As nuclear power dies, solar rises

By Denis Hayes and Scott Denman

April 22, 2014 

About 370,000 mirrors in the Mojave Desert reflect sunlight for a "power tower" system that powers 140,000 California homes.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Writers: On Earth Day we celebrate the dawn of the Solar Age, decline of nuclear power
• They say in the U.S. and worldwide, solar power installations are proliferating
• Writers: Nuclear reactors are aging and uncompetitive and it's too expensive to build new ones
• Writers: In 2013, U.S. and the world on threshold of sustainable, clean energy future

(CNN) -- At long last, this Earth Day we celebrate the true dawn of the Solar Age. That sunrise is hastened, here and abroad, by the slow demise of the once-touted "too-cheap-to-meter" Atomic Age of nuclear power.

As utilities find nuclear power less and less cost effective, new solar photovoltaic installations in the United States are springing up. New solar installations in 2013 reached a record 4.2 gigawatts, bringing the total to 10. On average, one gigawatt of solar photovoltaics powers 164,000 U.S. homes. That means power for 1.6 million homes.