Fusion has been 10 years away, with proper funding. It never got that funding. It struggled to maintain the break even funding to keep skilled people employed, and the lights on.

The difference is that over unity has been achieved, in a normally sustainable manner. The funding is such that it's 5-10 years at current funding. Most of that is building the actual test plants.

I fully agree that renewables are currently the best cost option. The catch is that they are not viable everywhere. They are also inherently low density, so can get expensive in certain areas.

Basically, we want a mix of options, to fit local requirements. Nuclear (and later fusion) should be part of the plan.

In practice, I'm of the take what we can get. We need to crash CO2 output, and we need to do it yesterday. Anything speeding that up is a win, as far as I'm concerned.

Nuclear is cleaner than any other power option.

It's just Oil Industry lies that make it seem "dirty". Lies that started at the very beginning.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0009279723004544