Comment on Australian governments subsidising fossil fuel use by more than $30,000 a minute, analysis finds

• shads@lemy.lol ⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  You keep asserting that, could you provide some sources for that assertion. Everything I am reading says that you need to commit to a major nuclear program and get everything right to approach the cost of renewables. Adding to this the advances are coming thick and fast, across the range of renewables and storage technologies, more efficiencys and cost savings. The only viable way I have heard of to improve the cost efficiencies of Nuclear is to extend the operational life span of the plants, and those efficiencies will only be realised once the extension is made to the service life of the plant (plus let’s be honest the private owners of the plants by that stage will just soak that up as extra profit).

  So if we are going to build out these phenomenally expensive projects we are going to need a fair assurance that the funders and then the operators are going to see a return on investment. If renewables keep being cheaper to deploy, if recycling becomes more efficient, if battery storage prices fall. All of this hurts the viability of Nuclear, and will certainly impact the public will to keep throwing vast amounts of money at infrastructure. The other countries who are building out nuclear capacity on accelerated time frames and lower costs, how many of them are operating within a regulatory framework that corresponds with Australia’s? How many of them are adding additional capacity to existing Nuclear, rather than starting from scratch? How many of them are not budgeting for lifecycle and just assuming they will find the money to decomission when they have to, instead of building that cost in during the operational life of the plants?

  How do you plan on convincing people like my father-in-law who hasn’t drawn from the grid in more than a year to be cool that his powerbill will be going up for a service he only keeps connected to sell his excess power? That’s where the regressive authoritarian bit came from, you are going to have to shutdown kw scale solar as it will be too much of a danger to the under construction nuclear industry.

  You seem really bent out of shape with the whole renewable thing, no technology is entirely benign to the environment, but if we keep on advancing the tech here we are going to continue to see positive change. Plus it seems so much more feasible to recycle a dead solar panel or battery vs the shielding of a reactor.

  I want nuclear to be part of an energy mix, but it’s going to be a huge commitment to build out, there will be delays, there will be cost overruns and there will be graft and corruption. You know how Australians are, it will be an excuse to keep propping up coal and gas, and when the first plant doesn’t deliver on the economies and timeframes of, let’s say the eight plant, there will be some shithead who will stoke up a bunch of populist dogwhistles around how Canberra is wasting tax payer money on a white elephant project.

  Imagine the nuclear advocates throwing that much money, time and effort behind nuclear only to see it stall out for another quarter century because the momentum faltered.

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