Demand for uranium for reactors seen jumping 28% by 2030 -report
www.reuters.com
Demand for uranium in nuclear reactors is expected to climb by 28% by 2030 and nearly double by 2040 as governments ramp up nuclear power capacity to meet zero-carbon targets, the World Nuclear Association (WNA) said in a report on Thursday.

Nuclear capacity is expected to rise by 14% by 2030 and surge by 76% to 686 GWe by 2040, the report said

This is only good news if it displaces thermal coal and gas generating stations.

  • Kalash
    10•1 year ago

    Wind and Solar aren’t reliable, so you either need storage or a backup source to compensate when demand peaks above production from renewables.

    • @[email protected]
      4•1 year ago

      Absolutely! The way I see it, grid energy storage is something we really need to improve dramatically.

      • Kalash
        5•1 year ago

        Yeah, but there really aren’t that many good options for it. Pumped Hydro is by far the best but limited by geography.

          • Kalash
            4•1 year ago

            I assume you mean the “limited by geograpghy” bit? It’s a pretty good video overall, but the US and Australia aren’t the best examples here. You guys have tons of space and a rather low population density. But large parts of Northern Europe we have some insanley densly populated areas and no site for pumped storage nearby.

            • @[email protected]
              4•1 year ago

              Yeah, that’s exactly it. Initially I thought it was pretty much impossible to find suitable locations any more, but apparently there are lots of sites left. Highly populated areas are obviously a lot more challenging. The point is that as opposed to having exactly zero locations, it seems that we do have some options here and there.

              Update: here’s an interesting map for potential locations. If you’re in Paris, Berlin, Warsaw, Stockholm or other flat regions, you’re not going to see any pumped hydro any time soon. However mountains of Norway, Spain, France, Italy and Germany look a lot better in that regard.

              Actually, Poland, Hungary, and England are probably the worst locations, but fortunately there are still many opportunities elsewhere in Europe.

    • @[email protected]
      2•1 year ago

      Currently that backup/storage is mostly fossil fuels, so building nuclear would displace fossil fuels. As long as nuclear remains expensive, we will only build it because not emitting CO2 is socially valuable.

      Nuclear would have to get a lot cheaper to eat wind/solar’s lunch. Maybe that could happen someday, but it’s not worth worrying about now.