this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2024
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So far I have not seen any real renewable energy source that can cover base demand, I am sure there will be eventually.
Nuclear is not a replacement for renewable energy, it is a shortcut to getting rid of fossil power generation and buying us time.
Nuclear power plants take a long time to do properly. Starting to build nuclear now would take a decade plus.
They’re also more expensive per watt of energy generated over the lifetime of the plant than renewables.
It would be cheaper and faster to build renewables, batteries, hydro electric, and other storage methods.
Nuclear is a distraction and you fell for it.
Standardisation will bring down the cost and time of building a powerplant.
I don't think it is fair to compare the cost of nuclear against the cost of renewable power since they will fullfill different roles.
Renewables are great at dynamic demand, nuclear is great at base demand.
Hydro power has been shown to be quite harmful to local fish dammaging the eco system, but yes, some hydro should absolutely be used.
But renewables still can't cut it for base demand.
I see nuclear powerplants as being a drop-in replacement for coal, oil and gas powerplats, buying us time to develop renewables further while also developing better and more efficient tech.
Oh so the costs will drop in 10…20 years? That’s too late to help.
You are straight up refusing to acknowledge that baseload can be provided by other means and isn’t actually an issue.
Building flywheels is cheap. They last practically forever. They don’t produce toxic waste.
You are wrong. The politicians and corporate interests pushing this are wrong.
Sigh, I have heard the economics argument for decades, and it basicially boils down to "we should have started 10 years ago", well yeah, that would have been the ideal, but today is the second best day to do it.
Untill now, no one in this thread has addresses the baseload problem.
Ok, flywheels, that is an interesting concept, depwnsing on the connection to the motor/generator and how much energy is lost in the transmission it could absolutely work.
I also wonder how scalable it would be...
You say that I am wrong, fine I can take critism, but when I just keep seeing people saying "NO" to any resonable way to remove our dependence on fossils with in a resonable timeline.
Tell me when would renewables be able to completely take over from fossil power generation, I mean in the long run (20+ years without any fossil fueld plants or nuclear plants), and run reliably even during the dark and cold winters in say northern scandinavia?
Give me a resonable idea on that.
A decade of building renewables would start generating power nearly immediately and would produce more energy per dollar invested even with storage attached.
Nuclear is a dead end for fools.
I don't see how people like you miss the entire concept of "base load".
I live in a region with vast amounts of renewable energy resources. It's always windy and the sun shines almost every day. I have solar panels on my house that cover most of my DHW and a large fraction of my summer cooling load, and keep most of my appliances running.
But right now, the sun is down and the wind is flat. And I still need power. My battery storage would be depleted by morning, damaging it through overdischarge if I don't buy power from the grid instead.
And it's a lovely summer evening with no heating or cooling demand! What about midwinter, -35C and dark and snowy? Where is my power coming from on that day, after a month of days just like it?
Nuclear.