[andbberger]

it's not a strawman. designing to requirements driven by fear and not rational risk assessment can make feasible technology infeasible.

if we designed airliners with a safety factor in line with people's fear of flying and not the actual risk of failure, they would never be able to get off the ground.

yet we require that nuclear power plants tolerate any conceivable failure mode, no matter how unlikely, or dangerous.

that's not rational.

[TheOtherHobbes]

It's far less rational to keep building expensive and unsafe generation when cheaper and safer generation is already available - and can be built more quickly.

And that's before equivalent spending on research, plus tax breaks and subsidies.