Government incentives, including providing cost-overrun insurance, would be needed to grow the country’s nuclear industry, Womack said. Other industries would also need to invest to expand nuclear, particularly new technologies like small modular reactors, he added.
“This country will need more nuclear plants going forward,” Womack said at the Reuters NEXT Global Energy Transition conference in New York.
“We’ve got to make investments, but we’ve also got to attract others to be a part of those investments,” he said.
Southern Company, which is based in the U.S. state of Georgia, began commercial operations on its Vogtle 4 reactor this year as part of the first nuclear power plant to be constructed in the country in several decades.
