Comment by Moldoteck
7 hours ago
"France's nuclear operators have been claiming this for years. But recently started claiming that wind and solar are bad because they force nuclear to flex which is too expensive." - one doesnt disprove the other.
French nuclear is extremely flexible https://www.services-rte.com/en/view-data-published-by-rte/g... but it doesn't mean it's free. Solar and wind without proper bess to support them are creating problems for other generators, acting as grid parasites without offering proper firm generation
The flexibility claim was always the same lie: that what mattered was technical flexibility, when economic flexibility wasn't there.
That's false too. Most of the arguments from antinuclear activists in this direction are about physical capacity of modulating too slow, which was false. Regardless, EDF is modulating now mostly due to economic reasons. Above 50-60% capacity factor you'll be fine, beyond that it'll be problematic with any asset, at which point you'll need to ask yourself if you love gas or you let nuclear run for some minimal CF or if you mandate each NPP to build a bess buffer to absorb capacity when needed