Simon Holmes à Court thinks 100% Renewable Energy has been Demonstrated to be Possible in Australia

More Twitter activity from Simon.

He starts by asking:

nuclear twitter: does anyone have a simple LCoE for a nuclear power station? i'd love to better understand the economics.

If he's an energy expert, I have to wonder why he's asking for data from strangers on Twitter. You wouldn't see the likes of James Hansen doing that for one of his many papers published in Science and elsewhere. And as is almost always the case with his tweets, you're never sure what he is trying to say. Did he mean an equation? An example calculation? Examples of LCOE for nuclear? A spreadsheet?

It's not just me. Also not sure what he is asking for, Suzy Waldman handed him a link to Lazards which listed various LCOEs and an EIA link that explained the concept of LCOE.

I, in turn, responded to Suzy:

Tom Biegler responds to me:

Thanks. And I don't suppose they include load leveling costs to turn wind and solar into a product that users might like, want and need.

I, in turn, respond to him with a link to an Energy Matters article that tries (but apparently often fails) to explain why you can't compare the LCOE of sporadic sources to baseload sources:

Exactly ...if you want to compare LCOE of wind and solar to baseload nuclear LCOE, you find what it would cost to make them do baseload (answer offshore wind in UK is six times more expensive than Hinkley). 

Missing the point of the Energy Matters article entirely, Simon posts a typically cryptic response devoid of capitalization:

Simon Holmes à Court would support fast, cheap, safe, small, flexible nuclear

This post is motivated by a Tweet by Simon who very much thinks he has an open mind about nuclear energy ...like all antinuclearists, but like all antinuclearists, he really doesn't. He's like the creationist who would love to believe the theory of evolution ...if the data would only support it. Classic case of self-delusion combined with a little cognitive dissonance.

His Twitter homepage intro:

interesting theory — data me up! 'likes' are bookmarks not endorsements. ATTN: loopy left & RWNJs: if you think i'm one, you're almost certainly the other.

Bottom line, I would not have had to "data him up"  if he really had an open mind because he would have already sought out the data. Below, he gives an attaboy to a supporting tweeted chart critiquing nuclear. I gave him a few other charts to think about, but no love for me (link):

His supporter then posted a strawman argument coupled with another graph and got another attaboy. Those graphs shown below are actually a positive sign showing how the combination of low carbon sources has joined forces but this guy somehow sees this as evidence that nuclear should not be part of the mix:

Mark Jacobson thinks a desert ecosystem usurped by mirrors is a beautiful thing

Photo Ivanpah Solar Thermal via US Fish and Wildlife Service

I disagree.

  

Above is Jacobson's Twitter response to my comment: "...what is beautiful about displacing natural desert ecosystems with mirrors?" Below is my response:

Bird scorched by Ivanpah solar thermal power station

 Sources:

http://solarindustrymag.com/update-nrg-confirms-cause-of-fire-at-ivanpah-solar-planthttp://solarindustrymag.com/update-nrg-confirms-cause-of-fire-at-ivanpah-solar-plant

http://www.investors.com/politics/commentary/ivanpah-solar-plant-catches-fire-but-taxpayers-get-burned/

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/14/business/energy-environment/a-big-solar-plant-opens-facing-doubts-about-its-future.html

http://instituteforenergyresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/IER-Testimony-Solar-Projects-on-BLM-Lands-1.pdf

Update 7/17/2016 below:

Mark responded with a pointless remark and got one back:

The term "Twitter debate" is an oxymoron (i.e, you can't debate someone using Twitter). Attempts to use it for debate would make good material for a modern Monty Python skit not unlike the classic Department of Arguments skit: