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Sweden All In On Nuclear Energy, Dumps Renewable Target
(greeninvesting.co)
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this post was submitted on 10 Aug 2023
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10 reactors? How long is that gonna take to build? A single reactor can take at least 8 years. So hopefully they aren’t ditching renewables all together. You can build a lot of solar and wind farms in those 8 years.
This is exactly the issue. Nuclear is necessary in the long term for a clean grid, however it will take much longer than as well as take investment away from renewable projects - which could achieve net zero more quickly than nuclear.
We should be going hard on current renewable technology, build out a massive excess (to account for reduced generation, the wind is always blowing somewhere and the sun shines throguh the clouds), and then once we have met all our energy needs from clean energy and phased out fossil fuels we can focus on fortifying the grid - in particular at that point we will need large turbines with lots of rotating mass, for voltage and frequency stability, which is a perfect role for nuclear to fulfill.
One of the problems that we have is that a big chunk of the country for a month don't have a single ray of sunshine due to polar nights. The problem is that that is when it's complete darkness leading up to the point and going out of it takes time as well so solar is not an option at that time of the year. On top of that most of the land is "disputed" by indigenous people (don't mark my words it's a very touchy subject I don't know how to express it better) or it's a nature reserve area so wind farms are out of the question. So the only thing we have left is hydropowered electricity which isn't clean at all as it destroys the natural course of the river up stream, destroys the river beds down stream and extremely reduces the fish populations as well as any greenery relying on the reliability of the rivers.
With that said if we simplify it a bit about 46% of Swedens total energy production comes from the northern hydroelectric plants and wind farms and because of lacking infrastructure it can't be transferred efficiently to southern Sweden where most of the consumption is happening. Of these 46% about only 30% is currently used but more companies have decided to establish their production in thr northern region due to the surplus of energy in this region.
Southern Sweden on the other hand gets a lot of their energy from unreliable wind farms as well as nuclear energy. However due to the layout of the land hydroelectric is only viable in some places which have already been exploited. We can only install so many wind farms until it affects quality of life to the people and animals living nearby. On a good day southern Sweden is having a net zero energy production and consumption. Those days are fewer and further in between. Currently since closing a reactor two years ago we have had to reinstate an oil burning facility as well as buying unclean electricity from abroad to keep up with demand.
So investing in nuclear to stabilise the production is one of very few options we currently have.
It's either that or moving either part of the population or factories to the northern part which is not really viable or sustainable eitherm
It sounds like the biggest issue is transmission, you need high capacity transmission lines between the north and south. That way, you could not only use more than the 30% currently, but expand that capacity. Also, transmission between neighbouring countries could help.
Currently we sell the surplus in the north to Finland and Norway as well as to Denmark and Germany in the south when we are over capacity.
What we would need is a better connection between north and south but that hasn't been a priority until now and it's 30 years too late.
The best time to plant a tree..
Nuclear takes a hell of a lot of subsidised state money, and that pot of money only ever grows. Renewables don't need state money, they're profitable on their own. Renewables will grow readily if the transmission infrastructure is there, and moreso if the planning process capacity is expanded (hire more civil servants), let alone if rates were subsidised anywhere near the same level as nuclear.
The best case scenario would be the government itself building state-owned renewable infrastructure, where the profit from selling cheap electricity on the commercial market would come directly back to the community. Most wind farms are owned by one company and managed & operated by another, with the turbine manufacturer providing turbine services. There's no reason the government couldn't be the owning company.
Funnily enough, projects for green steel and the construction of new massive factories in Northern Sweden mean that the power surplus is expected to be gone by 2030. We need more electricity production, from all carbon neutral sources being built everywhere, ASAP.
Exactly. We need it quickly.
Renewables are here now and can be deployed quickly. Nuclear takes time and is often heavily delayed and over budget.
We need nuclear as well, but we need renewables first, to build capacity as quickly as possible. We need a huge excess of renewable capacity, to account for times when the full capacity isn't available. We shouldn't expect to be using the full capacity at any time.
Once we've phased out fossil fuels, then nuclear will be important. But right now nuclear only serves to sustain our dependency on fossil fuels.
Care to elaborate on this?
The two largest economies with the low reliance on fossil fuels for energy (Sweden & France) get significant portions of their energy production from nuclear power. Iceland relies on geothermal, and the others (Tajikistan, Switzerland, Costa Rica, Norway) have lots of hydro capacity, which are all excellent, but also largely dependent on geography.
I don't have figures to hand, but I'd gladly dig into them with you, if you have suggestions.
Sweden does have some amount of fossil fuel generation. The article claims 3 nuclear plants provide 30% of the country's needs right now, and says the target being set is for 10 new nuclear plants over the next 20 years. In 2045 (~20 years), demand is predicted to be double that of today.
If we assume all current nuclear plants will close and all new plants will be 20% larger, that means these 10 new nuclear plants will fulfill 60% of predicted demand in ~2045. Again, I'm happy to review actual numbers - I imagine most if not all of these 10 plants are at least in early design proposal stages, so there are some actual MW numbers to be crunched.
I think keeping Sweden's nuclear at about 30-40%, while investing more into a large excess of renewables, would allow fossil fuels to be switched off more quickly. This would still mean investment and growth in nuclear, with maybe 5 or 6 plants (if the 3 existing plants have to close), but would get rid of fossil fuels more quickly.
In maybe 10 years' time, with fossil fuels well and truly on their way out, that would be a better time to expand nuclear.
Our world in data has excellent stats on the topic, and I am quite familiar with the electricity production of Sweden (my home country). Excepting 2003 and 2010 (both quite cold winters) the share of electricity from fossil fuel sources has been sub 5% since 1997. Thus, for my own country I tend to look more at the share of all energy that comes from fossil fuels (currently 26%) rather than just electricity, but below is a chart detailing the shares of electricity produced by each category.
As you can see, investments in wind have been massive, adding 30 TWh of production (~15%) since 2010. However, in the meantime, nuclear energy has not only been neglected, but actively dismantled. Since 2010, some 15 TWh of production has been removed from the grid. Whilst this isn't an issue in isolation, import demands for electricity from continental Europe have increased noticeably during the same time period. In 2010, we had net 0 power flow, whilst 2021 saw a net export of ~16TWh (mainly to a country that completely dismantled their fleet of nuclear reactors instead of their coal power plants and shall not be named)
What this means is that in a decade, with a population increase of 10% and a GDP increase of 20%, electricity availability has actually declined, which is becoming a serious problem now that some of the most energy intensive areas of society are starting to electrify in earnest (transports and heavy industries).
Green steel is the perfect dispatchable load. The steps up until sponge iron require very little capex, with the input costs being driven by energy price it is a far better match for renewables.
Same goes for high temperature electrolysis.
The resulting iron stores 2-8kWh/kg with nothing more than a box as infrastructure (and maybe some oil or nitrogen to stop rust).
Both are so ideal as dispatchable loads that iron js seriously being considered as a fuel/energy carrier instead of hydrogen.
Then run the arc furnaces which are higher capex and labour cost but a fifth of the energy at a constant rate.
The idea of buildkng nuclear to run green steel is utterly deranged.
Hopefully not as long as offshore wind farms. If Swedish laws regarding os wind are similar to Danish, it'll easily take 9-10 years from decision to actually begin building.
They are though. Focus on fossil fuels now and promise nuclear later - thats the plan.