Following the opening of its first commercial nuclear power plant in 1958, the industry flourished with 112 plants operating by the 1990s. But appetite for nuclear energy soon waned as the US “shale revolution” drove gas prices down. Nuclear energy’s days were numbered, or so it seemed.
Now, to the surprise of many, nuclear energy is back. Today, nuclear constitutes 19 per cent of the US energy mix and there are plans to double the capacity of nuclear energy by 2050. Why is it making such a comeback?
