German poll: Majority for return to nuclear energy
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Well its going to get more expensive relative as well as oil prices fall globally due to recession. But then we will hit another energy shortage and it will become cheaper, which is why France started building nuclear in the 1970s to begin with.
How exactly does nuclear decouple you from global dependencies if there are less than 20 countries with more than 100k tonnes of uranium reserves, with only one of them being in the EU?
it will become cheaper
Lol, sure. Says who?
France started building nuclear in the 1970s to begin with
Good example... The country that has to heavily subsidise power so people can still afford it.
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yes even coal is "cheaper" than nuclear once you disregard polution
once you disregard polution
Including radioactive waste, which coal produces significantly more of than fission power.
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As far as I know (I'm not an expert), negative void coefficient only affects the fission reaction, i.e. the controlled splitting of uranium atoms. The uranium atoms split into smaller unstable atoms, which decays over time causing heat. If the decay heat isn't removed, the core will melt.
Pebble Bed Reactors seem to be generation IV reactors, and I don't think there are any generation IV reactors in commercial use as of today. Again, my knowledge is limited, but I believe most reactors in commercial use are some kind of water cooled, water moderated reactors. For example, European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) is one of the latest designs commissioned in commercial use, and that design includes 4 emergency coolant systems.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTR-PM
China has the pbr in production as modular reactors.
When the reactor temperature rises, the atoms in the fuel move rapidly, causing Doppler broadening. The fuel then experiences a wider range of neutron speeds. Uranium-238, which forms the bulk of the uranium, is much more likely to absorb fast or epithermal neutrons at higher temperatures. This reduces the number of neutrons available to cause fission, and reduces power. Doppler broadening therefore creates a negative feedback: as fuel temperature increases, reactor power decreases. All reactors have reactivity feedback mechanisms. The pebble-bed reactor is designed so that this effect is relatively strong, inherent to the design, and does not depend on moving parts. This negative feedback creates passive control of the reaction process.
Thus PBRs passively reduce to a safe power-level in an accident scenario. This is the design's main passive safety feature
The west is irrationally afraid, but China understands nuclear is inherently safer than fossil fuels after having lost thousands to pollution.
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And the funny thing is that coal power plants are actually more radioactive to the environment than nuclear power. Sure, accidents like Chernobyl and Fukushima change the statistics by quite a lot, but for the absolute majority of nuclear plants they are way less radioactive to the environment than any given coal plant around.
Also there's not that many severe nuclear disasters in the history. Coal and other organic fuel plants cause far more casualties globally than nuclear ever did. But maybe it's easier to accept slow death of a lot of people due to cancer and whatever caused by organic fuel power plant emissions than single large spike when nuclear power (very, very rarely) goes wrong.
Well, if that's so rare and can essentially be ignored, I'm sure you'll easily find insurance for nuclear plants that will cover the cost of a potential disaster. I mean, after all, it evens out over all the nuke plants, right? The market handles it, right?
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https://www.weforum.org/stories/2024/10/planetary-boundaries-breached-nature-climate-stories/
We can't emit more carbon. Like really, we cannot. We have to sequester it. Gas plants still emit CO2. Nuclear is fine and works well, and doesn't emit CO2.
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Cost. You do not need much storage for a 95% renewable grid. For the last 5% nuclear baseload is still way too expensive.
I suspect that we will utilize a gas peaker plants for the last 5% for a long time; i couldn't think of a much better option.
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FFS, people are stupid.
There was a huge hysteria about nuclear when Fukushima happened. A clear majority was for immediate action. Merkel's coalition government would have ended if she hadn't done a 180 on nuclear and decided to shut down nuclear as soon as possible, which was 2023. I was against shutting it down back then but I thought you can't go against the whole population, so I get why they did it. People didn't change their mind until 2022. Nobody talked about reversing that decision in all these years when there was actually time to reverse the decision.
Now, that the last reactor is shut down, the same people that were up in arms in 2011 are now up in arms that we don't have nuclear. Building new plants will cost billions and take decades and nuclear doesn't work well with renewables because of its inflexibility. It makes no sense at all. It was a long-term decision we can't just back away from. What's done is done.
in retrospect, i understand France's long-held stance around 2000 that it wants to rely mostly on nuclear. it wasn't clear, back then, how long fossil fuels would be available (it was predicted they would last another 40 years) so they thought "oh well, uranium will be available for a longer time. renewable energy wasn't an (economic) possibility at that time. now that we have cheap solar energy, i suspect the last nuclear power plant worldwide will be shut down sometime around 2040.
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It's not an either-or.
We need as many sources of energy as possible to increase the available supply and reduce the cost.
usually i would agree to the "increase supply to lower the cost" story, but in the case of energy it's a bit different, because the Energy market uses the merit order principle, which means that whenever the nuclear reactors run, electricity is just as expensive as if nuclear reactors were the only source of electricity, and if they don't run, only then prices drop.
so, you're only getting cheaper prices by not needing nuclear energy. but, for nuclear plants, building them is a huge part of the cost, and they're typically heavily subsidized by taxes, which means an (unnecessary if not used) burden on the taxpayers.
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Because it makes zero sense.
Translation: They can't make an egregious amount of profit off of everyone else's hard work.
The problem is that it's not as profitable as renewables. If you push this, it will be at the cost of those.
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No. Take a good look at France and their nuclear strategy. Both maintaining old reactors and building new ones is extremely costly. Building times are to be measured in decades. Nuclear power is not economically viable nor is it a solution to the climate catastrophe.
Returning to nuclear power in Germany is nothing but a pointless waste of tax money.
Building times are to be measured in decades.
Should probably have invested more into developing their knowledge and experience then. Just have a look at China.
Littering vast spaces of land for wind and sun power generation is hardly a better long term solution.
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Arguably that makes nuclear plants safer, because attacking nations won't want to bomb them and risk escalating to a nuclear war. They have no problem bombing power stations and oil refineries, though.
that's a very whacky argument though
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How are you so uneducated?
With minimal storage, gas peaker plants that only run like a day per year and a grid spanning several countries it is a breeze to have wind and solar only. Probably not even all of the above are needed.
Thankfully planning and maintaining the electricity network isn't done by people commenting on Lemmy. (btw i agree with you)
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There's no good reason to be against nuclear power. It's green, it's safe, it's incredibly efficient, the fuel is virtually infinite, and the waste can be processed in a million different ways to make it not dangerous.
Well yes there is a very good argument against nuclear and that is that it replaces solar energy.
solar energy might have been expensive in the past but now it's the cheapest form of energy in history. we needed an absence of nuclear in the past to have a motivation to develop green, safe, efficient energy. and solar is the best way to do that.
i also ask you to consider the future. solar energy gets cheaper the more is deployed of it, so it will get even cheaper in the future. we have seen enormous price drops for transistors (computers) in the past, and solar panels are semiconductors, just like transistors are semiconductors. who says that we wouldn't also see similar price drops for solar energy in the future? maybe solar panels will be cheap as paper in the future.
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Building times are to be measured in decades.
Should probably have invested more into developing their knowledge and experience then. Just have a look at China.
Littering vast spaces of land for wind and sun power generation is hardly a better long term solution.
Unlike china, Germany has a lot of environmental and safety standards it has to meet before it can operate any large plant, and it cannot just give the contract to the lowest bidder who mixes rubbish and toxic waste into the cement als filler material...
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Summary
A new Innofact poll shows 55% of Germans support returning to nuclear power, a divisive issue influencing coalition talks between the CDU/CSU and SPD.
While 36% oppose the shift, support is strongest among men and in southern and eastern Germany.
About 22% favor restarting recently closed reactors; 32% support building new ones.
Despite nuclear support, 57% still back investment in renewables. The CDU/CSU is exploring feasibility, but the SPD and Greens remain firmly against reversing the nuclear phase-out, citing stability and past policy shifts.
Killing nuclear energy in Germany was the greatest success of FSB up to the point of planting an asset right in the middle of the Oval Office.
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As you can see in Ukraine, there is still absolutely potential for non nuclear weapon based war in Europe.
Except Germany is in a formal treaty with France and the UK who both have nuclear weapons
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No. Take a good look at France and their nuclear strategy. Both maintaining old reactors and building new ones is extremely costly. Building times are to be measured in decades. Nuclear power is not economically viable nor is it a solution to the climate catastrophe.
Returning to nuclear power in Germany is nothing but a pointless waste of tax money.
One way or another you need grid-scale turbines to maintain grid frequency. Solar power can't set frequency and wind power is too variable, so power grids use some sort of turbine to do it.
Nuclear reactors are also necessary to generate things like medical isotopes and tritium for industrial processes, and fusion research. Someone, somewhere on Earth needs to keep their fission reactors going.
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No. Take a good look at France and their nuclear strategy. Both maintaining old reactors and building new ones is extremely costly. Building times are to be measured in decades. Nuclear power is not economically viable nor is it a solution to the climate catastrophe.
Returning to nuclear power in Germany is nothing but a pointless waste of tax money.
Keep looking at things from a money perspective and the solution become obvious : kill everyone and be done with it.
Today, nuclear energy is a reasonably safe, efficient source of energy. Is it the energy of the future ? Probably not. But is it an efficient option for smoothing the grid while planting renewable all around it? It's definitely better than the other alternatives. Does it cost money to develop? Sure. Everything costs money. But there are benefits that won't show up in an accounting book that can't be brushed aside.
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in retrospect, i understand France's long-held stance around 2000 that it wants to rely mostly on nuclear. it wasn't clear, back then, how long fossil fuels would be available (it was predicted they would last another 40 years) so they thought "oh well, uranium will be available for a longer time. renewable energy wasn't an (economic) possibility at that time. now that we have cheap solar energy, i suspect the last nuclear power plant worldwide will be shut down sometime around 2040.
2040 huh?
My prediction is a record number of new plants going online in 2040.
Especially as there are literal factories being built to specifically crank out Small Modular Reactors.
We're looking at a future where every small town can have their own reactor, providing enough power for that town but not large enough to ever melt down.
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2040 huh?
My prediction is a record number of new plants going online in 2040.
Especially as there are literal factories being built to specifically crank out Small Modular Reactors.
We're looking at a future where every small town can have their own reactor, providing enough power for that town but not large enough to ever melt down.
i suppose you're also thinking that's because we need steady output?
which is a fallacy; we had constant generation in the past so consumption adapted and became constant; consumption would not naturally be constant, it would be higher in the daytime.
