We’re hearing the declarations from elected officials more often, and with more conviction: We must get serious about energy, and invest in the technology and infrastructure that will allow us to reduce our dependence on oil, domestic and foreign. Often, these exhortations include the suggestion that we need to take a fresh new look at nuclear energy for our electricity needs. State-of-the-art nuclear generators currently being used in other parts of the world are held up as safer than those that seared the words “Chernobyl” and “Three Mile Island” into our consciousness.
But since we’re not exactly made of money, they may want to go back to the drawing board with those intentions. According to a study conducted for NC WARN by Duke University researchers, the cost of solar power has for the first time been determined to be a better deal than nuclear.
As we’re reminded by The Energy Collective, manufacturing costs of photovoltaic components that go into solar systems have been dropping precipitously over the past several years. The current cost of a solar energy system today is about half of what it was 12 years ago. While this decrease has taken place on the solar side of the equation, costs tied to nuclear power continue to be heading in the other direction.
The study was performed by Duke’s John O. Blackburn, professor emeritus of economics and Sam Cunningham, masters candidate of environmental management. While the research was conducted with a focus specifically limited to the local energy landscape in the state of North Carolina, the findings point to an unmistakable, broader trend in the cost trends for the two energy options that may be expected to continue to diverge. Further, the study suggests that the relative cost advantage of solar would be even greater in those parts of the country even better suited than North Carolina to take advantage of solar.
Simultaneous to word of this study is a similarly upbeat view from Worldwatch Institute, whose annual survey of the global state of renewable energy affairs prompts them to state that renewables are at a tipping point.
As Worldwatch’s Christopher Flavin writes:
“Buoyed by hundreds of new government energy policies, accelerating private investment, and myriad technology advances over the past five years, renewable energy is breaking into the mainstream of energy markets. Over the past two years, the United States and Europe have both added more power capacity from renewables than from coal, gas, and nuclear combined, according to the report. Worldwide, renewables accounted for one-third of the new generating capacity added.”
Photo by diveofficer via Flickr.
