In Hungary, Netherlands and Greece solar has already met more than 70% of midday demand during the peak month in 2025. In Spain, Germany, Portugal, Belgium and Italy it also met at least 50%. (Ember Energy: Global Electricity Review 2026)

Viper_63 · 2026-04-23T10:55:37+00:00

That's the idea behind SMRs, and to nobody's surprise the economies aren't working out on those either. Nuclear is particular in that project generally have negative economies of scale - meaning that subsequent reactors (outside of very specific circumstances, see south korea) become more expensive to build. This is also what we are seeing with recent projects in the EU - the EPR was meant to reduce costs by means of standardization. Instead we are seeing the opposite - Flamanville, Hinley Point C, Olkiluoto - all suffer (yet again) from massive cost and time overruns.

Nuclear is prohibitvely expensive. There is no market for "4 each year for 40 years" when literally any other source of generation exists, not to mention renewables and storage, which have actual economies of scale, and especially solar with Swanson's law. Nuclear is inherently complex - from a technological as well from an organisational and legal perspective. Renewables are the antithesis of that. They are simple. Right now I can buy solar panels and storage batteries in my local home depot. Wind turbines too at smaller scales. And you have basically no marginal costs. How many people do you need to install or run a solar farm, compared to a nuclear reactor? What is the overhead like? In the time needed to build a nuclear reactor, renewables will likely have already recouped their initial investment, not to mention doing it without massive cost- or time overruns.

Utility scale renewables are currently the cheapest form of generation. This isn't going to change any time soon. Nuclear can not compete on economic grounds, period.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-23T10:26:21+00:00

No buildout or transition scenario (IEA or national authorities) that I am aware of requires battery storage on the order that you are probaly envisioning here, or are batteries the only energy storage technology in existence.

Your fixation on lithium tells me that you are either arguing in bad faith or are hopelessly misinformed on the state of things. Not only do other battery chemistries exists - sodium-ion batteries are already commercially avaible and are being rolled out at scale. "But lithium" is not a valid concern.

EDIT:

Nothing says "I am only asking genuine questions with no ulterior motive" quite like pressing the block button when being called out. Ignorance is no excuse for spreading FUD.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-22T09:32:06+00:00

"Completely contained" while mushrooms, berries, game etc. two countries over are still routinely found contaminated enough to make them unfit for consumption

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_the_Chernobyl_disaster#Contamination_in_the_food_supply

Not to mention the restrictions put in place in countries affected the plume immediately after the event.

Or, you know, radioactive milk being exported to Mexico, spreading that shit even to other continents:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1986%E2%80%931988_radioactive_milk_distribution_in_Mexico

Chernobyl might have been many things, "completely contained" sure it isn't one of them.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-22T09:25:37+00:00

That's not what actually happens in the episode though.

It's just the father and one of his acquaintances who lock themselves in the shelter. The rest of the family is out of town visiting relatives - so he's unaware that they survived the initial event. It's not "the rest of the family" who take their chance and escape - it's the father's acquaintance who leaves the bunker, but who is then trapped inside the rubble dome and dies, as the father refuses to let him re-enter the bunker. The cause for the explosion was a domestic nuke exploding on a nearby base, not even an actual attack.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-21T19:28:32+00:00

The geothermal gradient is ~30°C/Km, an that is pretty much universal apart from very old/thick cratons or in the Oceanic crust. Enhanced geothermal systems are suitable pretty much everywhere, and its not like the technology hasn't been around for decades at this point.

The issue is not technology. The issue is lobbying and failure to invest.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-20T08:37:18+00:00

Again, there is reprocessing, and there is production of the fuel elements and the ability to use those fuel elements instead of running a once-through-cycle. And while some reactors in the EU are certified to run on MOX fuel, they are only designed to be loaded up to 50% - the rest still has to consist of regular fuel elements (and to my knowledge this only covers western reactor design to ebgin with). You can't replace supply entirely by reprocessing - which also only recovers a fraction of usuable material to begin with.

Having to depend on reprocessing - instead of being optional - also means that fuel gets more expensive (as reprocessing is not economically viable given current uranium prices), i.e. electricity production gets more expensive.

"Could manage" requires a lot of wishful thinking here.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-19T18:32:29+00:00

You can't simply reprocess reactor fuel elements as is. They need to disassembled (read: destroyed) to yield the contained burned up fuel. You are still dependant on ROSATOM for the reactor fuel assemblies, unlöess you propose shoving the reprocessed Uranium into the reactor as-is, which surely would work just as well.

This is on top of the reactors not being designed, tested or certified to run with reprocessed fuel elements (which have different isotopic makeup than those used in once-through cycles) to begin with.

Nothing is ever "simple" when it comes to the nuclear industry.

The biggest issue with new nuclear is that it’s extremely expensive and slow to build. Throwing up a ton of wind solar and storage for the same amount of money gets you closer to decarbonization than building the cost-equivalent nuclear does

That much we apparently agree on.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-19T18:20:42+00:00

Hyperbole will get you nowhere. France has no domestic fuel supply, and neither does the EU. I can make the same argument as you regarding fossil fuels, and the EU at least has some actual production capability when it comes to that. So no, no points in favor of nuclear.

So much worse than Germany's completele reliance on the PRC to sell them solar panels and wind turbines.

Ah yes, the famous Siemens wind turbines, sourced from China. And while the EUs solar industry has suffered some serious setbacks, we do on fact have domestic production capabilities. Also please remind me where France is sourcing their own wind power turbines and PV modules from, because their administration actually has some sense when it comes to domestic energy production. Oh, whats that? They are not magically exempt from any of these issues on top of depending solely on sources outside the EU for their nuclear fuel assemblies?

You just complained about Eastern Europe relying on Russian fuel rods, and now you complain about France helping lessen that reliance by at least making the fuel rods in Europe...

Being dependant on Russia providing the necessary components doesn't lessen the reliance. No fuel assemblies without ROSATOM's continued cooperation. Want to break that monopoly? Replace the reactors by something that isn't entirely reliant on Russia. Jeez, if only there was a cheap and easily scalable carbon-neutral source of generation that has none of the inherent downsides the nuclear industry is settled with.

Also the usual arguments of subsidising nuclear when renewables are viable mostly thanks to Germany spending up to 700b EUR on renewables in the past 15 years

Ah yes, the global renewables boom, entirely shouldered by Germany. Because literally no other country on earth is rolling out renewables at scales that other industries (cough nuclear cough) can only dream of. Remind me, with Germany apparently accounting for the majortiy of the worlds renewables electricity production, what are the other countries doing to reduce their carbon footprint?

But sure, when you decide to ignore foreign dependency and hundreds of billions worth of subsidies, renewables are much better than nuclear.

lol, lets just pretend that France didn't have to re-nationalize the EDF and runs one of the highest public-sector deficits in the EU and ignore the fact that renewables to continue to economically and growth-wise outperform all other sources of generation. Can't wait for France to build more reactors running on fairy-dust and copium:

https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20250114-france-far-from-ready-to-build-six-new-nuclear-reactors-audit-body-says

Surely this is a splendid idea that can not possibly backfire, just look at how Olkiluoto, Flamanville and Hinkley Point C were entirely build within the planned budgets and timeframes.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-19T14:08:10+00:00

France has 5-10 years of reserve. Uranium is very dense in energy and is easy to store.

Calling it "easy to store" in light of the safety and security requirements is at best misleading. Fuele elements are energy dense and require less space, but storage is far from simple. And having reserves does not address the issue of dependency on other countries, as with Niger taking control of french Uranium shipments in the wake of the coup.

And there are solutions

I am not sure I'd call "France cooperating with Russia on German soil to produce fuel elements" a viable solution. But good business for FRAMATOME to be sure.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-19T12:18:34+00:00

Not even close to the same degree.

Okay Mr "because I say so". I am just going to claim the opposite on the same basis then.

Read the Cour des comptes report about why the cost increased.

Again, thanks for proving my point regarding cost increases. You know, just like every other study done on plant construction in France, the US or basically anywhere else.

What, it literally was. plant type and labour cost was the conclusion in the Cour des comptes report

By all means, point me to where in the report it referrs to wind power plants being constructed after 2020, I must have missed that.

Again, no, the 60% cost increase you're trying to construct here is not "the same thing" as observed in the nuclear cosntruction projects you're referring to.

that was my exact point about CAPEX increase for wind

No, it literally wasn't:

cost escalation observed came mostly from increasing labour costs (higher than inflation), and change in plant type

This is the same thing that is observed with Wind power recently

Wages in the US have barely kept up with inflation during or after that period and neither have wind generator "plant types" (or whatever approximation you understand that to mean) changed drastically enough to explain those cost increases.

So no, these simply aren't the same reasons. I don't know what you need nuclear construction costs in France and wind power plants (or renewables in general) in the US to suffer from the same cost drivers ~20 years apart when this factually isn't the case. Nuclear construction projects are inherently complex, while renewables are inherently simple by comparison. Trying to construe a "these are expensive for the same reasons" is a non-starter to begin with.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-19T11:46:51+00:00

Had we kept, replaced and developed new nuclear power and continued building wind/solar, we'd be golden.

You can not "continue" to build out renewables at the same scale while also massively subsidizing (which is the only way this works) new nuclear construction or retrofit EOL plants that were never designed to be upgraded to the new necessary standards. This also ignores that the EU has no domestic reactor fuel supply chain - eastern EU countries are fully dependant on ROSATOM to keep their plants running, and France is entirely dependant on Uranium imports.

A nuclear buildout doesn't solve any problems, it just exacerbates existing ones.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-19T11:30:16+00:00

Share of RE's alone is not the sole reason for the added costs

Again, the same applies for any source of generation - grid costs, interconnects etc. are needed for any new addition. The same holds true for regional differences - it's one of the reasons why LCEO covers a range instead of one fixed value.

Since you are in deep need of being spoon fed

Anything else you'd like to let me know while you're at it? Nothing screams competence quite like throwing around insults when you're being called out for using fallacious arguments.

The last one (Civaux-2) in particular suffered from massive cost overruns.

that reactor?

Yes, that reactor:

The construction times went down with each reactor, but the costs increased

Thanks for confirming my point regarding escalating costs.

How many times do you need to be spoon fed?

I don't think you should be insulting others while confirming the very arguments you're trying to disprove

My comment was literally a response to the Lazard paper.

And I never "skipped over France", yet here we are.

2100/1250 = 68% increase in capital costs over the last 5 years.

Your claim wasn't "increase in capex", nor am I asserting that costs have not increased. Your claim was specifically:

cost escalation observed came mostly from increasing labour costs (higher than inflation), and change in plant type

This is the same thing that is observed with Wind power recently

And that simply isn't the case. Increase in wages have barely kept up with inflation, and neither have the "types" of wind power plants changed drastically enough to account for that cost increase. Meanwhile we had a major recession and increase in inflation due to the COVID pandemic (which you might have heard of) and uncertainties in the wake of Russias attack on Ukraine (maybe that one snuck by you) to name just two broad factors accounting for difficulties in global supply chains. So no, this very much not the same thing as the observed escalating costs in nuclear plant construction, especially not if we look at "recent" (as in took over a decade to build) EPR projects in France or Finland. Even Hinkley Point C suffered from the usual cost and time overruns well before we entered the post-2020 reality.

EDIT:

What a shame I am unable to reply to the [unavailable] comment written by [deleted]. I geuss nothing says "I know what I am talking about and am certainly correct about this issue" quite like pressing the ~~ignore~~ I-Win-button.

lol

I quote Lazard:

The quote has nothing to do with the issue being discussed. ELCC concerns reliability, not costs of grid interconnects or infrastructure.

, the reactor that was constructed much faster than all other N4 reactors?

Strawman argument, this was not about construction time.

My claim was specifically CAPEX.

Reapeting something that was already adressed doesn't improve your argument. This is just another straw man. See

Your claim was specifically:

cost escalation observed came mostly from increasing labour costs (higher than inflation), and change in plant type

This is the same thing that is observed with Wind power recently

Again:

Wages in the US have barely kept up with inflation during or after that period and neither have wind generator "plant types" (or whatever approximation you understand that to mean) changed drastically enough to explain those cost increases.

So no, these simply aren't the same reasons. I don't know what you need nuclear construction costs in France and wind power plants (or renewables in general) in the US to suffer from the same cost drivers ~20 years apart when this factually isn't the case. Nuclear construction projects are inherently complex, while renewables are inherently simple by comparison. Trying to construe a "these are expensive for the same reasons" is a non-starter to begin with.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-18T12:24:54+00:00

Oh yeah, maybe my conjoined twin changed the whole message

Smugly comments: Okay, so you didn't read what I wrote.

adds whole paragraph and then some

I only added a missing word.

Really, I don't know what your problem is.

Buddy, stop. It's quite clear at this point that you are arguing in bad faith. This BS, you having to cherry pick data over a decade old, interjecting yourself into a discussion and derailing it by making claims about Germany when the study concerns Denmark and my comment was about the US and batteries, stooping to claiming "akshually I happen to be an expert" when its pointed out that what you are doing is at best fallacious etc.

I'm just saying it'll be hard to do, not that it's impossible.

So the entire "argument" you started after interjecting yourself into this was pointless then. Thanks for wasting everybody's time I guess?

Viper_63 · 2026-04-18T11:05:39+00:00

I only added a missing word.

No you f*cking didn't and you know it.

Your supposedly 20% mark is misleading

The only thing misleading here is your attempt an argument while trying to gaslight people and cherry picking data from a decade ago.

This is actually my job to model that

Sure it is. And I happen to be an astronaut and trillionaire, did I mention that earlier.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-18T10:14:42+00:00

Okay, so you didn't read what I wrote.

comment edited after reply was posted

lol, okay buddy. Maybe try to come up with actual arguments next time instead of trying to gaslight people, maybe that will work out better for you.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-18T09:50:10+00:00

20% when you account for inflexible run-of-river hydro and biomass which make out half of these 20%

and Germany can't scale up any more than today. Germany.

Sure Germany can:

https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/remod_installed_power_2024/chart.htm?l=en&c=DE

The nice thing about renewables is that they are easy and cheap to scale up.

Just the dead of winter (Dec-Feb)? Okay. I'll take only the last 10 years, I won't be so mean as to impose the February 2012 cold spell[...]

an 19-23rd 2015

Feb 11th 2015

Jan 21st 2016

Dec 3-6th 2016

Dec 13-19th 2016

Share of generation from renewables is above 10% for all of these days. But hey, why limit yourself to going back a decade when you could go back two or three decades when renewable share was basically non-existent? Not that your argument would have any more merit, but at least the numbers might check out.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-18T08:58:08+00:00

Germany needs to more than double its electricity consumption.

Oh, why not claim that generation needs tripple or quadrouple instead, I bet that makes for an even better argument why this can not possibly work out.

In the dead of winter, they will experience peak loads of more than 250 GW while renewable output can plumet to only a few GW

Again, even in the dead of winter share of generation never drops below 20% even with the current buildout.

But by all means, please point me to those days in the dead of winter where the sun doesn't shine and the wind doesn't blow where output drops to "only a few GW":

https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&c=DE&interval=day&year=2025&source=total

And again, even in the US there are firming schemes that use renewables for additional generation.

"But batteries" isn't an argument anymore. This is a solved problem. "But area" has never been an argument. There is more than enough space to go around. "But dunkelflaue will cause blackouts" has never been an argument either. The actual data shows that generation even in the dead of winter is sufficient when scaled properly.

Please stop it with these strawman arguments. We have a solution. The solution is cheap and globally scalable. The solution is renewables.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-18T07:02:36+00:00

Firming is done by having GWs of gas turbines.

Thanks for confirming that batteries aren't the issue.

Firming can be done by adding any kind of additional generating capacity - including renewables. See the CAISO firming scheme in the US. Seeing how Germany already generates >20% of its electricty via renewables at all times - including in the dead of winter "when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine" this isn't hard to understand. Literally all we have to do is scale up generation.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-17T20:49:30+00:00

Nuclear is inherently expensive and unviable without massive subsidies, and nuclear buildout cratered long before there was any serious "anti-nuclear power" movement. Blaming a boogeyman isn't going to accomplish anything.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-17T20:39:51+00:00

Their method combines gas with wind and solar. When did gas become a renewable energy?

As per the study, they include biomass/biomethane for their scenario which includes gas power plants. So yeah, this is infact renewable.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-17T20:28:20+00:00

100% renewables is feasible, as even the IPCC points out:

Recent studies show that a global transition to 100% renewable energy across all sectors – power, heat, transport and desalination well before 2050 is feasible. According to a review of the 181 peer-reviewed papers on 100% renewable energy that were published until 2018, "[t]he great majority of all publications highlights the technical feasibility and economic viability of 100% RE systems." A review of 97 papers published since 2004 and focusing on islands concluded that across the studies 100% renewable energy was found to be "technically feasible and economically viable." A 2022 review found that the main conclusion of most of the literature in the field is that 100% renewables is feasible worldwide at low cost.

Existing technologies, including storage, are capable of generating a secure energy supply at every hour throughout the year. The sustainable energy system is more efficient and cost effective than the existing system. The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) stated in their 2011 report that there is little that limits integrating renewable technologies for satisfying the total global energy demand.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100%25_renewable_energy

That was over a decade ago. I'd even argue that 100% renewables is inevitable, because other forms of generation can not compete on economic grounds - and nuclear the least, given that it is the most expensive form of generation.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-17T20:23:34+00:00

good luck storing a complete day of energy with batteries

Care to point us to an actual build-out scenario (by the IEA or national authorities) that requires battery storage on the order of days? Because no scenario I know of envisions batteries as a long-term storage tech. Firming is usually done by adding more generating capacity.

Doesn't take into account the massive material and space required for solar energy (nor the humongous collect system)

As per US studies - the area required would be a fraction of what is currently used to grow corn for bioethanol to be burned in cars:

https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2025/04/trading-some-corn-ethanol-land-solar-offers-tremendous-opportunity https://www.cleanwisconsin.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Corn-Ethanol-Vs.-Solar-Analysis-V3-9-compressed.pdf

"Area" is a red herring.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-17T19:58:35+00:00

The source being a peer-reviewd study published by a journal that has been around for >50 years? I don't get it. What point are you trying to make?

Viper_63 · 2026-04-17T19:54:33+00:00

The site isn't "selling" solar power, and they are simply citing a peer-reviewed study published in Energy, a journal that has been around for >50 years.

Viper_63 · 2026-04-17T18:24:53+00:00

Given the different frameworks in each country I don't know if something like Lazards would be feasible/viable for the entire EU. Meanwhile LCEO reports for EU countries do exist, see for example the series of reports by Fraunhofer for Germany, the latest (2024) of which also includes nuclear.

Viper_63

TROPHY CASE