alt Hacker NewsThe Wiki page above didn't really go into it much, but how much of the cost of nuclear power is self-inflicted? I.e. regulatory costs and actually paying the cost of externalities up-front. And if we were more consistent at building such facilities and producing said fuel, would there be cost reductions from scale?
~99% of the cost is due to red-tape regulations. It's so obscene that they require certified backup genererators for the backup generators and 3-4 layers of fail safes. Then you need to wait YEARS to get all the permits and licenses. Oh and if you get preapproval for a componant (say the generators) but too much time has passed from installation until you actually are ready to go, you need to go through the process again, hence the constant delays. An actual nuclear power plant is actually stupidly cheap to run if you cut all the red tape. Stupidly. Like $50k of fuel produces $50 million of electricity good.
Edit because I forgot to mention this, if coal or ccgt were regulated like nuclear is, not a single one would be profitable. And even if you take into account every single death due to radiation poisoning (from any source) nuclear would still be the safest power source in the world. Literally worker deaths from installing wind power plants exceed it.