Technology moves on, something often not appreciated. Only a few years ago few people would have thought wind turbines the size of what's being built today would be feasible, LED lamps were a dream and as for a quick electric car with a 200+ mile range, no chance.
I remember several instances when doing engine development work when the old-timers would say "we tried that 20yrs ago and it didn't work". Well, the concept was the same but the reason it didn't work was materials, manufacturing methods, or control systems etc, and those have moved along and now it will work.
I feel nuclear was/is a key player. It's not a perfect solution, but there probably isn't one in the near future. As I've said before, we mustn't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. If something can be done now and is better than what we have, then do it. You can always replace that when something "better" comes along.
One thing we should be honest about is the folly of burning wood to make electricity. That really is a political con-trick. It's the way it is treated as a "renewable" so zero carbon in the country where it is burned. The carbon is safely locked up in the fuel. When you have a choice of fuels to burn to generate electricity you use the one which releases the least CO2, and that's gas. From what I can find wood is about 1.5 times the CO2 of coal, and 3 or 4 times that of gas. Why would anyone burn wood? Sure it's renewable, but so is gas and coal if you wait long enough. Burning wood means a "carbon debt" for the next 50-100yrs until the trees grow back and re-absorb what you've released, it's stupid counting what it absorbed while it was growing as the "credit card" to borrow for the present.
I'm sure we could reduce the demand for electricity quite easily if we really wanted to. Just thinking about what is used and reducing it 5 or 10% would make a big difference at probably very little cost, bang for buck would very probably be much greater than other technology approaches. It's an attitude thing. Look at all the lights on in big buildings, there's no need for it, easy to switch stuff off either manually or automatically. Reducing demand is a no-brainer, less is better regardless of how it is generated, and in reality it's the dirtiest generation which provides the marginal energy, turn off the kettle and they turn down a gas fired power station, not a wind turbine.