121 Oct 2008 01:33
Nuclear capacity could rise fourfold by 2050-OECD
PARIS, Oct 16 (Reuters) - Nuclear power generation capacity could grow almost fourfold by 2050, although securing political and public support will be crucial, the OECD said on Thursday.
'By 2050, global nuclear capacity is projected to increase by a factor of between 1.5 and 3.8,' the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development's Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) forecast in its first Nuclear Energy Outlook.
If capacity growth is at the top end of forecasts, the nuclear share of global electricity production would rise to 22 percent by 2050, up from 16 percent today with 1,400 reactors of the size currently used operational, the NEA added.
In June 2008, there were 439 nuclear reactors operating in 30 countries, with a total capacity of 372,000 megawatts.
Current national plans and statements of intent suggest that the countries having the largest installed nuclear capacity in 2020 will be the United States, France, Japan, Russia, China and Korea with China and the United States planning the largest increases.
France, Japan and the United States currently have 57 percent of the world's nuclear capacity.
Although a number of countries without nuclear power have plans to build reactors, those are likely to add only 5 percent to the installed capacity by 2020, the agency said.
SECURING POLITICAL AND PUBLIC SUPPORT
But the agency warned that in order to achieve such an expansion political and public su