the energy constant that is maintained between governments

Before Donald Trump takes office on January 20, 2025, Biden has prepared a roadmap for nuclear energy. With changes or not, we will see, both governments understand each other on nuclear energy issues.

The roadmap. On November 12, the current Biden government published a roadmap explaining the objective of tripling the country’s nuclear capacity by 2050. This initiative was born as a result of an agreement signed last year at COP28.

In the action plan they have detailed how they will deploy an additional 200 gigawatts of nuclear energy through the construction of new reactors, the resumption of plant operations and the modernization of existing facilities. However, they have also contemplated having an operating capacity of 35 GW within a decade.

Will Trump agree? During his first term, Donald Trump supported and promoted policies to promote the development of nuclear energy. During that period he passed laws such as Nuclear Energy Innovation and Modernization Actbut cut the budget of the Department of Energy (DOE) which is linked to nuclear.

For this new mandate, forecasts indicate that the 47th president will continue to provide support, since in his rallies he announced that he would help supply electricity to factories and data centers. However, in an interview in October he stated that “they are becoming too big, too complex and too expensive”, which has generated uncertainty in the nuclear industry.

Despite these statements, in July 2024, both parties approved the law Advance which gives the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission new tools to regulate advanced reactors, strengthen the supply chain and deploy new nuclear technologies.

What does the document that Biden leaves say? Nuclear development in the United States has been hampered by a lack of skilled labor, domestic fuel supplies and infrastructure regulation. The 36-page document describes that the country must supply clean and safe nuclear energy.

Recommendations include measures to license large reactors and ensure long-term fiscal support. Additionally, the possibility of installing microreactors at Department of Defense facilities is being considered.

The future of nuclear in the United States. The demand for nuclear energy in the United States has increased following the need of large technology companies for this type of energy. Furthermore, the main sources of financing have their sights set on nuclear energy.

This year, large technology companies began to bet on nuclear energy. Microsoft was the first to sign an agreement to reopen the Three Mile Island plant that had stopped working in 2019. Google and Amazon followed for their data centers. Finally, Meta has been the last to join.

Donald Trump’s approaches to nuclear energy are pending review until the beginning of next year, as are the measures he is going to take with renewables. Analysis by Reuters and the Wall Street Journal have explained that the clean energy boom may have its days numbered. However, what we know so far is that Elon Musk is part of his cabinet and we can only wait to find out what will happen.

Image | Emma Kaden’s photo Flickr and Pixabay

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