The earlier answer on the entropy of renewables answered the question; especially when allied with a simple calculation on energy density for solar and wind. I strongly recommend https://www.withouthotair.com/ by either buying the book or it is available to download for free. The author sadly died in his prime but his most important legacy has global implications and is factual. It proves that the energy balance cannot be met with natural, non-depleting sources. Please be careful with what you read, many exponents of renewables equate electricity with energy. In advanced countries electricity is only about 20% of the primary energy supply. Heat and transport dominate by far worldwide.

As for nuclear, the IVth Generation of high temperature fission reactors is the near term future. Light water moderated reactors have been deployed almost universally in all countries except India, UK and Canada who have each chosen different routes. The reason for the light water reactor's dominance despite escalating safety costs is well documented in the military history of the last century. UK amongst some others developed and deployed the high temperature gas cooled 'dry' route which has many advantages as are now recognised.

The Generation IV small modular reactors are inherently safe (see Ref Kletz, Trevor for a definition) as has been physically demonstrated in Japan and China on real plants. These countries have looked carefully and dispassionately at the options and developed devices which are inherently safe, factory reproducible, provide high enough temperatures for industrial and domestic heat, also high enough to produce thermo-chemical hydrogen for synthetic transport fuels and provide distributed energy sourcing since it is not feasible to transmit the total energy quantities demanded electrically in mature economies. Growing economies can move directly to distributed low-carbon nuclear elegantly avoiding electricity or gas or liquid fuel transmission infrastructure.

The most advanced demonstration plant in the world is the HTR-PM, presently in commissioning at 2 x 100 MWe in China following the proving of its smaller prototype and serious worldwide development effort over decades. The worldwide body of knowledge on high temperature small nuclear is at a point where deployment at scale is practical before 2030. Most advanced countries have small modular reactor programmes with designs at advanced stages. The high temperature small modular reactor preparations in China, Japan, USA, UK, France and many others produce heat at a temperature matched to repower large coal stations carbon-free by re-using all except the boilers. Deployment studies for such repowering have been completed in China and USA. You will appreciate the massive impact this will have upon global emissions.

The fuel is of course radioactive but is non-proliferating for weapons use because it is contained in ceramic which is harder to break down than newly mined materials so is unattractive and this also makes it safer to store as waste. Waste storage volumes are smaller than from light water reactors due to the higher utilisation of the fuel in the lower energy density core and the conversion efficiency of the downstream processes plus other helpful factors. These high temperature small modular reactors can operate on other fuels such as thorium but can also consume legacy 'hot' residues from pressurised water reactors and the military.

In practical terms, it is physically impossible to build traditional large nuclear power stations at a rate relevant to the latest Paris imperatives. The only way to achieve a high pace of transition, even without global energy growth, is by factory manufacture of small distributable energy plants on a numerical scale similar to other volume manufactures such as aircraft. The Boeing 737 now has delivered 10,000 units manufactured at licensed factories worldwide and is still growing. This aircraft has a similar investment profile to small modular reactors in factory set up and economies of repetition. Volume manufacturing techniques from other industries are especially relevant to small modular nuclear but have not yet been widely applied in nuclear.

As has been said by others in this post, the energy subject is large but that should not prevent thinking fundamentally about the underlying thermodynamic realities as MacKay has done, applying the immutable laws of physics in this debate as few have done and unemotionally analysing the problem and reaching conclusions as many enlightened nations have already but perhaps too quietly done so that democracies can be offered rational choices.

Perhaps the final arbiter is cost in all these things. The UK Government Techno Economic Assessment has shown that small nuclear is attractive from a socio economic perspective and was followed up by a formative expert finance working group to make ready the market and the commercial context. Most recently a study, which can be extrapolated internationally laid out a pathway. https://d2umxnkyjne36n.cloudfront.net/insightReports/Preparing-for-deployment-of-a-UK-SMR-by-2030-UPDATED.pdf?mtime=20161011145322

So the answer to Dariusz's question is in my view, YES, supported by massive programmes of excellent work invested in small modular high temperature reactors which is largely unseen by the general population and decision makers to who sadly have so far only been offered rather poor, expensive and regressive energy choices for all our children.

Please read widely and draw your own conclusions.

I strongly suggest reading this paper Article Prospects for nuclear energy

In the future, I think that nuclear power plants are more focused on advanced generation reactors, such as small modular reactors (SMRs). Renewable energy is further developed.

I agree with Azab, I think is necessary unless another generation until the renewable systems be capable to replace the fossil and also nuclear generation.

Currently 57 nuclear power plants are under construction and will be in operation for at least 60 years. According to IAEA (https://pris.iaea.org/pris/) 288 nuclear power plants will be in operation for more than 30 years, and 87 will be in operation for more than 40 years. Extending the lifetime of nuclear power plants is becoming common practice in OECD member countries. About 90 percent of US plants have extended their operation to 60 years. A subsequent renewal extends a plant’s operation from 60 to 80 years. This means that some nuclear power plants will be in operation towards the end of this century.

The cheapest energy technologies of today are Solar PV and Onshore Wind. Other renewable technologies such as Offshore Wind are coming close. Cost of power from these technologies drop at dramatic speed. And they are clean and safe.

It would be a sad thing for the world if more investments were spend on nuclear energy technology, which leaves pollution, brings a safety problems and is extremely costly and apparently getting more costly every year.

Wind and solar in combination with battery technology and cross-country cooperation offers a low cost clean solution, which will also provide stability. Earlier this year the entire Danish electrical-system was running 20 consecutive days without coal, natural gas or nuclear. Wind today supplies in average 45% of all Danish electricity on an annual basis.

Renewable Energy technologies have come to maturity and can obviously do without coal and nuclear once the power plants have been constructed. Development is now extremely fast - and world wide. The battery technology rapidly develops the same way.

Forget nuclear power!

It is always dangerous to play with a dangerous gadget. Life is more important than any commercial aspect. Loney has no value before life. life is most important and not within control of man. Man should not play with a dangerous gadget, especially with atomic energy. Why not extract power from Thunderstorm? It is no fault of Max Planck and Alberts Einstein who found the Quantum Effect and thereby the Mass-energy conversion. Further research went dangerously but then moderated by heavy water. Yet it is dangerous. Alternative should have been searched seventy years back. Not now. Time reaching its inevitable end. Let us all have an introspection of our thoughts and deeds. Are they dangerous? Let us convey only those ideas which are not harmful and not dangerous. Energy comes from the Sun. If the Sun loses its energy we are in darkness. Within no time we enter ICE AGE. We shall be frozen. If the Sun beomes ORANGE or RED or BLACK what does it indicate? Think.. think... Think of what would happen? No one to help.

It shall be the eventuality. Space Journey collapses. All hopes collapse. Then what is our hope? Please think cool. Answer with all knowledge we have. What is our hope?

In my opinion, while trying to develop and in perfection of the two types of energy sources, human must prepare to live a more frugal life in the future. It's hard to assume the ever increasing demand can be reasonably met.

My opinion is that there is a place for nuclear energy and renewable energy to be used together. While technology is improving the effectiveness of renewable energy it is also improving the safety of nuclear energy.

For those who say renewable energy is safe and does not cause polution, you do not understand how the components and raw materials are produced to harness the sun and wind energy etc.. A significant amount of energy along with potentially dangerous production processes are required to process the raw materials to manufacture batteries, PV cells etc. These risks are never spoken about, and most likely more people are hurt than with nuclear energy.

Also there are many advances being quietly made in improving efficiencies in many process, including many manufacturing process routes, and harvesting green house gases etc.

Better avoid nuclear power

I like the discussions and debates about the future energy resources as the scientists exchange their visions and express their expectations according to their predictions. So, i respect every point of view.

I think the people will continue using fossil fuels, nuclear energy generators in the future till they depleted. However they will enhance their conversion and utilization efficiencies and make them much less environmental harm thank to new control technologies and machines with artificial intelligence. In my opinion the humans do not have the freedom to leave any source of energy without suitable method for utilization. This because it may take some transition time to commercialize the renewable energy sources. As renewable energy sources i would expect that the photovoltaic generation will dominant the renewable energy generation.

Best wishes

This is a difficult question to answer and it has always greatly polarised people and countries.... In my opinion this discussion should always start from making clear that there are no any form of Energy that are completely safe and problem free... All forms of energy that we know so far have caused accidents and have their death-toll per MWh of energy produced.

There are many aspects to take into account in making forecasts either for Nuclear Energy or renewable forms of energy, not last the national regulators and the political wind in the country. Germany for instance after 2011 has declared to start the phasing out of its nuclear rectors in favour of promoting the renewable energies: the real result has been that today Germany is the biggest consumer of brown coal (lignite) in the world, and lignite is one of the biggest emitters of CO2 per KWh of energy produced...

The pros of Nuclear Energy are among other the absence of CO2 emissions in the energy production process and a continuous base load capacity.

Renewable Energy still don't have a base load capacity and they require conspicuous investments in batteries and energy storage systems with some technological innovation that are still not at our reach.

Probably the best solution for societal development around the world and stable energy production is a well balanced mix of Energy production techniques...

Renewable power generation will be safe while considering environmental pollution. But it is intermittent. Space occupation should also has to be considered.

But for countries having large population requiring huge power generation are still going for nuclear plant construction.

But going for renewable is good for living beings.

New generations of nuclear reactors are secure and the probability of accidents is quite feeble. It is the only available economically feasible sustainable energy source at present and for the future. Fusion when applied will be the energy source for man. Renewable energy will never be able to compete for large scale applications. It will remain costly because of its high entropy (except hydro). Coal also is a future fuel for new IGCC plants.

I see further development on RE technologies in the near future by countries, compared to more nuclear power inclusions.

I humbly think that nuclear power may have a future if we see into new material that can facilitate it's conservation, manipulation and make it less dangerous for the environment. If not working on the sustainability of renewable energies is a field to explore and emphasise on for a brigther future.

The disasters from nuclear energy are too high a prices to pay for humanity. Avoid it for the sake of your children

Вважаю, що ядерна енергетика надзвичайно небезпечне джерело енергії. До того ж її видобування занадто затратне в економічному й енергетичному сенсі. Майбутнє має бути за природними (сонце, вітер) та відновлювальними технологіями видобування енергії

Future energy generation technologies that will deliver massive, enduring, clean, safe and low cost power for all peoples – in perpetuity, are in the hands of the world’s best and brightest scientists, physicists, engineers and researchers and of course are focused clearly on reaching the pinnacle of energy generation possibilities known to science.

Fortunately the world of science already understands well the immutable scientific principles behind this energy dense generation principal, so we are well advanced on the subject.

Importantly, we can all expect to see these very low footprint, versatile, and scalable modular generation technologies start to “pop up” and be put into service progressively and everywhere globally within 30 years for sure.

Exciting times ahead.

Lawrence Coomber

“Wind and solar power are transforming the electricity industry, but not fast enough to put the world on track for the UNFCCC's Paris Agreement target to hold the global temperature increase well below 2°C. This "climate stabilization" target needs nuclear power to play a significant role in the low-carbon power mix”. http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Climate-target-very-difficult-without-nuclear,-say

We need energy whether it is from nuclear or from fossil fules, hydro, wind or solar. First of all we have to understand both renewable energy and nuclear energy has negative environmental effects. The renewable energy is more expensive than nuclear energy. The reneweable energy is a danger for environment such as wildlife and habitat loss, more water use, land use, climate change in close areas and global warming emissions.The last and more devastating one is when the hydro electric plant is closed, there will be mess in terms of land and habitat. The nuclear power industry is also making significant technological progress in terms of security is true but how about the wastes of nuclear. There is not any solution or technological solution for that. The population of world is increasing , we need more energy. The renewable energy will meet the needs at some extent. So we need more nuclear for now and for future...

.

There is one more source of energy and this is human frugality and contentiousness

Among the critical issues of nuclear energy consideration over renewable energy technologies are the high costs of nuclear wastes' disposal, and the instillation of environmental consciousness on treating the decommissioning of nuclear power plants, due to the devastating socio-cultural and environmental consequences upon trans-boundary nuclear accidents. Besides, capital costs of nuclear power plants are relatively higher than those for coal-fired plants and much higher than those for gas-fired plants, while fuel costs for nuclear plants are a minor proportion of total generating costs, except for countries where there is localized access to low cost fossil fuels.Contrarily, renewable energy technologies are determined by relative highly- localized installation, by moderate needs of technical complexity, and by operational flexibility on remote areas, especially through solar (PVs) and wind (turbines) sources.

No free dinner for this question.

Though renewable energy is limitless, there are vagaries of its reliability, its location, and the space (volume)required to produce it in sufficient MW. At best it can only be a supplement. I would bet on nuclear and still fusion power. A fusion power reactor is currently being built in Cadarache, France with aa potential capacity of some 500 MW in time, they would be built more cheaply and needing less staff. the infrastructure to maintain renewable energy (e.g. wind) needs more manpower than nuclear and it is hardly ever mentioned is discussions. if windmills are over water, consider the motor boats required to service just one windmill of 1-2 MW.

As far as I understand the question asked @Dariusz Prokopowicz I guess that there is a choice and only one regarding Electricity Demand policies. Since 1973 (first oil shock), such approach is nothing but an pros and cons endless debate which systematically results in a single solution i.e. choosing one for its benefits, then ignoring its costs and reversely for the other choice. However important, it is a very boring and quite unproductive way.

Personnaly, I have decided long ago, to contribute to exit that "cul-de-sac" by supporting those researches within the so-called "Energy Conservation Programmes", a very  productive work. Do you hesitate ? Please visit that website demonstrating the "Rosenfeld Effect" : carefull analyse the diagram comparing electricity comsumption per capita in California versus similar US Data as a whole: https://citris-uc.org/art-rosenfeld-californias-godfather-energy-efficiency-dies-90/. Considering our own area of work as an Energy Conservation target, each of us is able to contribute locally to comparable studies through an Energy Management (EMS) or Iso or Ecocampus-like programme.

Best regards 

Jacques Roturier

Згідна з думкою Григорій Кіріакопулос . Всі, хто підтримує ядерну енергетику, я певна, з Чорнобильського досвіду, мають відношення до фінансування через її запровадження. Мирного атому не буває. Й добування й утилізація радіоактивних відходів, екологічні наслідки аж до зміни клімату перекривають весь економічний блок від отримання цієї енергії

As the source of nuclear energy is finite, we should not be dependent on nuclear energy for long goal. Moreover, nuclear wastes generated can be a threat to the environment because it is highly radioactive and disposal of them is still a problem. Therefore, use of other eco-friendly resources is more recommendable.

@Rachan Karmakar Your statement “nuclear energy is finite” is disputable.

1. Uranium, the main resource on which nuclear energy is based is not at risk of long-term exhaustion. The extraction of uranium from seawater would make available 4.5 billion metric tons of uranium—a 60,000-year supply at present rates. Fuel-recycling fast-breeder reactors, which generate more fuel than they consume, would use less than 1 percent of the uranium needed for current LWRs. Breeder reactors could match today's nuclear output for 30,000 years using only the NEA-estimated supplies.

2. Nuclear fusion can become, in the next decades, a clean, virtually inexhaustible nuclear energy source.

New renewable technologies will not be sufficient for future energy consumption. A fossil fuels have limited resources, the energy of the future will relay first of all on nuclear power stations. if nuclear fusion will be possible under controlled conditions THIS will be the future energy resource for ever.

A comment about nuclear wastes. The discovery and research of the natural nuclear reactor of Oklo, in Gabon, reaffirmed the viability of the idea of final disposal of vitrified waste in stable geological strata and deep enough. A natural chain reaction involving neutrons and uranium occurred 2,000 million years ago, and it developed intermittently for thousands of years producing a thermal power in the order of kilowatts.

Recently it has been possible to demonstrate the feasibility of an alternative to this type of final disposal of high-level waste, which occurs as a consequence of reprocessing or directly as a consequence of an open fuel cycle: it can be transmuted into isotopes of half-lives much shorter.

Actinides, in particular elements located beyond the uranium in the periodic table, are mainly responsible for the time interval of the order of thousands of years during which high-level waste can be dangerous.

The transmutation and incineration tests in a fast reactor (the Phoenix) carried out by AREVA during the last five years have shown that it is possible to shorten that interval to less than 500 years.

This would solve the waste problem in principle. But to implement such a solution in practice there is still a long way to go: possibly 30 years or more.

Tchernobyl was the result of a severe restricted level of human intelligence:

Why a nuclear reacting system known to have a limit unstability and no confinement protection was pushed on towards its limit ?

Fukushima was a collection of stupidity and greed considerations:

Why companies have built reactors "on the sea", meaning accessible for a tsunami in a so frequently earthquake submitted country?

Most of the opinion expressed here above are clear cut and reasonable.

Not only the known renewable energies (PV and wind mill) cannot deliver the future energy demand by an exponentially growing population (in terms of volume, of back pollution (construction and recycling), in terms of the needed hudge level of investments..).

Anyway mode of life has to be adapted for! and as conclusion (?) please take attention to the few graphs here attached : we must be intelligent.. OR ?

Daniel

Can we predict where when and how earthquake will strike ?

Please have a look on statistic data!

Is solar energy safer for people and the environment compared to nuclear energy?

When comparing, for example, solar and atomic energy, many significant differences can be shown.

Solar energy is safer than nuclear energy. There are no environmentally hazardous radioactive waste in solar energy. In addition, solar power plants can be of any size, while nuclear power plants are usually very large investments and require huge financial outlays for the construction of a modern nuclear power plant.

But besides, many other energy technologies are being developed, energy innovations are being developed in the field of renewable energy sources, such as wind, water, or sea waves.

In addition, geothermal energy and the development of energy storage technologies. This is an important issue because the consumption of electricity is growing in many developing countries. In the future, electricity consumption may increase even more when electromobility starts to spread, ie electric cars will be produced and sold on a massive scale.

In view of the above, I am asking you: Which type of energy should be developed in the future?

Please reply. I invite you to the discussion

I suggest a combination of renewable energy sources with limited atomic energy source for concentrated industry needs. No free lunch indeed.

The power of nuclear seems most effective but it may be lost with hydrogen consumption and new source at more minute level may come

The power of nuclear seems most effective but it may be lost with hydrogen consumption and new source at more minute level may come

Dear Dariusz,

You "simple" question cannot discussed in this RG forum Questions/Answers, since in fact it is very complicated with very many facets and considerations!

I had a look e.g. on the different costs and disposals cencerning the energy "sources" provided by many different official agency from many countries.. The results are quite different and somewhat puzzling. They depend for a part on the economical local situation, and might be printed by political gvt options...

So it is a little terrible to be unable answering the questions as you ask...

An exemple: try to understand the global CO2 impact for the use of new and future electrical cars (Lithium batteries!). Nothing is clear or certain, because it depends on so many different factors related to where you built and use this type of car. Might be, let us continue a direct discussion

[email protected]

Kind regards

Daniel

Nuclear power plants could be operated safely. If there wouldn't be financial interests which undermine safety constantly. Together with the fact that not a single operator of nuclear power plants has an idea, how to deal with the waste in the long run, we should avoid nuclear fission reactors.

The better way is to use nuclear fusion reactors. A good option would be a gravitationally confined reactor in a safe distance. Wait... we have such a thing, we already have a name for it: sun.

Even if it's not a 'renewable' source of energy (or did you see a spare sun hanging around somewhere?), it should be good for some time...

My opinion is that good and clean technologies to reduce the volume and "neutralize" the hot wastes from fission will be definitively effective in the next years, long time before the nuclear fusion reactor might be (if ???) operated... Besides, do not imagine please, that the nuclear fusion technology will be exempt of wastes...

At present and at least for the next 50 to 100 years, humanity has to "slim" a major lot, since the main question for future is not exactly energy...(will be ever available and cleaner if the number of consumers will be markedly reduced!! - but anyway more and more expensive), the main question is the future availabity of many resources, namely and first those called strategic elements... At present, considering the expansion of engulfing consumers, the remaing resources will be rare and rare, not enough to maintain an "advanced" way of life for so many people...

At present if you believe that CO2 is the main cause of global warming (H2O is a (the) hudge global warming tri-atomic molecule), you have to know that it was calculated that 10 000 years' will be necessary to retrieve the 1900' concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere... even if we are resonnably clean from to day!

Humanity has to break energetically (all meanings!!!!) as soon as possible ..

but IS THERE A PILOT IN THE COCKPIT.....???

Daniel

There will always be nuclear power, because its usefulness does not only apply to the power generation sector, which has important clean sources being incorporated and with significant potential. In addition, new discoveries related to reactors and their safety are underway, a relevant factor for the expansion of nuclear power in the future.

Respected Dr. Florian Glodeanu, Thank you for all those information and make me aware of very important things. As a disciple I must thank you. It would be a great help if you tell me what would be the environmental effect of extracting uranium in a higher rate, specially on aquatic ecology of oceans. Secondly, will there be no radioactive waste being generated from the nuclear energy production site in the next decades?

Uranium is a metal and is mined like any other metal. The issue is its concentration that requires controlled conditions. For nuclear power plant fuel it is merely a few percent. for weapons it is up in the 90+%. Used fuel can be recycled but few countries have the wherewithal to build such plants other than USA, France and Russia.

Clearly waste radioactive uranium fuel must NOT be dumped into the oceans.

If uranium is used for energy purposes, then it will become radioactive and we will have radioactive waste if it is not recycled.

The earlier answer on the entropy of renewables answered the question; especially when allied with a simple calculation on energy density for solar and wind. I strongly recommend https://www.withouthotair.com/ by either buying the book or it is available to download for free. The author sadly died in his prime but his most important legacy has global implications and is factual. It proves that the energy balance cannot be met with natural, non-depleting sources. Please be careful with what you read, many exponents of renewables equate electricity with energy. In advanced countries electricity is only about 20% of the primary energy supply. Heat and transport dominate by far worldwide.

As for nuclear, the IVth Generation of high temperature fission reactors is the near term future. Light water moderated reactors have been deployed almost universally in all countries except India, UK and Canada who have each chosen different routes. The reason for the light water reactor's dominance despite escalating safety costs is well documented in the military history of the last century. UK amongst some others developed and deployed the high temperature gas cooled 'dry' route which has many advantages as are now recognised.

The Generation IV small modular reactors are inherently safe (see Ref Kletz, Trevor for a definition) as has been physically demonstrated in Japan and China on real plants. These countries have looked carefully and dispassionately at the options and developed devices which are inherently safe, factory reproducible, provide high enough temperatures for industrial and domestic heat, also high enough to produce thermo-chemical hydrogen for synthetic transport fuels and provide distributed energy sourcing since it is not feasible to transmit the total energy quantities demanded electrically in mature economies. Growing economies can move directly to distributed low-carbon nuclear elegantly avoiding electricity or gas or liquid fuel transmission infrastructure.

The most advanced demonstration plant in the world is the HTR-PM, presently in commissioning at 2 x 100 MWe in China following the proving of its smaller prototype and serious worldwide development effort over decades. The worldwide body of knowledge on high temperature small nuclear is at a point where deployment at scale is practical before 2030. Most advanced countries have small modular reactor programmes with designs at advanced stages. The high temperature small modular reactor preparations in China, Japan, USA, UK, France and many others produce heat at a temperature matched to repower large coal stations carbon-free by re-using all except the boilers. Deployment studies for such repowering have been completed in China and USA. You will appreciate the massive impact this will have upon global emissions.

The fuel is of course radioactive but is non-proliferating for weapons use because it is contained in ceramic which is harder to break down than newly mined materials so is unattractive and this also makes it safer to store as waste. Waste storage volumes are smaller than from light water reactors due to the higher utilisation of the fuel in the lower energy density core and the conversion efficiency of the downstream processes plus other helpful factors. These high temperature small modular reactors can operate on other fuels such as thorium but can also consume legacy 'hot' residues from pressurised water reactors and the military.

In practical terms, it is physically impossible to build traditional large nuclear power stations at a rate relevant to the latest Paris imperatives. The only way to achieve a high pace of transition, even without global energy growth, is by factory manufacture of small distributable energy plants on a numerical scale similar to other volume manufactures such as aircraft. The Boeing 737 now has delivered 10,000 units manufactured at licensed factories worldwide and is still growing. This aircraft has a similar investment profile to small modular reactors in factory set up and economies of repetition. Volume manufacturing techniques from other industries are especially relevant to small modular nuclear but have not yet been widely applied in nuclear.

As has been said by others in this post, the energy subject is large but that should not prevent thinking fundamentally about the underlying thermodynamic realities as MacKay has done, applying the immutable laws of physics in this debate as few have done and unemotionally analysing the problem and reaching conclusions as many enlightened nations have already but perhaps too quietly done so that democracies can be offered rational choices.

Perhaps the final arbiter is cost in all these things. The UK Government Techno Economic Assessment has shown that small nuclear is attractive from a socio economic perspective and was followed up by a formative expert finance working group to make ready the market and the commercial context. Most recently a study, which can be extrapolated internationally laid out a pathway. https://d2umxnkyjne36n.cloudfront.net/insightReports/Preparing-for-deployment-of-a-UK-SMR-by-2030-UPDATED.pdf?mtime=20161011145322

So the answer to Dariusz's question is in my view, YES, supported by massive programmes of excellent work invested in small modular high temperature reactors which is largely unseen by the general population and decision makers to who sadly have so far only been offered rather poor, expensive and regressive energy choices for all our children.

Please read widely and draw your own conclusions.

Dear Dariusz and others,

I find the present information and arguments developped by James leading to a very clear cut enlightening of what should (must) be the necessary future development of nuclear energy.

James also demonstrates that above the debates (often polluted by preconceived ideas), research and researchers must be still very active, because many of his arguments were not possible to imagine justified ten years ago. A very important parameter to account for is the present and future costs of energies. As said in the McKay book, renewable energy can impact incredibly large surfaces of the country, of the landscape, of our space. But have we the money (even in the most advanced countries) to built up and pay for the many solar and wind equipments imagined being able to sustain a fully green solution? No!

So actively "we" must be as J. Watt who definitively has improved the efficiency of vapour energy... now searching for better efficient, cleaner but less expensive solution. As an example, only 11 years ago McKay has deconsidered strongly the hydrogen car (BMW 1st prototype), but he was entousiasmed by the Musk-Tesla proposal of battery cars (real CO2 impact? Li and Co availability? autonomy? where and how are extracted the"necessary" raw materials?) From the facts and the most recent developments in matter of transportation... we may repeat that "transportation (life) is not definitively a quiet river....".

But debates are at least also necessary than research and engineering.. because we have not the money (economy) to promote and build as fast as possible: anything and everything. False and preconceived ideas must be evacuated : nuclear energy must be properly considered for.

Daniel

I must also commend James for providing the link of energies obtained from numerous sources. At best the renewables can augment rather than replace the reliable base loads provided by nuclear.

We must consider the cost and energy/acre. Though nuclear is costly to install, it is is cheaper to run in the long term. In a typical nuclear plant producing some 3000 MW is run by about 2500 staff including the clerical. A little over 1 MW/member staff. the energy from windmills would require about 1500 windmills. What infra structure and manpower is needed to maintain them in operation ? and if over water, how large a marina is required to house the motorised boats and to keep them running? and how do motor launches emit? carbon dioxide.

I'm going to disagree (somewhat) with some of the other responders to this question. The long-term future (i.e. 50+ years from now) is uncertain and will depend upon many complex variables, many of which are political in nature. However in the near and mid-term, the future for new nuclear power plants in OECD countries is bleak. I would agree that much work and investment has been done in 4gen designs to eliminate some of the problems seen at Fukushima, namely the inclusion of passive safety systems.

However, the fundamental obstacle now remains economics and increasing unsuitability to the changing dynamic of the generation portfolio. The US DOE NREL study on nuclear economics puts the capital cost of new nuclear in the range of $5000-$8000/kW, and the LCOE in the range of $80/mWh. (https://atb.nrel.gov/electricity/2017/index.html?t=cn)

This simply will not fly at current grid prices. For example, utility-scale solar has a capital cost range of around $2000 - $2500/kW and LCOE in the range of $30-$40/mWh. It is true that solar (and wind) are intermittent resources with little-to-no capacity value, but with a gap this wide in energy and capital costs, it is still economic to pair these resources with fast-ramping CT's to provide the capacity attribute.

Added to this is the problem of the inability to ramp output up and down quickly in nuclear power plants, which increasingly makes them unsuitable to the evolving dynamic of a generation portfolio with increasing amounts of intermittent resources like solar and wind. Certainly, that problem could be solved by prohibiting more solar or wind resources in the portfolio (assuming the legal framework would even allow that, which is not the case in the US), but that would really only benefit large scale fossil resources, not new nuclear, because new nuclear looses the economics battle to fossil resources as well.

Lastly, the recent experiences of two large US utilities with the construction of large scale new nuclear units has turned out to be an unmitigated financial disaster. In the case of Vogtle 2, the plant was estimated initially at $8 billion, but is now at about $18 billion expended, still not operational, and the manufacturer (Toshiba/Westinghouse) has declared bankruptcy and liquidated. All of these things do not augur well for the near and mid-term future of new nuclear.

Small modular units may indeed revive the industry and the prospects for nuclear, but those are still in the proof-of-commercialization phase. There are a few interesting experiments going on (Canada, Idaho NL, Los Alamos NL). These may indeed be the answer, but the competition (renewable energy + battery) is not standing still either.

Douglas, thanks for putting a US utility view of legacy nuclear and encouraging ideas on the future of small nuclear. There is rather more than 'a few interesting experiments' happening because the perspective and drivers are different elsewhere. Indeed the technologies for small high temperature nuclear are not the rate-determining element because the technologies have been demonstrated at commercial scale over several decades in the countries mentioned. Discussing your points in turn:

The costs of large nuclear electricity-only power stations globally and their drivers are summarised in an up to date report at https://d2umxnkyjne36n.cloudfront.net/documents/D7.3-ETI-Nuclear-Cost-Drivers-Summary-Report_April-20.pdf?mtime=20180426151016 . These costs, of which Vogtle is referenced as the the most expensive ever large pressurised water power plant (so far), are inevitably and necessarily high due fundamentally to the characteristics of their underlying pressurised water physics. The historic reasons for that are well known but some countries already run with other physics as mentioned in my previous piece. As you say, the Gen IV high temperature small reactors have a different physics whose inherent safety brings major simplification, and therefore cost and siting advantages; quite separately from the benefits of factory manufacture.

It is common for writers from outside the electricity industry wrongly to compare the unit cost ($/MWhe = LCOE) of intermittent solar or wind electricity at their input terminals to the grid with dispatchable electricity at its grid input terminals. Dispatchable electric power (i.e. able to ramp power up and down as required) is a more valuable, lower entropy, energy product because it has a different system value and price proposition to solar and wind. In a genuine market, dispatchable electricity is sold for a higher cost at its input terminals to the grid because it brings higher system and societal worth due to its dispatchability.

Fast ramping combustion turbines burning gas can compensate for the intermittency gaps in solar and wind. However, very low priced gas fuel for combustion turbines is a local phenomenon in USA and some other favoured locations due to fossil shale gas reserves and the benign carbon taxation regime in USA. In UK for example, the Government planning basis is to tax carbon in 2035 at US $ 100 per tonne of CO2 in 2016 money, which dramatically changes the economics of combustion turbines burning methane for intermittent compensation. The present CO2 price is less than US $20 per tonne. Other countries either have no access to low priced gas or prefer to reduce fossil fuel use.

This is one reason why battery energy storage is under such intensive development. The scale of relevant battery storage was calculated in the Fluctuations and Storage chapter in David McKay's book and is presently not credible in physical or materials terms but research continues. The batteries' capital costs, round trip electricity loss costs, staffing and maintenance revenue costs must be, and are, added to the grid input terminal costs of raw wind and solar plants when comparing the system and societal cost of 'intermittents plus storage' against truly dispatchable low carbon technologies such as nuclear.

It is common for geographies with large fossil thermal generators on their electricity system to assume and erroneously to publicise that nuclear is not flexible to ramp up and down its output. France has a 556 TWh/y (gross) electricity system (2016) where large nuclear provides 403 TWh/y (72%), hydro 65 TWh/y (12%), coal and gas 45 TWh/y (8%), and solar and wind 31 TWh/y. France's nuclear-dominated system also exports 42 TWh/y to adjacent countries by responding dynamically to peak European network demands and prices. Their 58 legacy Generation III large nuclear power stations ramp up and down daily and have done so for decades. Modern Generation III+ large nuclear power stations are even more dispatchable. All high temperature small modular nuclear designs are dispatchable, some with autonomous load-following which is facilitated by their lower thermal mass/inertia and their different (not legacy pressurised water moderated nucleonics) physics.

The foregoing discussion was all about electricity but that is not really the global problem. The problem is energy.

As mentioned in my previous post, electricity is about 20% of the problem, the real issue is the 80% heat and transportation energy. So far we have only invented one tool to address that sustainably which is high temperature nuclear heating. This heat coupled through a 'standard heat interface' can feed energy to many optional open-market-developed APPLICATIONS (to use small computer terminology) for industrial steam (heat exchangers), desalination (flash or osmotic technologies), hydrogen and syngases (thermochemical or electrolysis), cement or ceramics or steel (gas-gas heat exchangers) or even electricity too (Rankine or Brayton cycles). The 'global standard inherently safe nuclear heat source' and its 'standard heat interface' should and can be designed so that these open-market applications form no part of the nuclear heat source's global standard regulatory safety case.

Most importantly, only through factory production first revealed by the Model T Ford 100 years ago, can sufficient numbers of 'standard small high temperature nuclear heat sources' with their globally common 'standard heat interface' be deployed on a scale relevant to global energy and environmental ambitions.

Just to add; that batteries can only store DC and at low voltage. This needs the infra structure to convert to AC (the world is mainly AC) and transformers are needed to boost to high voltage for transmission and for high duty.

Using gas for energy, however cheap these days, does produce greenhouse gases which we need to avoid.

The way to go long term appears to be: Fusion for base load, and hydrogen for other forms of energy (for cars e.g.) supplemented by wind and solar even when they need the ancillary equipment to transform them to AC.

In my opinion, it is good that there was a discussion in the question of this query.

The answers given are very inspiring. Interesting considerations, responses and conclusions have emerged that can be an inspiration to continue research in this area.

Therefore, I am still reading the answers, following the interesting discussion.

Thank you for your answers and I encourage you to continue your discussion, to continue the interesting discussion.

Dariusz, thanks for your very complete response to mine. You are right - a direct LCOE comparison of resources is not adequate if the two resources do not have a comparable availability profile. Nuclear and solar do not have a comparable availability profile ( which I distinguish from reliability, which is a different issue). The North American electricity markets use prices which are typically based on variable fixed costs plus fuel plus a margin which may be be positive, zero or even negative depending upon the characteristics of the market and your resource at the time of the offer. It does factor reliability as a penalty for failure to produce when you’ve committed to produce. For this reason, most solar and wind resources in markets prefer to run as “must run” resources which are required to be run whenever they produce. As a result, some markets have implemented capacity payments for resources that are not intermittent, to provide a guarantee for steady output. However, even with capacity payments, some of these plants are unable to remain profitable. Some say this is because capacity markets don’t pay enough, others point out that these capacity market prices are determined by auction.

Right now, there are not enough intermittent resources in the market to jeopardize reliability. That will change in the next decade, I expect, and different market mechanism will be required. I honestly expect, though, that new market mechanisms to provide availability, will not be enough to support new “big” nuclear plants like Vogtle. There will be cheaper alternatives, like storage and gas CT. Government policy mandates could change that, but I don’t think fundamental economics will.

Thank you very much Douglas Howe for kind words. I wish you all good and best regards

The answer to the question "Nuclear: Yes or No?" depends on many other questions:

- "Is the climate change going on?" I don't think there is any doubt about that. It happened in the geological past, so it can happen again.

- "Is carbon dioxide the cause or the consequence of the climate change?" CO2 absorbs the low-frequency radiation from earth, contributing to the warming of the atmosphere - this is a scientific fact and not something debatable. I sincerely hope it is the cause of global warming, in which case we can do something about it. If it is a consequence, it will just accelerate the warming, in which case the future of the next generations is bleak.

- "Economic aspects?" these are strongly influenced by political and strategic decisions of the government. The present favourable situation for solar is the result of favourable conditions created for this branch of industry. Government decisions can influence the economic aspects of any industry.

- "Nuclear or renewables?" at the end it is all a question of scale. As long as we have solar and wind at the level of a few percent, there is no problem. However, considering that to replace a medium sized conventional power plant (700 MW, say) with solar, the exclusion zone for the solar panel field that produces a comparable amount of energy is about 10 000 hectares of land on a sunny location.

- "Radioactive waste?" deferred phase-out of nuclear is the worst solution. We shall continue to accumulate waste for the next 20 years and will be left with an inventory of fission products (that decay in a few hundred years), as well as some heavy actinides that stay radioactive for thousands of years. These actinides are actually not waste but fuel that can by used in the 4-th generation nuclear reactors. Unfortunately they cannot be used in the current reactors because these were not designed for this kind of fuel.

- "Severe accidents?" they happen in every industry. We are so alarmed by the Fukushima accident in which one person died, compared to 19 000 deaths caused by the tsunami that triggered the accident. Note: it was the tsunami that caused the accident and not vice versa! Indeed, the exclusion zone around the Fukushima complex is about 30 km radius. Compare that to the exclusion zone for a solar field for a single reactor and multiply by the number of reactors (present, or needed in the future) before passing a judgement.

At the end it is all a question of scale.

Clear cut answers to dot the i's

Nuclear Energy is expensive and risky. That is why the future of Nuclear Energy is not so beautiful in the world specially in Bangladesh . Renewable Energy means Solar Energy will be developed in Bangladesh very soon.

Certainly Bangladesh can benefit from solar energy due to climate (mainly sunny) and location at a latitude where the Sun is prevalent. But what happens during the monsoon months? Consider locations in northern latitudes where the days are much shorter in winter at a time when energy is most needed. A reliable alternative is needed, and nuclear energy can fulfil that role.

I agree wholeheartedly with Andrej Trkov . it is summed up there.

Nuclear power will be a necessity if we are to convert off fossil fuels entirely. The reason is because weather driven energy is too intermittnet and we don't have a way to store electrical energy for years at a time to ride through low renewable's producing years. When you compare storage capital investment costs to nuclear power the nuclear power is much easier and lower cost to implement. So we will need some nuclear power to provide some of the energy. This need becomes apparent when modeled in my daily energy storage analysis for Texas and California https://egpreston.com/storage.pdf

Nuclear power should be considered as indispensable if in a given country there are limited possibilities of development of environmentally neutral, ecologically clean renewable energy sources.

I invite you to the discussion.

Nuclear Energy is has risk, so the new technologies of renewable energy being developed in the energy sector now being increased day by day,

Especially after the adoption of regions and the emergence of smart grids

Although it takes large areas of stabilization, nuclear power is more dangerous and expensive

My earlier answer to this was “no”, based on economics of new gen nuclear plants. That is still my opinion. Although a recently published study by MIT agrees that costs are the problem, it urges changes to laws and societal norms to rectify those problems. I’m skeptical that can be done, but the report is an important read.

http://news.mit.edu/2018/mitei-releases-report-future-nuclear-energy-0904

The development of various types of renewable energy sources is necessary because, unfortunately, the problem of sources of greenhouse gas emissions on Earth continues to grow. In many countries, greenhouse gas emissions continue to grow.

The rapid reduction of greenhouse gas emissions is one of the most important factors for the possibility of sustainable pro-ecological economic development based on the concept of a new, green economy. It is necessary to avoid a global climate disaster!

I invite you to the discussion.

Sustainable proecological economic development based on the concept of a new, green economy regarding entire national economies and future global economies is a necessary future that must be realized in the 21st century if humanity wants to avoid a global climate disaster. Sustainable ecological economic development is based primarily on the creation, development and implementation of large-scale ecological innovations, renewable energy technologies, reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, automation and robotization of the process of sorting waste, recovery of recyclable materials, reclamation of a devastated natural environment, afforestation of post-industrial areas, development of electromobility etc. Apparently humanity has only been a decade of time to implement this plan in order to avoid a global climate disaster resulting from the increasingly faster global warming. According to World Wide Fund for Nature (https://cop.wwf.pl/en) humanity is already an endangered species in the 21st century!

I invite you to the discussion.

Just as there are no free lunches, no technology is pollution free completely. Even solar panels would some day create huge waste. Therefore, a mix of technologies is the answer for any country. Fusion, hydro and solar energy are more promising as of now but in near future, wind should overtake , particularly in coastal areas. In India, it would be more meaningful because of huge coast line.

" no technology is pollution free completely " ...

Not-to forget, please , the "avoided power" technologies which are reaally carbon free. May I sugest to look for the "Rosenfeld Effect"

(https://newscenter.lbl.gov/2017/01/27/art-rosenfeld-californias-godfather-energy-efficiency-90/) from your browser. It perfectly demonstates the reason why the average enrgy consumption per capita is about 40 ¨lower in a California than in the whole USA

Best Regards to all readers

Jacques

You are quite right Jaques Art Rosenfeld made excellent demonstration, we have to encourage everywhere.. Moreover it applies well for USA and the demo was effective in California. However please have a look on a part of ppt lecture I had delivered (to Master's students) some year ago at Perm State University (Russia). Slide 9 shows that effectively if you reduce the energy consumption of 1 American citizen by 16%, it will be enough for 1 African citizen to live correctly...

Back to slide 2 and 3, it sounds that reducing some excited activites, leads to energy economy. However, at present USA is for less than 5% of the worldwide population. And slides 7 and 8 show that two representative traces are exactly homothetic.... As summarized in slide 11, it seems that there are two main options : either we return to slide 6 (Europa 1400's could be a less dramatic option) or we open the valve of "nuclear energy" as shown slide 10... Anyway it will be very difficult to control 8 to 10 billions people, licking to prifit of new technologies such as example 13 with result on slide 14... As one knows, the part of fossiles in the energy cake continues increasing (slide 15)....What is the landscape in terms of replenish the stocks (XXI century) - slide 16... avoiding as possible poluution and global warming (slide 17). Why huimanity needs so much energy (slide 19 and 20: many bigs, billions of small consumers). Every body knows that the clear and renewable energies capture are intermittent. So we have to store such as coal, oil, gas and... uranium are stored a lot). Why we have to store in the daily time; as shown slide 22, consummers and renewable are far to be synchronous systems... What relative efficiency for the energy vectors we can store. Uranium is "dinausor" comparizon to the "ant" electrical battery capacity . Hydrogen looks to be one of the best choice... if produced with no carbon print...Also Li and U technomogies have serious drawback in term of CO2 pollution before arriving at home! Also there is another drawback with hydrogen: the volumic energy.. but lot of people are working in the field (e.g. DF). Many questions are still to be solved as for example size of the grid, number of ReN systems (e.g. in France to replace our 58 active nuclear plants we need erect 200 000 wind mills, accounting the intermittance and effective effiency! who will pay for that steel forest!). Remains local production, local network, lacal users, intergrated networks... However our civilization will be very soon a city way of life... who will decide to change?... Last slide (29); the cost of future and clean energies will be soon markedly impacted by the cost and availablity of strategic elements (compring wood!).

Perhaps Dariusz can conclude??? His country was hoting the last COP24. Might be he has more recent information, more optimistic I hope.

I am much along side with Adam Broinowski

The tectonic plates movements are unpredictable and nuclear plants will serve as an ACCOMPLICE to the destructive powers of earthquakes

Long, but useful and constructive discussion.

Long, but useful and constructive discussion. We need to develop a energy source which will be effective as simple as our vehicle is moved by fossil fuel .

Instead of fossil fuel only, we need to develop multiple options of mobile unit generation, which will be user friendly and with multiple options of generation.

In my opinion, the economic systems of the developed countries need the generation of nuclear energy during the coming years. The generation of nuclear energy will gradually diminish until more efficient energy storage systems are developed, such as hydrogen.

To summarize what was already said, in short, both in terms of optimal use of natural resources and in what has to do with the decrease in the radiotoxicity of fuel and waste produced after reprocessing, an improvement by a factor of 100 is feasible in a short term, whenever the R & D work is required.

At this moment it would seem that we are in a situation of instability, in the following sense.

An energy conversion mode that comprises only 5% worldwide, if maintained at the same level, has no use for stopping or at least not worsening global climate change, nor does it have a significant economic impact.

It would seem reasonable to expect that one of these two things will happen: either we will definitely leave the nuclear power, or we will enter fully into it.

Fission energy seems to be currently the only energy that can meet the demands on a large scale, without aggravating the greenhouse effect and making possible an improvement in the quality of life of the inhabitants of the peripheral countries.

By its nature, it seems that it should fulfill the role of hinge between the current state of the global energy matrix, clearly unsustainable, and a future state. This new situation may be reached in 70 or 80 years, in which a new matrix, based on renewable energies already in place and in nuclear fusion, would make possible a true sustainable development.

A new global energy matrix is ​​a necessary condition, but of course nothing more than necessary for sustainable development. Will the other conditions be met so that, to some extent, sustainable development can become a reality?

its a disaster technology and no provision mitigation developed for that disaster. Solar power and its power generation is a better option and hazard free till today

Disaster technology.. yes sir.! could be if not precautionous enough!

My gand father was coal miner in a so-called-advanced country. At the time, expected life time for hundreth thousands of his colleagues... was 55 years.. Right he died at this age.. Now (cheap) coal is extracted in less safer conditions (I know) ... for economical and technical reasons.. Your are heating your body under those conditions, many lost lifes one ignores (!!) so distributing for your neighbors the "beneficial" effect of CO2, fine particles etc... I know that your countries are among those contributing to the 2/3 of world wide energy issued from fossil resources.. Please continue expecting the Râ (the sun) coming to your wishes enough... This is a simple question of physics, arithmetics and economy... the sun cannot help us at the level of the present (and future) demand of energy... because also there are close to 8 billions demanders...

What else??? Return in caverns???

Sciences and technologies offer options allowing overpass difficulties. I never said that nuclear energy was THE solution. I said that if not the unique one it offers the capability to decrease as much as possible the impact of carbon at begining of the XXI century...

Imagine a the GvT of a country, early XX century when pionners built and patented the first automobiles.. Imagine responsibles GvT able to predict that in 2018 will be 3500 died only by crashes in my small country.. and now could be 350 000 people yearly all around the world...AT the time perhaps they would say no cars! Who is responsible of this present yearly disaster.. ? GvT's ? you ? me? Not so many people pay attention to that..since the information is daily dispersed in our favourite news paper... Why? A reason among others is that our (of the survivors) way of life benefits with car civilization was unexpectly enormous... and we (survivors) prefer return to bread and butter for breakfast... but siometimes to complain on the Fukushima disaster????!!! Fukushima was a very bad experience, but a limited one. Teachings are to be expressed!

Now the questions with the car civilization and energy civilization are quite different because we are at the middle or end time of easy and dirty energies. We cannot reject the partial issue of nuclear energy, wainting and wainting (?) the first aid of the SUN... Scientists and Engineers have to contribute to built of the safer, efficient and cheapest as possible energy solutions. Men at work! We are all responsible for 8 billions humans on the earth!

DF

Hi Dariusz,

A litle off topic, but I believed it worth to metion. One technology that has some potential is Cold Fusion:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/environment/2018/mar/09/nuclear-fusion-on-brink-of-being-realised-say-mit-scientists

But it is still in development phase

What Cesar Negri has provided are links to the MIT program to develop a shorter route to produce energy via the fusion process . Nevertheless, it is NOT a Cold Fusion program; and MIT experiments do require extreme heat.

Fusion is the process where two lighter elements, usually Hydrogen (or Deuterium) and Tritium are compressed together in a rarified plasma atmosphere causing them to be heated to extreme temperatures; thus inducing fusion into Helium. The process yields tremendous energy output.

This process is being carried out on an international level and is named ITER. It is located in Cadarache France. Current status is that ITER has produced fusion but in short pulses. Currently they are now working on stabilising the plasma and extending the pulses, hopefully, into continuous pulses. ITER is about midway to producing power and is hoping to produce some 400-500 MWe in about a decade's time.

A few decades ago, Cold Fusion was claimed by a few scientists where they could produce fusion without heat at all, hence cold fusion. Their "experiment" was never corroborated, nor was it successfully repeated. they solicited research funds for the purpose of continuing their program. They were last heard from, living in the South of France.

Nuclear fusion ? I was a student in late 1950's. Of course, alike all others, I was very curious to identify and possibly help to exploit in the future the very promising resources that Mother Nature would offer to humans as soon as researchers discover proper ways and means. At that time, most University Professors told us that probably, in spite of not seeing electricity generated in nuclear fusion power plants during their whole life, we could .. after about 40 years. Dn't we give similar answer to to-day's students : please wait next 40 years ??? Now, I'm pretty sure that I won't see it myself ... moreover being unable to forecast any date for industrial application of nuclear fusion on Earth. Out of other available ressources, as long as nuclear fusion is targetted, in order to satisfy future Electricity Demand, better is to put our faith in BOTH solar energy AND Conservation Management.

Jacques

What you suggest in your last line " put our faith in BOTH solar energy AND Conservation Management. " is being carried out ... for the interim. Solar energy farms are increasing, consuming acres of land and the output is meagre. Then, we may run out of land, whilst demand is still increasing. Conservation is maintaining the status quo of existing plants (nuclear and renewables). What we need to satisfy insatiable demand is to produce energy from smaller "clean" units with a high output energy per volume. Fusion is such a method. ITER is the first such reactor. it will be completed within a decade from now, in our lifetime perhaps.

Once we know and use this new technology successfully, I envisage miniaturization of these plants (as advancing technology miniaturized the cell phones) and applied to small cities or to even large scale shopping malls. But that is speculative and projecting into the far far future.

if feasible, try to visit ITER, else Google it and monitor the progress. You will be impressed.

The generation of nuclear energy will depend on the development of more efficient and economical storage systems. These energy storage systems will increase the flexibility of the production of renewable energy (wind and solar PF). Actually the cost of renewable energy production is competitive (< 50€/MWh). The investment cost of a nuclear power plant is much higher than a renewable plant. If efficient and cheap energy storage systems are developed, the future will be 100% renewable. In addition, there is another technology to support renewable energies: combined cycles that use natural gas as fuel.

Так, з економічного боку ядерна енергія не є економічно вигідною. При її експлуатації за рахунок розробки ядерних копалин, транспортуванні ядерної руди (в СРСР вона перевозилась відкритим способом у звичайних вагонах) надзвичайно забруднюється довкілля. Вода у вигляді пари зі ставків охолоджувачів перерозподіляється в різних регіонах, спричиняючи не лише радіоактивне забруднення, але й засуху. Ще багато негативних чинників спричиняє розробка атомної енергетики. Я, як радіобволог за поновлювальну енергетику екологічно чисту й безпечну

@ Nicholas Sion My previous comment looks unclear to you. I''m not a fan of neither fission or fusion nor solar energy. Although I know that, not ignoring fossil fuels, we need presently some of these. Concerning primary energy (transformation , generation, ...) my knowledge is limited enough but I have in mind that all energy resources demonstrate both a lot of benefits and costs, including environment ones. So I d't support solar energy more than (and lesser than) any other. Regarding nuclear fusion , I'm just saying that in a forcastable future, the only PROOVEN way is, since millenaries, its daily generation and Planetwide use through solar radiation.

Then my unique goal is to remind that if the choice between related pros and cons of both nuclear and solar offers experts and others unlimited debates, there is a more urgent way has also to be analysed by the scientist community: can we (mankind) keep similar conditions of life thru a significant rdecrease of the energy consumption per capita? I know it's feasible and does really exist (see i.e. Rosenfeld Effect).

In summary, renewable electricity sources can not be dispatched at the request of power grid operators; that is, can not be turned on or off, or can not adjust their power output on demand.

Due to this, other sources of conventional electricity generation, such as nuclear energy, coal and natural gas, are currently necessary. These energy sources represent a fundamental back-up for renewable electricity sources. In Europe, due to current decarbonization policies and CO2 prices, there has been an increase in electricity prices in recent months. All this will mean the disappearance of coal-fired power plants. During the coming years, nuclear energy and natural gas will be very important to allow the penetration of renewable energies.