Berkshire Hathaway Energy said they would, from a financial point of view, never build a nuclear plant and keep increasing renewables. And they're not known to be bad capital allocators.
Buffet also said, "I will do anything that is basically covered by the law to reduce Berkshire's tax rate.” … “For example, on wind energy, we get a tax credit if we build a lot of wind farms. That's the only reason to build them. They don't make sense without the tax credit."
Oil also doesn't make sense without subsidies. If renewables are going to compete, they currently need subsidies. He's simply saying that they wouldn't cover their own costs without the credits. Not that the credits somehow pay for more than the price of the wind farm.
From what I heard, they also make sense without subsidies (about the same as solar panels which everyone is throwing onto their roofs now, except an efficient unit doesn't cost millions to get started), but I suppose this guy's logic for "worth it" includes outperforming sticking his money into an index fund
Also, what surprised me to learn is how much money goes into subsidies for fossil fuel companies. I really didn't think they needed that
I'd expect that to be because of the current regulatory hurdles and associated costs. If policy shifts to make it easier (thus cheaper) to build, I'm sure berkshire would jump in.
There are a lot of countries that are building or have tried to build nuclear in the last ten years.
In the US, the major nuclear projects are long running boondoggles, going way over.
In France, nuclear is so expensive that the national electricity company had to be nationalized to avoid bankruptcy, and plants are being closed.
Finland's Olkiluoto plant is 10 years over-schedule and has 300% cost overrruns.
South Korea had major cost overruns and is set to close half their plants
China isn't kind enough to share cost figures, but has reduced planned plants by a major percentage, indicating that the investment return is not very good. They do not have regulatory hurdles.
Maybe the only country on earth capable of building competitive nuclear is Russia of all places. They steadily increase the number of plants under construction and do not see to go over-schedule, though we don't know what the budgets look like.
While the US has a bad reputation for make infrastructure building ability, it seems to be global problem.
Nuclear has massive government subsidies. Most notably, construction contracts are structured such that cost overruns are borne by tax payers, not the builder. Also, clean up costs are covered by the tax payer.
erentz|2 years ago
SamBam|2 years ago
Aachen|2 years ago
Also, what surprised me to learn is how much money goes into subsidies for fossil fuel companies. I really didn't think they needed that
celestialcheese|2 years ago
missedthecue|2 years ago
In the US, the major nuclear projects are long running boondoggles, going way over.
In France, nuclear is so expensive that the national electricity company had to be nationalized to avoid bankruptcy, and plants are being closed.
Finland's Olkiluoto plant is 10 years over-schedule and has 300% cost overrruns.
South Korea had major cost overruns and is set to close half their plants
China isn't kind enough to share cost figures, but has reduced planned plants by a major percentage, indicating that the investment return is not very good. They do not have regulatory hurdles.
Maybe the only country on earth capable of building competitive nuclear is Russia of all places. They steadily increase the number of plants under construction and do not see to go over-schedule, though we don't know what the budgets look like.
While the US has a bad reputation for make infrastructure building ability, it seems to be global problem.
ralph84|2 years ago
bryanlarsen|2 years ago