New York Times Today2 Dec 2023 11:50
22 Countries Pledge to Triple Nuclear Capacity in Push to Cut Fossil Fuels
The group, including Britain, France and the United States, said the agreement was critical to meeting nations’ climate commitments
The United States and 21 other countries pledged on Saturday at the United Nations climate summit in Dubai to triple nuclear energy capacity by 2050, saying the revival of nuclear power was critical for cutting carbon emissions to near zero in the coming decades.
Proponents of nuclear energy, which supplies 18 percent of electricity in the United States, say it is a clean, safe and reliable complement to wind and solar energy. But a significant hurdle is funding.
Last month, a developer of small nuclear reactors in Idaho said it was canceling a project that had been expected to be part of a new wave of power plants. The cost of building the reactors had risen to $9.3 billion from $5.3 billion because of increasing interest rates and inflation.
Britain, Canada, France, Ghana, South Korea, Sweden and the United Arab Emirates were among the 22 countries that signed the declaration to triple capacity from 2020 levels