The reason storage for renewables is still hypothetical has to do with the fact that the storage has not really been required yet because people are still willing to burn stuff.
Also, when you offer nuclear as an option, you need to remember that nuclear can't do the job without storage either - unless you're willing to pay out of your nose for something that sits idle most of the time.
Also, in your incomplete list, you're missing biomass, biogas, thermal-electric storage, thermal storage (in the UK, a lot of the energy required could be stored and used as heat) and grid interconnections.
Thermal and thermal-electric are still not widely deployed. But biomass and biogas are.
> Also, when you offer nuclear as an option, you need to remember that nuclear can't do the job without storage either - unless you're willing to pay out of your nose for something that sits idle most of the time.
The disparity between peak electricity consumption and minimum electricity consumption is not so great as most people make it out to be [1], and base load still accounts for the majority of electricity demand.
Furthermore, nuclear plants can module their electrical output by more aggressively cooling the reactor. Your claim that nuclear requires storage is demonstrably false: France operates a grid over 70% nuclear (over 80% at its peak) without energy storage.
What do you mean by biomass and biogas? Burning wood and capturing methane from landfills has been done, but not on a relevant scale.
Thermal and thermal electric storage remain in the prototyping stage. If they prove to be cheap and scalable then great. But that's still in the world of hypotheticals, it may or may not pan out.
Also, when you offer nuclear as an option, you need to remember that nuclear can't do the job without storage either - unless you're willing to pay out of your nose for something that sits idle most of the time.
Also, in your incomplete list, you're missing biomass, biogas, thermal-electric storage, thermal storage (in the UK, a lot of the energy required could be stored and used as heat) and grid interconnections.
Thermal and thermal-electric are still not widely deployed. But biomass and biogas are.