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0 pointstoomuchtodo6mo ago0 comments

Enough renewables are deployed annually to replace the global nuclear fission fleet, year after year, even when accounting for capacity factor derating (to make a like for like comparison). The race is over, and renewables (with batteries) won. If you can find someone unsophisticated to invest in a fission reactor that takes billions of dollars and 10-15 years to build, more power to you. There will be no need for it by 2035-2040 when it prepares to send its first kwh to the grid.

(and to stay on topic for this thread, geothermal is a component of this when geothermal potential exists, cost is competitive, and dispatachability is a requirement to push out fossil generation in concert with renewables, hydro, legacy nuclear, battery storage discharge, and demand response)

https://www.google.com/search?q=baseload+is+a+myth

https://cleantechnica.com/2025/11/15/coal-killing-sodium-ion...

https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/q3-global-power-rep...

https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/solar-electricity-e...

https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/economic-aspec...

https://www.lazard.com/research-insights/levelized-cost-of-e...

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/solar-pv-prices

https://ourworldindata.org/battery-price-decline

https://ourworldindata.org/data-insights/solar-panel-prices-...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44513185 (lfp battery storage cost citation in 2025)

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yawaramin6mo ago

> If you can find someone unsophisticated to invest in a fission reactor that takes billions of dollars and 10-15 years to build

Unsophisticated investors like the Chinese government? 'Nearly every Chinese nuclear project that has entered service since 2010 has achieved construction in 7 years or less.'

https://thebreakthrough.org/issues/energy/chinas-impressive-...

toomuchtodoOP6mo ago

They dabble in nuclear, but it is not their focus. China can do what the developed world cannot because they are a command economy with less expensive labor, which will only last for a bit longer due to their structural demographics. Unless the developed world no longer has labor regulations, developed world wages, and capital based allocation systems, my statement stands with regards to investment. If capital and labor does not matter, certainly, anything is possible (Paraoh demanding pyramids, for example).

Your citation comes from an organization with pro nuclear bias.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakthrough_Institute

Can China Break Nuclear Power’s Cost Curse—and What Can the US Learn? - https://rooseveltinstitute.org/blog/can-china-break-nuclear-... - September 17th, 2025

China built more solar power in the last 8 months than all the nuclear power built in the entire world in the entire history of human civilisation. And even if you adjust for utilisation rate to compare against nuclear utilisation China built more solar power generated per hour than all the nuclear power currently in operation generate in an hour - and did so in 12-18 months - https://bsky.app/profile/climatenews.bsky.social/post/3lggqu... - January 23, 2025

China is installing the wind and solar equivalent of five large nuclear power stations per week - https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2024-07-16/chinas-renewa... - July 15th, 2024

Nuclear Continues To Lag Far Behind Renewables In China Deployments - https://cleantechnica.com/2024/01/12/nuclear-continues-to-la... - January 12th, 2024

Nuclear Energy & Free Market Capitalism Aren’t Compatible - https://cleantechnica.com/2023/11/06/nuclear-energy-free-mar... - November 6th, 2023

https://x.com/MoreBirths/status/1910780131318374524 | https://archive.today/iu9jx (China demographics citation)

yawaramin6mo ago

If France–a country known for its strong labour laws and unions–could transition to nuclear in the '70s, any Western country can do it.

Even if the Western world lags behind due to labour regulations, the cost still pays off in the long run due to overall less complex infrastructure and stable, AC baseload power. You are thinking only about the cost of building. What about the cost of maintaining all that infrastructure? Huge solar and wind farms spread out over vast areas, essentially destroying the local ecology? NPPs have a relatively tiny footprint.

Every cited source has a bias. You think 'Clean Technica' is unbiased? Come on.

nagisa6mo ago

The options in the '70s were much different from those of today. And for France specifically what they have underground (lots of uranium, no oil, no gas & no coal) strongly suggested exactly one way forward.

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toomuchtodoOP6mo ago

> If France–a country known for its strong labour laws and unions–could transition to nuclear in the '70s, any Western country can do it.

France had to nationalize EDF because they could not afford the costs associated with their nuclear fleet. The 70s are 50 years in the past, and are not what the future will look like.

This is also why Spain plans to retire its remaining nuclear generators, and go all in on renewables.

EDF fleet upkeep will cost over 100 billion euros by 2035, court of auditors says - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/edf-fleet-upkeep-wil... - November 17th, 2025

French utility EDF lifts cost estimate for new reactors to 67 billion euros - Les Echos - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/french-utility-edf-l... - March 4th, 2024

Explainer-Why a French plan to take full control of EDF is no cure-all - https://www.euronews.com/next/2022/07/07/edf-nationalistion - July 7th, 2022

Spain’s Nuclear Shutdown Set to Test Renewables Success Story - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-11/spain-s-n... | https://archive.today/4fB7K - April 11th, 2025 (“Spain is a postcard, a glimpse into the future where you’re not going to need baseload generators from 8am to 5pm” with solar and wind providing all of the grid’s needs during that time, said Kesavarthiniy Savarimuthu, a European power markets analyst with BloombergNEF. Still, she said, there is a reasonable chance this goal may take longer than expected and “extending the life of the nuclear fleet can prove as an insurance for these delays.”) (My note: As of this comment, Spain has 7.12GW of nuclear generation capacity per ree.es, and assuming ~1GW/month deployment rate seen in Germany, could replace this capacity with solar and batteries in ~28-36 months; per Electricity Maps, only 17.25% of Spain's electrical generation over the last twelve months has been sourced from this nuclear)

Tangentially, Europe has enough wind potential to power the world, for scale.

cbmuser6mo ago

»Your citation comes from an organization with pro nuclear bias.«

Go and throw all your money into renewables stocks and ETFs if you’re so convinced.

I bet you’re not doing that because you realize that the industry isn’t doing well and it’s nuclear power nowadays where all the money goes.

toomuchtodoOP6mo ago

Personally, I've invested ~500k EUR in a Portuguese Golden Visa fund invested in renewables (IRR is ~7-13%). Macro speaking, renewables investments keep hitting new records. I am convinced, and if you are not, I would strongly suggest consuming more data, because you appear to have a potential blind spot in your mental model on this topic.

https://about.bnef.com/insights/clean-energy/global-renewabl...

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2025-10-28/white-...

cbmuser6mo ago

»Enough renewables are deployed annually to replace the global nuclear fission fleet, year after year, even when accounting for capacity factor derating (to make a like for like comparison).«

Wind and solar do not replace conventional power plants and never will.

Heck, Germany tried that on the small island of Pellworm and failed and yet some people think this will work out for the whole country.

It does not work.

adrianN6mo ago

Pellworm is something like 95% renewable without storage. That really doesn’t sound like failure to me.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

0 comments

yawaramin6mo ago

> If you can find someone unsophisticated to invest in a fission reactor that takes billions of dollars and 10-15 years to build

Unsophisticated investors like the Chinese government? 'Nearly every Chinese nuclear project that has entered service since 2010 has achieved construction in 7 years or less.'

https://thebreakthrough.org/issues/energy/chinas-impressive-...

toomuchtodoOP6mo ago

Your citation comes from an organization with pro nuclear bias.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakthrough_Institute

Can China Break Nuclear Power’s Cost Curse—and What Can the US Learn? - https://rooseveltinstitute.org/blog/can-china-break-nuclear-... - September 17th, 2025

China is installing the wind and solar equivalent of five large nuclear power stations per week - https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2024-07-16/chinas-renewa... - July 15th, 2024

Nuclear Continues To Lag Far Behind Renewables In China Deployments - https://cleantechnica.com/2024/01/12/nuclear-continues-to-la... - January 12th, 2024

Nuclear Energy & Free Market Capitalism Aren’t Compatible - https://cleantechnica.com/2023/11/06/nuclear-energy-free-mar... - November 6th, 2023

https://x.com/MoreBirths/status/1910780131318374524 | https://archive.today/iu9jx (China demographics citation)

yawaramin6mo ago

If France–a country known for its strong labour laws and unions–could transition to nuclear in the '70s, any Western country can do it.

Every cited source has a bias. You think 'Clean Technica' is unbiased? Come on.

nagisa6mo ago

1 more reply

toomuchtodoOP6mo ago

> If France–a country known for its strong labour laws and unions–could transition to nuclear in the '70s, any Western country can do it.

France had to nationalize EDF because they could not afford the costs associated with their nuclear fleet. The 70s are 50 years in the past, and are not what the future will look like.

This is also why Spain plans to retire its remaining nuclear generators, and go all in on renewables.

EDF fleet upkeep will cost over 100 billion euros by 2035, court of auditors says - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/edf-fleet-upkeep-wil... - November 17th, 2025

French utility EDF lifts cost estimate for new reactors to 67 billion euros - Les Echos - https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/french-utility-edf-l... - March 4th, 2024

Explainer-Why a French plan to take full control of EDF is no cure-all - https://www.euronews.com/next/2022/07/07/edf-nationalistion - July 7th, 2022

Tangentially, Europe has enough wind potential to power the world, for scale.

cbmuser6mo ago

»Your citation comes from an organization with pro nuclear bias.«

Go and throw all your money into renewables stocks and ETFs if you’re so convinced.

I bet you’re not doing that because you realize that the industry isn’t doing well and it’s nuclear power nowadays where all the money goes.

toomuchtodoOP6mo ago

https://about.bnef.com/insights/clean-energy/global-renewabl...

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2025-10-28/white-...

cbmuser6mo ago

»Enough renewables are deployed annually to replace the global nuclear fission fleet, year after year, even when accounting for capacity factor derating (to make a like for like comparison).«

Wind and solar do not replace conventional power plants and never will.

Heck, Germany tried that on the small island of Pellworm and failed and yet some people think this will work out for the whole country.

It does not work.

adrianN6mo ago

Pellworm is something like 95% renewable without storage. That really doesn’t sound like failure to me.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse