It's far too late in the game to let the Sierra Clubs and the NIMBYs block nuclear power. It will take immense work to overcome the stigmas associated with nuclear power plants, however. With today's hyper-conspiracy minded discourse, it's going to be an uphill battle to convince people of safety, without getting drowned out by kooks.
That is a good step. One thing that i have found weird is that large parts of USA is remote and sparsely populated unlike say Japan, India or even mainland of China. To alleviate some of the psychological concerns would it not be possible to increase the transmission costs but site the nuclear plants in a location far from other urban centres ?
A bunch of reactors with 200 to 400 GW capacity sited remotely without urban area within 400 km might work i guess ? Off course they can be the latest generation reactors with all the advancements for safety factored in. Not sure if economies of scale can apply to nuclear like solar, but it may make sense.
It seems like every 20 years or so nuclear starts to gain acceptance, and then a Fukushima or a Chernobyl happens, and opinion turns against it for another 20 years. It’s hard because a nuclear accident is low probability but very very high consequence.
The world added 61GW of (mostly onshore) wind power in 2019, bringing the total capacity for wind energy to 650GW. (650 1GW nuke plants were not built.)
Except that certain percentage of renewable energy has to be backed up by something that can cover its unreliable nature. If you don't accept nuclear into the mix then you have to do it with hydrocarbons.
