Comment on US slows plans to retire coal plants because of AI power usage
d4f0@lemmy.world 3 months agoNew nuclear plants can be regulated without problems. Old nuclear plants weren’t designated that way, although they can be improved to be able to do it, but this isn’t usually done as old plants will most likely be shutdown in the short term and investors don’t want to spend any money in them.
poVoq@slrpnk.net 3 months ago
No, hypothetical new modular plants might be better at regulation, but the recently build and still under construction ones are not.
d4f0@lemmy.world 3 months ago
No, already existing nuclear plants can regulate, as it’s needed for places with lots of nuclear power like France.
powermag.com/flexible-operation-of-nuclear-power-…
poVoq@slrpnk.net 3 months ago
As the article you linked also states, this feature is largely theoretical and for operational and economic reasons utility companies do not use it unless forced to. In France specifically, the high percentage of nuclear power makes it look like you can regulate it quite well, but that is an artifact of looking at total numbers that does not transfer to other grid situations where nuclear is only a small percentage of the overall production capacity. Generally speaking, nuclear and renewables are a bad match, and if you have to chose between them, renewables clearly win on both economics and scalability.
d4f0@lemmy.world 3 months ago
Sure, highly theorical:
Of course they don’t use it unless force to, as the article states it’s cheaper to ramp down fossil fuels than nuclear. And this its a benefit, not a problem. But its also cheaper to ramp down nuclear than renewables, and this is also a benefit.
Nuclear andrenewablees are a better match than fossil and renewables, and right now we are doing fossil and renewables. We’ve been decades pussing for no nuclear in the hopes of getting only renewables and we’ve gotten fossil and renewables.