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12 J. World Energy L. & Bus. 1 (2019)

handle is hein.journals/jlowdeylw12 and id is 1 raw text is: Journal of World Energy Law and Business, 2019, 12, 1-3 doi: 10.1093/jwelb/jwy038 Advance Access Publication Date: 11 December 2018 Editorial Introduction to the special issue on the changing global nuclear energy industry: commercial and legal challenges The global nuclear energy industry is undergoing profound changes. The optimistic projection of a 'nuclear renaissance' in existing nuclear power countries has been discredited, or at best remains fragile. A combin- ation of safety considerations and rising costs have reduced the appeal of nuclear power across much of the EU and North America, as well as in Japan and South Korea. Many Western vendors are struggling to survive and nuclear power plants (NPPs) have been abandoned half way through construction. In contrast, state- owned companies from Russia, China and, to a lesser extent, South Korea, are marketing their wares overseas to a growing number of industrializing and developing nations that want nuclear power. Russia's Rosatom is moving beyond the confines of the former Warsaw Pact to secure projects or promises of projects across South Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Plants in Turkey and Bangladesh are under construction. The three Chinese state-owned nuclear vendors are still busy building new plants at home, but have also been making significant moves overseas, notably in Pakistan, Argentina and the UK. Meanwhile, Korea's KEPCO, in part- nership with the Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation, will soon commission the Arab world's first NPP, and is in the running for a UK project. The aim of this Special Issue of the Journal of World Energy Law and Business is to review the state of play in the global nuclear energy industry and to examine some of the commercial and regulatory challenges that NPP vendors and new build countries face. Ira Martina Drupady sets the scene with a historical overview of the development of civil nuclear power before examining the motivations of the newly rising NPP vendors. Whilst the companies from Russia, China and Korea all have commercial ambitions to internationalize, the governments of Russia and China, in par- ticular, are using nuclear energy as one of their many tools of global diplomacy. For the newcomer countries, these state-owned vendors offer many advantages. Intergovernmental agreements may not only cover the construction process and the full supply chain, but may also include favourable financing terms and capacity- building for both the host government and the partner corporation. These developments raise a number of concerns. Will the rise of these new NPP vendors undermine the global governance of nuclear safety and se- curity? Will it weaken healthy competition by crowding out the established vendors? Will the newcomer countries be able to regulate their new nuclear power industry effectively? To what extent does the newcomer country put itself at a strategic or security disadvantage through its long-term dependence on the NPP vend- or state? Finally, it is still far from clear that these vendors will have the capacity and sustained state backing to fulfil their ambitious internationalization strategies. In these ways, the paper sets the agenda for the rest of the Special Issue. Fabienne Pehuet addresses one of the most pressing concerns for NPP vendors that are not backed by the state and for host country governments, namely financing. NPP projects have high capital costs, and long lead times and life times. Whilst similar in some ways to large extractive industry projects, nuclear power proj- ects have their own specific risks. They are sensitive to government energy policy and regulatory standards, © The Author(s) 2018. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the AIPN. All rights reserved. . 1

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