This is one of the big questions of climate change policy.
On the face of it nuclear power should be the great savior of climate change. It is a clean power source which has worked well, provides base power, and supplies 10% of the world's energy needs. Yet what has happened in recent years in Europe and America is very discouraging. In England the Hinckley Point plant has been called the most useless and expensive power plant in history ( see the Guardian Dec 2017). Two large plants in Finland and in the state of Georgia USA, have taken an average of 10 years to construct and have come in at least three times the original budgets. These projects have given nuclear power in the West an awful reputation.
When calculating the overall desirability of a power plants one considers the initial capital costs, time to build, running costs including fuel, location flexibility, minimum size, and also the costs of closing them down when they are finished. On all these counts renewables have advantages over nuclear.
Many western governments are in a trap. Renewables like wind and solar are cheap but do not provide reliable base load. There is no more hydro available, and more gas and coal are not desirable. So, for lack of alternatives, nuclear has attracted more attention. The 3.2GW Hinckley C plant in England is a case in point. Originally projected in 2013 to cost around £15 billion, and to supply electricity at around £89/ MWh, with minimum government subsidy. It is now projected to cost at least £26 billion with prices of least £106/MWh. It has still to be completed. The high prices promised may cost the taxpayer more than £6 billion! By the way, a good tariff in the UK for solar is £40/MWh.
Even so, many see a revival of nuclear is possible and many governments are looking at mini- plants 50-500MW in size which can be sited more easily and built not on site but in factories . Bill Gates’s Terrapower, and Rolls Royce have the most well-known projects. Governments will be pouring in more than $1 trillion during the next 10 years in subsidizing these ideas.
Yet these new designs will suffer from the same problems as before – high cost and long planning times. Yes, China , France, and Korea will be building new plant but nuclear will not be our saviour. I strongly believe that these subsidies will in the end, be a waste of tax-payers money.
David Waimann is VP Energy at OurCrowd Investments and executive director at five water and renewable energy tech companies. drw@ourcrowd.com
This article is part of a series of more than 20 posts discussing climate policy and technology.
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#rollsroyce
#terrapower
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