-
Want to remove ads? Register an account and login to see fewer ads, and become a Supporting Member to remove almost all ads.
Prediction: Coal has fallen. Nuclear is next then Oil.
- Thread starter nwdiver
- Start date
-
- Tags
- Energy Environment Policy
mspohr
Well-Known Member
The Fantasy of Reviving Nuclear Energy https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/18/...ntasy-climate.html?smid=nytcore-android-share
World leaders are not unaware of the nuclear industry’s long history of failing to deliver on its promises, or of its weakening vital signs. Yet many continue to act as if a “nuclear renaissance” could be around the corner even though nuclear energy’s share of global electricity generation has fallen by almost half from its high of roughly 17 percent in 1996. In search of that revival, representatives from more than 30 countries gathered in Brussels in March at a nuclear summit hosted by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Belgian government. Thirty-four nations, including the United States and China, agreed “to work to fully unlock the potential of nuclear energy,” including extending the lifetime of existing reactors, building new nuclear power plants and deploying advanced reactors.
Pledges and declarations on a global stage allow world leaders a platform to be seen to be doing something to address climate change even if, as is the case with nuclear, they lack the financing and infrastructure to succeed. But their support most likely means that substantial sums of money — much of it from taxpayers and ratepayers — will be wasted on perpetuating the fantasy that nuclear energy will make a difference in a meaningful time frame to slow global warming.
What’s missing are leaders willing to buck their own powerful nuclear bureaucracies and choose paths that are far cheaper, less dangerous and quicker to deploy. Without them we are doomed to more promises and wasteful spending by nuclear proponents who have repeatedly shown that they can talk but can’t deliver.
World leaders are not unaware of the nuclear industry’s long history of failing to deliver on its promises, or of its weakening vital signs. Yet many continue to act as if a “nuclear renaissance” could be around the corner even though nuclear energy’s share of global electricity generation has fallen by almost half from its high of roughly 17 percent in 1996. In search of that revival, representatives from more than 30 countries gathered in Brussels in March at a nuclear summit hosted by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Belgian government. Thirty-four nations, including the United States and China, agreed “to work to fully unlock the potential of nuclear energy,” including extending the lifetime of existing reactors, building new nuclear power plants and deploying advanced reactors.
Pledges and declarations on a global stage allow world leaders a platform to be seen to be doing something to address climate change even if, as is the case with nuclear, they lack the financing and infrastructure to succeed. But their support most likely means that substantial sums of money — much of it from taxpayers and ratepayers — will be wasted on perpetuating the fantasy that nuclear energy will make a difference in a meaningful time frame to slow global warming.
What’s missing are leaders willing to buck their own powerful nuclear bureaucracies and choose paths that are far cheaper, less dangerous and quicker to deploy. Without them we are doomed to more promises and wasteful spending by nuclear proponents who have repeatedly shown that they can talk but can’t deliver.
mspohr
Well-Known Member
mspohr
Well-Known Member
Strict new EPA rules would force coal-fired power plants to capture emissions or shut down
Coal-fired power plants would be forced to capture smokestack emissions or shut down under a rule issued by the Environmental Protection Agency.
apnews.com
Coal-fired power plants would be forced to capture smokestack emissions or shut down under a rule issued Thursday by the Environmental Protection Agency.
New limits on greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel-fired electric plants are the Biden administration’s most ambitious effort yet to roll back planet-warming pollution from the power sector, the nation’s second-largest contributor to climate change. The rules are a key part of President Joe Biden’s pledge to eliminate carbon pollution from the electricity sector by 2035 and economy-wide by 2050.
The rule was among four measures targeting coal and natural gas plants that the EPA said would provide “regulatory certainty” to the power industry and encourage them to make investments to transition “to a clean energy economy.” The measures include requirements to reduce toxic wastewater pollutants from coal-fired plants and to safely manage coal ash in unlined storage ponds.
EPA Administrator Michael Regan said the rules will reduce pollution and improve public health while supporting the reliable, long-term supply of electricity that America needs.
mspohr
Well-Known Member
New Biden administration pollution regulations released Thursday will make it more expensive for energy companies to keep burning coal. The industry is losing two of its most powerful advocates in Congress, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell and Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin. And last month’s collapse of the Key Bridge in Baltimore choked off a crucial export conduit for coal producers whose domestic markets have dimmed during the past two decades.
Now the U.S. has a fleet of aging power plants that are slipping toward retirement — pushed on their way by persistent legal pressure from environmentalists who are hailing the new regulations from the Environmental Protection Agency.
But despite coal-fired power plants contributing just 16 percent of U.S. electricity last year, compared with about half two decades ago — and forecasts from the U.S. Energy Information Administration that more than 20 percent of the existing coal power plants will close by 2030 — the sector still wields some political might in Washington.
And there is no shortage of other pro-coal Republicans. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia is the top Republican on the Environment and Public Works Committee. (She denounced Thursday’s EPA rules, calling them the latest plank in an “unrealistic climate agenda that threatens access to affordable, reliable energy.”) John Barrasso, the Energy and Natural Resources Committee’s ranking member, is running for whip, and his state of Wyoming is far and away the nation’s biggest coal producer.
Raffy.Roma
Rome (Italy)
IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) 2023 reports renewables 10 times more efficient than nuclear at Carbon Dioxide CO2 mitigation.
Similar threads
