As the UK government dithers on how to approach its Net Zero emissions by 2050 target, Hugo Lidbetter, a partner in energy and natural resources at law firm Fieldfisher, considers the role of nuclear in achieving the country's low-carbon future.

"The Moorside and Wylfa Newydd projects, each of which received hundreds of millions of pounds of private sector development costs, were respectively abandoned and put on hold due to lack of government support. Aside from recognising the role nuclear has to play in a Net Zero energy mix, the most obvious gap is a decision on a new build funding model."

Scott Foster, director of the Sustainable Energy Division of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, describes how energy is the "golden thread" that connects the UN's Sustainable Development Goals, and that nuclear power has a role to play in the energy mix of the future. The following is the text of the presentation Foster gave during the webinar the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency held today to discuss its newly published Policy Brief, Nuclear power and the cost-effective decarbonisation of electricity systems.

Sama Bilbao y Leon of the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency describes how resilience - the capacity to withstand and bounce back from major disruptions - takes many forms at nuclear power plants. The following is an abridged version of the presentation she gave during the webinar the Paris-based organisation held today to discuss its newly published Policy Brief, Building low-carbon resilient electricity infrastructures with nuclear energy in the post-COVID-19 era.

Using the regulated asset base model has the potential for cost-overrun that can be somewhat addressed through the 'alliance' model, that is, a model based on one unified agreement under which all parties share the benefits and risks, write Vincent Zabielski and Elina Teplinsky, respectively, special counsel and partner at Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP.

To coincide with the publication of the World Nuclear Association's technical position paper The Enduring Value of Nuclear Energy Assets, World Nuclear News interviewed the co-chairs of the Long-term Operation Task Force, Michael Baron and Abdou Al Mazouzi.

In the early stages of the nuclear power industry, some oil & gas majors entered the uranium industry, but their interest in nuclear power projects is rare, with Total's bid for the Barakah project in 2009 one of the few recent examples. Are these instances historical footnotes, or might there be a role for OGMs in the nuclear power industry today, even considering the current pandemic and overall market conditions, write Amjad Ghori, Melissa Hersh, Edward Kee, Paul Murphy and Xavier Rollat.

Ashot Sargsyan, a lead engineer in the quality assurance department at Armenian Nuclear Power Plant, participated in the World Nuclear University Summer Institute of 2016, in Ottawa, Canada, as a World Association of Nuclear Operators’ scholarship winner.

A sustainable energy supply is crucial for ensuring stable economic growth and improving social welfare while at the same time preserving the ecosystems we live in, writes Evgeny Pakermanov, president of Rusatom Overseas, a subsidiary of Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom.

In 2020, the world has encountered a new global challenge that has affected a record number of people - the coronavirus pandemic. In a matter of weeks, it caused the biggest social and economic upheaval in decades. From the very start, a joint effort was required to combat both this life-changing infection and its consequences.

As the COVID-19 pandemic makes governments and international organisations consider new ways of conducting business and protecting communities, we need to turn the recovery into an opportunity to safeguard the future, writes Christer Viktorsson, director general of the UAE’s Federal Authority for Nuclear Regulation.

"Since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) in December 2019, and the World Health Organisation declared it a pandemic in March, it has triggered shock waves across the globe, locking down over 190 countries and affecting every-day life. The world is experiencing unprecedented challenges."

The COVID-19 pandemic has created an unprecedented demand for personal protective equipment (PPE), part of which must be sterile, i.e. exempt from any microorganism such as bacteria or moulds that can compromise the wearer’s or the patient's safety. It was realised that whilst irradiation is routinely used to sterilise medical products it might also be possible to use the technology to increase the available supply of PPE, writes Paul Wynne, chairman of the International Irradiation Association.

The effect on jobs globally as a result of COVID-19 has been uneven to say the least. While some industries and organisations are booming and hiring thousands, others are being hit hard. The nuclear industry employment situation could be best described as behaving like a nuclear power plant - continuing reliably without creating much attention while competently adapting to the needs of the current situation, writes Callum Thomas, CEO of Thomas Thor Associates.

One of the benefits of safety being at the heart of the culture in the nuclear industry is that consideration for the health and well-being of workers is already the primary objective