ENERGY « nuclear-news

Nuclear waste to nuclear reactor: The case of Russia in Kazakhstan

Ayushi Saini, 11 Jul 2025 https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/nuclear-waste-nuclear-reactor-case-russia-kazakhstan

Facing energy deficits, Kazakhstan turns to Russia’s Rosatom for nuclear
power despite a history of environmental and dependency concerns.

After shutting down its last Soviet-era reactor in 1999, Kazakhstan is now on the cusp of returning to nuclear energy. Long reliant on non-renewables and electricity imports, the country faces rising energy demands and an urgent need to diversify its energy sources.

In October 2024, a national referendum strongly backed the construction of a nuclear power plant, with Russia’s Rosatom ultimately selected to lead the project. The decision marks a major shift in the country’s energy strategy and reaffirms Russia’s enduring influence in Central Asia’s high-stakes infrastructure sector.

However, the decision raises several concerns, including environmental risks, increased energy dependence on Russia, and the revival of unsettling memories of Soviet-era nuclear contamination in Kazakhstan. Understanding why Kazakhstan is turning back to nuclear power and why it chose Russia for its first Nuclear Power Plant (NPP)merits a closer look at the strategic and geopolitical factors behind this move.

Nuclear past, nuclear future

Kazakhstan’s journey with nuclear technology is fraught and painful. As a Soviet republic, it served as a major testing ground, most notably at the Semipalatinsk Test Site, where more than 450 atmospheric and underground nuclear detonations took place. This placed a heavy toll on the environment of Kazakhstan, without the nuclear waste having been taken care of by the Soviet Union.

From 1979 to 1999, Kazakhstan hosted a high-neutron Soviet nuclear power plant. After independence in 1991, Kazakhstan dismantled its arsenal and embraced nuclear non-proliferation with the Semipalatinsk test site closing in the same year.

Now, facing power deficits, it is returning to nuclear power for civilian use. The new plant will be built near the village of Ulken by Lake Balkhash – a site chosen for its geographical viability, including proximity to water access. However, environmental concerns persist. Kazakhstan lacks the domestic capacity to manage nuclear waste and must rely on external actors. Despite its past role in Kazakhstan’s nuclear contamination, Russia has reemerged as a key partner in the country’s nuclear revival.

Illusion of a consortium

Astana designated Rosatom to lead the construction of its first NPPafter a competitive bidding process involving China’s China National Nuclear Commission (CNNC), France’s Electricité de France (EDF), and Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power. While authorities claim the formation of an international consortium, Rosatom remains the undisputed leader, reflecting both its technological edge and Moscow’s strategic weight in Astana. Kazakhstan claims that it is the exclusive owner, operator, and supplier of uranium fuel, with complete control over the technological processes of its upcoming nuclear power plant.

Meanwhile, China has been selected to lead the second nuclear power plant, with feasibility studies underway. Kazakhstani officials argue that China is best suited to cooperate with Russia, given their regional rapport. Though framed as multinational, the consortium appears largely symbolic, aimed at balancing ties with major powers. Rosatom’s financing offer further tightens Russia’s grip on Kazakhstan’s energy future.

Why Russia?

Kazakhstan’s decision to shift to nuclear power comes amid a growing electricity production deficit. The country faces a projected shortfall of over 6 GW by 2030, making energy security urgent. The selection of Rosatom to carry out the construction is officially justified by Kazakhstani authorities, given Russia’s global leadership in nuclear technology and its advanced VVER 3+ generation reactors, which are already in operation across several domestic and international sites. Rosatom was deemed to have submitted “the most optimal and advantageous proposal.”

This outcome is not surprising. Talks between Kazakhstan and Russia on nuclear cooperation began in 2011, leading to a feasibility study and a series of agreements. In 2014, an MoU was signed for constructing a VVER-based plant with a capacity of up to 1200 MWe. Kazakhstan also holds a 25% stake in parts of Russia’s nuclear energy sector, and Rosatom’s subsidiary, Uranium One, is already active in Kazakhstan’s uranium mining. Additionally, Russia was Kazakhstan’s top electricity supplier in 2024, exporting 4.6 billion kWh.

Kazakhstan’s alignment with Russia reflects shared Soviet-era technical standards, institutional continuity, and a workforce fluent in the Russian system. Rosatom’s reactors are cost-effective, geographically proximate, and supported by uranium supply and tech transfer offers. Russian remains a common language among elites, and Rosatom’s regional presence, including in Uzbekistan, adds further appeal.

As Kazakhstan’s oil and gas sector is dominated by Western companies (such as ENI, Shell and Chevron, and Russian Lukoil only having 13% stakes in Kashagan Oil Field), choosing Russia for nuclear energy helps Astana maintain a strategic balance and avoid overdependence on any one bloc, without triggering Western sanctions, as Rosatom remains unsanctioned.

Balancing act

Kazakhstan’s decision to pursue nuclear power under Rosatom’s leadership marks a turning point in both its energy strategy and ties with Russia. While the project aims to ease electricity shortages and boost Kazakhstan’s global energy profile, it also deepens reliance on Russia, whose regional influence had waned after the Ukraine crisis.

Although Kazakhstan seeks diverse partnerships – “middle power” diplomacy being a recent fous – geographic and historical ties continue to draw it toward Moscow. The inclusion of other countries in the proposed consortium reflects Astana’s multi-vector foreign policy, an attempt to maintain geopolitical flexibility while meeting infrastructure needs. As the consortium’s lead, Rosatom reinforces its influence over the region’s energy and political landscape. Yet, Kazakhstan’s visible effort to balance Russia and China suggests it won’t sideline either in its strategically vital energy sector.

July 14, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | ENERGY, Kazakhstan, Russia | Leave a comment

Why new nuclear power is a bad way to balance solar and wind

As we continue to respond to the coordinated propaganda campaign for new nuclear power in Scotland we hear from David Toke, the author of the book ‘Energy Revolutions – profiteering versus democracy’ (Pluto Press).

In the UK it has almost become an accepted truth in the media that new nuclear power is needed because there is no other practical or cheaper way to balance fluctuating wind and solar power. Yet not only is this demonstrably false, but it actually runs counter to the way that the UK electricity grid is going to be balanced anyway. Essentially the UK’s increasingly wind and solar dominated grid is going to be balanced by gas engines and turbines that are hardly ever used. But you would never guess this from the coverage.

Bella Caledonia 9th July 2025,
https://bellacaledonia.org.uk/2025/07/09/why-new-nuclear-power-is-a-bad-way-to-balance-solar-and-wind/

July 13, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | ENERGY, UK | Leave a comment

Nuclear Reliability- an uncertain route

July 05, 2025, https://renewextraweekly.blogspot.com/2025/07/nuclear-reliability-uncertain-route.html

uclear energy provides reliable, baseload, low-carbon electricity that complements the variability of wind and solar’. That, boiled down, is the UK governments view, as relayed in a response by the Department of Energy Security and New Zero to a critique by Prof Steve Thomas and Paul Dorfman. Well, none if it holds up to examination.

Low carbon? Not if you include uranium mining, waste handling and plant decommissioning. Baseload? A dodgy idea! A Department of Energy minister had previously admitted that ‘although some power plants are referred to as baseload generators, there is no formal definition of this term’ and the Department ‘does not place requirements on generation from particular technologies’.

A key point is that nuclear plants are not that reliable- if nothing else, they have to be shut down occasionally for maintenance and refuelling. Add to that unplanned outages, and nuclear plants are not very sensible as backup – especially given their high capital cost and lack of flexible operation. There are easier ways to provide the necessary grid balancing e.g. via flexible demand and supply management, smart grid transfer/green power trading, and via short and long duration energy storage, including green hydrogen storage.

All in all, as I’ve noted in earlier posts, it’s hard to see why the UK is pushing ahead with nuclear. As a recent US study found, the investment risk is high for nuclear compared to renewables. And as one of the authors put it ‘low-carbon sources of energy such as wind and solar not only have huge climatic and energy security benefits, but also financial advantages related to less construction risk and less chance of delays’

In which case it seems very strange that the UK Treasury seems happy to devote most of its new energy funding in the next few years to nuclear, with over £16bn evidently being earmarked for planned nuclear spending in 2025-2030, compared to under £6bn for renewables- see David Toke’s summary chart. It’s actually all a bit up the air at present since no one knows when Hinkley will be running- Toke even said it might not be until 2035! And no one knows for sure if Sizewell C will really go ahead and if so when – it’s still awaiting a final go-ahead decision. But some of the presumed nuclear spend is for Sizewell and some also possibly for SMRs, the latter getting £2.5bn diverted from renewables. And that’s not the end of it- consumers will also be shelling out to support Sizewell, if it goes ahead, paying an advanced surcharge on their bills to reduce construction risks under the RAB subsidy system.

To be fair, consumers do have to meet a range of green levies, including the Renewables Obligation, although that one may be phased out soon – with renewable technology support costs falling very well under its replacement, the Contract for Difference system. CfD strike prices were agreed in 2024 for wind at £54-59/MWh and solar PV at £50MWh, whereas Hinkley Point C got a £92.5 strike price in 2016, inflation index linked, so it would be over £128/MWh now and likely more by the time its running- in maybe 2030.

The next round of the CfD auctions for new renewable projects should be opening up soon, with the Clean Industry Bonus providing extra support for some key projects, including not just offshore wind as at present, but also possibly onshore wind and hydrogen systems. The next CfD round should also in indicate how tidal stream technology is getting on. However, it will be while before all the final strike prices are agreed for the various options – possibly not until early next year. But, by then, maybe the details of the Sizewell funding and SMR costs will have been revealed. So, we might then be able to see what makes economic sense for the future. It will be interesting to see what the Energy Security and Net Zero Select Committee has to say on all this in its updated nuclear roadmap review, which ought be out around then- if not before.

It certainly has felt like an uphill struggle over the years. But now at least there seems to be some progress, with, for example, the new Solar Roadmap setting out the steps needed for the government and industry to deliver 45-47 GW of solar by 2030, which it is claimed will support up to 35,000 jobs and use less than half a percent of total UK land area. It will be aided by governments aim to increase solar deployment on new build homes through the new Future Homes Standard requirements. In addition, the government says it has ‘taken action to deploy the technology at scale, approving nearly 3 GW of nationally significant solar – more than in the last 14 years combined’. It does seem more serious on solar now….certainly than the preceding Tories. And on wind too, including onshore wind, with, in all, the current wind industry workforce put at 55,000 and likely to double by 2030.

Of course this sort of expansion will face problems, for example leading to more wasteful curtailment of excess wind generation, unless transmission capacity is significantly expanded. Adding more inflexible nuclear to the system would of course not help – it would make it all harder to balance. But, oddly, that seems to be the plan with Sizewell C. And the proposed development of SMRs also has issues. For example, a recent review of nuclear options noted that ‘about 65% of Britain’s data centre capacity is concentrated in the London region’, and it suggested suggest that co-locating SMRs with data centre clusters could ‘assist in alleviating capacity constraints in areas of high data centre concentration like London.’ But would people in London, or indeed, other big cities, welcome SMRs, given the safety and security issues? And is this really the way to go?

July 13, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | ENERGY, UK | Leave a comment

Nuclear- a viable UK option? There are alternatives..

June 28, 2025, https://renewextraweekly.blogspot.com/2025/06/nuclear-viable-uk-option-there-are.html

ll of the expert advice says nuclear has a really important role to play in the energy system. So said UK Energy Secretary Ed Milliband, announcing an extra £14.2bn allocation for the proposed new Sizewell C reactor. Putting it charitably, he seems to have been poorly informed.

As I noted in an earlier post, there are many expert studies suggesting that there is no need for nuclear and that, in fact, it is a poor choice compared with renewables – which are cheaper as a way to respond to climate change. At least one of the submissions that I have seen to the ongoing Nuclear Roadmap Inquiry, run by the energy security and net zero Select Committee, takes a similar line- nuclear is too costly, slow and unreliable, with offshore wind being a better option.

However, it seems that the Select Committee will not start work on its report until later in the year, so it may be a while before we can see the results of its deliberations and all the submissions. And, meanwhile, the ground has certainly shifted. For good or ill, the UK is now heading for nuclear expansion, with Carbon Brief laying out a timeline chart showing what is expected. Of course, renewables are also expanding, and more rapidly. And the nuclear plans may come unstuck. For example the Times noted that ‘the government has commissioned just three SMR reactors, none expected before 2035. Rolls Royce said in 2015 that to make building a modular factory worthwhile, you would need an order book of 50 to 70’. So the £2.5bn diverted from Great British Energy’s renewable funding to SMRs, may not be enough, although it may still damage confidence in the progress of green power.

It also didn’t help that there was very little said about renewables in the spending review. That may have been understandable in terms of investment, since it was about major new capital/infrastructure projects like Sizewell, although the tidal energy lobby have complained about the Spending Review’s omission of tidal range energy commitments, warning that the government’s energy strategy dangerously over-relies on high-risk technologies. In a new report, the Tidal Range Alliance points to the quite large (~500MW) successful tidal barrages in France and S Korea, and says ‘Tidal Range is a proven, low-risk, high-reward technology’ adding that ‘it is time to mobilise it proactively as a resilient cornerstone of the clean energy system – not as a fall-back when other technologies falter.’ It claims that the UK’s tidal range potential, including tidal lagoons, could yield up to 30TW/h annually, and also offered additional benefits like coastal protection and local regeneration, with a levelised costs of energy put at £90–123/MWh. Hinkley Point C may end up with an inflation index linked CfD strike price well over that, maybe £130/MWh or more, by the time it finally gets to work, and who knows what Sizewell will really cost.

There are some CfD backed tidal stream projects already running in Scotland and more planned elsewhere, but the most advanced UK tidal range proposal is the 700MW Mersey barrage, although there is also a proposal for a huge 2.5GW tidal lagoon off Somerset, not far from Hinkley… There can be environmental problems with large tidal range systems, which is one reason why the 7GW Severn Barrage met with opposition, but smaller barrages and lagoons may have fewer impact issues. That’s also true tidal stream turbines, which can also be deployed in a modular way in large numbers, distributed around the coast, so that their peak outputs occur at different times of day, rather than just in two large bursts each day, as with individual tidal range systems.

While the Tidal Range Alliance is trying to move barrages and lagoons on, a Marine Energy Taskforce, has been launched aimed at developing a roadmap to realise the UK’s wave and tidal stream energy potential, which has been put at 25 GW for wave and 11 GW for tidal stream. Energy Minister, Michael Shanks said ‘With a coastline that stretches among the longest in Europe, it’s time we finally deliver on our marine energy potential and put our waves and tides to work. We will work closely with industry in breaking down barriers, unlocking investment, and kickstarting growth in our coastal communities, as we deliver clean homegrown power that we control.’

For the moment though, new areas like this await serious attention, and as far as renewables go, the focus is on PV solar and wind, on and offshore. They have been very successfully developed, in fact massively so since the early days. In 1986, with an election pending in 1987, Labours than leader Neil Kinnock gave an ‘unequivocal guarantee that the next Labour government will not sanction the ordering of another nuclear power station’, and added that ‘I am sure the advocates of alternative energy will not shirk the test the next Labour government will offer them’. But Labour lost…

Things have certainly changed since then, with the Tories, under Margaret Thatcher, backing nuclear. David Cameron too, later on. But renewables have nevertheless continued to live up to their promise – and are now supplying over 50% of UK power. Though we seem to keep going round the same cycle. Last time Labour was in power, in the 2000’s, it initially came up with a ‘no nuclear’ policy, but then changed its mind, with Tony Blair famously saying ‘nuclear is back with a vengeance.’ There was even talk of a 35-40% nuclear contribution ‘after 2030’. That came to nothing. But, now we are facing a big new Labour nuclear programme again….

However, at least this time around, although, if it goes ahead as planned, some resources will be diverted to nuclear, there is still over £6bn allocated to Great British Energy’s green power programme and renewable expansion, based on wind and solar, seems pretty unstoppable, with hydrogen also being part of that – now given £500m more. In addition, the Spending Review confirmed that the Warm Homes Plan would go ahead, with £13.2 billion helping to accelerate the uptake insulation and other domestic energy efficiency measures, as well as heat pumps and other low-carbon technologies, such as solar panels and batteries. So, one or two nuclear steps backwards maybe, but a lot of green steps forward, with a very welcome £1.2bn per year also earmarked for training and apprenticeships.

June 30, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | ENERGY, UK | Leave a comment

British billpayers saved £300m through energy flexibility in 2024, figures show

Savings were driven by lower contributions to infrastructure costs, reduced connection charges and the increased use of low-carbon energy sources.

Rebecca Speare-Cole, Independent 26th June 2025

.Many customers reduced their bills by changing the time or
day that they used electricity. British billpayers saved more than £300
million by switching the time at which they turned on their washing
machines or ovens, according to figures released by the industry body for
network operators.

The data shows households and businesses reduced their
bills by changing the time or day they used electricity – such as by
cooking or washing earlier or later in the day, or setting electric cars to
charge at specific times. In the past when most of the UK’s electricity
generators were fossil-fuel power plants, supply of electricity adapted to
demand.

Today as the wind and the sun influence when renewables are being
produced, incentivising users to adapt their demand to when there is a lot
of supply can help take pressure off the grid. Flexibility can also be a
valuable tool to optimise capacity while longer-term infrastructure
upgrades are planned and delivered.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/british-ofgem-mps-b2777498.html

Independent 26th June 2025

June 29, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | ENERGY, UK | Leave a comment

EPR nuclear reactors are just not performing well at all

The French EPR reactor was supposed to be built in 4 or 4,5 years, and to
produce 13 TWh of electricity per year. (As for EDF:s promise, see for
example https://lnkd.in/dFXe5geb point 19.)

At 13 TWh/year and operating when planned to do so, the first 4 reactors, in Finland, France and China should have produced about 648 TWh by the end of 2024. According to new
data from the IAEA PRIS they have produced 123,4 TWh, a mere 19 % of what
was promised.

Much of this underachievement is explained by construction
delays, on average 8,5 years for the first 4 reactors. But even after they
have started to produce electricity, it is far less than the 13 TWh/year.
In fact, it is 8,4 TWh. Put it in another way, the ”load factor” is
low. Lifetime load factors through 2024 are Taishan 1: 55%, Taishan 2: 76
%, Olkiluoto 3: 77,6%. Flamanville 3 in France was connected to the grid
only in December 2024 so it is too early to tell.

But as for the other three, the weighted average so far is about 67 percent. 100 per cent is
impossible. The world average load factor is about 82 per cent, as real
world reactors have both planned and unplanned stops.

The EPR has consistently been marketed as being able to produce 13 TWh per year, for 60
years. The theoretical maximum for a 1600 megawatt reactor, 24/365, is just
above 14 TWh, so 13 TWh corresponds to a load factor of 92.8%.It is
conceivable that the load factors will increase but it is not sure. Taishan
is the oldest EPR in operation, and it is also the worst performer.

Frederik Lundberg 24th June 2025,
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7343320565471924224/

June 27, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | energy storage, technology | Leave a comment

Why I can’t trust carbon capture or nuclear power to save us.

Tommy Shepherd (Former SNP MP) Sometimes I wonder if it’s the lack of a
scientific background among the country’s lawmakers which allows them to
be so easily bamboozled by technical experts. Could this be why energy
policy so blatantly disregards the obvious solution in pursuit of more
elaborate, costly and difficult answers?

Look no further than last week’s
announcements by the UK Government on nuclear and carbon capture to see
what I mean. Let’s start with carbon capture and storage. This has a ring
of plausibility and common sense to it. If you want to reduce CO₂ levels
in the atmosphere, why not find a way to remove it, compress it, pump it
underground and wait for time to literally turn it to stone? The thing is,
though, we already have things for taking carbon out of the atmosphere.

They’re very good at it. We call them trees. Photosynthesis is what has
always kept carbon in balance, ensuring not only that levels are reduced
but that oxygen, that vital component of life, is produced. You could build
very expensive industrial plants to augment the capacity of trees. Or you
could just plant more trees!

As the bill for Sizewell C grows towards £20
billion, remember that we will be paying for that too – even though
Scotland is self-sufficient in renewables. That is why control of our
energy is the greatest argument we can deploy to illustrate the benefits of
becoming an independent country.

The National 16th June 2025, https://www.thenational.scot/comment/25240560.cant-trust-carbon-capture-nuclear-power-save-us/

June 19, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | ENERGY, UK | Leave a comment

GB Energy handed £2.5bn bill for funding small modular reactors

GB Energy handed £2.5bn bill for funding small modular reactors.
Financing nuclear projects will leave state-owned company less cash for
backing wind and solar technology.

Great British Energy, the government’s
flagship state-owned energy company, has been handed the £2.5bn bill to
support a new generation of small nuclear power plants, cutting the amount
it has to spend on wind, solar and other technologies.

Rolls-Royce’sefforts to develop Britain’s first small modular reactors will be funded
by GB Energy’s £8.3bn budget over this parliament, according to measures
announced in Wednesday’s spending review. Until now it had been unclear
which part of the government’s budget would cover the funding for the
small modular reactor programme.

One senior government official said the
moves amounted to “reprofiling” of spending commitments into GB
Energy’s budget that might have previously been funded by the Treasury or
energy department. It follows months of negotiations between the Treasury
and the energy department, led by Ed Miliband, over whether the cash Labour
pledged to GB Energy in last year’s election manifesto would be cut,
given the tight public finances.

FT 11th June 2025 https://www.ft.com/content/a8e3a775-33c9-4ad6-b01a-bfb212dfdcbe

June 14, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | ENERGY, UK | Leave a comment

Vatican City Is Now Powered By Solar

Carolyn Fortuna, May 2025

Vatican City Is Now Powered By Solar. Pope Francis had a dream that the
Vatican would run entirely on green energy. He wanted to highlight the need
“to make a transition to a sustainable development model that reduces
greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere, setting the goal of climate
neutrality.”

To model what this could look like, he announced that solar
panels would be installed on a Vatican-owned property outside Rome, and the
power generated from that could supply all of Vatican City’s energy
needs. The future installation would be projected to “ensure, not only
the power supply of the radio station existing there, but also the complete
energy support of Vatican City State,” he wrote. Fast forward to 2025,
and the project is completed.

Clean Technica 29th May 2025,
https://cleantechnica.com/2025/05/29/vatican-city-is-now-powered-by-solar/

June 7, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Italy, renewable | Leave a comment

‘Fork in the road’: How a failed nuclear plot locked in Australia’s renewable future

The Age By Nick Toscano, June 1, 2025

hen Australians went to the polls and voted Anthony Albanese back as prime minister, they also voted for something that will outlive the next election: the power industry’s guaranteed switch from coal to renewable energy.

What they didn’t vote for were state-owned nuclear reactors, forced delays of coal-fired power station closures and a slew of other Coalition promises widely viewed as threats to the country’s era-defining challenge of cutting harmful emissions while keeping electricity supply and prices steady.

Although times remain testing in the energy sector, a feeling of relief is clear. “The nuclear conversation is dead and buried for the foreseeable future,” said an executive at one of Australia’s biggest power suppliers, who asked not to be named. Even as the Nationals keep arguing for a nuclear future, any genuine suggestion that atomic facilities could still be built in time to replace retiring coal plants after the next election rolls around was now downright “ridiculous”, said another, adding that renewable energy was on track to surpass 60 per cent of the grid by 2028. “That’s great for the energy sector – it simplifies the path forward,” they said.

Make no mistake, a seismic shift across the grid has been well under way for years now. Australia’s coal-fired power stations – the backbone of the system for half a century – have been breaking down often and closing down earlier, with most remaining plants slated to shut within a decade.

At the same time, power station owners including AGL, Origin Energy and EnergyAustralia are joining a rush of other investors in piling billions of dollars into large-scale renewables and batteries to expand the share of their power that comes from the sun, wind and water. The federal government has an ambitious target for renewable energy to make up 82 per cent of the grid by 2030.

Moving to a system dominated by less-predictable renewables will not be easy. It will take much greater preparation to match supply and demand and require the multibillion-dollar pipeline of private investment in the transition to continue. But ousted opposition leader Peter Dutton, before losing the May 3 federal election and his own seat, hatched a plan to change the course dramatically. A grid powered mainly by renewables would never be able to “keep the lights on”, Dutton insisted.

Instead, he declared, a Coalition government would tear up Australia’s legislated 2030 emissions-reduction commitments, cut short the rollout of renewables, force the extensions of coal-fired generators beyond their owners’ retirement plans and eventually replace them with seven nuclear-powered generators, built at the taxpayer’s expense, sometime before 2050

For Australians who wanted to see urgent action to tackle climate change – and investors at the forefront of the shift to cleaner power – the campaign to dump near-term climate targets in favour of nuclear energy came at the worst possible time. Some likened it to a “near-death experience” for the momentum of the shift to a cleaner, modern energy system that would have wiped out investor confidence and killed off billions of dollars of future renewable projects.

“When you reflect on the significance of energy in the campaign, it’s reasonable to say this was a fork in the road,” said Kane Thornton, outgoing chief executive of the Clean Energy Council……………………………………………..

Dutton argued for months that nuclear plants would be the best way to keep prices down, even though almost no one agreed with him.

“I’m very happy for the election to be a referendum on energy – on nuclear,” he said.

In the end, the idea proved too toxic for voters. It delivered big swings against Dutton’s candidates in electorates chosen to host reactors, while support for Labor grew in many of the places selected to develop massive offshore wind farms, which the Coalition had planned to scrap.

The decisive election result “locks in” the government’s ambitious push for an electricity grid almost entirely powered by renewables, said Leonard Quong, the head of Australian research at BloombergNEF.

“The Labor Party’s landslide victory … is a win for climate, clean energy and the country’s decarbonisation trajectory,” he said…………………………………………..https://www.theage.com.au/business/the-economy/fork-in-the-road-how-a-failed-nuclear-plot-locked-in-australia-s-renewable-future-20250523-p5m1qa.html

June 3, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA, renewable | Leave a comment

Solar puts Australia in fast lane to 100% renewables

A massive increase in solar power generation capacity is already putting Australia on the fast track to a 100% renewable energy future.

An academic living in cold Canberra retired his gas heaters a few years
ago and installed electric heat pumps for space and water heating. His gas
bill went to zero. He also bought an electric vehicle, so his gas bill went
to zero. He installed rooftop solar panels that export enough solar
electricity to the grid to pay for electricity imports at night, so his
electricity bill also went to zero. That Canberra academic will get his
money back from these energy investments in about eight years. I am that
academic and I’m experiencing how rooftop solar coupled with
electrification of everything provides the cheapest domestic energy in
history. Solar energy is also causing the fastest energy change in history.
Along with support from wind energy, it offers unlimited, cheap, clean and
reliable energy forever. With energy storage effectively a problem solved,
the required raw materials impossible to exhaust – despite some
misconceptions in the community – and an Australian transition gathering
pace, solar and wind are becoming a superhighway to a future of 100%
renewable energy.

PV Magazine 29th May 2025 https://www.pv-magazine.com/2025/05/29/solar-puts-australia-in-fast-lane-to-100-renewables/

June 2, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA, renewable | Leave a comment

More Renewables – or more nuclear?

May 24, 2025, https://renewextraweekly.blogspot.com/2025/05/more-renewables-or-more-nuclear.html

In my last post, I looked at how, despite renewable expansion, emissions were still rising. I focussed mainly on coal, but clearly it’s wider than that: multi-billion fossil fuel investment continues. In this post I will look at what is arguably another big issue- the attempt, to rebrand nuclear as a solution. Certainly some people in the UK and elsewhere think that there is a case for nuclear as part of a low carbon answer to climate change, although others do not agree. Even leaving aside the safety, security and waste issues, they say it’s too expensive and takes too long to build compared with renewables.

That debate continues, but in terms of what’s actually happening on the ground, the battle has arguably been won by renewables – they are expanding very rapidly around the world, leaving nuclear mostly stalled. Even China’s nuclear programme, currently at around 60 GW, is tiny compared with its renewables capacity, which hit 1.82 TW last year and is still expanding fast.

However, nuclear is still in the game in some locations, with, for example, Russia trying to export its nuclear technology and fuel services. And more generally, while the nuclear industry may mostly have to accept a lesser role globally, as renewables expand to high percentages of overall power, that in fact may be seen by them as a new opportunity- on the argument that nuclear will be needed to back up variable renewables.

The latest example seems to be Denmark, famed for its anti-nuclear ‘Atomkraft Nein Danke’ stance, with renewables now supplying over 80% of its power and aiming to get to 100% of all energy by 2050. That will require new grid balancing capacity, the most obvious being storage- with excess renewable output being stored in batteries or converted to hydrogen for use when there is renewable supply lull or a peak in demand. But evidently there is also now government interest in nuclear- and the idea of small modular reactors (SMR). It’s hard to see how this would be viable for occasional backup. Large conventional nuclear plants are expensive to build and inflexible to run, and current designs for SMRs are no better – and trying to make them flexible is likely add even more to the cost. So it seems very odd.

Spain also has a high renewable percentage, Portugal too, though, unlike Denmark and Portugal, Spain does have some nuclear plants. But it is planning to phase them out. Certainly they were no use in avoiding the recent large-scale total Iberian blackout- Spain’s nuclear plants evidently can’t run competitively when renewables are at peak. So, as it seems happens regularly, they were throttled back- most of the power was coming from wind and solar. We still don’t know what exactly went wrong, but it does seem that the remaining nuclear plants tripped out due to a grid overload signal, and PV solar also cut out for some reason. Perhaps a bit prematurely, the Spanish prime minister said that ‘there is no empirical evidence that the incident was caused by a surplus of renewables or a lack of nuclear power plants in Spain.’

He added ‘we are not going to deviate a single millimetre from the energy road map we have planned since 2018. Not only are renewables our country’s energy future, they are our only and best option. They are the only way to re-industrialise Spain.’

It may turn out have been a simple line fault, but it’s also possible that it was due to lack of synchronous inertia on the grid system. Large conventional fossil fuel fired or nuclear plants have large heavy spinning turbo-generators that help balance short-term output perturbations. PV solar has none, wind turbines only a small amount. But it would be crazy to build large expensive fossil or nuclear plants to provide rotational inertia for usually rare events.

There has been talk in the past of using just the turbo-generator sets of old closed plants, unpowered except for grid power, to provide ‘spinning reserve’ rotational inertia. However, if its needed, there may be easier and cheaper ways to do this electronically, via fast response storage and inverter systems- virtual synchronous inertia. Tidal lagoons and barrages are another option- they offer large scale energy storage capacity along with significant rotational inertia. So too do hydro projects. So inertia issues are not necessarily a major problem.

Needless to say though, despite there being no poof as to what actually happened as yet, there was a rush to early judgement and speculation by some of the media – along the lines that ‘you can’t rely on renewables’ and ‘this is what you get with net zero’! So far though, most of this invective has bounced off. Anti-nuclear Germany, currently gets around 63% of its power from renewables, and aims to get to net zero carbon with no nuclear. Occasionally there has ben some pressure to go back to nuclear but it has been resisted and certainly the ‘baseload for grid balancing’ case for nuclear seems very weak.

Meanwhile, the UK is getting 50% of its power from renewables, but is struggling to fund its proposed new nuclear plant at Sizewell: EdF evidently is no longer able to help out- it has enough financial and operational problems with its troubled EPR programme in France. It has also halted its initial SMR programme. The UK however is still keen to promote SMRs, although Westinghouse has pulled out of the race. The basic problem with nuclear technology, old or new, small or large, is cost – renewables like wind and solar are far cheaper, and storage backup is also now getting cheap.

The UK does need to get moving on hydrogen storage for the longer term, and also heat storage, which some see as better than heat pumps in some locations, possibly with green AD biogas as a storable energy source. Tidal lagoon power, though still a bit too costly, is also beginning to be talked up again. All of these are arguably a lot more promising for balancing than new nuclear.

So what’s likely to happen? There’s no question that the nuclear lobby has been pushing hard to get back in the game after the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan, which had led to nuclear programme reversals around the world, but in Asia especially. There were huge public demonstrations of opposition. But, in time, the phase out or cut back programmes planned by some Asian governments (including Japan, Taiwan and Thailand) faded away and nuclear is back in favour- although renewables are now seen as the main energy supply options in most cases. Not least since, even there, though lower than in the West, the constructions costs and investment risks of new nuclear are high, compared with solar and wind.

However, some also see carbon removal and biomass carbon capture playing a carbon negative role, especially in countries where there are a lot of agricultural carbon emissions- and also land. But as I noted in my last post, although there may be some exceptions, the economic and ecological viability of that approach on a large scale is debatable- expanding renewables even faster looks like a better bet. Though, as with nuclear, the debate continues…

May 26, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | ENERGY | Leave a comment

Two stories: Denmark’s soaring renewable success and global nuclear construction disaster

Denmark will soon achieve 100% electricity from wind and solar; but across the world nuclear power construction cost overruns soar

David Toke, May 22, 2025, https://davidtoke.substack.com/p/two-stories-denmarks-soaring-renewable

Two stories emerged on May 19th giving diametrically opposed results; one is very positive news for the booming deployment of renewable energy but the other is crushingly bad for nuclear power prospects. Renewables will make up more than of Danish 100% electricity in a couple of years time and just wind and solar not long after that. On the other hand a new study concludes that, around the world, nuclear power projects have cost overruns that are over 100%. Solar and wind have very low, if any cost overruns.

Danish renewables to reach 100 per cent of electricity

You can see the shares of electricity generation for Denmark in 2024 in Figure 1. Wind and solar already make up 69 per cent of generation and together with bioenergy they made up 87 per cent of electricity generation. But wind and solar generation is increasing rapidly. The different shares of power production can be seen in Figure 1.

Denmark blazed the trail for wind power starting in the 1970s as farmers and wind cooperatives put up their own wind turbines. Initially the turbines were only 20 kW in peak output. But the latest planned offshore windfarm will have turbines of 20 MW in size – a thousand times bigger! The early start for wind power in Denmark boosted its industry tremendously. Today Denmark also hosts Vestas, the largest wind generator manufacturer in the world.

There are still a trickle of onshore wind turbines being built. However, these days most of the new wind capacity is coming from offshore wind. The 1.08GW Thor windfarm that is currently being built will be fully operational in 2027. [on original]…………………………………………………………………………

Academic study reveals enormous average nuclear cost overruns around the world

Meanwhile, on the same day as the announcement of the forthcoming auction for the Danish offshore windfarms, an academic paper was announced which showed truly awful results for the nuclear industry. The study scoured the world for details on as many energy infrastructure projects that coud reliably be found – 662 in all – including 204 nuclear power plant constructions.

The researchers found that the average cost overrun for nuclear power plant was a staggering 102.5 per cent. That means that the construction costs were more than double the cost that was originally estimated before the construction started. What makes this figure all the more remarkable is that this was an average across the whole of the world.

The study includes Eastern countries like China. In these states there is still the specialist industrial skills (and more relaxed health and safety at work regulations) required to deliver nuclear power stations at anywhere near their projected construction time. Yet, in western countries, the construction cost overruns are much worse. Essentially, in western conditions, it has become impossible to deliver nuclear power plant at anything below astonomical costs.

I should add that there is an incredible amount of nonsense being spouted at the moment about how ‘small modular reactors’ are some way of saving nuclear power. Apart from occasioning a small amount of ultra-expensive nuclear capacity they are nothing of the sort. They are much worse in economic terms than even conventional reactors. See my discussion ‘Why small modular reactors do not exist – history gives the answer’. See HERE.

It is a completely different matter for renewable energy projects of course, where cost overruns are very low. But, from the press coverage, you would not guess all of this!

Conclusion

As we can see from this post Denmark is, within a few years, about to be the first country in the world with a net surplus of wind and solar power. Interestingly this is the country that turned its head against nuclear power forty years ago, although it never bult any nuclear power plant before then. I have heard an incredible amount of what could be described as nonsensical disinformation in the mainstream press about how nuclear power is accelerating around the world and even that is some sort of way renewables are in crisis. The reality is the exact opposite as the information in this post demonstrates.

May 25, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Denmark, renewable | Leave a comment

Nuclear has highest investment risk; solar shows lowest, say US researchers

Nuclear power plants exceed construction budgets by an average of 102.5%, costing $1.56 billion more than planned, according to a study by Boston University’s Institute for Global Sustainability.

May 21, 2025 Pilar Sánchez Molina, https://www.pv-magazine.com/2025/05/21/nuclear-power-carries-highest-investment-risk-solar-shows-lowest-say-us-researchers/

A new study by the Institute for Global Sustainability at Boston University found that energy infrastructure projects exceeded planned construction costs in more than 60% of cases. Researchers analyzed data from 662 projects across 83 countries, spanning builds from 1936 to 2024 and totaling $1.358 trillion in investment.

The study covered a wide range of project types. These included thermoelectric power plants fueled by coal, oil or natural gas, as well as nuclear reactors, hydroelectric facilities and wind farms. It also examined large-scale PV and concentrated solar installations, high-voltage transmission lines, bioenergy and geothermal plants, hydrogen production sites, and carbon capture and storage systems

Researchers modeled projects with minimum thresholds: power plants with more than 1 MW of installed capacity, transmission lines over 10 km, and carbon capture systems processing more than 1,000 tons of CO₂ per year.

In the study, “Beyond economies of scale: Learning from construction cost overrun risks and time delays in global energy infrastructure projects,” published in Energy Research & Social Science, the authors found that energy infrastructure construction takes 40% longer than planned – on average, a delay of roughly two years.

Nuclear power plants had the highest cost overruns and delays, with average construction costs exceeding estimates by 102.5%, or $1.56 billion. Hydroelectric projects followed at 36.7%, then geothermal (20.7%), carbon capture (14.9%), and bioenergy (10.7%). Wind projects averaged a 5.2% cost increase, while hydrogen projects came in at 6.4%.

By contrast, PV plants and transmission infrastructure recorded cost underruns of 2.2% and 3.6%, respectively.

Construction delays also varied by technology. Nuclear, hydro, and geothermal projects experienced average delays of 35, 27, and 11 months, respectively. PV and transmission builds had the best performance, typically completing ahead of schedule or with only minimal delays – averaging one month if delayed at all.

The study concluded that projects exceeding 1,561 MW in capacity face significantly higher cost escalation risks, while smaller, modular renewable builds may lower financial exposure and improve forecasting. Once construction delays surpassed 87.5%, cost increases rose sharply.

May 25, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | business and costs, renewable | Leave a comment

Solar Power Set to Surpass Nuclear Generation This Summer

By Tsvetana Paraskova – May 21, 2025, https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Solar-Power-Set-to-Surpass-Nuclear-Generation-This-Summer.html

This summer, solar power generation globally could exceed electricity from nuclear power plants for the first time ever, as solar capacity soars and sunlight and daylight hours are long in the northern hemisphere.

Global solar power generation jumped by 34% in the first quarter of 2025 from the same period in 2024, according to data from Ember cited by Reuters columnist Gavin Maguire.

If the pace of growth is sustained though June, July, and August, solar output is set to top 260 terawatt hours (TWh) in the summer months. This would beat the average 223 TWh of global nuclear power generation from 2024, Maguire notes.

Last year, record growth in renewables led by solar helped push clean power above 40% of global electricity in 2024, Ember said in its Global Electricity Review 2025 last month. However, heatwave-related demand spikes led to a small increase in fossil generation, too, the clean energy think tank said.

“Solar generation has maintained its high growth rate, doubling in the last three years, and adding more electricity than any other source over that period,” Ember’s analysts wrote in the report.

More than half, or 53%, of the increase in solar generation in 2024 was in China, with China’s clean generation growth meeting 81% of its demand increase in 2024, according to Ember.

China and Europe are driving solar power’s global surge, but in Europe, the solar boom has led to negative power prices more frequently.

At the end of April, for example, a sunny weekend in northwest Europe plunged power prices in the region to hundreds of euros below zero as solar generation soared.

Negative power prices, while beneficial for some consumers in some countries, generally discourage investments in new capacity as renewable power generators don’t profit from below-zero prices.

The more frequent occurrences of negative prices amid soaring solar output aren’t conducive to increased investment in generation only, and highlight the need of energy storage solutions to store the excess power and discharge it at evenings when it’s most needed.

May 24, 2025 Posted by Christina Macpherson | renewable | Leave a comment

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