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Nuclear doesn’t just have one problem. It has seven. Here are the seven major problems with nuclear energy and why it is not a solution to the climate crisis.
Nuclear doesn’t just have one problem. It has seven. Here are the seven major problems with nuclear energy and why it is not a solution to the climate crisis.
Energy storage is an issue also due to the mining it needs.
Still, I don’t understand why you think this one problem you mention is more important than the 7 of the article, to the point of saying:
Could you please explain?
Nuclear for better or worse, is a stable and well known technology. That works. Almost 24/7 and reliably. But renewables aren’t reliable at all, when there is no sun, there is no energy from solar panels, when there is no wind, there is no energy from wind farms etc. Of course, there is also hydro but even that depends on drought seasons and when there is surplus you can’t store it. And options for hydro are geographically dependent and not infinite. Basically, if you want to go full renewable, you need a huge amount of energy storage. Not just huge, but HUUUGE. And we aren’t capable of building these today. Perhaps in the future. You can say there is hydrogen, but it has problems on its own and not feasible today if ever. Bottom line is renewables are not a reliable source of energy without energy storage which isn’t there by far.
You massivly underestimate what hydro can do today. The reservoirs can be used as storage and those are massive. Norways hydro storage is 87TWh. That is about 11 days of electricity consumption of the entire EU in itself. Obviously there are issues with that, but it is a lot of storage.
Solar and wind are weather dependent. So a large enough grid will have times with lower production, but it is never really nothing. With strong connections that massivly reduces storage needs. For the EU:
https://www.energy-charts.info/charts/energy/chart.htm?l=en&c=EU&year=2024&interval=day&legendItems=jw3w1
So overcapacity is another great option. Add a bit of battery storage to balance the grid and high renewable grids are entirly possible. Even with limited hydro.
That is not to mention geothermal, biomass, hydrogen, adapting electricity consumption and a bunch of other more niche technologies.
You are citing Norway which has very favorable geography. But that’s hardly true in general. About grid - think about long winter nights where people are running heat pumps and worse means of heating tech. Will this grid be able to, let’s say, provide energy for a week? I doubt you could, assuming Norway provides their storage, distribute it all over EU. Biomass outputs CO2 and is only possible at small scale. Where are these hydrogen storages?
Anyway, I’m all for renewables and non-nuclear if somebody draws a plan that is well defined and realistic. But AFAIK we have no such plan, do we?
It obviously depends on the location and somewhat how the different technologies develop, but most of the year, you end up with a strong mix of wind and solar, as well as base load renewables. A bit of battery storage to allow one to cover a summer night or so. For longer cloudy periods with no wind you need either biomass or hydrogen.
Obviously it depends on the location and how different technologies develop in the future, but it is certainly possible.
Nuclear is not
stable norreliable. Reliability for me is also related to safety. It is well know that this technology has issues related to problems briefly mentioned in this article in the following sections:Also, it looks like you did not address any of the problematic aspects of nuclear. Which include the points above and the following:
Edit: the strikethrough, I thought it was used a synonym of “reliable”. Now that I think of it,I suppose it was in relation to the power grid?
Yep, it is a constant flow of energy.
About the problems - yes, there are problems and not minor ones, but OTOH we don’t have an alternative, do we? Also CO2 emissions are exaggerated - mining and other activities could involve more e-vehicles I suppose. What air pollution we are talking about? CO2?