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Comment by mobjack | Hacker News Reader

Nuclear can be competitive with subsidies.

A serious response to climate change would be large government support of both nuclear power and renewables.

Are we going to tell our children that the main reason we did nothing to fight climate change was because fossil fuels were more competitive economically?

First replace every coal and gas power plant, then we can argue about nuclear vs renewables.

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Aren’t the subsidies that nuclear needs essentially a poor form of carbon taxation? Without a real price on carbon (in the US, for instance), nuclear and renewables need subsidies in order to compete with fossil fuel generation. Fossil fuels receive an implicit subsidy, which is the externalities of climate change and air pollution that we must all pay for.

If a proper price on carbon existed, would nuclear and renewables not automatically look a whole lot cheaper without subsidies?

Exactly this. Fossil-based energy is enormously subsidized by a deferred carbon tax. No fossil/nuclear comparison is really meaningful without internalizing that externality.

I have to argue this to friends all the time.

That's why once you have a strong fission program you retire fossil fuel power as new nuclear comes online and then electrical vehicles and other more environmentally friends travel/HVAC etc starts happening. Economies of scale and training lower the price even more. This could happen in big powerhouses like China/India/Europe/USA and reverse some of the damage we've done to the environment and green house gas increases.

> Are we going to tell our children that the main reason we did nothing to fight climate change was because fossil fuels were more competitive economically?

We're doing exactly that.

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