[cfg83]

NeilBlanchard -

Thanks for your commentary. I follow the RMI argument against nuclear :

Forget Nuclear

Nuclear power, we’re told, is a vibrant industry that’s dramatically reviving because it’s proven, necessary, competitive, reliable, safe, secure, widely used, increasingly popular, and carbon-free—a perfect replacement for carbon-spewing coal power. New nuclear plants thus sound vital for climate protection, energy security, and powering a growing economy.

There’s a catch, though: the private capitalmarket isn’t investing in new nuclear plants, and without financing, capitalist utilities aren’t buying. The few purchases, nearly all in Asia, are all made by central planners with a draw on the public purse. In the United States, even government subsidies approaching or exceeding new nuclear power’s total cost have failed to entice Wall Street.

The Nuclear Illusion - May 2008
https://www.rmi.org/images/PDFs/Ener...uclIlusion.pdf

A widely heralded view holds that nuclear power is experiencing a dramatic worldwide revival and vibrant growth, because it’s competitive, necessary, reliable, secure, and vital for fuel security and climate protection.

That’s all false. In fact, nuclear power is continuing its decades-long collapse in the global marketplace because it’s grossly uncompetitive, unneeded, and obsolete - so hopelessly uneconomic that one needn’t debate whether it’s clean and safe; it weakens electric reliability and national security; and it worsens climate change compared with devoting the same money and time to more effective options.

Yet the more decisively nuclear power is humbled by swifter and cheaper rivals, the more zealously its advocates claim it has no serious competitors. The web of old fictions ingeniously spun by a coordinated and intensive global campaign is spread by a credulous press and boosted by the nuclear enthusiasts who, probably for the first time ever, now happen to lead nearly all major governments at once. Many people have been misled, including four well-known individuals with long environmental histories -- amplified by the industry’s echo box into a sham but widely believed claim of broad green endorsement -- and some key legislators. As a result, the U.S. Congress in late 2007 voted $18.5 billion, and the industry will soon be back for another $30+ billion, in new loan guarantees for up to 80% of the cost of new U.S. nuclear units. And the long-pronuclear British government, abruptly reversing its well-reasoned 2002 policy, has decided to replace its old nuclear plants with new ones, although, it claims, without public subsidy -- a feat no country has yet achieved. Thus policy diverges ever farther from market realities.

The Case Against Nuclear

Lovins highlights four problems with nuclear that keep it from competing against cheaper, swifter rivals such as cogeneration, wind and energy efficiency:

Cost: Nuclear plants are very expensive to build, and getting more so. Worldwide, construction costs have risen much faster for nuclear plants than non-nuclear plants.

Carbon: Because new nuclear power costs far more than its competitors, it buys far less energy per dollar, and therefore displaces far less coal energy per dollar than other sources of power.

Reliability: When nuclear plants go offline, they fail in billion-watt chunks and take a long time to restart.

Security: Proliferation is greatly facilitated by nuclear power’s flow of materials, equipment, skills, and knowledge, all hidden behind an innocent-looking civilian disguise.

On all these fronts, Lovins says small, distributed energy sources are better buys than nuclear. ...

Missing the Market Meltdown - May 26, 2008

Capitalists have already scuttled Patrick Moore's claimed nuclear revival. New U.S. subsidies of about $13 billion per plant (roughly a plant's capital cost) haven't lured Wall Street to invest. Instead, the decentralized competitors to nuclear power that Moore derides are making more global electricity than nuclear plants are, and are growing 20 to 40 times faster.

In 2007, decentralized renewables worldwide attracted $71 billion in private capital. Nuclear got zero. Why? Economics. The nuclear construction costs that Moore omits are astronomical and soaring; low fuel costs will soon rise two-to fivefold. "Negawatts"—saved electricity—cost five to 10 times less and are getting cheaper. So are most renewables. Negawatts and "micro-power"— renewables other than big hydro, and cogenerating electricity together with useful heat—are also at or near customers, avoiding grid costs, losses and failures (which cause 98 to 99 percent of blackouts).

The unreliability of renewable energy is a myth, while the unreliability of nuclear energy is real. Of all U.S. nuclear plants built, 21 percent were abandoned as lemons; 27 percent have failed at least once for a year or more. Even successful reactors must close for refueling every 17 months for 39 days. And when shut by grid failure, they can't quickly restart. Wind farms don't do that.

CarloSW2