[Table 5]

The nuclear question is one many are suggesting, but they aren't going to dip their toes again after the Hinkley Point C disaster.

Funny you should say that. Front page headline today in one of Englands biggest papers.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/m...lant-qrkqchkh7

Ministers are backing a multibillion-pound plan to build another large-scale nuclear power plant in Britain to ease pressure on electricity supplies as the country moves towards net zero.

Like I said, when prices get high enough, people start changing their tune pretty quick. Japan is already starting to look back towards nuclear, and at some point so will Germany, Belgium and all the other ones planning phase-outs. Nuclear already powers 70% of France and 20% of the US (and provides half of its clean energy). There's no reason why it can't do the same for others.

And you're right, a Nuclear plant is expensive to build, and takes years to bring online because of regulations and safety checks...so the time to act is now. Once you do have it running though, it offers many decades of clean, safe, and perhaps most important, reliable baseload energy. They operate at full capacity 92% of the time....which is 2-3 more times than wind/solar.

If the main concern of governments is lowering emissions and environmental impact, than I have no idea why they wouldn't pivot to nuclear. It produces about a third of the GHG emissions of solar (and about the same as wind), but with a much tinier footprint. Wind takes something like 360(!) times more land area to generate the same amount of energy. So instead of taking up 1 square mile for a nuclear plant, a wind farm would use 360 square miles and potentially impact people, farmland, natural ecosystems, coastlines etc...all while being an energy source that is finicky and still needs gas/coal power plants to remain on standby. Solar itself takes about 70x of land area and you need 3 million solar panels to generate the same amount of energy as a nuclear plant. Never mind the need for natural resources and constant hydrocarbons and mining required to build and service all these panels and turbines (because all the steel, copper, cement etc. all have to be mined and processed).

The only way out is energy independence with more renewables mixed with reasonable energy storage. Everything else will lead to what they're seeing today.

I agree energy independence is important, but as of now, I doubt ours will increase with going all in on renewables. Unfortunately for the west, China has effectively cornered the solar market, with 80% of solar panels being produced there (and as we've recently heard, often with forced labour), and also dominates the global rare earth supply chain as well that's needed for battery storage. Now this imbalance can change, but will most likely take decades to claw back if we're lucky. In the meantime, Covid has shown what happens when one country controls the supply chain for everyday goods. It's one thing to be reliant on them for our everyday goods, it's a completely different thing when they control the energy that literally everything we do is reliant on. It's quite the feat China has pulled off. They are supplying the west with renewables, all while half of energy generation in China is still from coal!

Also look at what's happening in Germany right now. They moved away from reliable energy to go all in renewables...and are now looking to pump in gas from Russia. Do you think giving Putin influence over your energy needs is good for Germany's sovereignty? I sure don't.

Will Nuclear give us energy independence? I'm no expert, but I do know that luckily for us, Canada has some of the world's biggest deposits of high-grade uranium in the Athabasca Basin (and we are home to one of the 2 big uranium companies in the world). I do think looking to source our energy needs from within our borders is a good thing for our long-term independence.