Thorium-Based Nuclear Power

en.wikipedia.org

15 points·masijo··5 comments

My hot, highly uneducated scoop on nuclear: we're too late to put a lot of effort into fission from an environmental perspective. If we had continued on investing and deploying as per pre-chernobyl, we might have significantly reduced emissions and been in a better place today. However, we didn't do it, and renewables are now better and more importantly cheaper in every respect. The time window for fission to make an impact for climate has passed.

This is only from an environmental perspective. The technology might still be impactful and interesting where fission makes sense.

Here is an equally qualified statement to counter your hot take: Common fallacy around these parts that renewables are cheaper. They're not.

What he's said is correct in the US if you don't account for storage costs. Battery costs are around $0.80 per kwh.

Right now Solar is being propped up by natural gas for the most part. Wind has been pretty good in states that can use it but it fluctuates in different ways requiring over provisioning.

So, it's just how you look at the problem. In one way solar and wind are cheaper per kwh. However they come with other costs that are often ignored when comparing to base load renewable nuclear power sources.

There was a source linked a while back I'm too lazy that got into the details and found that nuclear has high capital costs but is very profitable once paid off.

And of course it's a disingenuous comparison if you don't account for storage costs. Besides, energy prices aren't constant. It might be cheap to produce solar energy, but it doesn't matter if no one is buying.

Why people in HN seems so (positively ) obsessed about nuclear and so indifferent when it comes to renewable energies?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com