Nuclear always comes up when discussing the energy transition but renewables seem to be a much more popular consideration. Can nuclear energy help us towards a greener future or is it a long dead dream?
Nuclear always comes up when discussing the energy transition but renewables seem to be a much more popular consideration. Can nuclear energy help us towards a greener future or is it a long dead dream?
Nuclear is a heated topic and thought of informing myself more about it in order to have an opinion. I’m still in this process and the more I learn, the more I tend to see it as the wrong path.
Briefly the main issues of nuclear I can think of right now, are (btw most are mentioned in other comments): too expensive & too time consuming to build and to decommission old ones, their lifespam, as well as the waste problem. I didn’t mention the danger of an accident because I believe there is a lot of misinformation about it. For example here is a post I made about Thyroid cancer and Fukushima in the Medicine community that I believe highlights some relevant issues. For Fukushima specifically I could suggest also this video for details on what happened and this recent paper titled Fukushima Contaminated Water Risk Factor: Global Implications.
A few article links:
The shared history of oil and nuclear energy - The Maastricht University History Department Blog
NuScale ends Utah project, in blow to US nuclear power ambitions - Reuters
EU Scientists and Politicians Clash Over Gas and Nuclear as ‘Sustainable’ Investments - desmog
A Closer Look at Two Operational Small Modular Reactor Designs
For videos, I could suggest:
This video from Real Engineering talks about Why Germany Hates Nuclear Power and also talks about France.
This free video course is quite understandable for people that do not have a science background, at least as far as I have gone through it.: Nuclear Energy: Science, Systems and Society - MIT
This is a great response. Nuclear plants are expensive to build, and the waste is difficult to deal with.
What it doesn’t touch on is the functional aspect - the advantage (and disadvantage) of nuclear power is that it provides a very steady “base load” power supply, something renewables struggle with.
Regions with good access to natural solar and wind resources throughout the year, as well as those fortunate enough to have geothermal or hydro power (which has its own environmental drawbacks) can provide stable sustainable power supplies with minimal storage, but when the goal is zero emissions, getting that last 10-20% reduction at scale in many locations is incredibly difficult.
Having a power supply that’s always providing a steady stream of power, even when the Sun and wind are down, can dramatically reduce the amount of storage you need. For places where it’s appropriate, nuclear can help fill this void, but only after getting like 90% of the way to the finish line with renewables.
You are correct. I only talked about nuclear, I didn’t do a comparison.
About the base load for starters I could suggest the following article:
That’s not a bad article, but it’s largely focused on debunking claims about renewables on today’s grid (e.g., the false claims that they have somehow been responsible for blackouts in CA and TX).
I generally agree with the articles points, but what I’m talking about is a future grid with 90%+ renewable generation and limited geothermal/hydro resources.
It’s purely a hypothetical at the moment because no one has come close and technology could advance quite a bit before the grid even reaches those limits.
That said, based on today’s technology, under the right circumstances, nuclear can provide a cost effective means of closing the final gap in reaching zero-carbon electricity, but only AFTER we do the bulk of the work solving the other 90% of the problem which is installing more renewables and storage.