> ...nuclear power is the only viable option that is available today...
Nuclear power in itself is unlikely to solve our energy problems. It is only a part of the solution. We will not be able to supply the world with enough energy using nuclear power alone given the length of time it takes to design, approve, build, and certify a nuclear power station.
You'd be surprised at how quickly people can get things done if their lives are on the line.
We have more then enough thorium in the world to deal with the world's power demands (It's about as common as lead), we have much safer reactor designs created and tested, and we have thorium designs created and tested. It's just that there is a lot of politics and public opinion is not for nuclear power, it is very much for "green" power, which makes it not politically viable to create the number of nuclear plants needed supplant say coal/oil/gas fired power stations as our main supplier of baseload power.
The major problem with solar is that the sun goes down half of the day, there isn't any viable means to move power halfway across the world and there isn't any viable means to store anywhere near the amount of energy that is required to power a civilised country overnight.
Although academic, and with the possible exception of geothermal, astral energy is actually our only source of energy, albeit with differing latencies.
Fossil fuels contain energy from ancient biomass supported by the Sun, and heavy radioactive isotopes (like all heavy elements) are formed in supernovae.
Nuclear power in itself is unlikely to solve our energy problems. It is only a part of the solution. We will not be able to supply the world with enough energy using nuclear power alone given the length of time it takes to design, approve, build, and certify a nuclear power station.
The Sun is by far our greatest source of energy.
Have a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_resources_and_cons...