The US nuclear industry has been in decline for most of the past three decades but, thanks to strong backing from the Bush government, 2007 could mark the start of a renaissance.

US energy companies are looking at building more than 30 new nuclear reactors across the country. If any of these projects get off the ground they will represent the first new construction of reactors since the 1979 meltdown at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania. This was the country’s worst nuclear accident and, combined with the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine in 1986, undermined public confidence in nuclear safety and led to the cancellation of dozens of reactor projects.