First U.S. nuclear reactor built from scratch in decades enters commercial operation in Georgia::ATLANTA — A new reactor at a nuclear power plant in Georgia has entered commercial operation, becoming the first new American reactor built from scratch in decades.
The lifetime cost of of nuclear (build, running + clean-up) divided by the amount of electricity created is incredibly high. This report from csiro doesn’t include large scale nuclear but does include projected costs for small modular reactors +solar and wind. Generally large reactors come out behind smr especially in future projections.
https://www.csiro.au/en/research/technology-space/energy/energy-data-modelling/gencost
Note the “wind and solar pv combined” “variable with integration costs” which is the cost accounting for storage, transmission etc. It’s not that high (at least up to the 90% of the grid modelled for 2030). The best end of the nuclear estimate is double the cost of that. The reasons that the storage costs etc. Are not as high as you may intuitively expect are explained in that report.
Maybe there is a place for nuclear in that last 10%, but not in less than that. Also as far as rolling it out quickly, look at how long this last nuclear plant took to build from planning to construction being complete.
I think that it is possible to manage the cleanup of nuclear and to make it safe, but it’s all just very expensive. To make everyone happy with the transition off fossil fuels it needs to be cost competitive and renewables are, nuclear isn’t.
Maybe Australia’s grid is 90% ready for solar, I’ve heard they’re pushing for full renewable in 2 States. But the USA’s isn’t ready.
Again, I understand that new installations of solar power plants are cheaper than nuclear. My points against solar are:
Meanwhile points agaisnt nuclear are
Both of which seem like much simpler problems to solve:
Australia’s grid isn’t fully ready for renewables, but accounting for that cost they’re still cheaper than any other energy generation. Also as for your “need a lot of storage” comment, the reason solar + wind with integration costs is still relatively cheap is that you really don’t need much when it’s modelled as a full solution. Quite conveniently, wind produces more power at night and nicely compliments solar.
The footprint of solar also isn’t that big. I did a little maths in some other coment, and to power the US off solar alone (not solar + wind) would take a bit over a third the land used to grow corn for ethanol in the US. That land cost is also included in the cost of generation, so it doesn’t make solar uneconomic.
Yes there are difficulties, but they’re cheaper to solve than it is to make a safe nuclear reactor.