I am wondering how things will shake out if coal and nukes are shut down leaving only natural gas and "others". New nukes require such a large capital investment that I doubt a deregulated state will ever build one. If the SMR designs were to gain traction and the regulatory overhead is enough to ensure safety while also being affordable, they may be able to be cost competitive with the renewable sources. I could see a nice synergy with renewable sources where advanced SMR designs are able to ramp power quickly , make the reactive load to support a grid and load follow as demand changes.
If we go forward with the renewable plans that many people advocate without advanced nuclear plants or carbon plants, will America be able to adapt to the periodic shortages of power by consuming less until more energy supplies are found? I am still trying to understand what type of storage system we will be using to store the excess power during times of abundance for later consumption. I am sure that the future grid will look nothing like today because without reactive load making generators, large grids are not possible.
