nucleareurope participates in Energy Transition Summit panel

On 20 March 2024, nucleareurope’s Communications & Advocacy Director Jessica Johnson was invited to join a panel during the 2024 Energy Transition Summit. The focus of this panel was ‘From infrastructure to integration: addressing challenges on the renewable generation journey’.

During the discussion she underlined the fact that demand for decarbonised electricity is expected to rise dramatically over the coming years. This is why the focus needs to be on supporting all those technologies which can help meet this demand, ie nuclear and renewables. Policymakers have an important role to play in this respect, as legislation needs to be centered around goals (eg Net-Zero, security of energy supplies) rather than cherry-picking technologies.

When asked about which future nuclear technologies are expected to make a difference Jessica explained how Small Modular Reactors are expected to fit into the hybrid energy system of the future.  In this respect, she noted for example how SMRs could operate alongside industrial clusters, where you would have your wind, solar and SMR providing decarbonised electricty, combined with an electrolyser for hydrogen. Under such a system, SMRs could also provide industry with much needed decarbonised heat.