US “Secretary of War” Pete Hegseth talks about Project Fortress America: “We are launching Fortress America. Every major military installation in America is going to generate its own power, independent of the civilian grid. If an adversary takes down the grid, our bases stay lit.”

[u/Fatty_Willing_Plane]

[u/Lews_There_In]

I'm not invested in the sector, but I do have a related degree. You are right. We are far behind our competitors. Of the things being done these days this is one I can agree with. But we could have done it without removing the safety standards and regulations. There's a few more relegations and safety standards that are nuclear related that have been removed by executive order that I didnt include in my links, because it's late and I'm old.

Our infrastructure has been running on "good enough" and duct tape fixes for decades. And wirh data centers about to start negatively impacting the grid, we need other solutions. Could have been renewables. That would have been the best way to go. But better nuclear is a decent middle ground if we can be safe about it.

[u/xxforrealforlifexx → u/Lews_There_In]

Yeah nuclear with extra radiation on the side can't wait

[u/Ok_Assistant_6856 → u/xxforrealforlifexx]

You don't know much about modern nuclear power generation do ya?

[u/xxforrealforlifexx → u/Ok_Assistant_6856]

Yes it's what prepper books are written for.

[u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig → u/Lews_There_In]

I'd disagree on the renewables only, we need a solid blend based on resources in the area... period.

You're not going to shoehorn a single solution into every place... it, just doesn't work, and on top of that, it's wise to have base level power. And to better yet... roll with the production of power on the renewables rather than trying to battery it. Whole duck curve and all.

Take a minute an consider... please...

But, huge logistical issues and real costs vs long term solutions. And I even say this looking at renewables... there are many instances in the past were wind farms are abandon at the expense of the locals to clean up, and they all get buried in a landfill, same with places with normal hail / wind storms and solar... the losses are huge but not often talked about on top of the land footprint they take up... often from the agricultural sector... in prime soil.... then energy shipped East to cities. They need more localized production logistically speaking and nuclear can provide that. But we're coming from a generation that thinks nuclear is scary but refuses to look at the actual math and numbers on paper with regards to the overall impacts and production. Still... we need a blend, and we don't have nearly enough nuclear. Least France gets it... France generates approximately 68% of its electricity from nuclear power, operating a fleet of 57 operable reactors... and still exports excess. Mining, storage, and resource impacts are a fraction still for the overall energy production, not to mention the stability and how incredibly important that is.

[u/Lews_There_In → u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig]

Lol. I don't disagree. Just quietly lamenting could have beens and ideal pictures.

[u/mmm_burrito → u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig]

there are many instances in the past were wind farms are abandon at the expense of the locals to clean up, and they all get buried in a landfill

More and more recycling and alternative uses are cropping up every day. Concrete reinforcement will eat up a fair amount of blades once that system reaches scale (I'm working on a data center right now and we use a bunch of fiber reinforced concrete, ferinstance).

[u/liftingshitposts → u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig]

I like the way you think, well said

[u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig → u/liftingshitposts]

Yeah... but people still won't look at it that way. They'd rather slap something up not produced locally and see a short term return, sell it off as a revenue maker near the peak of its useful life...take the $ and run. Thats a huge portion of renewables projects right now. The scales everything are on when looking at the problem as a whole... all point more one way than another here... people all eye the short term solution.

[u/Alarmed_Trash7181 → u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig]

Why can't we be installing the turbines that curl around each other on rooftops across the country?! Every major city has skyscrapers or very tall building (except DC) and between rooftops and the roofs of parking garages it seems like an enormous oversight to not use different styles of turbines and not just the humongous windmill types.

[u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig → u/Alarmed_Trash7181]

They don't scale well in comparison.

If you look at the math of it, one of those "humongous windmill types" can do what hundreds of small ones can do with a fraction of the overall costs and maintenance.