One should bear in mind that, from 1 kilogram of enriched uranium, present-day light water reactors (LWRs) can produce the energy equivalent of roughly 150,000 kilograms of coal. A uranium-breeder reactor can derive from 1 kg of natural uranium the equivalent of over 1 million kilograms of coal. A similar ratio applies to thorium in a thorium breeder reactor. //

Could nuclear power be expanded rapidly enough to eliminate the use of fossil fuels for electricity generation in the foreseeable future? //

In a speech on national television in March 1974 French Prime Minister Pierre Messmer announced an ambitious plan to make nuclear-generated electricity the foundation of the nation’s energy system. He declared “France has not been favored by nature in energy resources…. There is almost no petroleum on our territory, we have less coal than England and Germany and much less gas than Holland…. Our great chance is electrical energy of nuclear origin…. We will give priority to electricity and in electricity to nuclear electricity.”

Following the Messmer Plan, France’s nuclear power expansion proceeded at a rapid pace. During the 1980s, 44 new nuclear power stations went on line – an average of 4 per year. Nearly all were standardized in design, with two basic types producing 900 and 1300 MW of electric power each. Standardization reduced costs greatly, and construction times for most of the plants were between 5 and 7 years.

In less than 15 years the percentage of electricity generated from nuclear plants rose from about 7% percent in 1975 to over 75% in 1990. //

The irony of the situation is that the environmentalist movement is to a significant extent responsible for the continued dependence on coal and gas power plants.

It is quite conceivable that we would have had practically CO2-free electricity today if it had not been for the intense campaigns against nuclear energy, mounted continuously for over half a century in the United States and Western Europe.

Although there are good reasons to be concerned about the safety of nuclear power plants – reasons we will discuss – the political opposition to nuclear energy has on the whole been characterized by ideology and hysteria rather than rationality.

In my view the rational response to the accidents in Chernobyl (1986) and Fukushima (2011) would have been to demand fundamental innovations in the design and operation of nuclear power plants – such as those I shall describe later – rather than attempting to block the development of nuclear energy altogether. //

Unfortunately, in the transition to commercial electricity production by nuclear reactors, most of the innovative reactor designs developed in the early period, were dropped in favor of a single basic type: the light water reactor (LWR). Here the starting point in the West was the successful US Navy program to develop reactors to power submarines. Other reactor types, such as so-called fast breeder reactors, have so far played only a marginal role.

In retrospect the fixation on LWRs as the mainstay of civilian nuclear energy, to the virtual exclusion of other types, was a mistake. The main reason was cost-cutting in the field of R&D, more than intrinsic advantages of LWR reactors. Through lack of developed alternatives, nuclear energy became stuck with the limitations of LWRs. We need to correct this.