Arguments
Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
Posted on 13 June 2019 by scaddenp
Abbott 2011 and Abbott 2012 doesn’t think so but perhaps there are better analyses? For discussions of economics, levelized cost estimates of various electricity technologies can be found here and here.
Nuclear energy is quite commonly proposed as the solution to reducing GHG emissions. As soon as this gets raised on an article's comment thread, there has been a bad tendency for on-topic discussion to be completely derailed by proponents for and against.
We have repeatedly asked for nuclear proponents to provide an article for this site which puts the case based on published science but so far we haven't had a taker. The proposal would need to be reviewed by Sks volunteers. In lieu of such an article, this topic has been created where such discussions can take place.
However, in the absence of a proper article summarizing the science, stricter than normal moderation will be applied to ensure that all assertions made for or against are backed by references to published studies, preferably in peer-reviewed journals.
Update - October 2020
This post has been up for a little over a year now, and has received over 200 comments. Now seems like a good time to add some clarification.
First of all, the challenge to "nuclear proponents" to provide an article requires that the article "summarize the science". It is not the desire of Skeptical Science to provide a one-sided, pro-nuclear assertion. The expectation is that an article would provide a balanced review of all aspects of nuclear energy as a practical, affordable, realistic source of low-carbon energy.
If you think of yourself as a "nuclear advocate", then writing a balanced article will be difficult for you. This is not a place for "lawyers' science", where the role is to pick a side and pretend there is no other reasonable argument. This is not about winning an argument - it is about coming to a common understanding based on all the available evidence.
If you think that criticism of your position represents an "anti-nuclear bias", then writing a balanced article will be difficult for you.
If you think that you are the only one that truly understands nuclear energy, then you are probably wrong.
Review of any submitted article will not be at the level of a review of a professional journal article, but anyone submitting an article needs to be prepared to have their positions examined in detail for weaknesses, missing information, lack of support in the peer-reviewed literature, etc. If you find it tough to accept criticism in the comments thread, then you will not find review any gentler.
Keep in mind the following:
nuclear 1GW x80% capacity factor x80 years = 560,640GWh lifetime
solar 1GW x25% capacity factor x30 years = 67,500GWh lifetime
wind 1GW x45% capacity factor x35 years = 137,970 lifetime
A recent SKS article identified a report released in June 2025 "Beyond LCOE" "This report explains why LCOE fails to reflect the full complexity of electricity systems and can lead to decisions that jeopardize reliability, affordability, and clean generation."
Keep in mind that Lazard's LCOE reports have many factors that they don't examine, which Lazard themselves clearly acknowledge.See the bottom of page 7 in the 2025 report (it was page 8 in 2024) "Other factors would also have a potentially significant effect on the results contained herein, but have not been examined in the scope of this current analysis. These additional factors, among others, may include: implementation and interpretation of the full scope of the IRA; economic policy, transmission queue reform, network upgrades and other transmission matters, congestion, curtailment or other integration-related costs; permitting or other development costs, unless otherwise noted; and costs of complying with various environmental regulations (e.g., carbon emissions offsets or emissions control systems). This analysis is intended to represent a snapshot in time and utilizes a wide, but not exhaustive, sample set of Industry data. As such, we recognize and acknowledge the likelihood of results outside of our ranges. Therefore, this analysis is not a forecasting tool and should not be used as such, given the complexities of our evolving Industry, grid and resource needs. Except as illustratively sensitized herein, this analysis does not consider the intermittent nature of selected renewables energy technologies or the related grid impacts of incremental renewable energy deployment. This analysis also does not address potential social and environmental externalities, including, for example, the social costs and rate consequences for those who cannot afford distributed generation solutions, as well as the long-term residual and societal consequences of various conventional generation technologies that are difficult to measure (e.g., airborne pollutants, greenhouse gases, etc.)"
[BL] Keep in mind that moderators here can delete everything and anything, and rescind your posting privileges.
Constantly shifting goal posts and repeating yourself will only lead to one place.
Responding to David-acct's off topic comment here:
Your claim that the data from your linked site does not support my statement that French nuclear power plants do not shut down is false on its face.
This data showed that reactors were shut down on the weekend:
date time Power MW
8/10 2:45 31645 Thursday 2023
8/10 13:45 30424
8/5 4:15 28489 Saturday 2023
8/5 16:15 25548
On Saturday at 16::15 6,097 MW less power was generated than on Thursday at 2:45. On 8/14/2023 I posed these questions to you:
"Several question about this raw data occured to me.
1) You state clearly that the data shows no nuclear power stations were shut down. Please explain why the power generated on the weekend is so much less than the power generated on Thursday. How does this show that no power stations were shut down over the weekend? It appears to me that about 6 of 31 power stations (20%) were turned off.
2) On both days they are generating more power at night when power is generated at a loss than they are generating during the day when the price of electricity is much higher. Can you explain why the "always on" nuclear plants generate less power during the most expensive part of the day than they do when electricity is cheapest?
This example proves beyond doubt that examining cherry picked factoids without any analysis is a complete waste of time. Please do not cite raw data any more. You need to cite analysis of data that filter out gross errors."
You refused to answer and stopped posting at SkS for several months. Please answer those questions now.
Looking at the French power link again I found this data for the weekend of August 2 (Saturday) and August 4 2025 (Monday).
date time Power MW
8/2 05:00 39717
8/2 14:15 25091
8/4 04:00 39722
8/4 13:45 24128
On this weekend reactors were shut off during the day. On 8/4 15 MW less power was being generated at 13:45 than at 04:00. Please explain why so many reactors were turned off. Other posters have suggested that they might shut down the reactors because there is not enough cooling water or because they cannot compete with cheaper solar power. In any case, the reactors are turned off since no one wants to purchase their power.
I note that since France has 63 GW of nuclear power the highest capacity factor last weekend was 63% and the lowest was 38%.
If they wasted the nuclear power by turning down the power output that counts as shut down. We cannot tell from the data if 15 reactors were shut off or if 30 reactors were run at half power.
I note that you said here "It would seem the cost of doing so would be prohibitive given the costs of restarts,"
I found this on Bloomburg French power slumps as surging renewables push out atomic plants which suggests that nuclear plants cannot compete with renewables even when they are owned by the government.
I do not care if you are not skilled enough to find resources that state France does not shut down reactors on the weekends. I linked a site that specifically stated that plants close on weekends and provided data (from your link) that showed without doubt that several reactors were closed on the weekend.
Apparently now they are shut down on sunny and/or windy days, in addition to weekends, because they cannot compete with cheaper renewables.
The most recent report by the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (Nista) in England has concluded:
"Plans to dispose of the UK’s high-level nuclear waste in an underground repository – a Geological Disposal Facility (GDF) – have been described as “unachievable” by a Treasury unit."
While nuclear supporters claim that it is simple to build underground storage facilities for high level nuclear waste it is proving difficult in practice. The USA currently has no proposed facilities. The current practice world wide is to store the waste in temporary casks on the grounds of existing reactors. Sometimes the waste is moved to another site.
Apparently FInland has a repoisitory near completion and Sweden has just started building a repository expected to begin taking waste in about 2040.
I have been reading this blog and it seems decent quality. I think that nuclear energy can used side by side renewable energy sources like wind and solar. That until we get the massive grid storage needed for all renewables that we can replace brown coal with nuclear at least in the short run.
I am not pro nor anti-nuclear, I just want to understand the topic better.
Pollution Monster,
Your blog is dated 2019. It is now out of date. Like many blogs, it contains many mistatements of facts, cherry picked numbers and deliberate lies. I recommend you read Jacobson et al 2022 which addresses all the issues with renewable energy raised in the blog and shows renewable energy is much cheaper than any other technology. Jacobson uses only existing technology to generate all world energy.
Abbott 2012, linked in the OP, lists about 13 reasons why nuclear will never be capable of generating a significant amount of power. Nuclear supporters have never addressed these issues. To me, the most important issue is there is not enough uranium to generate more than about 5% of all power
Since 2019 renewable energy and especially battery storage have dramatically decreased in cost. This solves the main issues the linked blog has with renewables.
Nuclear power is too expensive, takes too long to build and there is not enough uranium.
Thanks for the quick response. I will let the author know since he is still posting as if his 2019 assertions are correct. I couldn't find the Jacobson 2022, got too many off topic search results. I did read the Abbott 2012.
Sorry about posting a link with so many flaws.
PollutionMonster @456,
I'd assume the paper mentioned @455 is Jacobson et al (2022) 'Low-cost solutions to global warming, air pollution, and energy insecurity for 145 countries'.
I read the links provided and I am still not 100% sure who is correct. The author of the blog posted a new post again promoting nuclear as part of the solution along side renewables.
Nuclear and renewables?
I see this as a puzzle I am trying to figure out. Basically the author still makes many references to nuclear while also promoting many renenwables including solar. Seeing nuclear, geothermal, and hydroelectric as a stepping stone before we go to fully renewable.
So who is right? Do we eliminate nuclear entirely or do we use nuclear as a stepping stone until we can go fully nuclear?
Thanks for your time and energy in advance.
PollutionMonster @ 458:
Expecting to be "100% sure" is an impossible goal.
Reading over that link you provide, I see a few unqualified assumptions:
So, I see that blog post as yet another marketing presentation, rather than evidence that nuclear provides a quick and reliable way of adding energy to the grid. It's an opinion piece, not a rigorous analysis.
Regarding PollutionMonster’s comment @454, and the comments since then, I add the following comment with related recent news items related to the context of my earlier comments @450, @428, @413:
The Trump administration exempts new nuclear reactors from environmental review, NPR, Geoff Brumfiel, Feb 2, 2026.
The Trump administration has secretly rewritten nuclear safety rules, NPR, Geoff Brumfiel, Jan 28, 2026.
Trump's rush to build nuclear reactors across the U.S. raises safety worries, NPR, Geoff Brumfiel, Dec 17, 2025.
It appears that some people who made significant bad bets (investments) trying to develop small modular nuclear reactors have gotten the USA leadership-of-the-moment to weaken developed requirements requirements for evaluation and understanding of the risks and harms of new nuclear reactors.
The people who placed those losing bets appear to understand that the new nuclear systems being developed would be more expensive than the renewable alternatives if they had to be as safe and publicly well understood as the developed requirements for nuclear power plants would require.
One tragic argument in favour of small modular nuclear power plants is that the magnitude of the harm is limited because the plants are smaller than the large scale plants. The (il)logic appears to be that the damage done by a small nuclear plant would be less than the damage done by a large nuclear plant … therefore smaller plants can be riskier and be more harmful per unit of power generated than a large one.
The reality will be that the risks and harm of these new small modular nuclear reactors will become known after there are many of them in use. And, after the attempts to limit public awareness of the risk and harm, it will likely be argued that correcting what has been developed will be 'too harmful'. After all, it is unlikely that the powerful people pushing for benefits from the harmful unsustainable activity will suffer significant harm.
I will repeat the closing part of my comment @450 (with its pointing back to my comment @428):
Also, in the future, any energy system that is unsustainable will be unable to be continued. Unsustainable activities either use up non-renewable resources or produce accumulating harm. Nuclear power systems consume non-renewable resources and produce accumulating harm.
Therefore, no future energy system will include nuclear power generation. And since it is also a very costly way of generating electricity it should be unpopular.
However, humans have a tragic history of regionally developing popular support for harmful costly misunderstandings, as I implied in my comment @428.
Pollytion Monster:
Perhaps you do not understand the scientific method. Scientists spend much time measuring and experimenting to learn new information. Then several experts write a paper about what they have learned. They submit the paper to a scientific journal where an editor who knows about the subject finds several unbiased experts who review the article for errors. Then the article is published. An article is not necessarily correct, but it has been written by experts and screened for errors.
Your blog post is written by a neurosurgeon who claims no experience in energy systems. It accepts nuclear industry propaganda as fact. Bob Loblaw has identified several serious errors in it. There are more errors that he did not bother to point out.
If your doctor tells you that you need surgery do you ask your barber whether you really need it?
The comments policy at Skeptical Science asks for strong references to support your position. Most blogs do not count. Your blog does not address the issues raised in Abbott 2012.
For example, there is not enough uranium to generate a significant amount of world power. Money spent on nuclear is wasted, it should be used to build out renewable energy.
Read the rest of the posts in this thread, all of your questions have been addressed.
Nuclear power is too expensive, takes too long to build and there is not enough uranium.
Sorry for the typo in yiur name, my phone is correcting my typing.
@michael sweet 455
"To me, the most important issue is there is not enough uranium to generate more than about 5% of all power To me, the most important issue is there is not enough uranium to generate more than about 5% of all power"
Nuclear enegy already generates 9% of all power. Where are you getting the 5% number?
Nuclear 9% from 440 reactors
No problem about the typo.
"The comments policy at Skeptical Science asks for strong references to support your position. Most blogs do not count."
Ok, still kind of new here thanks for pointing this out, I just looked over the comments policy didn't see that. I do understand the scientific method, but I am new to the entire nuclear angle of climate change. I plan for this to be my last comment here for a while until I read your previous comments as suggested, been busy at work so may take awhile.
Pollution Monster:
In your own link, the statement is that "Nuclear energy now provides about 9% of the world's electricity..." [emphasis added]. The world uses a lot of energy in forms other than electricity (Michael's "all power"). Beware the denominator.
As for the comments policy, there are two relevant statements:
Although those sections are not a "thou shalt under all circumstances" rule, there is an expectation that opinions expressed here need to have more evidence and support that just a reference to another opinion.
Pollution Monster,
It appears that you posted at your link asking how they made their conclusions. Questioning people is a good way to learn.
At your link they claimed that I used motivated reasoning to skew data and conclude nuclear cannot generate more than 5% of all power and pointed out that nuclear currently generates 9% of electricity. Another poster pointed out that electricity is only 20% of all power. 9% of electricity is only 2% of all power. Who is using motivated reasoning?
This shows me several points:
1) The OP did not read Abbott 2012. Nuclear supporters generally do not do their homework.
2) The OP does not know what all power is. They do not even know the basic vocabulary of energy systems. Nuclear supporters do not discuss all power since it is obvious that nuclear cannot provide a significant fraction.
3) Most nuclear posters do not know much beyond nuclear industry propaganda.
There is no data showing modular reactors are safer. Upthread I link a report from a national nuclear regulator (French I think) stating this fact. Modular reactors produce more radioactive waste than conventional reactors. Cost will probably be higher. Links upthread.
In 2006 modular reactor designers said they would have running reactors in 2020. Few have even a design now, much less an approved design. When will their designs be ready? Why should I think they will be built faster when nuclear designers have promised faster, cheaper builds for Fifty Years and not delivered on their promises?
Bob Loblaw and I have followed nuclear for a long time. Nuclear designers are very long on promises with very few successes.
Nuclear is too expensive, takes too long to build and there is not enough uranium
Thank you for continuing the discussion. I have read the previous comments. Let's talk about Abbott 2012.
"What this means is that the industry would only have to increase its mining costs by 30 percent in order to increase the amount of accessible uranium for fueling conventional nuclear reactors by sixtyfold" Abbott 2012
If I understand correctly this means there is plenty of uranium. Sixtyfold would be more than enough uranium to get us through the next 50 years for a nuclear realist point of view about 20% of all electrcity.
Pollution Monster,
I do not think that you understand the quoted section of the paper correctly. In that portion of the paper Abbott is arguing that breeder reactors will not be practical. He points out that breeder reactors are even more complex and expensive than conventional reactors. The breeding of fuel does not make up for the extra complexity . I note that there are currently no reactors running world wide that breed fuel. Upthread RitchieB1234, a nuclear engineer, stated that the US Nuclear Reguatory Agency thinks breeders are not practical.
Abbott says:
"The World Nuclear Association (2011) conservatively projects 80 years of economically extractable uranium at the current rate of consumption using conventional reactors. The 2010 figure for installed nuclear capacity worldwide is 375 gigawatts. If this were to be scaled up to 15 terawatts, the 80-year uranium supply would last less than five years." my emphasis.
After the ecconomical supply of uranium is extracted there is no remaining ore that is worth mining. If nuclear generated 10% of All Power the uranium would run out in 50 years, way before the claimed life of the reactors. Nuclear supporters hope that more uranium can be found.
Think it through: if there was enough uranium, nuclear engineers would not be talking about extracting uranium from the ocean (which Abbott shows takes more energy than you get from the uranium) and extremely complex breeder reactors which are difficult to build and run.
In addition, Abbott lists 9 other reasons why nuclear reactors cannot provide a significant amount of power. Abbott does not even list that reactors take too long to build and are too expensive. Nuclear supporters have never attempted to respond to these reasons.
I note on your favored blog site that you are sympathetic to their unsupported arguments. Abbott 2012 is a peer reviewed paper. Your blog is written by someone who does not even understand the basic vocabulary of energy systems and appears to not know that proposed renewable systems provide All World Power. Who seems like a more reliable source of information?
Jacobson et al 2022, linked above, describes a system to provide All World Power. Electricity, heating, transportation, trucks, agriculture, industry and any other energy requiring activity. Your blog discusses nuclear providing 20% of current electricity. To be frank, that discussion was resolved in 2010. If nuclear could provide 20% of current electricity in 2050 it would be less than 4% of the energy that Jacobson's system would provide.
In addition, nuclear energy does not add to renewable energy well. A mostly renewable system requres backup that can provide more than 10% of daily power on the days it needs backup. Most of the time there is extra power being stored for the occasional slow days. Nuclear plants cannot provide cheap power to store for the slow days.
Nuclear is too expensive, takes too long to build and there is not enough uranium.
A followup to my comment @460,
The US leadership-of-the-moment’s push to deploy massive amounts of small nuclear reactors without rigorous proof that it will be safe continues as described in the following report:
US military airlifts small reactor as Trump pushes to quickly deploy nuclear power, reported in NPR, by Associated Press, Feb 21, 2028.
This is an example of misleading marketing abused by gamblers (inventor/investors) who will try to harmfully maximize their benefit from potentially bad bets (or bad ideas). The harm will be discovered in the future (because the innovator is not required to rigorously investigate potential for harm). And it is likely that the promoters of the ‘innovation’ will obtain benefits that cannot be taken away from them in the future when the harm they benefited from causing becomes undeniable – like the fossil fuel climate impact issue.
Selected quotes from the article:
Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Undersecretary of Defense Michael Duffey, who traveled with the privately built reactor, hailed the Feb. 15 trip on a C-17 military aircraft as a breakthrough for U.S. efforts to fast-track commercial licensing for the microreactors, part of a broader effort by the Trump administration to reshape the country's energy landscape.
...
Skeptics warn that nuclear energy poses risks and say microreactors may not be safe or feasible and have not proved they can meet demand for a reasonable price.
Wright brushed those concerns aside as he touted progress on Trump's push for a quick escalation of nuclear power. Trump signed a series of executive orders last year that allow Wright to approve some advanced reactor designs and projects, taking authority away from the independent safety agency that has regulated the U.S. nuclear industry for five decades.
...
The minivan-sized reactor transported by the military is one of at least three that will reach "criticality" — when a nuclear reaction can sustain an ongoing series of reactions — by July 4, as Trump has promised, Wright said.
"That's speed, that's innovation, that's the start of a nuclear renaissance," he said.
...
Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said the transport flight — which included a throng of reporters, photographers and TV news crews — was little more than "a dog-and-pony show" that merely demonstrated the Pentagon's ability to ship a piece of heavy equipment.
The flight "doesn't answer any questions about whether the project is feasible, economic, workable or safe — for the military and the public," Lyman said in an interview.
Rapid scale-up to power AI data centres could see 1000s of these ‘potential disasters’ in operation by 2030. The expected global power demand for AI data centres by 2030 is over 1000 TWh. Assuming a 5 MW generator, like the one reported to have been shipped by the military on Feb 15, 2026, operates at full power 24 hrs a day every day it would produce 5 x 24 x 365 = 43,800 MWh = 0.0438 TWh. (Also note that a typical AI data centre requiring 100 MW would need twenty 5 MW generators).
Poorly regulated, unrestricted, innovation in pursuit of personal benefit has a history of producing harmful results that Others have to deal with. New Nuclear appears to be rapidly becoming a New Future Disaster promoted by Master Misleading Marketers.
"It can also be argued that nuclear power has a key role to play in meeting emissions targets (Brook, 2012) for mitigating climate change" Abott 2012
The above quote shows that nuclear power can be arguged to help with emission targets.
The weakness with peer reviewed articles is they are technical and difficult to understand. I have seen people claim many peer reviewed articles support their claims and the opposite be true. It is easy to misunderstand.
As for uranium and the blog, both you and them are quoting the same peer reviewed article and coming to different conclusions. Sks is a blog within itself.
Personally, I am confused, I don't know if there is enough uranimum or not and I am just trying to figure this out. As for the answer I desire, I want the answer to be renewables. I don't want to have to pay extra money for nuclear let alone the risk of a meltdown. I personally had to pay the highest price in the country from PECO energy because of nuclear.
Nuclear is not cost competitive according to this article.
Nuclear too expensive to matter