News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Electricity map: Mapping the climate impact of electricity by adev_ on Tuesday March 22, 2022 @11:33AM (#30767342)
> What did France use for the other half of its energy? Why didn't it just use nuclear for everything?

Energy is was more than 70% nuclear in France. The rest is mainly hydro, solar when available and a bit of Gas [1]. Some reactors were built before and after this 20 years nuclear rush, this is why 50% in my previous message.[^2]

[1]: https://www.rte-france.com/en/eco2mix/regional-data#producti...

[2]: https://twitter.com/superbello123/status/1505287449995579396

Re:Electricity map: Mapping the climate impact of electricity by ZeroGravitas on Tuesday March 22, 2022 @01:12PM (#30768739)
Okay, so your comment was less correct than I assumed.

France peaked around 75% of electricity from nuclear. Energy is bigger than just electricity and generally includes transport and fuel for home and industrial heating, which puts Framce back around a half of energy from clean sources.

This 75% of electricity is (perhaps not coincidentally) very close to the 80% that many people feel modern renewables can provide without any major storage issues. Because that 20/25% leeway means you can just use fossil backup to fill any gaps where your clean supply doesn't match your demand.

But, the anti-renewable types who point to nuclear to justify their outdated opinions on renewables never seem to care that nuclear was only ever part of a larger system. They meticulously count every penny spent on grid upgrades and storage for one, but not the other. Pumped hydro and nuclear is a classic combination for decades.

They'll attack time-of-use pricing as some kind of attack on liberty even though its a standard thing to do with excess nuclear capacity overnight, in places like France, for example.