>> France aims to rapidly develop renewable wind, solar and biomass capacity to curb its dependence on atomic power, reducing its share in its power mix to 50 percent by 2035, from 75 percent today.
A quick google will turn up dozens of other sources discussing that if you like.
> reducing dependence on nuclear has a lot of advantages unrelated to "nuclear is bad" or "nuclear is not clean" or etc
When did I even say that? Please have the decency NOT to convert my educated and reasoned points into a straw-man argument. I spent years working in nuclear physics. I'm not making some idiotic "nuclear reactors will turn us into glowing mutants" argument here.
The real issues with nuclear are -- and always have been -- simple, practical problems of cost, time to construct, and the usual problems of cost overruns and delays that you see with constructing a very complicated system. The Flamanville EPR has been a fiasco, with costs triple its original estimate and a timeline that ballooned to 15 years.
In comparison, the competition from renewable energy has heated up rapidly. Economies of scale are rapidly driving down the costs renewables and batteries (and the underlying technology is improving rapidly). Between 2010 to 2019 wind energy become 70% cheaper and solar became 89% cheaper: https://www.lazard.com/media/451082/lcoe-8.png
"France has undertaken to cut the nuclear share in its electricity mix from around 75% to 50% by 2035 while increasing the share of renewable solar, wind and biomass."
“Whether we are looking at 100% renewables or a percentage of new nuclear, we want to consider all the elements, including technical, economic,” she noted. “On such important subjects, we must make rational, reasoned decisions, and that is the objective of the various studies that have been launched.”
To put that all together: France is cutting their use of nuclear, and waiting to decide whether or not to replace reactors that are fast approaching end-of-life. They're going to look and see how the energy market shakes out.
I already provided a citation for this - https://www.reuters.com/article/france-electricity-solarpowe...)
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>> France aims to rapidly develop renewable wind, solar and biomass capacity to curb its dependence on atomic power, reducing its share in its power mix to 50 percent by 2035, from 75 percent today.
A quick google will turn up dozens of other sources discussing that if you like.
> reducing dependence on nuclear has a lot of advantages unrelated to "nuclear is bad" or "nuclear is not clean" or etc
When did I even say that? Please have the decency NOT to convert my educated and reasoned points into a straw-man argument. I spent years working in nuclear physics. I'm not making some idiotic "nuclear reactors will turn us into glowing mutants" argument here.
The real issues with nuclear are -- and always have been -- simple, practical problems of cost, time to construct, and the usual problems of cost overruns and delays that you see with constructing a very complicated system. The Flamanville EPR has been a fiasco, with costs triple its original estimate and a timeline that ballooned to 15 years.
In comparison, the competition from renewable energy has heated up rapidly. Economies of scale are rapidly driving down the costs renewables and batteries (and the underlying technology is improving rapidly). Between 2010 to 2019 wind energy become 70% cheaper and solar became 89% cheaper: https://www.lazard.com/media/451082/lcoe-8.png
Battery costs have dropped 75% over the last 6 years: https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/report-levelize...
Nuclear energy in 2020 is often quite expensive compared to renewable energy, and the comparison is only getting worse over time.
> France has no plans on eliminating nuclear in the foreseeable future.
In 2020, Energy Minister Élisabeth Borne announced the government would not decide on the construction of any new reactors until Flamanville 3 starts operation after 2022. Citation: https://www.neimagazine.com/news/newsfrance-to-decide-on-new...
"France has undertaken to cut the nuclear share in its electricity mix from around 75% to 50% by 2035 while increasing the share of renewable solar, wind and biomass."
“Whether we are looking at 100% renewables or a percentage of new nuclear, we want to consider all the elements, including technical, economic,” she noted. “On such important subjects, we must make rational, reasoned decisions, and that is the objective of the various studies that have been launched.”
To put that all together: France is cutting their use of nuclear, and waiting to decide whether or not to replace reactors that are fast approaching end-of-life. They're going to look and see how the energy market shakes out.