Nuclear - future for Ireland?

Is that a serious question? would a turkey vote for Christmas?

That may seem very little over a year in that it is an average of just over 30 minutes a day, but when gas under the marginal pricing policy sets the price for all sources in the generation mix, for a day that 30 minutes can double the price or even more

On current approach we will never reach net zero

There literally gas power plants being planned and built all around the country today specifically because wind and solar makes us reliant on gas as backup for their unreliability

Germany spent over a trillion on the approach we taken over last two decades (prematurely shutting down their nuclear plants too!) with their Energiewende and what do they have to show for it? Second most expensive right behind us in Ireland and one of the most polluting while being fully dependent on France to maintain their grid

How close would renewables get us to Net Zero by 2050 and how would they achieve that and at what cost, or are you just blowing hot air ?

There used to be those who said we would never have gay marriage or abortion on this island

I suspect ever increasing prices ontop of what is already most expensive electricity in Europe coupled with billions in taxes leaving the country on “carbon fines” and more Eiffel Tower sized turbines on coasts and fields converted to industrial estates would focus minds

The reason we run peaker gas plants is because wind and solar are unreliable and when they drop off rapid response peaker plants are needed to prevent collapse, and the cost of doing so have little to nothing to do with the volume of gas they use.

If you run peaker plants to prevent that happening for 30 minutes the daily price due to the marginal pricing policy will more or less double. For 1 hour X3 and for 2 hours X6.

When wind and solar are doing little or nothing adding more of them will not increase the percentage any additional turbine or solar panel is supplying to the grid.

we ran peakers long before wind and solar came along. ….

We did, but you do not appear to understand the difference in how the price of electricity was calculated then and now.

Prior to wind, solar and the marginal pricing policy the price was determined by the average price of all the components in the generation mix. Now it is determined by the most expensive component in the mix.

The hike in price due to peaker plants I gave you was based on €2,000. Peaker plant operators can charge up to double that, so for 2 hours it would increase the price by X12.

Finland has had nuclear for the last 49 years

and you are only telling half a story. They added significant amount of wind and some solar in 2013.

Also you didn’t mention the nuclear plant was delayed over a decade…

Finland cancelled a SMR in. 2022 as it wasn’t feasible

it’s price of €11bn is because it was the red reactor built on an existing site.
wind and Hydro are giving credit for lower prices including negative pricing

Also the plant size itself reduced costs. But our network couldn’t handle that much and would need investments.

Any comment on tyenlnany going offline in November 23? We’d need to build a second Poland if that’s size to provide redundancy

I haven’t seen you data anything I’ve looked at attributes nicely , hydro , wind and solar as all contributing factors.

People can build nuclear. But when using counties with a nuclear program that goes back to the 60s is very misleading and can’t be used to give an example of pricing

Moneypoint is about 900 MW , we have 400kV lines. Nowhere else in the grid can transmit that. Why you are talking about distribution, it’s the transmission network that will need upgrading.

The distribution network needs to be upgraded regardless. Poles are rotting. Woodpeckers are running amok. Winter storms are getting worse.

The question is why we are indulging these Turkeys at the expense of domestic energy consumers, rural communties etc.??

Why would the grid fry ? An electron is an electron. Regardless of how it’s converted

what would cause it to fry is injecting 1.6GW at a single point and trying to force that through the grid. .

I’ve no issue with nuclear other than the time it would take to plan and commission a plant and the costs it would be

you seem to be of tha illusion that we could do it tomorrow and a very unrealistic cost.

Best of luck attempting to change that.

Try it and you will not be long being put in your place by these renewable companies the same as the U.K., Denmark and Germany were. All three countries tried and came crawling back giving them the terms and conditions they wanted.

All thanks to the power the E.U. handed them with the legislation on energy liberalisation which has allowed them to become the monopoly. As well as the E.U. sword of Damocles on emissions targets with fines for non compliance that they are hanging over the heads of any government that will not give them the terms they want.

we spent 30 years building 9GW of wind and solar and still can’t generate 6GW using them especially during winter peak

Yet ended up with dirty and Europes most expensive electricity