>>4262409>Yes, that's all well and good, but it still takes billions (USD) in investment to build or update a plantNo, no it doesn't. Again, you're basing your analysis on extremely outdated technology and not what people actually support when they say they support nuclear.
Nobody is recommending we build a ton more light water reactors. They are expensive, inefficient, and only got selected in the first place because they can produce plutonium for the defense department. Everyone who supports nuclear is for the modern reactor designs, all of which have massive efficiency gains both in terms of fuel and in terms of setup cost over LWRs.
Some of the economic analyses to come out of small modular molten salt cooled reactors, for example, have them calculating as literally the cheapest form of energy to build in existence in terms of mfr cost per kWH energy produced. Not even coal is cheaper. Removing water from the coolant loop means all that massive equipment and foot-thick containment walls and gigantic cooling towers can all be ditched for a set of small machines that fit inside a building and does everything you need.