alt Hacker NewsMay be base-load is not the best term but in case if batteries and other storages will run out during long cloudy stretch with weak winds nuclear will at least allow to power critical infrastructure. It’s bad that some consumers will loose power but less bad than total apocalypses when the storage is empty and you have no unintermittent power source in the grid.
for the foreseeable future that weather-anomoly backup role is going to be filled by gas. Spins up very fast, nearly zero marginal cost while sitting idle. And yes, it creates emissions, but if you're only using it for rare weather events, you're probably talking >5% of the supply annual total that produces emissions. Which is fine.