And I assume the energy companies will be footing the bill from construction till deconstruction and long term storage, the later two as a trustee deposit, on their own without any state subsidies. Given that all the pro-nuclear folk always tout so many benefits to nuclear, this should be a non-issue and be very profitable.
Those are not unsolvable problems though, and they stem from political issues rather than the technical problems we still have with the scale of energy storage that we will need with 100% renewable.
And that is not to say that we shouldn’t use renewables, we should just also use nuclear.Idk for germany but nuclear power is super profitable in france. In fact its soo cheap that our producer of electricity is obligated by EU to sell a part of his production to other brand of electricity to equilibrate with other companies who produce electricity with gas.
Nuclear Power is heavily subsuidezed in France. Most in france related to nuclear are state institutions. Including the Energy Company EDF and the scientific institute CEA. It is often phrased as a state-in-state with a lot of undisclosed structures and money funds. They were created when France saw in the 60s that they need also a nuclear bomb and hence developed a state-close structure that until today in not giving out too much informations. The French citizens pay with their taxes for their nuclear power plants. Heavily. And they hide it behind a lot of structures. Who is paying for the construction? The Repair? The Decomission? - Right: French citizens. If if calculate all these cost into the bill, Nuclear energy is one of the most expensive energy forms there are.
Your old reactors are producing “cheap” energy if we ignore indirect subsidies like state guarantees for project risks and replacing insurance for uninsurable power plants, costs of eventual decommissioning, waste storage etc. . But many of them are end of life. They are kept running because building new ones even to replace the existing capacity takes ages and is far too expensive to be profitable under the price regulation (i.e. Flamanville, which would require 12-17 cents/ kWh to be profitable while the regulated price is 7 cents which wind and solar can achieve natively. Similar problems with international EDF projects like Hinkley Point).
It is heavily subsidized by the french taxpayer, including price fixing for new plants to guarantee the profits.
You are being played.
How much does electricity cost per kWh in France?
Lindner: haha nein.
Thank God.
