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drethelin comments on Open thread, Feb. 16 - Feb. 22, 2015 - Less Wrong Discussion
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Considering options for reducing environmental impact of energy, it seems it would be both more economical and more environmentally sound for a large group of people to get together and invest in a nuclear power plant than for each of them to individually install solar panels on their roofs. Taking the USA as an example, the typical home consumes about 15,000 kWh/year and an average home solar installation providing this power would have a total cost of $30,000, or about $12,000 after city rebates and tax credits. It would provide power for about 20 years without extensive maintenance. If a million people got together and paid $5000 each, however, they could fund a full-size nuclear power plant and get the same amount of power for 60 years (they would actually get about 18,000 kWh/year, and the excess capacity could be sold off to fund power plant maintenance).
Yes, if only we could get the population of a large city to all agree to pay 5000 dollars for a plan that would pay off in 60 years!
It would pay off immediately (well, as soon as the power plant is built, but most power plant construction delays are due to funding delays, which would not be an issue here). The investment isn't that large; $5,000 would pay itself back for the average household in 1-4 years of power bills.
If that's true why can't some company get 20% per year on their capital by building a new nuclear power plant? Anything with predicted return well over the 10% should get funding.
Who says that they can't do so, rather than that they haven't noticed they could do so, or can't persuade people to get over their phobia of nuclear power and let them do so?
Can you show your estimates behind that claim?