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Nuclear too slow to replace coal, and baseload “simply can’t compete” with wind and solar, AEMO boss says (reneweconomy.com.au)

submitted 1 year ago by phneutral@feddit.org to c/energy@slrpnk.net

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The head of the Australian energy market operator AEMO, Daniel Westerman, has rejected nuclear power as a way to replace Australia's ageing coal-fired power stations, arguing that it is too slow and too expensive. In addition, baseload power sources are not competitive in a grid dominated by wind and solar energy anyway.

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[–] Diplomjodler3@lemmy.world 75 points 1 year ago (38 children)

Even if we started to build nuclear plants like crazy right now, it would be decades for them to make a real impact. Building a single nuclear plant is very expensive and time consuming. Building up the necessary supply chain to build a lot of them would take much longer. In the meantime, you can build huge amounts of renewables in just a few years for a fraction of the cost, even if you factor in storage.

[–] Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works 35 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (28 children)

Not only that but the cost of renewables and storage is still coming down rapidly. You'd better hope that you're not priced out of the energy market before your construction time plus payback period is up if you start building nuclear.

[–] The_Terrible_Humbaba@slrpnk.net 13 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (27 children)

Lemmy most of the time: Makes fun of people always bringin up "the economy" as if that's what's really important

Also Lemmy when it comes to nuclear: "But the economy!"

What happens in case of a sudden abnormal weather event that blocks out most of the sunlight? Picture a super volcano eruption covering the sky in ashes for thousands of miles. Or think back to the extinction of dinosaurs, where after a meteorite crashed into earth the sun was blocked by dust for several years. Or just think about northern European countries that barely get any light in winter; Portugal is a very sunny country, we have invested a lot into solar, and sometimes we still get energy from Spain (who use nuclear btw).

Also, I've been hearing this whole "it takes too long to build nuclear plants" since at least early 2010s; imagine where we'd be if we'd just started building plants then. I can picture the same thing being said in 2035-2040, while fossil fuels still have not been completely dropped.

[–] MonkderDritte@feddit.de 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

What happens in case of a sudden abnormal weather event that blocks out most of the sunlight

The neighbor has sun then. Buy it there. Or store the power.

Always the same old platitudes.

[–] shottymcb@lemm.ee 0 points 1 year ago

Australia doesn't have neighbors...

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