I don’t have time to write a super-long comment but as someone who has spent hundreds of hours on this question and turned from an anti-nuclear activist to a pro-nuclear funder, I do want to quickly point out that this post does contain a fair amount of errors / statements outside the relevant context.
1. Nuclear being overfunded compared to renewables: R&D budgets are one thing, but overall support is another. In the early 2000s, the world has spent hundreds of billions of dollars every year driving down the cost of renewables, while the last comparable effort to make nuclear cheap in the West was probably 1970s-1980s France. 2-3B USD in R&D funding are nothing when you have a regulatory process and public that are, by and large, at best lukewarm about nuclear.
2. LCOE and system integration: The discussion on this issue seems not very informed by the challenges of grid integration and system LCOE. You are suggesting that LCOE is biased in favor of nuclear, when the opposite seems more likely to be true given discounting and the fact that the system integration costs of renewables and the challenges around system integration are the primary determinants of slowed down penetration in high-renewable jurisdictions. You also seem to assume that the modular cost declines in something produced in factories are a good proxy for the massive infrastructure required for an all-renewables grid, which seems quite implausible given the lack of progress on transmission, seasonal storage etc.
3. The best argument for nuclear: You do not really seem to engage with what seems the best argument for nuclear, as (i) a hedge against failure of an all-renewables world and (ii) nuclear for hard-to-decarbonize sectors, not only electricity (e.g. hydrogen production, industrial heat).
To be clear, I am not at all certain that advanced nuclear will succeed or that the problems around renewables cannot be overcome, but when you think about marginal attention and additional effort and the structure of climate damage and current effort, marginally adding to what is already the biggest and most popular bet is unlikely to be optimal. If you look at overall attention, getting the conclusion that we over-invest in nuclear seems not justified, certainly not if you look at climate philanthropy and the mainstream climate conversation.
I just want to second Johannes’ point: A lot of money is going into renewables now and more is expected going forward. This is because we managed to get wind and solar below cost for other power types in many geographies. Once you harness the power of capital, it is pretty large-scale—pension funds are pouring money into renewables and they mostly do not need any more subsidies and having worked in wind energy myself I think I would not mind if all renewables R&D funding instead went to nuclear, for the reasons Johannes outlines. I think nuclear is left to die on the roadside in comparison and it would good to have it ready in case a non-carbon and non-nuclear grid proves really hard, or in case we can make fast-ramping nuclear that is cheaper than other ways to fill in when renewables are not producing. We want all the tools in out toolkit heading into the wild and uncertain road ahead that is the energy transition.
Just to be clear, we still think nuclear is good and we explicitly phrase it as a high-risk, high-reward bet against the failure of renewables. Furthermore, we very explicitly say that nuclear is better than all fossil alternatives which also implies that we would be in favor of having more nuclear.
I think our overall framing is more like: get away from fossil fuels, a bit more into nuclear and much more into renewables. If you think that is not clear from the text, we should definitely clarify this. Let me know how you understood it.
I don’t have time to write a super-long comment but as someone who has spent hundreds of hours on this question and turned from an anti-nuclear activist to a pro-nuclear funder, I do want to quickly point out that this post does contain a fair amount of errors / statements outside the relevant context.
1. Nuclear being overfunded compared to renewables: R&D budgets are one thing, but overall support is another. In the early 2000s, the world has spent hundreds of billions of dollars every year driving down the cost of renewables, while the last comparable effort to make nuclear cheap in the West was probably 1970s-1980s France. 2-3B USD in R&D funding are nothing when you have a regulatory process and public that are, by and large, at best lukewarm about nuclear.
2. LCOE and system integration: The discussion on this issue seems not very informed by the challenges of grid integration and system LCOE. You are suggesting that LCOE is biased in favor of nuclear, when the opposite seems more likely to be true given discounting and the fact that the system integration costs of renewables and the challenges around system integration are the primary determinants of slowed down penetration in high-renewable jurisdictions. You also seem to assume that the modular cost declines in something produced in factories are a good proxy for the massive infrastructure required for an all-renewables grid, which seems quite implausible given the lack of progress on transmission, seasonal storage etc.
3. The best argument for nuclear: You do not really seem to engage with what seems the best argument for nuclear, as (i) a hedge against failure of an all-renewables world and (ii) nuclear for hard-to-decarbonize sectors, not only electricity (e.g. hydrogen production, industrial heat).
To be clear, I am not at all certain that advanced nuclear will succeed or that the problems around renewables cannot be overcome, but when you think about marginal attention and additional effort and the structure of climate damage and current effort, marginally adding to what is already the biggest and most popular bet is unlikely to be optimal. If you look at overall attention, getting the conclusion that we over-invest in nuclear seems not justified, certainly not if you look at climate philanthropy and the mainstream climate conversation.
Sorry for lack of specific sourcing here, but relevant materials:
https://founderspledge.com/stories/changing-landscape
I just want to second Johannes’ point: A lot of money is going into renewables now and more is expected going forward. This is because we managed to get wind and solar below cost for other power types in many geographies. Once you harness the power of capital, it is pretty large-scale—pension funds are pouring money into renewables and they mostly do not need any more subsidies and having worked in wind energy myself I think I would not mind if all renewables R&D funding instead went to nuclear, for the reasons Johannes outlines. I think nuclear is left to die on the roadside in comparison and it would good to have it ready in case a non-carbon and non-nuclear grid proves really hard, or in case we can make fast-ramping nuclear that is cheaper than other ways to fill in when renewables are not producing. We want all the tools in out toolkit heading into the wild and uncertain road ahead that is the energy transition.
Thank you for your expertise and criticism.
Just to be clear, we still think nuclear is good and we explicitly phrase it as a high-risk, high-reward bet against the failure of renewables. Furthermore, we very explicitly say that nuclear is better than all fossil alternatives which also implies that we would be in favor of having more nuclear.
I think our overall framing is more like: get away from fossil fuels, a bit more into nuclear and much more into renewables. If you think that is not clear from the text, we should definitely clarify this. Let me know how you understood it.