Global Climate Change Science News

[pErvinalia]

It's global, so it's socialist.

[Tero]

More to do with city planning and transportation

[pErvinalia]

Socialism!

[Brian Peacock]

I loved being in Copenhagen. One of the cleanest, friendliest and most stress free places to navigate and get around. A large capital city with the feel of a small market town.

[Brian Peacock]

World Economic Forum:

Showing people the effects of the climate emergency fails to shift attitudes, study finds

How seriously do you take the threat of the climate crisis? You might think that the currently available data would be enough to convince anyone of the need to take action – but you’d be wrong.

For a new study, conducted by a team from Singapore Management University, Hong Kong citizens were shown a life-like 3D simulation of a climate-induced six-metre storm surge on their city. According to the findings, their perceptions of the risk from climate-related threats actually reduced after watching the simulation.

Reactions ranged from outright denial about the climate crisis to the belief that they, personally, would be OK whatever happened. Others said they were less worried because they were already taking steps to protect the environment.

Climate-related impacts were rated in the top-five near- and long-term global threats in the 2023 Global Risks Report from the World Economic Forum. Predicted effects ranged from extreme weather to large-scale forced population movements...

Research Article: Using virtual simulations of future extreme weather events to communicate climate change risk

[pErvinalia]

[Brian Peacock]

The EMBER Global Electricity Review came out a few days ago. Getting through it is a bit of a slog but a couple of things stuck out for me.

The concept of an electricity grid as a system of highly-centralised generation nodes feeding an expansive distribution network, is being undermined by a rapid expansion in supply options that generate at (or close to) the point of use - e.g. the costs driving the uptake of domestic solar and battery use, particularly between the tropics; community wind/hydro generation schemes in Northern Europe etc. Also, the acceleration in solar use (and manufacturing) is highest among climate-vulnerable nations and emerging economies - I.e. over 50% of climate-vulnerable nations now out-solar the US. The West is very much lagging behind here.

Nuclear is dead as a scalable supply option to bridge the transition from fossil to renewable grids - not least because the nature of grids has been changed by the falling costs of solar. The economics of capital-heavy supply options that require 80-90% uptime to break-even over their lifetimes are incompatible with grids dominated by the zero-marginal-cost techs of solar and wind (not that nuclear was ever a viable scalable supply option to begin with). The economics of nuclear also apply to fossil generation, though that sector obviously has more sunk-costs and leverage in the West.

I guess what strikes me the most is the rate of change in the adoption of renewable energy tech. After the pandemic the rising line on the graph literally shoots straight up!

Global Electricity Review 2026 (PDF)

[macdoc]

Couple of corrections.
Nuclear not entirely dead

Nuclear energy provides approximately 9–10% of the world's electricity, generated by about 440 reactors across 31 countries. It represents over 20% of global low-carbon electricity, making it the second-largest source of low-carbon power.

...it is fine for nations like Canada where renewables are limited but there is an established nuclear infrastructure.
China, US, Russia, France all have big nuclear fleets and Japan is restarting theirs\

Japan is actively restarting its nuclear power sector, marked by the 2026 resumption of the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, the world's largest, operated by TEPCO.

Australia would be seriously stooopid to start a nuclear program when already renewables are now base power and coal and gas plants backups.

Finland is a special case with very limited renewables.
Germany was stupid to close nukes before their expiry date.

China doing everything including some new coal plants tho peak coal is reached already ....it still has half its population not at middle class living standards so all power is useful. China expands nukes, wind and solar at crazy rates.
China has severely limited ICE small vehicles in cities and is astonishingly quiet and clean compared to India.

India I think has a challenge but lots of renewables and room for nuclear expansion. It has lots of thorium and Candu reactors are happy running on thorium tho India is buying Candu tech it is currently making deals with Canada for uranium.

India to Deploy a Fleet of 40-50 220 MW PHWRs
Posted on January 3, 2025 by djysrv

https://neutronbytes.com/2025/01/03/ind ... -mw-phwrs/

Planet

Might be too little too late ..a Hail Mary may have been useful in the 80s so now it's managing with severe climate and saving some biodiversity planet wide.
Fossil is dead but the dying convulsions dire.
2100 will see very different climate and coastline maps. I will be outa here.

[Svartalf]

nuclear better not be dead, it's the only reliable and continuous, non greenhouse, high output power source we have.we're going to need a lot of it if we keep hiking up the power demand as has been the case recently.

[macdoc]

Yup

[Brian Peacock]

Couple of corrections.
Nuclear not entirely dead

But I didn't say nuclear was entirely dead did I? I said that it was dead as a scalable supply option for bridging the transition to renewables. What's severely wounded it is the explosion in the development and availability of relatively cheap solar, batteries and wind, along with the zero-marginal-cost of those sources - and that's changing the nature of electricity grids.

Nuclear meets certain needs in certain circumstances, so it's not going to be entirely replaced by solar, wind or hydro. Small reactors may have a place feeding industry (those datacenters need a lot of juice) or servicing remote communities with isolated grids for example, and it's probably the right tech to ameliorate shortfalls in coverage and storage from other renewables.

At COP28 nuclear was finally included as part of the global stocktake, which is a good thing imo, but even with that global nuclear capacity is going to have to more than double to 2050 to maintain its share of the global mix against projected demand -- from 370 GW(e) in 2022 to 890 GW(e) by 2050 -- according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. This is technically achievable of course, but with large reactors typically in the 1-1.7 GW(e) range even generous assumptions still require more than 300 large reactors to be built to meet 2050 commitments, which is only 24 years away. Last year nuclear's share of the global electricity mix dropped to 8.9%, which was its lowest level since the early 1980s, and in the meantime the falling costs of solar and wind will continue to exert downward pressure on per-unit energy prices globally.

The broader picture (and my views btw) are a lot more nuanced than 'nuclear is entirely dead'.

[Brian Peacock]

nuclear better not be dead, it's the only reliable and continuous, non greenhouse, high output power source we have.we're going to need a lot of it if we keep hiking up the power demand as has been the case recently.

France is an interesting and particular case. Historic energy-security concerns led to policies which oversaw the French nuclear sector expand to where it is today - that is, accounting for c.70% of the nation's electricity needs. However, legislation is on the books to reduce that to 50% by 2050, and to cover the shortfall through upgrading/extending the life of some of the existing plants, and a rapid expansion of solar and wind generation (possibly with a little additional hydro also). The current govt also unveiled a strategy in February to build six new reactors from 2038-2050, with an option for eight more at some as-yet-to-be-specified later date. As part of this strategy 14 pressurised water reactors (REPs) in the 900MW(e) range are scheduled to be shut down by 2035 and to complete their decommissioning cycle by 2050. Needless to say there has been some political resistance to this.

That reduction to 50% of the electricity mix by 2050 though isn't necessarily a like-for-like reduction in overall capacity (i.e. that doesn't mean an overall 20% reduction in nuclear generation) but factors in projected rises in demand as energy for domestic, agriculture, transport and industry etc accelerate getting off the fossil wagon and onto the cleaner electricity train - as well as expanding solar and wind generation capacity. Don't worry Svarty - I don't think the lights will be going off.

[Svartalf]

well, I don't know what the french nuclear power generation will become... our current power stations are all significantly older than they were supposed to get, and we're not building any new ones, because the expected next generation is not yet perfected, so we can't build more of the prototype, and the previous generation... those morons of who manage the french nuclear industry simply have let the know how die out as the workers and engineers who had made the current stations when I was a child retired and died.

[macdoc]

There is lots of world nuclear tech available and I'd say France has done a good job with both power generation and waste disposal. Ironic that France sells power to Germany.
Wind and solar can't replace the base load of nuclear and maybe the huge capacity from Norway's hydro surplus can be employed.

Norway is often referred to as "Europe’s green battery" due to its ability to store vast amounts of energy in its hydropower reservoirs, which can balance intermittent European wind and solar power. With nearly 100% renewable electricity and 60-70% of its storage capacity, Norway can import surplus European power to store water, and export electricity during shortages.Key Aspects of Norway as Europe's Battery:Hydropower Storage: Norway holds roughly half of Europe's total reservoir capacity. This allows it to act as a giant storage system, where surplus wind/solar energy from Europe can "pump" water back up into reservoirs (pumped storage) and release it when needed.Balancing Variability: When the wind isn't blowing or the sun isn't shining in Europe, Norway can instantly ramp up its hydropower production to provide stable energy.Key Subsea Cables: High-capacity interconnectors like the North Sea Link to the UK and NordLink to Germany are critical for transferring this energy.Environmental Impact: While offering a clean, flexible energy source, the "green battery" concept faces some debate within Norway regarding the environmental impact of infrastructure developments like wind power and new, high-capacity cables.Production Capability:
Norway is the sixth-largest hydropower producer in the world.

[Brian Peacock]

To paraphrase Bill McKibben: Photons travel 93 million miles to strike a solar panel - none of them through the Strait of Hormuz. See here for a much fuller articulation of the economic and efficiency case for solar.