Wind energy becoming as cost-effective as nuclear
Bob Morris @ Aug 11th 2008 03:31 - Category: Wind turbines Tags: nuclear power
David McLellan at SolveClimate crunches the numbers and shows that wind is closing the gap with nuclear in cost per kilowatt. Further, the price of proposed nuclear plants keeps soaring, sometimes doubling or tripling, while the cost of wind doesn’t.
However, the primary reason for the gap closing is that nuclear plants take many years to get permits for, then build, and the money must be borrowed.
The average financing costs of the nuclear plants [described in the article] is 71% of the pre-financing price.
Bottom line: Nuclear and wind energy right now — from a purely financial perspective — seem to be about neck and neck, but increasing capital costs and unknown disposal and security costs are quickly going to put nuclear energy out of reach if present trends continue.
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