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this post was submitted on 31 May 2024
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Another thing a lot of people fail to mention about nuclear power, is the lifespan of a reactor. We have reactors from the 70s still running at full power, it's pretty insane. I'm wondering what the TCO per kWh is for a nuclear reactor compared to other sources of energy.
A solar farm in Switzerland from 1982 is also still providing power at 80% of original spec. Even today solar companies give 25 year warranty on new panels.
So this is not really an advantage of nuclear. In fact after 50 years a lot of them become a lot less reliable. We recently saw that in France.
I don't remember, but nuclear is the highest operating cost of electricity, until the reactor is paid off by rates, in which it becomes very cheap. Natural gas is the cheapest starting and maintaining and is reaching better efficiencies. However, it's killing the environment.
Methane (natural gas) is cheap because they don't factor in the cost of climate change caused by methane emissions. Methane would be one of the most expensive if they factored in the leaks and its strong ability to trap heat in the atmosphere.