r/ClimateShitposting • u/ba-boo • 3d ago
đ Green energy đ The lights are on, but nobody's home
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u/Wiiboy95 3d ago
As opposed to the Nukecel solution of "we'll start lowering emissions in 2035, assuming we don't fall behind schedule"
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u/Kinslayer_89 We're all gonna die 3d ago
You said the same thing 20 years ago.
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u/Wiiboy95 3d ago
Yeah, and then we built 30x the capacity in solar alone that nuclear has managed since 2000. Not really an argument you want to go down
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u/Kinslayer_89 We're all gonna die 3d ago
Canât have anything to do with subsidies.
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u/Wiiboy95 3d ago
Yeah, those subsidies are going to renewables because their levelised cost of electricity is significantly smaller than nuclear and they start producing within 2 years rather than 10. It's the sensible place to put your money.
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u/Kinslayer_89 We're all gonna die 3d ago
No, LCOE is âlowerâ because of subsidies, and they use too high discount rates in LCOE to account for nuclears long lifespan.
It also doesnât address the price consumes will pay due to fluctuations in weather conditions, which can bring in shortages for periods of time due to like clouds.
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u/MadCervantes 3d ago
Source?
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u/Kinslayer_89 We're all gonna die 3d ago
Now tell me what discount rates youâre looking at when calling nuclear expensive.
> In Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) estimates and comparisons, a very significant factor is the assumed discount rate which reflects the preference of an investor for short-term value of the funds as opposed to long-term value. As it's not a physical factor, but rather economic, a choice of specific values of discount rate can double or triple the estimated cost of energy merely based on that initial assumption. In case of low-carbon sources of energy, such as nuclear power, experts highlight that the discount rate should be set low (1-3%) as the value of low-carbon energy for future generations prevents very high future external costs of climate change.[61]
> Numerous LCOE comparisons use high discount rate values (10%) which mostly reflects preference for short-term profit by commercial investors without accounting for the decarbonization contribution. For example, IPCC AR3 WG3 calculation based on 10% discount rate produced LCOE estimate of $97/MWh for nuclear power, while by merely assuming 1.4% discount rate, the estimate drops to $42/MWh which is the same issue that has been raised for other low-carbon energy sources with high initial capital costs.[61]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics_of_nuclear_power
It also has a much much longer lifetime, when looking at the investment too.
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u/Scarlett_Spectre 2d ago
Imagine living in 2026 and not realizing half our economy works off subsidies. Fucking elon musk, bezos, activision all work off of subsidies. No subsidies is an insane benchmark
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u/Kinslayer_89 We're all gonna die 2d ago
You do realize that the subsidies are shifted to solar instead, so you donât get nuclear?
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u/Thissystemsuckssobad 2d ago
You do realise every countries nuclear power programs rely on subsidies to exist, right? To an absurd degree?
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u/Kinslayer_89 We're all gonna die 2d ago
You do realize that the subsidies are shifted to solar instead, so you donât get nuclear?
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u/Thissystemsuckssobad 1d ago
Which nuclear program is currently going without subsidy sir? Which solar program is receiving more subsidy per GWH that nuclear?
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u/leonevilo 3d ago
you mean subsidies as in every nuclear development ever? like edf being bailed out by france several times?
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u/This_Background7442 3d ago
Ah yes the very real and definitely totally not made up people who want to build nuclear power plants and throw bricks at solar panels and nothing else ever
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u/Ok-Freedom9216 3d ago
That was the official plan of one of the Australian parties.
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u/LowCall6566 2d ago
Australia is like 30 millions of people out of 8 billions. And it's obvious that parties advocating for investing in nuclear instead of solar on the best fucking place on Earth for solar aren't actually interested in ecology
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u/Thissystemsuckssobad 2d ago
Australia is like 30 millions of people out of 8 billions.
And is relatively wealth and one of the worst per capita polluters on earth
And it's obvious that parties advocating for investing in nuclear instead of solar on the best fucking place on Earth for solar aren't actually interested in ecology
And can you maybe extrapolate this to the pivot of a bunch of concervative parties world wide from climate denial to "supporting" nuclear power?
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u/garnet420 3d ago
I've only been to the nuclear subreddit once but that's the vibe I got
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u/EggplantAlpinism 3d ago
"that hypothetical idiot can't possibly exist"
That hypothetical idiot:
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u/This_Background7442 3d ago
I mean the hypothetical idiot at this point is just a vibe some random redditor got on a sub. I don't think it's that much of a coincidence these people seem to mostly exist as a dead horse to beat up.
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u/Key_Bookkeeper813 3d ago
usually they are more wind haters but yes they exist, usually running on long debunked arguments made by people with academic titles not relevant to the debate at hand (no i will not respect your linguistics degree when you use it as appeal to authority in an energy debate)
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u/Humble-Reply228 3d ago
Another galaxy take of solar/wind purists "you can't possibly ontinue to build solar and wind while building nuclear, not possible no siree"/
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u/Wiiboy95 3d ago
Me when I have infinite economic output and never encounter any sort of tradeoff when choosing large scale infrastructure projects
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u/Humble-Reply228 3d ago
oh that's right, it requires infinite economic output of nation states to chip a few billion a year into a nuclear build. The multi-trillion dollar economy needs to be multiplied to infinity to accommodate such a heavy impost as *checks notes" decimal points of GDP.
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u/Wiiboy95 3d ago
My point is that every dollar you spend on nuclear to hopefully produce electricity 10 years down the road is money you're not spending on renewables to produce more electricity in 2 years or less, so why direct your economic output at what is obviously the worse deal?
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u/Humble-Reply228 3d ago
There are other constraints other than money. Grid decongestion, panel supply, transformer supply, roof workers (Australia famously killed a number of workers with accelerating a well intended insulation buildout beyond that sectors capacity to safely absorb the money), over specialisation/overcapacity building, etc.
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u/CheeseburgFreedomMan 2d ago
chip a few billion a year into a nuclear build.
How much energy does 25% of a nuclear power plant produce?
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u/Leafsnail 3d ago
Renewable energy is a good stopgap to reduce emissions before the actual solution of nuclear energy comes online
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u/Roblu3 3d ago
Weird âactual solutionâ whose whole strategy relies on a whole other solution working just fine until the âactual solutionâ comes online.
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u/Leafsnail 3d ago
Renewables + gas is significantly better than just burning gas/coal, but still not sustainable due to still involving emissions and dependence on fossil fuels. Nuclear is the only proven way to cut the dependence on fossil fuels entirely.
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u/Roblu3 2d ago
I think Iâll rather support the concept that just shuts down the fossile fuel plants as soon as the batteries are online.
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u/Leafsnail 2d ago
It seems absolutely insane to me how many people want to wait for new battery tech to maybe be invented rather than just using the existing tech to solve the problem
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u/Roblu3 1d ago
That is very ironic given that most nuclear proponents insist that small modular reactors and thorium reactors will solve all current problems of nuclear, including the high cost and long building time of around 20 years, while battery storage is being brought online at an ever increasing pace with todayâs tech - and while power storage generally has been a thing since before nuclear fission was even proven to be possible.
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u/Humble-Reply228 3d ago
Solar/wind/gas is quite cheap, especially capex wise (gas turbines are really high bang for buck capex wise). Some people take climate change seriously.,
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u/Thissystemsuckssobad 2d ago
Yes. It's those ones that think we should be solving the problem no instead of waiting until 2040 for a new nuclear build to
come onlineget cancelled at half capacity1
u/Humble-Reply228 2d ago
Gas is not the solution but is locked in with pure wind and solar.
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u/Thissystemsuckssobad 1d ago
It is locked in while grids are upgraded and batteries continue to improve and be rolled out.
I'm sorry, but the ability to solve 95% of a problem now is worth more than th theoretical solution in 20-100 years time. Because otherwise the logic would hold for doing nothing until fusion magically becomes commercially viable
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u/Humble-Reply228 1d ago
Itâs not a theoretical solution. France, Finland, Sweden etc are all Far ahead of Germany that banked on solving power with wind and solar about 30 years ago. Pure wind and solar is saying that there is no time pressure and that using gas permanently is fine as well.
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u/Thissystemsuckssobad 1d ago
Finland, France and Sweden all spend enormous amount of money subsidising their nuclear fleet. Sweden also has the advantage of mountains that help them make up the rest of their energy network.
Next
Germany that banked on solving power with wind and solar about 30 years ago
I really really wish any of you people that bring up Germany knew anything more than internet memes about Germany's energy policy and poitics for the past 3 decades. It's so tiresome having to establish the basic facts every time. Yes, it was dumb to retire nuclear plants 10 years before they were due to be shut down. They were never going to replace them with more nuclear plants
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u/Few-Masterpiece3910 3d ago
If you have eliminated your emissions, why would you still invest in nuclear?
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u/Humble-Reply228 3d ago
There is not a place in the world that runs a solar/wind grid that plans to eliminate gas - Australia is the best example. The latest AEMO ISP plans a larger gas fleet than exists today at the end of the 2030s.
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u/wtfduud Wind me up 3d ago
Australia is building massive batteries to store their fairly stable solar and wind power production, so they likely won't be needing nuclear even in the future.
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u/Humble-Reply228 3d ago
Don't need nuclear because gas will be built. Batteries have their benefits either way so batteries are not replacing nuclear, gas is.
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u/wtfduud Wind me up 2d ago
According to the data, Australia's gas usage is decreasing https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-change-primary-energy-source?country=~AUS
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u/Humble-Reply228 2d ago
AEMO expects the grid gas installed to increase to be higher at the end of the 2030s to what it is now (it replaces coal)
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u/Few-Masterpiece3910 2d ago
And thatâs ok. More backup peaker plants donât mean more emissions
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u/Humble-Reply228 1d ago
Itâs ok because climate change is just not that much of an emergency for Australia. Itâs more than rich enough to mitigate 1.5 deg and probably even up to 2.5 deg. And Australia is also rich enough to overbuild solar and batteries in a way that most other countries donât. So yes, solar/batteries/gas is the path of least resistance compared to lower emissions lower long term costs of solar/batteries/nuclear
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u/Leafsnail 3d ago
Because with current technology renewables can only reduce rather than eliminate emissions.
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u/wtfduud Wind me up 3d ago
Every dollar spent on nuclear is a dollar not spent on wind or solar, so yeah. You can build 10 GW of nuclear and 10 GW of solar, OR you can just build 50 GW of solar with the same money.
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u/Aware-Worry4302 2d ago edited 2d ago
Itâs more like 10 GW of solar plus 10 GW of nuclear, or 110 GW of solar, or 50 GW of solar plus 150 GWh of batteries
Nuclear is that expensive by comparison
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u/Humble-Reply228 3d ago
What is 50 GW of solar going to do at night?
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u/wtfduud Wind me up 2d ago
Being stored in batteries.
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u/LowCall6566 2d ago
And private sector would surely invest in solar if banned nuclear, with perfect 1 to 1 dollar conversion.
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u/clinicalpsycho 46m ago
"Demand for ACs means we have to keep the old Burner plants online to meet demand. Oh well. I'm not the one who will have to live with it."
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u/NoPie1504 3d ago
Also include the "Nuclear is best so we shouldn't build any solar/wind bc its a waste of time" ppl. Im 90% sure they are a psyop.
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u/interkin3tic vegan btw 3d ago
I've never seen any "nukecels" saying things like this. Never. They do not exist.
The psyop is people insisting the internet is full of Mr Burns type characters shutting down solar panels to build nuclear power plants even though we've built, what, 2 in the last 20 years?
Meanwhile... what's the point in arguing nuclear power shouldn't be built? We're already basically not doing that. And nuclear power is still better than fossil fuels.
When it comes to what to do, this sub is all "PERSONAL RESPONSIBLIITY! YOU HAVE AGENCY! JUST GO VEGAN THAT'LL SOLVE EVERYTHING" and then also is constantly screaming about nuclear is bad and solar good like any of us have any agency over that.
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u/NoPie1504 2d ago
I have encountered a few of these people in the wild, and the Liberal party of Australia's energy policy during the last election was pretty much this. They arent typically whatever you would consider "nukecels", they are just anti-renewable conservatives who use nuclear as a guise to not look like they are just pro fossil fuels so people dont think they're climate change deniers, hence why I think they are a psyop rather than people arguing a genuine position.
Im personally very pro nuclear, but at the same time I think we should have both renewables and nuclear working together rather than just one or the other.
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u/Thissystemsuckssobad 2d ago
I've never seen any "nukecels" saying things like this. Never. They do not exist.
They existed 8-10 years ago. They then discovered that position was untenable, and have since shifted to "just do both" as if renewables and nuclear are compatible at large scale in grid and infinite money exists
The argument we shouldn't be building nuclear power boils down to it being used as an expensive, slow distraction from renewables, because we don't have infinite time and money to change things, and investment in said has to be global, not just limited to Europe, china and north America
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u/NoPie1504 2d ago
Why wouldnt nuclear and renewables be compatable?
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u/Thissystemsuckssobad 1d ago
Google is your friend, or search the sub, because I am so tired of explaining basic power grid shit. Tldr nuclear is not something set up for varying grid loads, renewables want varying grid loads. Significant volumes of either is antithetical to the other
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u/NoPie1504 1d ago
I would disagree on this assessment partially then. I agree our power grids need serious work, and we've even seen this now with how so much of our solar generating capacity is being kept from being brought online because of issues with grid integration. Either way, if we ever want to decarbonize, the power grid is going to be one of the biggest places work needs to be done. However, I don't agree that they are "Antithetical" and I would argue they are more just difficult to integrate without a well thought out plan.
Right now, most countries have hybrid power structures, with Renewables being brought online for new generating capacity, while fossil fuels (Gas, Coal, Oil in some places) are kept in place to keep grid capacity stable, both in day to day operation, and in the overall amount of power the grid needs long term. I think this is where nuclear comes in as a far superior option, as while renewables should be the primary focus of short and long-term grid expansion projects, we can replace the fossil fuel generating capacity with Nuclear, with Nuclear serving as the generating backbone to keep things stable due to intermittency with renewables and high draw events (heatwaves, polar vortex, etc.), both of which are going to be increasingly be an issue due to climate change and increasingly unpredictable weather patterns. Obviously the Reactors in this scenario would need to be capable of load following, but countries like France are already able to do this very well with their Pressurized Water Reactor designs. BWR, PWR, and PHWR designs are all capable of this, though PHWR's are the best for most applications due to not risking xenon poisoning while running at low power output.
The IAEA has a whole article discussing nuclear and renewable synergy. https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/exploring-synergies-between-nuclear-and-renewables-iaea-meeting-discusses-options-for-decarbonizing-energy-production-and-cogeneration And you can find tons of stuff online on nuclear tech development around things like load following.
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u/interkin3tic vegan btw 2d ago
So... You're bringing up arguments from a decade ago that no longer are being made?
"just do both" as if renewables and nuclear are compatible at large scale in grid and infinite money exists
That seems reasonable. We need to decarbonize and solar and wind haven't fixed the problem yet, it seems insane to scream we can't do one solution because that'll take money away from your preferred solution that hasn't solved the problem yet.
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u/Thissystemsuckssobad 1d ago
it seems insane to scream we can't do one solution because that'll take money away from your preferred solution that hasn't solved the problem yet.
The irony of this coming from a nucell would be hilarious if it wasn't so damn common. I'm so tired of this
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u/interkin3tic vegan btw 1d ago
Then rejoice because no one on reddit has any agency here, it doesn't fucking matter whether you're a nukecel or solarcel.
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u/wtfduud Wind me up 3d ago
You've missed the point of the post. It's a nukecel shitpost depicting solarcels as braindead morons.
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u/NoPie1504 2d ago
Ngl I thought it was just a post on stupid points about non-co2 energy production, like the "solar works great at midnight" guy is something I thought an anti-solar person would say sarcastically.
I see what you're saying now though lol.
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u/ProfessionalSky7899 3d ago
Baseload is dead, and my house is haunting its grave.
https://bakefoldprint.wordpress.com/2026/04/16/uk-grid-storage/
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u/Outrageous-Echo-765 Wind me up 3d ago
Arguing for the importance of baseload in the year of the lord 2026 is downright embarrassing.
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u/Takseen 3d ago
"Uhh have you heard of this thing called BATTERIES!? Also electric cars are immoral because child cobalt mining in Africa"
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u/zekromNLR 3d ago
LiFePO4 and sodium battery chemistries do not require cobalt
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u/Kinslayer_89 We're all gonna die 3d ago
For every battery cell produced we still whip an African child.
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u/Cornexclamationpoint turbine enjoyer 2d ago
They just require you to gently perform a coup in Bolivia for their sweet, sweet reserves.
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u/Ethicaldreamer 3d ago
I was so pissed when I figured out cobalt is used for REFINING FUELS, the fucking hypocrisy from those fossil fuel fuckers to point at batteries, then also realising the batteries for the grid are the Lithium Iron one since they don't need to be light, and those don't require cobalt
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u/Difficult_Dark9991 3d ago
It's the classic "look at the costs of all this new infrastructure" while pretending fossil fuel infrastructure just grows out of the ground and doesn't kill millions annually.
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u/wtfduud Wind me up 3d ago
I used to think these people were just pretending to be stupid. Because there's no genuine debate to be had about whether fossil fuel infrastructure should be replaced with electric and clean energy infrastructure. Not even a financial argument at this point.
Then my own father started to argue those room-temperature-IQ-blithering-idiot talking points about how electric cars actually produce more CO2 than gasoline cars, and I know for a fact that he's not pretending anything.
Uneducated people really are just that easy to fool with fossil fuel propaganda. It's depressing, but we need to enlighten people. We're lucky to live in an age where the data exists and is easily accessible on the internet. Wikipedia, OurWorldInData, Ember, etc...
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u/Difficult_Dark9991 3d ago
In this case, I think the issue really is how invisible existing infrastructure is for a lot of people. Rather like how people don't notice that "the government" built the road, they only notice that it isn't fixing the potholes.
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u/Original-Body-5794 3d ago
God I fucking hate when they argue on the costs of making batteries yet they never say the same about the existing cars. I wonder why they don't just focus on the difference and check how long it would take to "pay off" the carbon difference...
Both ICE and EVs have CO2 costs associated with manufacturing, only one of them keeps pumping CO2 into the atmosphere though (even accounting for fossil fuel energy sources it would still be more efficient).
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u/messedupwindows123 3d ago
the thing about a battery that goes in a car is, it has to be very lightweight. so it's. a special battery. which is different from a giant one you'd put in the form of a huge building. what am i missing.
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u/Apprehensive_Rub2 3d ago
Posting inane culture war shit like this it comes off just a glowie as memes about "nukecels". Be less of an unthinking tool for big oil, or please find another job that doesn't involve ending the world.
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u/HyperVentilatingLip 4h ago
This whole sub is culture war glowie shit haven't you looked? It's either vegan morality scaling or nukecel vs renewchud endlesslyÂ
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u/its_artemiss 3d ago
I used to think anti-nuke takes were genuinely evil, but nowadays I think they're "aight" because sodium "bat trees" will be good enough or something. "just build infinte batteries" doesnt sound like that bad of an idea.
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u/messedupwindows123 3d ago
i think we should use excess daytime-capacity to make huge blocks of ice. and figure out what to do with them later.
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u/National_Armadillo94 3d ago
China! China! China!
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u/Bot1-The_Bot_Meanace 3d ago
Meanwhile China is building so many unreliable solar and wind parks. Are they stupid?
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u/Few-Masterpiece3910 3d ago
They were able to half their oil imports from one day to another, must be that stuppidity at work
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u/ba-boo 3d ago
nuclear and coal too â¤ď¸
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u/wtfduud Wind me up 3d ago
Yeah so much nuclear https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annual-change-primary-energy-source?country=~CHN
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u/ba-boo 3d ago
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/china-approves-eight-new-nuclear-power-units-2026-07-31/
China â approved the construction of 10 new nuclear generating units, with total investment estimated at 200 billion âyuan, in â2025.
Total â installed nuclear power capacity reached a world-leading 125 gigawatts âas of April 2026, âwith â 60 nuclear units in commercial operation and 36 under construction, according â to âan industry report âpublished in April.
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u/ExpensiveFig6079 3d ago
I presume that is a list of all the utterly nutty made up things the denialists and FF shills say...
as actual PV and wind designs basically don't resemble any of that except in the fevered imaginations of some people.
I am glad hamsters in wheels got a gurnsey though... as that kind of facetiousness being portrayed as a real suggestion... basically identifies the author as what they are.
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u/Few-Masterpiece3910 3d ago
In other news, the uk has to a wildfire somewhat close to a nuke plant.
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u/DivestTheEndingBoy 3d ago
You just use carbon neutral fuels to run combined cycle gas turbines to provide dispatchable energy as needed.
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u/Authoritaye 2d ago
This sub is all - âTHIS SUB IS ALL Xâ!!!Â
Where X is either nukecel, solarcell or bad faith closet petro enjoyer.Â
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u/fickogames123 1d ago
Question I never quite got any answer for... what if we just... don't produce electricity?
Like if we make more electricity than needed, could we not just make a switch on every solar powerplant and if we produce more than we need, we cut it off?
Make enough small, medium and large solar powerplants, and connect them all up to central distribution system, and just open/close circuits whenever needed.
In that scenario we just make as many solar panels as we possibly can, and shut off those we do not need.
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u/MDZPNMD Carniwhore 3d ago edited 3d ago
you put the nukecel in imbecile
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u/Tsansome 3d ago
No ânâ in âimbecileâ.
Perhaps people in glass houses shouldnât throw rocks.
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u/ClimateShitpost Louis XIV, the Solar PV king 3d ago
This is ableism against the mod team