maxmfsa

Nuclear’s global share fell from 17.5% (1996) to ~9% (2024) and is flat outside China. That’s not a golden age. Of the 63 reactors under construction worldwide, all but four are backed by China or Russia. No country has an operating repository yet, not even Finland. France had more than half its fleet down in 2022 from corrosion, and had to throttle reactors again this year from heat. And unlike renewables — ~40% of German renewable capacity is literally owned by private citizens and farmers through energy co-ops — nuclear requires the kind of capital and secrecy that only states or utilities can provide. 19 EU reactors are still fully fuel-dependent on Russia’s Rosatom right now, which bundles its reactor exports with political influence programs. That’s not a coincidence, it’s structural.

Your personal comfort isn’t consent, a repository binds an entire region for a timescale (100,000 years) that outlasts every democratic institution we have. Nobody alive can consent on behalf of the thousands of generations that timeline covers. The reason siting takes decades everywhere is precisely that “I personally wouldn’t mind” isn’t how legitimate consent works. You need actual buy-in from residents, municipalities, parliaments, not one guy’s shrug.

Nuclear energy isn’t a solution to anything. Solar and Windmills are much better, there really isn’t any argument for nuclear energy (if you want to teach me a better one, why don’t we start by building a nuclear repository in your region?).