It's kinda wild that there is a science that allows us to harness an almost limitless power of molecules for almost entirely clean energy, but the US just wants to literally burn ancient dinosaur fossils for energy despite it being a major cause for the total collapse of the environment.
Remember when we first figured out how to do this and everyone though that by the 2020s we'd be running nuclear powered cars and vacuum cleaners and shit?
Yeah me neither cause I wasn't born yet but still, why couldn't I have been born into that world
They have to write something that sounds plausible against the backdrop of american exceptionalism.
Looking at Wikipedia, the US has brought 2 new nuclear reactors online at a plant in Georgia this decade. Meanwhile, China, has brought 8 online in the same time span. Before those 2 reactors, the US only brought 1 other online since 1996, and that one began construction in 1973. If I counted correctly, China has brought 54 online and operational in that same period, all since 2002. Most have a capacity of at least a gigawatt like the most recently completed US reactors. China also has 25 reactors already under construction, while the US has none. Just 9 that are planned. Also, the US hasn't managed to get a reactor operational within 10 years of the start of construction since 1987, while most of China's recent new reactors have taken around 6 years from start of construction to operation.
Some of China's reactors are designs from US companies, so the US clearly has the ability to design competitive reactors. Building them is another story though.