Wind, solar, nuclear etc seem to be the way forward.
If you have wind and solar and gas for backup until we get storage sorted what role is there for nuclear ?
Conversely how can you use nuclear on the grid if you don't have gas ? And where does the money to replace gas come from if the money is being shovelled into a pit ?
Nuclear has missed the boat. It's a day late and a dollar short. Except it's going to be 10-15 years late and $10bn short from the original construction budget.
Nonsense when you look at the fuel mix in Germany compared to a nuclear grid like France on a year to year basis
France is phasing out a third of it's nuclear power. Going from 75% to 50%. EDF would be the poster for inefficient nuclear construction, except that other companies are worse. EDF haven't gone bankrupt yet, haven't had a huge fake parts scandal, haven't had their CEO fined trillions, haven't had major preventable meltdowns. Like the Tory leadership contest the bar is very low in the nuclear construction industry, offhand I can't remember EDF abandoning multiple construction sites, unlike others.
26 out of 56 of of France's Nukes were offline at one point during winter, and a similar % in the UK if you take into account earlier than expected retirements. They also have lots of hydro. And the UK is a captive market that imports an Ireland's worth of power from them.
Cheap, good, fast ? Pick 2. Except for nuclear where it doesn't matter which you pick because you won't get any.
Citation needed.
Oh, look, a padded German solar bra, and just as fake nonsense about 'storage'.
The Germans know a fake tit when they see one and are restarting their coal fired power plants because they need the real thing. Was all that excess solar actually used, or was it wasted as so much peak solar in California is?
'Storage' is greenwashing hopium. Current world production capacity of electrolysers to make hydrogen with, is 1GW a year.
""Because electrolysers is currently what the world is stumbling over, grand pronouncements and no action, [it] sounds a lot like greenwashing" Mr Forrest said."
And as for nuclear needing 'backup', that's typically dishonest of you when you are championing renewables, given the availabilty factor for Korean made nuclear is somewhere around 95%.
Let's build lots more wind turbines in Ireland, because nuclear needs backup 5% of the time - bulldust!
You really picked a great day to BS about nuclear needing backup.
"And as for nuclear needing 'backup', that's typically dishonest of you when you are championing renewables, given the availabilty factor for Korean made nuclear is somewhere around 95%."
How does even a 95% capacity factor imply that you don't need backup? What happens during the 5% downtime? 18 days of load shedding/blackouts per year? Of course it needs back-up - like every other type of generation with a less than 100% availability - which is all of them.
To brand another poster dishonest for stating this simple and obvious fact is weird.
Oddly enough the UK got 5GW from nuclear and 8.2GW from solar yesterday. Odd because the difference is a 3.2GW nuclear power station that was supposed to be up and running back in 2016. Doubling the UK's solar could be done sooner and cheaper than finishing Hinkley-C.
Hinkley-B reactor 2 is currently Moved to defueling phase. Will not return to power generation. There's a good chance that Hinkley-C won't even replace all the reactors that shut down before it is fully operational.
In Germany yesterday nuclear dropped from 4GW to 3.2GW during day light hours and back up to 4GW afterwards. Either solar is displacing nuclear or nuclear is just that unreliable ?
Dropping 800MW off our grid would be a major problem.
It seems nuclear can be impacted by the changing climate. Some EDF plants in France are cutting production due to the current heatwave, even with special circumstance derogation of some of the regulations. Not for the first time. And if these events are to get more common, as they say, perhaps nuclear isn't as stable as claimed into the future either.
Heatwaves prove particularly difficult for nuke plants due to the reduced availability of water
Nuclear plants are also susceptible to climate change and cooling water issues caused by floods, icing up, and bans on dumping more heat into rivers or lakes.
Heatwaves also mean more jellyfish. They have taken plants offline from California and Florida , Japan and Israel, to South Korea. Repeatedly. Shouldn't be happening as it's widespread and being going on for decades.
Since you CBA providing the fuel mix here it is : https://www.rte-france.com/en/eco2mix/power-generation-energy-source
Today French nuclear was outputting a relatively steady 24GW which was only 50% of demand, during peak hours, in summer. France has a LOT of electric heating in winter which acts as a de-facto subsidy for nuclear.
Hydro peaked at 10GW
Solar got near 10GW
Imports also hit 10GW at the bottom in gray ( in summer when they should be exporting nuclear ?? )
Only 5GW of gas was needed thanks to the above.
Like the UK example earlier solar covered the peaking during the day.
Other views of the same data.
https://www.gridwatch.templar.co.uk/france/ note scales are different , has CSV if you want raw data.
Seriously 40% is an ok-ish figure for a Scottish wind farm in a good location.
Same for all conventional plant - including all the ones needed for wind/solar back up. The likes of the Texas and Spanish grid wind/solar elements didn't perform much at all during the severe winter of 2020
France isn't the grid rushing to re open coal plants or most exposed to Russian gas and Macron has recently announced plans to further expand the role of Nuclear in decarbonisation there and beyond. You windy pals in Germany certainly don't inspire confidence in that regard.
It is pretty nuts to claim that nuclear will be made redundant by storage tech that doesn't exist yet. Look, I can promise you, nuclear is often beset by construction delays, but we haven't a hope in hell in meeting our decarbonisation targets. Ireland is only at about 15% renewable in terms of total power. Despite Ireland being one of the best countries in the world for wind power. God help the likes of Spain, Poland or Germany who have less potential. I dont know if it is economical to build nuclear here but Ireland should be rabbiedly pronuclear power, at least in on paper and it should be decriminalised, if nothing else but to promote nuclear overseas and encourage investment.
Thing is nuclear is a terrible investment, from an investment perspective. Its LCOE is terrible compared to other sources and requires insane levels of funding up front with decades required for payback.
Other sources begin to payback a lot faster and at faster rates.
I thought Ireland was at 15% for renewables as part of overall energy consumption in 2020.
But 39% of electricity was generated from renewables?
https://www.seai.ie/news-and-media/energy-in-ireland-2021/
We don't have the expertise or economies of scale that the UK has. The UK has been doing nuclear power since the 1950's. They need plutonium for nuclear weapons. They have a much higher population density so less wind or solar per capita. They would be a repeat customer as they'd order more stations than we would.
They decided to roll out multiple nuclear power plants in 2011. The first (and only) power plant will be fully operational by 2027? and the price is extortionate and still increasing.
So if you want nuclear you have to state clearly what will power the grid while waiting for nuclear, and it must meet 2030 targets. You'll then need to explain why expensive nuclear is needed if there is already a paid for alternative in place.
The storage tech exists and has existed for donkeys years. Many EU countries store about 30% of their annual natural gas usage. The UK closed down it's Rough facility, that would have stored our annual demand. In north east England the existing flows of hydrogen would be enough to power our grid. 1GW per annum hydrolyser factories cost in the order of a monthly Hinkley-C cost increase*. You can get hydrogen turbines but they aren't as big as the existing power turbines which Siemens and GE will have modify for hydrogen use by 2030, they can already run on high % of hydrogen so can phase in.
*what are the economics of stopping Hinkley-C and going for hydrogen instead ? Don't even need to store the stuff as the gas network could easily accommodate enough hydrogen to offset enough natural gas to produce 3.2GW of electricity.
The French government has offered almost €10bn to fully take over EDF, it was reported on Tuesday, offering minority shareholders a 53% premium to the 5 July closing price. The state already owns 84% of the company
Nuclear isn't commercial, it's done by large nation states with deep pockets.
Not one wind or solar farm has been built here without inflated price supports via RESS - these parasites have their hands deep in all of our pockets for years with no end in sight
French Nuclear will be keeping the lights on here much of the time when that interconnector to France gets built
The solution to that is to regulate energy prices properly - not plan to build nuclear reactors that will dig deeper into our pockets before the ever (if ever) get built.
It has taken 50 years to get close to start building an underground railway for Dublin, and just as long to get close to connecting our largest airport to the city centre with a rail service. And we still have the main media dissing it.
How long before we get the law changed to allow us to even plan for nuclear energy? Which political party will campaign for it? Which local area will actively campaign to become the development site for this putative nuclear industry?
Can't export unless you have a surplus.
Nuclear in France is being propped up by gas, hydro and solar. They were importing 10GW from the neighbours. That's two Ireland's worth.
I can see us exporting wind over the interconnector. And solar during summer evenings if we install enough of the stuff.
The government has given the go-ahead for the new Sizewell C nuclear power plant on the Suffolk coast.
The project, mainly funded by the French energy company EDF, is expected to cost in the region of £20bn. ... Negotiations with the government on raising funds for the project are continuing and a decision on the finances is expected in 2023 (note : it took SIX years to negotiate the price last time)
£20Bn is the price of the printer. It tells you nothing about how much the ink costs 106.12£/MWh
Or the hire purchase interest rate which mounts up over the years.
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/statistics/yield-curves - this is the rate the UK government pays for loans compare it to the interest rate that will be asked for nuclear
Nothing like the scale the German Grid is fossily propped up with - in any case the current French government will be further expanding nuclear to fill in any perceived short falls
Yes those two figures are is correct.
We can and we should do a lot more to promote nuclear, even if we don't choose it ourselves. It has by far the least impact of any energy source and those can must built it, whether that is the moral leaders like Finland, Poland, UAE and France or anyone else etc.
2 words, nuclear waste
Low impact it ain't yet the cost and complexity and dangers of dealing with are routinely ignored by many supporters.
The cost, complexity and danger of dealing with nuclear waste is higher cause they don't just pump it into the air like most other energy sources.
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