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Conference Spotlight
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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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.
Wei Zhou, Michael J. Apted, John H. Kessler
Nuclear Technology | Volume 170 | Number 2 | May 2010 | Pages 336-352
Technical Paper | Radioactive Waste Management and Disposal | doi.org/10.13182/NT10-A9487
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This paper describes the recent work to evaluate the technical storage capacity for spent fuel in the Yucca Mountain repository. To increase the capacity from the current statutory limit of 63000 tonnes HM commercial spent nuclear fuel (CSNF), two alternative repository designs are proposed and analyzed, which add two additional emplacement drifts adjacent to each current-design drift. All designs assume the same waste package inventory, or heat generation rate, and drift ventilation as the current design. As both alternative designs would fit the well-characterized repository footprint, no additional site characterization at Yucca Mountain would be necessary. The work also examines extended ventilation and phased waste-loading assumptions in anticipation of an expanded role for nuclear power in electricity generation. The key parameter to the storage capacity in the Yucca Mountain site is water movement. To study the thermal and hydrological responses to increased storage capacity, series of two-dimensional models were used to simulate coupled heat and mass (water and air) transfer within the repository system and the near-field subsurface environment, including all geological formations above and below the repository horizon from the surface to the water table. A three-dimensional model was applied to investigate the effect of axial heat transfer and fluid flow. The results show that the current repository footprint can accommodate three times the currently legislated 63000 tonnes HM of CSNF without compromising repository performance.