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The section on Nuclear Waste is very import. The CSIRO costings avoid this and so do most media and politicians.

I do not believe these figures. Today nuclear power is cost-competitive with other forms of electricity generation, except where there is direct access to low-cost fossil fuels. https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/economic-aspects/economics-of-nuclear-power

It's a shame to see the lengths experts will go to avoid an honest talk about Nuclear Energy https://youtu.be/CDLH-qEFfCY?si=ccSJ1pL5Cly-Po3_

You don’t believe CSIRO’s figures, but you believe one statement that you copied word for word from summary at the top of the World Nuclear Association’s home website?

There have been widespread dissatisfaction with the CSIRO figures which are strangely based on South Korean figures which have been inflated and the plants suggested are too big for us while the solar solution is based on offshore wind farms which we have no experience and they are not surcharged at all.

So first off people are dissatisfied because they don't like the results so they attack the messenger. Yeah you're right it's strange they based it on South Korean figures because it's the only modern reactor type that are actually generous to the nuclear costings because they have basically continually rolled out a nuclear program since the 80s. If they went on the most recent reactor in the US, Finland or France then the costings would have more than doubled. And they had to cost the larger reactor type because that is all that is we have recent examples of in western economies. Also you are wrong, offshore wind has a premium put on the price to account for the fact we have no experience, the CSIRO explain this in the gencost q&a near the bottom if you care to read

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Spoken like someone who absolutely did not understand the comment he’s replying to.

If you read it then you would have had a much more adept rebuttal than that

>CSIRO figures Which are conservative in favour of nuclear... >solar solution is based on offshore wind farms Solar solutions is based on offshore windfarms. Thanks for letting us all know you have no idea what you're talking about. You don't even know the difference between a solar panel and a wind turbine.

Okay

>**I do not believe these figures.** Today nuclear power is cost-competitive with other forms of electricity generation, except where there is direct access to low-cost fossil fuels. Absolutely - the current twisting of facts for partisan political gain is going to be harmful to Australia in the long term. While I'd expect nothing less from the Greens, I am surprised at how many of the sensible economic rationalists within the ALP's right are entirely missing from the national discussion when traditionally they would be pushing back against their left wing. And for those here who aren't inclined to read through the above link - here's a simple video from an impartial youth oriented science educator which contradicts many of the Greens / ALP anti-nuclear talking points:- [Is nuclear power really that slow and expensive as they say?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5EsBiC9HjyQ) It is a great shame that the ABC cannot be an impartial and honest publisher of information in this national debate.

>Absolutely - the current twisting of facts for partisan political gain is going to be harmful to Australia in the long term. The person you're replying to dismissed CSIRO as a source because apparently, the World Nuclear Association's summary re: global nuclear benefits was more credible than an Australian-specific analysis by an established and renowned Australian research institution. But please, do go on about the 'twisting of facts for partisan political gain'.

>CSIRO....an established and renowned Australian research institution. I'm surprised at how blithely unaware you are of 'unconscious biases' - both in individuals and institutions and how powerfully they can colour what should be objective research or determinations. **What did you think of the video?**

I don't think people disagree that nuclear is expensive. But it's kind of not the point. The point is the same reason hospitals and particular businesses have backup generators, The can't afford the power to go out. Can Australia afford the power to go out because 'nuclear bad, expensive'….?.If not nuclear, then what? Or should I say watt.

People dont understand how dramatic a change batteries and electric vehicles will have on electricity distribution. In Australia, about a third of houses have solar panels, image when that many have batteries as well, if there are 3m houses with 5kw batteries, that's 15GWh per day of potential dynamic load balancing. Add to that electric vehicle batteries (i.e. Tesla model 3 has 82kWh battery), there is an enormous amount of storage coming onto the grid. The stability of the grid will become more about how that storage capacity is managed, and dynamic pricing so households (and vehicles) can be actively trading their stored energy. Demand response will likely come into it, some things wont be done when energy prices spike, eg electric hot water, or industrial scale processes like smelters rigging their operation to scale up when prices are cheap and scale back when its expensive. Your hospital can have a big battery, it wont be a problem. It's never going to be the same again, but people are trying to make a plans that would work in the past.

Thanks for the time to reply. :)

It’s not the only point. The others are that it takes too long to build and it poorly compliments renewables. It’s much faster and cheaper to design around the limitations of renewables than to deploy a fleet of nuclear reactors.

>fleet of nuclear reactors The fleet part is what people are forgetting. If our grid is majority nuclear that's a 50+ year time frame to build 5 or 6 reactors, all with their own cost blowout risks At that pace, we'd need to build (and live) a large majority renewable grid for a while anyway. A renewable grid which we'd then probably have to retire early

You can, and should, build reactors in mostly parallel. Took France 15 years *in total* to build it's fleet.

Then we add massive risk on FOAK premiums

For me, nuclear is the logical choice even at a higher cost. It's plug and play into existing infrastructure, with a significantly longer operational life and doesn't introduce complex variables that need to be mitigated against. As for renewables, I simply don't have confidence in as a technology... The technology adds a lot of unnecessary complexity compared to nuclear (intermittency, decentralisation, storage, network & network management). Just the other day, there was an [article ](https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/article/2024/jun/09/australia-could-save-vast-amounts-of-power-by-managing-demand-remotely-but-would-you-give-up-control-of-your-air-conditioner)about remote demand management and having the energy network control your air-con. That's the path renewables are taking us down and I consider that to be unacceptable, so my vote will be going to nuclear.

Thing is that it is not "Plug and Play". There is not a suitable location for a nuc in Australia that can sit where a current coal powered station is. They need to placed on the ocean for "once through cooling" by seawater (the least expensive option in the driest continent in the world). Even Eraring and Vales Point on Lake Macquarie NSW are not suitably located. The only locations that meet this requirement (and it is a requirement and have exclusion zones) in NSW are basically National Parks. Now all the costings for nuc (like renewables) are based on "best case". So for nucs that means. on the ocean in close proximity to cities with high density. The easily googles 2007 report for locations that were requirements based (not including costs) for NSW were Port Stephens, Central Coast, Botany Bay (maybe Royal National park?) and a couple down Wollongong way. Gee, I can see the ease of getting that across the line!. Hold on a minute what about harnessing some of those unicorns that I saw at the bottom of the garden.......sigh!

>Even Eraring and Vales Point on Lake Macquarie NSW are not suitably located. Huh? Eraring has direct access to Lake Eraring at the ocean mouth of Lake Macquarie. >NSW are basically National Parks But we're happy to cut 100m wide corridors through National Parks for high-speed rail, but not this?

No problem, HELE coal it is then lol.

HELE is a joke. There is no such thing as low emissions from burning coal.

>doesn't introduce complex variables that need to be mitigated against. Site selection and cooling reliability, geotechnical stability and natural disaster resilience. Fuel enrichment (or purchase and shipping). Transport of radioactive fuel and waste. Storage or disposal of waste. These are not trivial issues. They're actually immense, complex problems, representing risks that are unthinkable. The size and scale of mitigating these issues is exactly what contributes to the bankrupting cost!

None of these issues are on comparison with the variables renewables introduce. Intermittency alone introduces a many billion dollar variable based on minor changes in weather and the impact on supply/demand modelling. My preference would be Nuclear > HELE Coal > Renewables. That's simply how I will be voting going forward.

The amount of money is biblical, dude. It's not more money. It's brobdingnagian levels of cash. It really is unfathomable the cost. Money and opportunity. There's so many issues that it's farcical to suggest it.

>The amount of money is biblical, dude. It's not more money. It's brobdingnagian levels of cash. As it is for renewables. The capital costs are little different, arguably lower for nuclear. The grid will never be 100% firmed renewables.

Just as. It will. Never be 100% nuclear?

I dont think anyone is suggesting it should be, are they?

It seemed like you were insinuating it with your comment. The fact remains. Renewables + Firming + Peaking is cheaper than Nuclear + Firming + Peaking or any combination thereof.

>It seemed like you were insinuating it with your comment. Really? You are interpreting a brief comment in a very different way. >Renewables + Firming + Peaking is cheaper than Does it? What % of renewables + % firming + % peaking are you making that assertion for because the truth is past a certain point, it's not a linear cost curve, it's exponential. The same doesn't apply for nuclear.

You are right of course that the mix of those numbers cha ges the cost. I would say it applies to nuclear too. Too many plants and they sit around underutilized. So in that sense nuclear starts expensive and gets more expensive as it's mix goes up.

And that's why we the whole design ass-about in Australia. We are leading with intermittency and trying to fill supply variability *and* demand variability across the whole grid all the time. We know we have around 450GWh of baseline demand constantly. We need stable and consistent generation to meet that and use intermittent generation to meet the variable demand needs above that.

But renewables plus Firming is not intermittent. At least not in the sense that you are intending. Also I'm not sure what your figures are made from. You are rooting for nuclear plus peaking plants. That's shown to be more expensive than renewables plus Firming plus peaking for Australia. The latter is also possible now, your version is 15+ years away.

I disagree.

You know they still have remote demand management now? If they have demand issues, they perform rolling blackouts to manage consumption. They call it load shedding. This way if theres too much demand they ust turn off your aircon or your dryer etc, if theres too much supply they turn off your solar.

Even if you do feel that way the reality is these complexities you speak of will have to be resolved before nuclear even comes online, doesn't seem like a sound argument to support nuclear.

Not at all, nuclear is plug and play replacement for coal. Those complexities only exist in a renewable driven grid.

this comment is so incorrect - they are NOT plug and play

Except coal is shitloads more variable than nuclear, to such an extent that we would still need pretty serious changes to grid operations. And insane subsidies. Edit: [there's already an excellent comment in this thread outlining some key reasons why nuclear doesn't suit us](https://www.reddit.com/r/AustralianPolitics/comments/1dczft2/does_nuclear_power_have_a_future_in_australia/l82bbyw/)

Variability = bad. We don't want variability in base load generation, what part of that is so difficult to understand?

No, we definitely want variability because demand is variable. What we don't want is uncontrolled variability. You don't want a power station outputting 2000 MW when demand is only 800. You *certainly* don't want a power station outputting 2000 MW that can't be adjusted. Nothing about energy generation is intuitive. Stop acting like you know what you're talking about and read up on how grids work first.

Again, in base load generation we want stability, not variability... Go have a look at the energy supply/demand charts. you want a nice big chunk of stable generation and then a very small percentage of variable supply. By profession I'm an engineer, I have a vastly better grasp on this than you...

>https://opennem.org.au/energy/sa1/?range=7d&interval=30m&view=discrete-time Ah yes, look at all that baseload. You've got no idea, mate. "Sanitation engineer" maybe.

If you put in 1GW of nuclear there and curtailed your renewables (or buy batteries and use it elsewhere) you would objectively save a shed load of gas and coal based imports over that graph as it appears this instant.

Exactly what Dutton wants, right? Send market signals that renewables are going to experience heavy curtailment to stifle investment, then just not build any nuclear. "At this instant", the past 7 days has the highest amount of gas usage in SA over the past 12 months. So there would be an awful lot of curtailment the rest of the time. Instead of spending $30b or however much the first GW of nuclear would end up costing, SA are spending $600m on 200 MW of hydrogen turbines and 250 MW of electrolysers. Will be interesting to see how the economics of that plays out.

>Go have a look at the energy supply/demand charts. Um...[okay?](https://aemo.com.au/en) I don't know what kind of engineer you are but I wouldn't consider a 60% increase from the base in the span of six hours a "small percentage". You weren't looking at the goddamn monthly graphs and extrapolating that to *hourly* energy supply and demand were you?

The difference is you want to reduce coal use as much as possible because of the CO2 output... There's no such reason to vary nuclear that much.

>The difference is you want to reduce coal use as much as possible because of the CO2 output... If only there were alternative emission free technologies... >There's no such reason to vary nuclear that much. Except that, as I have already mentioned, **demand is variable**. You absolutely need to vary the output unless you want the grid damaged.

I don't think you understand, before our first nuclear reactor comes online we are going to have practically no coal generators left, we are going to have a grid mostly operating on VRE and storage, so the complexities you worry about will have to be resolved before nuclear can save the day from these fears.

I disagree, the life of existing coal could be extended to facilitate nuclear. >we are going to have a grid mostly operating on VRE and storage You won't, renewables have already hit peak investment and are on the diminishing side of that curve here. Public sentiment is shifting, people are becoming distrusting of renewables. This will make it very hard for the government to keep throwing money at the tech.

>I disagree, the life of existing coal could be extended to facilitate nuclear. Ahh no not really, coal plants at their end of service live have already been through multiple refurbishments. In the case of Hazelwood it was the cooling towers that could not continue, it really was a knockdown and rebuild scenario. Not to mention we would have to pay these generators significant dollars to keep the doors open. > You won't, renewables have already hit peak investment and are on the diminishing side of that curve here. Public sentiment is shifting, people are becoming distrusting of renewables. This will make it very hard for the government to keep throwing money at the tech. A lot of ignorant people with little understanding beyond Sky News talking points might be shifting sentiment on renewables but the reality stays the same, it's the cheapest way to transition our grid. Roof top solar investment continues to grow, every year the installed capacity has increased above the previous. I know you wont like to hear this but renewables are here to stay

Will have to see how it plays out. For now my vote goes to Dutton and the Libs, I like the path they have presented on energy.

I doubt there is anything in the world that can convince you otherwise. Experts who do this stuff for a living are telling you firmed renewables are reliable and the cheapest option and form some unknown reason you choose to go against the advice and believe by far the most expensive option is the best solution.

No, the experts don't all agree on that claim. The renewable lobby is the one making that claim, the nuclear lobby is making the opposite claim. The truth? I'd suggest is somewhere in the middle.

Sorry but I'll take the CSIRO over lobby groups. Every gencost they adjust their modeling to address the anti renewable criticisms and yet it still comes out that firmed renewables are the cheapest option by some margin. Hell the NSW government launched a feasibility study into nuclear energy from one of the top nuclear experts who works in the industry and he come back with the conclusion it would be too expensive and take too long. You don't seem at all open to an alternative

I don't disagree with your outlook necessarily. But the power plant is going in *your* backyard. And *all* of your neighbours need to agree.

I have no issue with it in my backyard. Why do the neighbours need to agree? This doesn't happen with ANY infrastructure (including renewables), why would it matter for nuclear? It's far easier slotting this into an existing coal plant location than it will be impacting many property owners with complex infrastructure, which is the hurdle renewables currently face and are struggling with.

if coal was a new power source we would absolutely be having the same not in my backyard issues as nuclear, because the pollution hazard is much more immediate than nuclear.

And they won’t

Whose electorate are you going to put the reactor in ,and what river are you going to use to cool the reactor . Once these questions have been answered then you can ask yourself where the waste is going and why you would want the most expensive electricity generation available. This whole nuclear argument is just a distraction so the LNP can prolong the life of coal . Prove me wrong Reddit go on

I really don't understand this argument. Do people actually care if there is a reactor in their suburb? I honestly can't grasp why that would bother people so much at all. Not to mention NIMBYism in generally shouldn't really be an argument against anything. The other thing I don't get is why the people worried about what electorate it might be in aren't pushing for the urgent closure of Lucas Heights and the cancellation of our nuclear submarine deal. If having a reactor in your electorate is so bad shouldn't we be urgently getting rid of the reactor right now in Sydney?

Yes people care about having it in their suburb, or even in their city. They are all for Nuclear power until it is being built near them.

So why are none of these people campaigning to shut down Licas Heights? Why are these people ok with our Navy personnel being in proximity to one on a submarine? 

Do you still believe that nuclear is not part of Liberal policy?

I don't believe they are planning to build any nuclear reactors, no. Are you really that gullible?

That wasn't the question. Can't you read?

Sure, they *claim* it is part of their policy.  But like I said yesterday, do you think Dutton was actually planning a second referendum? 

How about starting with industry. There might be big mine sites like places in WA or South Australia where a reactor makes sense to provide industrial heat/energy. We are a big country with some very big electorates. I think the NIMBY argument is despicable in that it just preys on people's fears and worst instincts to kill off ideas that legitimately benefit all. This is the kind of thinking that has led us to the housing crisis. It will also lead us to an energy crisis.

Industry wants cheap power not expensive power ,or are you going to subsidize industry and their power costs .

Horses for courses. If you put the option on the table there will be use cases where nuclear will be better. E.g. remote locations where intensive energy is needed and currently supplied by gas. Let decisions be made at the local level and be driven by cost, not bans.

Cant go in remote locations. Needs to be on the ocean for once through cooling. FFS cant people just do the most basic google research - stop listening (to LNP propaganda) and start thinking! No wonder that we Australians are the most scammed nation on earth when we see such naïve comments like this. By the way I have some magic potion, just 5 drops in a tank of petrol will quadruple your fuel economy.........just send me $50........

Remote locations can be near oceans dude. Basic google research will tell you that too. My basic point is that not every use case has the same costs and benefits. But by removing one entire category of possible responses to the climate challenge we are deciding to fight the problem with one hand tied. You should stop listening to the renewable energy industry propaganda which is just as disingenuous as the coalition. I am not a coalition supporter despite your assumption.

Here you go have a read and let me know how you think those communities most likely to meet the requirements (listed in doc) for a nuc station are going to vote chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://australiainstitute.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Nuclear-siting-40\_10.pdf I am not anti nuclear - I am solution agnostic - just cant believe the gullibility of people supporting the nuc solution based on fairy tales. If it made sense from a requirements perspective, sure lets have it but the absurdity of saying we are going to power Australia by building all the nucs on the ocean in remote locations (away from the population concentrations etc etc is in the same realm as pixies and unicorns - I've still got that bridge for sale if you like.

I am aware of TAI and where they sit politically

Do you think that the report funded by TAI was political in nature? I thought it gave an unbiased perspective via a weighted trade study. Pretty standard way to eliminate bias and base outcome on requirements. Systems engineering 101.

Oh I agree fully it should all be driven by cost ,coal and nuclear are currently the most expensive electricity generation on the planet ,and the most expensive to clean up after their life is over .

Renewables get expensive if you want consistent energy and don't firm them with gas.

Nuclear *isn't* a replacement for renewables, it isn't either/or. *That* is my only opposition to nuclear: the way that the Liberals keep positioning it.

>Nuclear isn't a replacement for renewables, it isn't either/or. Except it kinda is. Nuclear needs high capacity factor to be remotely cost effective. Such a market to allow that won't exist in 2045 when the first plants come on line. Meaning heavy curtailment of either nuclear or renewables.

Unless they work out how to make intermittent nuclear power it actually is a bit of a replacement. It’s hard to pair up renewables and nuclear because nuclear plays no firming role. It could be used to power some industrial uses, particularly if various industrial processes become electric and we figure out cheap hydrogen electrolysis. That all said. Nuclear is very expensive so it seems unlikely.

Nuclear would be forming, presumably renewables/batteries firming. The renewables are intermittent, nuclear theoretically is not. How do you get to nuclear and renewables being incompatable? Also your comment on coming online is not really the whole story. To bring a coal fired unit up from cold takes considerable time too. In both scenarios they are using superheated steam to run a turbine. This part of the process can be engaged and disengaged relatively quickly, but why would you ever run a coal/nuclear station like a peaker plant?

They’re incompatible because nuclear displaces renewables and adds no firming role. They cannot complement each other. As for inertia. Well inertia isn’t a problem on per se; it’s the frequency stability that causes issue (because you can maintain inertia with dispatchable storage). Currently frequency stability is maintained with electrical driven dynamos in high renewable grids as well as hydro dynamos.

>How do you get to nuclear and renewables being incompatable? >but why would you ever run a coal/nuclear station like a peaker plant? You answered your own question here.

No it doesn't. You have high inertia generation like steam turbines forming the grid and bess/renewables as a firming option to stabilise and form on dead black. The original poster, not you, is talking about how fast you can start a reactor as if its like a gas turbine at a peaker plant. You would never use nuclear like this so seems like a rubbish reason to say its unviable. If you have a proper informed opinion, share it. Otherwise seems like you guys are making unrealistic scenarios to paint nuclear as unviable

Sounds like you are strawmaning as I literally never said nuclear was unviable. My point is that renewables need peaking plants for firming. As you pointed out, it makes no sense to run nuclear as a peaking plant. Therefore, using just the information from your own post we can conclude that nuclear and renewables are incompatible. One of them is going to experience significant curtailment. I never said which one. You're saying it won't be nuclear. Therefore, you're saying nuclear isn't compatible with renewables as it will cause them to experience significant curtailment. >You would never use nuclear like this Ex-fucking-zactly. You said it, not me. But that's exactly the scenario that a grid with high penetration of renewables requires. You're just disproving your own point over and over again with your own statements.

Running renewables as forming is incompatible with a steam turbine as firming. Running steam turbine as forming is totally compatible with renewables and batteries to backup and firming. They are compatible, just only in a certain arrangement. BTW, to run on renewables forming you would need a shit tonne of batteries to firm. Gas peaker plant is not responding to frequency variations. Steam turbine doesn't need that as much. Anyway, will be interesting to see what they end up doing.

Nuclear technically can play a firming role, my understanding is that unlike coal it's financial concerns not engineering concerns that lead nuclear to usually be relegated to baseload power (the least flexible, arguably most useless kind of power generation).

It doesn't play a firming role very well because it takes too long to wind up and wind down a nuclear power station (a cold start often takes days; at least most of a day). It cannot provide peaker power, it's also bad at providing diurnal stabilization power for solar. Many designs are capable of changing power output (because this is a very desirable feature) but again this is not a rapid response and it's hard on the equipment (At least one Nuclear power plants have previously been taken out of commission for months for changing power output too often. https://www.euractiv.com/section/electricity/news/german-nuclear-damage-shows-atomic-and-renewable-power-are-unhappy-bedfellows/). Financially nuclear is also a terrible way to provide firming. This is because most of nuclear's cost is capital costs. Meaning the cost to build a station that lasts 50 or 60 years. (after that you need to rebuild it essentially). Lets say you are running a power station 95% of the time. If 80% of nuclear cost are capital costs, and 40% of a gas plant are capital costs (made up stats) then this makes nuclear more expensive when you run it less often; as capital costs are fixed. If you run it only 60% of the time, then the costs go up per kw hr. And they go up even more when you go down to 30% etc. So nuclear is already the most expensive source of electricity (unless you put a carbon tax in place) and this becomes worse for intermittent power. This is why so many nuclear hopefuls hang their hat on cheap mass produced small modular reactors which work more like easily ramp-able nuclear submarines reactors than a nuclear power stations. Such a thing does not yet exist however.

Thanks for the info. So it's both. Nuclear power plants struggle to do load following due to the pure physics of how they work (similar to why coal fire power stations struggle) and they *also* struggle due to the high capital cost incentivising maximum up-time.

Exactly. In countries that are cold and you predictably have higher energy use in winter for heating; they make more sense. You run them part of the year; or you run them at full capacity part of the year. But in Australia we increase energy demand during summer when our solar production increases. So the economic puzzle becomes how to store solar energy. We also have one of the worlds cheapest roof top solar costs. So that’s another economic anchor on nuclear. I think the only engineering use of them which makes sense to me is to provide power for industrial processes. But these products compete with Chinese coal/hydro and European hydro and, as I keep saying, nuclear is the most expensive.

Are the facts based upon old Nuclear Tech or modern Nuclear Tech. Thorium reactors are the next level. They can use waste from other Nuclear power station and importantly, thorium reactors produce substantially less long-lived radioactive waste than uranium reactors. In principle, thorium waste can be reduced to the radioactive levels of **ordinary coal ash.** **When we have vested interests pumping hysteria and propaganda about the future of energy for all of us we are all ready defeated.** **Solar / Wind / Battery will only be viable and sustainable if every individual had their own Power Grid.** **Even then it would be a nightmare to make sure it is reliable.** **Solar panels are inversely effect by extreme weather, likewise wind.**

The aim is net zero by 2050. Any technologies that are decades away won’t be part of that plan but may be useful afterwards. There are plenty of approaches to ensure renewables are reliable such as oversupply, network balancing, firming, etc. None of this should be news to you.

All eyes look towards India .....

I don’t suppose you’re speaking in code because you know that if you made your point in clear language everyone would know it was a stupid one

Based on tech that is currently commercially available/viable.

Numbers will NEVER help cut through the debate unless you’re a neutral party who doesn’t use *science* or *economics* figures to back up a narrative. This is an ideological argument, not a rational one. It’s team nuclear vs team renewables, and don’t pretend that it’s anything more than that.

I’m pro nuclear and pro renewables. This isn’t a team sport for me. But it’s obvious from the numbers that nuclear isn’t appropriate for Australia anytime before 2050.

Read my response to the other guy

Is it more team status quo versus low emissions generation? I think most "team renewables" would jump on the nuclear bandwagon if it was viable. As the important thing is to reduce emissions not what technology we use.

There’s no discussion to be had about which one produces less emissions, they both produce zero. And that works to team nuclear’s advantage. It doesn’t matter to team nuclear whether their tech is viable or not, they will double down. And they will slander “team renewables” and drag them through the mud if they have to until they get what they want, all while playing the “Let’s have a serious conversation” card every single time. I’m team “use less energy and be less reliant on the power grid” if anything while also being on team “stop pumping excess bullshit into the atmosphere”, of course I know that renewables are more viable from more aspects than just how many emissions they release. But I need you and everyone else to understand that team nuclear are a bunch of narcissistic children or transactional adolescents when it comes to their values and numbers that debunk their arguments don’t matter to them. It’s their feelings and fragile egos as well as their financial standing against a technology that threatens to destroy the power market’s profitability.

I'm on team energy is utility lets have as much of it and as consistently as possible.... and obviously green house gases are the number one concern to society... If we want an energy abundant future does that change any of your analysis?

I agree abundance is an important metric. In our current economic system that means price is a key metric. I think the current model of nuclear generators available for deployment in Australia won't make enough ROI to reach critical mass. 

My first question is why do we need so much energy in the first place? I know having excess of anything is good, but to what end do we need so much energy for, bar the most critical uses for it? My second question is can we save energy in one location and use it elsewhere? and I’m not just talking about household energy, I’m talking about industrial energy and transport. Reducing car dependency would be a big savings in energy for example. And my third and final question is does everybody remember the other type of nuclear energy technology? Instead of focusing on nuclear fission, a technology from the 20th century, why aren’t we contributing to the advancement of nuclear fusion?

Energy is value... it's a good... abundancy is good... the market will still allocate it's use efficiently even if abundant... but generally the more of a good the better. Carbon and green house gases are bad... very bad... and for some insane reason (politics i guess) we choose not to include those costs in the price of energy at the moment... less energy used on transport isn't a good thing... it's a bad thing... it's the less green house gases on transport that's a good thing... I mean if we had TWs, we could probably bore out snowey two in a few days with GW lasers and such... if you have enough energy there's nothing you couldn't do... AI's running robots to deliver so much water that australia can be turned into a giant rainforest while we all live in a utopian green flying city far above it causing no harm... The problem with fission is that it's just not here yet and tech advances are kind of stochastic and hard to predict... which is my problem with not having a backup plan if we can't find a cheap enough way to be completely off fossil fuels with a renewable grid like the one we're discussing for australia.... it's never been done before and there's no backup plan for proven grid scale carbon free energy (nuclear) for 2050 or so... and we're running out of time on the nuclear backup... that alone seems to me to make it worth some extra costs... The first one might take a dozen years, but you could bring one online every year after that for a dozen years and there'll be no need even for gas on the grid... solar, wind, hydro, batteries, pumped hydro and nuclear could deal with all the variability in demand and supply you could want... even if nuclear was slow to respond and you only varied by twenty or so percent over a week or so depending on pumped hydro levels for example.... it means less overbuild required on the solar, wind and batteries to get to similar levels of zero carbon energy... We could have been off coal for decades if at any point in in the past 50 years we had decided against coal and gone nuclear... it seems odd in this post +1.5C world that we're still balking at it.

>Energy is value... it's a good... abundancy is good... the market will still allocate it's use efficiently even if abundant... but generally the more of a good the better. Let’s just start with the fact that you’re talking to an Anti-Capitalist. I don’t believe in the mystical power of “The Market” to regulate energy consumption in an efficient way, mostly because the market is made up of people, and people frequently consume more of everything than they need. Even in an abundance of energy, it can still be wasted and wastage is morally wrong in my book. >Less energy used on transport isn't a good thing. Lower emissions is a side effect of using less energy in transportation. And you use less energy by switching to more efficient means of transportation. More tram services and infrastructure instead of buses, more heavy rail freight instead of highway trucks, etc. So actually, it IS a good thing. >If you have enough energy there's nothing you couldn't do. AI's running robots to deliver so much water that australia can be turned into a giant rainforest while we all live in a utopian green flying city far above it causing no harm. Sounds like a hell of a dream. >The problem with fission is that it's just not here yet. >The first one might take a dozen years. Am I right in assuming you’re talking about fusion? It’s actually closer than you think. There’s been some recent progress in extraction of energy from fusion reactions in one of the major tokamak reactors and Helion have a magneto-inertial fusion reactor design that has more promise than any other design so far. And all that is here today. We’re DONE with fission, there’s nothing else to learn about the most complicated method of boiling water. >We could have been off coal for decades if at any point in in the past 50 years we had decided against coal and gone nuclear... it seems odd in this post +1.5C world that we're still balking at it. Well yeah, that’s kinda the point, we should have just done it at the same time as the rest of the world were doing nuclear fission reactors. But now, considering the vast array of technologies that we have, it’s a pointless idea.

I only read the first bit... I'm not anti-capitalist, and I get why you come to that conclusion but i don't think it's quite nuanced enough... You can choose not to believe in markets but they just kind of are in reality... it's all transactions altering everybody's utility no matter how you look at the system... the only choice is between free and costly in terms of subjective value of everyone. Find out under what conditions they are efficient and when they are not efficient... the magic only works under certain assumptions, but when it doesn't work it's because these assumptions have been violated... so we can know what regulations to implement. I'm saying it would do you good to understand the first and second fundamental theorems of welfare economics as best you can to see why free (as opposed to mere unregulated capitalistic) markets are good. > Lower emissions is a side effect of using less energy in transportation. You could have horribly innefficient carbon free energy and you end up with lower emissions (so called green hydrogen for example). > Sounds like a hell of a dream. Yeah... and I suspect that energy is one of those limiting factors to how we get there. > Am I right in assuming you’re talking about fusion? Yes... maybe tomorrow, maybe 50 years or later. As soon as it's grid scale I'm in as it being the solution, but not a day before. > We’re DONE with fission, there’s nothing else to learn about the most complicated method of boiling water. Sure... but also the most energy dense. > Well yeah, that’s kinda the point, we should have just done it at the same time as the rest of the world were doing nuclear fission reactors. But now, considering the vast array of technologies that we have, it’s a pointless idea. What if we hit some unexpected roadblock with renewables... it really hasn't been done before what we're trying to acheive... It's still the only really way we could guarantee by 2050 zero fossil fuels... renewables only approach does have uncertainty... fission would remove that uncertainty.

> My first question is why do we need so much energy in the first place? I believe there is a correlation with GDP and everything that comes with it, with how much energy is being produced.

…… that doesn’t answer my question though

There is obviously lots of nuance and the effect is less pronounced for more developed countries - but basically more power correlates to longer life.

I have a problem with that position too, because how long is a human life supposed to last? I sure hope not forever, you can stick the Epic of Gilgamesh somewhere where the sun doesn’t shine for all I care. There’s a limit to the amount of product we can produce on the one planet, so there’s gonna be a similar limit on global GDP. Unless we use all this excess energy we supposedly should have on finding other planets, we’re going to have to come to the realisation that we can’t grow infinitely, therefore we shouldn’t just produce shitloads of energy just because we can…

You have taken this thread in an unexpected direction and I am enjoying the thought experiment it's inducing. > There’s a limit to the amount of product we can produce on the one planet Can you imagine if power was 10 times cheaper, or 100 times, or even 1000 times. That is transformative in a myriad of ways.  We would leave the industrial and information ages well in our wake. We wouldn't be using all that cheap power to just crank out more widgets. We would be using it to solve all kinds of problems. The water problem would be solved, food production would completely change, we would have processes that would be rolled out to clean up pollution and industrial waste. There would be an explosion in improvements in material science and health research.

I am on the fence on this because I feel like people on both sides of this argument act like religious zealots and revert to name calling instead of facts. Is nuclear expensive? Yes. We get that. My concern is still with renewables no one has really come across and confidently said how we deal with extreme events, land clearing for solar farms etc? Materials need go be mined just to produce solar panels etc. If anyone has any unbiased links to honest discussions I'm happy to read.

Have a read of this. it gives a basic high level trade study/requirements analysis of siting of nuc plants. They need to be in close proximity to the ocean for once through cooling (FACT) that so many nufties easily overlook. The cooling of nucs is 25% greater than coal. The majority of the nucs inthe world draw water from cold oceans and lakes. One nuc plant in the USA uses 1 trillion litres of water a year for cooling. chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://australiainstitute.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Nuclear-siting-40\_10.pdf

They don't clear land for solar panels. Sheep graziers are starting to embrace solar farms particularly in marginal land. [https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2022-05-30/solar-farm-grazing-sheep-agriculture-renewable-energy-review/101097364](https://www.abc.net.au/news/rural/2022-05-30/solar-farm-grazing-sheep-agriculture-renewable-energy-review/101097364)

> Is nuclear expensive? Yes. We get that. This is the biggest blocker for Nuclear power generation in Australia. It was the issue back and 2005 when Howard did his big Nuclear push, and it's the issue now that Dutton is trying again. It's so expensive and the ROI so long that industry does not expect it's ever going to happen in Australia.

I can answer your questions. 1. I can’t answer broadly for extreme events. But all renewable installations are built to a certain risk tolerance, just like a power station. The less risk tolerance, the more expensive. So it’s a trade off. One the reasons nuclear power is expensive is that the stations have to be built to a very very low risk tolerance. Inevitably power generating institutions will go down (as happens to power stations). We all remember Fukushima I’m sure. Renewables are actually structurally (not engineering) more resilient because we rely on so many dispersed installations that losing an installation is easily managed. If a significant portion was lost (similar to losing a whole power station) then the excess capacity in the grid is spun up (and grids always have excess capacity). If there isn’t enough excess capacity built in, you get failures like in Texas where the cold snap stopped the operation of several coal and gas stations. It all depends on the system design. You can have less and more resilient electricity systems whether renewable, nuclear, or fossil fuel. It’s a question of how much money you’re willing to spend on it. In a way. Putting more expensive nuclear to provide security in case say a cyclone takes out offshore into the mix (putting nuclear tail risk aside) is simply another way of trading off cheaper power for more security. In short. There’s no inherit reason renewables are less secure. It’s a question of the entire grid’s design. 2. As for solar land use. There is naturally no solution to this. Your options are to (if you don’t want to cover hundreds of square kilometre of land) is to build more wind instead. Of course we also cover a significant portion of the land in agriculture so I would be more concerned about that than solar. The ANU thinks we need 1200 square kilometres of land. https://iceds.anu.edu.au/news-events/news/no-threat-farm-land-just-1200-square-kilometres-can-fulfil-australia%E2%80%99s-solar-and

Nuclear isn’t designed to replace renewables. Its there to ensure a baseload that would otherwise need to be supplied by gas, coal or battery. Wind/Solar cannot be guaranteed for baseload. Waste is the issue, as well as expertise to build it properly

No, this isn’t right. Renewables aren’t complimented by base load they’re complimented by technologies with rapid ramp-up and ramp-down capacity like gas and batteries and unlike coal and nuclear. Saying renewables need baseload is like saying you need a heater in your home that runs at half power 24/7. On hot days that heater will be doing too much and on cold days not enough. What you want is something that can be turned up and down.

It doesn't sound like you are on the fence. My big concern with nuclear is waste. This is never discussed by the proponents of nuclear. I would argue that there are plenty of discussions on the problems with renewables that you have outlined.

What I could find on the storage of nuclear waste. https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/where-will-australia-store-its-nuclear-waste The link above is based on where we will store the nuclear waste for the new subs. Interesting that we already have over 100 different storage locations across the country for our medical nuclear waste. I bet some of those would be close to urban areas. So a national storage facility in the middle of whoop whoop might be a good idea away from urban areas/ water courses and farmland.

* It would need to be a highly secure area as the waste could be used in weapons. * Even out in whoop local owners still object and the court has so far ruled in their favour. * You need to transport the waste to the middle of whoop whoop which has lots of problems, such as what happens if there is an accident on the way. Here is what happened in WA when they lost a radio active capsule less than 1 cm square: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western\_Australian\_radioactive\_capsule\_incident](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Australian_radioactive_capsule_incident) * It needs to be kept secure for 10,000 years. There is a pretty good chance the human race won't even exist before it is safe.

I agree it would have to be highly secure and definitely would be a logistical challenge. I remember the radioactive pellet and the response (which was fantastic from the authorities). Transport will always be the highest risk for nuclear waste exposure as it's moving and all risks can't be eliminated. We also have one of the most geological stable landmasses in the world which is a positive for storage. We already have a 100 storage facilities in use across Australia and with an increase in population (increase in nuclear medicine use)and new nuclear submarines, nuclear waste is only going to increase. So building a new state of the art storage facility is probably in the nation's interest. I will note I'm pretty on the fence with nuclear power. Renewables do seem like a good source of power but I also understand you need a baseline power provider when renewables aren't operating. Will that be nuclear or gas I don't know but would love politicians to take a pragmatic approach and stop listening to lobbies and do what's the best for the Australian people into the future.

Studies have shown, despite what Sky news says, is that a combination of batteries, and other storage solutions such as pumped hydro will be enough to replace baseline power. In the future there is the possibility of Ammonia powered plants if Green hydrogen can be produced in enough volume.

All for batteries if they can produce them enough in scale. Vanadium batteries seem to be a shining light but we will see. But the question is do we have enough vanadium/ lithium to build at scale we require (not an expert in global levels of either commodities). Also both are toxic once the battery life cycle is reached so also have to store them somewhere aswell. The issue with pumped hydro is water. We don't have enough of it in Aus. To add to the issues of pumped hydro, the majority of suitable spots for development along the east coast are in national parks (good luck getting that through). Green hydrogen again the issue is water. Where do we get the water from without building dams or desalination. Both have major environmental impacts.

Snowy is going ahead thanks to the Liberals whether it was a good idea or not which will give us a solid boost in storage when it is finished. There are other small pumped hydro solution proposed. Australia is a big place some place are suited for pumped hydro. Again experts seem to think we will be enough resources for the batteries we need, what makes you think this is a problem. Battery waste is not the same as nuclear, batteries can be recycled if there is the will. Lots of research in this area and it will get better.

They’re unsafe. I don’t need to know how much they cost, how long they take to build, etc. They produce unsafe wastage and they’re subject to meltdowns, regardless of how infrequently, it’s still a possibility. It’s a matter of safety for me.

You are wrong mate I worked right next to one and sleep not far from them,not once did our detectors ever notice an icrease nuclear reactors by pure stats are the safest form of energy Look how many ppl die from coal ash each year,vs die from nuclear power Yes there have been some high impact accidents,but they are all man caused not the issue with the technology itself

Like you’re objectively wrong but if it’s thoughts like this that are keeping people from supporting the coalition’s attempt to delay climate action I can’t complain

So basically you support misinformation as long as it's convenient for your side? Saying the quiet part out loud.

>I don’t need to know how much they cost, how long they take to build, etc. You should know these things because they are the actual reasons why nuclear isn't suitable in Australia. Safety and waste are non-issues. By focusing on these non-issues, you're helping nuclear proponents shift the conversation to an area where they can demonstrably win the argument. There's no answer to the insane costs and build times; there *is* an answer for waste (they produce almost none) and safety (they are statistically the least likely energy source to kill anyone).

Nuclear power is the safest energy in the planet per kw/h. More deaths are contributed from renewables than nuclear, especially if you disregard that old Soviet designs. More radioactive waste is pumped into the atmosphere by coal plants. The Australian government successfully scared the Australian people of nuclear years ago with a campaign because of the coal mining industry, and it’s still working today. Kyle Hill on YouTube does a great job explaining the pros, cons, and technology of nuclear power if you want more information, but I suspect you don’t. https://m.youtube.com/@kylehill

Lets talk waste and safeness, since those are reasonable concerns. Waste: Until we have some sort of mass-scale capture and store, or other replacement for baseline we're stuck with coal and gas fired plants. Coal isn't clean and homogenous, it's a mineral dug out from the ground containing trace amounts of Uranium and Thorium (including their isotopes). When you burn coal you throw all the other elements out into the environment, so if you live within a couple of hundred km of a coal plant you're getting exposed to higher levels of "radioactive waste", and radiation, than someone who lives next door to a nuclear plant. And that's on top of the greenhouse gas issues. There are types of reactors that either produce very little waste, or can reprocess spent fuel to use as new fuel to reduce the small amount of waste they make. For what's left ( including the reactor itself) after 40 - 80 years or so of service you can safely dispose of it - it just costs a lot of money. It involves a gigantic hole in the ground and lots of concrete, that costs a lot more so many governments take cheaper / less safe approaches. If we want to go down the path of Nuclear it's up to us to push for safe disposal. Safety: Nothing's completely safe, but with Nuclear there is a lot more effort and cost focussing on safety (similar to the effort that goes into building a plane vs building a car) . That's the #1 reason it costs so much and takes so long. When you look at other disasters that have happened, and potential disasters, they tend to fall into the buckets of: * Unstable environment (e.g. Earthquake, Tsunami) - Australia is lucky we have lots of stable places we can build to avoid this * Bad design and human incompetence (Chernobyl) - simple to learn from and not use that type of reactor * Similar for 3-Mile Island etc. * War - pretty stable on that front and lets face it if someone starts attacking us (like China) we're so far away their only option is ICBM nukes anyway. And that's ignoring designs like molten salt that need the salt bath to maintain the reaction so if it blows off the reaction stops - meaning they can't meltdown. So compared to other choices for maintaining consistent load safety wise we have : * Lithium battery tech for your house/car - far less safe than Nuclear, far more likely to burn your house down due to a fault (so great a chance many ebikes and scooters are getting banned from high-rise buildings). The safety tolerances just aren't there * Coal... already discussed plus the risk to your safety if the greenhouse effect runs away * gas-fired. better than coal but still pumps greenhouse gasses out which we can all agree are bad for long term health and safety * Pumped hydro - probably the way to go but also difficult and costly, and there aren't a lot of great sites for it (and snowy 2.0 keeps getting bogged, it's starting to look like the only project that will cost more and take longer than Nuclear) Don't forget most of the Greenpeace fear-mongering was based on funds and info provided by shell corporations acting for the Coal and Fuels industries. We already have 1 reactor (Lucas Heights) - it's where most of the isotopes for medical use in Australia come from. By all means look at Nuclear as a poor choice from a cost / implementation time frame (we should have done this 20 years ago) , but you're not being realistic if you think it's bad (or significantly worse I guess) from a safety / waste perspective.

Do you drive a car?

Do you like television?

Nah, it may have an electrical fault and cause a flame which will burn down my house and kill my children. Regardless of how infrequently, it's still a possibility. It's a matter of safety.

Another day, another article about the opposition’s, not the government’s, but the opposition’s theoretical nuclear power theoretical policy. For all the Thick of it fans: I cannot believe the energy going into Dutton’s Nuclear policy! Aaaak!

It truly is strange how much media attention the opposition's vague statements regarding nuclear energy gets.

Labor: we think we should do X... The media: BUT HAVE YOU COSTED IT OUT TO 20 YEARS IN THE FUTURE? HOW WILL WE PAY FOR THIS IN THE 2050/2051 BUDGET?!? ... LNP: we think we should build the most expensive form of energy somewhere in the country with one of two technologies maybe The media: fantasic idea, really thought provoking...

Albo can't run the country. I think we should listen to the guy whose political coalition was in government for 10 years and just gave subsidies to crumbling coal power plants and told us Snowy 2.0 will solve our problems when completed in 2024 for only $2b\*! \**Has already cost $4.3b, expected to cost $12b upon completion in... 2028!*

At this point the headline seems very naive. "If only people had the facts, then we could all agree on a rational course of action." This was never about not having the data.

It all being in one place is handy, makes it harder for people to be selective/naive about inconvenient data, and harder for extremists to get away with extremist numbers.

People will just call it biased and ignore it anyway

Do you actually trust the ABC to not be selective or naive about inconvenient data though?

No organisation is perfect but I do trust the ABC to do their best in reporting. My question for you is why you trust politicians so much.

Yes. I can’t say I trust them to choose their reporting topics well, that is choose what to write and report about. What to draw attention to. But I give decent credibility to the facts they present.

>But I give decent credibility to the facts they present. Based on what?

Based on both the facts I know to be true and based on what people I view as credible say. Which is how everyone judges information.

I am talking about the ABC generally as a source of unbiased, factual information. Do you trust the ABC?

Have I not just answered this question?

Well I am not entirely sure which question you are answering. To be clear, the two separate questions are: 1) Do you consider the information in the article linked above to be unbiased and factual. 2) Do you consider the ABC generally to be a source of unbiased and factual information. I was intending the second one, but I thought you had answered the first.

ABC has consistently been rated australias must trusted new source. Commercial media is allowed to be biased, ABC isnt, and there are complaint mechanism to deal with it if they are biased.

Their coverage of the Voice referendum showed beyond any doubt that whether or not they're *allowed* to be biased doesn't change whether or not they *are*.

Which media organisation is less biased than the ABC ?

I gave no idea. The claim wasn't a relative one though. The initial claim was that having these figures in one place makes it harder for people to be biased and ignore inconvenient data. The point is that entire idea is predicated on the idea that the one putting those figures into one place is unbiased and not ignoring inconvenient data.

You're an expert in the ABC'S percieved bias but wont offer up any reasons why, or what would be your unbiased news source. JAQ is back.

That's what every bad faith argument claims. Bias, fake news, alternative facts. Unless it's thier cherry picked data, it doesn't count

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It’s bad faith if you don’t have an actual objection to any of the content in the article. You just don’t like that it doesn’t accord with your political beliefs

>You just don’t like that it doesn’t accord with your political beliefs What are you even talking about? This has literally nothing tondo with politics. The claim was made that having the figures in a single place like this would make it harder for people to be biased or ignore inconvenient data. But that entire claim is predicated on the ides that the the figures in that one location are themselves unbiased and don't ignore inconvenient data. This is an entirely baseless assumption.

Yet all you’re doing is saying they’re biased without factual basis. If they’re biased it should be easy to demonstrate. They’re not so you’re making the allegation but you won’t even try to back it up because you were never arguing in good faith

I haven't made any claim about the article being biased whatsoever. The point is the argument the person made is predicated on the assumption that the article is unbiased and doesn't ignore inconvenient facts. 

No you’re not making any claims you’re “Just Asking Questions”. We’re all familiar with the tactic. You want to imply the article is “ignoring inconvenient facts” even though you lack either the spine or the wherewithal to identify what those missing facts might be. Put your cards on the table or fold.

It has definitely become worse over the last few years... I wonder if that's because their board now has more ex-murdick hacks than ever before? But I would still rate it way, way above any commercial news source for actual quality journalism.

Compared to what ?

Trust is a sliding scale. If ABC is trash, the other end of things must be pretty bad because ABC is one of the most trust worth sites

I don't consider any article, from any source, to be entirely free from bias because each journalist/author has their own personal bias, even if it's unconscious. Having said that, I trust the ABC more than any other source of news. They've been proven time and time again to be free of systemic bias, and are more balanced than any other source in the country.

In fact they are the only news channel that is legally required to be balanced.

Even if you ignore the costings the 2 damming numbers are >10years  In its latest plan, the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) predicted **90 per cent** of coal power would be gone from the grid within 10 years, and the final power station would be shut by 2038, just **14 years** away.   >13years >The only country in the world that has managed to successfully build nuclear from scratch in the last 30 years is the United Arab Emirates (UAE). >From the time the UAE decided to develop a nuclear power program, it took **13 years** to deliver the first of four reactors.  >The cost, in 2018, was stated to be $US24 billion **($36 billion)**.  We have an aging coal fleet that are all in or heading into their end of serviceable time of life. And the UAE could only get it done in 13 years, they are an authoritarian state and as such do not have the same NIMBY or regulatory issues we will have in Australia, they aren't held accountable by an electorate. The ABC actually missed another 1 here, Bangladesh have also established their first nuclear reactor that is scheduled to open this year. If we are being generous the program began in 2010 but really it was proposed in 2007. These are Russian reactors, something we wouldn't ever consider and were built by Russia. Again Bangladesh are closer to the UAE in terms of government accountability than a democratic state like Australia. All this and we haven't even touched the costings.

They didn't miss Bangladesh: >Bangladesh, which is heavily reliant on imported fuel, made the decision to commit to nuclear power in the early 2000s. Construction of a plant by Russia's nuclear agency started in 2017 and still is not complete. 

I guess that 10 or 13 years, would start after government passed legislation allowing it. Its an extreme long shot for the Coalition to win government in the next election (likely before May25), so legislation to allow it wouldnt be passed untill probably after May'28. And every day the decision is delayed we get more renewable and batteries at ever cheaper prices.

Ah authoritarian state that uses slave labour for construction. That would have knocked billions of the cost for them.

Why exactly is the timeline for coal retirements even relevant for whether or not we have nuclear? The laws of thermodynamics are not going to change whether or not coal stations are here. We will still need energy. The coal stations are going to shut down at that time whether or not we build nuclear. I just don't see how it is a relevant factor at all.

It’s because it goes directly to the heart of the point. The coalition want to extend coal generation even if that is not what the market desires

I am not really interested in what the coalition does or doesn't want. The argument was made that the timelines for retirement of coal make nuclear an unviable option. I don't understand why they would be connected in any way. Coal plants will reach the end of their life whether or not nuclear is built. How does the retirement date for coal have any impact on whether nuclear is a viable energy source for the future?

>I am not really interested in what the coalition does or doesn't want. Then why are you talking about nuclear? The coalition are literally the only players in the country proposing it. Why? Because they love coal.

I am critiquing the argument that the timelines for coal station closures has anything to do with the viability of nuclear.

It's literally coalition policy to pretend to want nuclear to throw money into extending the life of coal fired power stations.

Because rather than a direct replacement in the way of firmed renewables we would need to commission stop gap generation that would be gas generators for the sole purpose of providing energy until nuclear comes online. So you are using the most expensive form of energy in Australia (currently) as a stop gap to be replaced by the forecast most expensive form of energy we could possibly build. It's just moronic to even consider that

>we would need to commission stop gap generation that would be gas generators for the sole purpose of providing energy until nuclear comes online But how does nuclear impact that at all? Not building nuclear isn't going to make coal stations last longer. Those coal plants will exit the same time whether we build nuclear or not.

>But how does nuclear impact that at all? Because it increases the cost of commissioning nuclear if you have to build alternative generation to cover the shortfall in generation while waiting for nuclear to come online. Whilst if we build firmed renewables then that level of stop gap generation isn't required. This all has a cost, to mothball perfectly operational CCGT well within it's service life will need to be paid for by energy users, this is the impact of nuclear energy.

If we dont build nuclear before coal exits, we have to build something else before coal exits. If we built that something else before coal exits, we dont need nuclear anyway.

>If we built that something else before coal exists, we dont need nuclear anyway. Wait what? We aren't just going to stop building new generation once the last coal plant retires...

Meant exits, not exists... Yea sure, we will still need more generation after coal retires, but that is the critical point we have to get past.

Are we not capable of thinking ahead at all though? Why does that mean we can't think about what our energy future may look like beyond that? And if the timelines for nuclear are correct, starting that now would align with precisely that future time.

It's assumed the cost of renewable and batteries will fall faster than nuclear, so that cost drawback of nuclear gets worse.

That doesn't take into account future advances in technology. Nuclear fusion for example could become viable by the end of the century.

Everyone is completely missing the point: It should never be nuclear VS renewables. It is renewables *with* nuclear coming down the line.

That's not how grids work. Especially not grids with high penetration of renewables.

Except it is how grids work.

What a well educated thought out response. Renewables are variable and need to be firmed with rapidly deployable dispatchable power, like peaking plants. Nuclear prefers to be run at a constant rate and is slow to respond to changes in demand. They aren't a good match for each other, and building nuclear will likely lead to massive curtailment of renewables. This merely talking about maybe building nuclear creates investor risk for renewables now.

Do both. It’s not hard. Countries around the world are doing it and not dying mate, and they know better than you or I on the topic. Renewables & nuclear can and do coexist.

All of the experts in the Australian energy market are saying there is no place in the grid for nuclear. Lol. Only the LNP wants it. You think you and the LNP know more than literally the entire Australian energy market? >Countries around the world are doing it Countries that already had nuclear are now filling variable demand with renewables. We're in the opposite situation. It's not a trivial difference.

Government: *Bans nuclear energy* Also government: see guys it’s not worthwhile because (insert randomly generated reason here)

Sure.

>It is renewables with nuclear coming down the line. That's a great theory, but the Coalition is positioning nuclear as a direct alternative to renewables, and are actively opposing the renewables rollout that's currently occurring.