very enjoyable reading.  The lottery example is a good one--of human habits...so...

I hope that nuclear energy's full potential - and we're not there yet - will not like be "exploited" the last winning lottery ticket, fossil fuels.  On the contrary, I hope that with whatever wisdom we may have realized from the expenditure of our last winning ticket, and the orgy that ensued, will be avoided the next time out.

I think we're going to need something better than hope.  The problem (one of the problems) with nuclear power is that it (as far as I can see) doesn't stop us spending too much--overall (following your analogy)--though it helps with the specific CO2 debt hole we're stuck in.

You seem to think renewables "just won't work".  Nuclear "will work" to reduce C02...but nuclear won't sort out our finances...and those behaviours that got us into this mess.

Whereas "renewables" are, I think, and to follow again the analogy, the equivalent of "(learning to) spend what you have" rather than "what you can get hold of"...?

I think we need to tie nuclear and renewables together rather than see them as enemies...?

(Ref: [as a single e.g.] Jerome's latest diary about wind energy)

(I also think money is a red herring.  Money "appears" when...[take a war, any war]...it is deemed necessary...?)

Don't fight forces, use them R. Buckminster Fuller.