technology
Can nuclear energy help solve climate change?
Radiant Energy Fund
Natural Resources Defense Council
4
1
Genesis
Response
Penultimate
Finale
March 19th, 2022
An important function of informed debate is indeed to narrow disagreement, so I begin by noting a conspicuous lack of rebuttal to several of my opening points, including:
- Globally, as a share of total electricity generation, nuclear power peaked in 1996 at 17.5% and then declined steadily to 10.1 percent in 2020; and
- Global additions of wind and solar generating capacity for 2020 (238,000 Megawatts) were five hundred times greater than nuclear capacity additions net of retirements (400 Megawatts).
I also appreciate acknowledgement of the “infamous cost overruns” that have plagued the nuclear industry and undercut its capacity to contribute to affordable decarbonization. And yes, NRDC’s endorsement of New York’s broadly supported plan for closing Indian Point reflects its unique proximity to the nation’s highest density population center (20 million people live within fifty miles of the plant). NRDC agrees that additional measures are needed to ensure that this closure does not interfere with New York State’s aggressive decarbonization goals, and the legislature and energy agencies are in full accord.
But here’s a real head-scratcher: “after all, only new nuclear plants need large investments, and only a few operating nuclear plants in the world are actually struggling to make ends meet, namely American plants in "deregulated" electricity markets put into direct competition with abundant natural gas from the fracking boom.”
Those American electricity markets put many of our nuclear plants into “direct competition” with all forms of generation (not just those with access to fracked gas); that’s among the most enduring and widely supported reforms in the history of energy policy, and it’s helped replace inefficient incumbent plants of all kinds with cleaner and less costly new entrants. Russia, China and France don’t subject their nuclear plants to competition, but is that really a compelling argument?
And how could anyone seriously contend that “only new nuclear plants need large investments?” San Onofre, with the costly and flawed replacement steam generators that forced its sudden retirement in 2013, is one of many sources of painful evidence to the contrary (here’s another involving Arkansas Unit 1 in that same year).
This brings us to Diablo Canyon, where (as my opening statement indicated), NRDC and the plant’s workers helped negotiate an agreement to extend a crucial permit that otherwise would have expired in mid-2018, and to retire the plant at the close of its federal operating license term in August 2025. “Evacuation risk” was not an issue. But the plant needed massive refurbishments in an obsolete water cooling system in order to operate beyond 2025, and replacement with low-carbon alternatives was the less costly path. That wasn’t just NRDC’s assessment; the plant’s owner was in full accord. Like New York, California has much to still to do in order to achieve its decarbonization goals at affordable costs, but given its long-term costs and inflexibility, an aging Diablo Canyon would have been a liability, not an asset. And to say that the plant is “indeed in-the-money even in today's flawed electricity markets” betrays a fundamental misunderstanding, since (unlike many other U.S. nuclear plants) Diablo Canyon doesn’t have to recover all its costs in wholesale electricity markets, although it competes in them. PG&E customers make up shortfalls through utility bill surcharges. There is no way of knowing whether and when the plant is really “in the money.”
Is recent economy-wide inflation affecting solar and other renewable energy costs in California and elsewhere? Yes, just as it is affecting natural gas and everything else, but NRDC and America’s principal utility association agreed recently that this has not “eliminate[d] solar power’s competitive advantage in retail and wholesale markets.”
What about Germany? It remains a global climate solutions leader, with combined progress on energy efficiency and renewable generation more than offsetting reduced nuclear power contributions over the past decade, thanks in part to even larger cuts in coal generation (see p. 362 in the linked reference for specifics).
From a climate perspective, ultimate progress in Germany, California and elsewhere is measured in total emissions, not the market shares of generation categories, nuclear or otherwise. Let’s persevere in building diversified zero-carbon portfolios through competitive processes that pick the best buys first, and buy only what we need.
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1 Comment
Dec 15
Cool discussion guys
"About 100 power reactors with a total gross capacity of about 100,000 MWe are on order or planned, and over 300 more are proposed. Most reactors currently planned are in Asia, with fast-growing economies and rapidly-rising electricity demand"
Google has an interesting answer to the build out of capacity question with a 30% increase in nuclear in the works and a potential further 100% of current capacity proposed, very roughly and without retirement. This raises the question of why growing Asian countries are building nuclear rather than following the lead of developed western countries such as Germany if the economics are clear. One possible answer is that the intense managerial demand of a non-baseload grid is not an option as some countries see it even if there were savings on the other side of the mountain. Another is that between-country grid interconnectivity like Europe's or North America's is not a geopolitical option elsewhere - something that also comes to mind when you hear about new interest in nuclear in Eastern Europe. Both of these answer in favour of nuclear in some degree and seemingly a large one
So what about Diablo Canyon? I think there's a reversal behind the point that Diablo may receive subsidies. How could it possibly be that a state that was entirely willing to shut its nuclear down is also entirely willing to pay it subsidies on top of keeping it running after all? The whims of public opinion can't be strong enough to blow fully backwards here. The market argument assumes the market is pricing things true to cost. But lately we hear of novel subsidies being paid to firm generation specifically for that feature, even to fossil plants. It is interesting to wonder whether in 2022 there is a growing irrational political demand for non-economic baseload power in the sense that it leaves you with a sense of wonder that you entertained the possibility
It seems like we have at least a temporary answer by my lights for the question of existing nuclear in Europe and North America. So what about in 10 years or so? Is there a point to building new nuclear? One look at this is to ask the question of whether there is a point to building new offshore wind which should be subject to the same political incentives as onshore. If so then any special motivation to build offshore wind may reveal hidden economics
In Britain Hinkley Point C is famously expensive at a guaranteed price of $130/MWh. This is where I expected to hammer a different point home but it turns out UK offshore wind strike prices have dropped like a stone to $50/MWh from nearly $200 a few years ago. The capacity ordered does tell part of the story, and there is more. First of all the auction numbers I'm looking at were 70% offshore wind. Why is new UK offshore wind 70% of an auction including solar and onshore in 2022? They bid the lowest. I assume this is a ringing endorsement of capacity factor or I'm interpreting something incredibly wrong. Of course there is another special reason they could bid the lowest. They aren't paying for storage or transmission. It's a mystery as to what those would have brought the bid up to but it does again suggest that the UK gov't is willing to subsidize this cost for offshore specifically because its reliability is dramatically contrasted to onshore and solar
And maybe it's not a mystery as to what the bid would be with the full costs included. In 2021 the Danish government approved an offshore wind island hub with storage that will cost $30 billion for the first 3 GW. If they're dealing with the same price drop as UK offshore it seems that transmission and storage are massive costs that governments are nevertheless willing to pay for offshore wind. I think you'd have to be pretty generous with overhead costs and assuming the storage is sufficient to be able to confidently say that the Danish full cost 10 GW nameplate plan will be less per GW than even current one-off western nuclear plants like Hinkley. The wind will have low marginal cost but the nuclear plant will last 80 years or more
So maybe offshore wind answers the question about the hidden economics of onshore and solar even in interconnected and advanced economies. But perhaps it leaves the question of "why any more Hinkley?" not fully answerable. And that's a reasonable point to wrap up on. Can new nuclear help zero emissions strategies? If British offshoring of renewables provides a likely answer to hidden economics of onshore and solar - and if Danish offshoring reasonably raises the question of whether nuclear actually is currently entirely competitive with full cost considerations - then we should build nuclear as well. The only reason not to would be if we relaxed zero emissions goals and allowed whatever amount of natural gas is revealed to be necessary. And then, why not nuclear anyway if it may be a better deal than offshore wind after all as well as bringing down the system costs for solar and onshore? I think it's truly in the mix then, even for new builds
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