" the waste produced by coal plants is actually more radioactive than that generated by their nuclear counterparts. In fact, the fly ash emitted by a power plant—a by-product from burning coal for electricity—carries into the surrounding environment 100 times more radiation than a nuclear power plant producing the same amount of energy"

From: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-...

We seem to have been fine burning coal and not thinking about the radiation that puts into the surrounding environment.

It's also disingenuous to think that there aren't negative environmental externalities from the production and operation of "renewables".

All forms of energy production will have some negative consequences and we need to understand what those are and think of ways to mitigate them, rather than just pointing to what's bad about one form and ignore what's bad about others.