Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced last week that the president of El Salvador has proposed to detain deportees from the U.S. of any nationality, including U.S. citizens. This announcement coincided with a less-publicized offer from the United States regarding nuclear power.
El Salvador’s Foreign Minister Alexandra Hill Tinoco stated that a civil nuclear cooperation agreement with the U.S. would enable the Central American nation to generate energy “at competitive prices without relying on geopolitics or fluctuating oil costs.”
“The expertise that [the United States possesses] in civil nuclear energy will provide us with the necessary resources to train our workforce, specifically our Salvadoran experts, who will oversee the technical and regulatory facets of this unprecedented transformation,” Hill Tinoco remarked.
Rubio praised the nuclear cooperation agreement just prior to reporting that El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, has also consented to accept deportees and incarcerated Americans from the U.S. and “place them in his jails.”
Bukele expressed that he would levy a “relatively low” fee for housing convicted criminals in El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center, known as CECOT, a large prison designed to accommodate up to 40,000 inmates. He indicated that this nominal fee would assist in making El Salvador’s prison system self-sustaining.
The nuclear agreement is seen as a potential national security advantage for the United States, according to Edward Kee, who was appointed to the Department of Energy’s Nuclear Energy Advisory Committee in 2022.
“A nuclear power facility represents a hundred-year relationship. If a Central American nation were to enter into an agreement for a reactor from Russia or China, it would pose a threat to U.S. national security in the region,” stated Kee, who established the Nuclear Economics Consulting Group in Washington. “This concern is heightened as these Russian and Chinese nuclear arrangements often encompass broader governmental partnerships.”
The United States is the leading producer of nuclear energy, providing approximately 30% of the global total, according to the World Nuclear Association.
Advocates assert that nuclear energy is one of the most environmentally friendly and reliable energy sources available, while opponents regard it as hazardous, wasteful, and costly.
Energy Secretary Chris Wright has vowed to prioritize the growth of nuclear power and liquefied natural gas during the Trump administration. Investors responded positively, and stock prices surged when Wright, with a background in fossil fuel companies, was nominated.
Partner nations must enter into a 123 Agreement with the United States before the U.S. can license major exports of U.S.-origin nuclear materials and equipment. These agreements aim to enhance mutual nuclear nonproliferation and security goals, as stated by the State Department on their informational page concerning these accords.
As of February 3, the U.S. had 25 such agreements, including partnerships with the United Kingdom, Singapore, Norway, and others. El Salvador would be the first and only Central American nation in this group.
El Salvador is in pursuit of nuclear energy — having signed a comparable agreement with Argentina in October — at a time when previous barriers preventing smaller countries from developing nuclear capabilities may be diminishing, according to Alfonso Blanco, the former executive director of the intergovernmental Latin American Energy Organization.
“There exists a significant opportunity to revitalize nuclear energy through small-scale reactors, and the technology necessitates demonstration sites in nations that lack developed nuclear infrastructure,” Blanco explained, currently with The Dialogue, a Washington-based think tank. “This could offer a potential growth path for El Salvador.”
Blanco noted that El Salvador, like many other countries, faces limited options for acquiring the necessary fuel for nuclear power, as only eight nations possess the capability to enrich uranium.
“For El Salvador, emerging as a regional leader in the implementation of new nuclear technology could present an exciting opportunity, particularly given that such infrastructure projects can lead to substantial job creation and local capacity building,” Blanco commented.
However, while the country’s mega-prison is fully operational and capable of housing tens of thousands, its nuclear ambitions are still in the early stages.
This indicates that El Salvador is unlikely to advance towards nuclear power during President Trump’s administration, as stated by Francisco Monaldi, director of the Latin America Energy Program at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy.
“This is something that will probably not come to fruition under the Trump administration, and should it proceed, it will take considerable time,” Monaldi remarked.
