A new report argues that the world’s supply of uranium ore is now so depleted that the nuclear industry may already have passed the point at which it is able to supply the energy needed even to dispose of its own wastes. In The Lean Guide to Nuclear Energy, A Life-Cycle in Trouble, British energy economist David Fleming details how the nuclear industry will be forced to become a major net user of energy, almost all of it from fossil fuels. ‘The evidence is clear: even under the most optimistic scenarios for uranium supplies, the industry will face `energy bankruptcy’ in a matter of decades,’ says Fleming.