Except this is wrong. Wikipedia cost of electricity by source shows 81-82$/MWh for nuclear, 67-146$/MWh for offshore wind. Solar is 31-146.
A notable fact is also that renewable supporters are very often very against nuclear energy, and very much on favour of turning it off at all cost. I know no nuclear energy supporter who is against renewable energy.
If the goal is to remove fossil fuels from energy, some people should really stop fighting nuclear energy at all cost like they did for 40 years.
Offshore wind is more expensive than onshore wind, by far.
I’m not in favour of turning anything off until replacements are energised. One of my pet peeves is how fast coal has been switched off, only to be quietly replaced by tons of small, inefficient diesel and gas generators that can be installed near industrial estates and hidden behind fences. These pollute more per MW than the large coal plants they replace.
The goal isn’t just to remove fossil fuel from energy, the goal must be to remove it as quickly as possible. Renewables are the only answer for that specific goal.
Nuclear is needed long term. Existing nuclear plants should be maintained as long as possible, and replacement plants on the same site should have priority over new plants on new sites. However nuclear takes time to build and is very expensive. Renewables are quick and cheap.
Money and time are finite resources; focusing all of it and going hard on current renewable tech is the best way to quickly remove fossile fuels.
Once fossil fuels are gone, then we can see about expanding nuclear.
As quickly as possible is not the only parameter. Consequences is an important one too. We can technically turn off half the grid right now, but there would be severe consequences to that.
Smart grid is a cool thing, but we are far from it still if it needs to work from renewables only.
Well yes, we shouldn’t switch things off before replacements are switched on. But that means we should be targeting replacements that can be switched on quickly. Nuclear is not quick.
That is exactly the kind of fallacy I’m talking about. That somehow renewable and nuclear would be exclusive to each other. Or that renewable can replace all the fossile faster than a nuclear power plant can be built.
We need both. We need to start building nuclear power plants now, and we need to build renewables. This is the best allocation of resources. And this is the only solution out of fossiles.
I think you’re assuming an infinite capacity of funds and people to build the things. If that were true, then yes we should be going for both renewables and nuclear. However it isn’t, and renewables provide far better value and can be built far more quickly.
We need to build both, but we can’t build it all at once. It makes sense to build all or most of the cheap and quick renewables first, in an excess (which before long will become capacity again), to get the fossil fuels switched off as quickly as possible, and then fill out the portfolio with nuclear.
Wrong. The question is how expensive a determine MWh power is, not a single unit price ; prices for 2MWh of renewable or nuclear are comparable.
Secondly, renewable and nuclear don’t mobilise the same resources, both human and material, thus it will always be faster to build both at the same time.
Thirdly, renewable take a lot of space, which means it’s easy to build the first farms, but the more you have, the harder it is to find space for it to build ; not all countries are islands or massive continents with large deserts.
You’re not really making sense there. Prices in MWh is what the market charges at, and renewables are FAR cheaper per MWh than nuclear. However there is a disconnect between the generation market and consumer markets - as a consumer, you don’t see any difference. Regardless, I haven’t been saying that 1MW of renewables is the same as 1MW of nuclear. I’ve been saying we need to build an excess of renewables everywhere to account for the times it isn’t available in some locations.
Yes, they do. There are only so many people in the industry. I say this as an electrical engineer who has worked throughout (renewables, nuclear, factories, basically anything with HV). There is also production capacity, but we haven’t reached this yet with renewables and it can be expanded - however when we do get closer to it then it will make more sense to put money into nuclear. Money is also a limiting factor, particularly when it comes to government finance, and is perhaps the biggest limiting factor of all.
Wind farms take up a lot of space, solar can go on roofs, hydro requires bodies of water. Hydro is very location specific, wind somewhat, solar not very much. However the biggest obstuction of all is the NIMBY attitude.
I’m talking prices to build 2MW power gen capacity, also considering the effective uptime, because wind or solar don’t have 100% uptime. Construction prices are equivalent for nuclear and solar. And nuclear doesn’t take 20 years to build, contrary to what anti-nuclear propaganda pretends.
Finally electrical engineers are not the only people needed for these projects. And if electrical engineers are the limiting factor to build new stuff, we’re simply screwed.
Except this is wrong. Wikipedia cost of electricity by source shows 81-82$/MWh for nuclear, 67-146$/MWh for offshore wind. Solar is 31-146.
A notable fact is also that renewable supporters are very often very against nuclear energy, and very much on favour of turning it off at all cost. I know no nuclear energy supporter who is against renewable energy.
If the goal is to remove fossil fuels from energy, some people should really stop fighting nuclear energy at all cost like they did for 40 years.
Offshore wind is more expensive than onshore wind, by far.
I’m not in favour of turning anything off until replacements are energised. One of my pet peeves is how fast coal has been switched off, only to be quietly replaced by tons of small, inefficient diesel and gas generators that can be installed near industrial estates and hidden behind fences. These pollute more per MW than the large coal plants they replace.
The goal isn’t just to remove fossil fuel from energy, the goal must be to remove it as quickly as possible. Renewables are the only answer for that specific goal.
Nuclear is needed long term. Existing nuclear plants should be maintained as long as possible, and replacement plants on the same site should have priority over new plants on new sites. However nuclear takes time to build and is very expensive. Renewables are quick and cheap.
Money and time are finite resources; focusing all of it and going hard on current renewable tech is the best way to quickly remove fossile fuels.
Once fossil fuels are gone, then we can see about expanding nuclear.
As quickly as possible is not the only parameter. Consequences is an important one too. We can technically turn off half the grid right now, but there would be severe consequences to that.
Smart grid is a cool thing, but we are far from it still if it needs to work from renewables only.
Well yes, we shouldn’t switch things off before replacements are switched on. But that means we should be targeting replacements that can be switched on quickly. Nuclear is not quick.
That is exactly the kind of fallacy I’m talking about. That somehow renewable and nuclear would be exclusive to each other. Or that renewable can replace all the fossile faster than a nuclear power plant can be built.
We need both. We need to start building nuclear power plants now, and we need to build renewables. This is the best allocation of resources. And this is the only solution out of fossiles.
I think you’re assuming an infinite capacity of funds and people to build the things. If that were true, then yes we should be going for both renewables and nuclear. However it isn’t, and renewables provide far better value and can be built far more quickly.
We need to build both, but we can’t build it all at once. It makes sense to build all or most of the cheap and quick renewables first, in an excess (which before long will become capacity again), to get the fossil fuels switched off as quickly as possible, and then fill out the portfolio with nuclear.
Wrong. The question is how expensive a determine MWh power is, not a single unit price ; prices for 2MWh of renewable or nuclear are comparable.
Secondly, renewable and nuclear don’t mobilise the same resources, both human and material, thus it will always be faster to build both at the same time.
Thirdly, renewable take a lot of space, which means it’s easy to build the first farms, but the more you have, the harder it is to find space for it to build ; not all countries are islands or massive continents with large deserts.
I’m talking prices to build 2MW power gen capacity, also considering the effective uptime, because wind or solar don’t have 100% uptime. Construction prices are equivalent for nuclear and solar. And nuclear doesn’t take 20 years to build, contrary to what anti-nuclear propaganda pretends.
Finally electrical engineers are not the only people needed for these projects. And if electrical engineers are the limiting factor to build new stuff, we’re simply screwed.