this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2024
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I am absolutely certain that experts have looked at it, and come to different conclusions.
I'll even go as far as to accept that there is no scientific consensus.
However, seeing that we keep outputting more and more co2, we need to do something drastic, fossil plants are one of the biggest sources of co2, so it makes sense to shut them down as soon as possible.
Nuclear power doesn't really produce co2, the radiation is a local, limited problem, co2 emmisions is a global, existential problem.
Renewables are still not ready to deal with base load in a power grid long term, hydro power messes with local fish and environment, solar doesn't work during the night, wind is quite unpredictable, batteries degrade over time and can't supply AC without extra equipment.
So what is left but Nuclear power?
Nothing, nuclear power will buy us time to develop reliable renewable power while cutting our co2 emmissions drasticly.
And what reference do you have for that? A recent one, because as I said, the economics have totally changed in the last 30 years.
Concrete does. Reactors need a lot of concrete. A lot.
Which doesn't matter. Base load exists because it's cheap to make power plants that stay at the same level all the time. The economics of that don't apply to renewables.
Utterly untrue. It'll take 10 years to deploy a single new GW of nuclear. That's not buying time.
The nuclear process itself doesn't produce co2, the construction of the building does, you are absolutely right about that.
This goes for all concrete needed for renewables as well, massive hydro power dams will produce far more co2 during construction than a nuclear powerplant.
It is obvious that the economixs have changed in 30 years, and they will change in the next 30 years as well. The hesitation of building new nuclear powerplants will not make the situation better. The best time to build nuclear powerplats was perhaps 30 years ago, the second best time to build them is today.
By using economics as an argument you are deliberately advocating against using all tools to reduce global warming.
Base load absolutely exists, without it our society would fall apart.
Nuclear power would give us time to reduce the baseload to managable levels and further develop renewables so they can cope and we can transition away from coal power that needs kilometer long trains of coal every day, to me that sounds like it is worth paying a bit extra to do it faster than drag our feet when we have the knowledge and capability to do it.
I bet that in 30 years when this debate is still going on, you will say that we should have started building nuclear plants 30 year ago because the economics has changed since then.