Reply #19: nuclear plants are a sunk cost [View All]

[dcfirefighter]

coal plants must continue to pay for fuel (and hopefully one day, emissions).

If more nuclear plants were built, as energy costs rise, we'll get economic-forced conservation with fewer emissions: the nukes will run at 95% capacity loading b/c it's not much more expensive to run them than it is to not run them. Coal plants are significantly more expensive to fuel - they'd be only viable to fill in where a hydro or nuke plant couldn't.

I agree with your desire for conservation - though the only way I can see that happening is through higher energy prices. This has the potential for disproportionally affecting lower income families. The alternative I like is to raise the price of energy by capturing externalities through the assessment of fees against emissions, and using those fees to provide an energy dividend to each resident - a cost-neutral change for the average energy consumer, likely cost-advantaged for median and lower energy consumers.