If you commission a new plant today it will not produce before 2040. That is the single biggest issue

It really is... Unfortunately there's not perfect answer and any near term solutions will need to include a variety of sources. I also think we should be working on water pipelines as well. Energy preservation is another issue, and where Hydrogen is likely one of the better solutions... but that will require a combination of more effective water filtration and desalinization along with transportation of clean water nearer to where energy is generated.

We should definitely be breaking ground on more nuclear plants in more stable (geographically) locations. I'm less convinced that current solar tech is a better net good considering what goes into building the things. I have similar reservations on electric cars for that matter. I think the tech is very cool and we will go through a lot of revisions.

Of course I also have some skepticism on the eminent dangers of global warming or man's influence in part or whole. Considering there are relatively recent times (about 3-8k years ago) where the understood earth temperature was a bit higher than even the projections for the end of the next couple centuries at worst.

Edit: and I'm still waiting for the flying cars I was promised.

This is simply not true.

In the USA it is. Sadly. China can probably get it running in 6 years but in the west it seems these things take 20 years.