shot across the bow

I've generally taken a skeptical view of massively increasing nuclear power to keep our future rolling. There are a lot of good reasons to avoid it; and the argument for it seems to be desperation. (As in, "Argh! We must have energy at any cost!") Similar reasoning explains why coal is now being flogged as the latest "gateway" energy source, a bridge to a hypothetical.

Peak Energy Australia spotted an Amory Lovins argument that nuclear is insolvent in both in terms of financial returns, and by implication energy returns.

Competitors To Nuclear: Eat My Dust
Whenever nuclear power's competitors (even just on the supply side) were allowed to compete fairly, they've far outpaced central stations. Just in 1982–85, California utilities acquired and or were firmly offered enough cost-effective savings and decentralized supplies to meet all demand with no central fossil-fueled or nuclear plants.
...
No wonder the world's universities have dissolved or reorganized nearly all of their departments of nuclear engineering, and none still attracts top students—another portent that the business will continue to fall, as Nobel physicist Hannes Alfvén warned, "into ever less competent hands,"

For me, the gold standard in evaluating nuclear would be an end to end lifecycle analysis of energy returned on energy invested. This turns out to be one of the most complicated energy research projects one could take on; it is beyond my means as a part time blogger. If anyone knows of such an analysis, please drop a comment.

However, I tend to think that in practical terms the high cost of nuclear implies that useful energy return is dubious, and carrying with it a toll of nuclear waste.

So I really value Amory Lovins analysis on this one - cannily playing to the market forces set using a comparison of the heavily subsidized nuclear industry and renewables.