Imagine a capital juggernaut like Amazon invested in truly renewable energy instead of just trying to be power hungry assholes trying to race Google to the AI market.
The amount of technology that they could create simply from these investments could change the course of our planet. But, no. Line must go up next quarter. Not 2 years from now.
juergen@feddit.org 7 months ago
i disagree. nuclear power is expensive to build (usually exceeding the planned costs), is not resistant to high heat in summer (as shown by french summers), and a proper way of getting rid of nuclear waste is still not developed.
One Big Chart: how does the cost of nuclear power compare to renewables?
theguardian.com/…/nuclear-power-australia-liberal…
CSIRO confirms nuclear fantasy would cost twice as much as renewables …org.au/…/csiro-confirms-nuclear-fantasy-would-co…
Nuclear reactor in France shut down over drought Chooz Nuclear Plant on Belgian border turned off after dry summer evaporates water needed to cool reactors
www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/…/1952943
witx@lemmy.sdf.org 7 months ago
shadowtofu@discuss.tchncs.de 7 months ago
Building nuclear power plants is not a science problem, though, it’s an engineering problem. Just because we can harness energy by breaking up nuclear bonds does not mean that we can do so economically, given the constraints under which we have to operate power plants.
And OP never disputed the science anyways?
aesthelete@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Also like solar wind and water power also function using science? As do coal plants? So like, really WTF are we even talking about with science functioning?
clove@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 months ago
Horrible take.
IamtheMorgz@lemmy.world 7 months ago
They go so far over budget because of lawsuits, usually. Vogtle was announced in like 2011 and didn’t even get to break ground until 2017, then got caught up in even more lawsuits, if I recall correctly. And while conventional nuclear plants will probably always have huge upfront costs that take 30 years to offset, SMRs are darn close to a full reality and those will be a lot cheaper, and will get cheaper over time, like solar panels did.
There’s a plant in Phoenix Arizona that uses city wastewater to cool the reactors, so they can hold up to hot dry climates just fine if designed to do so. (Fun side fact, the plant has to clean the rad waste out of the water before they use it - the rad waste from medical procedures that get into wastewater would be enough to exceed their allowance of acceptable release).
I’ll give you the waste issue, but it’s 100% a matter of politics. You’re going to have to convince a state to take it on and none of them will. But on-site cask storage isn’t the worst option. It’s worked for a long time. There’s also a lot of research going into other stuff we might be able to do with it. (In fact, waste isn’t an issue in France because they already recycle it; the US doesn’t because some of the recycled materials could be used to build bombs).
By footprint (in terms of land and waste) nuclear is the best option still. It’s still the most stable output (save perhaps geothermal, but you can’t do that everywhere) One day we might have batteries good enough to make that less of an issue but right now it’s probably not a good idea to abandon nuclear.
turnip@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
Nobody has ever died from nuclear waste.
Nuclear waste itself is a misnomer, there is no waste it’s just uneconomical to use at a certain point, it still has a ton of energy potential.
tonytins@pawb.social 7 months ago
So? It pays for itself.
Fredthefishlord@lemmy.blahaj.zone 6 months ago
Genuinely, disposing of nuclear waste is not the slightest issue. Just dump it in one spot.