Aspects of Nuclear Power
August 2, 2008
1. Nuclear Reactor Hazards : Ongoing dangers of operating nuclear technology in the 21st century
2. Nuclear Power: no solution to climate change
3. Pros and cons of nuclear power
4. The nuclear ‘solution’ to climate change
5. The Nuclear crisis in France
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Nuclear Reactor Hazards : Ongoing dangers of operating nuclear technology in the 21st century
Report prepared for GREENPEACE International, April 2005
This report gives a comprehensive assessment of the hazards of operational reactors, new “evolutionary” designs, and future reactor concepts. It also addresses the risks associated with the management of spent nuclear fuel. The first part of the report describes the characteristics and inherent flaws of the main reactor designs in operation today; the second part assesses the risks associated to new designs; the third part the “ageing” of operational reactors; the fourth part the terrorist threat to nuclear power; the fifth and final part the risks associated with climate change impacts – such as flooding – on nuclear power.
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Nuclear Power: no solution to climate change
Contents: (1) Nuclear power: a limited and problematic response (2) Nuclear Weapons Proliferation: the myth of the peaceful atom (3) Radioactive Waste (4) Hazards of the nuclear fuel cycle (5) Reducing greenhouse emissions without nuclear power
Click here to read Nuclear Power: No Solution to Climate Change [PDF, English, 3.5MB] »
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Pros and cons of nuclear power
A factsheet from Time for Change
As a result of the current discussion how further global warming could be prevented or at least mitigated, the revival of nuclear power seems to be in everybody’s – or at least in many politician’s – mind. It it interesting to see that in many suggestions to mitigate global warming, the focus is put on the advantages of nuclear power generation, its disadvantages are rarely mentioned.
Hopefully, the following summary of arguments for and against nuclear power can fill this gap:
Advantages of nuclear power generation:
* Nuclear power generation does emit relatively low amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2). The emissions of green house gases and therefore the contribution of nuclear power plants to global warming is therefore relatively little.
* This technology is readily available, it does not have to be developed first.
* It is possible to generate a high amount of electrical energy in one single plant.
Disadvantages of nuclear power generation:
* The problem of radioactive waste is still an unsolved one. The waste from nuclear energy is extremely dangerous and it has to be carefully looked after for several thousand years (10’000 years according to United States Environmental Protection Agency standards).
* High risks: Despite a generally high security standard, accidents can still happen. It is technically impossible to build a plant with 100% security. A small probability of failure will always last. The consequences of an accident would be absolutely devastating both for human being as for the nature (see here , here or here ). The more nuclear power plants (and nuclear waste storage shelters) are built, the higher is the probability of a disastrous failure somewhere in the world.
* Nuclear power plants as well as nuclear waste could be preferred targets for terrorist attacks. No atomic energy plant in the world could withstand an attack similar to 9/11 in Yew York. Such a terrorist act would have catastrophic effects for the whole world.
* During the operation of nuclear power plants, radioactive waste is produced, which in turn can be used for the production of nuclear weapons. In addition, the same know-how used to design nuclear power plants can to a certain extent be used to build nuclear weapons (nuclear proliferation).
* The energy source for nuclear energy is Uranium. Uranium is a scarce resource, its supply is estimated to last only for the next 30 to 60 years depending on the actual demand.
* The time frame needed for formalities, planning and building of a new nuclear power generation plant is in the range of 20 to 30 years in the western democracies. In other words: It is an illusion to build new nuclear power plants in a short time.
Sustainability: Is nuclear energy sustainable?
For several reasons, nuclear power is neither «green» nor sustainable:
* Both the nuclear waste as well as retired nuclear plants are a life-threatening legacy for hundreds of future generations. It flagrantly contradicts with the thoughts of sustainability if future generations have to deal with dangerous waste generated from preceding generations. See also here .
* Uranium, the source of energy for nuclear power, is available on earth only in limited quantities. Uranium is being «consumed» (i.e. converted) during the operation of the nuclear power plant so it won’t be available any more for future generations. This again contradicts the principle of sustainability.
Is nuclear power renewable energy?
Nuclear energy uses Uranium as fuel, which is a scarce resource. The supply of Uranium is expected to last only for the next 30 to 60 years (depending on the actual demand). Therefore nuclear energy is not a renewable energy.
Conclusion
From the above mentioned pros and cons of nuclear power plants, it should be evident that nuclear energy cannot be a solution to any problem. Even worse: it is the source of many further problems.
We must not any longer shut our eyes to the consequences of our being on earth. Besides moral, ethical and spiritual reasons, at least for the pure will to survive we should consequently strive for a sustainable living and realize it in our personal life. It’s time for change!
The actual interests of the energy industry in nuclear power
Generally speaking, the electrical energy industry is aware of the substantial drawbacks of nuclear power generation. Nevertheless this industry is now spending an incredible amount of money and time, lobbying for the revival of nuclear energy. The main interest of the owners of existing nuclear power plants is however to prolong the life-span for existing nuclear plants. Because the existing plants will be amortised at the end of their originally planned life time, huge financial profits can be realised for any day longer which these plants can be kept in operation. This is much more lucrative than building new nuclear plants!
However, to operate nuclear power plants longer than originally planned can be quite dangerous since any plant or technical appliance usually gets more troublesome towards the end of its planned life expectancy.
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The nuclear ‘solution’ to climate change
By Jim Green, 3 May 2008.
Nuclear power must be rejected as a climate change abatement strategy for three major reasons: a doubling of nuclear power would reduce global greenhouse emissions by no more than about 5%. A much larger expansion of nuclear power would deplete conventional uranium reserves in a few decades.
In addition, there are the serious hazards of nuclear power, in particular the contribution of “civil” nuclear programs to the proliferation of nuclear weapons — the most destructive weapons ever devised.
Third, the availability of a plethora of clean energy options — renewable energy sources plus energy efficiency and conservation measures — means that we can meet energy demand and sharply reduce greenhouse emissions and therefore obviate any “need” for nuclear power.
This article addresses the first of those arguments — the limitations of nuclear power as a climate change abatement strategy. (The second and third arguments are explored in papers on the Friends of the Earth website
Electricity is responsible for less than one third of global greenhouse gas emissions. According to the Uranium Institute, the figure is “about 30%”. A detailed paper prepared for the Pew Center on Climate Change puts the figure at just 16%.
The simplistic view that nuclear power alone can “solve” climate change is already out the window. Nuclear power is used almost exclusively for electricity generation (a very small number of reactors are used for heat co-generation and desalination), and electricity generation accounts for just 16-30% of global greenhouse emissions.
This is not to dismiss, or trivialise, the importance of reducing emissions from the electricity sector, not least because there are projections that emissions from electricity generation will increase in overall terms and that the percentage of overall emissions from the electricity sector will increase.
Emissions reduced?
Ian Hore-Lacy from the industry-funded Uranium Information Centre (UIC) claims that a doubling of nuclear power would reduce greenhouse emissions in the power sector by 25%. But the power sector accounts for just 16-30% of greenhouse emissions, so Hore-Lacy’s figure of 25% falls to just 4-7.5% if the impact on overall emissions rather than just the power sector is considered.
The figure needs to be further reduced because the UIC makes no allowance for the considerable time that would be required to double nuclear output.
It is unlikely that nuclear output could be doubled before the middle of the century. A fixed additional input of nuclear power will have a relatively smaller impact if measured against increased overall greenhouse emissions. Under a business-as-usual scenario, overall emissions could be expected to double by the middle of the century, so the estimated emissions reduction of 4-7.5% would be halved.
Notwithstanding the assumptions and uncertainties built into the above calculations, it can be concluded that it is unlikely that a doubling of global nuclear power would reduce emissions by more than 5%.
Doubling nuclear output by the middle of the century would require the construction of 800-900 reactors to replace most of the existing cohort of reactors and to build as many again. The capital cost would be several trillion dollars and the 800-900 reactors would produce more than 1 million tonnes of nuclear waste (in the form of spent fuel) and enough plutonium to build more than 1 million nuclear weapons.
Clearly, a doubling of nuclear power would come at considerable expense and risk yet the greenhouse benefits would be small.
One important assumption has not yet been mentioned. The above calculations assume that nuclear power displaces coal. But, compared to most renewable energy sources, nuclear power produces more greenhouse emissions per unit energy produced.
For example, the 2006 Switkowski nuclear report states that nuclear power is three times more greenhouse intensive than wind power. As high-grade uranium ores give way to low-grade ores, nuclear power may become six times more greenhouse intensive than wind power. Nuclear power is vastly more greenhouse intensive than energy efficiency measures and will become even more so as high-grade reserves are depleted.
A temporary response
A very large expansion of nuclear power could make a significant dent in greenhouse emissions. A ten-fold expansion might reduce overall greenhouse emissions by about 20%. But the proliferation risks would be horrendous.
Harold Feiveson, writing in a 2001 issue of the Journal of the Federation of American Scientists, calculates that with a ten-fold increase in nuclear output, 700 tonnes of plutonium would be produced annually. Assuming 10 kilograms of “reactor grade” plutonium is required for one nuclear weapon, 700 tonnes would suffice to produce 70,000 nuclear weapons annually, or 3.5 million weapons over a 50-year reactor lifespan.
In addition to the proliferation risks, a very large increase in nuclear output would run up against the problem of limited conventional uranium reserves.
According to the Nuclear Energy Agency and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the total known recoverable uranium reserves — reasonably assured reserves and estimated additional reserves which can be extracted at a cost of less than US$80/kg — amount to 3.5 million tonnes. At the current rate of usage — 67,000 tonnes per year — these reserves will last for just over 50 years.
Of course, the nuclear power industry will not come to an immediate halt once the known low-cost reserves have been exhausted. Other relatively high-grade, low-cost ores will be discovered, and lower-grade ores can be used. A number of studies estimate the reasonably-assured, reasonable-cost conventional uranium reserves in the range of 14-16 million tonnes, enough for about 200 years at the current rate of consumption.
But if nuclear power increased ten-fold, these reserves would be depleted in a few decades, leaving us with the fanciful and/or highly-problematic options of extensive reprocessing to recycle uranium, fusion, thorium, or the use of plutonium in fast neutron (breeder) reactors.
Large amounts of uranium are also contained in “unconventional sources” such as granite (4 parts per million), sedimentary rock (2 ppm) and seawater (up to four billion tonnes at 0.003 ppm).
It is doubtful whether uranium could be economically recovered from unconventional sources, and the extraction of uranium from such ultra-low-grade ores raises further concerns in relation to the amount of energy required to extract the uranium and the greenhouse emissions expended.
[Jim Green is the national nuclear campaigner with Friends of the Earth, Australia An earlier, referenced version of this paper was published as EnergyScience Briefing Paper #3,
