We're talking about a country that spent ยฃ40.5 billion on a high speed rail, had to cut the scope because estimated cost rose 200% and reached ยฃ100 billion and still doesn't know when and if it will be finished. Of course they are not able to build a nuclear plant.
this post was submitted on 28 Mar 2026
79 points (97.6% liked)
Europe
10779 readers
1661 users here now
News and information from Europe ๐ช๐บ
(Current banner: La Mancha, Spain. Feel free to post submissions for banner images.)
Rules (2024-08-30)
- This is an English-language community. Comments should be in English. Posts can link to non-English news sources when providing a full-text translation in the post description. Automated translations are fine, as long as they don't overly distort the content.
- No links to misinformation or commercial advertising. When you post outdated/historic articles, add the year of publication to the post title. Infographics must include a source and a year of creation; if possible, also provide a link to the source.
- Be kind to each other, and argue in good faith. Don't post direct insults nor disrespectful and condescending comments. Don't troll nor incite hatred. Don't look for novel argumentation strategies at Wikipedia's List of fallacies.
- No bigotry, sexism, racism, antisemitism, islamophobia, dehumanization of minorities, or glorification of National Socialism. We follow German law; don't question the statehood of Israel.
- Be the signal, not the noise: Strive to post insightful comments. Add "/s" when you're being sarcastic (and don't use it to break rule no. 3).
- If you link to paywalled information, please provide also a link to a freely available archived version. Alternatively, try to find a different source.
- Light-hearted content, memes, and posts about your European everyday belong in other communities.
- Don't evade bans. If we notice ban evasion, that will result in a permanent ban for all the accounts we can associate with you.
- No posts linking to speculative reporting about ongoing events with unclear backgrounds. Please wait at least 12 hours. (E.g., do not post breathless reporting on an ongoing terror attack.)
- Always provide context with posts: Don't post uncontextualized images or videos, and don't start discussions without giving some context first.
(This list may get expanded as necessary.)
Posts that link to the following sources will be removed
- on any topic: Al Mayadeen, brusselssignal:eu, citjourno:com, europesays:com, Breitbart, Daily Caller, Fox, GB News, geo-trends:eu, news-pravda:com, OAN, RT, sociable:co, any AI slop sites (when in doubt please look for a credible imprint/about page), change:org (for privacy reasons), archive:is,ph,today (their JS DDoS websites)
- on Middle-East topics: Al Jazeera
- on Hungary: Euronews
Unless they're the only sources, please also avoid The Sun, Daily Mail, any "thinktank" type organization, and non-Lemmy social media (incl. Substack). Don't link to Twitter directly, instead use xcancel.com. For Reddit, use old:reddit:com
(Lists may get expanded as necessary.)
Ban lengths, etc.
We will use some leeway to decide whether to remove a comment.
If need be, there are also bans: 3 days for lighter offenses, 7 or 14 days for bigger offenses, and permanent bans for people who don't show any willingness to participate productively. If we think the ban reason is obvious, we may not specifically write to you.
If you want to protest a removal or ban, feel free to write privately to the admin that applied the rule (check modlog first to find who was it.)
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
That's the cost of around 20 GW in wind turbines btw.
A nuthead will still tell you that wind is no equivalent because of missing winds.
You might have to factor PV and batteries in to make a even better point.
load more comments
(5 replies)
Let's see if those nuclear fanboys are showing up in this thread
I'm fairly convinced nuclear fanboys on reddit are either paid astroturfers or LLM bots paid for by the oil and gas industry to derail renewables
They are on lemmy too.
load more comments
(7 replies)
I am a nuclear fanboy, because it is a clean and safe form of energy. But the EPR costs and building time are a tragedy for the entire sector and I have no problem in admitting that. But there are good third generation reactor like the hitachi abwr that are fast to build (less the 48 months) and relatively cheap (less than 5 billions).
The real problem is the amount of safety changes required to gen3 design after Fukushima (that was a gen2 reactor that suffered the worst earthquake and tsunami ever in the history of Japan and caused maybe a 1 single death after 4 years, just to put things in prospective).
But this is a problem in general for European nuclear. An APR-1400 costs 4.5 billion in Korea and 9 billions in Europe.
It was also fortunate that all it did was contaminate some towns and land forever uninhabitable.
I kinda understand the paranoia, I just wish I could hope that economies of scale would kick in after a while but we'll just not build another one for almost exactly the right amount of time for all the institutional knowledge to disappear.
2.2% of Fukushima prefecture is nothing compared with the damage that fossil fuel is doing every single year to the entire planet. Even ignoring climate change, we are breathing pollution that is killing us. Radiation is a natural thing all around us, and our body evolved to correct for that below a certain threshold. Closing nuclear in germany before closing carbon killed a lot of people. If nuclear displace carbon I am more then happy with nuclear
Don't get me wrong, I too want nuclear power, but we need to hit it hard enough and without outsourcing, and to do it long enough to build institutional knowledge and get costs down. I kinda want the Rolls Royce SMR to work out, but britain is crap at building anything.
load more comments
(3 replies)
Surprising absolutely nobody...
Nononono, nuclear power is cheap and safe!
Also, nuclear plants can't explode!
And don't forget the simple matter of sourcing, enriching, using, possibly reprocessing, storing, and then disposing. Simples!
No, you don't understand. Uran and the tech to enrich and process it is widely available and they all are totally not dependent on Russia. Why so many still import from Russia then and fight sanctions year after year, you ask? Well... it's because... Look! There! A squirrel!
A squirrel!!? Where???!
Why so many still import from Russia
Isn't that US related trade restrictions? Also Kazakhstan supplies some 43% of the world supply of Uranium, followed by Canada at 14%.
the tech to enrich and process it
If you watch some of the early American nuclear projects it seems like its about as hard to work with as coal, and enrichment means spinning it. Its all known quantities.
Also while I'm here, the quanties of nuclear waste are so small compared to the literal mountains of flyash power plants make. And the french are really good at reprocessing it. I think we can do better than what the Americans did with their miniature nuclear reactor on Greenland (just flushed the toxic waste into a cavern drilled into the ice, along with all the poops).
Also, nobody ever seems to want to talk about the radioactive output of coal stations just burning coal with trace radioactive elements in it. Just straight up the stack and over the neighbourhood.
Newsflash: the people who want to get rid of nuclear power ALSO don't want coal power! We have cheap and abundant alternatives.
I want to get rid of coal, but also want to increase nuclear power. I exist. I am people.
Newsflash, dipshit, you're not the player character.
Just dig a big hole. Problem solved.
My bad, I keep forgetting!! Thank you.
load more comments
(5 replies)
If only someone could have foreseen this..
Makes you think how any of the old plants were ever built. Is it just mismanagement and corruption?
I live not that far away from a (now decommissioned) nuclear power station, and from what I keep hearing from old people who lived through the time of its construction, there was a lot of lenience and looking the other way involved. For instance, (A very persistent) Rumor has it, that many houses built in the nearest town around that time, had their foundation, cellar walls, and floors poured with the heavy anti-radiation concrete intended for the power station, because quite a number of the concrete trucks destined for the containment building (which is made of an awful lot of concrete) did conveniently take a wrong turn and ended up at the wrong construction site for some odd reason. (Maybe the drivers getting a case of beer for every detour they took might have been a factor)
Makes you think how any of the old plants were ever built.
Experience. The first one you build will have massive teething problems, but then the second one will just be a copy of the first.
The problem nowadays is that we in the west go "Oh no, learning stuff was expensive! Lets not use any of that and instead never do this again!" then, ten years later we start over again.
Except this one is being built by a company owned by the French government which has loads of experience, so corruption it is.
I'm sure McKinsey are making a killing. All those risk assessments need 6k/day consultants.
load more comments
(1 replies)
view more: next โบ