I'm 100% convinced there is an oil/coal lobby conspiracy here. Nuclear used to cost $3000/kw in the fucking 80s, still does in China.
America needs 700GW of Nuclear power for 100% nuclear energy AND to charge EVs. That's just $2.1 trillion to COMPLETELY decarbonize both energy and transport. That's 3 years of military budget, we could have done this 40 years ago :agony-consuming:
For the UK, even assuming a conservative $5k/kW cost of construction, it would cost $250 billion to fully nuclearize the electricity grid. That's 1% of the GDP over 10 years. This 1-2% over 10-15 years figure applies more or less to all developed countries.
There is ample evidence of coal/oil interests frustrating nuclear power construction through sockpuppet environmental NGOs, lobbying to hamper nuclear development, anti-nuclear propaganda etc.
Here are 5 reasons why capital doesn't want nuclear:
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Nuclear is structurally unprofitable. It requires massive initial capital investment, and there are very little running costs to profit from. Nuclear power has never been profitable anywhere, BUT IT DOESNT MATTER. It is still massively beneficial to humanity. It is living proof that profitability is not the only metric for a better society, and in fact can actively hamper building a better society.
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Nuclear lasts 60-80 years, modern designs could even last 100 years. Coal, Oil and even wind turbines, solar, need continual gradual replacement. See why fossil interests support wind and solar, and oppose nuclear? It's better for them to have a constant stream of revenue. :capitalist-laugh:
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Virtually all reactors are owned by the state, for reasons of profitability. Nuclear is a socialist source of power, private corporations HATE that! There is a reason why China is going all in on nuclear. The Soviet Union also was planning on making nuclear it's primary source.
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Resource extraction industries also extract rent, i.e super profits (according to Ricardian theory of differential rent). Uranium is a tiny fraction of nuclear costs, can't have that, gotta get that oil/coal/gas rent.
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Solar/Wind requires trillions in energy storage, that's another massive cost to humanity, but for capital - a massive source of profit :capitalist:
Edit : China built a 6000MW nuclear power plant for $10 billion. At that cost, it would cost USA just $1.2 trillion to go full nuclear https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yangjiang_Nuclear_Power_Station
I am not quite sure what you mean with works best. The prices for photovoltaic are so low that at most places on earth it is cheaper to produce some yourself than to buy it from your municipal or private electricity generating company.
https://www.irena.org/-/media/Files/IRENA/Agency/Publication/2020/Jun/IRENA_Power_Generation_Costs_2019.pdf (careful older report, the numbers for wind and PV are much better now than they were in 2019 - a result of how levelized it is, new built modules and installations are cheaper and more efficient than what is written there).
The hefty bill of renewable energy laws you mention is mostly a thing of the past - and is actually not as hefty as many think. It did lead to faster effects of scale for PV generation, though. Let us ignore the subsidies for gasoline and such, too.
For around 2 years now it is even cheaper for electricity generating companies to plan for PV/wind than for other technologies.
no, you arent understanding environmental effects and subsidies. like i know nuclear physicists its just functionally impossible to produce solar and wind at the scale needed without absolutely fucking the environment. it will require rare earth materials from exploited nations, it will require building in perfect locations (even deserts are not good places to build solar panels because of surface ablasion, so it needs to not be windy, not dusty, and sunny! and we need to predict with good accuracy what will change the weather with climate change. theres only a handful of good places like that, if you dont get places like that, you will have a bad time with replacement costs). for wind, you also need wind at speeds of, and dont quote me on this, excess >6kmph. very few places are good for this, and its mostly places that are already decently developed (argentina, china, europe, america, south africa, and so on). and you cannot have those places produce electricity for the interior of many continents for a variety of reasons, mostly because of dimishing returns of transporting electricity over long distances. so at minimum you would need a significant nuclear infrastructure in africa and the interiors of every continent, with north america being the exception to that rule due to the great wind production the great plains has to offer.
to be completely anti-nuclear is stupidity. and its also completely stupid to be anti renewables. its just the bulk of our electricity needs will have to be from nuclear. and hopefully, if we have a ton of nuclear scientists, we will be able to develop fusion faster.
and im not even talking about how we have no clue how to build wind turbines without oil extraction. most of the outer body of each wind turbine is made out of petroleum products, and we havent devised a way to recycle it. and lets not forget the land use required for wind and solar generation, do not act like this wont disturb environments if it is on a grand scale like youre suggesting. it will demolish entire ecosystems. it will require land use equal to the size of a fairly large US state.
Yeah I only know what I had in 2 Master / Graduate level courses of electricity generation and courses for STEM in particle physics and energy generation for human use.
Therefore I just think that there is a gap between what knowledge authorities imparted me and the body of knowledge you hold. I just think your data is dated.
If you say there are advantages for nuclear - sure. If you say PV+wind+renewable generation isn't able to meet the global demand - this is not true and not a materialistic point anymore. Most points given are not on the current state of discourse (abrasion happens and then you just look at the lifetime electricity production of those cells and divide it by the lifetime cost and you see that they are viable - this was done for all relevant places on Earth and can be read in the linked documents) .
On the same hand just looking at what we could achieve by tapping into fusion and fission, without looking at what newly constructed projects actually deliver and cost, isn't materially either.
PV potential map (everything below 60° is viable for grid parity, most of under 55° is viable commercially), everything in very high generation areas is just awesome.
Wind potential generation is awesome, too. Even onshore. Though there are areas in which the other technologies will benefit. In terms of "the wind doesn't always blow", this is not really a problem if you go to 100m or higher.
If you do look at the maximum distance to be travel to find a potential site for a wind turbine park over the world you will find that this distance is much smaller than the economic grid reach, therefore on most places on earth (and all the places that matter cause many people are there or there is high electricity demand) it is feasible.
cool i know 3 phds that work in a nuclear field to contridict you, neat
Go to them and ask them how much is the total lifetime cost per kwh per electricity source, how much is the estimated potential by the iea for the energy sources and you will be good. Cause what I tell isn't some magic, but easily verifiable if you spend a dozen hours talking to experts, reading the reports or asking your friends about the relevant reviews.
But just for fun and being contrarian: What exactly do you think your friends (who hold the PhD not you) would contradict?
theyll respond that labor costs are lower for nuclear, which is a net good for humanity. also less carbon produced. youre making a capitalist argument.
https://www.iea.org/reports/projected-costs-of-generating-electricity-2020