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The paper addresses the issue of long-term forecasting of the global nuclear power market and opportunities for studying its individual sections. Given the current state of the market and related industries, a scientific approach to strategic forecasting based on evaluating dispersions of forecasts acquires particular significance. The authors first developed and applied a probabilistic forecasting technique to a number of market indicators of the global nuclear power industry in real terms for the period up to 2035. In particular, the calculations concern the number and electric capacity of input-output nuclear power plants; and the demand for natural and enriched uranium and enrichment services. The forecasting is based on stochastic modeling of NPP lifecycles and exploitation parameters, uranium enrichment rate, and nuclear energy planes in the different regions. The proposed model, as opposed to scenario approaches, means that the probability distributions of mentioned values can be calculated. This is of crucial importance in assessing the economic risks for various economic agents operating in the world nuclear technology market. The results of modeling the main indicators of nuclear power markets (the dynamics of the net electric capacity of nuclear power plants worldwide and across the largest regions) are consistent with the scenario forecasts provided by WNA and IAEA (2013), which are based on data provided by the members of these organizations. This fact indicates the correct choice of the model for describing the frequency distributions of the key stages of reactor ‘arbor vitae’. The authors modeled the likely volumes of the market for constructing new NPP and taking the stopped ones off the road for the next 15 year period in the different regions, Russia and worldwide. Finally, the paper estimates the likely share of the new Russian designed NPP construction in the world market for the period up to 2030.

This paper summarizes the experience gained in the application of multi-criteria decision making and uncertainty treatment methods to a comparative assessment of nuclear energy systems and related nuclear fuel cycles. These judgment measures provide a means for comprehensive evaluation according to different conflicting criteria, such as costs, benefits and risks, which are inevitably associated with the deployment of advanced technologies. Major findings and recommendations elaborated in international and national projects and studies are reviewed and discussed. A careful analysis is performed for multi-criteria comparative assessment of nuclear energy systems and nuclear fuel cycles on the basis of various evaluation and screening results. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the lessons learned, to share the identified solutions, and indicate promising future directions.

This paper examines the history of nuclear energy, safety developments of reactors and nuclear energy policy from the 1950s on. I investigate the effects of nuclear accidents on energy policy with the help of a panel dataset of 31 countries from 1965-2009, using annual data about the capacity of reactors under construction, primary energy consumption, as well as three nuclear accidents scaled INES five or higher by the International Atomic Energy Agency. After determining the extent of the accident impact in the different countries, I find that neither Three Mile Island nor Lucens had a worldwide negative effect on construction starts, while Chernobyl did. The effect of Chernobyl is however shown to wear-off in certain geographical clusters, after ten to thirty years. I find that nuclear capacity enlargement shows a significant persistence, but it was also driven by primary energy consumption in the past five decades. The effects of real interest rates, inflation, or gross domestic product on reactor construction were not found significant. Thus, an accident is likely to have a negative and long lasting impact in the country where it happened, and possibly in countries affected by the direct consequences, or where governments are subject to severe public pressure. It is difficult to estimate the consequences Fukushima is going to have on worldwide power plant constructions, but areas closer to the accident might be affected more negatively and for a longer time. Growing concerns of energy supply security and greenhouse gas emissions may counteract this impact at the legislative level.

The Fukushima disaster has lead the French government to release novel cost information relative to its nuclear electricity program allowing us to compute a levelized cost. We identify a modest escalation of capital cost and a larger than expected operational cost. Under the best scenario, the cost of French nuclear power over the last four decades is 59. €/MWh (at 2010 prices) while in the worst case it is 83. €/MWh. On the basis of these findings, we estimate the future cost of nuclear power in France to be at least 76. €/MWh and possibly 117. €/MWh. A comparison with the US confirms that French nuclear electricity nevertheless remains cheaper. Comparisons with coal, natural gas and wind power are carried out to find the advantage of these Financial support from Generalitat de Catalunya (XREPP), Ministerio de Economia y Competitividad and Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovaci-n (contract ECO2010-16353) are gratefully acknowledged. This paper was revised during a summer visit at the Australian National University in 2013