Jonathan Tirone reports that the potential for nuclear power to play a role in the fight against climate change is growing as low interest rates make capital-intensive investments more attractive, the International Atomic Energy Agency said.
Assuming that investors would demand a return of between 3 percent and 7 percent for financing the construction of reactors, and fossil-fuel generators will have to pay $30 per ton for their carbon emissions, nuclear power is a cheaper option than coal and natural gas, the IAEA said in a report Tuesday. The agency used discount rates of 5 percent to 10 percent last year for its calculations. The estimates are very sensitive to the discount rate assumed, said Edwin Lyman at the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington, a group that remains essentially anti-nuclear because of its founding objectives of the 1960s. In theory, expanding nuclear power is an option that could help to reduce carbon emissions but the problem is putting that theory into practice, says the UCS.
The claims that the nuclear-power industry focus has shifted toward Asia as safety concerns and cost overruns have slowed construction in Europe and the U.S. are untrue in fact. The $37.9 billion Hinkley Point project, Britain first nuclear plant in three decades, is being challenged in court by the usual anti-nuclear groups, while the recent economic-development plan from China envisions as many as 8 to 10 new nuclear plants a year through 2020.
To play a bigger role in efforts to restrict climate change, the industry would need to have high construction rates but also to maintain those rates over several decades, David Shropshire, the IAEA head of planning and economic studies. The challenge is also financial as such resources would have to be mobilized to deploy nuclear plants worldwide, which would be anticipated with such projects. Read carefully in this article for quotes from experts that appear to have been exaggerated.
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