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Conference Spotlight
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
Standards Program
The Standards Committee is responsible for the development and maintenance of voluntary consensus standards that address the design, analysis, and operation of components, systems, and facilities related to the application of nuclear science and technology. Find out What’s New, check out the Standards Store, or Get Involved today!
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Latest News
IAEA again raises global nuclear power projections
Noting recent momentum behind nuclear power, the International Atomic Energy Agency has revised up its projections for the expansion of nuclear power, estimating that global nuclear operational capacity will more than double by 2050—reaching 2.6 times the 2024 level—with small modular reactors expected to play a pivotal role in this high-case scenario.
IAEA director general Rafael Mariano Grossi announced the new projections, contained in the annual report Energy, Electricity, and Nuclear Power Estimates for the Period up to 2050 at the 69th IAEA General Conference in Vienna.
In the report’s high-case scenario, nuclear electrical generating capacity is projected to increase to from 377 GW at the end of 2024 to 992 GW by 2050. In a low-case scenario, capacity rises 50 percent, compared with 2024, to 561 GW. SMRs are projected to account for 24 percent of the new capacity added in the high case and for 5 percent in the low case.
Technical Session|Panel|Sponsored by OPD
Wednesday, June 19, 2024|10:00–11:45AM PDT|Jasmine C
Session Chair:
Andrew Whittaker (SUNY Distinguished Professor, University at Buffalo)
Alternate Chair:
Chandrakanth Bolisetti (Senior Scientist, Idaho National Laboratory)
Session Organizer:
For the United States to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, we will need to deploy nuclear power plants at an unprecedented speed and scale. Construction of nuclear power plants has been challenging in the recent decades - schedule delays, cost overruns, among other factors, impeded the widely-anticipated "nuclear renaissance" and damaged industry confidence. Civil works amount to almost half the capital costs of nuclear power plant built in the past and are a major contributor to overruns. Without advances and civil engineering and construction methods of nuclear power plants, advanced nuclear construction will face the same barriers and urgent, large-scale deployment will be almost impossible. The goal of this panel session is to bring attention to the importance of civil engineering of nuclear plants and shed some light on ongoing development and much needed technological advances in this topic.
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