When I think about something everyone likes, I think about cake and parfait. That’s mostly because I watched Shrek recently and Donkey does a great job of talking up those two things. Next to join that list of things that everyone likes might just be nuclear energy. A recent Pew Research poll from this spring showed that support for nuclear energy has gone from 43% in 2020 all the way to 59% now – a16-point surge in just 5 years.
Not only that, but both Republicans and Democrats are polling at over 50%, showing that this is one of the places where both parties feel positively. There’s just a 17-point difference between Democrats and Republicans on this issue, which pales in comparison to the difference in their support for other energy sources like coal mining and offshore oil, which each have a difference of 50% or more.
While we at the NEI content team would like to take all of the credit (we’ll take 99% of it), there are many great reasons for this advancement in public opinion from across the nuclear energy industry. We’ve seen increased support from politicians, businesses, Wall Street, and even influencers all leading to more awareness in the public – and in turn, more support.
It all starts with awareness. Folks simply aren’t going to support something that they don’t know much about or are even aware of. That’s why folks like Gabriel Ivory, who brought an “I heart Nuclear” sign to College Gameday, are so important to the industry. They’ve brought awareness into a more general population, where folks may not always be thinking about the best ways to power our grid or clean our air. That’s also why NEI launched a brand campaign, Nuclear Makes It Happen, to spread the good word.
This goes hand in hand with folks in the industry working to be clearer about how they’re benefiting the communities that they serve. Before, many communities didn’t really know how nuclear was benefiting them. But now, the industry is showing how they’re helping by showcasing the great jobs they bring to an area as well as the massive amounts of clean energy to power homes and local businesses.
Lastly, the benefits to nuclear energy are just being highlighted more and more by our growing energy needs and need for clean energy. With just under one-fifth of U.S. electricity coming from nuclear already, folks are seeing that it can provide massive amounts of energy using very little space. This is going to be crucial as things like data centers that require a great deal of energy continue to ramp up.
As everyone in the nuclear energy industry continues to row in the same direction, we’ll see that approval rating continue to increase. In no time folks might be mentioning nuclear in the same breath as cake and parfait.
.jpg?language=en-US)
.png?language=en-US)
