Report: 350,000 new US jobs from nuclear revival

Tuesday, 23 September 2008

Up to 350,000 jobs and $542 billion in GDP could be created over 20 years if the USA embarks on a program of substantial investment in nuclear energy, according to the American Council on Global Nuclear Competitiveness (ACGNC).
 

In a report prepared for the ACGNC, Oxford Economics studied the economic benefits of a reinvestment program for the US nuclear power industry. The report - entitled Economic Benefits of Nuclear Energy in the USA - looked at the economic and employment effects of an investment scheme involving the design, manufacture, construction and operation of 52 new light-water reactors of 1400 MWe capacity each, one new recycling facility (with capacity to process 2500 tonnes of used nuclear fuel annually) and four new enrichment facilities (with a combined annual capacity of 14.3 million separative work units).
 

Sea to shining sea   The US states expected to gain the most new jobs from a possible nuclear build program are: South Carolina (50,800) Texas (47,100) Illinois (43,400) Florida (29,300) California (22,100) Pennsylvania (21,500) New York (20,800) North Carolina (20,700) Ohio (20,600) Maryland (17,900) Arizona (17,300) Georgia (15,200)

This program, the report said, would involve two overlapping phases of work: the 'investment phase' (the construction and manufacture of a new fleet of nuclear reactors, nuclear recycling plants and enrichment plants); and, the 'operation phase' (when the reactors and plants start commercial operation).
 

According to the report, the total economic benefits of the investment program would be up to $61.5 billion, with $33.6 billion arising during the reactor construction phase, $16.1 billion during the construction of the recycling and enrichment plants, and a further $11.8 billion during the operations phase. The number of jobs created during the reactor construction period would be 268,000, the report estimates, while a further 136,000 jobs would result from the construction of the recycling and enrichment plants. The operation of the reactors and plants would involve an additional 96,000 jobs.

The report also examines the extent to which each of these benefits are experienced in each US state, firstly according to current planned construction (33 reactors by 2021 in 15 states) and then by an assumed replacement of current capacity involving 19 more reactors by 2025 in a further six states.

 

"Without the substantal program of new investment," the report says, "the capacity of the US nuclear energy industry will dwindle to zero by 2050. The specific jobs and associated value-added and tax benefits that industry would support will also be lost."
 

According to the report, a large proportion of the jobs that would be supported by the nuclear investment program are manufacturing jobs in the production of the capital goods necessary to support the nuclear energy industry. "These are high-tech, high-value-added jobs that reflect high spending on R&D and fixed investment: jobs that the US economy can ill afford to lose." It adds, "Alternative ways of meeting US electricity generation needs would be unlikely to create so many high-value-added manufacturing jobs."
 

The report notes that maintaining the current level of nuclear generating capacity in the USA would help the country save up to $49 billion annually on fossil fuel imports while reducing US CO₂ emissions by 450 million tonnes per year (compared to a zero-nuclear-generation baseline).
 

Scott Campbell, president of the ACGNC, commented: "This state-level analysis clearly and powerfully articulates the benefits of building new nuclear infrastructure. A serious program of new nuclear construction offers substantial gains in job creation, GDP growth and greenhouse gas reductions."

The ACGNC is a non-profit organisation that says it seeks the return of American leadership in the world through the emergence of a US-led global nuclear enterprise.