Net-Zero America’s Nuclear Neglect: How Renewables-Only Orthodoxy Undermines Climate Justice

The Princeton Net-Zero America report – touted as a technology-neutral roadmap – in practice left nuclear energy on the sidelines. This policy critique argues that by downplaying nuclear power’s role and leaning on a renewables-only strategy, climate planners set themselves up for technical failure and political backlash. From huge land requirements and intermittency problems to internal rifts within Princeton’s research circles, the evidence suggests that excluding nuclear is a costly mistake. We also examine how the Biden administration’s embrace of Princeton’s framework (over a more nuclear-forward MIT study) created vulnerabilities in the 2024 election cycle. Ultimately, from an Earthrise Accord perspective of “nuclear realism” as a moral imperative, we contend that marginalizing atomic energy undermines true decarbonization and alienates the very communities a just climate transition must serve.

Princeton’s Net-Zero America: Tech-Neutral or Nuclear-Averse?

The Net-Zero America project at Princeton modeled five pathways to a zero-carbon US economy by 2050, claiming no favoritism among technologies. Yet a closer look shows nuclear power was largely kept at status quo levels or excluded entirely in these scenarios. In the core cases, the report assumed no new nuclear plants beyond today’s fleet – nuclear generation was “maintained at roughly today’s levels” – and only under a scenario artificially limiting wind and solar build-out did nuclear “expand significantly”reddit.com. One pathway even disallowed nuclear altogether, aiming for 100% renewablesreddit.com. This hardly reflects true technology neutrality. Instead, the Princeton team’s assumptions (such as high nuclear costs and easier scaling of renewables) effectively biased the outcomes against nuclear. Indeed, their own annex admits the model found nuclear “a more costly option” for firm power unless capital costs drop drastically – but if nuclear costs fell to $1800/kW, their model showed significant nuclear expansion that displaces wind and solarreddit.com. In other words, with reasonable cost improvements, nuclear would outcompete much of renewables – a possibility the main report downplays.

By structuring scenarios that only favor nuclear in extreme cases (or not at all), Net-Zero America sent a subtle message: that America could feasibly reach climate goals primarily with wind, solar, and batteries, treating nuclear as optional. This standpoint downplays decades of evidence that a robust nuclear component greatly eases deep decarbonization. The authoritative 2018 MIT study on decarbonization warned that excluding nuclear makes the whole endeavor dramatically more expensive and less likely to succeedearthriseaccord.org. According to that MIT report, there is “no viable path to climate survival without nuclear power,” and removing nuclear from the mix renders emissions targets effectively unattainableearthriseaccord.org. By glossing over this reality, the Princeton report’s “neutral” stance veered into nuclear-neutralizing territory. The result was a high-profile roadmap that gave policymakers the impression that nuclear can be minimized – an impression that subsequent events have proven problematic.

The Limits of a Renewables-Heavy Strategy

Emphasizing wind and solar while marginalizing nuclear isn’t just a philosophical choice – it carries major technical limitations. A renewables-heavy strategy faces well-known hurdles in land use, resource requirements, intermittency, and energy storage that a more balanced approach could mitigate:

• Enormous Land Footprint: To replace dense energy sources like fossil fuels (or nuclear) with diffuse renewables, you must blanket vast areas with infrastructure. Even the Princeton report itself noted the staggering land implications. Its 100% renewable scenario in 2050 required wind farms with a “visual footprint” of about 1 million square kilometers – an area equal to six U.S. states combinedreddit.com. Even less extreme pathways still consume land area the size of multiple large states for turbines. Solar farms, while smaller in footprint than wind, would directly cover an area from the size of Connecticut up to that of Virginia in 2050 scenariosreddit.comreddit.com. Such extensive land use raises serious concerns about ecological impact, community resistance, and competition with agriculture or conservation. The renewables-only orthodoxy often glosses over this land footprint challenge, whereas nuclear energy’s land efficiency is unparalleled – a handful of reactors can generate power equivalent to thousands of wind turbines, on a fraction of the acreageearthriseaccord.org.

  
  

• Intermittency and Grid Reliability: Wind and solar only produce power when the wind blows or the sun shines, making grid reliability a major challenge. Massive battery storage and overbuilt capacity are needed to maintain supply during calm nights or winter doldrums. In practice, a grid dominated by intermittent sources must either oversize its generation fleet dramatically or lean on backup fuels. As Earthrise Accord notes, without a firm nuclear backbone, a renewables-based grid ends up needing “massive overbuild (covering vast landscapes with turbines and panels) or continued use of coal, oil, and gas to fill the gaps”earthriseaccord.org. That is not a sustainable solution – it’s “wishful thinking, a form of green theology that ignores physical and economic realities”earthriseaccord.org. In Germany, for example, shutting down nuclear while scaling renewables led to a resurgence of coal and gas burning, stalling emissions cutsearthriseaccord.org. Without reliable baseload power, even wealthy nations struggle to keep the lights on without fossil fuels. This intermittency problem means enormous battery farms or other storage must be deployed. Yet grid-scale storage technology is still expensive and technologically challenging at the required scaleearthriseaccord.org. Relying on yet-to-be-achieved storage miracles is a risky foundation for national energy policy.

  
  

• Materials and Supply Chains: Building out renewables to 100% requires vast quantities of raw materials – steel, concrete, rare earth metals, lithium, cobalt, copper – for turbines, panels, and batteries. The mining and processing of these materials carries significant environmental and social costs. There’s also a looming supply chain bottleneck: scaling wind, solar, and battery production to the levels envisioned (and doing it sustainably) is a Herculean task. Moreover, renewables infrastructure has a finite life: solar panels and turbine blades wear out and must be disposed of. Already, heaps of decommissioned “giant fiberglass turbine blades [are] headed to landfills,” and toxic byproducts from battery and panel production are mountingearthriseaccord.org. These wastes and upstream impacts get little attention compared to nuclear waste – which, ironically, is minuscule in volume and well-contained in comparisonearthriseaccord.org. A strategy that leans overwhelmingly on renewables must confront the full lifecycle impacts: from massive mining of critical minerals to eventual disposal of millions of panels and batteries. Without diversification (including nuclear), a “renewables-only” path could trade one set of environmental strains for another.

In short, a renewables-heavy approach faces serious practical hurdles. None of this implies wind and solar aren’t valuable – they absolutely are essential pieces of the puzzle. But treating them as the only solution while eschewing firm, high-density power sources leads to infeasible plans. As one Earthrise commentator put it, scenarios of deep decarbonization “without nuclear may work on paper or in isolated cases, but at large scale [they] often lead to energy scarcity or continued fossil fuel reliance”earthriseaccord.org. That is precisely what a Net-Zero America built exclusively on renewables would risk: either energy shortages or a quiet reliance on natural gas as backup (the outcome Germany and California have flirted with). Nuclear energy’s unique strengths – dispatchable 24/7 output, minimal land use, and long-lived infrastructure – directly tackle these challenges. By downplaying those strengths, the Princeton framework and others like it set up a climate plan resting on brittle foundations.

Nuclear Realism vs. Renewables Orthodoxy at Princeton

The subdued role of nuclear in the Net-Zero America report did not emerge in a vacuum – it reflects a broader tension in the research and advocacy community, including within Princeton itself. On one side are experts like Princeton’s Jesse Jenkins, a lead author of the report and a well-known proponent of an “all of the above” strategy that includes advanced nuclear. Jenkins’s work, through Princeton’s ZERO Lab, has highlighted the value of firm low-carbon resources and even shaped federal policy to support “clean firm power” like next-generation reactors and carbon captureprinceton.eduprinceton.edu. The very passage of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) with its nuclear production credits and advanced reactor incentives is due in part to analyses from Jenkins and colleagues, which were “widely cited by the White House”princeton.edu. In short, there is a strong pro-nuclear current within Princeton’s energy research.

Yet, alongside that current runs a powerful renewables-only orthodoxy. Many academic and NGO voices – some of them colleagues in Princeton’s environmental and security programs – remain skeptical of nuclear or outright hostile to it, clinging to an outdated anti-nuclear stance. Earthrise Accord’s investigations have shown that many well-intentioned institutions and experts became “captured by a ‘renewables-only’ ideology,” reflexively opposing nuclear power even as climate realities grew more direearthriseaccord.org. This orthodoxy often treats wind, solar, and battery solutions as the exclusive path, downplaying or dismissing nuclear as too risky, too slow, or unnecessary. At Princeton, one can see this dynamic in the contrast between the Andlinger Center energy modelers (pragmatic about including all tools) and some voices in the Science and Global Security sphere who emphasize nuclear proliferation risks or cost downsides over climate benefits. The result is a political balancing act within the research community: even as Jenkins and others contribute analyses showing nuclear’s importance, the overall messaging of a project like Net-Zero America gets tempered to avoid challenging the renewable-centric consensus too directly.

The influence of this orthodoxy showed in how Net-Zero America was framed. Rather than plainly stating the MIT-backed conclusion that excluding nuclear would likely doom our climate targets, the Princeton team presented nuclear as a kind of optional add-on. In scenarios without explicit constraints on renewables, the model simply doesn’t build much new nuclear – not because nuclear isn’t needed, but because they assumed it would remain costly or face public resistance. This assumption arguably baked the anti-nuclear bias in, yielding a self-fulfilling prophecy where nuclear looks irrelevant. Insiders suggest that Jenkins’s pro-nuclear insights may have been toned down in the final report to maintain consensus among collaborators, some of whom align with the “100% renewables” vision. Such internal dynamics are common – researchers conscious of political palatability might not spotlight nuclear too aggressively for fear of clashing with colleagues or funders committed to wind and solar. But bending to this “green orthodoxy” has consequences: it risks turning ostensibly rigorous analysis into a polite fiction. As Earthrise Accord argues, a climate movement guided by “wishful thinking” and ideological hang-ups – rather than engineering realities – ends up sabotaging its own goals. The Princeton report’s treatment of nuclear exemplifies this: by skirting the hard truth about nuclear’s indispensability, it presented a rosier-but-unrealistic path that appeased the orthodox view, at the cost of clarity.

Biden’s Climate Strategy and the 2024 Wake-Up Call

Politically, the influence of Net-Zero America reached the highest levels – and not necessarily to positive effect. The Biden administration essentially adopted the Princeton framework as a blueprint for its climate agenda. Biden’s team leaned on the Princeton modeling to justify massive investments in renewables, electric vehicles, and grid expansion, as seen in the IRA and related policiesprinceton.eduprinceton.edu. By contrast, a 2018 MIT study urging aggressive nuclear build-out received far less attention in Biden’s circle. The choice to favor Princeton’s renewables-heavy roadmap over MIT’s nuclear-forward strategy may have seemed politically savvy at first – it aligned with the preferences of influential environmental groups and a base enthused by the Green New Deal. However, as the 2024 election cycle revealed, this decision came with significant political vulnerabilities.

For one, the Princeton-style strategy offered a target-rich narrative for opponents. Republicans and fossil fuel interests were quick to brand Biden’s climate plan as a war on traditional energy – pointing to visible initiatives like cancelling pipelines, pushing wind farms, and phasing out gas cars, while downplaying the administration’s quieter support for nuclear. With few high-profile nuclear projects to show (since those take time and were less emphasized), Democrats struggled to rebut the charge that their plan was unrealistic and harmful to workers. The absence of a strong nuclear component made it easier for critics to caricature the policy as “all solar panels and Teslas” – in other words, benefitting coastal elites and tech firms, but offering little to working-class or rural Americans. This narrative found fertile ground in 2024. Even though climate change ranked behind economic issues for many voters, the symbolism of energy policy loomed large: the GOP portrayed the Democrats as willing to sacrifice jobs and grid reliability on the altar of a renewables-only dream. High gasoline prices in 2022–23 and fears of winter blackouts were linked (fairly or not) to the administration’s approach, further eroding trust among blue-collar communities.

Importantly, by not championing a robust nuclear build-out, Democrats forfeited an opportunity to proactively address these concerns. A nuclear-inclusive climate plan can credibly promise both climate action and industrial revival – e.g. constructing new reactors means thousands of skilled trade jobs, often in the same regions and for the same unions that fossil fuel projects employed. As Earthrise Accord’s “abundance agenda” analysis notes, nuclear power is uniquely positioned to drive an “industrial revival” with “high-quality union jobs” and broad economic benefits, helping reconnect the Democratic Party with working-class votersearthriseaccord.org. Biden’s climate strategy, however, remained tilted toward renewables subsidies and efficiency measures that, while beneficial, don’t ignite the public imagination or labor support in the same way. The result was a lukewarm reception in precisely the swing states and constituencies Democrats need. In the 2024 cycle, Democrats found themselves constantly playing defense on energy: assuring coal miners that solar installer jobs would come to Appalachia, or telling Midwest rural counties to tolerate forests of wind turbines on their skylines. Meanwhile, a more “nuclear realist” platform could have allowed Democrats to go on offense – championing homegrown advanced reactor projects, pledging stable grid reliability, and undercutting GOP arguments about energy security.

The electoral warning signs were clear. From the perspective of Earthrise Accord and other climate realists, the 2024 political headwinds for Democrats were partly self-inflicted by an energy narrative that sounded detached from working people’s needs. Aligning too closely with a “100% renewables” narrative made it easy for opponents to cast the Democrats as ideologues out of touch with economic reality. Indeed, an overreliance on renewables without visible heavy-industry projects feeds the impression (fair or not) of an elitist agenda of austerity – telling people to use less energy, accept higher prices, and trust in a future of ubiquitous windmills. As the Roosevelt Institute warned, “policies built on scarcity and austerity” alienate voters and fuel populist resentmentearthriseaccord.org. Unfortunately, by sidelining the abundance narrative that nuclear power could have embodied, Democrats ceded the mantle of pragmatism. In 2024, that translated into a lack of enthusiasm among some union workers, skepticism in manufacturing towns, and an opening for Trumpist populism to claim “Democrats care more about climate ideologues than your jobs.” It was a stark lesson: Climate policy must be credible and inclusive if it is to be politically sustainable. And credibility, as energy experts know, requires acknowledging that fast, large-scale decarbonization needs nuclear in the mix.

When Climate Policy Loses the Working Class

A particularly troubling aspect of the renewables-only orthodoxy is how it inadvertently alienates working-class and rural communities – the very groups that should be central to a just energy transition. Climate justice isn’t only about reducing emissions; it’s about who benefits and who bears the costs of the new energy economy. Here again, the contrast between a renewables-only approach and a nuclear-inclusive approach is stark.

Consider the jobs and economic gains. Utility-scale solar and wind farms do create jobs, but many are temporary construction roles or lower-wage manufacturing positions, often not unionized. Once a solar farm is built, it needs relatively few staff to operate. By contrast, nuclear plants provide long-term, high-skilled employment – plant operators, engineers, security, maintenance – typically with strong union representation and wages that far exceed the national median. A single large reactor can sustain hundreds of permanent jobs for decades. For communities like those around the current fleet of nuclear plants (often rural towns or small cities), these facilities are an economic anchor. When Democrats fail to vigorously support replacing aging reactors with new ones, or building plants in new locations, they miss the chance to offer a tangible livelihood to these communities. Telling a nuclear plant worker or a coal miner that they can install solar panels instead has not been a winning message – it sounds like a downgrading of their skills and way of life. In contrast, involving those workers in building the next generation of nuclear reactors (or operating them) leverages their industrial expertise and pride. An Earthrise Accord commentary notes that nuclear energy, done right, is “fundamentally pro-labor,” representing “massive public and private investment in building things – power plants, supply chains, advanced reactors… That means high-quality jobs—often union jobs—on a large scale.” This is exactly the kind of climate solution that can unite environmental goals with labor interests.

Now consider rural impacts and landowners. A renewables-only push often means siting sprawling wind and solar farms in rural areas (since that’s where land is available). While some farmers welcome the extra income from leasing land for turbines, many rural communities have begun pushing back against being made the “energy colony” for big cities. Industrializing vast tracts of countryside with wind turbines and transmission lines can breed resentment, especially if locals feel decisions are made by urban policymakers who don’t understand rural life. In contrast, nuclear plants are geographically flexible – they can be located near where power is needed or at retired coal plant sites, minimizing new land intrusion. They also have a small footprint: a nuclear facility might take a couple of square kilometers, versus the thousands needed for equivalent renewable output. By failing to emphasize nuclear, policymakers essentially chose an approach that concentrates renewable infrastructure in rural regions, often without commensurate local benefits. It’s not surprising that this can lead to a political backlash. In the 2024 cycle, we saw more talk of local moratoriums on wind farms and counties rejecting solar projects. To rural voters, “renewables-only” can sound like “they want to cover our fields with panels and turbines and then tell us it’s for our own good.” This perception further widens the urban-rural divide that has plagued national politics.

The irony is that a truly ambitious climate agenda should be a boon for working-class and rural Americans – if only it were framed around building big things (like nuclear plants, transmission lines, carbon-free industrial hubs) with well-paid American labor. Instead, the Democratic mainstream narrative in recent years often felt like an awkward mix of high-tech utopianism and conservationist frugality. The Earthrise Accord framework of “nuclear realism” aims to correct that by insisting that climate solutions be both scientifically sound and socially equitable. Any plan that glosses over reliability, or asks everyday people to bear inconvenience without clear benefit, will falter. By marginalizing nuclear, Democrats ended up with a plan that sounded like sacrifice – electric bills might rise, gas cars would be phased out, familiar power plants would close – without the offsetting vision of abundant clean energy and industrial renewal. Little wonder, then, that many working-class voters remained skeptical. As one analysis put it, the politics of “scarcity and austerity” in climate policy “alienates voters” and “undermines democracy by fueling populist resentment.”earthriseaccord.org We saw that play out: communities who felt unseen in the Democrats’ climate narrative were more receptive to populist promises to bring back coal or “unleash American energy” (even when those promises were empty). To win these hearts and minds for climate action, the lesson is clear – offer solutions that improve their livelihoods and respect their communities. Nuclear power, coupled with robust investment in local economies, can do that; a renewables-only approach, often, has not.

Earthrise Accord’s Perspective: Nuclear Inclusion as a Moral Imperative

From the Earthrise Accord point of view, embracing nuclear energy is not just a technical preference – it’s a moral and strategic imperative for true climate justice and energy equity. Earthrise Accord’s mission is grounded in the idea that “there can be no climate justice without energy justice, and no energy justice without embracing the full potential of clean, reliable, zero-carbon technologies, including nuclear.”earthriseaccord.org In practice, this means calling out “false solutions” and convenient half-measures that politicians sometimes prefer. A renewables-only narrative, while politically expedient in certain circles, amounts to a false solution if it cannot realistically deliver deep decarbonization on the timeline required. It may be comforting to imagine we don’t need nuclear or other dispatchable clean sources, but as Earthrise advocates bluntly state, “justice without realism is rhetoric.” Ignoring hard physics in favor of wishful thinking does a disservice to the very climate goals and frontline communities we aim to protect.

By marginalizing nuclear, policymakers perpetuate a form of “energy inequity.” The wealthy world might afford to gamble on less efficient all-renewable grids (backed by gas peakers or costly storage), but developing countries and vulnerable populations won’t have that luxury. They need abundant, reliable power to escape poverty and adapt to climate impacts – exactly what nuclear can provide without emissions. Failing to invest in nuclear innovation and deployment thus worsens global injustice: it withholds a critical tool that could help deliver clean energy to billions. Even within the US, the burdens of an unstable or expensive energy system fall hardest on the poor. Blackouts, energy price spikes, and industry shutdowns hurt low-income and marginalized communities first. Nuclear realism insists we don’t accept those outcomes as the price of decarbonization when a better path exists.

Crucially, Earthrise Accord emphasizes accountability for the decades of anti-nuclear disinformation that got us here. As documented, fossil fuel interests quietly funded anti-nuclear campaigns knowing that sidelining nuclear would lock in more demand for oil and gas. Unfortunately, much of the environmental movement took the bait – some activists still treat nuclear as a bigger threat than climate change itself. This history underscores why we must be vigilant against “short-term political conveniences” in climate policy. It might be easier, politically, to appease anti-nuclear sentiments or declare a simplistic 100% renewable goal. But easier isn’t always ethical. The ethical route is to confront misinformation, re-examine biases, and pursue all effective solutions with urgency. As Earthrise’s founders put it, “realism is not cynicism, but courage: the courage to see the world as it is, and to fight for the world as it could be.”earthriseaccord.org In energy terms, that means acknowledging the limits of wind and solar alone and having the courage to champion nuclear power’s role despite decades of stigma.

The stakes are too high for anything less. Continuing to downplay nuclear in our climate strategies will only perpetuate a cycle of inadequate action: emissions reductions that fall short, and political support that frays when promises don’t match reality. The Net-Zero America report and the Biden plan built on it were wake-up calls in this regard – they showed that even well-intentioned experts can err on the side of optimism and consensus at the cost of truth. But course corrections are possible. By integrating the insights of the MIT study and Earthrise’s nuclear-inclusive framework, future climate blueprints can be both honest and inspiring – honest about what it really takes (build everything, especially nuclear), and inspiring in the vision of an energy-abundant, equitable future.

Conclusion

It is time to move beyond the renewables-only orthodoxy and embrace a stance of nuclear realism for the climate crisis. The Princeton Net-Zero America project, for all its valuable analysis, ultimately presented a roadmap that was politically palatable but technically incomplete. The Biden administration’s reliance on that framework – instead of a bolder nuclear push – exposed fault lines that opponents eagerly exploited in 2024. If there is a silver lining, it’s that these missteps can inform a better path going forward. A climate policy that fully includes nuclear power (alongside renewables and other tools) is not only more scientifically sound; it is more socially just and politically viable. It offers the promise of reliable clean energy without massive land sacrifice, of good jobs and economic revitalization in communities that need them, and of actually hitting our climate targets rather than just virtue-signaling them.

In the battle for a livable planet, downplaying one of our best weapons is a grave error. We must correct the record that relegated nuclear to the background. As Earthrise Accord argues, true climate justice demands we use every means to decarbonize rapidly – and that means treating nuclear energy as indispensable, not optional. The hour is late, and the task is enormous. Facing it with eyes open and tools ready is the only responsible choice. Anything less is just delaying action behind comforting delusions – a luxury we can no longer afford.

Sources:

• Princeton University, Net-Zero America report summaryreddit.comreddit.com

• Earthrise Accord analysis by E. Anders (2025)earthriseaccord.orgearthriseaccord.org

• MIT Energy Initiative, The Future of Nuclear Energy in a Carbon-Constrained World (2018)earthriseaccord.org

• Princeton ZERO Lab / Jesse Jenkins interview (2023)princeton.edu

• Earthrise Accord mission and research excerptsearthriseaccord.orgearthriseaccord.org

• Abundance vs. Austerity II: Nuclear Power and the Battle for America’s Future, Earthrise Accord (2025)earthriseaccord.orgearthriseaccord.org