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EU court rules nuclear energy is clean energy

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1041 points mpweiher | 2 comments | 12 Sep 25 18:18 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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m101 ◴[13 Sep 25 07:25 UTC] No.45230060[source]▶
I think a good exercise for the reader is to reflect on why they were ever against nuclear power in the first place. Nuclear power was always the greenest, most climate friendly, safest, cheapest (save for what we do to ourselves), most energy dense, most long lasting, option.
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AndyPa32 ◴[13 Sep 25 08:01 UTC] No.45230223[source]▶
I disagree with cheapest. If you factor in twenty years build time and nuclear waste disposal, the whole thing is not economically viable.

Then there's a problem with nuclear fuel. The sources are mostly countries you don't want to depend on.

You are of course right with your assessment that nuclear is green, safe and eco-friendly. That's a hard one to swallow for a lot of eco activists.

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freetonik ◴[13 Sep 25 08:07 UTC] No.45230243[source]▶
Long build times are often the result of constantly changing regulations. Also it’s interesting that build times in Japan are almost 2 times smaller than in US.
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rootsofallevil ◴[13 Sep 25 09:02 UTC] No.45230554[source]▶
Nuclear doesn't have a great record in other countries either. I might have the wrong figures but Hinkley Points C is over 2 times over budget and likely to be 5+ years late.

The exemption being France and maybe China?

France did a programme of nuclear power stations rather than the 1 or 2 offs that seem to be the norm elsewhere and that seems to have worked pretty well.

I'd be surprised if HPC is competitive with solar + wind + BESS when it comes online but I could well be wrong

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1. Nursie ◴[13 Sep 25 12:55 UTC] No.45231709{4}[source]▶
It won’t be competitive with anything.

But that’s OK, Theresa May signed a guarantee that they’d get paid an uncompetitive price by the taxpayer, regardless.

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2. ZeroGravitas ◴[13 Sep 25 13:19 UTC] No.45231885[source]▶
But that expensive guaranteed price still wasn't enough to cover the actual costs and the EdF CFO resigned in protest.

Once that became too obvious to deny, after the French government had renationalised EdF, they were begging the UK government to give them more money, possibly buried in the contract for the second plant build.

For that build they stopped using CFD, a financial instrument designed for nuclear but which has massively helped renewables, be ause it couldn't hide the nuclear cost overruns. They're now charging electricity users in advance for the nuclear they are going to build with no guarantee of eventual costs.