WRT. energy needs - pulling carbon out of the atmosphere will be energy-intensive; it's yet another reason why we need clean and cheap energy (and lots of it!). Nuclear shouldn't be taken off the table.
Seeing the shape of the slope needed now and comparing it to the shape we have needed in e.g. 2000 and knowing the current political climate in the U.S. makes me very pessimistic that the 2 deg limit will be achieved, and knowing how dramatic e.g. 4 degrees or more are going to be, I doubt anybody can expect much “progress”. More some medieval developments.
The current estimate is +3.2 deg in 2100, but it still assumes that the current actions progress:
http://folk.uio.no/roberan/t/global_mitigation_curves.shtml