Comment by cure | Hacker News Reader

Comment by cure | Hacker News Reader

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> Every year coal is still here, instead of nuclear, is 100 years of death. If > building powerplants (of any type) were instant, and solar were one year away, > then we should STILL replace all coal with nuclear TODAY, to minimize harm. (in > a spherical chickens in a vacuum sort of way)

But... we all know that it takes a lot longer to build a nuclear plant (on the order of 10-20 years) than it does to build (large) solar or wind farms (on the order of 1-5 years).

So.... yeah, if it was magically possible to replace all coal with nuclear right now, that would be a net improvement in terms of carbon output and general pollution.

But we live in the real world, and that is not possible, so I'm not sure what point you are trying to make, to be honest.

I'm pretty sure that enough solar/wind + storage can be built to replace a significant percentage (30%? 50%?) of the remaining coal plants, before the first new nuclear plant's plans and siting are even finalized, let alone before a new nuclear plant is fully operational.

And it's going to be a lot cheaper, too.

People who made those exact arguments 10-20 years ago where wrong, since those plants would have prevented a lot of coal, oil and gas from being burned. Those people have both blood and an ongoing climate crisis on their hands.

Who should we blame in 10-20 from now if people still are burning coal, oil and gas? Who will take responsibility for the inaction?

> People who made those exact arguments 10-20 years ago where wrong, since those plants would have prevented a lot of coal, oil and gas from being burned. Those people have both blood and an ongoing climate crisis on their hands.

Perhaps. But 10-20 years ago, solar/wind/storage was a lot more expensive and a lot less efficient. The situation is quite different now.

> Who should we blame in 10-20 from now if people still are burning coal, oil and gas? Who will take responsibility for the inaction?

Realistically, there will probably still be knuckleheads who will be burning coal, oil and gas in 10-20 years from now. But hopefully they will be a very small minority.

The main thing that gives me hope is that it is now so much cheaper to build/run renewables than fossil fuel plants, that the latter will be phased out sooner rather than later, just for economic reasons. Those 6 out of touch old people on the supreme court are trying to delay things - and their actions will have very bad consequences for all of us - but the trend is clear.

> Realistically, there will probably still be knuckleheads who will be burning coal, oil and gas in 10-20 years from now. But hopefully they will be a very small minority.

Germany is the largest country in EU. If they are still burning coal, oil and gas in order to supply energy when the wind is low, what will we say about this "very small minority". Investors are putting a lot of money today on fossil fuel power plants that has several decades in estimated life-spans. We can wish and hope that some future technology will prove them wrong, just like climate change denials can wish and hope that scientists are all wrong.

This lead me just back to my original question. Who should we blame in 10-20 if people still are burning coal, oil and gas? If future tech won't save us, who can we blame for making this gamble and using the planet as collateral?

> it takes a lot longer to build a nuclear plant (on the order of 10-20 years)

Because of the red tape the mob has strung up. China builds these in two years [1]. France does it in five [2].

[1] https://interestingengineering.com/china-moves-toward-nuclea...

[2] https://lemielleux.com/how-long-does-it-take-france-to-build...

That red tape was installed (in North America) post-Five Mile Island however.

South Korea is also very capable at building these quickly, though I've heard concerns raised about their safety (grain of salt, I have no opinion myself).

I’m not suggesting we strike all the rules. But they’ve metastasised. Korea and France aren’t insensitive to popular concern.

China does not build nuclear plants in two years. In particular when China starts the clock on building a plant is not same as when the clock is started in the West. In China, there's already concrete and steel in the ground at that point.

Also, the plan described there is an addition to take steam from an ALREADY EXISTING nuclear power plant.

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