Yep. Our last nuclear plant cost right around 30 billion. (And the cost overruns still haven't stopped with Vogtie. In the end it will cost more.) Now even if

Yep. Our last nuclear plant cost right around 30 billion. (And the cost overruns still haven't stopped with Vogtie. In the end it will cost more.) Now even if you get rid of any and all regulations, you're still talking about 2 to 5 billion to build one of these things. And it's transitional in nature. It will be shut off when the renewables take over. So that's the problem. Energy investors can take this enormous risk on nuclear, that will be going away, but they don't really know when? So the gamble is, will I make my money back before the renewables do my plant in? Or Those same investors can just slap up windmills everywhere and start making their money back right away, and continue generating income on each windmill for the life of the equipment. Even energy investors like Pickens have switched over to the "slap up a windmill" strategy. (Or in his case, I guess it's more of a "slap up so many that no one else can compete with you" strategy.) Point is, Pickens is old, stodgy, conservative, has a preference for big energy projects, and is not prone to rash action. If you can't even convince guys like that to back nuclear in actual deed instead of screed, you really are just not being realistic about the challenges faced by nuclear investors. It's not just regulation, it's all the other energy options that offer far better returns. If we want nuclear, the American tax payer will have to foot the bill for it, and that's just not terribly likely to happen.