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Comment by jhoechtl | Hacker News Reader

Nuclear fell out of fashion because people do not understand statics and were unable to address peoples concern about their safety.

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Conveniently ignoring the extreme cost of nuclear power. The power companies simply do not want to invest billions and then wait 7+ years, assuming there are no project delays or cost overruns (which there always are). Renewables and natural gas are much cheaper.

The extreme cost of nuclear power are partially the fault of scaremongers stopping all production of them in the west. China has 100s being built or planned and obviously they can't cost 10s of billions each.

Thanks for blackouts when it's cloudy and not windy.

China’s nuclear program is just getting started and is almost completely state funded. They only have 49 plants right now with 16 under construction, I’m not sure where your 100s came from. Their plan is to quadruple generating capacity (current at 50 Gw) to 200 Gw by 2035.

France is still the model country when it comes to nuclear power. Even in 2035, nuclear will be less than 10% of its energy mix.

China routinely announces plans for things that it does not, in the end, build.

"Renewables" cost our government here in Ontario.

https://toronto.citynews.ca/2018/06/07/kathleen-wynne-ran-en...

They were in power for ~11 years, but thanks to their "green energy" programs they not only lost the election, they lost political party status and have yet to regain it.

Renewables are not cheaper.

"The FAO estimates that the renewable generation subsidy program will cost the Province a net $2.8 billion over the first three years of the program, from 2020-21 to 2022-23. The FAO's three-year cost estimate is significantly higher than the Province's cost estimate of $1.3 billion reported in the 2020 Ontario Budget."

These long-term "green energy" programs were expensive, and the government knowingly lied about how much it would cost.

You gave nothing to compare those prices to so it's impossible to determine cheaper or not cheaper.

Nuclear was simply too expensive for the other side to bother debating with the environmental opposition. Unless the government subsidizes it (construction costs), private companies aren’t going to go near it. Other renewables are simply so much more profitable these days.

Power should be a public good and not in the hands of private companies.

Macroeconomics has unfortunately fallen out of fashion on todays curricula at schools/universities.

Nuclear was perfectly affordable until laws were passed to make it unaffordable (specifically: if nuclear power happened to be cheaper than other energy sources for any reason, then it was considered to be not spending enough on safety, so it was required to spend money on marginal safety measures until it cost the same as other forms of energy).

Nuclear was, in fact, never cost-effective. No civil power nuke has ever been operated, anywhere in the world, without utter dependence on massive public subsidy.

Nukes get less competitive every day. Lately, already paid-for nukes are about on par with fresh-built solar or wind,big you neglect the disaster liability subsidy. But wind and solar costs are still falling.

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