Re:Nuclear turn green as EU parliament approves new taxonomy
by nilsbunger on Thursday July 07, 2022 @03:47PM
(#32018447)
There are at least two stances here:
1) Keeping existing nuclear power plants running and making incremental investments in them. I'm a proponent of this for the next 20-30 years because they generate carbon-free base load electricity. I don't think we have a choice given climate change - when we turn off a nuclear plant, we spin up coal and natural gas.
2) Building new nuclear plants. I'm skeptical of this - the costs don't seem to pencil out anymore and the political capital isn't there. From what I've seen we're better off investing in wind+solar+storage.
The worst-case scenarios are a real issue and I wouldn't want to bet on nuclear forever, but to me the imperative to address climate change is bigger in the near term.
1) Keeping existing nuclear power plants running and making incremental investments in them. I'm a proponent of this for the next 20-30 years because they generate carbon-free base load electricity. I don't think we have a choice given climate change - when we turn off a nuclear plant, we spin up coal and natural gas.
2) Building new nuclear plants. I'm skeptical of this - the costs don't seem to pencil out anymore and the political capital isn't there. From what I've seen we're better off investing in wind+solar+storage.
The worst-case scenarios are a real issue and I wouldn't want to bet on nuclear forever, but to me the imperative to address climate change is bigger in the near term.