The Nuclear debate

[nut]

Did our media miss the bit about France turning off reactors because of renewables?

Electricity Prices in France Just Turned Negative Because of Renewables

Upside Down Energy Energy prices in France turned negative following a surge in renewable output last week, causing a number of nuclear reactors to shut down in response. As Bloomberg reports, consumption dropped considerably, with blasting sunshine and strong winds causing solar and wind...

au.news.yahoo.com

 

[Upgrayedd]

heard physicist prof rachel webster this morning talking up geothermal energy as a safe energy source. already in use in europe and we have abundant sources of it here. expensive but not in the same stratosphere as nuclear.

Might be more expensive to establish then nuclear to be honest. Amazing for Iceland. Added benefit is that they pump up the natural hot water which is pushed through housing which really is efficient during their 9 month winter and makes energy pretty cheap. Smaller country and geothermal heating really is a double whammy in terms of producing power/almost free heating.

However a lot of investment and basically being a US military base for about 30 years is the way they paid for it

 

[QuietB]

Another SMR has been cancelled, this time by the French. They wanted to get an SMR to produce electricity at $161/mW but couldn't. SMR's remain pixie dust, which the coalition are promoting as their future energy strategy. I don't think we should depend on pixie dust to keep the lights on.

French nuclear giant scraps SMR plans due to soaring costs, will start over

French nuclear giant has scrapped its plans for small modular reactors, and decided to start over after customers raised concerns about costs.

reneweconomy.com.au

The article also talks of some of the issues the French are having with nuclear energy, which proponents here hold up as a poster boy for the benefits of nuclear.

"...because of the costs, it expects to significantly reduce the share of nuclear in its energy mix as it focuses more on large scale solar and offshore wind.

EdF has run into similar problems with its large scale technology. The Flammanville project in France was announced in 2004 with a budget of €3 billion and a deadline of 2012. It is still not in operation and its costs have soared at least four-fold to €13.2 billion.

The Hinkley C project in the UK has been an even bigger disaster. EdF had promised in 2007 that it would be “cooking Christmas turkeys” in England by 2017, at a cost of £9 billion, but is already delayed to 2031 with a spiralling cost of £48 billion when inflation is taken into account, or $A93 billion.

EdF announced another impairment charge of €12.9 billion ($A20.7 billion) from Hinkley earlier this year. It had to be bailed out by the government last year after suffering record losses in 2022 caused by outages at nearly half of its nuclear power plants due to maintenance at its reactors across France."

The coalition nuclear policy is simply nonsense, based on ideology rather than facts. It exposes Australia to huge risks and expense without any chance of reducing our CO2 emissions to meet targets. As poster have said earlier, it only makes sense if you want to keep the coal plants burning as long as possible and maximise the profits.

Note that cold, old Europe had managed 50% renewables for first time in first half of 2024, with Germany at 65%.

EU surpasses 50 pct renewable power share for first time in first half of 2024, Germany at 65 pct

Eurelectric has released figures showing that 50 per cent of public electricity generation in the EU came from renewables for the first time in the first half of 2024.

reneweconomy.com.au

So my simple maths says that $93 Billion in todays money x 7 plants equals;

$651 Billion Dollars

Plus;

• Political costs to make nuclear legal
• Cost of creating a nuclear industry
• Cost of acquiring sites including clean up
• Cost of decommissioning old coal reactors
• Cost of storing waste
• Maintenance
• Yada yada

This is how you double the National Debt with one simple brain fart.

Oh, and I am sure the French cannot wait to build them for us

 

[peetoo]

Dick smiths on board the nuclear train.

He says he made poor personal investment choices with solar battery and EV, but his opinion is better than both the CSIRO and AEMO apparently.
‘Had to replace my home battery costing $40k’ you were robbed man.

https://www.skynews.com.au/opinion/chris-kenny/very-frustrating-dick-smith-calls-out-labors-environmental-damage-with-wind-farms/video/75e8b842f11118b722572fb2f8959b58

 

[Seeds]

Dick smiths on board the nuclear train.

He says he made poor personal investment choices with solar battery and EV, but his opinion is better than both the CSIRO and AEMO apparently.
‘Had to replace my home battery costing $40k’ you were robbed man.

https://www.skynews.com.au/opinion/chris-kenny/very-frustrating-dick-smith-calls-out-labors-environmental-damage-with-wind-farms/video/75e8b842f11118b722572fb2f8959b58

Dick smith is basically MAGA now. A massive right wing misinformation peddler.

 

[Seeds]

When it comes to power, solar could leave nuclear and everything else in the shade — here's why

Energy experts — and even Greenpeace — underestimated solar power's rapid global growth. Now many believe solar is set to become the world's biggest power source within the next decade. But it is falling prices — rather than environmental benefits — that might be driving that change.

www.abc.net.au

Like the quote at the end. To bet against solar is to to bet against capitalism.

Solar is not winning cos of a green agenda. Its winning cos its already the cheapest and getting even cheaper.

Virtually free power will happen in our lifetimes if governments dont get in the way of the economic renewable freight train (cough DUTTON YOU EFFING MORON).

 

[nut]

Like the quote at the end. To bet against solar is to to bet against capitalism.

Yep… and to bet against capitalism Dutton had to use a communist policy.

 

[nut]

Dick smiths on board the nuclear train.

He says he made poor personal investment choices with solar battery and EV, but his opinion is better than both the CSIRO and AEMO apparently.
‘Had to replace my home battery costing $40k’ you were robbed man.

https://www.skynews.com.au/opinion/chris-kenny/very-frustrating-dick-smith-calls-out-labors-environmental-damage-with-wind-farms/video/75e8b842f11118b722572fb2f8959b58

All the CSIRO figures for wind and solar includes storage.

 

[Northalives]

When it comes to power, solar could leave nuclear and everything else in the shade — here's why

Energy experts — and even Greenpeace — underestimated solar power's rapid global growth. Now many believe solar is set to become the world's biggest power source within the next decade. But it is falling prices — rather than environmental benefits — that might be driving that change.

www.abc.net.au

Like the quote at the end. To bet against solar is to to bet against capitalism.

Solar is not winning cos of a green agenda. Its winning cos its already the cheapest and getting even cheaper.

Virtually free power will happen in our lifetimes if governments dont get in the way of the economic renewable freight train (cough DUTTON YOU EFFING MORON).

and that's the capitalist world we live in. Use the bloody thing to get the right outcomes for us and the planet.

I roll about laughing about the Murdoch gutter press and Dutton telling us that the UK Labour Party is embracing nuclear and therefore, so should the ALP here. Nuclear has been in the system in the UK since the mid 1940's. Britain is a piddly little island in the North Sea where the sun hardly ever shines and they don't have any of the limitless, cheap, safe renewable resources Australia.

To even contemplate incredibly dangerous nuclear in Australia is idiotic and if that doesn't convince people, then surely the prohibitive cost should.

 

[Northalives]

Yep… and to bet against capitalism Dutton had to use a communist policy.

Yeah, that's hilarious hey? Just like his "break up Woolies and Coles" proposal.

 

[Northalives]

The push for nuclear always struck me as being ideological. The announcement has come from the people who always low key denied climate change, but apparently it’s the only way to reduce carbon emissions. It’s like they’ve accepted the reality but just want the way forward on their terms. A bit on the nose, imo.

and it's the far right ideologues that are accusing those who rightly oppose nuclear as being ideologues.

That's always been one of the tactics of those who conspire to to do all manner of things, that is, when someone, some group, get close to the truth or have found the truth, the conspirators accuse them of being the conspirators.

We see it with climate change morons like Bolt who reckon it's all a left wing conspiracy. The anti-vax, "Freedom" ******s who reckon that Covid was not real but a conspiracy by "big-pharma" to sell drugs and that the UN and the WHO are all hellbent on imposing a "world government".

 

[Northalives]

The choice to go completely off grid is now very easy and cost affective.
With electric cars becoming a mobile energy storage system that can bring power “home” via vehicle to home technology.
The real danger to our national grid is millions disconnecting from it.
This situation is called a death spiral, where less and less people are left to pay for the rising cost of power, which forces more people off the grid … causing power to go up and up and up.

House batteries are now very affordable and the payback is around 6-7 years depending situation. As battery technology continues to improve and prices continue to fall, Nuclear will be the biggest economic and strategic failure in the Nations history.

Dutton's ploy with Nuclear is all about spooking investors out of investing in renewables in the hope that energy prices go up. He then can say, "look, renewables are very expensive and it's all the Governments fault".

 

[Northalives]

But if the state owns the plants then the only private sector people that make money from this is the construction sector isnt it? I.e Labors corrupt friends. Hard to see dutton wanting to pay up money to the construction sector.

The libs are begrudgingly making this state owned because its such a bad idea that no one else will build it but the state. Its an economic disaster. But they cant change their minds now.

The libs can not be elected at the next election. This is insane. We can not go nuclear for so many reasons.

If nuclear reactors ever become a reality, then the great capitalist tradition of nationalising the debt and privatising the profits will, sure as night follows day, be implemented.

 

[Seeds]

If nuclear reactors ever become a reality, then the great capitalist tradition of nationalising the debt and privatising the profits will, sure as night follows day, be implemented.

They have already stated the nuclear plants will be government owned so the profits will be the states. This is cos the private sector refuses to invest in them.

 

[QuietB]

Dick smiths on board the nuclear train.

He says he made poor personal investment choices with solar battery and EV, but his opinion is better than both the CSIRO and AEMO apparently.
‘Had to replace my home battery costing $40k’ you were robbed man.

https://www.skynews.com.au/opinion/chris-kenny/very-frustrating-dick-smith-calls-out-labors-environmental-damage-with-wind-farms/video/75e8b842f11118b722572fb2f8959b58

I assume he is bored with Dick Smith Vegemite then - branching out

 

[peetoo]

I assume he is bored with Dick Smith Vegemite then - branching out

And disk smith ‘capitalist economic growth is unsustainable’

 

[Kram]

Dick 'hey look at me' Smith.