Do you have a better explanation? What were the "economic reasons" that caused three nuclear stations to shut down, if it wasn't the availability of cheap renewable electricity?
[1]: https://www.powermag.com/more-than-32-gw-of-new-gas-fired-po...
[2]: https://www.sei.org/publications/subsidies-shale-oil-and-gas...
[3]: https://www.forbes.com/sites/rrapier/2020/03/20/we-must-not-...
The fraction of electricity produced with those heavy-emitting plants is the major question, and ways to use mostly renewables and therefore to reduce it are known: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31557422
France never relied on gas as a complement for its nuclear fleet. First off, because we have always had enough reversible hydro if ever there was a need.
Second, because nuclear in France can do load-following just fine.
France's gas has three main sources:
1) industrial gas users that use the heat in a plant to generate some power,
2) gas companies building gas plants near their LNG terminals to have more options with their gas,
3) gas plants built in the 2000's by Poweo when the energy market opened, which are operated independently from EDF's nuclear plants.
In the very first graph, titled "PRODUCTION NETTE D'ÉLECTRICITÉ", the reddish-orangish surface reflects coal, oil (petrol), gas (methane) (also biomass and waste but it was and stays a small fraction)
Second: no, nuclear load-follow has severe limitations. Please read https://www.sfen.org/rgn/expertise-nucleaire-francaise-suivi... Pertinent information: « un réacteur peut varier de 100 % à 20 % de puissance en une demi-heure, et remonter aussi vite après un palier d’au moins deux heures, et ce deux fois par jour » it means: "a reactor power output can vary from 100% to 20% in 30 minutes, then after 2 hours can go back to 100% at the same speed, and can cycle this way 2 times per day".
This is quite a good performance when it comes to load-following (French engineers are very good at this), however it is insufficient in the real world (save any ridiculously expensive over-provision of nuclear reactor, most idling) and very weak compared to gas turbines performances.
Then I can't understand your "gas has three main sources". It lists (including cogeneration) indeed "sources" of load-following, however they all are fueled by fossil fuels, and therefore are consistent with my observations: France needs fossil fuel for power generation, its nuclear fleet isn't sufficient.
I'm not saying France doesn't have power from gas. I'm saying that the reason we have gas plants is completely unrelated to nuclear. If you look at intraday graphs, the resource historically used to improve performance is STEP hydro, not gas.
> Second: no, nuclear load-follow has severe limitations.
The article you quote does say the opposite of what you have it say. Let me quote from it:
> Méconnue, la souplesse du parc nucléaire français permet d’ajuster à tout moment l’offre de production des différentes énergies variables à la demande des consommateurs.
translation: "Little known, french nuclear plants' flexibility lets them continually adjust the production capacity, including variable energy sources, to consumers' needs"
> however it is insufficient in the real world
<citation needed>
> It lists indeed "sources" of load-following
No, it lists the reason why these historic plants were built. The reason was never load following, as you claimed earlier.
> France needs fossil fuel for power generation, its nuclear fleet isn't sufficient.
That is completely unrelated.
According to this line of thought we prefer gas over nuclear. This is not true: on an economic perspective and also emission-wise nuclear + hydro is a better tandem. However it cannot fully cope and needs 'backup', which is nowadays mainly gas turbines in powerplants.
Why, in your opinion, do we need to use those gas turbines?
Right now https://www.rte-france.com/eco2mix shows 9% gas, and everyone can check that it is a quite common figure: https://www.rte-france.com/eco2mix/la-production-delectricit...
> The article you quote does say the opposite
No, your quote means "nuclear can be used", it is true and I don't deny it: I showed limits (stated in the very same document), meaning that nuclear follow-up cannot be done "at will", and also that other non-desirable (but more flexible) sources (gas) are in use. Why are they in use, if not in order to compensate nuclear's limits? Why do we need fossil fuel for power generation?
Because we need the power, simply. That's unrelated to the other plants we have, though.
> I showed limits (stated in the very same document)
These limits are not preventing NPPs to participate in both primary and secondary reserve mechanisms which are used to balance the power grid. See [1] for more details.
[1]: https://hal-edf.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01977209/document
True (in order to generate electricity demanded during peak consumption), and it doesn't preclude other uses (load-following). Everyone can check (for example at https://www.rte-france.com/eco2mix ) that many gas turbines are up and running, and really producing (they aren't in "maintaining warm mode, with minimal production, in order to be ready quickly to ramp up") even outside of peak load.
> NPPs to participate in both primary and secondary reserve mechanisms
Yes, they do participate. The point is for them to be sufficient, to do it all by themselves, to let us get rid of fossil fuel: they don't.
The very document you reference (it is very interesting, thank you) abstract state aforementioned limits: "EDF’s nuclear reactors have the capability to vary their output between 20% and 100% within 30 minutes, twice a day, when operating in load-following mode" then "thermal fleet (mostly gas turbines or combined cycles) are used for mid-merit and peak generation."
That is and will remain true regardless of NPP's status. If anything, because only one of the power providers uses nuclear.
> state aforementioned limits
The needs for power modulation we have are within these limits for scheduled daily variations. Daily variations are not the same as load following.
Besides, the document also states that NPPs have other mechanism to tune power produced (+/- 2% over 30 seconds, and +/- 5% over 15 minutes). These other mechanisms are the ones used for load following, and are fully automated. See pp. 4 and 5.
All mechanisms used to tune power are pauses-inducing (depending upon the fuel state...), they cannot be used at will. If I'm wrong please explicitly write here that a "the (thermal) power generated by an existing and active industrial French nuclear reactor can always be freely modulated, without any limit nor any need to sometimes abstain from doing so for a while".
Load following isn't about a plant being started or stopped, it's an automatic mechanism that is either handled without any intervention (primary reserve : the plant's turbine monitors the frequency and adapts over 30s) or with interventions from the grid operator only (secondary reserve: RTE's systems have the hand on the providers' facilities). Every plant that participates in load following does it through the same mechanism, nuclear or gas doesn't matter.
What you describe is merit order, and it's not happening at the same operating level.
> Therefore if a gas turbine takes the load, nuclear could not do so
We do have examples of nuclear being used this way. It is likely that gas plants are also used this way, since every power provider is required to participate, and some french providers don't have NPPs.
> All mechanisms used to tune power are pauses-inducing (depending upon the fuel state...), they cannot be used at will.
Not sure what you mean by that. Like gas plants, nuclear plants work by heating water. This means that this water buffers some energy, and that buffer can be used for fast but small power variations, with minimal impact on the pipe system.
As for large variations in power, such as the 100% -> 20% change you quoted, they are scheduled ahead of time, and you can find technical explanations on how operators do that.
As you noted, there are obviously bounds to variations. As you said, they can't be used at will. One thing you seem to neglect, though, is that flexibility requirements are within these bounds. That means that power variations required can be serviced while staying within the limits of the system.
This means that what you're asking for: "active industrial French nuclear reactor can always be freely modulated" would be unnecessary gold-plating.
This is, indeed, central here.
It seems to me that, if nuclear can do all necessary follow-up (the fine, low-latency, the part of it which is at best not-well-planned and often absolutely not planned for), it should do so, as it is cheaper and emits less than any fossil-fuel-burning equipment.
I can only see two reasons for this: - the price-calculation method (marginal cost...) used in Europe offers way more benefits by always producing the last kWh thanks to fossil fuel - letting a fleet of nuclear reactors take on all necessary load-follow has some unwanted long-term effect (costs, maintenance, fuel state...)
Are those reasons sound, is there any other one?
Frequency controlling a grid (e.g. increasing or decreasing plant output by a few %s) is important for grid stability first and foremost. Grid costs are less important, and the process is not overseen by the producer, who bears the costs, but by the grid manager. Because of that, every power provider connected to the grid, is required to be able to provide some % of flexibility on its non-renewable fleet, including the providers who only operate fossil plants. For redundancy reasons and ease of implementation, this flexibility is split between as many plants as possible for each operator.
The step at which you can prioritize less costly means of production is scheduled ahead of time. This is when you typically need larger variations, such as moving a plant's output from 100% to 20%. In this step, merit order is used, and, to my knowledge, nuclear has priority over gas in France.
> redundancy reasons and ease of implementation, this flexibility is split between as many plants as possible for each operator.
This is the core of the argument. My point is that if the nuclear fleet was flexible enough to provide 100% of the follow-up it would do so (because it emits less and costs less), and therefore production snapshots would rarely show significant production from flamme plants (burning fossil fuel), which would only be significant during peak consumption. In other words thanks to such a sufficient flexibility the merit-order could be sound at any moment. The reality is that those 'fossil' plants very often (nearly constantly) generate a fair fraction of the gridpower (they aren't in minimal production "ready to warm-start" mode, they generate in a useful way).
> The step at which you can prioritize less costly means of production is scheduled ahead of time. This is when you typically need larger variations, such as moving a plant's output from 100% to 20%. In this step, merit order is used, and, to my knowledge, nuclear has priority over gas in France.
Yes, and it shows that the nuclear fleet can always (bar any incident) tackle a rather large scheduled (in hours) modulation, which is a totally different challenge than "realtime" follow-up.
And my point is that the grid does not work that way, and it's not up to NPP operators to decide it.
Usually, the numbers you get are installed capacity. They aren't really helpful, because renewables load factor is significantly lower than other energies.
That being said, even factoring that out and relying on demand fulfilled instead, a renewables+gas system still usually sources most of its energy from renewables. If you see a system where most of the power comes from fossil fuel, that means renewables aren't dimensioned to service all the power needs.
https://www.cleanenergywire.org/sites/default/files/styles/g...
In 2022, the last nuclear plants were shut down. I expect that capacity was replaced by either import or fossil fuels + any new renewable capacity since last year.
By inspecting the graph, it seems that their current consumption includes about 2000 PJ of renewables, which is maybe slightly more than the production from nuclear was 20 years ago.
https://www.cleanenergywire.org/sites/default/files/styles/g...
If you compare this to a graph of installed capacity you see how misleading it is to look at installed capacity, where you get the impression that more than half of Germany's power comes from renewables:
https://www.google.com/search?q=german+energy+consumption+by...
In reality, it looks like Germany gets about 15-20% of their energy from renewables.
Over the last 20 years, energy prices in Germany have roughly doubled, while the amount of energy produced by carbon-neutral sources is about the same (nuclear was replaced by renewables). Total greenhouse gas emissions have gone down a bit, due to reduced overall consumption and the replacement of coal with gas.
I think that would be if you're only counting electricity production. And that's only because heating and automobile still uses primarily fossil fuels. If they are included, Germany is still at only about 15-20% renewable.
> I consider this to be a huge success
Compared to the most obvious reference, France, German greenhouse gas emissions are still almost twice as high.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/carbon-fo...
Like most nations, it looks to me that the population in Germany is being targeted with propaganda from their government.
That's also true in France, despite our different power production means. Home heating and transportation are mostly fossil-based.
This means that France's performance in terms of greenhouse gas emissions is significantly better than Germany, Spain and Italy. Also, and maybe even more importantly, France has enjoyed significantly cleaner air, and thousands fewer deaths from air pollution every year, compared to what they would have with polution at the same levels as their neighbours.
Over the last 30 years, Nuclear power may have saved 100000-300000 French lives.
Is electricity in the US socialized? I thought they were all private companies, but you seem to be talking as though this is a political choice, rather than an economic one. I freely admit I don't know much about how the US operates its grids.
The total price tends to end up around $0.15/kwh, plus taxes, or around the same as new nuclear, with all associated regulations. (but more than already established nuclear, or the cost nuclear should have if built economically).
For those who really care about global warming, nuclear is still much better than such a mix.
If you're really not worried about global warming, gas + renewables make a lot more sense. Especially if you don't want coal or nuclear "in your back yard".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_load
"Base load" on the power generation side has only ever been an side effect of economics, not an intrinsic property of the electrical grid.
I think I just don't get what point you're making.
You need load following to keep up with shifting demand, that’s absolutely required and the only thing actually required. Intermittent and base load on the other hand is simply cheaper than load following which lowers production costs vs a 100% load following grid.
Intermittent sources can actually provide a much higher percentage of annual power than base load sources at a lower cost per kWh.
Load following is the 1st category historically, currently filled by hydro, gas turbines, and batteries.
Base load was the 2nd category which was less flexible but historically cheaper coal and nuclear. The only advantage it has over load following is price.
We now how a new 3rd category intermittent generation which is also cheaper than load following but just like base load it can’t follow the demand curve.
Therefore replacing all base load generation with cheaper intermittent generation is absolutely fine as lone as load following can pick up the slack there is zero downsides.
PS: Nuclear doesn’t actually lower peoples electricity costs. The difference is people in France are paying a percentage of their electric bill in taxes rather than as a separate bill. That’s great for poor people, but less so for the economy.
That’s critical because nuclear really doesn’t fit very will in a renewable heavy grid. Given the choice of nuclear + hydro + batteries or solar + wind + hydro + batteries the solar + wind grid is vastly cheaper.
Having said that, some nuclear is likely to be cost competitive without subsides in 2060+ somewhere.
I'm very much not anti-nuclear but I do wonder if we've possibly missed its window. To me, a plausible two-step solution to decarbonization would be (or could have been): 1a. Replace all the fossil fuel base load generation with nuclear/hydro, 1b. Replace all the variable load natural gas plants with storage, 2. Now that storage is mature and scalable, replace all the nuclear with solar/wind.
The reason this makes more sense in my head is that renewables are actually more dependent on natural gas than nuclear would be, in the current world of limited storage. I agree with you that once storage is built out, the role of nuclear is a lot less clear. But I think you'd have to say that it's still an open question whether we can really make storage scale as much as it needs to if it's going to support a fully renewable grid. It has only recently started to seem like the answer to that may be promising.
Not saying the following is the case, but the sample space is broad. For example, overregulation.
The thing about nuclear is that regulation is clearly highly necessary in the industry -- there's still plenty existing power plants like Fukushima that are not safe to walk away from, and that can only exist safely when they're competently monitored, and their weaknesses are shored up.
And in fact, accidents result in more, expensive but reasonable regulation. One of the conclusions from Fukushima was that you needed the ability to hook up emergency power and water to a power plant in the event of a disaster, even one that destroys roads. Had people gotten to Fukushima in time with the right tools, it'd have been far less dramatic and less expensive. So that's a quite reasonable thing to want.
However, this means that now there need to be tools and spare parts that can be carried by a helicopter in reasonable time. The existence of those tools, parts and helicopters however all costs money, and so is their continued testing and maintenance.
And yet again nuclear gets more expensive as we patch another hole, while renewables are not affected.
for instance: In CA Diablo Canyon is catching flak over the effect its cooling water has on the local sealife (gmafb) which is at least part of the official reason it is intending to shutdown.
Now you might argue that power production is going to unavoidably kill something, and we have to make a choice about what's the lesser evil -- do we poison everything with coal, overheat fish with nuclear power plant cooling, smash birds with wind turbines, or set them on fire with a solar heliostat?
We might well decide that it comes out in favor of nuclear there, but if we're minimizing harm then harm has to be measured, accounted for, and limited, and therefore regulating this particular thing makes perfect sense.
The problem is that this argument holds for every 'this particular thing'. How does it affect the patterns of migratory birds? Cicada cycles? Invasive species? Are historical buildings going to be destroyed? Trees cut down? Was there a native american settlement on the site that we just have to study? That any one of these petty concerns can be brought to litigation by an activist party to stand in the way of 9% of California's total energy demand is absurd and self-defeatist.
People wonder why we can't build anything anymore[0] and then demand we bike-shed every petty item to death in the courts.
[0]At reasonable costs/timelines. I'm still waiting for my high speed rail. Or housing that doesn't cost an arm and a leg.
I agree. But should we hold wind power to the same standards?
Hundreds of thousands of birds are killed by wind power per year, in the US alone:
https://www.birdwatchingdaily.com/news/conservation/new-stud...
Did anyone compare the environmental damage done by Nuclear per GWh to winder per GWh?
"Since the first ZECs eligibility period began, power markets have deteriorated significantly, thus the financial needs of New Jersey's nuclear plants have continued to grow. Nationwide, nuclear plants continue to struggle economically to survive. Since 2018, three nuclear plants have closed in the eastern U.S., all for economic reasons, and the impact has had a ripple effect."
So, they aren't blaming regulations, they're blaming the fact that the power markets have "deteriorated" ie. there is less money to be made.
Nuclear clearly hasn't become cheaper, and neither have fossil fuels, so what exactly has led to this cheaper electricity if it isn't the plummeting price of renewables?
Yet no evidence for this is raised.
I don’t believe an abandonment of nuclear R&D is solely to blame. But I haven’t seen sufficient evidence to discard the hypothesis.
Most of the rest of the electricity energy sector campaign for LESS regulation - the coal power industry is notable example but you see this even in the renewables space where, for example, wind producers would like to have more freedom to site turbines.
The fact that the nuclear industry puts nearly all its lobbying effort into securing financial support instead of attacking regulations, suggests that regulation is not the reason why nuclear is failing to survive but that it's simply because of price/cost.
The other notable example I can think of in the energy sector is with directly growing biofuels. A similarly uneconomic way of providing energy that couldn't exist without massive subsidy.