Comment on Green party drops longstanding opposition to nuclear power
brucethemoose@lemmy.world 8 hours agoWell, yeah, I agree with that.
But I’d argue that it draws from the same limited funding pool as renewables and other climate-important research.
The latter is urgent. We will not get to the point of effectively utilizing fusion unless we stabilize the planet, so if we have to trade one for the other, I’d say the bulk should be diverted away from fusion.
It’s not that we shouldn’t research it, eventually. There’s lots of long horizon concerns. But factoring in the time horizon is very important, and reducing emissions is needed yesterday.
erin@piefed.blahaj.zone 6 hours ago
The funding for fusion and renewables research don’t really overlap. The renewables technology is already ready, it’s just adoption that needs to take place. Fusion is nowhere near adoption, and the funding for that is the same type of funding going towards space flight and CERN. Society is more than capable of adapting renewables right now, the hold up isn’t fusion research or nuclear, but fossil fuel giants and their immense financials lobbying capacity.
brucethemoose@lemmy.world 4 hours ago
But more research into renewables (new solar cells, turbine designs, geothermal drilling techniques and such) makes them even more cost competitive, which puts immense pressure on fossil fuels.
It’s of course cheaper in some cases, but if renewables were drastically cheaper, I think lobbying would only get them so far.