Technology

That's interesting you say that because building nuclear plants is also a "bloody nightmare", see Vogtle, Hinkley Point, Flamanville, etc

It's not either/or. We need to roll out everything we can, including solar and nuclear, as well as carbon removal tech.

Nuclear power plants have a massive footprint. For example in Australia they're planning to setup a new nuclear waste disposal facility with a forecast budget of half a trillion US Dollars and it will be full in 70 years time - they'll have to build a new one somewhere else after that.

That nuclear waste site will be radioactive for millions of years. The land will never be able to be used for basically anything, ever.

If you covered just that nuclear waste facility with solar panels, it would provide a massive amount of power. Enough to cover the day time power needs of a small country.

Solar panels aren't a "zany" idea. In fact one of the reasons it's being explored is because it would reduce evaporation. Power generation is often almost an afterthought. The panels also don't have to be ugly - in fact there are prototypes that are invisible. They just look like ordinary glass, and don't cost much more than glass either.

If nuclear was in any way comparable in terms of cost to renewables + storage you might have a point, but it isn't, so you don't.

In fact, hot take: Why don't we deploy a solar power belt around the equator... AND nuclear power wherever we can put it? And while at it, let's make reprocessing of nuclear waste a must-do. It gives you more kWh/kg uranium, and the inevitable waste you do end up having is a cup instead of a cask, and far less dangerous for far shorter.

This happens to solve another problem though, which is that decreasing cloud coverage in the Pacific is leading to increasing surface water temperatures

The quickest way to de-carbonize our grid is nuclear. Meanwhile the US closed Three Mile Island a few years ago and onlined more natural gas in the state and Germany closed several nuclear plants and onlined more coal plants. The anti-nuclear push is fucking stupid.

At least France is building nuclear like crazy. They have one of the most de-carbonized grids on the planet.

We need renewable energy sources that can be quickly made. We simply don't have the time, during a period where climate change is in full swing, to make nuclear plants.

Plus, it's better safe than sorry in the long run. Did you forget what happened in Chernobyl? If that happened in America, it'd be catastrophic. In Chernobyl, they've still got to build something over the destroyed remains, for years to come and it's very costly. The surrounding areas is still radioactive.

We can rebuild those panels faster than we could put yet another concrete dome over radioactive waste. Which by the way, we don't do a good job handling things like trash and recycling. What makes you think we're capable of dealing with radioactive waste?

But you know, pro-nuclear people, I'd be keen in knowing how you'd handle the event such a meltdown would occur? I can already hear the crickets from here.

Minor correction, but I learned they actually slipped a metal dome over the current concrete one because it was unstable and falling apart. And they plan in the future to dismantle the fourth reactor while possibly restarting the other three reactors. Not a good idea, but still.