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two plants already in the middle of the 1990s. Sweden now gets 50% of
its electricity from 12 nuclear plants. In the Philippines, a completely
constructed plant is being mothballed, and in Austria, a mothballed plant
is to be dismantled.
However, this is not the dominant attitude.
At present the United States has 107 nuclear power stations in
operation, producing 16.6% of US electricity, and 15 new nuclear power
stations are planned to go into operation between now and 1990. The
United States where, according to many, nuclear power is dead, has in
fact by far the largest nuclear power industry of any country and this
will be true also in the foreseeable future.
While there are no expectations about new orders for nuclear plants
in the USA at the present time because of the past excessive ordering and
the long construction times which have been experienced in the last
decade, a good deal of activity is taking place which may in due course
result in such orders. A recent study on energy security issued by the
US Department of Energy points to actions which need to be taken to
ensure a comeback of nuclear power in the US.
In the other superpower, the Soviet Union, the Chernobyl accident
has by no means led to plans for slowing the growth of nuclear power.
The Soviet leader, Mr. Gorbachov, declared already shortly after the
accident that he could not imagine the future world economy without
nuclear power.
However, a reaction comparable to that which occurred in
the Western world after the Three Mile Island accident in the USA in 1979