There is an ongoing debate as to whether nuclear is a renewable energy source, but is is acknowledged that it is a low carbon source...
So if it is renewable it's certainly a far more expensive form of electricity generation than that from a gas power station...
But in any case there has to be a back up energy source for when the sun doesn't shine or the wind doesn't blow, so as the UK is going down the nuclear route the huge costs involved must be added to the equation.
Nuclear isn't as expensive as often claimed. Especially compared with renewables.
The issue here is mainly that renewables' cost claims omit the cost of backup, be it storage or a fossil fuel back up. You need that extra capacity to make renewables technically feasible, and this adds to the cost. To rely on renewables entirely, and to build enough backup to supply enough power over every foreseeable issue, would be entirely uneconomic.
However, there is also the fact that fossil fuel companies have pulled back from renewables. Why? Because even though they are cheap (at the point of installation), they are not profitable compared with fossil fuels.
But it goes further than this when comparing the cost of energy sources. Renewables are often quoted as being cheaper but this goes by Levelised Cost of Energy. This is poor metric to compare nuclear with renewables. The reasons are lengthy, and here is a good discussion as to why:
A thorough comparison of clean energy sources
zionlights.substack.com
But basically, it doesn't account for the fact that a nuclear plant supplies reliable energy for many more decades over the life of the plant that the equivalent sized wind farm or solar farm would. There are other issues, but this is a key point.
Then there's the cost of carbon that isn't accounted for when comparing with fossil fuels. If you account for the hidden cost of fossil fuels, they suddenly cost far more.
Renewables look cheap ATM, as they don't have to rely on a large proportion of back up to keep them viable, but they are built in enough quantities to keep the costs down. We need more of course, but there is a limit as to what we can achieve by renewables alone.
