As my colleague Wesley A. Hill wrote, Russian-enabled geopolitical turmoil in Africa, which Russia is using to try to acquire formerly French uranium assets, helped force Europe to double its import of Russian uranium in 2023. The US was no better, remaining dependent on Russian nuclear exports even after the war in Ukraine restarted in 2022. The US imported Russian nuclear fuel until May 14th, 2024, over two years after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began, from the same entities that the White House sanctioned.
Russia is not alone in surpassing the US. China is also far ahead of the US in the nuclear energy industry. China’s nuclear power industry has retained its domestic focus, with twenty-three power plants under construction in China as of July 2023. This is due to increasing energy demand, as China continues to develop its economy. The United States is constructing a single nuclear power plant. While China has refined its nuclear power production process, the last plant built in the US arrived 7 years late and 17 billion dollars over budget, as a testament to America’s byzantine permitting and environmental review system.
China has built upon this expertise also to begin supplying reactors abroad. The China National Nuclear Corporation and China General Nuclear Power Group have developed a third-generation reactor called Hualong One. This new reactor began operations in 2021 in Fuqing. In 2023, China began construction on the Chashma-5 nuclear power plant in Pakistan, which will use Hualong One reactors. Such actions contribute to China’s capacity to construct infrastructure abroad and expand its influence.
The American nuclear power industry was once the world's envy, peaking with 112 operational reactors in 1990, with America on a path to carbon neutrality much earlier than current predictions. 34 years later, the United States has lost nearly a third of its operational nuclear reactors, has built almost no new ones, and its average reactor age is decades old. If nothing is done to rectify this, in the next 10-15 years, scores of nuclear reactors will have to be retired as their operational lifecycles end, and as a result, America will have to contend with nearly 20% of its electricity capacity evaporating.
Despite these obstacles, changes are finally coming. Public attitudes towards nuclear energy have positively shifted amongst Democrats, independents, and Republicans. US officials are now working with the Export-Import Bank the US International Development Finance Corporation and small modular reactor developers to secure foreign contracts, with prospects including Bulgaria, Ghana, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, and the Philippines.
In Congress, the House passed the Atomic Energy Advancement Act, which will ease regulatory hurdles by increasing hiring at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and lowering application fees. It will also incentivize nuclear reactor innovation through awarding financial prizes. It has yet, at the time of writing, to be considered by the Senate.
American businesses like General Atomics and Bechtel also stand to benefit if barriers to U.S. nuclear power developments are removed. The International Atomic Energy Agency estimates that global nuclear energy generating capacity can reach up to 890 gigawatts by 2050, up from 371 gigawatts in 2022. According to the Nuclear Energy Institute, US nuclear energy exports of both hardware and expertise could lead to more than $1 trillion of business at that time.
Nuclear energy is at an inflection point as global powers realize that nuclear energy will play a prominent role in combating climate change and projecting their economic power. In the U.S., the Senate should pass, and President Biden should sign the Atomic Energy Advancement Act to jump-start America’s domestic nuclear sector for domestic and international projects. Continuing the prioritization of SMRs through the EIB and USIDFC is also a policy that is overdue. Failure to act now would not only be a missed financial opportunity for American nuclear power businesses but a major geopolitical defeat, as more countries become dependent on Russia and China for their energy during the green transition.