nuclear-news

Nuclear outpaced fourteen to one by wind and solar in Europe

• Joe Bernardi, Vanessa Levy, Ye Huang, and Jessie Cato
•  Global Energy Monitor (accessed) 4th Sept 2025

Key points

• Aging infrastructure, unrealized plans, and high costs continue to limit nuclear’s role in swift decarbonization, while solar and wind power are expanding rapidly and outpacing nuclear in new capacity and generation.
• Nearly 40% of all nuclear power ever proposed has been cancelled: 566 gigawatts (GW) of nuclear capacity has been cancelled worldwide, more than what is currently operational (401 GW) or retired (116 GW) combined.
• Europe’s nuclear sector has lost 122 GW of planned capacity to cancellations, more than the operating nuclear fleet of any single country worldwide. An additional 68 GW has been retired, and 90% of the remaining reactors are more than 35 years old. In contrast, European wind and utility-scale solar capacity under construction or in pre-construction outweighs nuclear by a factor of more than 13 to 1.
• Australia’s moratorium on nuclear, lengthy projected development timelines, high costs, lack of expertise, and strong public and policy preference for renewables mean nuclear is unlikely to play a significant role in filling the gap left by the country’s planned coal phaseout by 2038…………………………………………………………………………………………… https://globalenergymonitor.org/report/nuclear-outpaced-fourteen-to-one-by-wind-and-solar-in-europe/

September 6, 2025 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | EUROPE, politics