Is nuclear power our best bet against climate change?
The most enduring product of any nuclear power project is not radioactive waste, but corruption. Nuclear power construction projects, at least in the western world, invariably become conduits for wholly legal, long-term corruption, making nukes about the most expensive kind of power (ignoring externalities from coal). This is a common feature of big-ticket public-works projects, particularly also including tunnel projects and military procurement.<p>Nukes take so long to build not because it is so hard to do -- it is mostly just concrete and plumbing -- but because nobody actually involved wants the construction money <i>ever</i> to stop flowing. No output is even promised for years, which is easily stretched out, often beyond a decade. Sunk-cost fallacy helps this process: once a few $B are burned, it is easy to unlock more against the prospect of admitting what was already spent bought nothing.<p>As bad as is the corruption around fission, fusion has been and must be much worse. A fission plant is expected to produce power eventually, or the plug will finally be pulled. One recent fission failure has cost $30B, so far, which seems like a lot, but fusion has burned more already without even breaking ground on a plant. ITER, even if 100% successful, will generate zero watts: no turbines are in the site plan. A plant built after it would cost, conservatively, &gt;$50B and take decades to finish. (The most likely outcome would be that it is <i>never</i> finished.) Meanwhile, the costs of solar, wind, and storage are still plummeting, with no hint of a lower limit.<p>Thus far wind and solar have mostly avoided becoming conduits for corruption, probably because it is easy to see how the money is spent, and maybe because of the high fraction of idealists involved. (The exception is solar thermal.) Power can begin flowing almost immediately, after a small fraction of the whole installation is done, which can then fund further construction. Thus, the up-front capital needed is small, and costs are constrained by immediate revenue.<p>Thus, every penny diverted to fission and fusion (not to mention feeding and maintaining coal) from solar and wind brings climate catastrophe ever nearer.