Global Nuclear Renaissance: Between Media Hype and Chinese Domination.

While tech giants and governments around the world announce a return to nuclear energy to power AI centers, the stark reality on the ground shows a deep gulf between ambitions and execution. According to Bloomberg's analysis, the US and Europe are facing a “hollow” industry that has lost its expertise, while China is building reactors at a rate of 10 units per year, using state funds and a fully integrated domestic supply chain

A turning point, according to Shoko Oda and Dave Merrill, occurred with the Vogtle project in Georgia. The first new American nuclear power plant in three decades was completed after years of delays and at a cost that more than doubled the original budget. Analysts warn that this project was a "turning point" after which economic actors in the U.S. lost faith in their own ability to build domestically. By contrast, China is building reactors at a price that is less than one-fifth of the cost in the U.S. and Europe.

Nuclear Reactor Demographics: A Race Against Time

Average age of the American fleet of 94 reactors is 44 years, and the U.S. strategy is currently to extend the operating life of existing units to 80 years, while newer projects (such as NuScale's SMR design) have not yet entered the phase of full-scale construction. On the other hand, China will, according to current projections, overtake the U.S. in capacity by 2032, thereby gaining a key advantage in the energy-intensive race to develop artificial intelligence.

The authors also claim that despite sanctions and the war in Ukraine, Russia's Rosatom continues with ambitious plans to double capacity, while India enters the race with a target of 100 gigawatts of capacity by 2047, which requires investments of an astonishing $211 billion.

Thus, the so-called "West" is paying the price of a decade-long slowdown from the 1980s to today when the construction of new nuclear capacities was practically at zero. Bloomberg also confirms that, despite marketing, no small modular reactor (SMR) in the West is yet in the stage of full-scale construction, and that small modular reactor technology does not have the capacity to replace fleets of large-capacity reactors.

But the main conclusion of Bloomberg's analysis is that the stagnation of the nuclear industry in the West is not due to a lack of money, but a loss of industrial capacity. The United States and France, once leaders, have not built new reactors for decades, and even today their projects are extremely slow, as with the aforementioned Vogtle, Flamanville, Hinkley Point C, and Sizewell C.

And the main advantage of the Chinese nuclear industry is economies of scale: China builds 10 units per year, which produces the effect of so-called mass production. And thanks to state financing and a domestic supply chain, Chinese reactors cost less than 20% of the price of the American or European equivalent. In a world where electricity is a commodity, this price difference is unbeatable for Western commercial models.

Bloomberg's piece we highlight as it also contains a lesson for Serbia: if you enter a project without your own human infrastructure (engineers and builders who know how to work with nuclear standards), you risk the fate of the Vogtle, Flamanville, Hinkley Point, and Sizewell: drastic budget overruns and potential decade-long delays. Also, reliance on SMR technology is very likely not to be able to fulfill all promises given in the future, so relying on it can be a risky bet on “hype” instead of on proven technology.

Also, you can read the full text on Bloomberg's site.