8mo ago

We can do all three things at once

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Exactly. It’s not about building new ones, that’s incredibly expensive with modern Western safety standards. But at least keep the ones already built running as long as it’s safe. Germany really fucked up with this due to populism
- Please stop this nonsense argument about Germany fucking up by shutting down nuclear. Even 20 years ago, nuclear energy wasn't that significant for our enery mix and shutting it down over the last 20 years didn't fuck up anything. The last few power plants had a capacity of about 4 to 8 GW and are not missed here.
  For the last 20 years, coal consumption declined (could be faster though) and renewable had a steep growth (could be faster of course).
  It is true that we started consuming more natural gas, but in the end the change is not about using old nuclear power plants that are unsafe or building new nuclear plants that will be usable in 10 to 20 years but about pushing renewable and improving the grid to solve the distribution problem.
  
  Thanks for the correction, never realized how little the nuclear share was in Germany, I always assumed it was much higher, similar to the countries I’m more familiar with. The recent phase-out barely makes a difference
  
  You're welcome. I hope I didn't come across as too pissed off.
  "Germany fucked up by shutting down their (last) nuclear power plants" is not only an argument by people outside of Germany but unfortunately is used by german conservatives and the far right as well as libertarians who don't want to take any steps to fight climate change but try to preserve "the old ways".
  Nuclear in Germany has been more or less dead for a long time. The last (commercial, there are newer reactors used for science) reactor has started building in 1982 and started producing in 1989. People who call for more nuclear power in Germany are at least 35 years too late.

231 comments