# Increasing the usage of nuclear power **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 28, 2018, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677 "2018-01-28T21:13:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/41 "2018-01-30T18:00:40Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > [This doesn’t sound very niche](http://fortune.com/2017/04/08/solar-california-electricity/) to me. > > I wouldn’t consider “half the load for the state of California” to be “niche, a pissant sideshow”. > > I didn’t outright say you’re wrong, but you read the article and tell me. > > California is ahead of the rest of the country (and most of the world), and yes, they pay 50% above the national average for electricity. But the cost of solar and wind are still declining. Simple arithmetic tells me if they decline another 50%, it’ll be a no brainer for a lot of the rest of the country as well. > > Natural gas has leveled off, it’s a fossil fuel and those turbine plants are very complex and expensive capital equipment. And the fuel itself is a commodity that stops getting produced when the price is low (they stop fracking for it) and the old wells eventually stop producing. So it’s definitely worth installing renewables just so you burn less expensive fossil fuel. Again, I never said ‘niche, a pissant sideshow’. It’s like you are doing everything to strawman my arguments, such as they are, to fit some sort of discussion you want to have. Niche in this context means it’s not the main source of energy generation…and it’s not. I haven’t read the article, but unless the sun and wind work magically different in California then when it’s not sunny and the wind isn’t blowing they don’t work. Making them a niche source of energy that requires a mainstream source to smooth out power distribution. The rest of your argument is arguing with someone else. I never said it wasn’t worth installing solar or wind, even if they are niche. It’s like the ‘pissant sideshow’ remark…you are arguing with some other XT in your own head. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/42 "2018-01-30T18:07:08Z")
So, I did some quick digging about California. They do in fact get 45% of their electricity from renewables according to [this](https://www.forbes.com/sites/judeclemente/2016/04/03/californias-growing-imported-electricity-problem/#756d395a4469) Forbes article. But there is a catch…they import 33% of their electricity from neighboring states. > [@](#): > > California’s SB 350 requires the state to procure 50% of electricity from renewable energy and double energy efficiency savings by 2030. And the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s “Clean Power Plan” wants states to “to act more like California.” > > Yet, beyond power rates 45% above the U.S. average, California has another problem that makes it less of a model than some proclaim. California now imports 33% of its electricity supply from fast growing neighbors, with about 65% of that coming from the Southwest and 35% coming from the Northwest. These numbers increase most in summer months when air conditioning loads peak. Imports have been rising rapidly: in 2010, California “only” imported 25% of its power. > [@](#): > > Per the U.S. Energy Information Administration, California imports because “its wholesale power markets in the region are relatively open and generation from outside the state is often less expensive.” In fact, California imports about 6% of its electricity from out-of-state coal-fired power plants, with another 14% coming from “unspecified imports,” of a cloudy origin that is generally attributed to hydropower, gas, nuclear, and other renewables. > > Besides having the most expensive electricity west of the Mississippi River in the continental U.S., California already has the least reliable electricity. California easily leads the nation with nearly 470 power outages a year, compared to 160 for second place Texas, which is really amazing because Texas produces 125% MORE electricity! (here). California’s reliability problems will be multiplied as more wind and solar enter the power mix, intermittent resources located in remote areas that cannot be so easily transported to cities via the grid. [Here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_California) is the Wiki, for anyone interested, on California’s internal electricity production. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/43 "2018-01-30T18:26:02Z")
> [@XT](#): > > So, I did some quick digging about California. They do in fact get 45% of their electricity from renewables according to [this](https://www.forbes.com/sites/judeclemente/2016/04/03/californias-growing-imported-electricity-problem/#756d395a4469) Forbes article. But there is a catch…they import 33% of their electricity from neighboring states. How is that a catch? ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/44 "2018-01-30T18:46:03Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Again, I never said ‘niche, a pissant sideshow’. It’s like you are doing everything to strawman my arguments, such as they are, to fit some sort of discussion you want to have. Niche in this context means it’s not the main source of energy generation…and it’s not. Ok, I didn’t mean to strawman. The definition I was going with was based on [this](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niche_market). Ok, so at the point that non-hydro renewables is above 25%, I’d consider it far more than niche, I’d consider it a major, crucial player. So at 45% that definitely fits the definition, but to be fair, I don’t count hydro. The reason I don’t count hydro is it is limited and we already tapped almost all of it. In any case, this transition is accelerating. You’ve seen articles like [this](https://electrek.co/2018/01/12/94-percent-new-electricity-capacity-usa-from-renewables/), right? To be totally fair, I will say that the 94% number is overstated because “1 watt of solar” actually means about “15% of 1 watt” while “1 watt of fossil fuel generator” means about “90% of 1 watt” (you have to shut down for maintenance). Wind capacity factors depend on location. Still, I’d consider that a total dominance of renewable. Nobody would call this niche. Going by total grid generation is silly because the makeup is going to be mostly old power plants, and solar/wind have only become extremely affordable recently. Let’s play your argument in a different scenario. Me : Hey, XT, it just turned 2028. Man I’ve seen a lot of electric cars around. XT : Bah, they are a niche vehicle. 75% of the cars on the road are still fossil fuel or hybrid. Me : Huh, fair enough. Me : Wait a minute, it says that 94% of all new cars sold are pure electric or series hybrids with small range extending engines! Uhhh… ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/45 "2018-01-30T19:17:13Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > Me : Hey, XT, it just turned 2028. Man I’ve seen a lot of electric cars around. > XT : Bah, they are a niche vehicle. 75% of the cars on the road are still fossil fuel or hybrid. > Me : Huh, fair enough. > Me : Wait a minute, it says that 94% of all new cars sold are pure electric or series hybrids with small range extending engines! Uhhh… But this isn’t an example of a niche system…it’s an example of a system that is, presumably, shifting the paradigm, assuming that the vehicles in question have roughly the same performance envelope. If we were talking niche then the argument would be ‘the electric cars can only do 100 miles on a charge and take 4 hours to recharge, so are only useful in a niche role such as for city driving or commutes of less than 50 miles’. THAT would be an example of discussing something in a niche role. See the difference? > [@Ravenman](#): > > How is that a catch? Here is the statement this was in response too: “I wouldn’t consider “half the load for the state of California” to be “niche, a pissant sideshow””. So, the ‘catch’ is that saying that ‘half the load for the state of California’ is being taken up by solar and wind is not telling the whole story if they are getting 33% of their total load from out of state (and mostly NOT from wind and solar). If you don’t think that’s a ‘catch’ or at least a bit disingenuous then that’s fine…YMMV. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/46 "2018-01-30T19:40:21Z")
Other than public approval, every advantage that coal power has, nuclear has to an equal or greater degree. Likewise, every disadvantage that nuclear has, coal has to an equal or greater degree. We would be better off, by every metric, if people could be convinced to replace all of our current coal generation with nuclear generation. That said, there are some drawbacks to both coal and nuclear, most notably in their slow responsiveness. It may perhaps be that the optimal mix of power generation includes no slow-response generation, or only a very small amount, in which case we might not want nuclear. But it’s still definitely better than coal. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/47 "2018-01-30T19:53:11Z")
> [@XT](#): > > But this isn’t an example of a niche system…it’s an example of a system that is, presumably, shifting the paradigm, assuming that the vehicles in question have roughly the same performance envelope. If we were talking niche then the argument would be ‘the electric cars can only do 100 miles on a charge and take 4 hours to recharge, so are only useful in a niche role such as for city driving or commutes of less than 50 miles’. THAT would be an example of discussing something in a niche role. See the difference? No. If 94% of vehicles sold are electric, even if they have “100 miles on a charge and take 4 hours to recharge”, they are not a niche role. They are a dominant player. In fact, if driven by automation, those performance specs are more than adequate to take over nearly all passenger car roles. The _actual_ niche is trips over 100 miles, and if people don’t have to own a car that can do it all, but can just rent a vehicle for the trip they are actually going to take, the majority of all trips would be taken in these shorter range vehicles if there were a cost advantage. Similarly, solar still only works in the daytime and batteries are rare. They are a dominant player. The market doesn’t appear to care about your arbitrary performance specs and is finding a way to make it work. This might limit total adoption, to be fair. In 10 years, if batteries are not vastly cheaper, we might see new solar installs start to slow down or decline. (since the original panels last for decades) ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/48 "2018-01-30T19:54:16Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > According to this Wikipedia article, the US had about 14% of electricity generation from renewables in 2015. Other Western countries, though much smaller ones, have rates substantially higher than that. I don’t think countries like the UK, Switzerland, Germany, and others are having problems with blackouts, so I think your “small fraction of total demand” metric is unnecessarily pessimistic. What is 14%, but a small fraction? (Okay, it’s a percent, but expressed, it’s 7/50) IMHO, less than 25% (1/4) is a small fraction. My point is that renewables cannot make up the bulk of power. They have places that they are useful, but providing dependable base load electrical generation is not one of them. SamuelA is saying that the fact that renewables are variable and do not provide good baseline power is a reason not to use nuclear, and instead to continue to use fossil fuels in the form of natural gas to generate electricity. I disagree. He is incorrect in claiming that nuclear reactor based electric plants cannot load follow. Many generation II nukes have some difficulty with it, but they can manage just fine, as long as the load doesn’t transition too quickly, and later generations do an even better job of it. As to the idea that they must be operating at 100% at all times because they are expensive to build, that’s only a problem because they are expensive to build. They are expensive to build only partly because of the technical difficulties in building them. The political difficulties add substantial cost, and economies of scale would drive down the price even further if we actually started producing them on a regular basis, especially if a modular reactor is designed. And then there is the fact that you are admitting that in order to depend on renewables for more than a fraction of the power, you MUST use fossil fuels to even out the fact that renewables are not on demand, and have 0 ability to follow a load, and in fact, just make any load following on the grid that much harder to do. The dependence on renewables requires dependence on fossil fuels. Gas generating plants are cheap, sure, and they are small, but you are going to need enough of them to cover close to 100% of your peak needs, as you cannot count on the sun shining and the wind blowing at the same time as your power demands are at their highest. Ultimately, not saving you all that much resources, as you have to build more capacity than you actually need, in order to accommodate the limitations of renewables. Natural gas sounds like a good idea, but, unburned methane is a worse greenhouse gas than CO[sub]2[/sub], and natural gas lines leak. Generators leak. And that’s on a good day. You also have pipe breaks and other much larger emissions that will become more common and severe as more and more electrical production moves to natural gas generators. What is probably going to happen is that China is going to develop a modular reactor, and we will buy them from them. ---
**Author:** ![SamuelA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c77e96/32.png) [@SamuelA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SamuelA)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/49 "2018-01-30T20:04:38Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > SamuelA is saying that the fact that renewables are variable and do not provide good baseline power is a reason not to use nuclear, and instead to continue to use fossil fuels in the form of natural gas to generate electricity. I disagree. > > What is probably going to happen is that China is going to develop a modular reactor, and we will buy them from them. You’re just wrong. It’s just not going to work like you think. The evidence is overwhelming, solar + wind is the biggest thing already, and it perfectly synergizes with machine learning and automation. Why do I say this? Several factors : a. Automation/ML makes gathering resources for solar panels/batteries/wind turbines easier, since mining is a repetitive task and also underground mining is hazardous to human workers. b. Automation/ML makes production of vast quantities of capital equipment - all those thousands of tons of the equipment you need for this low density form of power generation - much easier, since semi-intelligent robots can do all the repetitive tasks. c. Automation/ML makes the other capital equipment cheaper. If robots can make robots, and we have vast industrial farms full of cheaper machinery, we can just have the machinery making the less valuable products pause when the wind has died down and it’s nightime. (backup generators and batteries kick on the keep the production of high value things going 24/7) Demand regulation, essentially. This is what plants do, btw, and since plants replicate exponentially, if we wanted a product that plants could make, and we had a place to put them, we could rapidly scale up production. d. Clean renewable energy is much easier to get past government regulators, there’s minimal regulations and red tape especially somewhere like China. Much faster to scale rapidly without delays. e. You have a cycle between recognizing a demand and responding with renewable installations of mere months. This is vastly more capital effective for a business. If you think about the business of making power (without government help), you’re in the commodities market. You see a commodity that is priced high (demand for power is high and rates are high). You want to buy something and collect some revenue and definitely at a minimum get your money back. Installing new gas turbines + renewables is so much faster and more responsive. Nobody wants to bet on maybe not getting approval from the NRC and waiting 10+ years. I guess you just can’t see it. We’re not talking far future, we’re talking the next 10-20 years. And not “starting in 10 years”, I mean “this year (and last year) and onwards”. There is a revolution happening, and it’s just going to grow. China is abandoning their plans. Even if they did this, we wouldn’t buy it. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/50 "2018-01-30T21:04:24Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > You’re just wrong. Ummm, no, I’m not. You did in fact say that renewables are variable and do not provide good baseline power and claimed that as a reason not to use nuclear, and instead to continue to use fossil fuels in the form of natural gas to generate electricity. > [@](#): > > It’s just not going to work like you think. The evidence is overwhelming, solar + wind is the biggest thing already, and it perfectly synergizes with machine learning and automation. > > Why do I say this? Several factors : > > a. Automation/ML makes gathering resources for solar panels/batteries/wind turbines easier, since mining is a repetitive task and also underground mining is hazardous to human workers. > > b. Automation/ML makes production of vast quantities of capital equipment - all those thousands of tons of the equipment you need for this low density form of power generation - much easier, since semi-intelligent robots can do all the repetitive tasks. > > c. Automation/ML makes the other capital equipment cheaper. If robots can make robots, and we have vast industrial farms full of cheaper machinery, we can just have the machinery making the less valuable products pause when the wind has died down and it’s nightime. (backup generators and batteries kick on the keep the production of high value things going 24/7) Demand regulation, essentially. This is what plants do, btw, and since plants replicate exponentially, if we wanted a product that plants could make, and we had a place to put them, we could rapidly scale up production. And everything you just said there applies to nuclear as well, and nuclear is still better. What doesn’t is that no matter what you do there, you cannot make the sun shine at night, not make the wind blow on a calm day. > [@](#): > > d. Clean renewable energy is much easier to get past government regulators, there’s minimal regulations and red tape especially somewhere like China. Much faster to scale rapidly without delays. Govt red tape is becuase the public has negative perceptions about it. In China, there is much less red tape involved. The fact that there are poor regulations for the industry is a problem for those in the industry, but it is not an excuse to support the bad regulations. > [@](#): > > e. You have a cycle between recognizing a demand and responding with renewable installations of mere months. This is vastly more capital effective for a business. If you think about the business of making power (without government help), you’re in the commodities market. You see a commodity that is priced high (demand for power is high and rates are high). You want to buy something and collect some revenue and definitely at a minimum get your money back. Installing new gas turbines + renewables is so much faster and more responsive. Nobody wants to bet on maybe not getting approval from the NRC and waiting 10+ years. Yes, in this you are correct. Many times, people go for short sighted solutions. Not a reason to advocate for short sighted solutions. > [@](#): > > I guess you just can’t see it. You really shouldn’t make these sorts of assumptions about other people. They are out of line, and not remotely correct. > [@](#): > > We’re not talking far future, we’re talking the next 10-20 years. And not “starting in 10 years”, I mean “this year (and last year) and onwards”. There is a revolution happening, and it’s just going to grow. The revolution’s been in the works for decades now. Any time now… Meanwhile, there are many reactor designs that we haven’t really looked at seriously, even though other countries have used them just fine, and there are other designs that are still just paper that other countries are looking into building that we developed the base science for int he first place. > [@](#): > > China is abandoning their plans. Even if they did this, we wouldn’t buy it. This is where you are factually wrong. Why would you even try to [make such an easily disproved claim?](http://www.scmp.com/business/companies/article/2107354/china-pips-us-race-start-worlds-most-advanced-nuclear-power-plant) > [@](#): > > China has 20 nuclear power plants under construction, more than any other country on earth. With Sanmen, the industry is hoping to get the nod to build more reactors at home, and even export the AP1000 technology. you are correct that we probably wouldn’t buy it. We would probably continue to use fossil fuels to subsidize trying to make renewables power the nation’s grid and be too bankrupt to buy it. The rest of the world will move on without us. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/51 "2018-01-30T21:08:03Z")
> [@SamuelA](#): > > No. If 94% of vehicles sold are electric, even if they have “100 miles on a charge and take 4 hours to recharge”, they are not a niche role. They are a dominant player. > > In fact, if driven by automation, those performance specs are more than adequate to take over nearly all passenger car roles. The _actual_ niche is trips over 100 miles, and if people don’t have to own a car that can do it all, but can just rent a vehicle for the trip they are actually going to take, the majority of all trips would be taken in these shorter range vehicles if there were a cost advantage. > > Similarly, solar still only works in the daytime and batteries are rare. They are a dominant player. The market doesn’t appear to care about your arbitrary performance specs and is finding a way to make it work. > > This might limit total adoption, to be fair. In 10 years, if batteries are not vastly cheaper, we might see new solar installs start to slow down or decline. (since the original panels last for decades) No back at you. You don’t seem to be getting this so I’ll try once more to go through this. First, what you are doing here is shifting the discussion to make the statement a paradigm shift instead of an example of a niche system. The exact same statement, i.e. “100 miles on a charge and take 4 hours to recharge” can mean either, based on context. Today, for the majority of drivers, their requirement exceeds the specifications of “100 miles on a charge and take 4 hours to recharge”, thus as the vehicle wouldn’t meet those requirements it would be a niche system. If there is a paradigm change and the majority of people feel that it DOES meet their requirements, well, then the same statement “100 miles on a charge and take 4 hours to recharge” indicates it is indeed mainstream and not niche. As for power, solar and wind are a niche system because it doesn’t meet the requirement of providing a steady source of power at a steady rate for the full day/night cycle in all weather. It’s niche, it provides power when it can. To make it not niche you’d either need to figure out how to make the sunshine and wind blow steadily 24 hours a day or provide a backup that could level out the energy for the full usage time. Perhaps that will happen one day and then it won’t be niche anymore…perhaps someday electric cars will have the performance envelop that meets the majority of drivers requirements and will shift the paradigm such that they will comprise the majority of cars being built or on the road or whatever, but until that happens they and solar/wind will be niche. I’m unsure why this is hard to understand or an issue…it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have solar or wind or electric cars, just that they don’t meet our full needs and thus provide their services in a niche. So, having beaten this dead horse some more, are we good or do we need to go through this again? We seem to be straying from the topic of nuclear, though the OP is a bit strange in anycase and I think it’s been answered at this point. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/52 "2018-01-30T21:33:45Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > What is 14%, but a small fraction? (Okay, it’s a percent, but expressed, it’s 7/50) > > IMHO, less than 25% (1/4) is a small fraction. > > My point is that renewables cannot make up the bulk of power. And I’m saying that there’s no reason to believe that 14% or 25% is the upper cap on renewables, since several highly developed countries go significantly beyond those numbers. In other words, if something is being done, it is possible. Saying something that is being done is not possible is wrong. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2018, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/53 "2018-01-30T21:52:51Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > And I’m saying that there’s no reason to believe that 14% or 25% is the upper cap on renewables, since several highly developed countries go significantly beyond those numbers. > > In other words, if something is being done, it is possible. Saying something that is being done is not possible is wrong. Some countries have a momentary time when they have a decent percentage of their electricity supplied by renewables, but not all day everyday. And I will note that your 14% figure (that you didn’t like to a wiki article in your post, so I had to go find it) isn’t 14% from wind and solar. About half of that is from hydroelectric, which does not have much room to grow. Wind made up most of the rest, with solar barely 1/6th that of wind. So, when you talk about renewables, you need to be specific about which ones you are talking about, and which ones can actually grow and be developed more. When you talk about renewables, most assume you are talking solar and wind. If that is the case, if you are talking solar and wind only, as those are the only things that make sense in talking about if you are talking about increasing their production, then they only make up about 7% of energy production. An even smaller fraction. ---
**Author:** ![Doubticus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@Doubticus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doubticus)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2018, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677/54 "2018-01-31T00:12:14Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Today, for the majority of drivers, their requirement exceeds the specifications of “100 miles on a charge and take 4 hours to recharge”, thus as the vehicle wouldn’t meet those requirements it would be a niche system. I wanted to point out that this would only be true of an exclusively electric car. The vast majority of mileage put on a car comes from commuting (something like 85 percent). If you consider a plug-in hybrid like the Chevy Volt, the entire commute could be handled by it’s pure electric range and longer trips it would fill up with gas and not need to be recharged and reduce gas usage by 85 percent. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/increasing-the-usage-of-nuclear-power/807677.md?page=2)