@USWeatherExpert @davey1233 @swansandsable The Financial Times's @Grepsul investigated nuclear economics last year came to same conclusion: standardization lowers costs and innovation raises it

ft.com/content/c06524…
@USWeatherExpert @davey1233 @swansandsable @Grepsul "Only by sticking firmly to the same specification, engineers and builders could you drive down construction costs. This 'learning by doing' could lead to meaningful reductions."
@USWeatherExpert @davey1233 @swansandsable @Grepsul "Having swallowed the hefty 'first of a kind' (FOAK) costs — see Hinkley and Flamanville — and invested in the supply chain to build the latest big “practical” reactors (after a 30-year nuclear hiatus), countries such as the UK should build large 'cookie-cutter' fleets."
@USWeatherExpert @davey1233 @swansandsable @Grepsul "The last thing needed is a multiyear pause while the next generation is brought to its FOAK phase, turning that costly investment rapidly into dust."
@USWeatherExpert @davey1233 @swansandsable @Grepsul "Solar panels became cheap not through radical changes in design but rather decades of incremental process-based improvements. he writes. Nearly seven decades after Rickover’s memo, it is a lesson the nuclear industry should learn."

ft.com/content/c06524…
@USWeatherExpert @davey1233 @swansandsable @Grepsul "The French have two kinds of nuclear reactors and hundreds of kinds of cheese whereas in the United States the figures are reversed," said Ivan Selin, the former Nuclear Regulatory Commissioner, when asked to explain why French nuclear was so cheap compared to the U.S.
@USWeatherExpert @davey1233 @swansandsable @Grepsul Standardization gives construction workers & manager a chance to “learn by doing” & build consecutive nuclear reactors faster and cheaper. What matters most is the tacit knowledge in the heads of construction managers, not reactor models.

forbes.com/sites/michaels…

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More from @ShellenbergerMD

22 Apr
Democrats must stop sacrificing good American nuclear jobs for cheap Chinese solar panels

THREAD

forbes.com/sites/michaels…
The Biden Administration is promoting the participation of Chinese President Xi Jinping in a White House climate summit at a time when Congress is considering whether or not to halt the import of solar panels from China for human rights reasons.
“China’s Solar Dominance Presents Biden With an Ugly Dilemma,” read the @nytimes headline of an article published yesterday. “President Biden’s vow to work with China on issues like climate change is clashing with his promise to defend human rights.”

nytimes.com/2021/04/20/bus…
Read 51 tweets
20 Apr
Democrats in Congress point to blackouts in Texas & California as reason to increase subsidies for renewables, but anyone concerned about extreme weather should want *less* reliance on weather-dependent energy sources, not more.

My latest @Forbes!

forbes.com/sites/michaels…
@Forbes Both the heat-driven August 2020 electricity shortage in California, and the cold-driven February 2021 shortage in Texas, were caused by over-reliance, not under-reliance, on weather-dependent renewables like solar panels and wind turbines.
@Forbes Thus, any effort by the federal government to make states more dependent on renewables would likely increase not decrease the probability and frequency of blackouts.
Read 49 tweets
1 Apr
Speak for yourself, Greta.

We in the U.S. reduced our emissions more than any other country btwn 2000-2020, mostly thanks to fracking

Meanwhile your country, Sweden, is shutting down its nuclear plants, which will raise emissions, and you won’t lift a finger to help stop it
Meanwhile, the world is either at, or very near to, peak emissions

If you actually cared about climate change you would demand that your allies around the world — starting with your German comrades — end their maniacal campaign to shut down nuclear plants
For those who would like to actually help protect the environment, rather than simply moralize about your personal behavior, or hypocritically demagogue other nations, please consider standing up for nuclear power. We need good people everywhere:

standupfornuclear.org
Read 5 tweets
11 Mar
The imminent, premature, & unnecessary closure of nuclear plants threatens to increase electricity prices, blackouts, and emissions, which declined more in the US than in any other nation in history, 2000-2020

My first-ever testimony before the US Senate

environmentalprogress.org/big-news/2021/…
Greenhouse gas emissions declined more in the US over the last 20 years, a remarkable achievement.

The US is the global climate leader.

The US is ahead of its United Nations emissions reductions targets

Why haven't the mainstream news media reported this?
The media also mis-reported Texas cold snap.

While all energy sources failed, they didn’t all fail equally. The capacity factors for nuclear, natural gas, coal, and wind during the cold snap were 79 percent, 55 percent, 58 percent, and 14 percent, respectively.
Read 11 tweets
5 Feb
Major new report by Dutch/Czech governments finds:

- Solar/wind require 148x - 536x more land than nuclear

- Solar/wind cost 4x more than nuclear

- 100% electricity from solar/wind would require area 1.8x larger than all of Netherlands

roadtoclimateneutrality.eu
Solar/wind require significantly more land than nuclear for inherently physical reasons

My colleagues and I have calculated that solar/wind require ~200 - 500x more land than nuclear plants using real world plants around the world

DATA:

environmentalprogress.org/power-density-…
It was only a matter of time before governments recognized the physical impossibility of transitioning (back) to renewables

It makes sense that the Dutch, with less land & more reason than Germans, would be the first to get it

@terugindepolder

telegraaf.nl/nieuws/1135312…
Read 4 tweets
27 Jan
Murderers & other prisoners in California have stolen $31 billion in unemployment benefits, making it biggest fraud scheme in history

Madoff = $18B

Cal. Labor Sec @JulieSuCA = @JoeBiden ‘s Dep. Labor Sec nominee 😬

@GavinNewsom will you claw this back?

abc7news.com/california-edd…
- 27% (!) of all claims appear to have been fraudulent

- California officials have been dribbling this out since December with initial estimates appearing to be of just $2 billion in December

abc30.com/california-edd…
Nigerians and others stole $36 billion last summer including $9B from Washington state and $2 billion from California so this has been going on for a long time

usatoday.com/in-depth/news/…
Read 10 tweets

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