World faces setbacks on energy challenges

Slower-than-expected progress on nuclear power means the world must look elsewhere for decarbonisation options

Recent developments in new energy technologies—as well as energy shortages, drastic oil and gas price increases, and widespread disruption to energy markets—suggest disheartening challenges to the clean and energy-abundant future the world had come to expect from technological advances and aggressive government climate change policies. The hope that zero-emission nuclear energy would help the world achieve its decarbonisation goals led to a focus on small modular reactors (SMRs) as the most likely candidates for achieving that objective. The designs proposed by several players were touted as the future of fission energy, and a sure bet that they could soon be a bridge to an eventual fusion e