Wind power is most efficient when atmospheres are thick, but Mars’ low atmospheric density means that wind on the planet produces significantly less force than wind on Earth. For this reason, the Martian wind had not been regarded as a viable energy resource. Hartwick and colleagues have challenged this assumption and shown that diurnal and seasonal fluctuations in solar energy could be compensated for by wind energy. Hartwick says that they “were surprised to find that, despite Mars’ thin atmosphere, winds are still strong enough to produce power across large portions of the Martian surface”.The study suggests that wind could work in combination with other energy resources such as solar to boost power generation. This could be especially helpful during local and global dust storms, when solar power decreases and available wind power increases. Wind would also be a useful resource at night and around the winter solstice.
It will be interesting to see how things shift from SpaceX providing their own power for ISRU to a more general power supply organization as the economy blossoms. A non US nuke is an interesting twist but I would not be surprised to see the whole thing solar.
However. At some point solar won't scale very well, proportional to the size of the base or colony. Local real estate will be covered with panels, and growth will require greater and greater area to supply energy needs. As that point approaches, nuclear will be the only real option for baseline power but that day is far down the road.
I'm wondering about OP's premise that the nuclear "...option is unrealistic for a private company operating out of the US." Why is that?
The only issue I see is the concern about an exploding SH/SS spilling a reactor on Paducah, but the fanboiz have been assuring us for years that by then SH/SS will be operating like an airliner and be so safe that it won't even need a LES. In that case, what's the problem? With the public conditioned to an unending stream of successful launches so boringly flawless that there's no news coverage, they will have a hard time getting worked up about a small reactor heading to a dot in the sky that they can't even point out.
Can thermal energy be a useful commodity? There's semi-serious talk of steam tanker trucks on earth. If you had a cask of hot liquid silicon, would that be functionally useful in terms of a market?
Solar will work if you have a year to produce enough fuel to return. And like someone said, solar farms will grow with each landing Starship bringing panels. The problem with a small nuke power plant, even if another country makes it, is launching it from the US. Permits have to be acquired for each launch. SpaceX once landed on Mars, may be able to get NASA's help to launch a nuclear power plant. I could see massive solar farms using rolled solar panels. Large battery banks would also have to be brought for night use. Small nuclear plants could be brought, say around 10-20 ton units on trips to be coupled together for a larger power source for 24/7 power. What would be the power production of solar vs nuclear mass wise on transporting to Mars? Has anyone worked this out?
Will it get to the point when the land area taken up by the solar farms is restricting the actual settlement growth ?
If you have food production, unless it is in very lossy greenhouses, you automatically have too much heat in your habitat....Because the habitats are well insulated, they can overheat easily. So heat is more of a bother than a resource.
My own proposal is here:https://marspedia.org/Cost_of_energy_on_MarsNuclear is cheaper, but solar can do the job.
This "encyclopedia" seems to contain some heavily fudged pro-nuclear numbers.
