Say "No" to Nuclear Power Interventions \ stacker news ~Politics_And

An August 17, 2024 article, at oilprice.com, entitled, “A New Era for Nuclear Power in the US” describes US government funding and intervening to reopen closed or closing nuclear power electric generating plants (nuclear) to support their green transition policies from the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

The IRA provides $6 billion financial support to nuclear power plants at risk of closure—$1.2 billion per year from FY2022 through FY2026. The new federal program is another example of government intervention through a subsidy or incentive to keep a nuclear plant operating when it is losing money.

The article states, “The US government is supporting the reopening of the Palisades (Palisades) nuclear power plant in Covert, Michigan, the first such effort in the country’s history.”

Palisades shut down after 40 years of operation in May 2022, largely from the electricity production cost increase compared to cheap and abundant natural gas encouraging a shift away from nuclear energy. The plant lost an electric power purchase agreement leading to no available electric power buyer.

Palisades was sold from Entergy to Holtec in June 2022 to be responsible for decommissioning this site. Thanks to a $1.5 billion conditional commitment for a loan guarantee from the US Department of Energy to Holtec, which announced in March 2024 the Palisades plant would be repowered thanks to, “The federal financial backing of the restart...” This federal intervention with a corporate benefactor is crony capitalism.

This is something I was not aware of: the cost of producing electrical power using nuclear power plans is higher than using natural gas or coal! If this is the case than producing the base load power by nuclear power is going to cost much more than necessary and is, perhaps, another sign that intervention by the state in the economy is really good for cronies. Crony capitalism seems to be in full blossom under the old administration and is still blooming. It is ripping us off.

20 sats \ 3 replies \ @BlokchainB 2 Mar

Wow first time I saw an article critical of nuke power economics

135 sats \ 2 replies \ @Rothbardian_fanatic OP 2 Mar

It really comes down to how much the marginal cost of production is for power. Gas and coal seem to be cheaper, overall, for production. Now, I don’t know if this includes the costs of deactivation for any of these power plants or the cost of disposal of detritus as the waste product. Until the capital price of making the nuclear plant comes down, a nuke may be too expensive. Perhaps, the small modular generators can be manufactured for a fairly low price.

20 sats \ 1 reply \ @BlokchainB 2 Mar

Yeah that is true I wonder if that plant had any cost control measures enforced upon it by the local governments

106 sats \ 0 replies \ @Rothbardian_fanatic OP 3 Mar

I don’t know about cost control measures from local governments, but there is usually a Public Utilities Commission or some such that imposes price controls on the output to the customers. This is one reason why it has become unprofitable to build and operate those big nuclear plants. If they could charge for the power at a rate that would return a profit, I think you would see more of them.