Part of me thinks that a hydro electric power plant has a much bigger impact on the environment than a nuclear power plant does.

For example if a dam bursts you are kinda screwed, but also when you take it into operation, especially the big ones that can compete with nuclear power, they have to flood a massive area behind the dam as far as i understand. Nuclear power is just a really warm reaction that produces heat in a really small area. Its the containment buildings and safety mechanisms that take up space (which is what they didnt have in chernobyl, but they did have it at Fukushima, and in fact there was 3 meltdowns at Fukushima but only 1 single dokumented case of ilness as a result after all these years :) and fukushima is inhabited by about 200k people, they were only evacuated initially out of an abundance of cautation but could return immediately caus the powerplants safety mechanisms worked and prevented another chernobyl despite being hit by the largest earthquake in history and then a goddamn tsunami and experiencing 3 meltdowns compared to chernobyl which was only 1. And how did germany respond? they decided to shut their nuclear power program even tho Fukushima showed that even under the worst circumstances nuclear power is safe..) thats all. TKHAGKJSDHGKJDSH