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Japan has opened its first osmotic power plant

(www.theguardian.com)
301 points pseudolus | 2 comments | 25 Aug 25 02:53 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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setgree ◴[26 Aug 25 18:44 UTC] No.45030567[source]▶
> While it is still an emerging technology being used only on a modest scale as yet, it does have an advantage over some other renewable energies in that it is available around the clock.

I notice the 'some' here, and the absence of the word 'nuclear' from the article, which of course is also available around the clock. Most readers will know something about Japan's troubled relationship with nuclear power and can fill in that context themselves, but to my eyes, it's a startling omission.

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Arnavion ◴[26 Aug 25 18:52 UTC] No.45030651[source]▶
Some other *renewable* energies. Nuclear isn't generally considered renewable.
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wafflemaker ◴[26 Aug 25 21:05 UTC] No.45032325[source]▶
But it's inexhaustible. Sun will die at some point and moon will fall down to earth. Then we'll have no solar and no waves.
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immibis ◴[26 Aug 25 21:29 UTC] No.45032552[source]▶
Nuclear is quite exhaustible. If we use it to power everything, we have about 100 years worth. It's just another kind of fossil fuel, storing energy that was captured long ago.
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1. Aachen ◴[27 Aug 25 11:35 UTC] No.45038230{4}[source]▶
Idk why this is downvoted. People should look it up before you thinking someone isn't contributing to the conversation

> The European Commission said in 2001 that at the current level of uranium consumption, known uranium resources would last 42 years. When added to military and secondary sources, the resources could be stretched to 72 years. Yet this rate of usage assumes that nuclear power continues to provide only a fraction of the world's energy supply.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uranium_mining

Or depends also on what we're willing to pay for the power but critics already call it too expensive compared to be viable given renewables' price and price history

The estimate is outdated but I didn't quickly find newer info and it's just generally not a weird notion to say it's exhaustible

Imo we should make use of what we have and not wait for everyone to put solar on their roofs to supply like 10% of what we need and then wonder how else we're going to reach net zero (especially in local winter), but that's another discussion

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2. ranger_danger ◴[27 Aug 25 15:56 UTC] No.45041400[source]▶
I think those numbers unfairly assume many things, including:

- breeder reactors will not exist in time

- we will not find more uranium on Earth than we have already

- we will not be able to economically extract uranium from seawater, phosphate minerals, coal fly ash or other sources

- other materials besides uranium will not be used in the future

- synthetic production will not become viable

To say that nothing will change in the next 40-70 years and we will simply run out of material and stop using nuclear altogether, just seems quite far-fetched in my opinion.