Global nuclear power generation is on course to decline after a record-breaking 2024 on insufficient investment and aging power plants, the World Nuclear Industry Status Report has warned.
Ahead of the official release of the report, later today, Reuters wrote that, in addition to already announced new nuclear projects, 44 new nuclear power plants need to be built to keep the 2024 momentum going over the next five years.
The likelihood of that happening, however, is questionable. In addition to lower than necessary investments in maintenance and new construction, there are other challenges as well, such as cost overruns and growing competition from other power generation technologies. The World Nuclear Industry Status Report noted things like wind, solar, and batteries among these.
“Together these new technologies are evolving towards a highly flexible, fully electrified energy system… outcompeting traditional centralized fossil and nuclear systems,” the WNISR said, reporting that last year, investments in the above three were 21 times higher than investments in new nuclear, and capacity additions were 100 times more than net nuclear additions.
It bears noting, however, that wind and solar have a lower efficiency ratio than nuclear, which means a lot more capacity needs to be installed for the same amount of generation. Separately, wind and solar do not generate dispatchable, round-the-clock electricity and batteries that help with that are still not part of every wind and solar installation, despite falling costs. The technology remains quite costly, but nuclear is becoming costlier, the report noted.
Unsurprisingly, China led the world in nuclear energy last year and will continue leading it this year. The report noted the resurgence of interest in nuclear energy but said that unless investment increased, the share of nuclear in the global energy mix was going to fall further this year, from 9% in 2024.
By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com
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