The large scale use of nuclear power during the 1950s and 1960s was con­centrated in the USA, UK, Russia and Canada. Whilst some Western European countries began developing research programmes (often with experimental reactors), many full scale nuclear plants did not start producing electricity until the later 1960s and 1970s (Sweden, Japan, West Germany). West Germany was the first non-weapons nation to start up a nuclear power station in November 1960. However, a commitment to nuclear power is at the heart of the European Union. The Euratom Treaty signed in 1957 is one of the founding treaties of the European Union. The treaty recognised the need for an expansion in the supply of electricity for European economic growth, stating that ‘‘nuclear energy represents an essential resource for the development and invigoration of industry’’. It was also touted as a solution to the urban pol­lution caused primarily by coal-fired power stations located close to urban areas that plagued many of Europe’s cities in the immediate post war period.17

Whist the state took control of planning and construction of nuclear plants in many European countries, in the United States the federal government was keen for the private sector to invest in nuclear power. This proved extremely difficult to do in a situation where cheap oil and coal were available to the energy utilities. As a result, the federal government financed and built a number of demonstration reactors to prove to the private sector that nuclear was feasible. As a result, Westinghouse designed the first fully commercial PWR, a 250-MWe reactor at Yankee Rowe, which started up in 1960. Meanwhile a 250-MWe Boiling Water Reactor (BWR) was designed by General Electric, Dresden-1, which also started up in 1960.[10] [11]

In an attempt to build up the market for nuclear reactors the two major companies, Westinghouse and General Electric initially sustained losses of up to $1 billion per plant. This high risk strategy eventually paid off as a rush of orders from Energy Utilities ensued, amounting to 44 reactors during 1966-1967 alone (Scurlock 2007b). By the end of the 1960s, orders were being placed for PWR and BWR reactor units of more than 1000MWe.[12]

A pamphlet published by the nuclear company Westinghouse in 1967 cap­tures the prevailing optimism about the promise of nuclear power at the time:

‘‘It will give us all the power we need and more. That’s what it’s all about.

Power seemingly without end. Power to do everything that man is destined

to do. We have found what may be called perpetual youth’’.118

The first full-scale civilian reactor to provide electricity to a national grid, a gas graphite reactor, came online in the UK at Calder Hall (on the same site as the Windscale plutonium piles) officially opened with much fanfare by Queen Elizabeth II on 17 October, 1956. Calder Hall eventually comprised four ‘‘Magnox’’ reactors (so called because of the alloy cladding around the fuel rods) which generated 50 MWe of power each, with the plants having both a commercial and military use.[13] [14] [15]

In February 1955, a White Paper A Programme of Nuclear Power took the engineering industry by surprise when it announced a major programme of 12 Magnox stations to be built between 1957 and 1962 (ref. 19, 20). The White Paper justified this by arguing that there would be a growth in demand for electricity that the coal industry could not meet, and that over time electricity from nuclear stations would be cheaper than coal.21 There was a naive assumption that nuclear plants would be no more challenging to build than coal-fired stations. The 1955 White Paper was brimming with such confidence, suggesting that the Magnox programme could contribute 25% of the nation’s electricity at a cost today of $5.7 billion. x™ The Suez crisis created concerns over energy independence which led to increased calls for more nuclear power.23 However, the Magnox programme was characterised by escalation in costs and time overruns which reflected problems in the tendering process, with competing consortia winning contracts at individual plants which meant novel design changes at each site, and as a result economies of scale could not then be realised.™”

Sir John Cockcroft, former head of Harwell, advised Government that electricity generated from nuclear would in all probability be more expensive than alternatives (such as coal). Eventually the Labour government conceded that coal-fired power plants were 25% cheaper than nuclear. Nuclear power stations were seen as additionally useful to reduce the bargaining power of the coal miners’ unions, with uranium being seen as ‘‘strike proof” given that only small amounts were needed to power reactors.24 Indeed one of the earliest campaigns against nuclear power in the UK was initiated by the National Coal Board (NCB),[16] which tried to expose the subsidies provided to the nuclear industry by government. The NCB did not believe the CEGB’s claim that nuclear was cheaper than coal, but were frustrated given they could not gain access to the data on costs which were covered by the secrecy laws that made it impossible to gain information on nuclear matters.

As a result of the 1964 White Paper The Second Nuclear Power Programme, the government chose the 600-MWe Advanced Gas Reactor, which would complement the 4190 MWe generated by the Magnox stations with 8380 MWe of AGR capacity. AGRs were eventually built at seven sites across the UK.25 Each station was built by a different consortia which drove up costs and, as with the Magnox build, this hindered economies of scale. The White Paper on fuel policy in 1967 further reinforced the preference for nuclear over coal.[17] [18] [19] A government statement to the House of Commons in 1963 stated that nuclear generation was more than twice as expensive as coal. The ‘‘plutonium credit’’ which assigned a value to the plutonium produced was used, initially secretly, to improve the economic case, although the operators of the power stations were never paid this credit. During this period of British history, even con­servationists expressed a preference for nuclear power over coal mining in relation to the perceived lesser negative impact on the natural environment.27 Indeed as late as 1972, an article appeared in the journal, Environment, arguing that ‘‘there has been very little public opposition to nuclear power in England’’.™

The role of government regulation and liability guarantees were central to the success of nuclear power. In the USA for example, the Price Anderson Act of 1957 which established a ceiling of $560 million for private sector liability for nuclear accidents, enabled private sector involvement in nuclear power production to proceed.™1

One event was to provide a huge boost to the fortunes of the nuclear industry: the OPEC oil crises of 1973-1974. The oil crises of 1973-1974 which saw oil prices quadruple overnight made energy independence and energy security key policy issues worldwide. In France for example the result was a government review culminating in the ‘‘Messmer plan’’ whose aim was to secure energy independence. As a result 56 nuclear reactors were eventually built.29

Prior to 1973 much of the country’s electricity came from oil. The oil crisis exposed a worrying dependence on foreign states. Lacking domestic fossil fuel, they found themselves highly vulnerable to sudden spikes in the price of oil. Government leaders saw a centrally planned nuclear programme, launched through collaboration with Electricite de France (EdF), as a rational solution. The nuclear option was also portrayed as a resurrection of la patrie—frequent comparisons were made between reactor sites and such hallowed monuments as Notre Dame and the Eiffel Tower. During these years of expansion nuclear energy seemed to embody modernisation, industrialisation and aspirations for technological achievement. In France nuclear power was seen to contribute to the ‘‘radiance of France’’ to counteract the country’s rapidly declining influence in world politics.30,31 As Hecht observes, ‘‘The image of a radiant and glorious France appeared repeatedly in the discourse of engineers, administrators, labour militants, journalists, and local elected officials. These men actively cultivated the notion that national radiance would emanate from technological prowess’’.32,xxul

As a result the percentage of electricity generated by nuclear power in France rose from 7% in 1973 to 78% by 1994 (ref. 33) a level which it has maintained to this day. Other countries such as Japan vowed to intensify their commissioning of new nuclear power stations as a result of the oil crisis, this was particularly acute in nations that had no substantial indigenous energy supplies and that were dependent on imports of oil, coal and gas. Nuclear energy has been a national strategic priority in Japan since 1973. Indeed, across Asia during the 1970s and 1980s a number of countries began to buy and licence western nuclear technologies, leading to a situation today where Japan, South Korea, India and China have burgeoning domestic nuclear R & D capabilities.[20] [21]

The period following the oil crisis then witnessed the biggest increase in nuclear plant orders even seen in France, Belgium, Sweden, Japan and the USSR.34 In this period of exponential growth a total of 423 nuclear reactors were built from 1966 to 1985 (IAEA 2008). The USSR began selling reactors to Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany and Poland, even to Finland.

During this period, the nuclear industry was at pains to demonstrate the benefits nuclear power had for consumers. In a 1975 survey of the 24 American utilities which operated nuclear power plants, the industry claimed that $750 million had been saved in customers’ utility bills in 1974, compared with the cost had the electricity come from fossil fuels only.35 We can see the confidence that policy makers had during this time in the ability of nuclear energy to be the main source of electricity. In 1974, the Nixon administration launched ‘‘Project Independence’’ which optimistically called for nuclear power to provide 50% of the nation’s energy needs by the year 2000.36 However the economic recession that followed in the wake of the Oil Crisis led to a drastic reduction in electricity demand in many countries, which steadily reduced the attractiveness of nuclear plants (and for coal plants) for utilities and governments.™

Whilst we can view this period as one characterised by optimistic expansion and public acceptance, it was also a period when a ‘‘counter-expertise’’ was slowly forming, primarily around environmental NGOs and academics. Decision-making itself remained firmly in the hands of engineers, and governments sought to reassure the public rather than foster transparency, but in some countries there were attempts to move away from the DAD approach to decision making (decide, announce, defend). Books with titles such as Man and the Atom: Building a New World through Nuclear Energy, by the celebrated scientist Glenn Seaborg (1971), celebrated the progressive potential of atomic research. Other books also were published, however, which countered this optimism, such as Curtis and Hogans’ (1969) The Perils of the Peaceful Atom: the Myth of Safe Nuclear Plants. Although the optimistic vision remained dominant, voices were being raised which had begun to question the unbridled optimism of an earlier age.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, there was even opposition to nuclear power in France, particularly at the local level. In 1976, 55% of the French population were hostile to nuclear power and the antinuclear movement had managed to penetrate local representative politics.38 However, a number of factors, including: pro-nuclear trade unions, cross-party consensus on the orientation of energy policy and the fact that the French electoral system made it difficult for smaller parties to enter parliament, impeding this movement in gaining influence on national policy.39

In the UK, the secrecy and closed decision-making structure that had been a feature of the nuclear industry also began to come under challenge during the 1970s, with the government pressured to adopt a more open policy style, epitomised by the six-month Windscale Public Inquiry in 1977. The inquiry was held in response to British Nuclear Fuels’ (BNFL) application to build a thermal oxide reprocessing plant (THORP) for national and international spent nuclear fuels (Hall 1986), a project which critics argued would turn the UK into the ‘‘World’s Nuclear Wastebin’’.40 While the inquiry was hailed by some as a ‘‘landmark in British nuclear policy making’’,41 for its broad scope and participatory approach,42 the final report was criticised for failing to justify why the arguments of the opposition had been rejected.43

In countries which are in the vanguard of new nuclear build today, the oil crisis did not impact upon them in the same way as it did in the West. In China for example, given its reliance on domestic coal for the vast majority of its energy needs, there was no impulse to invest in nuclear. Whilst in 1970 the then Chinese [22] premier, Zhou Enlai, argued that China needed to explore the peaceful uses of nuclear energy, the first nuclear plant did not begin construction until 1985 and only became operational in 1991.[23] A number of factors can help to explain this retarded development relative to the West. State funds available to invest in nuclear plants were not made available by the Chinese government during the 1970s through to the 1990s. Chinese policymakers thought that domestic coal reserves were sufficient to meet the growing energy needs of the country, fur­thermore until 2005 nuclear energy was not part of the nation’s strategic energy plan, prior developments being ‘‘haphazard and lacking strategic vision’’.45 However, whilst public opinion in the West has waxed and waned in relation to support of nuclear power, in China public opinion is strongly supportive.46

In the first two decades of operation there had been reactor accidents in Canada, the UK, the USA and Switzerland, leading to a small number of deaths and millions of dollars of damage, none, however, had been of sufficient severity to throw the industry into turmoil and lead to a reversal in public confidence. This was about to change.