> China has 21 times the population of France, so building 12x as many nuclear power plants isn't much.
They're not 12 nuclear power plants, they're reactors.
China is adding 35-40x the new nuclear power generation vs France over 20 years. It doesn't make much sense to only sample 4-5 years for such a ratio given how long it takes to build nuclear. If we only sample out to 2024-2025, France may be at zero on that scale given the endless delays in their construction. Not to mention, if we pick up the sampling after France is done their present construction, China's advantage jumps to infinite, since France won't be building anything.
You're also moving goalposts repeatedly in these comments.
First you said nobody can build nuclear today. I point out that, in fact, China and India are building nuclear just fine.
Then you say that what China is building doesn't compare to what France is doing. Then I point out that, in fact, China's 12 new reactors are considerable in output, so much so that they're equal to 1/5 of France's entire nuclear base. The output of those 12 reactors is far larger than anything France is building currently, many times over.
Then you move the goalpost again, to a matter of ratios, which I didn't dispute in the first place because it had nothing to do with what you originally claimed.
Your ratio premise requires that China stop building new nuclear power, when their plans are the opposite, they're going to keep building, whereas France is not. For China it's an ongoing process of adding.
No, completely not. Of course I am aware that nuclear power plants are still being built. For various reasons. I said, no one can afford to build nuclear power plants. That some still do, is another matter.
The thing is: France is not building enough nuclear power plants to sustain their current nuclear production levels. Finland is struggling to finish the one under construction (vast cost overruns), the UK has a single plant in production with guaranteed prices way higher than market (they want to keep nuclear capability for military reasons I guess). In the US, two half finished plants got abandoned for cost reasons.
Yes, China (and some others) still have ongoing nuclear power plant construction, but compared to the country size, their efforts are also miniscule. To get to the same level of nuclear production, China would need about 1000 plants. They are very far from that and their expansion in renewables is much larger than in nuclear.
When the Hinkley project in the UK was originally planned it probably looked like a much better calculation.
Renewables were still expensive then.
Oil prices were heading over $100/barrel - with no reason to believe they would drop.
There was a lot of hope around the new generation of automatically safe reactors.
Hinkley was supposed to be the first in a chain of new reactors, with later reactors having decreasing costs due to economies of scale and learning.
Time passed, delays accumulated, the situation changed, and I guess they just refused to adapt to the new circumstances, because they'd already spend so much money?
They're not 12 nuclear power plants, they're reactors.
China is adding 35-40x the new nuclear power generation vs France over 20 years. It doesn't make much sense to only sample 4-5 years for such a ratio given how long it takes to build nuclear. If we only sample out to 2024-2025, France may be at zero on that scale given the endless delays in their construction. Not to mention, if we pick up the sampling after France is done their present construction, China's advantage jumps to infinite, since France won't be building anything.
You're also moving goalposts repeatedly in these comments.
First you said nobody can build nuclear today. I point out that, in fact, China and India are building nuclear just fine.
Then you say that what China is building doesn't compare to what France is doing. Then I point out that, in fact, China's 12 new reactors are considerable in output, so much so that they're equal to 1/5 of France's entire nuclear base. The output of those 12 reactors is far larger than anything France is building currently, many times over.
Then you move the goalpost again, to a matter of ratios, which I didn't dispute in the first place because it had nothing to do with what you originally claimed.
Your ratio premise requires that China stop building new nuclear power, when their plans are the opposite, they're going to keep building, whereas France is not. For China it's an ongoing process of adding.