I can see how you could argue that nuclear reactors qualify as clean energy but calling natural gas green is just ridiculous. Might as well call a diesel generator green energy because it creates less emission than burning lignite.
this post was submitted on 12 Sep 2025
85 points (98.9% liked)
Europe
7288 readers
1430 users here now
News and information from Europe ๐ช๐บ
(Current banner: La Mancha, Spain. Feel free to post submissions for banner images.)
Rules (2024-08-30)
- This is an English-language community. Comments should be in English. Posts can link to non-English news sources when providing a full-text translation in the post description. Automated translations are fine, as long as they don't overly distort the content.
- No links to misinformation or commercial advertising. When you post outdated/historic articles, add the year of publication to the post title. Infographics must include a source and a year of creation; if possible, also provide a link to the source.
- Be kind to each other, and argue in good faith. Don't post direct insults nor disrespectful and condescending comments. Don't troll nor incite hatred. Don't look for novel argumentation strategies at Wikipedia's List of fallacies.
- No bigotry, sexism, racism, antisemitism, islamophobia, dehumanization of minorities, or glorification of National Socialism. We follow German law; don't question the statehood of Israel.
- Be the signal, not the noise: Strive to post insightful comments. Add "/s" when you're being sarcastic (and don't use it to break rule no. 3).
- If you link to paywalled information, please provide also a link to a freely available archived version. Alternatively, try to find a different source.
- Light-hearted content, memes, and posts about your European everyday belong in other communities.
- Don't evade bans. If we notice ban evasion, that will result in a permanent ban for all the accounts we can associate with you.
- No posts linking to speculative reporting about ongoing events with unclear backgrounds. Please wait at least 12 hours. (E.g., do not post breathless reporting on an ongoing terror attack.)
- Always provide context with posts: Don't post uncontextualized images or videos, and don't start discussions without giving some context first.
(This list may get expanded as necessary.)
Posts that link to the following sources will be removed
- on any topic: Al Mayadeen, brusselssignal:eu, citjourno:com, europesays:com, Breitbart, Daily Caller, Fox, GB News, geo-trends:eu, news-pravda:com, OAN, RT, sociable:co, any AI slop sites (when in doubt please look for a credible imprint/about page), change:org (for privacy reasons)
- on Middle-East topics: Al Jazeera
- on Hungary: Euronews
Unless they're the only sources, please also avoid The Sun, Daily Mail, any "thinktank" type organization, and non-Lemmy social media. Don't link to Twitter directly, instead use xcancel.com. For Reddit, use old:reddit:com
(Lists may get expanded as necessary.)
Ban lengths, etc.
We will use some leeway to decide whether to remove a comment.
If need be, there are also bans: 3 days for lighter offenses, 7 or 14 days for bigger offenses, and permanent bans for people who don't show any willingness to participate productively. If we think the ban reason is obvious, we may not specifically write to you.
If you want to protest a removal or ban, feel free to write privately to the primary mod account @EuroMod@feddit.org
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
idk why the EU is such a shitshow, it's one bad news after another
On the curve, they're still doing well.
You've, uh, seen America, right?
Lol. For real. Shit is dark over here. I WISH we could label anything other than coal and oil as clean energy. N But no, saving the planet is gay or something. Gotta own the libs. Fascism is fun.
It's better than coal and oil. People shit the bed because of 2 big events that happened to old reactor types which were susceptible to such errors.
Honestly, would you rather live in a world where nuclear and gas are used to transition or coal and oil? Wind and solar still can't power all of Europe 24/7. Solutions are being worked on, tested, and built, but in the meantime, I'll sleep better with coal and oil centrals being replaced by nuclear. They will use less space, provide more stable power, and serve as a fine transition until the storage issue has been solved.
Of course subsidies for coal and oil should be phased out ASAP, but let's not paint a pure coal and oil transitional period as better.
You can't just replace coal and oil by nuclear power. it takes decades to build a new plant and is very expensive. Money that is better spend in investing in wind and solar.
You can't just replace coal and oil by nuclear power. it takes decades to build a new plant and is very expensive.
That's been said for over a decade at this point. We could have had plenty of nuclear power plants and maintained/developed expertise in the area if clean energy was a goal that was taken seriously by Europe. Both solar and wind are innately inefficient in terms of W/m^2, and wind has the additional problem of noise pollution and environmental impact.
Nuclear is needed for stable base load, in significant quantity as well. And the argument of they take years doesn't hold water, in fact its more the reason to start now.
The global-average build time is 6-8 years.
No-one is saying "stop building solar and wind". Nuclear is for transitioning and should've been built 10-20 years ago, but now is also a good time.
Eeech.
Natural gas can be green, if it's biomethane. Nuclear though...
"Natural gas" can never be green because it is specifically fossil-fuel gas.
If you're harvesting methane from landfills, that's actually green since burning it reduces the greenhouse gas effects. But that's only like 0.1% of the methane used
Yeah, that's the kind of natural gas I was talking about, but it seems that it comes down to how you define words.
That is green gas. It isn't green "natural" gas, because "natural" is exclusively the fossil fuel stuff. Stupid naming, probably some 19th century marketing thatfor some reason stuck.
Edit: 19th, not 18th.
Ah, probably the same weirdness that lead to large gas storage vessels being called gasometers
Nuclear can be green, if its a breeder reactor. Natural gas though...