David Crane, NRG Energy’s president and chief executive, thinks of his company as “the little blue train”' – the one in the children's storybook that, despite being so small, managed to pull the broken engine over the hill so the good boys and girls would get their toys.

Only in his version, it is NRG that is still chugging ahead, long after people either gave up or simply forgot about the company. Not only that, but now NRG is coming to the rescue of the people of America with much-needed nuclear energy.