this could be said about computers back in the day too. they used to take up entire floors, now they fit on your pocket. i suspect something similar applies for tech in general and reactors also
> The worst proponents of nuclear are so called environmentalists who's feelings over facts have caused far more harm to the environment (mining for rare earths anyone?).
Modern PV involves less rare earths than a nuclear reactor for the same energy output. DFIG wind generators use none. New batteries use none.
Uranium mining on the other hand poisons thousands of km^2, and is almost never properly remediated. Tailings dams of mines that ran out decades ago still need constant maintenance (often on the public dime) to not spew heavy metal laden dust everywhere.
> If we would have continued research into other than light water reactors instead of abandoning it we'd be burning "nuclear waste" instead of arguing where to bury otherwise useable fuel.
Trillions were spent on 'burning nuclear waste' by which you actually mean creating larger quantities of Pu240 and Pu241 (the worst high level waste) than a burner reactor does and dumping fission products into the ocean. It went nowhere.
And there has never been a real program to systematically use the civilian nuclear waste. This was of course planned but the program was stopped in the general anti-nuclear attitude of the 70s. This program would have lead to a huge amount of green energy and a reduction in the nuclear waste.
And the uranium mining would be much less of an issue if we had modern reactors. We are operating at 2% efficiency, a thermal breeder could reach high 90%s. The existing civilian nuclear waste could be enough for a long time. No more mining. And thorium is a waste product of current rare earth mining in absurd quantities. So really any more mining that we do is just because of bad policy.
And when talking about mining, the reality is solar and wind need far, far more mining and those mins have tailings too.
> Fission gets billions of dollars of free public money for research every year and had much more spent in the past.
And nuclear was excluded from almost all green energy subsidies for decades a far larger number in total. Even more important the changes in the grid pricing basically simply did not favor long term base-load investments. Not to mention all the programs that force utilities to adopt a % of renewables.
And even today, the places that have stable reactors have low electricity prices because of long term price agreements while everybody else is suffering.
France had decades of low energy prices and even today most in France have low energy prices. And the cost of that was mostly on the books of the utility and has been paid down for many decades now even with the low energy prices.
France has sadly mismanaged its fleet for the last 30 years, with the anti-nuclear state abusing the amazing systems the generation before built for them. And despite all of that abuse and lack of maintenance and investment France still has reliable, low price, green energy.
Your car analogy doesn't really work. It's like saying "desktop computers are mature tech, can I fit one in my pocket?" No, but you can fit a smartphone in your pocket, which does many of the same things a desktop computer can do.