They are not becoming a thing and they are an asinine idea from the start. It’s basically decentralizing something that can only profit from centralization as it requires massive amounts of infrastructure for safety and security reasons in each location.
Nuclear is the most expensive way to make electricity and that will not change anytime soon.
So, basically like a massive UPS with some physical, local energy storage. Here’s hoping these will become practical in the near Future.
They are practical, and they are already being built.
I don’t think that’s true, but it depends on what metrics you’re taking into account (startup costs, energy storage, etc). In pretty much every study I’ve seen, nuclear is competitive, with the main issue being time to build a new reactor and arrange waste disposal, not long term running costs.
Nuclear is only competitive if you don’t factor in the negative externalities ( it has that part in common with fossil fuels) and the massive amount of government guarantees and subsidies that go into each and every plant.
Nuclear accidents are not insurable on the free market, that should tell you everything. If they were and owners had to factor in a market based insurance price, that alone would be so astronomically high that no investor would ever touch nuclear.
So governments guarantee to pay for damages in case of nuclear incidents. Governments bear the cost of waste disposal. Governments bear the cost of security (as in military /anti terrorism measures, because these things are awesome targets). Governments pay huge amounts of direct subsidies or take on debt via government owned companies to cap consumer prices. None of this is factored into electricity prices, none of this is factored into most studies.
Because, again, google won’t ever have to foot the actual bill. Also, google has a history of investing into things that don’t work out, so I wouldn’t necessarily cite them as an authority.
Edit: We don’t even know if google is actually “investing” anything here. They only say they agreed to buy power.
It’s unclear how Google and Kairos set up the deal — whether the former is providing direct funding or if it just promised to buy the power that the latter generates when its reactors are up and running.
They are not becoming a thing and they are an asinine idea from the start. It’s basically decentralizing something that can only profit from centralization as it requires massive amounts of infrastructure for safety and security reasons in each location.
Nuclear is the most expensive way to make electricity and that will not change anytime soon.
They are practical, and they are already being built.
I don’t think that’s true, but it depends on what metrics you’re taking into account (startup costs, energy storage, etc). In pretty much every study I’ve seen, nuclear is competitive, with the main issue being time to build a new reactor and arrange waste disposal, not long term running costs.
If small nuclear plants are so impractical, why is Google funding seven of them?
Nuclear is only competitive if you don’t factor in the negative externalities ( it has that part in common with fossil fuels) and the massive amount of government guarantees and subsidies that go into each and every plant.
Nuclear accidents are not insurable on the free market, that should tell you everything. If they were and owners had to factor in a market based insurance price, that alone would be so astronomically high that no investor would ever touch nuclear.
So governments guarantee to pay for damages in case of nuclear incidents. Governments bear the cost of waste disposal. Governments bear the cost of security (as in military /anti terrorism measures, because these things are awesome targets). Governments pay huge amounts of direct subsidies or take on debt via government owned companies to cap consumer prices. None of this is factored into electricity prices, none of this is factored into most studies.
Because, again, google won’t ever have to foot the actual bill. Also, google has a history of investing into things that don’t work out, so I wouldn’t necessarily cite them as an authority.
Edit: We don’t even know if google is actually “investing” anything here. They only say they agreed to buy power.