In terms of energy, it's not a contest and it's not a hangup. Carriers are already powered by nuclear reactors. They have about 1500MW of steam power available

In terms of energy, it's not a contest and it's not a hangup. Carriers are already powered by nuclear reactors. They have about 1500MW of steam power available as a matter of course. Compare to 25MW if you paved the flight surfaces with solar panels and parked it at the equator on a sunny day with perfectly calm seas and measured at noon. Unlike solar in this example, the nuclear design is not bumping up against physical constraints and could be scaled up quite dramatically if there was a compelling reason to do so. Fuel production would be a compelling reason. The chemistry and chemical engineering problems you point out are the major hangups.