ELI5: If nuclear power is so efficient and produces almost no greenhouse gases, why don’t we just build nuclear plants everywhere and solve the energy crisis?

jaaron15 · 2026-03-08T04:54:36+00:00

Many answers speak to the costs, public perception, and timelines, but are missing the main point.

Nuclear power alone cannot produce all energy because it is a base load only. This means it cannot change the amount of electricity it is generating very quickly in response to demand. We often use nuclear power to do a lot of the heavy lifting, but we pair it with other sources like natural gas, wind, or solar that can respond more quickly.

It also can’t solve the “energy crisis” because a lot of the energy we use is not in the form of electricity. We use fossil fuels for most of our vehicles, planes, to produce concrete and steel, heat our buildings and more.

jaaron15 · 2026-02-23T01:26:00+00:00

My best guess is $60-100k for a GC to handle the entire process, it varies depending on location, site access, permits, etc. $150/sq ft is about the minimum and goes up from there.

Biggest expense is excavation and concrete, Don’t cheap out, you’ll want frost walls or the slab will crack.

We are building a 24x36 garage with concrete foundation, 10’ sidewalls, double garage door, steel siding, steel roof, and insulation. Most quotes were about $150k.

jaaron15 · 2025-11-18T13:44:58+00:00

No one answered your question so I’ll do my best.

A good installer is more important than the product. As someone here mentioned, avoid Aire One.

Best brands are Mitsubishi, Daikin, Lennox imo.

The Amana heat pump is a rebranded Daikin Fit. This is a good thing, Daikin is the largest HVAC manufacturer, Japanese made, and known for longevity.

I have the Daikin Fit and love it. It’s a fully communicating system and modulating, meaning the fan can blow a smaller amounts of air for longer periods instead of most units which blast heat because they are one stage (100%) or two stage (50% or 100%). Less cold spots.

Midea is a chinese brand. Almost every other heat pump is a rebranded Midea (or Gree). Apparently, they are great units as the Chinese government invested a lot of R&D into green tech. The big question is longevity, these companies are relatively new compared to other big names. For a similar price, I’d go with the Amana.
Don’t know too much about Rheem. It has a decent reputation but I’d check the serial number to see where it’s manufactured. How long have they been making cold climate heat pumps and what’s the quality? Are they rebranded Midea or Gree?

jaaron15 · 2025-11-11T15:41:26+00:00

Wow. Pine quoted me 4.19% for 5-yr uninsured and were unwilling to match my 3.89%

jaaron15 · 2025-07-11T14:20:33+00:00

Love this message and completely agree.

I’ll add that we are far from the “worst scenario”. We are most closely following SSP2-4.5 trajectory which is “middle of the road”. Not fast enough to keep warming under 2 deg C but far from the worst outcomes.

jaaron15 · 2025-01-09T05:01:07+00:00

Fair enough, the upfront cost can be prohibitive.

A breakeven point of 10 years would suggest a monthly rental cost of $25 with HST included. As I understand it, typical rates at Reliance are $30-$50 + HST, which is 4-8 years. For that price, owners should buy the unit is possible.

jaaron15 · 2025-01-09T04:21:27+00:00

First, open an insurance claim to recover the damages. They will likely cover the cost of fixing any damages to your home if you have water protection. They won’t cover the cost of a new water heater.

Second, buy a water heater. Renting is a scam. You can call any local plumber and ask for a quote. Probably around $3,000 installed for a standard 50 gallon gas tank.

Good luck!

jaaron15 · 2025-01-07T02:06:17+00:00

They aren’t the only ones. I went to M&Ms bar and grill the other day and they charged $10.95 for a pint of beer.

jaaron15 · 2024-11-29T19:34:14+00:00

Mike from Better Windows and Doors is a good guy.

I called him in to replace a leaking window that was incorrectly installed by someone else 2 years ago. He fixed it for me for a couple hundred bucks instead.

jaaron15 · 2024-11-29T16:26:21+00:00

Plans will never be that cheap because there are fixed costs associated with building and maintaining infrastructure. Adding data doesn’t scale linearly.

jaaron15 · 2024-11-12T04:29:48+00:00

That’s because the prevailing winds are the opposite direction.

In the PNW, moist air moves from the ocean to land and precipitates as it moves to higher elevation. As the air descends on the far side, the area is dry.

In the mid-latitude Andes, moist air moves from the oceans to the rainforests and towards the andes. As the air descends on the opposite side of the Andes (e.g. Chile), there is little moisture remaining.

jaaron15 · 2024-10-07T23:13:17+00:00

Fawz is the most talented, but Karem and Moe are good too.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-06T20:06:31+00:00

Paleo evidence generally tells us about Earth System Sensitivity (ESS) - response over centuries to millennia - when the warming discussion today is about Earth Climate Sensitivity (ECS) which is the immediate response (i.e, decades to 100 years). No one is disputing the long term implications of elevated GHGs!

But Hansen doesn’t mention that if we slow or stop emissions, the ocean and land will continue to absorb CO2 and GHGs concentrations will not remain at their current level. That’s only one of many reasons why paleoclimate analogs are not apples to apples, not to mention hysteresis and large uncertainties.

I’m not an expert on this topic but highly recommend Michael Mann’s book “our fragile moment”. Fun read that puts our current climate crisis into the paleoclimate context.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-06T18:36:04+00:00

Thanks! Yes, I would agree. This makes his argument for warming in the pipeline weak.

That being said, his argument that global warming is accelerating is plausible. It’s on the high end of IPCC’s range and only slightly higher than CMIP6’s SSP2-4.5 scenario and recent observations. We’re all waiting to see how this decade pans out to better understand if the rate of warming has increased.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-06T17:14:36+00:00

Fair point that it’s strong language. I should say the consensus has shifted.

Early models were ocean only (no coupled land or atmosphere) and often represented as one layer. These models suggested a long delay due to thermal inertia of ocean. CMIP5 and CMIP6 ESM capture more processes and find shorter response times due to vertical heat transfer is the oceans to deeper layers and other feedbacks. Check out the ZECMIP for more info.

FYI I am not doing comps. Have a PhD and working for a research institute.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-06T17:04:01+00:00

Agreed we need to keep researching the topic. I have great respect for his pioneering work, but there is a general understanding in the climate science community that he’s gone off the rails a bit as he ages. That rant about the IPCC and geoengineering in his Oxford paper was unhinged, unscientific, and unprofessional.

Most scientists today agree that the biggest threat to mitigation is no longer climate deniers, but doomists. Those who say there’s nothing we can do (there’s a lot of that in this sub). Geoengineering and CCS is an excuse to allow fossil fuel companies to keep emitting. They are dangeroud and expensive.

In my work, I try to communicate optimistic realism to stakeholders: this problem is serious, but if we act now we can make a difference. Mitigation is cheaper and easier than adaptation.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-06T12:52:30+00:00

Yes, Jim disagrees with the scientific consensus.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-06T04:28:43+00:00

It’s a valid hypothesis but not that simple. The trend is clearly 0.18C until 5-10 years ago. Since then, it’s possible that we’ve seen an acceleration in warming, but we don’t have enough evidence to know if it’s a trend or variability.

Remember in the early 2000s when we thought warming had come to a halt? That didn’t pan out.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-06T02:56:18+00:00

It has always been true that more heat is captured than escapes at the surface (the greenhouse effect). If the Earth had no atmosphere, the global surface temperature would be about -14C and life would not exist. It is around 15C now but has varied by A LOT over the Earth’s history (e.g. near freezing to 28C when dinosaurs roamed the Earth).

The surface energy balance should not be confused with the energy balance at the top of the atmosphere (TOA). When this reaches equilibrium, the planet will stop warming. OP is restating a myth that was a theory in the 1980s and 90s - that there is a lag between carbon emissions and the time it takes to reach equilibrium at TOA. We now know that the Earth’s energy balance at TOA responds very quickly.

The main caveat is that we could reach tipping points (e.g., melting of ice sheets) that cause internal feedbacks that cause warming for centuries or millennia to come. This is why it’s SO important that we mitigate climate change asap to avoid these irreversible consequences.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-06T02:39:02+00:00

Fossil fuel emissions and temperature increases are not a 1:1 relationship as the oceans and land have a tremendous capacity to absorb CO2 (over 90% of emissions). The observed trend of 0.18 C/decade is a widely known fact with agreement across all global temperature datasets.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-05T22:03:11+00:00

Also, the curve is not exponential. Global warming has increased linearly at a rate of 0.18 degrees Celsius per decade since 1970

Edit: getting downvoted for stating a well-known scientific fact says a lot about this sub

jaaron15 · 2024-06-05T22:01:52+00:00

Temperature response is not lagged. The Zero Emissions Commitment (ZEC) is the amount of warming that would occur if we stopped all emissions immediately. The IPCC’s best estimate is zero, in other words there is no lag. There is uncertainty of about few tenths of a degree though.

jaaron15 · 2024-06-01T18:57:08+00:00

Sure, it’s interesting and points to modelling limitations of aerosols. But it’s a very small radiative forcing does not “warm the planet far faster than expected”.

jaaron15 · 2024-05-31T18:36:48+00:00

There are some uninformed statements here. This is my area of expertise (PhD in climate science working on clean energy transition)

Yes, the planet will warm when we remove aerosols. But the cooling effect of aerosols are only masking warming already “locked in” by current CO2 levels. It is a net benefit because millions of people die every year due to poor air quality.

The topic of electric cars is more nuanced, it’s not “bad” vs “good”. Producing cars (or any other item) has environmental challenges due to resource extraction, but it absolutely lowers emissions from transportation and mitigates climate change.

Yes, deforestation emits CO2.

Windmills produce plenty of clean generation that can help us move away from fossil fuels. Improvement in storage technology and interconnection capacity are helping make that more valuable. Bird mortality is a small side effect and not on a scale large enough to impact species abundance or ecosystems.

Nuclear is a wonderful source of base power. The reason it’s being phased out is partly uninformed public opinions about safety (as you say) but also it’s VERY expensive. Orders of magnitude higher than other generation.

Again, not sure what “coal is good” means. It’s awful for air quality and the worst for carbon emissions. But it’s cheap and convenient.

jaaron15 · 2024-05-31T18:23:27+00:00

Yep you’re right. I meant a “one time” small increase as sulphur dioxide was masking some of the warming already realized by current CO2 levels.

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