Nuclear power

[pocaracas]

Yes

No, I don't think solar activity can reach the Earth with such power that it can jeopardize any structure, let alone a heavily (radiation) shielded place like the radioactive region of a power station.
Out in space, high neutron fluxes can damage semiconductor based electronics and biological tissue... Most everything else should be fine. There's is also the risk of electromagnetic interference and some satellites getting blacked out, but these should be temporary.
Our atmosphere absorbs most neutrons and other energetic radiation from the sun and other cosmic sources and we get a small amount of those on the surface.


I think the higher risk of having many small nuclear stations is keeping all that enriched uranium away from unintended hands. Many plants represent many nuclear sites licenses, lots of security forces and many more opportunities for failure.


Maybe one station per 5 or 10 million people, complemented by renewables...
Let me see... At ~6MWh per capita per year, your need 30,000 GWh of power for 5 million people. The UK is currently building Hinkley point C which will have an output of ~3MW, which amounts to ~26,000 GWh in a year..., So yeah, that's a good estimate.
If we can make it so that renewables count for half the supply, then we can extend it to one station per 10 million people.
If nuclear fusion ever becomes viable, it will replace all fission plants and most renewables... Until then, we have to juggle all the options.

A nit to pick.  Hinkley C’s designed power output is 3.2GW, not 3MW. 

How much non-renewable is required to support a renewable heavy system depends on a combination of the types of renewables are on the grid, their output curves and the variability of their outputs under local conditions, how well their combined outputs curves match grid load curve, and how variable are their combined grid wide outputs,  how much energy storage and other load shifting capability are there on the grid. 

There is also the consideration of how much consumer pressure is there on electric rates, how strong is NIMBY, related difficulties in establishing transmission corridors.

There is also the concern that most nuclear power plants requires relatively frequent (every 2 years or more) long duration (several weeks) outages for refueling.  In addition experience shows nuclear plants have greater chance of protracted outages of a year or more.

Right... foiled by the comma that I was conditioned to consider as a decimal point... rats!
3,200MW, so... one Hinkley Point C can provide power for the whole of the UK and have more to spare, provided no losses.
Brilliant! We need even less power plants than I estimated at first.