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0 pointsJedd6y ago0 comments

I was going to point out that Ontario, at 15m, accounts for 0.002% of the population, and suggest it may be a statistical blip.

But -- and thanks for the link, it's fascinating -- diving into that page raises some questions. The nuclear component is very steady at 11MW, which I suppose is a function of the technology, to provide a reliable base load.

Nuclear fission accounts for 12MW -- while Hydro seems to consistently provide about a third that figure, with wind averaging just over 1MW, but peaking up to 4MW.

Canada has 19 nuclear fission power plants, with all but one being in Ontario.

Seemingly [1] several were / will be shutdown, as refurbishment is too expensive, and no plans to construct new plants in the province.

Storage of spent fuel is expected to cost ~$30B ... but that project hasn't found a site yet, and that's a projected figure circa 2005.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Canada

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Retric6y ago· 2 in thread

The import vs export numbers are critical for understanding what’s going on. The reactors are located in Ontario, but they supply power across a much wider area. Further, abundant hydroelectric power allows them to load follow locally at low cost. Yet they are still often paying 15+c/kWh.

mabbo6y ago

The hydro power is actually pretty fascinating in what it might mean for usage of unstable renewables like solar and wind. Hydro is a giant, slowly recharging battery. It's perfect to pair with wind and solar because it can deal with their highly variable generation and our society's highly variable needs.

But we don't have enough hydro-battery storage to allow for solar and wind to provide our base load. That's where nuclear shines, and why Ontario uses it so much.

Until we can come up with a way to store something like a week's worth of power, it's going to be very difficult to ever phase out of nuclear. But given how clean nuclear is compared to the alternative base-load energy sources (gas, coal, etc), I think that's just fine.

Retric6y ago

It might seem that way, but minimum and maximum power demand are generally so far apart when you include seasonal differences, solar and nuclear need about as much peaking power to supplement each other. That’s why even with huge exports Frances nuclear power stations hover around 77% utilization where US nuclear can hit 92%. Nuclear can clearly play a role, especially near the poles, but it’s just really expensive.

In the end Ontario is in an unusual situation that stops working as the rest of Canada scales either nuclear or wind power. It’s working for them and their electricity is mostly carbon neutral, it just does not scale.

PS: That’s not to say nuclear can’t scale to 100%, nuclear subs make it work with wildly swinging demand. However, low capacity factor directly results in higher costs.

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