Rear Admiral Michael Hewitt, Co-Founder and CEO of Allied Nuclear and its parent company IP3, appeared on The Capitol program, hosted by Lebanese journalist Maria Maaloof.
Hewitt spoke about how climate change, decarbonization and rapid population growth and urbanization across the world requires more energy — not less — to power tomorrow’s economies and mega cities.
“Countries that are stable and have plenty of electricity have the luxury of talking about decarbonization and being 100% carbon-free,” Hewitt said. “But nations that don’t have adequate electricity, such as India and many of the African countries, aren’t prepared to be carbon-free; they need [more] electricity.”
“It is critically important for us to recognize that the emerging-market countries … need foremost [more] electricity and if it can be clean at the same time; that’s great,” continued Hewitt. Nuclear energy offers an abundant supply of clean baseload power to ensure growing manufacturing and urban centers continue to have their needs met, he said.
Despite the challenges, Hewitt said climate progress “has to be driven by commercial opportunity. It has to be driven by what we call market principles.” Technological innovation and capital from the private sector must drive clean energy transitions; not subsidies and government policy, he said.
