Nuclear energy for an era of rising demand and strategic risk
Maria Korsnick is president and chief executive officer of the Nuclear Energy Institute, the nuclear industry’s policy organization in Washington, DC, a role she has held since January 2017. This essay is part of the 2026 Global Energy Agenda.
Countries today face a dual challenge: meeting fast-growing electricity demand while building energy systems that are less vulnerable to disruption, coercion, and volatility.
That is the backdrop for nuclear energy’s renewed importance. Around the world, governments are planning for stronger economic growth, more digital infrastructure, expanded manufacturing, and broader electrification. All of that requires dependable power on a larger scale. At the same time, energy security has become more urgent. Geopolitical tensions, fuel-market instability, and supply-chain disruption have reminded policymakers that energy systems must do more than produce electricity at the lowest apparent cost. They must also support resilience, continuity, and confidence over time. Nuclear energy matters more than ever because it speaks to both sides of this challenge at once: It helps meet rising demand and strengthens energy security.
This is why nuclear energy is moving back toward the center of serious energy planning. Countries are looking for power sources that can support modern industry, data infrastructure, and rising living standards without exposing the economy to avoidable risk. They want electricity that is available when needed, at scale, and over many decades. They want systems that can help meet clean energy goals without compromising reliability. Nuclear energy stands out in that setting because it provides large-scale, around-the-clock power and does so in a way that can anchor long-term industrial development. For many countries, the attraction of nuclear energy is no longer theoretical. It is practical. It is about how to build a more secure and more capable economy.
The United States offers one example of why this moment is different. America’s existing nuclear fleet remains one of the country’s most valuable infrastructure assets. Today, ninety-four reactors in twenty-eight states provide nearly one-fifth of US electricity and almost half of its clean generation. That fleet has operated at high levels of safety and reliability for decades. It also anchors an industrial base of utilities, engineering firms, manufacturers, fuel suppliers, skilled workers, and technology developers. For countries assessing the long-term value of nuclear energy, that kind of operating depth matters. It reflects not only a crucial energy technology but an ecosystem capable of sustaining that technology over time.
What is especially notable now is that the US nuclear sector is not only relying on past achievement. It is moving on several fronts at once. Vogtle Units 3 and 4 entered commercial operation in 2023 and 2024, adding new large-scale nuclear capacity to the US grid. Across the existing fleet, plant owners are pursuing license renewals and power uprates that can add significant output from plants already connected to the grid. US nuclear utilities are pursuing license renewals at twenty-six units and uprates at twenty-nine units, with more than eight gigawatts of additional capacity expected from fuller use of existing assets over the next decade. At the same time, advanced reactor projects are moving ahead, including designs that are smaller and simpler and may prove better suited to a wider range of grids, industrial uses, and national circumstances.
That combination of continuity and innovation is important internationally as well as domestically. Countries considering nuclear energy want to see that it is being used, extended, improved, and built in the supplier country itself. They want confidence that the technology rests on real operating experience and durable institutional support. They also want options. Not every country needs the same reactor type, the same financing structure, or the same pace of deployment. A broader range of technologies can make nuclear energy more adaptable to national circumstances and more accessible to countries whose grids or industrial needs do not fit a single model. Here, the United States is well positioned: It has the benefit of an operating fleet with momentum behind uprates and life extensions, and a growing portfolio of advanced technologies coming toward market.
This momentum rests in part on something international partners also notice: broad political support. Nuclear energy in the United States has proved unusually durable across party lines because it advances many interests at once. It supports grid reliability and industrial competitiveness. It creates skilled employment. It strengthens energy security. It helps meet clean energy goals. That is why policy support for nuclear energy has endured across different administrations and changes in control of Congress. The ADVANCE Act, passed with bipartisan support and signed into law in 2024 to develop and deploy advanced nuclear fuel, is one recent example of that continuity. For countries seeking infrastructure partnerships measured not in years but in generations, political durability matters.
The same is true of US nuclear cooperation abroad. Since President Dwight Eisenhower began peaceful international nuclear energy cooperation, the United States has built a record of partnership that reaches well beyond the export of equipment. US cooperation has helped partner countries develop institutions, train workforces, localize parts of the supply chain, and connect those capabilities to broader global networks. Just as important, the United States and its partners have worked together for decades on nuclear safety, security, and nonproliferation, helping make the peaceful expansion of nuclear energy possible on a wider scale. That remains true today. Recent agreements and frameworks involving partners such as Saudi Arabia, Armenia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand show that civil nuclear cooperation remains an active and bipartisan feature of US engagement with allies and partners.
This is one reason the quality of partnership matters so much in nuclear energy. Countries embarking on nuclear programs are not only choosing reactors but also making long-term decisions about industrial development, workforce formation, regulatory confidence, supply-chain participation, and strategic alignment. They want safety and security standards that will endure. They want a relationship that can help build local capability over time. They want confidence that the institutions behind the technology are strong enough to provide life-cycle support for their projects. In nuclear energy, the strength of the partnership is part of the value proposition.
The larger point is straightforward. In a world of rising electricity demand and strategic risk, nuclear energy is becoming harder to overlook. It can support economic growth, strengthen energy security, and provide clean and reliable power for decades. Countries looking seriously at nuclear energy will weigh many factors, as they should. But among the considerations that will matter most are operating experience, technological depth, institutional strength, and a demonstrated capacity for long-term industrial partnership. Those qualities will shape the next phase of nuclear growth.
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Image: Cooling towers are seen at the nuclear-powered Vogtle Electric Generating Plant in Waynesboro, Georgia, U.S. August 13, 2024. REUTERS/Megan Varner