...things which are technical failures for physical reasons, and things which fail because of ignorance.
Irrespective of your need to gloat...
It is technically impossible for so called "renewable energy" to support the world population at a decent standard of living, and the reason is physics, specifically the energy to mass ratio. So called "renewable energy" failed to support humanity after the early 19th century, which is why it was abandoned.
I have convinced myself after many years of study that it is technically feasible to double the per capita energy consumption of human beings on this planet - which would amount to an average continuous power consumption of about 5000 watts - if the criteria is simply engineering. It is technically feasible to do this on a scale of centuries with the elements already mined and isolated.
However the reach of science and engineering have often been ignored by appeals to ignorance - it's more the exception than the rule actually, and the 21st century is merely consistent with the past - and what is technically feasible is not what is socially feasible. After all, in the time of the bulbonic plague, there were certainly a few people who thought that cleaning up the garbage piles that drew rats might be a good idea, but the culture as a whole decided prayer would work better.
I am well aware of your contention that everyone needs to either wear a sack cloth or die, and I'm aware that the circumstances under which that situation is inevitable is becoming more and more likely - but there is no physical reason that this outcome needed to be obtained. With a little more vision, and a lot less whining, including the "Nothing can work!" type of whining, we might have done better with the platform this planet has been for seeing to the edges of the universe.
Your equivalence between the "renewables will save us" fantasy and nuclear technology is frankly, absurd and not supportable. A comparison between Mark Jacobson and Glenn Seaborg is, if not obscene, then certainly specious. One is a tiresome clerk with a mysterious and unjustified academic appointment repeating mindless cant that 50 years of experience has shown to be useless, and the other won the Nobel Prize, was discoverer or co-discoverer of 10 elements in the periodic table, the head of the AEC when more than 80 nuclear reactors were constructed, and perhaps one of the most important weapons limitations negotiator ever, among other things.
Nuclear energy prevented the dumping of two years worth of carbon dioxide - we'd now be closer to 410 ppm or higher without it, given that we're now going up at more than 3.00 ppm a year and accelerating while dumping carbon dioxide at a rate of more than 30 billion tons per year.. No other form of energy has done as much as nuclear energy has done, and no other form of primary energy has been subject to a discovery in the last one thousand years. Of course there are dipshits complaining that somewhat might die from radiation as a result of Fukushima, but if one can count, one can do simple comparisons.
If one can't count, one makes specious generalizations. We see that a lot, but my contention is that it is morally bankrupt to do so.
Have a nice day.
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