> costs too much
because we haven't invested in any experimentation in most markets. The US has stopped building new reactors for decades. There's no reason why nuclear reactors can't be made to be cheaper.
> I think it's no longer great;
This needs a benchmark. Nothing is great in absolute. It's still great vs all the other energy productions methods. Solar need huge surfaces to produce large quantities of energy, and solar panels require very toxic materials for manufacture... nothing's perfect unfortunately.
For thorium, the wikipedia page lists 22 disadvantages: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_fluoride_thorium_reacto.... It may well be the longest list of arguments against I've seen on Wikipedia, including, by the way, proliferation risks.
It's interesting how you say "has been dealt with" and then point to a technology that barely exists in reality. Thorium reactors have been promised as a solution since a long time, people have predicted that many of them will be built really soon. It hasn't happened.
No. In some ways they're much worse, in fact.
> Nothing is great in absolute. It's still great vs all the other energy productions methods. Solar need huge surfaces to produce large quantities of energy, and solar panels require very toxic materials for manufacture... nothing's perfect unfortunately.
Indeed, by many metrics (deaths per kWh, environmental footprint) nuclear is the best option we have.
The cells themselves are pretty inert, although CdTe (rarely used but once popular) is quite toxic. And of course none of this stuff radiates.
Nuclear has such a complex set of technologies and industry that needs to be developed and maintained. The buildings themselves take years to develop and construct.
Then there's the stigma around them etc etc.
Renewables just make more sense these days.
Though apparently radiation is not as bad for the flora and fauna as people are:
“Wildlife is thriving around Chernobyl since the people left”
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn28281-wildlife-is-thr...
Also, deaths during construction tend to be workers who have signed up to the risk. That isn't OK, but it is a lot less bad than risk to random members of the public who have not consented. And it is a vast improvement on the deaths caused by fossil fuels.
Source?
Also it only functions as baseload - it's a great alternative to coal, but that's about it.
Not the case for the UK.
There the energy density per head of population is too high for renewables.
Good video by the late David Mackay on that point here.
You can also send power under water quite a ways cheaply. So, it’s hard to find a location which needs extreme power production density.
As to solar, clearly you have seen them on roofs which have no other real use.