I interpret your sarcasm with amusement, but also depression. it's really sad to see how Germany turned away from nuclear evergy. It seems like the 3 main soures are now:
Coal should be deprecated already. Renewables are dependent on environmental effects, in particular solar doesn't work in emergency situations such as volcano eruptions rendering the sky dark. For oil, we depend on third parties, of which we know that they do not have our best interests at heart.
It is depressing to see the political situations on these metrics, especially the idea which gets pushed now, which claims that everything will be alright if we just optimize our energy consumption. It ain't gonna happen. People won't meaningfully reduce their energy-consumption, at least not in a way that would justify the use of fossil fuels.
So what are we left with? Nuclear is the only good bet you could make right now, while waiting out on fusion.
edit: I often think of this meme which goes around, talking about the fact that people are much more willing to donate to a single child in need, rather than a group of children who equally need help. People are prone to take action when they feel like their individual action makes an impact.
I feel like this is similar to the fossil fuels - vs - nuclear debate. We know, that about 20mil ppl die every single year due to air pollution. We also know, that a very small, countable number of people died of nuclear accidents, in the complete history of humanity, ever, in total.
Yet we seem to think that the few nuclear accident's fatalities are worse than the ones caused by air pollution. Why? Because we are in some way biased to give more meaning to individual events, rather than rates of change that are around us. And it'll break our backs if we don't carefully examine the problem at hand.
You forgot imported gas, but has the same problems as Oi, maybe worse because the conflicting party is geographically "around the corner" instead of on the other side of the globe.
Germanys relationship with Nuclear power had been one with Tons of absurdity from the get to go. To name a few examples (in no specific order):
- When West Germany decided where they should (temporary) store nuclear waste they had a list of potential abandon mines. While this list wasn't quite up to modern standards it was well thought out. But in the end they choose a mine which not only wasn't on the list, but was known to not be well suited. Reason: Pettiness, east Germany had just done so too, so they choose a mine at the border to east Germany.
- The Anti-Nuclear Power movement in West Germany was partially sponsored and instigated by East Germany (through so where most non-small movements).
- after Fukushima plans to stop using Nuclear Power where moved up costing the State millions due to existing contracts and being questionable. I mean the danger of Atom power had been well understood at that point in question, Fukushima didn't change this, nor did it unearth any (not already well known) huge flaws. So this asks the question if it is so important why wasn't it started years earlier, if it isn't why move so abrupt?
- Germany loves importing nuclear power, not only from France but also from other countries with lower safety standards of which the reactors aren't that far of Germany (geologically seen).
Each and every nation connected to the European supergrid imports when needed and exports when possible, because it is much more efficient than trying hard to maintain autonomy. The is eases balancing production (which may originate from anywhere) with consumption.
Here Germany often acts as a provider for Poland, Austria, the Czech Republic and Switzerland (which also may provide it to other needing nations).
Well it may depress you even more that I didn't even expect constructive feedback like yours when I pulled in Germany into this discussion (it is the Elephant in the European Grid-Operators-Room anyways).
> 1. Coal
Yes, from Poland
> 2. Renewables
Yes, definetly
> Solar
Already plans underway to force every new home to have solar panels on its roof, regardless of the direction of the gabel and regardless how non-significant solar energy is in Germany anyways. Existing home-owners love the idea of increasing construction costs for future home-owners...
> Wind
Already plans underway to massively increase density of windmills per km, regardless that the existing mills already are turned off for most of the year (because it would melt the grid to keep them running), regardless that we're chopping down huge amounts of trees to make room for them, regardless of the environmental impact of planting unremovable kilo-tons of concrete footing into the ground
> Ocean Currents
No, for two reasons. One: Maintenance costs make this technology inefficient (rust). Two: Since we're world champions in moral soundness our whole tidal-range-gifted coastline is deemed a national park and as such is forever excluded from any such infrastructure work
> 3. imported oil
Already doing that.
I fear, unless there is some crucial pain of whatever sorts on behalf of the average German, our nomenclatura will continue to proceed with the current polciy of "nearshoring responsibility". Because:
> It ain't gonna happen. People won't meaningfully reduce their energy-consumption
German consumers still don't do that, despite paying the highest electricity bills in the developed world (almost twice of what the French pay). Apparently we can still afford to kick down the can (or rather to kick it across the border).
> German consumers still don't do that, despite paying the highest electricity bills in the developed world (almost twice of what the French pay).
No (France .32, Germany .19), and this comparison isn't sound because the financial models differ: Germany finances its transition by taxes on energy, and France mainly finances it thanks to other taxes (the consolidated tax burden is way higher in France).
Sorry, your price link is contradicting you. Meanwhile you've left out that aside from energy-taxation, Germans already are having the highest income-tax and social-security costs of the developed world as well. France must have some very elaborate scheme hiding this great price-equalizer.
> in particular solar doesn't work in emergency situations such as volcano eruptions rendering the sky dark.
I'm not familiar with this. Is this a common problem in Germany? Are southern states like Baden-Württemberg more afflicted or less compared to more northern ones like Schleswig-Holstein?
No, it is a hypothesis of mine, that a large volcano eruption may disrupt the function of solar within a large area that was affected and which depends on solar energy. A particular example may be
I don't think nuclear is much more resistant against forces of nature than solar/wind are... An INES level 7 accident in France could cause a similar outage in France's nuclear capacity (similar to Japan's nuclear lost decade). Or massive droughts could cause nationwide nuclear outages due to a lack of cooling water. Having a mix of nuclear/solar/wind with hydrogen as a "battery" in an EU super grid seems like a good way to mitigate the risks.
No, but winter is. Inclination of the earth means solar produces considerably less energy in winter and this is even more prevalent in far northern/southern latitudes. Also cloud coverage can drastically reduce solar output.
The problem for doing this large scale if the right of way for the HVDC lines. I'm watching this on a smaller scale in Massachusetts, where Maine voters are blocking a HVDC link to Hydro Quebec. But I think this is a game between established interests.. in this case NextEra funded the ballot question and advertising, I think because they lost out on their SeaLink project (HVDC to Seabrook nuclear power plant).
Thanks for that, I really wish everybody could stop classifying the burning of biomass as "renewable" in these discussions. Yes, I understand that it's part of the carbon cycle, but burning it still results in more CO2 in the air than before. In other words, it's a net negative for carbon sequestration.
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1. Coal,
2. Renewables (Solar, wind, perhaps ocean currents),
3. imported oil.
Coal should be deprecated already. Renewables are dependent on environmental effects, in particular solar doesn't work in emergency situations such as volcano eruptions rendering the sky dark. For oil, we depend on third parties, of which we know that they do not have our best interests at heart.
It is depressing to see the political situations on these metrics, especially the idea which gets pushed now, which claims that everything will be alright if we just optimize our energy consumption. It ain't gonna happen. People won't meaningfully reduce their energy-consumption, at least not in a way that would justify the use of fossil fuels.
So what are we left with? Nuclear is the only good bet you could make right now, while waiting out on fusion.
edit: I often think of this meme which goes around, talking about the fact that people are much more willing to donate to a single child in need, rather than a group of children who equally need help. People are prone to take action when they feel like their individual action makes an impact.
I feel like this is similar to the fossil fuels - vs - nuclear debate. We know, that about 20mil ppl die every single year due to air pollution. We also know, that a very small, countable number of people died of nuclear accidents, in the complete history of humanity, ever, in total.
Yet we seem to think that the few nuclear accident's fatalities are worse than the ones caused by air pollution. Why? Because we are in some way biased to give more meaning to individual events, rather than rates of change that are around us. And it'll break our backs if we don't carefully examine the problem at hand.