The biggest holdup in building new reactor units in the US has been regulatory, according to new energy secretary Chris Wright.

“I think there is an unrealistic and bureaucratic system created decades ago that has simply been ineffective,” Wright told Fox News.

“We want to have safe, careful regulation of nuclear plants and we have the ability to do that,” he said adding that “so far it has been impossible to build anything new” and the new administration “needs to change that”.