On nuclear subsidies

March 25th, 2010 § 1 comment

The Guardian

The government has officially confirmed plans for a new carbon levy on consumer bills which it hopes will make building new nuclear plants viable, as the Guardian revealed in October last year.

Nuclear companies like EDF Energy have warned they will not make the billions of pounds of investment necessary in the UK without government financial guarantees.

So it’s a fucking hostage situation is it? We’ve all got to pay for these fuckers to make buck?

How long has nuclear power been around? The first nuclear power station went live in 1954. That’s 56 years. 56 years to get it right. 56 years to work out a viable business model to get a power plant built ad working and make a profit out the process.

But no. These guys want us to pay for it’s construction.

I could understand if it was a small company with a new technology, or even just a small company. It’s not though. In 2007 EDF Energy made €8.4 billion (£7.5 billion) and EDF Trading made €670 million (£598 million).

…companies are reluctant to build low-carbon generation plants, particularly nuclear reactors, because they do not know what return they will make on the huge up-front investment required.

Who the fuck does know what returns they will make on an investment? If it was that easy I’d be build a nuclear plant.

It’s not just the cost of building the bloody thing in the first place. Although it is a big part of it, building these plants never stick to budget, we still have to deal with the waste that is produced. Bury it, store it, dump it in the sea, it’s stuck with us for sometimes millions of years. The energy companies ain’t gonna look after it for ever.

When any bit of kit of the size of a nuclear power plant, of whatever type and function, goes pop it makes a big ol’ mess. But when a nuclear plant goes bang it fucks thing big style. And they do go bang (my emphasis)

A study published in Energy Policy in May 2008 shows that, in the period to 2007, sixty-three major nuclear accidents have occurred at nuclear power plants. Twenty-nine of these have occurred since the Chernobyl disaster

And who pays for the clean up? The fucking governments because insurance companies won’t touch them.

So, what do we have? Companies that make billions of pounds want us to pay for their equipment, deal with their waste and pay for it when it all goes tits up.

Fuck you. Shoot the hostage. I don’t want to pay that ransom.

(For more reasons, arguably more important reasons, why nuclear power is a bad idea ave a look at Greenpeaces’ Nuclear Reaction)

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