> Then look at the trend lines in the cost of storage, particularly utility scale lithium batteries. You don't have to be a genius to realize this makes new nuclear a bad bet purely on the finances.
You are off by more than one order of magnitude! For non-hydro renewable to be self sufficient, you need between 200h and 600h of storage[1]. So to replace a 1300MW reactor, you need 3000MW of renewable power (assuming 33% load factor, which is a good one for renewable) AND at least 200GWh of storage! The storage cost just dwarfs the cost of everything else (and because it won't last 40 years, you'd need to pay for it at least twice!).
Solar and wind power are financially interesting because: the grid handles the load variations, subsidies, and the financial markets financing short-term projects easily compared to bigger one expected to run for 60 years.
Non-hydro renewable are nice when you want to reduce fossil fuel consumption in a grid where most electricity comes from fossil fuel (and ideally not too much coal), but on a purely technical standpoint, they are no match for nuclear. The thing are never purely technical though, and overall I'm sceptical about the future of nuclear.
> For non-hydro renewable to be self-sufficient, you need [8-25 days] of storage.
If you're adamant on generation following load, low transport, probably no overgeneration, no hydro and absolutely no backup biomass, gas or similar, then yes, you probably need 25 days of storage.
It would be good to have at least a couple of days or weeks of energy buffer in the world's supply chain, but that can take many forms. Electricity and lithium batteries seem a bad choice for the bulk of it.
You are off by more than one order of magnitude! For non-hydro renewable to be self sufficient, you need between 200h and 600h of storage[1]. So to replace a 1300MW reactor, you need 3000MW of renewable power (assuming 33% load factor, which is a good one for renewable) AND at least 200GWh of storage! The storage cost just dwarfs the cost of everything else (and because it won't last 40 years, you'd need to pay for it at least twice!).
Solar and wind power are financially interesting because: the grid handles the load variations, subsidies, and the financial markets financing short-term projects easily compared to bigger one expected to run for 60 years.
Non-hydro renewable are nice when you want to reduce fossil fuel consumption in a grid where most electricity comes from fossil fuel (and ideally not too much coal), but on a purely technical standpoint, they are no match for nuclear. The thing are never purely technical though, and overall I'm sceptical about the future of nuclear.
[1]: https://bourrasque.info/articles/20180116-moulins-%C3%A0-ven... (in French)