Energy is the life-blood of every country and the key factor in determining its stability and control over its own future. But the key question is “who controls it; the host country or Russia and China?”

We are about to see explosive growth in the global power sector, and today you’d have to say that most of that business will go to Russia and China. The construction of plants to meet the needs of half the world’s population will represent the largest infrastructure project in human history.

And it’s not just the business. With ownership and control over the generation of electricity goes huge political power; for example, power to influence the price of oil in Saudi Arabia, or of cobalt in Congo, or to control traffic through the Suez Canal. Thus far the United States has not been competitive.

Still, it remains plausible that the United States could rally companies here at home and engage partners from among other traditional nuclear power producers. Such a consortium could lead the competition against Russia and China and ultimately rebuild our own industry.

Energy Secretary Rick Perry and the Department of Energy are doing all that they can to enable the recovery of our nuclear power industry. We must do that. If we fail, we will lose the leading role that includes the right to set the standards and make the rules that have foreclosed the enrichment of nuclear fuel and the launch of clandestine nuclear weapons programs.

Our country participated in the negotiation of an agreement with Iran that was designed to constrain the development of its nuclear weapons program. Whatever one may think of that agreement it has clearly stimulated a determination among the Gulf Arab States to achieve an equivalent nuclear power capability.