My stance is that if society has decided it's serious about CO2, it is necessary to put a whole lot more effort into next-gen nuclear than has been done so far. Even so, small companies like ThorCon, Terrestrial Energy and others are making good progress. The next step is a plan for a major, worldwide rollout of (mostly modular) nuclear reactors.

That avoids the issue of a possible decrease in the standard of living, and provides an affordable mechanism that doesn't involve coal for India, Indonesia and other countries that need to build out their electric grid.

Lots of good info here: http://thorconpower.com/news

Video from ThorCon CEO making his case: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4xjQWBw7i0&feature=youtu.be

One of the problems with thorium nuclear reactors is that they seem to be a perpetual "10 years" thing, and even with a huge increase in development funding we're probably 20+ years from viable commercial builds - and a lot further from getting a significant percentage of energy from them. By the time that can happen we're likely to see huge changes in renewables and even bigger changes in energy storage and usage efficiency.

Thorium may end up as a good viable option eventually, but I suspect that it'll probably never be more than a niche option for as long as most of us are likely to be alive.

Oh, and that 20 years? "Hi regulatory body, we'd like approval to build a brand new type of nuclear reactor in your state, close enough to a major population center for transmission losses to not be too high. What do we need to do to make that happen?"... And that's before you get to the billion+ of construction costs even if the new reactors only cost 10% of current designs.

Why wait for next gen nuclear?

I will eat my words if in a few days South Texas Nuclear generating station melts down (because its being hit by a category 4 hurricane as I type this).. But right now the technology we _HAVE_ is sufficiently safe.

But not sufficiently cheap, compared to alternatives.

Fossil fuels are cheaper than nuclear only if you treat the (huge) environmental effects as costing nothing.

Our nature can change at evolutionary time scales.

Our ability to 'do things' used to be so limited, but is now growing quickly.

The gap between our nature and our ability to change the environment around us is, I think, the root of many of our problems.

There's a great Documentary[1] about the recent mass Coral Reef bleaching too. Our leaders who do nothing about this and those of us who elect them are screwing up royally.

1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6fHA9R2cKI

It will take focused, continual political will to invest some of our vast stores of capital in technologies that preserve our standard of living yet have a smaller carbon footprint. Elon Musk and co are proving that we can build luxury and eco-friendly at scale.

Entrenched, monied, existing political ties to fossil fuel and extraction industries still exert control. I'm not willing to take the position there's nothing we can do until we've fully shaken them off the backs of our political system.

Do you see the population clamoring to reduce fossil fuel use, only to be stymied by lobbyists? I don't. I don't see the people clamoring at all.

I agree completely that tech investment is a much easier political sell than reducing the standard of living.

Just because you don't see people doing it now doesn't make it impossible.

People passively use fossil fuels because they are the norm. It will take investment from both our government, from private industry, and from grassroots activists pressuring both to make the norm clean and sustainable.

Scientists, celebrities, activists, and politicians have been screaming at the public for decades about this. They have used logical and emotional appeals. They have appealed to data, to our common humanity, to our long-term prosperity, to our duty to our children. None of it has worked. What exactly do you propose?

The "norm" is whatever is cheapest. That is what we have to do: make renewables cheapest.

I think we're talking about the same things. I'm just trying to make the case for how we should make renewables cheaper. The existing non-renewable oil & gas norm historically depended upon heavy investments in infrastructure:

1. Interstate expressway system

2. Oil and gas pipelines

3. Fracking R&D

3. Direct tax subsidization of private refining and exploration.

We need that level of effort applied to renewables development.

It seems we already have a large chunk of the tech as well (nuclear, wind, solar, biomass etc), but still seem to stick with fossil fuels for reasons of convenience(?).

No, we stick with fossil fuels because they are cheaper (at the scale we need). More expensive energy -> less energy use -> lower standard of living.

This is what I was alluding to about technology. If we can make clean energy significantly cheaper to use at scale than fossil fuels, then the world will use it.

More realistically, we need to make it cheaper to build new renewables than to keep using existing fossil fuel sources.

Anything can be made to seem superficially 'cheap' if corruption is used to enforce subsidies on populations.

Fossil fuels are only 'cheaper' because governments have become irredeemably corrupted by fossil fuel interests, so none have to face public liabilities for the damage caused by their products. The apparent 'cheapness' is a consequence only of fraudulent accounting. This is a specific case of the more general 'Pollution Paradox', viz. "The more polluting a company is, the more money it must spend on politics to ensure it is not regulated out of existence" (George Monbiot).

No, fossil fuels really are cheaper than competing energy sources. No corruption needed!

You think they are cheaper when the actual physical consequences of CO2 emissions are priced in? No-one else does, including the fossil fuel companies. They haven't invested the vast sums they have into lobbying and science-interference out of charitable inclinations towards lobbyists, amateurish scientists and think-tank careerists.

> More expensive energy -> less energy use -> lower standard of living.

This makes 2 assumptions which I find to be false.

1) Any drop in the standard of living is bad. e.g. I don't need to be freezing in a store in the middle of summer.

2) Less energy use necessitates a drop in the standard of living. e.g. using energy more efficiently via lights and insulation.

1) I agree, but most of the population does not agree and will vote accordingly. This isn't about what's rational - taking a hit to our standard of living to stave off catastrophe is definitely rational. This is about what the masses will support and vote for.

2) Efficiency gains can help, but shaving off some excess here and there will not prevent a climate catastrophe. It will take drastically less fossil fuel use. I don't see that happening unless technology makes renewables cheaper than fossils. It's hard, but it's possible.

>No, we stick with fossil fuels because they are cheaper (at the scale we need). More expensive energy -> less energy use -> lower standard of living.

So why aren't we using nuclear?

People got afraid of it and replaced it with fossil fuels. Near term visible risk vs. long run invisible risk. Also, cost overruns and regulatory issues played a role I think.

We could conceivably swap out carbon for nuclear though. Just not carbon for [more expensive energy source]. People get antsy even when economic growth slows. A drop in the standard of living is political suicide.

I don't think we're very well psychologically equipped to deal with this.

That and the expense of initially building nuclear energy facilities. Even though it's cheaper once it's built, the initial capital cost can be daunting.

A large part of the capital costs is satisfying all the environmental studies and inevitable lawsuits. The core technology is pretty cheap (concrete and pumps).

Nuclear power is literally orders of magnitude cleaner/safer than anything else, and yet the fear mongering continues and the idealistic environmentalists are pumping more CO2 into the atmosphere with every NG turbine installed to backup the wind/solar plants. Just the other day I heard a talking head repeatedly referring to "the old dirty coal and nuke plants".

I think you're right. Assuming everything we think we know about carbon, methane, and global warming is true, we're sunk. And there's nothing we can do about it. The party's been great.

You cannot solve social problems with a technical approach.

You can sometimes solve social problems with a technical approach.