Everything else has a huge dependency on environmental factors (wind, sunlight, water) or storage resources which are harmful to scale up without safety consideration.
The actual data on renewables is impressive, but not nearly impressive enough to stop climate change…as.anyone can see who is paying attention to the emissions data.
Renewables still greatly depend on fossil fuels as a backup power and thermal power source, which is why fossil fuel companies are promoting renewables-only to the masses.
It ensures society remains dependent on fossil fuels for the next decades, albeit at a lower intensity. Which works out very well for them, since they already passed peak production and just want to sell the remaining stock as long as possible for the highest price.
Once we crank up a few hundred nuclear reactors to serve as the backup for renewables and as a thermal energy source for producing synthetic hydrocarbons, then fossil fuels will become obsolete.
Until then, we’re going to be partly dependent on fossil fuels and pay a hefty price for them.
Fossil fuel companies are not promoting renewables only. I’ve only seen objective reports from within the electricity industry promoting this - eg the UK’s Nation Grid recently did a Future Energy Scenarios study that determined renewables was the fastest way for the country to reach net zero.
Building a few hundred nuclear reactors takes a long time. Meanwhile, fossil fuels will continue to dominate our use. This is what fossil fuel companies want, to delay our transition away from them. Renewables give us the opportunity to wean off fossil fuels much more quickly. We’ll use a lot more fuel waiting for nuclear than we will backing up renewables.
We need nuclear, as part of a complete energy portfolio. However, renewables are available now, they’re quick, cheap, proven and profitable. If we build an excess of renewables, we can account for nearly all of the times where the wind isn’t blowing or the sun isn’t shining. Then, once we’ve weaned off fossil fuels, we can fill out our portfolio with nuclear. By the time the nuclear plants are built, our demand will have grown and that excess in renewables probably won’t be an excess anymore.
Renewables are highly volatile and storage technology isn’t there yet for most large grids. Right now that stability must come from coal, LNG, or nuclear, with some exceptions like geothermal. Pick your poison. China is building 5-10 giant new coal plants per year to satisfy this demand, despite being one of the cheapest places in the world to manufacture solar panels and turbines. If we care about the environment, we’ll choose nuclear. Germany’s “green” party has successfully lobbied to effectively end nuclear support in the country, and now they have to significantly increase coal and lignite consumption following the Russian LNG embargo.
I don’t understand why nuclear has to be a dirty word. Modern reactors are clean and safe. Far better for the environment than coal and LNG.
It’s not either/or, it’s in conjunction with, and it just so happens that renewable-only isn’t sufficient and has failed to scale enough to combat climate change.
While here in Australia we already have a state running on 100% renewables, any plan for nuclear takes too long and costs too much. Read up. The barriers for compact reactors are large and expensive before nuclear is feasible and they still haven’t worked out that pesky waste issue. Investing in nuclear once renewables are established is fine. Expecting nuclear to bear the load while they are yet to be built is just fantasy. Renewables are here and are cheaper. They are literally the answer already here.
Tasmania has some great geography for hydro power, generating 90% of their power. Most places in the world don’t have such geography. Pointing to goldilocks locations as though they’re replicable everywhere isn’t well informed. Further, while hydro is less volatile than wind and solar, it still requires a reliable grid fallback during droughts. Tasmania has this with the Basslink. Without it, they would also require quick-fire coal and LNG plants on standby. Or, more likely, running permanently as the spool-up cost is very high.
No one is claiming nuclear is cheap and instant. We’re arguing that neglecting nuclear keeps coal and LNG consumption unnecessarily high.
Appreciate you did research, however Tasmania isn’t SA. And Bass link runs both ways. It’s a grid link, not a power generator.
But if you th8nknthats goldilocks, let’s look at France. It’s the most successful and pervasive nuclear power. And they are currently moving away from nuclear. Ouch.
But if you th8nknthats goldilocks, let’s look at France. It’s the most successful and pervasive nuclear power. And they are currently moving away from nuclear. Ouch.
Unfortunate that they don’t have the workers to maintain them, the failure to maintain existing reactors has resulted in blackouts as urgent repairs occur, and the only way to make nuclear seem to work is to nationalise the debt and make everyone pay heavy taxes to cover up the losses. But hey, eight new reactors planned, that’s not a goldilocks!
Albania, Iceland, and Paraguay all hit 100% renewable also.
Nuclear is a dirty word because we have 80 years of demonstrating its disastrously destructive tendencies, including in North America. Trinity tests irradiated and killed entire towns. Three Mile Island is like the 3rd largest nuclear disaster of all time. Fukushima/Chernobyl haven’t quelled anyone’s fears of meltdowns.
Now, is a meltdown ever likely to happen? No, of course not. But that doesn’t mean it can’t. The mining and processing of uranium/thorium is insanely bad for the environement, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it was close to coal carbon emissions.
We have thousands of miles of coastline, thousands of miles of rivers, and many large lakes in Canada. Why couldn’t we have a robust hydro network?
Nuclear should absolutely be part of the picture. That being said, nuclear does a bad job scaling up for peak demands over base load. Better than solar or wind for sure but not good enough. For a fossil fuel free world we do need energy storage. Luckily pumped water energy storage is pretty viable.
Oh no! If only we had some other means of creating or storing energy, if only there was a way to rid us of the dependency of oil!
Nuclear?
Everything else has a huge dependency on environmental factors (wind, sunlight, water) or storage resources which are harmful to scale up without safety consideration.
That’s a convenient sound bite that really ignores actual data on renewables.
The actual data on renewables is impressive, but not nearly impressive enough to stop climate change…as.anyone can see who is paying attention to the emissions data.
Renewables still greatly depend on fossil fuels as a backup power and thermal power source, which is why fossil fuel companies are promoting renewables-only to the masses.
It ensures society remains dependent on fossil fuels for the next decades, albeit at a lower intensity. Which works out very well for them, since they already passed peak production and just want to sell the remaining stock as long as possible for the highest price.
Once we crank up a few hundred nuclear reactors to serve as the backup for renewables and as a thermal energy source for producing synthetic hydrocarbons, then fossil fuels will become obsolete.
Until then, we’re going to be partly dependent on fossil fuels and pay a hefty price for them.
Fossil fuel companies are not promoting renewables only. I’ve only seen objective reports from within the electricity industry promoting this - eg the UK’s Nation Grid recently did a Future Energy Scenarios study that determined renewables was the fastest way for the country to reach net zero.
Building a few hundred nuclear reactors takes a long time. Meanwhile, fossil fuels will continue to dominate our use. This is what fossil fuel companies want, to delay our transition away from them. Renewables give us the opportunity to wean off fossil fuels much more quickly. We’ll use a lot more fuel waiting for nuclear than we will backing up renewables.
We need nuclear, as part of a complete energy portfolio. However, renewables are available now, they’re quick, cheap, proven and profitable. If we build an excess of renewables, we can account for nearly all of the times where the wind isn’t blowing or the sun isn’t shining. Then, once we’ve weaned off fossil fuels, we can fill out our portfolio with nuclear. By the time the nuclear plants are built, our demand will have grown and that excess in renewables probably won’t be an excess anymore.
Renewables are highly volatile and storage technology isn’t there yet for most large grids. Right now that stability must come from coal, LNG, or nuclear, with some exceptions like geothermal. Pick your poison. China is building 5-10 giant new coal plants per year to satisfy this demand, despite being one of the cheapest places in the world to manufacture solar panels and turbines. If we care about the environment, we’ll choose nuclear. Germany’s “green” party has successfully lobbied to effectively end nuclear support in the country, and now they have to significantly increase coal and lignite consumption following the Russian LNG embargo.
I don’t understand why nuclear has to be a dirty word. Modern reactors are clean and safe. Far better for the environment than coal and LNG.
This stupid renewables vs nuclear debate is engineered by the fossil fuel bastards. We need both. It’s not a choice. Both.
I fully agree.
Or, and hear me out, we could just go with renewables.
It’s not either/or, it’s in conjunction with, and it just so happens that renewable-only isn’t sufficient and has failed to scale enough to combat climate change.
While here in Australia we already have a state running on 100% renewables, any plan for nuclear takes too long and costs too much. Read up. The barriers for compact reactors are large and expensive before nuclear is feasible and they still haven’t worked out that pesky waste issue. Investing in nuclear once renewables are established is fine. Expecting nuclear to bear the load while they are yet to be built is just fantasy. Renewables are here and are cheaper. They are literally the answer already here.
Tasmania has some great geography for hydro power, generating 90% of their power. Most places in the world don’t have such geography. Pointing to goldilocks locations as though they’re replicable everywhere isn’t well informed. Further, while hydro is less volatile than wind and solar, it still requires a reliable grid fallback during droughts. Tasmania has this with the Basslink. Without it, they would also require quick-fire coal and LNG plants on standby. Or, more likely, running permanently as the spool-up cost is very high.
No one is claiming nuclear is cheap and instant. We’re arguing that neglecting nuclear keeps coal and LNG consumption unnecessarily high.
I’m arguing that aside from the fission reaction, Nuclear is just as dirty as coal.
Appreciate you did research, however Tasmania isn’t SA. And Bass link runs both ways. It’s a grid link, not a power generator.
But if you th8nknthats goldilocks, let’s look at France. It’s the most successful and pervasive nuclear power. And they are currently moving away from nuclear. Ouch.
“In February 2022 France announced plans to build six new reactors and to consider building a further eight.”
Unfortunate that they don’t have the workers to maintain them, the failure to maintain existing reactors has resulted in blackouts as urgent repairs occur, and the only way to make nuclear seem to work is to nationalise the debt and make everyone pay heavy taxes to cover up the losses. But hey, eight new reactors planned, that’s not a goldilocks!
Albania, Iceland, and Paraguay all hit 100% renewable also.
Nuclear is a dirty word because we have 80 years of demonstrating its disastrously destructive tendencies, including in North America. Trinity tests irradiated and killed entire towns. Three Mile Island is like the 3rd largest nuclear disaster of all time. Fukushima/Chernobyl haven’t quelled anyone’s fears of meltdowns.
Now, is a meltdown ever likely to happen? No, of course not. But that doesn’t mean it can’t. The mining and processing of uranium/thorium is insanely bad for the environement, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it was close to coal carbon emissions.
We have thousands of miles of coastline, thousands of miles of rivers, and many large lakes in Canada. Why couldn’t we have a robust hydro network?
Where to you put the trash?
Finland
Nuclear should absolutely be part of the picture. That being said, nuclear does a bad job scaling up for peak demands over base load. Better than solar or wind for sure but not good enough. For a fossil fuel free world we do need energy storage. Luckily pumped water energy storage is pretty viable.