It’s still not earning you money to spend electricity because you still have to pay the transfer fee which is around 6 cents / kWh but it’s pretty damn cheap nevertheless, mostly because of the excess in wind energy.
Last winter because of a mistake it dropped down to negative 50 cents / kWh for few hours, averaging negative 20 cents for the entire day. People were literally earning money by spending electricity. Some were running electric heaters outside in the middle of the winter.
Welcome to the world of renewables. We have quite some negative hours in Germany in summer when sun and wind are active simultaneously. Unfortunately Finland relies on nuclear, does it?
It’s a poor solution for what people like to call “baseline power”.
The argument goes: solar and wind don’t provide consistent power, so there has to be some power generation that doesn’t fluctuate so we always have X amount of power to make up for when solar/wind don’t suffice. Nuclear is consistent and high-output, so it’s perfect for this.
Unfortunately, reality is a little different. First problem is that solar/wind at scale don’t fluctuate as much. The sun always shines somewhere, and the wind always blows somewhere. You have to aggregate a large area together, but that already exists with the European energy market.
Second issue is that solar/wind at scale regularly (or will regularly) produce more than 100% of the demand. This gives you two options: either spend the excess energy, or stop generating so much of it. Spending the excess requires negative energy prices so people will use it, causing profitability issues for large power plants. As nuclear is one of the most expensive sources of energy, this requires hefty subsidies which need to be paid for by taxpayers. The alternative is shutting the power plant down, but nuclear plants in particular aren’t able to quickly shut off and on on demand. And as long as they’re not turned on they’re losing money, again requiring hefty subsidies. You could try turning off renewable power generation, but that just causes energy prices to rise due to a forced market intervention. Basically, unless your baseline power generator is able to switch off and on easily and can economically survive a bit of downtime, it’s not very viable.
Nuclear is safe. It produces a lot of power, the waste problem is perfectly manageable and the tech has that cool-factor. But with the rapid rise of solar and wind, which are becoming cheaper every day, it’s economic viability is under strong pressure. It just costs too much, and all that money could have been spent investing into clean and above all cheap energy instead. I used to be pro-nuclear, but after seeing the actual cost calculations for these things I think it’s not worth doing at the moment.
As for what I think a good baseline power source would be: I think we have to settle for (bio-)gas. It’s super quick to turn off and on and still fairly cheap. And certainly not as polluting as coal. We keep the gas generators open until we have enough solar/wind/battery/hydrogen going, as backup. If nuclear gets some kind of breakthrough that allows them to be cheaper then great! Until then we should use the better solutions we have available right now (and no, SMRs are not the breakthrough you might think it is. They’re still massively more expensive than the alternatives and so far have not really managed to reduce either costs or buils times by any significant margin).
Maybe fusion in the future manages to be economically viable. Fingers crossed!
What’s your opinion on smaller scale power plants? It seems like a decent way to cut the costs and still get that extra power in those seasonal low power periods. Or do you think it’s not worth pursuing at all?
I’m in the US which is quite large. I’ve always thought small scale power plants in conjunction with solar and wind would be good.
Especially since a lot of states turn the land surrounding the power plant into wildlife sanctuaries since nothing can be built in the safety zone anyway.
It’s like bird watching heaven at the power plant near me. I guess I just really like the idea of a power source that also incidentally protects forested areas.
The sun always shines somewhere and wind always blows somewhere. Now we just have to install x-times the global energy demand in production capacity and also the infrastructure to distribute it around the world and also make sure that this hyper centralized system is not used against us and then already we have a perfect solution without nuclear. Ez pz, no more CO2 in 500 years.
The toxic and deadly trash it makes. Deadly for centuries.
In Germany we still search for an area to dig for ages. We search since 30 years.
In the mean time, you seem to be a big fan of burning coal instead, which only pollutes the atmosphere instead of easily storable material to be buried when we feel we have found a sufficient deep hole that no one is going to look in.
Many active reactors rely on old designs, we have new ones now that are far cleaner. Some even use existing waste as fuel, so we would be able to get rid of those old stock piles.
Ofc the oil industry is fighting that tooth and nail since it doesn’t jive with their FUD campaign
Look at the clean-up cost of Fukushima, it’s mental. Then look at the set-up costs, and how long it takes. Compare that to renewables.
Look at costs of dam failures. Or how many people they killed. Or look at the cost of climate change. Fukushima is nothing in comparison. You can also compare it to the cost of the tsunami that actually caused the issue to begin with.
Not that I want to disagree with you, but even without comparing to two of the biggest fuckups in human(energy) history nuclear energy is always much more expensive than renewable energy, because it needs a lot of safety mechanisms a much longer and more complicated supply chain, and then finally the costs of decontamination.
I know nuclear isn’t ideal but to rule it out completely while the alternative for stable baseline power is still coal and gas seems problematic to me
Yes indeed. Best is to move to renewables as fast as possible. This will make power very cheap in the middle run.
Storing solar and wind isnt cheap enough. The battery costs are outrageous, not to mention the thing you dont want: the materials Arent easy renewable. Nuclear can generate 30% of you base powerload while the rest is powered by solar and wind (that way you dont need coal of gas).
Storing electricity from wind/solar with hydrogen isnt efficiënt and would drive up energy prices just like with batteries
Shutting down their nuclear power plants is probably the worst thing the Germans have done.
And when the sun and wind aren’t active?
People will point to a few hours of negative energy prices as if it’s a triumph, but it just proves that there’s still nowhere near enough storage for renewables to provide baseline power.
for renewables to provide baseline power.
I think what people always forget is, that water energy exists. It is a form of renewable energy that has the potential to provide baseline power, since it isn’t that dependent on short term weather. I think in Spain they have a water power plant that produces as much energy as several nuclear power plants together.
Indeed, that’s why Hydro assets are generally already used to the greatest possible extent. Nuclear is needed to supplement that baseline power. The problem is with Variable Renewable Energy (VRE) not renewables as a whole.
And when the sun and wind aren’t active?
That is a serious issue. Under the hood the power grid is being reengineered to solve it. Lot of battery storages, pump lakes, and may be hydrogen conversion. Still this is an open issue. I love to follow the discussion in blogs and podcasts.
