[epups]

> the general consensus as I understand it is that building new nuclear power plants is not cost effective with other forms of energy storage/generation capacity.

Different forms of energy generation serve different purposes. I hope you can see why comparing nominal prices of solar panel installations vs a nuclear power plant is misguided. The latter can take you through a tough winter, the former cannot. Renewables are great, let's keep building them. For the times where they cannot help us, we can then choose to use a technology that is costly in dollars (nuclear) or lives (gas/oil/coal).

[hn_throwaway_99]

You're mistaking operational costs with capital costs.

Nuclear has huge up front capital costs, which makes building new plants a non-starter if it is believed that other storage options (including batteries and things like green hydrogen) will be cheaper before the lifespan of a power plant can essentially recoup its large up front costs.

[epups]

No, I'm not. I'm saying that just because renewables are cheaper, you cannot simply replace anything with them or you would have severe unreliability.