offbyone on Nostr: So $20B for 1 GW. Assuming 80% availability, that gives annual output of 7008 GWhrs. ...

So $20B for 1 GW. Assuming 80% availability, that gives annual output of 7008 GWhrs. Plugging in 10% return on capex ($2B/yr) gives $285 per MWhr, before operating expenses.

I'm not including discount factors, cost of money and things like that in this analysis. Makes it easier to follow the money so to speak. Hard to say if that's to the advantage or disadvantage to nuclear in this approach - with long construction times and long operating lives, choice of discount factor can have huge (literally exponential) effects on the equivalent present day costs.

Doing it this way though gives a solid idea of how close (or otherwise) nuclear is to the present day cost of alternatives. If you find yourself relying on cost of money to get a project over the line, might not be that great of a project. Certainly needs a closer look in that situation. 2/n

#nuclear #auspol