High interest rates are not helping. They were too high for too long anyway but the (possibly temporary) impact on sentiment from the budget is making them seem even more unsuitable for current conditions.

I suppose there is always sun/wind/tide somewhere.

Can an “Internet of energy” combined with small-scale storage and energy demand smoothing work?

I have an amateur enthusiasm for the idea!

I don’t really know.
Flow batteries are an interesting technology.
The proliferation of home solar installations with batteries will provide some demand smoothing.
But for seasonal rather than daily fluctuations maybe long-distance transfers could work?

Don’t restrict the sources to just Europe. There are proposals to bring renewable electricity to the UK from North Africa.
I’m just commenting as an interested citizen- no particular industry knowledge

Agreed. It seems likely that we won’t need nuclear. Instead we will have a combination of renewables, storage and long-distance electricity transmission.