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marcusaurelius_phd t1_jeb38q3 wrote

Reply to comment by Kaz_55 in The European Union to nearly double the share of renewables in the 27-nation bloc's energy consumption by 2030 amid efforts to become carbon neutral and ditch Russian fossil fuels. by chrisdh79

https://app.electricitymaps.com/map

Currently:

France: 40g gCO₂/kWh thanks to nuclear

Germany's Energiewende: 250 g — and it's a good day, they've been at around 400g most of the winter when there was no wind across Europe.

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Kaz_55 t1_jebgdcs wrote

You do realize that this doesn't actually adress any of the inherent issues with nuclear - industry as well as technology - that I pointed to, right? Using your logic I can simply point to Iceland to invalidate everything you have asserted so far.

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marcusaurelius_phd t1_jebmyt0 wrote

I'm pointing you to real time data from right now, where nuclear produces dozens of actual gigawatt of carbon-free power and wind+solar sucks and fails to meet demand that has to be covered by gas and coal, but hey, don't let facts get in the way of your pie in the sky schemes where solar makes sense in Northern Europe and anticyclonic events don't affect the whole continent.

Also re levelized cost of electricity, do you know what the lowest sell PRICE of that wonderful Danish wind power is on the market? It's almost 0€. Not because it's cheap, but because it's next to worthless when there's plenty of wind as there's too much supply and nothing to do with it. And you know what the Danes have to do when there's no wind? They have to buy hydro from Norway at outrageous prices, because there's huge demand.

My point? The levelized cost of intermittent renewables WITHOUT pricing in storage or alternatives is just a fucking lie. Nuclear does the job, it's doing the job right now.

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Kaz_55 t1_jebsri0 wrote

>I'm pointing you to real time data from right now

And I have just done the same with reneweables, so your argument is invalid.

Maybe ask yourself why you have opted for a strawman instead of actually adressing any of the points brought up.

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da2Pakaveli t1_jebdr9s wrote

Gotta wonder why so many CDU politicians sit in various supervisory boards of fossil fuel companies? Coal plants were doubled down on and modified. The truth is that Merkel and her party slowed the energy transition drastically because they hate how wind farms make the landscape worse

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marcusaurelius_phd t1_jebl3v2 wrote

Wind farms don't work when there's no wind. That was the case in early december across the whole of Europe, when incidentally solar farms weren't producing much.

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Helkafen1 t1_jebn6f9 wrote

Renewable-based systems will be much larger than just wind and solar farms. They also plan to store weeks worth of clean fuels.

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marcusaurelius_phd t1_jebnrm7 wrote

> They also plan to store weeks worth of clean fuels.

They plan, some time, maybe, somehow.

Nuclear works now. There's also a way to have cheap, nearly free nuclear: not fucking closing perfectly working plants.

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Helkafen1 t1_jebp0ah wrote

Europe has already enacted policies to support green hydrogen. It's not just a plan. The Inflation Reduction Act in the US does the same.

It's also important to remember that we can reach a ~90% renewable energy system without these fuels. We don't need them immediately. We'll need them mostly in the 2030s and 2040s.

> Nuclear works now.

Does it, though? The three recent European nuclear projects (Flammanville, Hinkley Point C, Olkiluoto 3) are all financial disasters plagued with massive delays.

Strong agreement about keeping existing nuclear plants online.

Edit: grammar

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marcusaurelius_phd t1_jebth4e wrote

> Europe has already enacted policies to support green hydrogen. It's not just a plan

Green hydrogen does not exist at this time. Therefore, it's just a plan.

> Does it, though? The three recent European nuclear projects (Flammanville, Hinkley Point C, Olkiluoto 3) are all financial disasters plagued with massive delay

There's about 100 GW of already installed capacity. That's 100 GW more capacity on windless winter days than non-hydro renewables.

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MightyH20 t1_jedw0r0 wrote

Germany, has progressed farther on the COP target and CO2 reduction and agreement as opposed to France though.

Electricity is just a quarter of total energy consumption.

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marcusaurelius_phd t1_jedwdsg wrote

My alcoholic neighbour has done a lot of progress, he's decreased his drinking a lot more than I have (I don't drink).

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MightyH20 t1_jee6cbs wrote

Your example is irrelevant since France already has lower targets. And yet, Germany has progressed more as opposed to France in % reduction.

COP target Germany: cut 65% emissions from 1990 emission level. Current emissions from 1050 to 675 million tonnes. Reduction = 36%

COP target France: cut 40% emissions from 1990 emission level. Current emissions from 400 to 300 million tonnes. Reduction = 25%.

Not only is France behind in the progress to meet targets, the emissions in absolute numbers are way less too.

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