards is difficult to do. Furthermore, power consumption is going to increase as transportation and industrial processes become electrified.

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#65

Post by rgmerk » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:55 PM UTC

andrewinardeer wrote: post #18

HideousKojima wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Environmentalists are blocking construction of more wind power Environmentalists really are their own worst enemies. When I was in high school near San Diego about 15 years ago, there was a huge amount of opposition to a solar power project. From environmentalists. There was a solar power plant out in Imperial County and the environmentalists were protesting the high voltage lines that would bring the power into San…

Here in Australia, it can be argued that The Green Party's blanket ban and refusal to even consider let alone use nuclear has contributed significantly to more carbon in the air as we have instead relied on coal for the last 50 years.

This is just plain wrong.

Absent environmentalism or non-economic considerations (hello Jervis Bay) no nuclear power would ever be built in Australia. We have way too much cheap, conveniently located coal.

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#66

Post by ryan93 » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:56 PM UTC

Absurd that discussion of nuclear power brings out people who think it’s too pricy. 30 trillion in US debt. Ten percent of that could have nuclearized this country

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#67

Post by megaman821 » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:56 PM UTC

neamar wrote: post #44

megaman821 wrote: post #25

This will provide a nice data-point for those who argue nuclear makes more financial sense over wind/solar/battery, but some anti-nuclear cabal is stopping their construction. Maybe they are right and France will make lots of money selling energy to its neighbors, or they are wrong, and France will be stuck with some of the highest energy prices in the euro region.

France has historically been a net exporter of its mostly nuclear electricity. Electricity price is average compared to the rest of Europe, https://strom-report.de/electricity-prices-europe/

That link has a nice chart. What on earth is going on Denmark? There pre-tax price of energy seem pretty high compared to their neighbors.

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#68

Post by ch4s3 » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:56 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #49

ch4s3 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't seem particularly coherent to me for a few reasons. To draw a hard line between human activity/habitat and nature seems artificial. A human settlement is not so different from a beaver dam of ant colony in many ways. The idea especially in the US that there is some pre-colonial unspoiled nature that we could preserve or return to seems historically ignorant. Native Americans were managing the land with fir…

> The idea especially in the US that there is some pre-colonial unspoiled nature that we could preserve or return to seems historically ignorant. Who are you replying to here? Who's argued this?

The point I'm making is that there's a certain type of activist who believes these kinds o things, and they're arguing for things like reduction of per-capita energy use to reduce society's impact on the land based on the idea that there was ever really land here that wasn't actively managed by people. (At least since the glaciers receded) I'm making the case that these neo-malthusians want to protect an imagined environment of the past that didn't exist. There are certainly things we're doing that are environmentally negative form the perspective of biodiversity, CO2, local water tables, etc but I don't think fixing those things necessarily means using less energy, or having a lower standard of living.

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#69

Post by outside1234 » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:56 PM UTC

They can sell it to Germany once the US bombs the pipeline they are building to Russia (its gonna happen eventually).

Re: France to Build Six New Nuclear Reactors

#70

Post by Manuel_D » Thu, Feb 10, 2022, 9:56 PM UTC

ekabod wrote: post #45

socialdemocrat wrote: post #7

I am skeptical to current nuclear power, would have liked Molten Salt Reactors instead. However I see leaders having to do something. Environmentalists are blocking construction of more wind power, and crisis with Russia makes gas less accessible. France has a relatively good track record on nuclear power. They may pull this off. 2035 is a really long time to wait for new power to the grid though.

"France has a relatively good track record on nuclear power" What does that means?

France built out its nuclear power generation from 10% to 80% in the span of less than 20 years [1]. While it's true that its latest plants are having difficulties, nuclear power has always been more expensive for one-of-a-kind designs rather than serial production.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_France#Messme...