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Comment by pdonis | Hacker News Reader

> The simple answer is end fossil fuels. How do we do that?

Build nuclear power plants.

All the other things are fine, but if you really want to end fossil fuels, you need a non-fossil-fuel source of reliable base load power. Nuclear is the only one we have. Other sources are fine, but they can't produce reliable base load power.

And, btw, I think we should end fossil fuels even if it turns out not to make much of a difference to climate change (which might well be the case since all of the models that have a high sensitivity to CO2 built in have been over-predicting warming for several decades now).

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>Build nuclear power plants.

And to all the people who say "they take too long there isn't enough time": the best time to start nuclear power plant construction was 10 years ago, the second best time is now.

Except by the time the plant is done being built (10 years late and 10x over budget) renewables will have surpassed it in terms of cost for deployed GW, and grid-scale and consumer batteries will be at the point where we can store and demand shift enough power to use all the renewables we can bring online.

Renewables has already surpassed nuclear in the US. I think the new reality is the best time to build a nuke plant is never.

> renewables will have surpassed it in terms of cost

Are you thinking in terms of dollars or including the price of future use/materials? In other words, can’t a nuclear plant effectively be swapped in for a (e.g.) coal-fired generator and Just Work, versus all the materials (grid-scale collectors, batteries, etc), which is just the next generation of junk in a treadmill that’s still a carbon problem?

I ask because I don’t know.

Look at the other article on the front page about air pollution. We’ve actually made tremendous progress reducing sulfur dioxide emissions from coal in the last decade. To damages from air quality problems in the US are down 20% overall, which is a economic savings of $1.6 trillion per decade.

The waste stream from solar is a real question. The video posted in the other reply brings it up as well. We definitely need panels that are designed for extremely long service and recyclable end of life. I do think the battery tech is evolving extremely rapidly and dovetails with EVs so that will help keep renewables competitive even as total overall renewable supply share increases.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21200082

Go into this with an open mind, but it shows a number of ways that nuclear is superior to renewables, coming from someone who was staunchly against nuclear:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciStnd9Y2ak

It’s a great video - thanks! I’m less worried about the safety, than the actual ability to just manage to build the damn things to spec and any kind of budget in the US regulatory environment.

Here's a way for nuclear to make a dent: if the defense officials [1] who claim the climate change is a security threat are indeed serious about it, they could demand that Congress legislate the US military to be net zero carbon emitter. The US Navy can then build and operate enough reactors to achieve that. They already are operating dozens of naval nuclear reactors, and acquiring new ones at a steady pace (2-3 per year). Their regulatory hurdles are basically zero.

Currently the US defense emits a non-negligible amount of CO2 [2]: "If it were a country, it would have been the world's 55th largest greenhouse gas emitter, with emissions larger than Portugal, Sweden or Denmark." [2]

[1] https://www.npr.org/2019/03/05/700462955/former-defense-lead...

[2] https://www.livescience.com/65698-defense-department-climate...

Bill Gates wants to: https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/amp25728221/...

So... backed by about 24 to 48 hours of storage, and overbuilt by a factor of 2 to 3 (so you curtail most of your energy), wind and solar can produce reliable, baseload power. Particularly if you connect geographically separated regions and use wind/solar (and possibly geo/hydro) together. The cost is about the same as nuclear.

We should do everything, though, including nuclear. i'm a big nuclear fan. All at once, right now.

If the cost is the same as nuclear, it should be preferred, as there is no nuclear waste.

And that's probably even also considering that both the actual cost of nuclear[0][1][2][3], as well as the risk of failure[4][5] and the therein resulting costs[6] are often wildly underestimated.

[0]: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4631737.stm

[1]: https://www.pv-magazine.com/2019/01/31/debunking-the-low-cos...

[2]: https://financialtribune.com/articles/energy/9386/nuclear-de...

[3]: https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/letters/true-cost-of-nucl...

[4]: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-4543400/Scie...

[5]: https://phys.org/news/2017-05-nuclear-greatly-underestimate-...

[6]: https://cleantechnica.com/2019/04/16/fukushimas-final-costs-...

I'm including the wildly inflated costs, here. And it only works at lower latitudes. At high latitudes, it's not viable.

And engineer some safe small-scale reactors for container/cruise ships. It's a crime we aren't hedging our bets on renewables with some next-gen prototype reactors.

Generally, I do find that a good idea, but I seriously doubt the people operating those ships are to be trusted in the proper handling of nuclear equipment.

Make operation of diesel cleaner and thus more expensive so that sails and PV would be considered and used as well.

Hydropower can work for base load, but it has its own issues.

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