With the ever-ongoing ‘progress’ of the proposed UK nuclear power plants, I wonder if this is the best course of action (not just in the UK, but across other nations also)?
With the ever-ongoing ‘progress’ of the proposed UK nuclear power plants, I wonder if this is the best course of action (not just in the UK, but across other nations also)?
I’m more wondering, is one better than the other? Is it practical for them to co-exist?
To answer your question directly: I don’t know, depends on if it can work ig. But also: we have finite resources, so where should those resources be spent/focused?
I think diversity is redundancy. Keep in mind the necessary evil than none of those “green” energy sources can be created without us still leaning on fossil fuels some. So rather than claiming a single type, why not minimize what we can of the worst with all the better choices?
Some places simply can’t do wind and/or solar. Some places should be doing it all the time because it’s so consistent.
I see, so you believe it’s regional dependent, and we should be focussed on the least harmful methods/plan?
Wind, solar and geothermal. Nuclear is far too expensive per kilowatt to even compare. Geothermal is the best idea given newer drilling technology and simplicity. That said nuclear is always brought up when corporations can make taxpayers “contribute” via tax dollars with no real savings to those taxed. Corporations love those deals and politicians love the campaign contributions.
Don’t suppose you have the statistics to back that one up, do you?
https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/electricity_generation/pdf/AEO2025_LCOE_report.pdf
Yes, and again, with redundancy, so that does mean probably a nuclear plant connected to tap into any part of the grid, even if it’s not normally used. Same with wind and solar, they should help with reducing nuclear power use in nearby grids if they’re overproducing past their typical storage plan. An example of what happens when you try to run a separate grid without that capacity is Texas.
And continued work to reduce the impact of all of these. Better nuclear designs (some places have thorium in the works, and of course there’s always fusion in the future), also improving wind and solar in their materials and construction, something often not talked about. They need to be far more “renewable” recyclable than they are, and less toxic to create. One reason solar is so cheap is because its outsourced to places that don’t have strict rules on where to dump byproducts of their production, and of course cheaper labor. That needs to get better.