The US Senate has voted to pass the Inflation Reduction Act. The wide-ranging bill includes support for existing and new nuclear, and according to the White House, marks the largest investment ever in combatting the "existential crisis" of climate change.
 

The leader of Australia's opposition has launched a formal process to examine the potential for advanced and next-generation nuclear technologies to contribute to national energy security and reduce power prices. Peter Dutton said it is "high time" for an "honest and informed debate on the benefits and costs of nuclear energy".

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that keeping the country's final three operating nuclear power reactors online beyond their planned shutdown at the end of this year may "make sense" in order to ensure electricity supplies.

Nuclear power imported from Ukraine could avoid consumption of 5-6 billion cubic metres of gas in the EU this winter - more than one-tenth of the total reduction that EU countries agreed when an extraordinary session of EU energy ministers on the energy crisis was joined by their Ukrainian counterpart, Herman Halushchenko.

Nuclear generation bounced back from the pandemic-related decline seen in 2020, increasing by 100 TWh to reach 2653 TWh in 2021, according to World Nuclear Association's latest performance report which has just been published.

The Belgian government and Electrabel have signed a non-binding Letter of Intent on continuing negotiations on the feasibility and terms for the operation of Doel 4 and Tihange 3 for a further ten years. The two sides aim to agree a binding legal agreement by the end of December.

Japan's Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has called for up to nine of the ten reactors that have already been restarted to be in operation over the winter to avoid electricity shortages. There are currently five reactors in operation in the country.

Tennessee Valley Authority has issued a request for proposals for supplying up to 5000 MW of carbon-free energy that must be operational before 2029. Nuclear power, along with renewables, is listed among the sources acceptable to TVA.

South Korea's new President Yoon Suk-yeol has encouraged a speedy restoration of the country's "nuclear power plant ecosystem" - after Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Lee Chang-yang set out plans, including the aim for work on the Shin Hanul 3 and 4 reactors to resume as early as 2024.

Successful commercialisation of advanced nuclear reactors could lower the total cost as the US transitions to a clean energy system - and increasing investment and policy support for advanced nuclear technology will generate far-reaching national benefits, the study by the Breakthrough Institute has found.
 

The proposed inclusion of certain nuclear and gas activities within the European Union's list of officially approved "green" investments is set to become law after an attempt to block it fails in the European Parliament.

South Korea's government has laid out a new energy policy which aims to maintain nuclear's share of the country's energy mix at a minimum of 30% by 2030. It also calls for the construction of units 3 and 4 at the Shin Hanul nuclear power plant to resume after design work was suspended in 2017 due to uncertainties about government policy on the construction of new reactors.