Honestly I don’t care if it’s solar, wind, geothermal, biofuel, or nuclear, as long as it displaces fossil fuels. And it’s feasible on a very near time scale.
If Sweden did an honest investigation and found that renewables would be more costly and take longer, let em get nuclear.
We need an “all of the above” approach. This fight between nuclear and renewables is just stirred up by fossil fuel interests. Either is good. Both is good.
If Sweden did an honest investigation and found that renewables would be more costly and take longer, let em get nuclear.
Bullshit. Renewables are cheap as chips.
Think of a traditional power plant. There are 4 main cost catagories: Construction, Maintenance, Fuel, Demolition.
In a traditional plant, over the life of the plant Fuel will by far be the biggest cost.
For renewables, Construction, Maintenance and Demolition cost more (issues such as remote locations, weather, smaller generators means more generators which increases the mean time to failure) however they have ZERO fuel cost.
Renewable generation is profitable as fuck, moreso than nuclear. Your average wind farm pays itself off in less than 5 years.
This is a right wing government backing the interests of fossil fuels, by implementing policy that delays any meaningful reduction in fossil fuel use.
Sweden already has a significant surplus of electricity production, to the degree that we are one of the largest exporters in the EU and have had several bouts of negative spot prices this past summer.
However, we also have an effect deficit for the colder part of the year. Two-thirds of simulations by SVK (our national power distributor) find that the peak-load hour during the winter 25/26 will have a deficit equivalent to three gen-II nuclear reactors running at 100% (10’000MW), and 10 continuous hours of blackout due to power shortage. This is during the coldest part of the year when solar is ineffective, and additionally is often combined with high-pressure fronts, which means low wind speeds.
In Sweden upwards of 75% of homes get their heating from electricity, and potentially a full day without power in temperatures of beyond -30°C would literally mean people freezing to death.
Our power bill for December was 800€, and we both have geothermal heating and averaged 14-18°C indoors for the month. This was more than January, February and March combined. Meanwhile, the bills for all summer months put together (May, June, July and I expect also August) cost less than the bill for April (100€).
The most viable short-term solution they’re looking at is (unfortunately) reopening old oil plants from the 60s & 70s however, this might not be possible either, due to newer EU legislations. Bringing them into compliance in time could cost 100’s of millions of SEK, which ironically is more than the “prohibitively expensive repairs” that the previous gov:t cited when they shut down 4 nuclear reactors 2015-2020.
Renewables should grow (they’re profitable), but there should be further incentivised growth to help reduce reliance on fossile fuels more quickly.
Yes, nuclear is brilliant for voltage and frequency stability. Large turbines have momentum in their spinning mass, when loads are switched on and off they keep spinning the same speed. However there are other options, eg rotating stabilisers, often used on very large ships but land installations are now being made also. These can be built without the nuclear red tape.
Replacing existing nuclear plants is always a decent thing to do. You skip over many of the hurdles by building on the same site under the same nuclear permits. However taking money away from renewables to pay for this is questionable at best.
I think Sweden does have some geographical complications, along with a lackluster transmission network. These are much harder to get private investment for. However if there was a decent transmission network then there would be more utility of renewable generation in the north as well as the capability for import of energy from neighbouring countries or even export when Sweden has an excess.
Putting my balls on the table, I reckon if Sweden put all the money they’ve got in nuclear into transmission first and then renewables, I reckon they could switch off more fossil fuels more quickly.
The points I listed are the strongest arguments to expand nuclear power which both the left and right of Riksdagen generally agrees on.
So how this is a right wing conspiracy to further the fossil energy industry as you point out is still to me a mystery, that’s all you need to explain.
The fact that left and right wing parties both currently (in the middle of soaring energy prices and a cost of livings crisis) agree with measures that support fossil fuel interests does not change the fact that the Swedish government (which is currently right wing) is implementing policies that benefit the fossil fuel industry.
Also, I question the nuance in that - I’m sure many in the left that support nuclear investment, but are less happy about renewable targets being scrapped.
However I apologise if I came on a bit too hard with it being a left vs right wing issue. It’s wealth vs society.
have you ever been in Sweden? it is a a rocky mountainous and mostly dark region. they only renewables that they can easily manage is geothermal and iirc they do not have the correct crust for it
According to another comment they have plenty of renewables up in the north but only use about 30% of that capacity. So it seems the main issue is with the transmission network for the country, its ability to get power from one place to another.
Instead of investing in 20 year nuclear power plant plans, they should be looking at accessing and expanding the available renewable generation in the short term.
the wind mills would be in inaccessible areas so you are better to just go with nuclear and invest in transmission from settlement to settlement instead to the turbines
Honestly I don’t care if it’s solar, wind, geothermal, biofuel, or nuclear, as long as it displaces fossil fuels. And it’s feasible on a very near time scale.
If Sweden did an honest investigation and found that renewables would be more costly and take longer, let em get nuclear.
We need an “all of the above” approach. This fight between nuclear and renewables is just stirred up by fossil fuel interests. Either is good. Both is good.
Bullshit. Renewables are cheap as chips.
Think of a traditional power plant. There are 4 main cost catagories: Construction, Maintenance, Fuel, Demolition.
In a traditional plant, over the life of the plant Fuel will by far be the biggest cost.
For renewables, Construction, Maintenance and Demolition cost more (issues such as remote locations, weather, smaller generators means more generators which increases the mean time to failure) however they have ZERO fuel cost.
Renewable generation is profitable as fuck, moreso than nuclear. Your average wind farm pays itself off in less than 5 years.
This is a right wing government backing the interests of fossil fuels, by implementing policy that delays any meaningful reduction in fossil fuel use.
Sweden already has a significant surplus of electricity production, to the degree that we are one of the largest exporters in the EU and have had several bouts of negative spot prices this past summer.
However, we also have an effect deficit for the colder part of the year. Two-thirds of simulations by SVK (our national power distributor) find that the peak-load hour during the winter 25/26 will have a deficit equivalent to three gen-II nuclear reactors running at 100% (10’000MW), and 10 continuous hours of blackout due to power shortage. This is during the coldest part of the year when solar is ineffective, and additionally is often combined with high-pressure fronts, which means low wind speeds.
In Sweden upwards of 75% of homes get their heating from electricity, and potentially a full day without power in temperatures of beyond -30°C would literally mean people freezing to death.
Our power bill for December was 800€, and we both have geothermal heating and averaged 14-18°C indoors for the month. This was more than January, February and March combined. Meanwhile, the bills for all summer months put together (May, June, July and I expect also August) cost less than the bill for April (100€).
The most viable short-term solution they’re looking at is (unfortunately) reopening old oil plants from the 60s & 70s however, this might not be possible either, due to newer EU legislations. Bringing them into compliance in time could cost 100’s of millions of SEK, which ironically is more than the “prohibitively expensive repairs” that the previous gov:t cited when they shut down 4 nuclear reactors 2015-2020.
Simply incorrect and ignorant and I could leave it at that.
But I won’t so here:
Nuclear is carbon neutral
The majority of Swedens energy production is still renewable and will continue to grow
Nuclear is absolutely necessary for load balance
Current nuclear plants are nearing their end of life and needs to be replaced
I think Sweden does have some geographical complications, along with a lackluster transmission network. These are much harder to get private investment for. However if there was a decent transmission network then there would be more utility of renewable generation in the north as well as the capability for import of energy from neighbouring countries or even export when Sweden has an excess.
Putting my balls on the table, I reckon if Sweden put all the money they’ve got in nuclear into transmission first and then renewables, I reckon they could switch off more fossil fuels more quickly.
The points I listed are the strongest arguments to expand nuclear power which both the left and right of Riksdagen generally agrees on.
So how this is a right wing conspiracy to further the fossil energy industry as you point out is still to me a mystery, that’s all you need to explain.
The fact that left and right wing parties both currently (in the middle of soaring energy prices and a cost of livings crisis) agree with measures that support fossil fuel interests does not change the fact that the Swedish government (which is currently right wing) is implementing policies that benefit the fossil fuel industry.
Also, I question the nuance in that - I’m sure many in the left that support nuclear investment, but are less happy about renewable targets being scrapped.
However I apologise if I came on a bit too hard with it being a left vs right wing issue. It’s wealth vs society.
have you ever been in Sweden? it is a a rocky mountainous and mostly dark region. they only renewables that they can easily manage is geothermal and iirc they do not have the correct crust for it
According to another comment they have plenty of renewables up in the north but only use about 30% of that capacity. So it seems the main issue is with the transmission network for the country, its ability to get power from one place to another.
Instead of investing in 20 year nuclear power plant plans, they should be looking at accessing and expanding the available renewable generation in the short term.
the wind mills would be in inaccessible areas so you are better to just go with nuclear and invest in transmission from settlement to settlement instead to the turbines
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