The industry is finding it increasingly difficult to profitably operate existing reactors - especially ageing reactors requiring refurbishments - let alone build new ones.

This year has been the nuclear power industry's annus horribilis and the nuclear renaissance can now be pronounced stone cold dead.

Nuclear power suffered its biggest ever one-year fall in 2012 - nuclear generation fell 7% from the 2011 figure. Nuclear generation fell in no less than 17 countries], including all of the top five nuclear-generating countries. Nuclear power accounted for 17% of global electricity generation in 1993 and it has steadily declined to 10% now.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has downwardly revised its nuclear power projections, and now anticipates growth of 23% to 100% percent by 2030.

Historically, the IAEA's upper projections have been fanciful, and its lower projections are usually much closer to the mark. So annual growth of a little over 1% is about as much as the industry can realistically hope for. And the IAEA will further reduce its projections when it factors in this year's annus horribilis.