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Comment by dsq | Hacker News Reader

Nuclear power has some issues which need to be addressed on the political and social level as well as the technological. Waste disposal, proliferation, safety. However, looking forward, it is hard to see any competition as a robust, always available, all weather, conpact, baseline power source. This is especially true if climate change degrades solar and wind farm performance by disrupting weather patterns.

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France reprocesses spent fuel, already has the bomb, and has one of the best safety records of any operator, with no serious accidents.

Nuclear is more expensive comparing watts to watts, but Europe is learning the hard way that, without useful storage (the situation today), more than one watt nominal renewable generating capacity is necessary to reliably replace one watt from a thermal plant.

> one of the best safety records of any operator, with no serious accidents.

Yeah, they make sure to do the dirty stuff on Pacific atolls, far from prying eyes.

Which is the French nuclear power plant operated on a Pacific atoll?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-56340159

yes, yes, not an operator - the point is, whenever they have an inkling that something remotely dirty might happen, they run for the sea. Supposedly they don't do it anymore, but personally I wouldn't trust the French MoD to tell me the time of day - they have a massive history of lies, deceit, and coverups.

You appear to be conflating nuclear power with nuclear weapons. These are not the same technology, although both do involve the fission of the atomic nucleus.

Over the decades that the French (and other European nations) have been using said nuclear power, how have they been dealing with waste disposal, proliferation and safety? I do not ever recall the French having a safety problem.

None of those are the real issues with nuclear. The real issue is that it's too expensive. And no, it's not too expensive because of unnecessary regulations.

Environmentalists thinks it is too expensive to save the environment so they argue we should burn coal? I doubt that.

It's too expensive in two senses. First, it is too expensive now per unit of fossil CO2 displaced. Second, in the end game of a 0% fossil economy, it's too expensive vs. non-nuclear alternatives.

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