Nuclear (fission) power stations, provided 11% of the world's electricity in 2012, somewhat less than that generated by hydro-electric stations at 16%. Nuclear energy policy differs between countries, and some countries have no active nuclear power stations, or have phased them out. The first nuclear generated electricity, used to power four 200-watt light bulbs, was produced at the EBR-I reactor near Arco, Idaho, in 1951. This was followed in 1954 by the first grid-connected plant (in the USSR), and in 1956 by the first commercial plant (in the United Kingdom).

During the last decades of the 20th century, concerns about nuclear waste, nuclear accidents, radiation and nuclear proliferation led to an anti-nuclear movement. The 1979 Three Mile Island accident, the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, and the 2011 Fukushima disaster also played a part in stopping new plants in many countries, while the economics of nuclear generation and of nuclear decommissioning have also been factors. Despite this, some countries including China and India have continued to remain active in developing nuclear power, Germany will close its 19 nuclear plants by 2020, and is investing heavily in renewable energy commercialization instead.

• According to research by the IPCC, government funding for most energy research programmes has been flat or declining for nearly 20 years, and is now about half the 1980 level?

• Renewable energy in Iceland provides over 70% of the country's primary energy needs, and 99.9% of Iceland's electricity?

• The Rance tidal power plant in France was the world's 1st electrical generating station powered by tidal energy?

• A tropical cyclone (example pictured) can release heat energy at the rate of 50 to 200 trillion joules per day, roughly 200 times the world-wide electrical generating capacity?

• Ordinary fossil fuel power plants convert between 36% and 48% of the fuel's energy into electricity, with the remainder being lost as waste heat, about half of which is unavoidable due to the second law of thermodynamics?

• Burning biomass indoors leads to between 1.5 and 2 million deaths each year from indoor air pollution in developing nations?

• Over 50% of world small hydroelectricity generating capacity is in China?

• Charles Fritts developed the first solar cell in 1884, although its efficiency was less than 1%?

Born in Ireland, Thomson studied at the University of Glasgow, Scotland. On graduating, he became a mathematics teacher at the Royal Belfast Academical Institution. During his life Thomson published more than 600 scientific papers and filed over 70 patents.

As early as 1845 Thomson pointed out that the experimental results of William Snow Harris were in accordance with the laws of Coulomb. Over the period 1855 to 1867, Thomson collaborated with Peter Guthrie Tait the Treatise on Natural Philosophy that unified the various branches of physical science under the common principle of energy. His inventions included the current balance for the precise specification of the ampere, the standard unit of electric current.

In 1893, Thomson headed an international commission to decide on the design of the Niagara Falls power station. Despite his previous belief in the superiority of direct current electric power transmission, he agreed to use alternating current after seeing a Westinghouse demonstration at the Chicago World's Fair.