Thread by @Philip_D_Ord

A common attack on #nuclear advocates is that we are trashing #wind and #solar. Wind and solar have so many limitations and drawbacks that simply talking about them is considered trashing them. Explaining why we need nuclear means telling the truth about renewables. 1/

The fact is simply this. Wind and solar make the act of decarbonizing grids to completion harder because they are variable intermittent sources of power we can’t call on. This is a physical fact that has been handwaived away since the original push to use those sources. 2/

Nuclear now has to be the technology that can integrate wind and solar into the grid. An example is @TerraPower Natrium. They are adding thermal salt storage tanks to deal with the randomness of wind and solar. Decarbonization would be a lot less complicated with just nuclear. 3/

People are just conditioned to view wind and solar as a sacred cow that cannot be criticized. I believe the hype around wind and solar is a dangerous lie and actually threatens efforts to decarbonize to the degree needed to save the planet from climate disaster. 4/

Now I am not saying we can’t do some wind and solar where appropriate. But I am saying we can’t continue to believe that wind and solar will do the grid heavy lifting. And saying otherwise is feeding delusion. We need to be clear and adamant in our criticism of wind and solar. 5/

If that is considered trashing it then so be it. We can’t be coddling feelings over facts. Wind and solar are intermittent, energy diffuse, resource and mining intensive, invasive to ecosystems, needing of ungodly amounts of transmission infrastructure,… 6/

…needing of replacement every 30 years at a maximum, have no real cheap storage solution, make grids more expensive in total, is unavailable during sever weather, requires lots of natural gas backup, has very low capacity factors and need to be overbuilt,… 7/

…is totally reliant on huge government subsidies, decreases spinning reserve for grid stabilization, cannot black start in an emergency, the list goes ON AND ON. We are not trashing them. We are telling the truth, and the truth is often uncomfortable. 8/

Now we can be kind in our truth telling to not turn people off immediately, and exercise a little more humility. But we shouldn’t have to just tiptoe around the glaring issues with wind and solar just because the appeal-to-nature folks have more institutional power. /END