Climate change, the world’s unquenchable thirst for power and the geopolitical tensions and price instability associated with oil have combined to spark a renewed interest in nuclear energy. None of these factors would mean much if the nuclear industry had been plagued with significant safety concerns, but it has been 28 years since the Three Mile Island incident and 21 years since Chernobyl. In the interim, nuclear energy has provided a reliable source of base-load electricity to the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada.1 As of July 2007, over three-quarters of the operating nuclear reactor units in the U.S. have renewed or are seeking renewal of their operating licences for extended periods of up to 20 years.2 There are 19 separate locations at existing plants in the south eastern and north eastern United States, as well as Texas, which are currently considering constructing new nuclear reactors...