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Comment by pydry | Hacker News Reader

Energiewende didnt start in 1973, it was first authorized in late 2010.

France's nuclear program was also very, very expensive: https://www.i-sis.org.uk/The_True_Costs_of_French_Nuclear_Po...

That article is extremely loaded. It bemoans every factor that made building nuclear a sensible choice, as if these factors were unfair and shouldn't have existed (with that logic, I guess Norway should never have built dams, and it's unfair that they have all these mountains). It also insists that France should have added a lot of burdensome process, which reminds me of CIA's Simple Sabotage Field Manual. Also bonus point for complaining about the Tennessee Valley Authority. I've read many articles about pricing the French nuclear fleet, but this was a first.

For people interested about a real inquiry discussing the price of the french nuclear program [1] which is actually exhaustive and well documented.

[1]: https://www.ccomptes.fr/sites/default/files/EzPublish/themat...

You can say whatever you want when discussion the cost of nuclear in France because of the structure of its nuclear industry. Part of it comes from the government’s budget, so depending on your point of view it can be accounted for differently. Then, there are externalities (pollution, greenhouse gases, etc). And then there are strategic aspects and associated costs. The alternative in the 1970s was skyrocketing oil, which is much more costly at the planet’s level, and was on track to be much more costly at the country’s level as well. And in the meantime, consumers got reasonably cheap and clean electricity for decades.

Skimming your source, I would not trust it very much.

>The alternative in the 1970s was skyrocketing oil

They imported and still import just as much oil as anyone else.

They in fact import far less gas than Germany and let’s not even look at coal.

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