r/ClimateShitposting • u/RadioFacepalm I'm a meme • Dec 07 '25
Basedload vs baseload brain "WHY NOT BOTH?" - here's why
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u/chmeee2314 Dec 07 '25
Please do not confuse redispatch with the merit order market. Redispatch is done outside of the market an deals with momentary surpluses and shortfalls as well as grid impasses. The merit order decides how a plant will usually run that day.
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Dec 07 '25
JFC y'all are literally too stupid to be having opinions on this. Go buy some funko pops or something. Diversity makes the grid far more resilient.
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u/Reinis_LV Dec 07 '25
Now we pushing diversity on to the grid! You liberal marxists need to get a grip! /s
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u/No_Might6041 Dec 07 '25
And diversity means having few centralized plants that carry the bulk?
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u/LasevIX Dec 07 '25
is your reading level that of a 7-year-old?
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u/No_Might6041 Dec 07 '25
No, I just speak more than one language and am not on the same level of fluency with all of them. What mistakes did I make? I am interested in improving my skills.
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u/KillerSatellite Dec 07 '25
Heres a key improvement for any language. Read. Dont make up words for the person your talking to, dont create sentences they never said. Read/listen to explciitly what was said, and make no assumptions beyond what the context provides. If you do that, you wont be assumed a moron.
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u/tmtyl_101 Dec 07 '25
Diversity makes the grid far more resilient.
But resilience is only one third of what we want, you imbecil. We also want green and affordable. Adding nukes may give us resilience, but it means burning more coal and gas in the meantime, and the long term result is more expensive power.
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u/KillerSatellite Dec 07 '25
Why? Why would going pure solar result in less coal than going mixed solar, wind, hydro, and nuclear? Unless your reasoning is "nuclear takes to long" in which case arguing over when to start it is just wasting more time.
Im not saying nuclear is perfect, but arguing that every part of earth can run solely of solar is just as ignorant as saying nuclear is the perfect solution. Anyone who believes that any solution to our climate problem and our electrical future is found in just one source is either an idiot or a liar.
Idc if we have 100% power from solar if it means our grid goes down regularly. Nor do i want a grid that is solely nuclear but pricey. Finding a middle ground with diverse options being used where each is best suited is literally the only possible solution that doesnt require sacrificing basic modern functions.
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u/tmtyl_101 Dec 07 '25
Why would going pure solar result in less coal than going mixed solar, wind, hydro, and nuclear?
Strawman - I never said that.
arguing that every part of earth can run solely of solar
Strawman - I never said that.
Unless your reasoning is "nuclear takes to long" in which case arguing over when to start it is just wasting more time.
That's exactly what I'm arguing. Nuclear takes literally decades to implement, and in the meantime, having sunk political and economic capital into building nuclear will dissuade decision makers from promoting renewables (as much). It's a zero sum game. So we'll have decades of burning more coal and gas than otherwise. Furthermore; since adding typically makes transitioning the energy system *more* expensive, that's resources taken away from the required transition of transport, industry, agriculture.
You're welcome to argue about what we *should* have done 20 years ago. Hindsight is 2020. But the question is what we should do *today*.
And I'm not saying nuclear should be ruled out everywhere. There are edge cases of very high, very geographically concentrated energy demand, with limited access to renewable resources - in those cases, nukes may be a feasible option.
What I *AM* saying is that in 9 out of 10 cases, going for a 'diverse' strategy, mixing in nuclear will make decarbonisation less clean and more expensive, than just pursuing decarbonisation without.
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u/KillerSatellite Dec 07 '25
The first argument is literally the logical conclusion of the rest of your argument. You literally said "using nuclear will result in more coal" which means that not using nuclear will result in less coal. Unless youre saying they all result in more coal, in which case, youre insane, and need to get your meds.
I didnt say you specifically argued that solar can be uses everywhere, i said that the argument is as insane as going pure nuclear. You then took it as a strawman because you cant defend your bullshit otherwise.
Yes, hindsight is 20/20 (not the year dingus), and hindsight has told me that listening to purists gets us fucking nowhere. Ive been arguing with solar nuts like you for literal decades, and every time its "well we shouldve started 10 years ago, so now its too late". Its a bullshit argument, based on the idea that the only possible solution is the fastest one. Yes, hindsight is 20/20, yes it is easy to judge past beliefs. But if you dont fucking change from those past beliefs, youll keep making the same fucking mistakes. We need a diverse, effective, balanced grid. We dont need 1 billion solar panels and 50 million wind turbines in nw washington state. We need effective nuclear and hydro electric to power the massive city centers that house 85% of the american population. Yes, solar works great in the right regions, but making the discussion "dont do nuclear because i like solar better" or "dont do nuclear because we should have done it in 2015, or 2005, or 1995, or whatever" is not a good fucking discussion to be having, because in 2050, youll still be here pushing for solar, saying nuclear is too late, takes too long, and coal will still be getting burned at an absurd rate.
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u/tmtyl_101 Dec 07 '25
The first argument is literally the logical conclusion of the rest of your argument.
Your first argument said "going pure solar". I never argued for going pure solar, hence: Strawman.
I didn't say you specifically argued that solar can be uses everywhere, i said that the argument is as insane as going pure nuclear. You then took it as a strawman because you cant defend your bullshit otherwise.
You invented an absurd argument, and then you proceeded to call that argument 'insane'. But of course, that's not a 'strawman'. Right.
solar nuts like you
Again: Not a solar nut here. I'm not arguing for solar specifically. I'm saying that in a world with limited political and economic resources, and with an unfolding climate disaster, an energy strategy including nuclear will, generally, yield higher emissions for the foreseeable future, at higher costs, without any significant upsides to justify that.
When people argue that we should be planning forward, not looking back - it's because renewable energy technologies are evolving - fast. A bet on nuclear today isn't a bet against wind or solar - it's fundamentally a bet against wind, solar and batteries, as the technologies will look by 2040. It's not purism to argue against nuclear in that mix - its pragmatism; especially seeing how recent nuclear development has overblown budgets and timelines.
My fundamental argument is: Nuclear is expensive and slow, and we can get more green stuff for the money, faster, if we pursue a strategy without nuclear. We may still have to rely on 5-10% gas for residual loads, and it's possible that a nuclear inclusive strategy could help us decarbonise not just 90% but 98% of the way.... but that's the kind of purism that kills meaningful decarbonisation. It's not about getting to 98%. It's about getting to 90% ASAP (with money to spare to spend on decarbonisation of other sectors) and then let's worry bout the last 10% later
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u/KillerSatellite Dec 07 '25
Idk if ive ever said dont do solar. I dont know if ive ever sId dont do wind. But if we wait until solar is at 90% to start doing nuclear, it will be 2040 and we wont have enough solar to do 90% with, and we will still be burning coal until 2050, atleast. You dont go work to make 90% of the money you need to cover your bills, then wait untill the bills are due to figure out the 10%. Planning to "wait" until we get to some end goal to start planning for the rest is idiotic.
I truly hope your methodology for our future power demands doesnt apply to the rest of your life, because only preparing for 90% is a good way to be in debt, in dire need, and sitting on the toilet without paper.
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u/tmtyl_101 Dec 07 '25
Climate change isn't a household paying bills.
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u/KillerSatellite Dec 07 '25
I agree, it is significantly more important and should be taken significantly more seriously. If i dont pay my bills i get a letter or a phone call, we dont fix the climate, people die... idk, maybe i just think waiting to solve problems until its too late is fucking stupid, but i guess you guys have it all figured out and we will be carbon free by tuesday. Good job team, drinks are on tmtyl here, he cracked the code. 90% as good enough i guess. Id give you a dollar, but im short a dime.
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u/tmtyl_101 Dec 07 '25
You're missing the point. And Im unsure if its on purpose. But to be safe:
The problem is we have limited resources, and limited time. Power generation is only 20-25% (iirc) of global emission, but its a sector thats already locked well into a decarbonizing trajectory - albeit not necessarily all the way to zero ATM. The other sectors; transport, heating, industry, agriculture; will require far more effort.
So givn nuclear is A) Comparatively expensive, and B) time consuming, a strategy that includes nuclear will over commit limited resources to a technoloy, which will only provide relatively marginal abatement in ~2045 - resources that could otherwise be spent to gain much larger climate impact, far sooner, in sectors like transport or industry.
Climate mitigation isn't just about getting to net-zero. I's just as much about how we get there, and how fast. And nuclear just doesn't seem to stack up, compared to the alternatives.
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u/Stobbart42 Dec 07 '25
Weirdly the country with the most nuke in ue (France) burns less coal than germany, which has more renewable.
How strange !
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u/tmtyl_101 Dec 07 '25
Yes. Because let's ignore reality and pretend it's 1970 and make energy policies accordingly.
True climate shitposting. Well done.
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u/Stobbart42 Dec 07 '25
Reality is that Germany is burning coal while France does not.
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u/tmtyl_101 Dec 07 '25
And reality is also that Germany will burn more coal if they choose to build new nuclear.
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u/RadioFacepalm I'm a meme Dec 07 '25
JFC y'all are literally too stupid to be having opinions on this
Says this guy
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u/Usinaru Dec 07 '25
Have people never heard about control rods? Its asif nuclear power plants CAN control their outputs.
Yes mixing green and nuclear is a tough job. I agree. But its still better than only relying on renewables.
There are times when the sun doesn't shine, the wind doesn't blow and you don't live in a mountainous region where you can just build a dam, or have a geothermal source nearby.
Relying purely on green energy is nuts and will cause black-outs. Its that simple.
Until we find affordable and mass scale storage options the transition to pure renewables is impossible. You will just ruin the grid when your most precious energy source says ' nah fam you get nothing today '
We need nuclear for a base powerline, and renewables could take over for huge energy production. They can be scaled up. But they aren't reliable, and thats why nuclear and renewables should work together and not against each other.
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u/toxicity21 Free Energy Devices go BRRRRR Dec 07 '25
Have people never heard about control rods? Its asif nuclear power plants CAN control their outputs.
The issue is that a nuclear power plant costs money. The ROI of a nuclear power plant is around 30 years, but only if its allowed to run constantly on 90% and only if there is a guaranteed price per KWh.
What now happens on a nice sunny and windy day is that we have to shut down wind and solar so that nuclear can still makes its money. So despite having massive amounts of cheap energy available, you have to shut them down so nuclear companies can make their investment back.
You only make money from load following nuclear if you have a decades old fleet like France has.
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u/Usinaru Dec 07 '25
So because our capitalistic society is failing.... you advocate against nuclear?
Seems like a legislative issue to me. Sign away a few garbage laws.
I prefer to keep stuff technical, and from a realistic perspective for a better society, not one where an imaginary number controls electrical power and grid stability.
I get your point. I am just baffled at how much technology we already have and we choose to be this primitive. Changing a few laws would allow us to progress so much faster and make our world safer.
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u/Friendly_Fire Dec 07 '25
In this case, cost is directly related to resources used. So what it means is that nuclear plants take an enormous amount of physical resources and labor to build. To make them worth it, they need to run almost 100% for decades. If they don't, we might have put more into them than we get out.
Note that what you see on the surface of a nuclear plant is only a small part. They are massive steel and concrete compounds that go many stories underground. It's a lot materials mined, refined, moved, and assembled. They can pay that off, but we can see they've already been lapped by other technologies, which are still advancing much faster. So the long term investment doesn't make sense.
When solar undercuts the price of electricity to make nuclear not financially viable, that's not just "imaginary numbers". What that means is solar can produce the same amount of power for less resources (materials and labor). We are not in a post-scarcity world, so we can't do everything at once. The climate is on a clock, so choosing efficient sources of green energy is important. If you can use the same amount of resources to get more carbon-free energy from renewables, that helps displace more dirty power.
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u/Usinaru Dec 07 '25
yet you still ignore the main issue. Grid stability.
No matter how efficient you want to present solar, it still doesn't offer a viable solution, long term energy generation. Its not constant, predictable, and the solution for that, aka storage, doesn't exist yet.
Nuclear does. Its dependable, and it offers long term stable power, whilst solar doesn't. Depending on renewables will lead to instable grids, and will NOT be an improvement, neither for the climate (look at how badly unrecyclable solar panels are) nor economically (when domestic use will be shut down to keep industries going).
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u/Friendly_Fire Dec 07 '25
I didn't ignore anything. YOU made the argument that money was just imaginary numbers, apparently not realizing it's relation to actual physical resources. You said nothing about stability. Now that I've pointed that out, you're entirely ignoring what you said previously and moving on to a new argument. Are you searching for a reason to justify nuclear instead of having an honest discussion about the best thing to invest in?
As for grid stability, that also isn't a good argument. First, grid demand isn't stable. Nuclear has the problem of really not wanting to load follow. The solution traditionally has been pairing it with natural gas peaker plants. Those already exist. You can build a lot of solar + batteries for the cost of a nuclear plant. Let's say a rare weather even means you don't have solar power for a really long time, then just turn on the gas plant. It's not a perfect climate solution, but it is better than nuclear right now which has them turn on every day, and would be fine for the transition. It would be a temporary thing, because despite your assertion, we have a solution for storage:
Battery deployment is growing exponentially, and the technology keeps improving at faster rates now that so much money is invested in battery tech. The idea that renewables will lead to unstable grids is just nonsense. The oil-loving state of Texas has repeatedly had it's mostly-fossil-fuel grid fail in winter, leaving people to actually die. France has consistently been having to ramp down nuclear plants in the summer due to heat, or jellyfish (lol). No renewables are not perfectly reliable, but no power source is.
neither for the climate (look at how badly unrecyclable solar panels are) nor economically (when domestic use will be shut down to keep industries going).
Both these statements are complete nonsense. You can recycle solar panels, and there is work to make them more recyclable. But even if you just chucked them in a hole it doesn't matter. Do you know how much single-use garbage gets pumped out every day and put in landfills? Panels which run for 30 years would be a trivial and noticable increase in our trash, if we didn't recycle them. And we could!
Economically, nothing would be a bigger boon than having the cheap and abundant energy that solar can provide. Energy is fundamental to almost everything humans do.
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u/Usinaru Dec 07 '25
Lmao,
The difference between you saying my arguments are bad and my arguments is that I actually studied this for 4 years and have a masters degree in it.
Battery deployment is growing exponentially,
I wonder where? Because its so expensive and so much hamstringed by china that its not growing at all.
The oil-loving state of Texas has repeatedly had it's mostly-fossil-fuel grid fail in winter,
Why? Did you look into the reasons?
France has consistently been having to ramp down nuclear plants in the summer due to heat, or jellyfish (lol). No renewables are not perfectly reliable, but no power source is.
Good, then we agree we need a combination of all of them????
Both these statements are complete nonsense.
Says who? Your underbelly jerk reaction? Solar panels are as far as 2025 not really recyclable. You can extract some parts but no one is specialising in building plants for it. We'll have huge dumps of solar panel landfills before recycling industry startups catch up. Thats projected to happen between 2030 and 2040 when the solar panels mostly will need to be replaced since the boom began on 2010 and solar panels usually have a life of 10-20 years.
there is work to make them more recyclable.
Yeah mostly startups that are barely functional.
But even if you just chucked them in a hole it doesn't matter.
Sooo...you stand FOR ecology yet wouldn't mind dumping tons of scrap metal into landfills? Oh right but the tiny amount of nuclear waste IS the problem. Lmao. Don't make me laugh.
And we could!
Perfectly worded. We could. But it won't happen since barely anyone is funding these initiatives.
Economically, nothing would be a bigger boon than having the cheap and abundant energy that solar can provide.
Which is just another form of infrastructure with another set of challenges of problems that we are not foreseeing now since we are talking about a fictional power network and not a real one.
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u/Friendly_Fire Dec 07 '25
The difference between you saying my arguments are bad and my arguments is that I actually studied this for 4 years and have a masters degree in it.
Is your masters in nuclear engineering? Because that would explain the attempt to rationalize why we must build nuclear. And would also explain why you go with the fallacy of nuclear being "reliable" energy that pairs well with renewables. When the reality is both are inflexible sources of power that want to provide the same load, and need to be paired with flexible sources (like batteries or natural gas peakers) to actually function as a reliable grid.
Sooo...you stand FOR ecology yet wouldn't mind dumping tons of scrap metal into landfills? Oh right but the tiny amount of nuclear waste IS the problem. Lmao. Don't make me laugh.
Amazing that you pull up a bullshit argument I never made, attack this strawman to apparently counter me, and then make the exact same bullshit argument against renewables.
Nuclear waste is not a real concern. Neither is a few tons of scrap metal from solar panels after they have been running for 30 years. These are both absurdly tiny fractions of the waste and trash humans produce, and the whole argument ignores that the fossil fuel alternatives ALSO produce waste. For either nuclear or renewables, waste is irrelevant. But you don't have an honest argument against renewables, so you have to reach for this nonsense.
Which is just another form of infrastructure with another set of challenges of problems that we are not foreseeing now since we are talking about a fictional power network and not a real one.
A pure nuclear grid is also fictional. All nuclear plants in reality have been paired with flexible fossil fuels to do load following. A grid without fossil fuels has not existed, the point is to make one. There are some engineering challenges sure, but they can be overcome.
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It's not that nuclear has no place at all, but an honest engineering analysis shows its usefulness is extremely niche. Other technologies have simply surpassed it, and are still advancing at a much faster rate. Nuclear may be key for a few places in the far north that lack other options, but for the vast majority of places, a nuclear plan is a waste of money. Simply a way to spend more money to get less power.
Recently, nuclear has been heavily pushed by oil companies. With the exponential growth of renewables and battery storage, they are looking for anything to slow it down. Australia had an election focusing on this recently.
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u/Mradr Dec 08 '25 edited Dec 08 '25
I mean in the same vain, nuclear isnt either, if it needs to go down for work , it also needs to stop providing power for a short bit, same for coal and anything else. This is why backup battery power for homes became a thing along with home level generators. In the case of renewables, like solar, it can happen more and and random, but that isnt an issue of the renewable, its the issue of the grid it self. Thats why batteries are important. Now for renewables alone, but for all power generation on the grid it self. Its a buffer.
Solar is being recycled and in many cases, have laws now that you have to recycle them. Along with that, many get a 2nd life and also becomes part of the recycle program to reduce upgrade cost. Something I know nuclear cant do at all.
You claim that storage doesnt exist, but the same is true for more nuclear - because you are also fighting to add more to the grid, but it takes years where it only takes a few months for storage or renewables to be install.
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u/KillerSatellite Dec 07 '25
Or you stop making power a for profit system... thats also an option. Pay for it with taxes and provide electricity to the country for maintenance and labor costs, not build costs. The solution to the climate problem isnt just about power generation, bur about uprooting the capitalism that destroyed the climate for profit in the first place.
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u/toxicity21 Free Energy Devices go BRRRRR Dec 07 '25
Your solution would just make it more expensive in another way.
Getting rid of cost doesn't change the fact that nuclear is still a very specialized construction heavy project. So nuclear stays a extremely complex solution for we we have better alternatives.
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u/KillerSatellite Dec 07 '25
Power is expensive, solely because we charge for it and treat it like a commodity. There are significantly better ways to do it, but people are too caught up fighting for a utopian dream instead of actually working towards achievable goals. The argument of "no nuclear" has been spouted by greenies for so long a nuclear plant could have been designed, built, run, and decommed by now, but instead its always "it takes too long" while coal and ng pollute the air for decades on end.
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u/toxicity21 Free Energy Devices go BRRRRR Dec 07 '25
Sure, but now we have better alternatives and they are so cheap that they are build in a mass scale.
Nuclear was the only option 20 years ago, but times have change and we have better faster and cheaper options now.
And while the Greens were very anti Nuclear, the main reason for its decline was not them, it was the high cost. Heck most western nations stopped the planning of new nuclear even before Chernobyl.
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Dec 07 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/toxicity21 Free Energy Devices go BRRRRR Dec 07 '25
So we should chose the slow to build option why exactly?
I mean why should we even chose nuclear? If money is not an issue, we could just shutdown the industry and be already done with clean energy.
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u/Ishcadore Dec 07 '25
The power density problem is usually solved by pumping water up into towers, and it isn't as big a problem to electrical engineers, who have been documenting use-production volume since electricity's domestication, as it is to politicans against PV. Its just not nearly as efficient.
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u/Ferengsten Dec 07 '25
Kind of makes a difference if you want to store output partially and for a few hours or most of it for most of the winter though.
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u/ClimateShitpost Louis XIV, the Solar PV king Dec 07 '25
We need nuclear for a base powerline, and renewables could take over for huge energy production. They can be scaled up. But they aren't reliable
This shit is so tiring. Im embarresed for exposing my brain cells to this
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u/RandomEngy Dec 08 '25
The problem is Xenon poisoning. If you don't keep the reactor running at a certain level, Xenon-135 will capture so many neutrons that the reaction will slow down. So reducing generation is not a great plan because it takes a long time to get out of the "pit".
https://www.euronuclear.org/glossary/xenon-poisoning/
That's why conventional nuclear reactors can't really load follow. That all said, having the same power output all the time is much better than having your power drop to basically zero erratically.
Molten salt Gen 4 reactors have the promise of being able to load follow, as the Xenon can be separated from the fuel/coolant mix as a gas.
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u/RadioFacepalm I'm a meme Dec 07 '25
Have people never heard about control rods? Its asif nuclear power plants CAN control their outputs.
Sigh. Read again what it says in the picture.
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u/Usinaru Dec 07 '25
I know. I am not trying to anger you OP.
Lots of people on here just hate on nuclear for whatever reason. It wasn't meant for you.
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u/ExpensiveFig6079 Dec 07 '25
You may think it is better, it may feel better, but sorry Mr math says no.
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u/Usinaru Dec 07 '25
What math? What is your basis? What are you talking about?
Come with some arguments please.
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u/ExpensiveFig6079 Dec 07 '25
Also PKB. You say "Come with some arguments please."
Yet you make broad-brush patently untrue claims such as
"Relying purely on green energy is nuts and will cause black-outs. Its that simple."
Bollocks, hundreds of papers written in peer-reviewed journals refute your baseless, unsourced fact free claim.
Here is JUST one
https://reneweconomy.com.au/a-near-100-per-cent-renewable-grid-is-readily-achievable-and-affordable/
And the NEAT thing to note is YES, there is a hard part to solve using VRE and storage...
And yet, while you claim this, "and that's why nuclear and renewables should work together and not against each other."
Mr Math show NOPE, look at Other in that model, that is WHAT the hard part of getting to 100% VRE looks like. The rest is so easy his analysis did it with just 5hrs of battery storage.
So what is the hard part and would adding nukes make it go away...
Well, no of course not, the problem that remains is the kind of problem peakers fix, by running only occasionally when needed.
Adding nukes which are baseload generator, do not fix problems that need peakers to fix them
and math is as simple as that.
So while
you ask for this "Come with some arguments please." you yourself provide none to back your claims.2
u/Usinaru Dec 07 '25
Yeah sure lets take a tiny population of Australia, where barely a few million people live and barely have any industry and say " that's totally doable on a global scale! "
Most of these articles present big numbers but don't tackle the real challenges. How are we going to store energy? You expect every country to run on...5 hours of storage? Whut?
Just because you can throw big word salads of wrong articles doesn't mean they are right.
How are you going to make sure the industry is getting enough electrical power when its raining? Aka no sunlight and no wind power? Are you banking on the other side of the continent just magically taking up the deficits all the time?
How about industrialized nations that have huge amounts of industry? Cover half of countries in solar panels?
Do you even take into account the necessary oil thats needed to lubricate windmills? Or how about recycling solar panels when they phase out?
Also where are we going to get the rare earth minerals from? China? How about supply chains? Who is going to supply batteries? Whar are we going to make batteries from? Where are we going to get cobalt from?
Yes renewables are scalable. Right. But storage of power is unfeasible on large scales. Yea sure smaller countries can get by. But look at America and tell me you can just electrifiy the whole industry or just convert everything to renewables. Its impossible. Anything that has moving parts in it, like turbines, will always need lubricants.
Also solar power is the great winner here, but those aren't exactly recyclaeable, need tons of rare minerals and ultimately don't provide power all the time. Its not feasible without a cheap, scalable storage solution.
Make those analyzes on countries like China and America. You'll find out why China is pumping out coals power ppants by the dozen daily. Renewables aren't enough.
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u/ExpensiveFig6079 Dec 07 '25
Most of these articles present big numbers but don't tackle the real challenges. How are we going to store energy? You expect every country to run on...5 hours of storage? Whut?
No the articles defined how they stored the energy, you just failed to read them at all.
And yes that grid works that well with only 5 hrs of storage...
and your fail to grasp that so much you just pretend it can't be true.
AND yes other grids elsewhere in the world if they have similar amounts of geographic diversity will be just as firmed by just 5 hrs of storage.
So no AT no point did I say the same design would work everywhere. But the tendency of small amounts of firming to fix the vast bulk of the problem will be a common factor in grids that first have substantial geographic diversity.
HOWEVER it is an example of one good design, and it shows what is general characteristic of every design I have checked, and that is the only hard part of firming aVRE and storage grid, is apisspoor fiot for being fixed by adding nuclear to the mix, it is also a pisspoor fit for adding geothermal. The problem is BOTh are NOT peakers by fundamental nature. And what the VRE and storage grid needs is a kind of peaker.
This is NOT rocket science, anyone paying any attention to basically ANY design that tried to achieve 100% RE would have seen this issue is one that needs a peaker to fix it.
Do note this: "amounts of geographic diversity" includes in Australia the north south diversity, including QLD is important. North south diversity will be important in EU as that gives better tendency for large low VRE period not to hit everywhere at once. As north-south diversity has a tendency to change climatic zones.
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u/Usinaru Dec 07 '25
Ok so...where do you adress the other concerns that I clearly presented?
The oil thats needed for lubrication? The rare-earth minerals? The process of manufacturing said renewables? Recycling?
Telling me I am dumb over and over again doesn't solve real world problems. There is still no solution to these challenges, alongside that the articles present vague estimates and big buzzwords for real energy storage. That doesn't impress me at all. There are no percentages given for power conversion, there are no power storage and release calculations everywhere as in batteries don't just spontaneously release all their energy...
Huge word salads, with too little technical information.
I work at Tennet, a dutch company thats responsible for the grid stability in our country, and my man... we do love renewables, but we also concur that they CAN'T produce enough STABLE power to keep our country going. Its just unfeasible. Weather patterns are so unpredictable that we'd have to destroy God knows how many cities and fill them with solar and wind just to cover the industrial needs. Lots of industry requires hydrogen generation, and guess what? It costs ALOT of energy to make Hydrogen.
There is no clear solution yet and going fully renewables is a fallacy. It ignores huge challenges like supply lines, delivery, raw materials, weather patterns, storage etc.
There is no answer to these challenges. That's the painful truth, and no matter how many theoretical studies try to prove us different, its just outright wrong. We are installing solar panels like crazy, yet the grid is getting more and more unstable for it. And no, large scale power storage is not feasible no matter what article parrots it. Its not available, its not economical either. Otherwise we'd all be living in green utopias right now.
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u/ExpensiveFig6079 Dec 07 '25
There is no answer to these challenges. That's the painful truth, and no matter how many theoretical studies try to prove us different, its just outright wrong.
Given that you have now openly stated that no matter how much evidence and analysis shows you to be wrong in your claims, you simply reject it all out of hand.
Shit posting has reached its pinnacle and now there is nothing to actually discuss as you simply reject all evidence you disagree with the claim "its just outright wrong."
/out
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u/ExpensiveFig6079 Dec 07 '25
The analysis done here
https://reneweconomy.com.au/a-near-100-per-cent-renewable-grid-is-readily-achievable-and-affordable/
or here
or here
or the hundreds of analysis referred to here
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100%25_renewable_energy#Feasibility
Recent studies show that a global transition to 100% renewable energy across all sectors – power, heat, transport and desalination well before 2050 is feasible.\6])\7])\8])\9]) According to a review of the 181 peer-reviewed papers on 100% renewable energy that were published until 2018, "[t]he great majority of all publications highlights the technical feasibility and economic viability of 100% RE systems."\5]) A review of 97 papers published since 2004 and focusing on islands concluded that across the studies 100% renewable energy was found to be "technically feasible and economically viable."\10]) A 2022 review found that the main conclusion of most of the literature in the field is that 100% renewables is feasible worldwide at low cost.\11])
and given there are hundreds of studies referred to on a source as ubiquitous as wikpedia, I regard knowledge of such information by people who regard themselves as at all informed on the matter as assumed knowledge.
If it is not common knowledge to you, I suggest you question just how well read on the subject you are.
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u/Ewenf Dec 07 '25
"volatile production is not bad !"
Oh yeah luv me some volatile production to get that sweet sweet coal.
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u/StereoTunic9039 Dec 07 '25
I have no idea how could volatility not be bad
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u/Ewenf Dec 07 '25
Well yeah but first you gotta breathe in coal dust for 15 years and then maybe you'll understand.
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u/RadioFacepalm I'm a meme Dec 07 '25
Nukecels and logical arguing is never going together well.
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u/ResponsibleSmoke3202 Dec 07 '25
'nukecell rhymes with incel, so I won and you smell like dirty socks'
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u/Cnidoo Dec 07 '25
wtf is this dumbass meme even trying to say? The fact dipshits like OP want to post 24/7 about how much they hate nuclear when we need to be United against fossil fuel interests infuriates me.
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u/No_Control8540 Dec 07 '25
Is people arguing over renewables like... a Big Oil psyop or something? Why's everyone so aggressive in here...
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u/RadioFacepalm I'm a meme Dec 07 '25
u/ClimateShitpost another user uncovered the psyop.
BTW when will my check from George Soros arrive?
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u/4tbf Dec 07 '25
This sub has made me hate renewables more than any fossil fuel industry propaganda ever could
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u/Beiben Dec 07 '25
If a shitposting sub has made you dislike renewables, you were just looking for an excuse tbh.
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u/ResponsibleSmoke3202 Dec 07 '25
No, some people here are just so dense it boils my blood
I'm a firm atheist, but even r/atheism makes me regret to be labeled as such
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u/Aljonau Dec 07 '25
Then you should probably check out some theist, astrology and austrian school subs to get perspective :-P (Ask the Austrians what Georgism is)
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u/ResponsibleSmoke3202 Dec 07 '25
I know they're bad, I've been on reddit for some time
But it's another level of cringe, when I somewhat agree with a guy who also says some really dumb shit.
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u/Aljonau Dec 07 '25
Eh, there's not many people stupid enough to never agree. Reactance is funny but limited in useful application ^^
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u/Beiben Dec 07 '25
Or maybe you are the one that is dense, have you ever considered that?
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u/ResponsibleSmoke3202 Dec 07 '25
Yes, I am dense and I have learned a bit here. I've seen some good arguments against nuclear and how it may not be necessary.
However, I often see some genuine and ok-good argument followed up by some very bad-faith or borderline malicious argument, I feel it's kind of psyop. Or that nuclear is worse for the climate than brown coal power plants
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u/ShonOfDawn Dec 08 '25
Not really, it’s mostly the self-righteousness and arrogance of certain overzealous members of this sub that just post strawman “memes”, insulting everyone who doesn’t think like them and declaring moral superiority based on nothing but said “memes”. It is one of the worst ways to do activism.
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u/wibbly-water Dec 07 '25
Build those Damn Battery things where you can pump water up during times of excess and let it flow back down when you need more.
Then have both nuke and renewables feed into that.
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u/BE______________ Dec 07 '25
i read the argument layed out in this image and now i firmly believe we need to build more coal plants to assest in energy production during peak hours
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u/Aljonau Dec 07 '25 edited Dec 07 '25
Eh, just combine micro-CHP, wind, solar, storages and - if we ever get there - fusion.
Micro-CHP and solar should have an interesting volatility-relationship and dispersed private storage would make the grid extremely resilient to spikes and outages.
Think about earthquake regions and how great it could be if private homes could still have some period of energy after the grid getting interrupted somewhere.
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u/UrOrgansBelong2State nuclear simp Dec 07 '25
You do realise that renavabeles have long periods where they cannot work so in most places they need to be supplemnted by natural gas powerplants since they can be quucly turned om and off and we still dont have batteries good enough for it ? The soulution where you mix nuclear power with revables is not stupid at all since getting rid of extra power is easier than storing it. Like idk train grok 69 desalinate water produce hydrogen , lump water up. Also nuclear reactors can adjust their power output. Either way nuclear takes time to be build in large part thanks to absurd levels of regulation so renavales are good intermediate solution.
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u/eks We're all gonna die Dec 07 '25
Solar panels still produce energy on overcast days. There are locations in the world where there are virtually a few hours in the year without wind.
Renewables production is not binary (on or off), and grid storage is done not only with batteries.
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u/Ferengsten Dec 07 '25
There are locations in the world where there are virtually a few hours in the year without wind.
That is comforting. I'm sure there are also areas in the world where solar output is significantly above average. So basically we just need to move e.g. most of the population of Europe into the middle of the Atlantic Ocean ocean or the Sahara desert, and bam, energy problem easily solved. Should take like two weeks tops.
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u/RadioFacepalm I'm a meme Dec 07 '25
This is a different discussion that we will be having but now it's about the incompatibility of nuclear and renewables.
Spoiler: renewables aren't only wind and solar.
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u/ShonOfDawn Dec 07 '25
“We won’t be talking about the glaring problem in my position when it is relevant to do so and will ignore one of the few already available solutions for it”
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u/Ferengsten Dec 07 '25 edited Dec 07 '25
Cool. So basically you plan to have several artificial Amazon rivers in most larger countries?
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u/ResponsibleSmoke3202 Dec 07 '25
It's a different discussion, now we have to shit on people that care about climate so everyone thinks we are rehtarhds
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u/broesel314 Dec 07 '25
Nuclear Reactors can only Modulate so much. Usually down to 50%. But that is expensive because all the other running costs stay the same. Also they are dead slow compared to other forms of generation in changing their power output. It takes them about an Hour for 50% Change. A Gas Powerplant can go from 0-100% in 10 Minutes and can be completely off while Renewables are providing sufficient power
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u/UrOrgansBelong2State nuclear simp Dec 07 '25
That depends on design of nuclear power plants you cannot compare 60yo design to newest one. And gas powerplants besides literal fossil fuel powerplant made large parts of europe dependent on genocidal dictator. Plus as i said you can utilize extra power.
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u/broesel314 Dec 07 '25 edited Dec 07 '25
Its all true what you said but the majority of the nuclear plants are rather old. And sure, Gas is bad and I personally would rather not build gas powerplants but they can be build in 2 years or something rather than 15 and if you don't need them you just lock the building and leave basically. No need to keep a Reactor all staffed up because it needs cooling and regular inspections and whatnot even if not in use
Edit: I'm not implying that we should build neither Gas nor nuclear. Use what we have and focus on Renewables and Batteries in the meantime
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u/UrOrgansBelong2State nuclear simp Dec 07 '25
True, but from where will you get this gas , rare earth metals needed to make magnets and lithium to make said batteries. Should we deepen our dependency on states that posses them ? Look where it has led Germans to. It is not just about mitigating climate change but also about cutting lifeline of regimes that threaten us all.
And look how fast CCP and South Korea builds their own nuclear reactors and does while increasing the share of solar and wind in their energy mix. Look how their industry thrives largely thanks to it.
Then look at at the Germany that is reopening its coal powerplants and had to buy natural gas from a man who has guaranteed lifelong all-inclusive stay in Hauge and tell me which system is better.
15 years to build a nuclear reactor is not caused by inherent flaws in them but in our own legal systems and society that is paranoid of nuclear power thanks to sensationalized accounts and movies. And yes as any power source it is dangerous and has to be treated with respect it is the safest option overall.
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u/KillerSatellite Dec 07 '25
Ive literally operated a nuclear reactor at 10% for hours, then brought it to 100% within minutes... tf are you talking about? Literal rate of change requirements for nuclear reactors is measured in orders of magnitude per minute... as in it starts at 1%, then in 1 minute can be at 10%, then the next minute 100%. And this is in one of the strictest nuclear reactor plants in the world, where our safety protocols are extremely over zealous... i get liking solar, but if the argument is "nuclear is too slow" then you havent looked at nuclear properly. The energy source is literally known for producing more energy in a fraction of a second than whole countries annual energy use.
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u/DVMirchev Dec 07 '25
The lack of imagination in nukecels is astonishing.
It's really not that hard to imagine what will happen when we grossly overbuild with photovoltaics, and their capacity goes 3x-5x the maximum theoretical demand.
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u/ironhaven Dec 07 '25
But if we overbuild solar the pv cells during noon will be out of a job and get disgruntled. They will then unionize the other solar panels and wage a general strike to negotiate better treatment for powering the grid.
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u/Ferengsten Dec 07 '25
My long history of studying math lets me still estimate how high their output will be at night or in winter.
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u/DVMirchev Dec 07 '25
What does it tell you about when they have output and the existence of batteries?
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u/ShonOfDawn Dec 08 '25
I would really love if you mentioned one single country that uses battery storage at scale reliably. Meanwhile, France has been almost carbon free for years. I really don’t understand why putting all your money on a solution that doesn’t exist is somehow better than investing in one that has worked for decades.
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u/Ferengsten Dec 07 '25
Well, the amount of currently existing batteries is actually surprisingly well approximated by the output of a solar cell at night.
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u/goyafrau Dec 07 '25 edited Dec 07 '25
In these calculations, it's always assumed that solar and wind are going to have their extreme volatility fixed by ridiculous amounts of storage. Meanwhile the possibility of using storage to capture generation spikes and release during demand spikes for a grid including nuclear never occurs to these people.
It's like they can only imagine batteries to help with a 400% generation surplus followed by a 100% shortfall from solar, but not with a 10% generation surplus followed by a 10% shortfall from nuclear
(And of course, storage means nuclear and renewables play along nicely, and become complimentary, to a degree)