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Anon questions our energy sector (slrpnk.net)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/science_memes@mander.xyz
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[–] 4 points 2 years ago* (2 children)

The same problems faced the oil industry too, with their drilling rigs & refineries (over budget and over schedule, with gov money grants and subsidies), it's just less in the media & more spread out (more projects).

Also 10s of billions is still insignificant for any power, transport, or healthcare infrastructure in the scheme of things - we have the money, we just don't tax profit enough. And we don't talk about how the whole budget gets spent (private or public), where all the money actually goes, instead we get the highlighted cases everyone talks about. But not about the shielded industries when they fuck up.

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Also 10s of billions is still insignificant for any power, transport, or healthcare infrastructure in the scheme of things -

    Bullshit. If you can get the same amount of reliable power by just slapping up some solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries, then obviously the cost is not insignificant.

    That sentence shows that you really aren't thinking about this as a practical means of power generation. I've found that most fission boosters don't so much like actual nuclear power, but the idea of nuclear power. It appeals to a certain kind of nerd who admires it from a physics and engineering perspective. And while it is cool technically, this tends to blind people to the actual cold realities of fission power.

    There's also a lot of conspiratorial thinking among the pro-nuclear crowd. They'll blame nuclear's failures on the superstitious fear of the unwashed ignorant masses or the evil machinations of groups like Greenpeace. Then, at the same time, they'll ignore the most bone-headedly obvious cause of nuclear's failure: it's just too fucking expensive.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

    Bullshit. If you can get the same amount of reliable power by just slapping up some solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries, then obviously the cost is not insignificant.

    I'm thinking in practical terms how that still doesn't happen that often, humans allocate assets, humans don't behave logically (behavioural economics).

    Nothing ever is going to be perfect and efficient, solar panels might get through vast price volatilities as well, installation costs hand already soared.

    Then, at the same time, they'll ignore the most bone-headedly obvious cause of nuclear's failure: it's just too fucking expensive.

    So why did we subsidised so much expensive oil infrastructure. And at higher cost of life.
    Oil rigs can go into billions of dollars (and thats not even the total cost), nuclear plants tend to have the total running cost up-front (with decommission costs after the planned decades).

    Humans don't make economic decisions rationally.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 years ago

    Well if we had no alternative I would agree with you and I would be okay if we had to subsidize nuclear (which isn't emissions free due to the mining and refining of uranium bye the way). But if a country like France, which has a pretty high rate of acceptance regarding nuclear, can't get it to work, who will? Apart from maybe authoritarian countries. Just think about the amount of plants we have to build to create a significant impact, if hardly any plant has been built in a relative short timeframe. I'd say put money in research yeah but focus on renewable, network, storage and efficiency optimization for now.

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