Spyke

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How China became the king of new nuclear power, and how the U.S. is trying to stage a comeback

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It's not profitable. For example, in Sweden, the companies involved aren't interested. There was talk of EDF being restructured a couple of years back separating the unprofitable nuclear away from their other businesses (until state bailout and investment). Their CFO resigned over their decision to carry on building UK's latest nuclear powerplant. The Conservatives only pushed through the UK's next nuclear powerplant only after giving EDF assurances and ability to start taking in profits before the completion of the project.

This is what it takes to build nuclear. A lot of state money... Whereas renewables are cheaper, easier, and faster to decarbonise.

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Germany set to miss net zero by 2045 target as climate efforts falter

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So, you're going to spend, billions, to build a nuclear powerplant, that will decarbonise at a slower rate, never turn a profit, be an economic sinkhole megaproject, or, you could just build a solar panel or wind turbine in like, a year, where it'll be functional and working. Profits allow you to reinvest into more projects. Losses, mean you're putting endless amounts of money into less.

memes

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China bad, USA good

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China's President sent his own daughter to Harvard and China has wide income inequality, as well as the greatest proportion of millionaires and billionaires in the world. The wealthy in China go on day trips to Paris to literally eat cake.

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Lockdowns and face masks ‘unequivocally’ cut spread of Covid, report finds

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Sweden was a bit of an outlier though. Most younger Swedes live alone. And they tend to follow government advisories. New Zealand's strategy was stellar, particularly early on in the pandemic. You could do what you want. I remember we were out having concerts as if there was no pandemic, thanks to the zero COVID strategy. But by late-Delta, early-Omicron, zero COVID could not longer be sustained, and it was clear only mitigations would stick. The government hoped to eliminate it like they did the other times, but it was just impossible then, people had become complacent. But yes, on the healthcare-side and economic-side, NZ fared better than Sweden.

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Germany set to miss net zero by 2045 target as climate efforts falter

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It's actually the worst time to get started on nuclear. Costs keep going up. There's a reason why countries overwhelmingly prefer to invest in renewables over nuclear. This includes nuclear companies. EDF is one of the largest investors in renewables, and it's actually the profitable side of the business. It's going to be the taxpayer that's going to pay for nuclear, and they're not going to get their money's worth, as opposed to renewables.

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Germany set to miss net zero by 2045 target as climate efforts falter

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Poor track record with safety (not talking about the big issues such as meltdowns, but smaller issues such as minor leaks, and workplace incidents). Nobody's interested in building them unless they've got profit guarantees and subsidies from the government. Nobody's interested in insuring them in full (unless it's the government). Nobody's interested in the eventual decommissioning process, which can take a century, and again, still costs. Renewables will be up and running, and profitable, long before nuclear is constructed.

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Ehhh, I saw a news article once about doctors helping a boy through an illness. And when he got better the mother wanted to thank the saint she was praying to, and the doctors were running an analysis of which specific saint it was that was responsible for this (since the mother prayed to multiple).

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Germany set to miss net zero by 2045 target as climate efforts falter

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But that's the thing with nuclear. The upfront costs are massive, and literally irrecoverable. Can you name a single nuclear powerplant that has broken even? I can't. Not unless, it's one that the government has built and then handed over to private industry, for example. Reducing safety from nuclear powerplants is not viable long term. And that's the only way to get them commercially viable.