Okay, so there's a new solar cell that is slightly better and perhaps can be manufactured a little cheaper. Great! So what? You have failed to take into account the burden of energy storage. The capacity factor for solar is an abysmal ~20% if not ~10% in some localities. Wind can have a superior capacity factor of up to ~50%. Energy storage is the constraint.
PWRs can provide about 30% of world electricity and that same low grade heat and then you run out of Uranium. It also requires overprovision or storage for fluctuating demand and planned downtime and has correlated failures on the order of weeks or months.
Even with current storage technologies the nuclear option costs more than adding enough storage to cover the next 30%
Won't happen anytime soon. There's a lot. We have a century's worth, and the uranium price could easily be three times higher, without hardly an impact to utilities, and unlock more reserves and exploration.
> capacity factor of <50% of the french fleet
This not an indictment of nuclear power as a whole. American nuclear reactors have a ~90% capacity factor.
https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/nuclear/data-and-statist...
> Cheap storage like thermal (so the cheapest sand)
Won't be effective for producing electricity. Might only be ~30% efficient.
> far worse than new offshore wind
Wind is reasonable but don't forget that reactors can last a ridiculously long time ~75 years. Wind turbines might only last ~20 years in a corrosive environment.
> Won't happen anytime soon. There's a lot. We have a century's worth, and the uranium price could easily be three times higher, without hardly an impact to utilities, and unlock more reserves and exploration.
A century at 300GW. Quadruple that and it's 25 years. Replace 2/3rds of electricity and it's under 20. And those are reserves at a price 3 times higher. New lower level reserves will be even more expensive to the point where the LCOE of solar is around the raw uranium price.
> Won't be effective for producing electricity. Might only be ~30% efficient.
...Which is why I suggested it for the 20-30% of primary energy that is low grade heat where it is 100% efficient.
> This not an indictment of nuclear power as a whole. American nuclear reactors have a ~90% capacity factor.
If you want the anomalous US reliability, then you can't pretend you're going to pay historic french or japanese prices. Also what's the capacity factor of US nuclear reactors where construction started this century?
> Wind is reasonable but don't forget that reactors can last a ridiculously long time ~75 years. Wind turbines might only last ~20 years in a corrosive environment.
When individual unplanned repairs, or regular planned maintenance for a decade, or mid life refurbs cost more than an entire new wind turbine, this is a massive downside, not an upside. Pre-paying for 75 years worth of electricity rather than 25 means you can only build out a third of the capacity (or a twelfth given the much higher user facing cost per kWh even if you can find the cash to keep hiding the larger hidden costs)
But before you can start gaslighting about the economics you have to demonstrate that it's physically possible. Which you have not done.
Nuclear can make a small contribution, but it cannot meet the scale of renewables.
No. From the World Nuclear Association, "doubling the uranium price (say from $25 to $50 per lb U3O8) takes the fuel cost up from 0.50 to 0.62 ¢/kWh, an increase of one-quarter, and the expected cost of generation of the best US plants from 1.3 ¢/kWh to 1.42 ¢/kWh (an increase of almost 10%)."
Uranium could easily be $300/lb and nuclear will still be competitive.
> Pre-paying for 75 years worth of electricity rather than 25
Yeah, "electricity" which is intermittent and currently requires Russian and Qatari natgas to load balance... or perhaps you can re-open some coal mines. Pick your poison.
> Uranium could easily be $300/lb and nuclear will still be competitive.
$300/lb is $14/MWh which would put it precisely a dollar above the PPA price of recent indian and mexican solar projects in the current fleet, or $10/MWh which is projected 2025 prices in a high burnup reactor. Ie. Raw Uranium alone would cost more than renewables total cost whilst still only making up a quarter of the marginal costs and a tenth of the total cost.
> Yeah, "electricity" which is intermittent and currently requires Russian and Qatari natgas to load balance... or perhaps you can re-open some coal mines. Pick your poison.
Replacing 50% of electricity and 30% of primary energy without any electrical storage at all is still double what is possible with nuclear which will require that gas and coal to be running 24/7. 4 hour storage and more variable loads (like replacing fossil ammonia) can push this up to quadruple the maximum physically possible contribution from PWRs.
Also before you start gaslighting about storage you need to demonstrate that PWRs can do better than renewables with no storage if the PWR has 0 capex or build time, or that nuclear doesn't need 4 hour storage for meeting variable loads. Which you haven't.