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@Emil This sounds like a sensible, level-headed approach. #Australia, take note!
@Emil This sounds like a sensible, level-headed approach. #Australia, take note!
@breadsmasher @Emil Yellowcake is not very dangerous, but it’s not safe to eat either.
@Lats @ajsadauskas @australianpolitics
Well, right now there is much more derailing of nuclear in the hope of solving storage than derailing solar+wind in the hope of re-enacting a nuclear buildup (like in France, Japan, Germany (1970s-80s), Ontario, China, India…) going on.
Get both on the road, they do not much compete for resources. It will be faster than only one.
@Lats @ajsadauskas @australianpolitics The problem as I see it is that solar+wind+storage alone will not get you there ever. It will go up to 40% solar+wind, then maybe 10—30% with storage+solar+wind (depending on your technooptimism). And then you start replacing everything built every 20 to 30 years. Buys time, but not sustainable.
What you say is true: you need to build up the entire nuclear industry. International cooperation for bootstrapping will be important. Better get started.
@planet @clojure That link seems broken, even if it has a real date. But this one seems to work: https://xtdb.com/blog/dev-diary-feb-24
@ajsadauskas @australianpolitics
What would »grid scale solar & storage« cost, and how long would it take?
This is the competition:
No one in the whole world has ever built (2). There is no mature industry, and no technology even matching the only grid scale storage we have so far (pumped hydro).
For (1), there are several international players with established designs.
I wouldn’t stop either one.
@Emil From a pure technical view, it is almost always more reassuring to use the »original«. And that is all this one argues.
But there are other considerations, such as political security for Europe. And diversification of supply is practically always a win for the consumer.
I think Europe should pay a research grant or something like that to whoever develops replacement fuel units.
@Emil This sentence somehow seems wrong: »They are highly radioactive and have long half-lives.«
Halflife and decay rate (and thus radiation intensity) are inversely proportional to each other, and there is the halflife gap in fission products above Strontium-90 and Cesium-137 quite clearly separating »high radioactivity/short halflife« and »low radioactivity/long halflife«.
@Sweetshark @Emil @Diplomjodler
It’s almost funny to watch anti-nuclear rhethoric over the years. In the beginning it was »it’s unsafe, you’re just doing it for profit«, then »it’s dirty, you’re just doing it for profit«, and now that those points don’t hold up, it’s »it’s unprofitable, you’re just doing it for, uhmm…«.
@Sweetshark @Emil @Diplomjodler
Regulations are necessary. But regulations can be implemented in ways that do not create arbitrary month-long delays for simple and standard engineering questions. Or you can do what Trittin described.
The problem is that the Greens /still/ have not cleaned up their priorities. Habeck last year was unable to affirm in an interview the direct question whether coal is worse for the environment than nuclear.
This seems like a good view into the mind of an anti-nuclear zealot: that /they/ are the vox populi and there /obviously/ cannot be a genuine public opinion against them.
@matthewtoad43 @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis
I think you do not realize how much of our population only exists because of Haber and Bosch.
@matthewtoad43 @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis
Sorry, but the term »degrowth« is a red flag for me.
Sure, we are getting more efficient over time. That’s why even Germany’s emissions fell over the last two decades.
But cutting power that is actually needed means poverty, and that will immediately end support for long-term thinking as well as severely limit our technical options.
There are too many people for romantic visions of rural self-sufficiency.
@matthewtoad43 @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis
Yes, but I’d like to add that we need to think about lifetimes.
Let’s imagine having built all we need in 30 years, through sometimes extreme efforts.
Current solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries have a lifetime of (a bit generously) 30 years. So we’d have to immediately start again with the entire effort just to keep it up. I’m worrying that this might not be … sustainable.
@matthewtoad43 @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load-following_power_plant#Nuclear_power_plants
For a grid of 100 GW peak demand, you either need
- 100 GW nuclear plants, or
- 100 GW storage output, plus (100 GW × storage loss factor) storage input (volatiles or whatever), plus additional transmission capabilities, or
- a combination of 60% nuclear plus, say 10% hydro, plus 30% volatiles
I’d say some variation on the last looks most plausible to me.
@matthewtoad43 @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis
You seem to argue that our /current/ fossil grid would also need more storage, but it works just fine as is. Nuclear is better at load following than fossils, so what gives?
@matthewtoad43 @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis
Again, £50 per MWh is at current penetration levels of volatiles. This doesn’t scale linearly.
See that you get to more-of-the-same-kind nuclear reactors. This does.
@matthewtoad43 @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis
Nuclear is faster at load following than everything but pumped hydro and (very dirty) gas peakers. It was even a design requirement for the german Konvoi type in the 70s and 80s.
@matthewtoad43 @MattMastodon @BrianSmith950 @Pampa @AlexisFR @Wirrvogel @Sodis
At least Germany never had subsidies for commercial nuclear power.
On the other hand, »renewables« are still subsidized heavily, and there is much moaning right now because the build-out is slowing down, as the best places are taken.
And France has no /real/ problem with its riverside plants. Last year (much bemoaned) had 0.05% (one twentieth of a percent) curtailing for river temperatures.
@Emil OK, it’s a start. Once regulatory and economic processes are in place, there will be an option to become much more ambitious here, depending on how other plans turn out. Good.