[Skunkleton]

You can't just look at cost/kwh. You have to look at the cost of meeting total instantaneous energy demands. Sure, solar and wind are cheaper in many places, but they all depend on a reliable fallback like natural gas. I really don't see how we can avoid fission power for the time being. Its the only current technology that is 100% compatible with our existing grid.

[cogman10]

For now in the US, you can.

We simply aren't at the point where there are enough renewables on the grid that adding more would ultimately cause more natural gas emissions. Until the renewable profile starts pushing into base load generation (particularly eating into green base loads like hydro and nuclear) then it is pretty much a pure win to add solar and wind. The natural gas peakers ultimately produce less CO2 with renewables than with base load fossil fuels.

However, there is a time where storage becomes the main issue. We aren't there yet. Until we hit that point, deploying as much solar and wind as possible is going to be the fastest, most efficient, and cheapest way to decrease our carbon footprint.

[Skunkleton]

We can’t afford to wait around, especially in the US. As it stands today, nuclear is part of the solution to climate change. The time to build new plants is now.

[cogman10]

We can push out new solar and wind today, right now. The lead time for new renewables is months.

The lead time for new nuclear is 10->20 years. It is, frankly, too late for nuclear (at least without serious regulations overhaul). It might make sense to start building plants, but if we want to curb climate change then the only path is renewables.

[Skunkleton]

My point isn’t that we shouldn’t deploy more solar/wind. Of course we should. We will need more nuclear power plants as well. The time for all of these is now. We can’t afford to wait until we hit the limit of what current renewables can provide before we build up our nuclear infrastructure.