Hmm…I grew up a few miles from the Rancho Seco plant and, as a kid, always thought it was kind of cool. As an adult, I’m on the fence about nuclear power. On the one hand, fossil fuel-based power generation is horrible, no matter how “clean” we can make it; alternative sources are required. On the other hand, California is a pretty wobbly state and maybe nuclear isn’t a great idea for that part of the country. On the third hand (did I mention I grew up near a nuke plant?) I don’t have serious concerns about nuclear power’s safety, if it can be located in a safe place and properly regulated.
Ideally, we’ll get to an all-renewables energy future some day, and CA is a great place to start with plenty of opportunities for solar, wind, tidal, geothermal, who knows. But in the meantime I’m on the fence about, say, replacing a coal plant or three out here in the plains with a nuke plant. What’s worse, a huge concrete bunker full of several tons of nuclear waste, or millions of tons of CO2 and carcinogens being released in the atmosphere? I don’t have a definitive answer, tho climate change appears, to me, to be a more pressing issue than nuclear waste.
It’s not comfortable on this fence.
Efficiency of power storage, smart grids, distributed storage and renewables might be able to achieve energy goals. Remember, this plant is going to be online for most of another decade, lots of things coming along in that time frame.