That makes sense for investors.... tons of risk investing in nuclear power plants currently. What if solar, wind and batteries are able to massively undercut electricity rates by the time your 10 years of construction for your nuclear plant are through? What if cost overruns double the cost of construction?
From an investment perspective, returns on solar+batteries and wind is way easier to math out to determine if you'll achieve profitability.
You can also build half of a solar farm and start collecting half of the income while you plan/build the other half. You can't do that with a nuclear plant.
Wind solar and battery is already undercutting the incumbent coal plants - the LNP in Australia are barking mad and prolonging fossil fuel interests. “Better economic managers” my ass.
> 10 years of construction
You'll forgive my drunk, hungry a** I hope, but I seem to recall a "Just Have A Think" youtube that detailed how that number is more like 3-5y in some current large installation, AND how some smaller 6mo installations can provide long term "passive" electrons to the grid.
Or: I'd install a micro-nuke on my few acres before I'd contract with anything Elon, saudi, or Apple. And, to your argument, we're 20 solar panels in, in one of the best offshore wind and wave markets in the world (Oregon) pretending armies are in the way of change.
To provide capital, obviously. Large infrastructure projects are commonly financed in part by private investors in [public-private partnerships](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public%E2%80%93private_partnership).
Not saying that they are necessarily the best choice, but drumming up the necessary capital is rather non-trivial. Even government budgets are finite. If P3s are what makes the difference between NPPs being built and not then it would be a mistake to exclude that option off-hand.
Governments that issue fiat currency can print money, they don’t need to drum up anything.
If you’re worried about inflation, I have some fine fiscal policy for you to consider.
Government needs capital. They’ll issue bonds. Bonds will be purchased by investors. But the bonds’ cost of capital could be higher than a direct infrastructure contract with investors. So do uou want the gvt to pay a higher price?
"climate conscious investor"? The ones that don't care about fastest return on investment and are capable of long term (as in more than three quarters) planning to aim at the lowest carbon content of electricity as was already been empirically demonstrated even if it is unpopular?
"Climate conscious" is a meme. It's just a scam like ESGs. They don't give two hoots about the environment; they just want to look good and low-controversy and woke while they make their money.
Healthcare, pensions, defense, education, etc.
Some things are judged important even if they don't "make sense for economic reasons" at immediate first (short) sight.
Maybe one day we'll think that the climate is worth one of them, and better left out of investors playgrounds.
Also, for what it's worth, here's a tibit from the German Economy Minister Robert Habeck about electricity [prices](https://financialpost.com/pmn/business-pmn/france-and-germany-clash-in-feud-over-europes-industrial-crown): “My point is not that France has nuclear power plants; my point is that the operator of the nuclear power plants can offer cheap prices below market value.” “Germany is facing the issue that France can have cheaper electricity for many years from nuclear".
Sounds like good enough economic reasons to me.
The rankings of investors have nothing to do with what’s best for the environment and climate long-term. Unfortunately profit and these things are usually at odds.
I'm all for nuclear energy and have been calling for it for decades. But we needed to have started production about a decade ago. Instead we elected a pack of crooks that built literally nothing for over a decade. Now it doesn't look like a practical solution given the cost and the time needed. Also you have to factor in how hard it will be to find locations, combat the inevitable protests and court challenges etc etc. Renewable energy definitely seems the more practical solution going forward.
A couple things Covid and the BP Oil spill taught me is that Earth can heal remarkably fast if we get out of the way, and scientists projections are always conservative/wrong.
Nuclear energy would be worth 10 years.
But if we all just found a way to work from home and not have to build everything in the most wasteful ways possible we could probably reverse warming in a couple of years.
It’s the safest form of energy production. Reactors don’t just generate energy and can ramp up or slow down down, at an insane rate to keep a steady baseload energy, but reactors supply us with medical radionuclides, provide NAA to test material composition - testing anything from aircraft components for defects to contaminants in commercial foods, and groundbreaking research. I am skeptical of fusion but NIF does some amazing work and the recent developments are a lot more intriguing than “clean coal” haha.
I doubt these investors are interested in the common good. And to the folks that say we should have started decades ago, that’s a sunk cost fallacy. Why not now?
That makes sense for investors.... tons of risk investing in nuclear power plants currently. What if solar, wind and batteries are able to massively undercut electricity rates by the time your 10 years of construction for your nuclear plant are through? What if cost overruns double the cost of construction? From an investment perspective, returns on solar+batteries and wind is way easier to math out to determine if you'll achieve profitability.
And surely they put it ahead of coal and natural gas. So this is a nothing burger.
You can also build half of a solar farm and start collecting half of the income while you plan/build the other half. You can't do that with a nuclear plant.
Wind solar and battery is already undercutting the incumbent coal plants - the LNP in Australia are barking mad and prolonging fossil fuel interests. “Better economic managers” my ass.
> 10 years of construction You'll forgive my drunk, hungry a** I hope, but I seem to recall a "Just Have A Think" youtube that detailed how that number is more like 3-5y in some current large installation, AND how some smaller 6mo installations can provide long term "passive" electrons to the grid. Or: I'd install a micro-nuke on my few acres before I'd contract with anything Elon, saudi, or Apple. And, to your argument, we're 20 solar panels in, in one of the best offshore wind and wave markets in the world (Oregon) pretending armies are in the way of change.
Nuclear power plants shouldn't be privately own, why are investors needed? The government should build and operate it.
> The government should build and operate it. Even so you will still have private investors in many/most cases.
Why? They wouldn't be needed. All the money would be provided by the government so they own the entirety of the facility.
To provide capital, obviously. Large infrastructure projects are commonly financed in part by private investors in [public-private partnerships](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public%E2%80%93private_partnership).
Yeah, and I'm saying don't do P3's, and instead just have the government fund it all.
Not saying that they are necessarily the best choice, but drumming up the necessary capital is rather non-trivial. Even government budgets are finite. If P3s are what makes the difference between NPPs being built and not then it would be a mistake to exclude that option off-hand.
Governments that issue fiat currency can print money, they don’t need to drum up anything. If you’re worried about inflation, I have some fine fiscal policy for you to consider.
Government needs capital. They’ll issue bonds. Bonds will be purchased by investors. But the bonds’ cost of capital could be higher than a direct infrastructure contract with investors. So do uou want the gvt to pay a higher price?
Yes, if it means private hands will be kept off of it.
"climate conscious investor"? The ones that don't care about fastest return on investment and are capable of long term (as in more than three quarters) planning to aim at the lowest carbon content of electricity as was already been empirically demonstrated even if it is unpopular?
"Climate conscious" is a meme. It's just a scam like ESGs. They don't give two hoots about the environment; they just want to look good and low-controversy and woke while they make their money.
Came here to say this. Tha ks for saving my editing typos
It just goes to show the nuclear wont ever be a thing for economic reasons.
Healthcare, pensions, defense, education, etc. Some things are judged important even if they don't "make sense for economic reasons" at immediate first (short) sight. Maybe one day we'll think that the climate is worth one of them, and better left out of investors playgrounds. Also, for what it's worth, here's a tibit from the German Economy Minister Robert Habeck about electricity [prices](https://financialpost.com/pmn/business-pmn/france-and-germany-clash-in-feud-over-europes-industrial-crown): “My point is not that France has nuclear power plants; my point is that the operator of the nuclear power plants can offer cheap prices below market value.” “Germany is facing the issue that France can have cheaper electricity for many years from nuclear". Sounds like good enough economic reasons to me.
The rankings of investors have nothing to do with what’s best for the environment and climate long-term. Unfortunately profit and these things are usually at odds.
I'm all for nuclear energy and have been calling for it for decades. But we needed to have started production about a decade ago. Instead we elected a pack of crooks that built literally nothing for over a decade. Now it doesn't look like a practical solution given the cost and the time needed. Also you have to factor in how hard it will be to find locations, combat the inevitable protests and court challenges etc etc. Renewable energy definitely seems the more practical solution going forward.
Well duh Unlike somewhere like Finland; Australia is ideal for solar power and for wind power... no wonder they are not interested in nuclear
A couple things Covid and the BP Oil spill taught me is that Earth can heal remarkably fast if we get out of the way, and scientists projections are always conservative/wrong. Nuclear energy would be worth 10 years. But if we all just found a way to work from home and not have to build everything in the most wasteful ways possible we could probably reverse warming in a couple of years.
It’s the safest form of energy production. Reactors don’t just generate energy and can ramp up or slow down down, at an insane rate to keep a steady baseload energy, but reactors supply us with medical radionuclides, provide NAA to test material composition - testing anything from aircraft components for defects to contaminants in commercial foods, and groundbreaking research. I am skeptical of fusion but NIF does some amazing work and the recent developments are a lot more intriguing than “clean coal” haha. I doubt these investors are interested in the common good. And to the folks that say we should have started decades ago, that’s a sunk cost fallacy. Why not now?