Nuclear faces its own energy transition

The fuel may appear to be in terminal decline, but it remains the focus of Great Power competition, suggesting it is not dead yet

The energy transition is, to distil it to its core, a move to a lower and eventually zero-carbon energy mix. But what might be the role for nuclear power, which is free of CO2 emissions? At first glance, not a lot. Nuclear's popularity with the environmental lobby can be summed up by NGO Greenpeace’s successful campaign to get Germany to ditch it years before there was any momentum for the country to abandon its polluting thermal and brown coal industries. And, while wind and solar costs have fallen precipitously, the new generation of European pressurised reactors (EPRs) have proved an almost 20-year black hole of delays and hair-raising cost escalations. But John Reilly, a prominent energy