[HN Gopher] China's quiet energy revolution: the switch from nuc...
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China's quiet energy revolution: the switch from nuclear to
renewable energy
Author : flgb
Score : 20 points
Date : 2024-05-03 22:12 UTC (48 minutes ago)
(HTM) web link (johnmenadue.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (johnmenadue.com)
| aurareturn wrote:
| On HN, there are a lot of nuclear proponents. Any comments from
| them on this article? Just curiosity from me because I don't know
| much about this topic.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Nuclear is slower and more expensive to deploy than solar or
| wind. Nobody should dispute that. We should deploy the latter
| as quickly as possible. _In addition_ , we should build nuclear
| plants, certainly until we've phased out coal and oil for
| primary generation.
|
| The article describes China scaling back new plants at a slower
| pace--about 5 a year instead of ten-but that's still a multiple
| of anything we're doing.
| pfdietz wrote:
| The analysis I've seen doesn't support the position we should
| also be deploying nuclear. We come out ahead rolling out
| renewables and storage as fast as possible, driving these
| technologies down their experience curves. Any new nuclear
| added will likely close early when it can't even make an
| operating profit.
| causality0 wrote:
| The article makes it pretty clear the shift was prompted by
| their ongoing failure to meet their nuclear goals as well as a
| dropping cost of renewables, not by a philosophical choice to
| embrace only renewables.
| MostlyStable wrote:
| its short and mostly just a description of whats happening. Not
| much to comment on. Except for the last sentence that says that
| nuclear "can't" compete with renewables.
|
| Firstly, it's actually competing with coal, which is what is
| going in instead, and secondly, any regulatory regime that
| slows nuclear deployment so much that you instead install coal
| is deeply, _deeply_ flawed. Nuclear is orders of magnitude more
| safer than coal, and has been for 50+ years. They need to
| figure out which roadblocks are slowing it down and remove
| them.
|
| Regulation is a choice. Sometimes it's a very good choice. But
| if your options are "highly regulated nuclear" and "coal", then
| you have made some poor regulatory choices.
| TeeMassive wrote:
| I've always found these articles about China adopting green
| policies and shifting its industries towards green energy sources
| to be suspicious. If they were true then why are China's emission
| ever increasing year after year:
| https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china
|
| If their share of renewables / nuclear energy were increasing
| then there would be a decrease in C02 emissions per capita, but
| that has never been the case even with the increase in
| announcements in "green" mega projects over the years.
| janice1999 wrote:
| is this so hard to explain?
|
| - CO2 comes from sources other than energy (electricity)
| production.
|
| - Overall energy usage is increasing, outpacing % growth of
| renewables.
| MegaDeKay wrote:
| From the article: "Previously China expected that its energy
| emissions would peak in 2030, but revised forecasts are now
| indicating that this could happen as early as 2024, 5-6 years
| ahead of target."
| robertlagrant wrote:
| > If their share of renewables / nuclear energy were increasing
| then there would be a decrease in C02 emissions per capita
|
| This seems a bit obvious to say, but that wouldn't be the case
| if the standard of living were also being raised. Also, there's
| a huge amount of CO2 generated by non-energy means; e.g.
| building with concrete.
| socks wrote:
| https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/china-dominates-rene...
|
| "There is also a caveat to China's rapid build-out of renewable
| capacity because at the same time it is still adding
| substantial coal-fired generation."
|
| "China already accounts for 53% of the world's 2,095 GW of
| operating coal-fired generating capacity, a share likely to
| increase in coming years as more coal plants are retired in the
| developed world."
| tomohawk wrote:
| China is building a lot of coal power plants.
|
| https://energyandcleanair.org/publication/chinas-new-coal-po...
|
| And industrializaing vast swaths of land by covering it with
| solar panels.
|
| https://www.facebook.com/XinhuaSciTech/videos/solar-panels-o...
| spacebanana7 wrote:
| Coal has excellent politics, especially in India & China.
|
| It's mineable almost everywhere people live, is burdened by
| little international regulation (at least compared to nuclear),
| and is labour intensive enough to create powerful local
| advocates.
| janalsncm wrote:
| The undeniable fact is that humans are very electricity hungry.
| Cheap electricity opens up tons of downstream benefits.
|
| I am envisioning something like an international market for
| clean electricity. Something like an internet for power. This
| would enable developing countries to leapfrog dirty methods
| like coal, similar to how many countries leapfrogged over
| credit cards and cheques we still have in the US. Of course the
| UHVDC technology may not be ready for it yet.
| janalsncm wrote:
| It is telling that a country with basically none of the American
| barriers to nuclear (NiMBYism, slow construction) is also
| shifting focus to solar and wind. It's just simpler. You can put
| up a solar panel tomorrow and start generating power.
|
| A solar panel is a self-contained prefab power generating unit.
| Even with all of the advancements in nuclear, we still don't have
| anything like that.
| spacebanana7 wrote:
| It's very difficult to estimate the true cost of nuclear power
| because so many resources are spent on safety features rather
| than the basic stuff essential to power generation.
|
| New construction cost per energy out can vary by 5x, even against
| the grain of expected purchasing power parity advantages:
|
| https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/why-britain-is-building-...
| pfdietz wrote:
| Safety features aren't essential to power generation?
| spacebanana7 wrote:
| Yes, but after a certain point it becomes a matter of risk
| tolerance.
|
| Apparently some radiation standards in nuclear power plants
| work out at millions/billions of dollars per year per life
| saved
|
| https://jackdevanney.substack.com/p/nuclear-power-is-too-
| saf...
| WalterBright wrote:
| In the Pacific Northwest, I see rooftop solar panels half-covered
| with mildew. I wonder how that affects the power generation, and
| how often one would have to climb up on the roof to scrape them
| clean.
| ajross wrote:
| The article is about industrial generation, not home solar
| which is largely a vanity thing still. Go look for mildew on a
| big solar farm on the other side of the Cascades.
|
| You'll need to dig through all the wind turbines and dams to
| find them though. The PNW has better choices than solar anyway.
| henry2023 wrote:
| To this day I think that nuclear is the best way to produce clean
| and abundant energy. There only one problem. Only governments
| build nuclear reactors and if you want to innovate in this space
| you need to deal with these institutions which adds a lot of
| complexity is dealing with these institutions.
|
| Solar on the other hand appeals to the public and can be deployed
| in large scale facilities. Large scale economics apply directly
| and we can see that by looking at the historic price per kW[1].
|
| Finally, me as a nuclear advocate own 14x550w panels + a 20 kWh
| battery. I'm off grid > 95% of the year. Solar is unstoppable
| now.
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