SPENT FUEL: Dry cask storage, pictured here, is the best interim solution for spent nuclear fuel, according to a new report, especially since it may not truly be waste but a future resource.
Image: Courtesy of NRC
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On September 15, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission affirmed its expert opinion that spent nuclear fuel could be safely stored on nuclear power plant grounds—whether in pools or dry casks—for "at least 60 years beyond the licensed life of any reactor." That is good news, because there is nowhere else for such waste to go.
As President Obama's Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future continues to ponder what role nuclear power might play in the U.S. electricity supply, a group of scientists, engineers and other experts assembled by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) released a report on the nuclear fuel cycle paid for by the nuclear industry. In short, the report finds that uranium resources are not likely to run out in the next century, even if the U.S. alone builds as many as 1,000 nuclear reactors. Therefore, either reprocessing or recycling spent nuclear fuel, as the French and Japanese do, is likely to be a waste of money better spent on improving the light-water reactors presently in use. The funds could also be used to create a $670-million-per-year research and development program for nuclear power as well as to determine the best fuel cycle over the course of the next several decades. Finally, the global expansion of nuclear power plants should be enabled by some form of leasing program for the uranium fuel rods—one up for renewal every decade or so.
"For the next several decades in the U.S. the once-through fuel cycle using light-water reactors is the preferred option," said M.I.T. physicist and report co-chair Ernest Moniz at its release on September 16 in Washington, D.C. "Light-water reactors are the workhorse, and there's a lot we can do to improve [them]." The U.S. employs 104 light-water reactors to generate 20 percent of its electricity today; the reactors moderate uranium fission and the heat it produces with water, which is also boiled into steam to turn an electricity-generating turbine.
M.I.T. nuclear engineer Charles Forsberg, another co-chair of the report, noted that a typical light-water reactor in the U.S. needs 200 metric tons of mined uranium resulting in 20 metric tons of uranium fuel per year. All this uranium represents as little as 2 percent of the final cost of the electricity from that nuclear power plant. Therefore, even if uranium prices doubled or more, the impact on electricity prices would be minimal.
The M.I.T. report predicts that even if the world's fleet of more than 400 nuclear power plants grew to be 4,000 such plants that then operated for a century, the cost of the electricity from those facilities would rise by a mere 1 percent as a result of the increased demand for uranium. "There's no shortage of uranium that might constrain future commitments to build new nuclear plants for much of the century," Forsberg said. This also argues against alternate fissile fuels such as thorium. "What do you get by complicating the fuel cycle by looking at thorium when we have plenty of uranium?" asked M.I.T. nuclear engineer and report co-chair Mujid Kazimi.
The question then becomes what to do with that abundant uranium once it's been fissioned in a nuclear reactor. After all, the spent nuclear fuel still contains fissionable uranium 235 and plutonium 239. "Today, we don't know whether spent nuclear fuel from light-water reactors is waste or a resource," Moniz noted. Forsberg added that the spent nuclear fuel currently awaiting a home in the U.S. could be compared with "a super-strategic petroleum reserve. We should be cautious before we throw it away."
But a place to throw such radioactive waste remains necessary. Even though the spent nuclear fuel from the entire U.S. fleet of reactors—roughly 2,000 metric tons per year—requires just two hectares of land to be stored in dry casks, some form of geologic isolation—such as the proposed repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada—will be needed ultimately. But rather than choosing a site for political reasons, as in the case of Yucca, the M.I.T. report authors argue for selecting a site based on the type of waste to be placed there, the geology that then best shields that type of waste, and even the initial reactor design as a result (to make sure the right kind of waste is made). For example, an entire nuclear cycle involving light-water reactors, reprocessing of the spent fuel, and disposal of small "packages" of highly radioactive nuclear waste in deep boreholes could prove an attractive option, Moniz noted.
Such reprocessing—or even fast-neutron reactors that don't use water to moderate fission and can potentially create more fuel than they consume—remain a distant prospect. Since the 1950s roughly $100 billion has been spent on the research and development of such reactors around the world, yet there is currently only one producing electricity—the BN-600 reactor in Russia, operational since 1980. And even with such fast-neutron reactors, the amount of potentially worrisome material for making nuclear weapons does not change. "Transuranics are not magically changed in terms of their inventory by these things," Moniz said. In fact, the M.I.T. report argues that creating reactors that produce more fuel than they consume may never be necessary. "Light-water reactors are with us for the entire century," Kazimi noted. "They are the backbone of the system."
So that leaves the question of proliferation, particularly as many countries in Asia begin to build new nuclear power plants, ranging from the United Arab Emirates to Vietnam. The M.I.T. report argues that a leasing program, in which countries with the capability to enrich uranium fuel supply it to other countries and then take back the spent fuel for disposal in one form or another at the end of its useful life. "One might combine climate and proliferation concerns with a way of attaching carbon credits to new nuclear construction in countries that took certain kinds of agreements around enrichment and reprocessing," Moniz said.
Regardless, the U.S., at least, appears to be in no hurry to build nuclear reactors; only one is currently under construction at Watts Bar in Tennessee, with another potentially in the works at Vogtle in Georgia as a result of a loan guarantee from the Obama administration. The problem, as always, with nuclear is construction costs—the M.I.T. report assumes a nuclear reactor costs $4,000 per kilowatt of electricity produced to build—or $4 billion for a typical one-gigawatt nuclear power plant. Actual industry estimates for reactors being built today are at least $6 billion for such power plants and as much as $10 billion. "If you build a nuclear power plant and operate it well, it's going to produce a steady stream of income," Moniz noted. But "the disadvantage of nuclear is the enormous capital commitment that is made up front."
Or as the report notes: "The track record for the construction costs of nuclear plants completed in the U.S. during the 1980s and early 1990s was poor. Actual costs were far higher than had been projected…. The first few U.S. plants will be a critical test for all parties involved."
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57 Comments
Add Comment"Nuclear Regulatory Commission ... spent nuclear fuel ... safely stored on nuclear power plant grounds... for "at least 60 years beyond the licensed life of any reactor." ...good news... ."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt results from their expert opinion that spent nuclear fuel is not dangerous anymore +/- 60 years after the life of any reactor. Can they certify that?
And after sixty years the storage can then be treated as what, regular garbage? Would the author care to elaborate?
Also, dealing here with an administration akin to the one regulating industrial and environmental safety in the Gulf of Mexico which has again proved a certain Mr Murphy's laws correct, can these experts fully guarantee that for these 60 years nothing nasty will happen to the immediate environment of these storage areas?
And how many of these safe, 60-year back-to-normal-trash storage areas will be needed and where will they be?
(May I discreetly suggest the French solution, to put all the plants near the borders and use water from away bordercrossing rivers. Would give North of Dixie a completely new meaning.)
"What do you get by complicating the fuel cycle by looking at thorium when we have plenty of uranium?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this100% burnup. Seriously, dude. Why don't you know that?
"What do you get by complicating the fuel cycle by looking at thorium when we have plenty of uranium?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this100% burnup. Why don't you know that?
The report provides support for an assertion that I have continued to make - the world's supply of heavy metals (uranium, plutonium and thorium) turn the entire notion of energy scarcity upside down. As the MIT study shows, the earth has been endowed with such an incredible clean energy resource that we can afford to just skim the easy cream off and leave the more challenging parts of the resource to future generations for their use.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOf course, there are a few dedicated scientists and engineers who are not willing to leave all of the fun of problem solving to future generations, so they want to make some contributions to the solution now. I am not a big fan of spending huge sums of taxpayer money on commercial developments, but if the IFR or thorium folks can figure out a good business model that will provide an income stream to support their research efforts, I will continue to promote them as something worth doing just to prove that it is not only "possible" but being done.
The NRC decision is a modest one. Their scientists and engineers have determined that there is nothing that they can foresee happening to the used material in licensed casks over the next 60 years. They could have made that a longer time frame, but they are only comfortable with projecting current experience so far before recognizing that there might be something out there worth thinking about.
After we have stored the current material for another 20-40 years, I expect that responsible, cautious regulators will be able to make another projection based on the accumulated science. I figure that if nothing else happens, the 60 years will turn into 120 years, the 120 years will turn into 240 years, and eventually people will figure out that the casks contain some valuable energy fuels and some additional rare materials that have unique physical properties. (That is the normal definition for valuable material, not for waste.)
Rod Adams
Publisher, Atomic Insights
=And after sixty years the storage can then be treated as what, regular garbage? Would the author care to elaborate? =
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUse it in a fast breeder reactor, didn't you read the article?
This report "paid for by the nuclear industry" stinks of a payoff from the makers of old tech inefficient US reactors, hoping to shut out the 100% efficient waste burning Gen IV models. Just like buggy whip manufacturers trying to stop the automobile.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThose morons from the second class universities in those countries whose nuclear experts have actually built reactors in the last few years, disagree with the MIT experts from a has been nuclear country that hasn't built one in 40 years.
France runs half its fleet on reprocessed U and Areva who is the world reprocessing expert claims it is the same cost as virgin fuel. We are supposed to be burning MOX soon anyway as part of the dismantling of Russian nukes. Those dumbheads in Japan who can't even make a Toyota work right are starting MOX burns now. They should have sent one of their second rate engineers to MIT to learn from the best.
India even stupider has built a 500 MW fast metal reactor for service next year and has plans for five more. MIT should write the PM and tell him what a dumbass he is building 100% waste burning reactors that eliminate nuke waste at $2.5B a gigawatt for a first of a kind. What idiots!!!!
And China getting ready to start construction of two more. Fools!.
Biello while mentioning the Russian BN-600 600 MW waste burning fast reactor grid connected since 1980, with the dishonestly common to nuclear deniers and the Big Oil funded Sciam pointedly failed to mention the French 233 MWe Phénix grid connected since 1973, the Japanese Monju 280 MWe restarted in June. and India's new and planned units.
New first of kind new nukes in the US - South Texas, Vogtle, and SCANA to be built by corrupt American attorneys and politicians. - are with 2010 budgeting coming in at $4.5B/GW far cheaper than new coal and a fraction of the cost of any renewable.
Biello fails to mention that Vogtle is under contruction, with reactor parts being delivered on schedule.
"http://www.scana.com/en/investor-relations/nuclear-financial-information/default.htm"
That $4.5B/Gw is 3 China's cost for the same reactor built by American engineers. That cost is dropping rapidly to under $1B/GW with 3 year builds.
"http://nextbigfuture.com/2010/08/china-leverages-learning-curve-cost.html"
We can build better airplanes cheaper than the Chinese in the most highly regulated industry on earth. We should be able to compete on nukes after America’s major cost and delay factor the NRC is upgraded to an OECD standard regulator. We invented the damn things after all.
Rod Adams, "incredible clean energy". Where do you see that in nuclear fuel? It seems everything but incredible clean. The only thing that is incredible about nuclear energy is, it is 'incredibly expensive', 'incredibly dangerous', 'incredibly destructive to the land', can and will be in time 'incredibly destructive to the environment', 'incredibly expensive', incredibly expensive', incredibly expensive. Anything that produces that much of toxic waste is not clean or safe to use around populations.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGeothermal, with a temperature of 500 to 700 degrees, can produce as much energy as a nuclear power plant and there is no radioactive waste to worry about. These drilling rigs for deep water oil drilling can drill to a depth of 1200 meters and one hole can produce that energy for 30 years, and then just put your water hose over to the other hole and you are good for another 30 years while the first hole heats back up. Read this article: http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2010/09/geothermal-energy-is-the-solution-for-the-future -and you will be convinced about geothermal. For the cost of one dirty nuclear plant, you can build five clean geothermal power plants and you will not be tearing up the land looking for radioactive rock to power the geothermal plant.
@ jamesDavis
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAll energy sources have human and environmental consequences. Geothermal power plants in California are estimated to emit up to 5 Curies of radiation every day ("Health Physics Journal", May 1990) I don't think that's of concern, but some people are worried about any human caused radiation releases. Chemical toxins are released from geothermal plants as well, such as hydrogen fluoride.
I'm not saying we shouldn't use geothermal energy, I use it myself. The most significant form of geothermal energy I've personally used, is sitting in geothermal pools at Ainsworth, Banff & Radium. I just think all energy sources should be held to the same standards.
The Scientific American article, "California Heats Up over Natural Steam," claims that geothermal power plants in California have lead to hundreds of earthquakes. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=california-heats-up-over&sc=I100322
""The track record for the construction costs of nuclear plants completed in the U.S. during the 1980s and early 1990s was poor. Actual costs were far higher than had been projected"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat escalation was entirely due to greeny directors of the NRC appointed by Big Coal politicians to destroy nuclear power.
See how the NRC put the shaft to American nuclear without any real safety improvements here in a paper by well known respected nuclear power expert Bernard L. Cohen, DSc,Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Pittsburgh
http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/chapter9.html
His CV: http://alternativeenergy.procon.org/viewsource.asp?ID=007699
The new $1.2B/Gw Chinese AP-1000's are on track on budget. All Candu builds started in the last two decades were buit on time on budget at less than $2B/Gw.
@JamesDavis
Since all the world's current nuclear waste would occupy a football field buried fifty feet deep, and is safely stored in place as used fuel waiting recycle it is definitely far cleaner than the thousand of sq miles of concrete covered earth occupied by soon to be out of subsidy dead windmills and the cubic miles of toxic solar trash. I'd say the nukes were a lot cleaner - wouldn't you.
As for expensive, I've given you links above showing you how cheap it is. The TVA has new nuclear power at 5 cents a kwh and is using it to replace coal.
Massively polluting with sulfer emission, mass LARGE SCALE gigawatt level geothermal energy requires drilling deep into the earth injecting water and pumping with not yet invented 400 deg C pumps supercritical steam to the surface driving generators but also causing earthquakes.
Your car will be powered by a Mr. Fusion device long before large scale geothermal becomes viable.
Are today's nuclear deniers like James so callous that they believe the death of three million folks every year they can delay the coal to nuclear conversion like TVA has begun, is a reasonable price to pay for their silly dreams of soft sunbeams and warm breezes in a fuzzy wuzzy renewable future.
@JamesDavis - the average production cost for US nuclear energy plants was 2.03 cents per kilowatt hour in 2009. That cost does not include capital costs, but does include all of the following components of operating costs:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this" . . .purchasing of uranium, conversion, enrichment, and fabrication services along with storage and shipment costs, inventory (including interest) charges less any expected salvage value, labor, material & supplies, contractor services, licensing fees, and miscellaneous costs such as employee expenses and regulatory fees."
http://www.nei.org/resourcesandstats/nuclear_statistics/costs/
In contrast, the average production cost in 2009 for "cheap" coal was 2.75 and for "cheap" natural gas was 5.00 cents per kilowatt-hour. Neither of those fuel sources pays to capture and isolate waste products from the environment.
I used to go to sea inside nuclear powered submarines. I even spent about 40 months as the man in charge of the engineering department, so I was responsible for reviewing all aspects of the plant's performance. Suffice it to say that there is a reason why submarines can remain undetected - they do not dump any detectable waste into the environment. If you cannot detect it with even the most sensitive instruments, it cannot do anyone any harm. Thus my comment about cleanliness comes from "deep" personal experience with operating and maintaining nuclear power plants.
By the way, how about a bit of honesty. What is the actual power that can be obtained from a single geothermal well? I know a bit about steam and a bit about the diameter of the wells that deep drills produce. My guess is that the power level is somewhere in the single digit MWs for a single drilled hole.
I found an environmental assessment for one project in Oregon that describes a project that will result in a 1.2 MWe binary power plant.
http://www.eere.energy.gov/golden/PDFs/ReadingRoom/NEPA/OITFinalEA.pdf
At that rate, you need to drill 1,000 holes to equal the output of a single Westinghouse AP1000.
Rod Adams
Publisher, Atomic Insights
Host and producer, The Atomic Show Podcast
I've made the same calculation at home, and am going to quit throwing out the trash and recycling, and quit paying for the cans. I figure it's a better economy just to let that stuff stack up around the house, because whoever gets to deal with the place after I'm dead will be far wealthier and smarter and much better able to handle the stuff. I love economics, it's such a useful tool for putting off costs to later generations.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Use it in a fast breeder reactor, didn't you read the article?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI keep reading these solutions and for forty years there's been solutions to every problem and safety is never an issue and nothing is going to go wrong and for every question there is always an answer and I always agree and accept but WHY CAN'T YOU GET THE DAMN THINGS WORKING AS PROMISED ONCE AND FOR ALL? If wind or solar or whatever energy ressources were as heavily burdened they'd be forgotten and shelved by now. What is it with this obsession of heavily subsidized, complex to handle and constantly controversed subject that keeps a minority pushing for it? If you people had invested all your energy and mental ressources and a fourth of the money into an intelligent energy management program and new energies we wouldn't need the bloody things at all and could wait, and there I agree in part with Mr Adams, until future scientists know more. - Aside from that, I admire the religious fervour with which some people defend it, it's quite religious (and as such deeply suspicious). If only that fundamentalism could be turned into objective thought...
Every discussion here is like trying to get a US car manufacturer to use modern technology and road handling. One is instantly classified as anti-nuke simply because one has reason to believe that the powers pushing this industry are not on top of their technology. I am NOT against nuclear energy per se but I believe that its present level is simply not good enough because the wrong parties (military and wall street) constantly divert progress for their asocial interests. Until the sector matures I prefer energy management as the cheapest, fastest, simplest way to save substantial energy over the next years until nuclear research is up to the level society has a right to expect. As is, this industry sucks. That's why I don't trust it. How can you expect the public to trust something that after decades still has not managed to get a safe and clean reputation with the public? They have good reason not to trust the military (see its present imbroglio) and wall street (see the last two years).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs Americans, we need to be open to alternative energies due to the fact that using fossil fuels is causing global warming. Nuclear power is one of the most highly debated alternative energies due to the accident in Chernobyl. The fact is that whether the nuclear power plants are cost effective or not, no one is going to want on in their area. This is a very unfortunate reality in American society today because people have an irrational fear of these power plants. I live in Georgia and the fact is that the proposed nuclear power plant has been met with such opposition. If people continue to fear change then we will never move away from fossil fuels and continue to hurt our environment.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs Americans, we need to be open to alternative energies due to the fact that using fossil fuels is causing global warming. Nuclear power is one of the most highly debated alternative energies due to the accident in Chernobyl. The fact is that whether the nuclear power plants are cost effective or not, no one is going to want on in their area. This is a very unfortunate reality in American society today because people have an irrational fear of these power plants. I live in Georgia and the fact is that the proposed nuclear power plant has been met with such opposition. If people continue to fear change then we will never move away from fossil fuels and continue to hurt our environment.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@jctyler:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am not defending nuclear energy with "religious" fervor. I have done the numbers, learned all I can about alternative technologies, and understand the limitations of efficiency, especially when I know how little energy billions of people in the world use every day.
My support for nuclear energy is purely rational. It is amazing stuff - I can hold the energy value of 30 tanker trucks full of oil in the palm of my hand and still have room to double that amount without even trying very hard.
I suggest you attempt to live for just a few days within the limits of wind and solar energy. You will find out quickly that you miss the grid and the always on power that flows through those wires - 90% of which comes from burning either coal or natural gas or fissioning uranium.
Rod Adams
Publisher, Atomic Insights
I just came here to register id num
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHold on now, Mr. Boyce. You are comparing apples with bed bugs. Chernobyl was a carbon plant, not a light or heavy water plant as virtually ALL the other nuclear power plants are in the whole world. A carbon plant is good for only ONE thing: making weapons grade plutonium. It generated electricity only as a by-product. That's why it caused so much radiation damage. It was spewing out plutonium. Additionally, the U.S. is the ONLY nuclear power nation that doesn't recycle its fuel. It's not just France and Japan, it's Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Italy, China, etc. I know: I was responsible for supplying parts to these countries for their reactors.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"The problem, as always, with nuclear is construction costs...........Actual industry estimates for reactors being built today are at least $6 billion for such power plants and as much as $10 billion."........."The track record for the construction costs of nuclear plants completed in the U.S. during the 1980s and early 1990s was poor. Actual costs were far higher than had been projected…. The first few U.S. plants will be a critical test for all parties involved."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this=========
While I definitely believe we need to push forward with GenIV reactors, cost is still an issue, especially when the same defense contractors like GE and Westinghouse are being used, and in a day and age where nothing comes in on budget or on time. If the past track record is any indication of future costs, I'm willing to believe the industry numbers of closer to $10 Billion per reactor than anything that the rabid nuclear proponents are spewing, especially in their haste to belittle any other kind of energy production for political reasons.
Trying to compare nuclear building costs here in the U.S with Chinese building costs, is not only comparing apples to kumquats, but ludicrous at best, or else corporate America would not have built their manufacturing mecca in China!
Nuclear waste is a resource even as we wait for a hundred years for its radioactivity to subside. In a recent Outlook India article, 'Transforming Nuclear Waste Heat Into Power Possible , Prof D Chandrasekharam, Earth Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, points out that high-level nuclear waste in a geological repository should be considered an anthropogenic Enhanced Geothermal Systems with a small volume of waste capable of generating high amounts of electric power.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCapitalizing on the thermal potential of high level waste is the essence of the Nuclear Assisted Hydrocarbon Production Method which would use the thermal flux of HLW to fracture an unconventional oil formation, alter the chemical and/or physical properties of the hydrocarbon material within the formation to allow removal of the altered materials.
The recent MIT study on nuclear power calls for more financial incentives to build reactors.
Alberta's incentive should be to use the carbon free heat of HLW to produce its bitumen with an EROI of 5.2/1 for this anthropogenic geothermal heat source.
Who needs nuclear power when hydrocarbon pyrolysis is cheap, greenhouse gas free and can, unlike nuclear supply all the worlds energy needs?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@lakota2012
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs a rabid acolytle of the not so renewable religion all of Lakota's posts spew revolves around his "beliefs" without any reference to fact from reputable sources.
Here are some real cost sources
New first of kind new nukes in the US - South Texas, Vogtle, and SCANA to be built by corrupt American attorneys and politicians. - are with 2010 budgeting coming in at $4.5B/GW far cheaper than new coal and a fraction of the cost of any renewable. Vogtle is under contruction, with reactor parts being delivered on schedule.
"http://www.scana.com/en/investor-relations/nuclear-financial-information/default.htm"
That source is SCANA itself, who as a dedicated bunch of liars, they love risking their jobs lying to the regulator and you.
That $4.5B/Gw is three times China's cost for the same reactor built by American engineers. That cost is dropping rapidly to under $1B/GW with 3 year builds.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601080&refer=asia&sid=aJPyNB5Q_Fr0
Bloomberg, 100% owned by the foreign nuclear industry, is a well known for distorting the facts when reporting to their readers. Their financial reporting business is only a sideline.
The most recent Candu build in 2004 in China was under $2B/GW 2 cents a kwh.
http://www.cnnc.com.cn/tabid/168/Default.aspx
CNNC- the China news agency - is of course 100% owned by Nuclear interests. Like Bloomberg, their news reporting is only a cover for their real business - nuclear lobbying.
FDR's Federal agency Tennessee Valley Authority's two new nukes under construction and ready for service in 2012 and 2013 are budgeted under $3B/Gw. When added to the double international standard current 2 cents a kwh cost of operating American nukes, we have TVA quoting 5 cent a kwh cost and replacing coal. But don't believe me, Google it yourself.
The cost overruns in the 80's were caused by greenpeacers like NRC commissioner Peter Bradford a notorious no nuker who dedicated themselves to destroying nuke industry at the time. Hopefully with taxpayer skin on the line these days, politicians will rein in the NRC 90% staffed by attorneys.
While Lakota's hopes for Gen IV units are laudable his standing with other low information nuclear deniers makes me think he believes the death of three million folks every year his kind can delay the coal to nuclear conversion like TVA has begun, is a reasonable price to pay for silly dreams of soft sunbeams and warm breezes in a fuzzy wuzzy renewable future.
eco-steve at 12:35 PM on 09/19/10
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Who needs nuclear power when hydrocarbon pyrolysis is cheap, greenhouse gas free and can, unlike nuclear supply all the worlds energy needs?"
Actually All the worlds resources might be enough to do it with wind/solar/biomass. But the planet would be denuded,there'd be nothing to eat, and runaway global warming would have sent the survivors back to the cave.
Nope biomass is dead end according to Mr Green himself Lester Brown.
http://www.grist.org/article/the-limits-and-potential-of-plant-based-energy/
A worldwide investment in 10000 mass produced nuclear reactors paid for by ending expensive fossil fuel use, would eliminate most air pollution saving millions of lives annually, end the global warming/ peak oil problem within a ten year time frame, provide a huge job producing boost to the economy, and require only a small part of our industrial capacity.
The simple, easy, cheap solution to the entire energy/peak oil/ climate warming problem starts with a conversion from coal and NG electricity and heating applications to mass produced nuclear electricity. The freed up gas would be available to make CNG, methanol, DME (propane), and synfuel transportation fuels.
You greenies pretend to fear Peak Oil/ Global warming but when the only possible solution is presented, you start baying at the moon howling "renew renew renew". I suppose you will do that until your dedicated opposition drags us all back to cave if we survive at all.
@rodadams, "I suggest you attempt to live for just a few days within the limits of wind and solar energy. You will find out quickly that you miss the grid.."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this=========
Typical nuclear proponent that has a need to belittle solar and wind power, only to boost his political rants from his "atomic insights" bottom line. Even though I've lived off-grid for over 10 years, and know many others that do the same, the vast majority of solar/wind power is NOT to off-grid homes, but grid-tied average homes paying little or no electric bill.
As PV prices have continued to plummet to $2 per watt this year, and more than likely even cheaper by next year with more thin-film technology available, solar power is rivaling even fossil fuel-produced electricity today. Life expectancy of PV is between 25 to 50 years, and some of the newer wind turbines like Bergey Windpower, have 10-year warranties, with technology changing on a yearly basis.
With over 50% of the installed energy over the past 2 years in both Europe and the U.S. being renewable energy, it's future has never been brighter, no matter how much propaganda or political rhetoric is spewed by the fossil fuel or nuclear energy special interests!
@rodadams, "I am not defending nuclear energy with 'religious' fervor."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@seth, "the thousand of sq miles of concrete covered earth occupied by soon to be out of subsidy dead windmills and the cubic miles of toxic solar trash."
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Yes, most certainly the nuclear proponents are "defending nuclear energy with religious fervor," and I always get a kick out of seth's sensationalism to boot, with moronic lines like "thousands of sq. miles of concete covered Earth," and "cubic miles of toxic solar trash."
As the solar and wind industries continue to grow in the 21st century, fueled by clean renewable energy, it seems that the nuclear industry is still being hampered by the fossil fuel industry lobbyists, wanting to keep their huge piece of the pie!
Sethdayal : Fossil hydrocarbons are all part of biomass, and so pyrolysing them would produce hydrogen for our energy needs until all oil and gas reserves are used up. Maybe by then we will have finally developped safe CO2 capture and storage. Nuclear will never provide more than 6% of world energy needs, so why bother?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is past ludicrous to think we should put all of our eggs into one silly energy basket like the fossil fuel industry has done for us over the past 100+ years. Instead of replacing the finite fossil fuels with just one more energy source like the nuclear proponents suggest, it is far more intelligent to diversify our energy needs with as many energy sources as possible for the 21st century.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs we phase-out the dirty and finite fossil fuels, we should be adding renewable energy like solar, wind, hydro and geothermal, along with GenIV nuclear including thorium in the coming decades -- but never should it be a monopoly of only one type of energy source. Each industry can create jobs, so we should never limit our resources in the 21st century.
@seth, "As a rabid acolytle of the not so renewable religion.."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this===========
Thanks for the usual attack, but you must mean "acolyte" and not your "acolytle," which is not a word in my dictionary!
This report documents the dawning of a new worldwide industry - clean energy - which has experienced investment growth of 230 percent since 2005. Demonstrating its strength, the clean energy sector declined only 6.6% in 2009, despite the worst financial downturn in over half a century. In 2009, $162 Billion was invested in clean energy around the world. Rebounding from a sharp downturn in the last quarter of 2008and first quarter of 2009, clean energy investments in the G-20 averaged a robust $32 Billion in each of the last three quarters of 2009. In an encouraging sign for the future, many governments prioritized clean energy within economic recovery funding, the bulk of which will reach innovators, businesses and installers in 2010 and 2011. Clean energy investments are forecast to grow by 25 percent to $200 Billion by 2010.
Accounting for more than 90 percent of worldwide finance and investment, G-20 countries dominate the clean energy landscape. As the country profiles in this report demonstrate, virtually all G-20 countries have seen investments grow by more than 50 percent over the last five years.
http://www.pewtrusts.org/uploadedFiles/wwwpewtrustsorg/Reports/Global_warming/G-20%20Report.pdf
Exactly how much has been spent on new nuclear reactors in the past 10, 20 or even 30 years in the U.S.? As a matter of fact, more nuclear reactors have been shut down than built!
Adding 30 years to storage requirements is no big deal as long as there are to be inspections and replacements of failing parts or whole containers along the way. Going beyond that timeframe brings in societal stability questions. Hence the IAEAs urging that disposal not be delayed for reasons such as political-cowardice. Is the contract going to remain in place making the US taxpayer liable for all that storage?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe MIT report has a narrow focus, which is this century and the US fuel supply. International fuel supply and cost impacts are mentioned, but this is not a forward-looking or comprehensive document. I recall a meeting of the IAEA where a high-ranking UN diplomat gave a talk about the potential for wars in the future over energy supply. He suggested the time for making the world a more ethical and equitable place was now, and it included providig power to developing nations so that despair does not escalate among the world's fastest growing populations (population growth slows when there is hope, and energy availability provides hope or so it appears). If we look at the needs of our great-grandchildren who will likely live into the next century, we are faced with their having to potentially face high U prices and energy wars and other issues. Another issue being addressed (but ineffectively without our help) by international nuclear organizations is the "sustainability" of nuclear power, which leads one to GEN IV and other means to stretch the fuel supply over many centuries, not just this one.
The time for the US to gaze inward and say "all is well" has been over for a long time. The one great idea proposed during the Bush administration was the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership which addressed both the equity issue of nuclear power availability around the world and the very urgent nonproliferation issue through "take-back" of spent fuel leased under the program. That "take-back" part was politically corrected out, the US people would not stand for taking back foreign fuel for reprocessing or disposal we heard, gutting GNEP of its nonproliferation control side. But it is not too late to reverse this unfortunate decision and to actually take a leadership role in seeing that nuclear power is globally available, sustainable, and proliferation resistant.
@eco-steve
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisObviously you didn't or more likely can't read Lester Brown's report. You have no clue of the damage even a small increase in biofuels would cause. Nuclear can easily provide 100% of our energy needs at a fraction of the cost of fossil or biofuels.
You are a denier obviously. Pyrolysing hydrocarbons would end our civilization with global warming. However even TVA has found with current first of kind crooked attorney crippled US nuclear, nukes are much cheaper than coal to gas plant.
@lakota2012
I always love lakota's spew of his not so green religious dogma.
$2 a watt is about the cost of a mass produced home depot skylight - same construction less the solar cells- ain't gitten no cheaper. Works out to $5 a watt best case installed and grid connected or 40 cents a kwh on the average American roof. With a 5 kw array on every roof 2% of America's energy need could be met but the cost would have to triple for transmission and long term storage. Rooftop wind power in most of the US is of no use whatsoever.
Like all deniers lakota accidentally on purpose mistakes energy with nameplate capacity. As we have shown many times without penetrating Lakota's thickness wind and solar produce no net energy because of their need for low efficiency fast spooling gas plant to load balance. The cost is 25 cents a kwh for wind and almost twice that for solar and growing. This compares to nukes at 5 cents for current first of kind and less than two cents for the hundreds of American designed reactors now under construction or engineering in Asia.
For that reason wind and solar are of course supported by Big Oil and this magazine as Lakota points out.
All the money most of it taxpayer's subsidy spent on not so renewables is of course wasted and the dead hulks will soon become the taxpayers responsibility to clean up when the subsidies end shortly.
This report makes the common mistake. The MIT $4000 per kW is the overnight cost and does not include owners costs and financing. The utility numbers do. So they are consistent.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis report makes the common mistake. The MIT $4000 per kW is the overnight cost and does not include owners costs and financing. The utility numbers do. So they are consistent.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thissethdayal - did you really write this: "A worldwide investment in 10 000 mass produced nuclear reactors..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd it would take only a few year to build them, right? And since they're mass produced safety shouldn't be an issue. I mean, what's a 1 per mil error rate?
Your plan would
"eliminate most air pollution saving millions of lives annually..."
the US population would explode, McDonalds and Coke shares rocket, four times the roads, five times the cars, six times the traffic congestion BUT clear exhausts because all the cars would be electric, clean water, employment and tea parties for all, everybody becomes rich because the consumer market doubles every ten years... what else?
"end the global warming/ peak oil problem within a ten year time frame"
With 10 000 mass produced nuclear plants you can power 10 zillion air-conditioners. That should take care of global warming. Aside from the one or other of your 10 000 mass produced reactors heating up locally!
"provide a huge job producing boost to the economy*
The numbers of security jobs in the nuclear industry alone could save half the states from bankruptcy.
"and require only a small part of our industrial capacity"
Sounds dangerously close to GM's claim in 2008 "requiring only a small part of our taxpayers' money" to save their butt. But with your boost of the economy and cheap electricity galore GM will obviously convert to electric cars. Which should be another boost in your already redhot economy.
And you could cheaply climatize your little medical greenhouse...
@David Cota
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCheck out for the Chinese? Orion.
www.nextbigfuture.com/2010/03/150-kiloton-nuclear-verne-gun.html
@jctyler
You are such a comedian. Where can I get more of your schtick?
While perhaps only part of the solution, a total fossil fuel elimination with the hot tub size factory produced 30 Mwe Hyperion unit weighing in at about 15 tons illustrates the small amount of industrial capacity required. Two units - made almost 100% of steel with a few pounds of enriched uranium weigh about the same as 20 automobiles or a Sherman tank and are lot less complex. 50000 of them would be needed to convert American from fossils to nuclear about the equivalent of a half million vehicles - .5% of American's 2007 auto production per year for 10 years.
There is a lot of unemployed autoworkers and mothballed auto factories just waiting for orders.
Not a trivial thing certainly but well within our capacity. What would work best is a giant public national power authority like the Bonneville (Grand Coulee) Power Commission or TVA one time national technical and environment certifications - no lawyers allowed - charged with replacing all the nations coal plants efficiently on budget and on time just like Asian countries are doing.
Big nukes are 99% steel and concrete and today's much smaller units require about the same materials as a bridge or building. They can be largely mass produced in factories. Labor is a relatively small part of nuke cost but we sure have a lot of that available. With orders for 10000 nukes worldwide, colleges would have hundreds of thousand of graduates ready for the big push three or four years now the road.
"safety shouldn't be an issue"
Nope. When was the last a new mass produced GM vehicle exploded?
"the cars would be electric"
Nope could use nuclear produced syn fuels with cheap offpeak hydrogen.
Lets see at 500 staff per plant that's 5M jobs worldwide less than are in the energy industry today. Big jobs in construction though and lots of jobs because we power would be so cheap.
5% of the workers once employed making cars would get new jobs.
Rather than spend billions of dollars on storage facilities for expletive Uranium, we could build one big container, power it with the One Billion Dollar Boeing Rocket and send it into Jupiter. Boeing will love it, it will save 200 jobs well-paying jobs on that deal alone.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSpent fuel is the most precious energy resource on Earth. And the US government and the American people own it!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe may be just 20 or 30 years away from building the next generation of commercial reactors that could extract more than 100 times more energy from these spent resources than we currently can. Yet some folks want to simply throw potentially tens of trillions of dollars of this energy wealth away!
Marcel F. Williams
It's not a question of running out of uranium; if the report says that, it is dumb. The question is when will supply peak, and at what level? I doubt that the supply could keep up with 1,000 new reactors in the US.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut reports such as this are very blinkered. How with external factors affect the supply of uranium? For example, peak oil could very well have an impact. A peak of supply seems highly likely to come well before the end of the century.
I agree we have a huge resources here, we have blown up thousands of nukes ,this notion that we can't launch a few % of this fuel for interplanetary and asteroid travel is just ludacris.Each pound of material we gain from asteroids using nuclear fuel is worth more than weight in gold.The time is now ,its time to put the fear mongers in their place,and move on.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this. "Today, we don't know whether spent nuclear fuel from light-water reactors is waste or a resource," Moniz noted.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is obvious that spent nuclear fuel is waste - and a hazardous waste at that - until its status as a resource can be realized in practice.
What is more, it is a lucrative and vulnerable target for terrorists, saboteurs and hostile powers.
I need to eat some crow, which is very distasteful to a vegetarian like myself. One of the authors of the MIT report emailed me the summary and it does indeed address sustainability beyond a hunfdred years and discusses nonproliferation issues quite nicely. So, I withdraw my complaint againt the MIT report. It us US-centric but does discuss the international situation in quite a bit of detail. It is OK after all.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs far I know, the present end product from a nuclear reactor using Uranium still is radioactive. We should find out ways and means to reuse the same till it becomes a fully nonradioactive end product. This way, we can not only conserve Uranium for the future but also value add each end product of the nuclear reactor till it becomes non radioactive
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"The M.I.T. report argues that a leasing program, in which countries with the capability to enrich uranium fuel supply it to other countries and then take back the spent fuel for disposal in one form or another at the end of its useful life."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou have something against using complete sentences?
Sethdayal : It is a common mistake to confuse first or second generation biofuels with third generation fuels made by biomass pyrolysis.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRead wikipedia 'biomass pyrolysis' to see the distinction.
Pyrolysing fossil biomass (hydrocarbons) produces no CO2, but plenty oh hydrogen for energy production. Carbon is captured in solid form and is stored in landfill sites. This is better and cheaper than CO2 CCS. There are still plenty of hydrocarbons to produce hydrogen as long as crude oil and gas supplies are available, by which time maybe we will have dicovered clean technology for burning carbon.
The difference between Europe and the US is that in Europe criticism becomes the basis for progress, which might explain Europeans' usage and quality of the ressource as compared to the half-wrecks in the US. The problem is therefore still the same as 30 years, USamericans simply can't take criticism based on logic or ratio, for example conclusions from the practical problems surrounding the commercial handling of the plants in the US. It gets worse when stupid proposals are refuted ironically. Irony? In a USamerican forum? Blasphemy! Sacrilege! Those posts must be eliminated for using intellectual weapons of massive laughter. I had forgotten why it says "scientific AMERICAN". Delete this one too, I won't notice. Been here too long.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLet's make a calculation to replace all CO2 producing coal-gas-oil energy sources by nuclear on the world.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBenchmark is USA consumption rate which we should accept that people on the world will not be satified with a lower standard. USA consumes 25% of world energy with its %5 of world population. So we should admit that in near future energy consumption will be increased 5 fold to catch the USA standards.
Todays 430 nuclear reactors (avarage 850 MW capacity each) provides 6% of total energy consumption.
Hydro+Geo+Wind+Solar provides %7 all total.
With current consumption rates we need 434*(93/6)=6665 and with rates equal to USA consumption benchmark we would need 5*6665= about 33000 of 850 MW nuclear power plants on the world.!!!!
Come on nuclear fans, wake up from your dreams. Our lovely earth is not a laboratory for your deadly ideas.
At the moment, the core of our discussions should be re-defining the human activities/existence in nature. It is obvious that romantic democracy system, which puts the humanity over everything has eventually failed. We need an amendmend in Constitution with following clauses:
1- Nature has absolute sovereignty and has the right to sustain.
2- Every person has the right to defend the “Rights of Nature” in Courts.
3- Waste producing human activities (including urbanization) can only be allowed if waste stabilization is provided in 20 years maximum.
@sethdayal, "I always love lakota's spew of his not so green religious dogma."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this---------------
While I'm sure your juvenile attacks on other posters' opinion is meant to "try" to change their minds towards your one-sided energy plan of 100% nookular, you've finally succeeded.
While I was a proponent of a diversification of many types of energy for our future consumption so as not to put all of our eggs into one basket, you've changed my mind completely, and due to your rants and childish attacks, have taken nuclear completely off the board. I thought that GenIV nuclear might be a good way to use spent nuclear fuel, but now I will just fight against all nuclear reactors of any type, and might even join the public in Georgia and South Florida to fight those new installations.
Thanks seth, for changing my mind, and making another enemy of the nuclear mistake.
C&EN recently had an article on newer designs one of which uses current spent fuel as its fuel thereby reducing the waste issues significantly.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@lakota2012
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThanks for finally coming out.
All deniers like Lakota seem to use emotion and reject science in making decisions. That's been obvious from his blatherings to date.
@namikozcan
Using IEA's 2035 estimate we would need 23000 nukes to replace fossils. If we further assume that transition would come with efficiency improvements, electric vehicles, and a lot of cogen that could maybe cut to 15000 nukes or 600 a year well within the worlds recession depressed unused industrial capacity. With mass production, the cost of $600B annual using Gen 3's is less than 25% what the world spends on fossils. With DMSR's the cost reduces to $200B.
Assuming the worlds population stabilizes and the third world moves to US energy use towards 2100, new energy needs would easily be met by continuing the 600 nuke a year build pattern.
In a time slice its a lot less power plants than would be needed than if we stuck with fossils.
Your alternative maybe is 33 million wind turbines.
My way:
10000 nukes worldwide costing $10 trillion is well within our industrial/financial capacity to build within the next ten years. It is paid for by and ends fossil fuel use, saves millions of lives every year from toxic radioactive waste from coal plants and ends global warming. Reasoning Democrats (most I hope) and almost all Republicans and Deniers will go along with this at least part way as momentum builds.
The "renewable" way:
Thirty years from now some new tech renewables we've been waiting for are now less than 10 times the cost of nuclear. Apparently attaching a microprocessor making them "smart" helps with the cost. Unfortunately, the "opinions" of those silly scientists were right and most of the worlds coastal cities are flooded, the gulf stream has stopped, billions are dead and starving from toxic radioactive coal plant emissions flooding and bad weather. Europe and eastern North America are frozen solid. Deniers and Republicians still refuse to spend on renewables because the treasury is empty feeding the starving, CO2 is plant food and we need lotsa that. The new age renewable "religion" with High Priest Al Gore wants to start culling humans because we produce too much CO2. Jesus and Mohammed have been seen walking together.
You pick.
sethdayal:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlease see article “Rethinking Nuclear Fuel Recycling” By Frank N. Von Hippel on May 2008 Scientific American to understand the problems related with Breeder Type Nuclear Reactors and futile efforts for Waste Reprocessing.
So, 15000-30000 nukes over the world is not something that could be ever done unless you admit that we are going to be last few generations of humans on this lovely earth.
So my choice is following scenario, believing that humans equipped with correct knowledle are intelligent creatures:
A) Amend the constitution for nature sovereignity over human sovereinty with following clauses:
1- Nature has absolute sovereignty and has the right to sustain.
2- Every person has the right to defend the “Rights of Nature” in Courts.
3- Waste producing human activities (including urbanization) can only be allowed if waste stabilization is provided in 20 years maximum.
B) Decrease energy supply %20 by 2020, less %20 by 2030 and less %20 by 2040. This is not difficult if we understand that 100 kg person does not need 2 ton car to reach somewhere and we do not need to heat-up or cool down 300 m3 house/office volumes for our comfort and ……many-many more.
C) Convert all energy producing plants to Hydro-Wind-Solar-Geothermal-Tidal
D) Convince everybody that earth cannot host more than a few billion people.
E) Cities with populations over lets say 500000 people are nature murderers and should not be allowed.
F) Senate should be formed by Nature Scientists instead of a few term running Politicians.
G) Earth-Orbit elevator should be immediately built to get rid of accumulated Nuclear Wastes.
…..You can add many more.
And last, USA should use all her Political-Scientific power to convince all world nations on above. Naturally her own citizens first.
This is a reply to Mr David Cota. My reservation was about the logic of Moniz's observation. Until proved otherwise, nuclear waste is just that - a hazardous wsate.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe worry is not about any specific country, or about the present. If nuclear power-generation becomes a worldwide practice in the future, and nuclear waste is lying about at various plants in countries big and small, stable or disturbed,(Pakistan is a worrying example) it does not require much imagination to figure out the consequences.the consequences.
This is a reply to Mr David Cota. My reservation was about the logic of Moniz's observation. Until proved otherwise, nuclear waste is just that - a hazardous wsate.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe worry is not about any specific country, or about the present. If nuclear power-generation becomes a worldwide practice in the future, and nuclear waste is lying about at various plants in countries big and small, stable or disturbed,(Pakistan is a worrying example) it does not require much imagination to figure out the consequences.the consequences.
namikozcan, unfortunately you have failed to understand fundamental principles of natural systems. You need to learn about the Gia Hypothesis and the World's Foremost Environmentalist, James Lovelock, who has correctly determined that ONLY NUCLEAR ENERGY
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisONLY NUCLEAR ENERGY can save the Mother Earth. See:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe Natural Energy of the Universe - James Lovelock on Nuclear Power:
http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/2009/06/natural-energy-of-universe-james.html
The #1 goal of Life is to expand to new environments. In order for Life on Earth to expand it needs the help of humans, who can Terraform other planets to make them suitable for Terrestrial life. Mars is actually an easy planet to Terraform, and can actually be done in a trivial one hundred years. Expanding Terrestrial Eco-systems to another World, makes all the damage humans have done to the Earth, so trivial as to be not even worth discussing.
namikozcan, you are also forgetting that every 100 million years a large asteriod destroys 90% of the life on Earth. Only humans can prevent this from happening by using Nuclear Energy. So you see, Nuclear Energy is THE POWER TO SAVE THE WORLD. And is a gift to not only human civilization but to Natural Eco-systems as well.
The most Environmentally DESTRUCTIVE thing Humans have done to Mother Earth by a Huge Margin, is to FAIL to embrace Nuclear Energy, and use it to not only Power Human Civilization but to Expand Terrestrial Eco-systems to other planets.
If we do not want it, we could construct a space ship, using the technology of the Flying Saucer (discovered and patented), fill it with a few thousand tons of that material, and dump it by remote control into Jupiter.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf not, we can use the same technology to construct inexpensive, super-powerfull INGs to wring the few megawatts out of it.
Sethdayal : Nuclear power could never provide more than 6% of the worlds energy needs. Hydrocarbon pyrolysis can extract hydrogen until hydrocarbons are all used up. Then the extracted solid carbon could perhaps be burnt if CO2-CCS technology will habe proved to be workable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBy pyrolysing hydrocarbons, there would be no need to burn coal until CO2-CCS is effective, which could take many years.
eco-steve: Look at France's meager effort to replace Oil generated Electricity with Nuclear in the 1980's.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.iea.org/stats/pdf_graphs/FRTPES.pdf
Notice that they replaced half of their total Energy Supply with Nuclear in about 20 yrs, most of it in 12 yrs. This is for a middle wealth nation, with the best health care & social services in the World, one of the most expensive Military's in the World, and during the period improved their Standard of Living & productivity much faster than Renewables Germany, and instituted a 4 day, 32 hr work week. And all France did was take a run-of-the-mill GenII American Pressurized Light Water Reactor design, standardized and started building. No modern modular construction. No assembly line production. No CAD or CAM. No advanced computer control systems. No advanced GenIII designs or computer simulations. And they even partially reprocess their Fuel, producing only 0.3 oz of waste per capita per yr.
All France has to do now is Electrify Transport, Nuclear Synthetic Fuels, District Heating and/or expand their Nuclear by another 50% over what they already did. And they are a the World's ONLY ZERO CARBON NATION! Pretty simple minded, even without using Modern Construction & Design Methods.
So if France could do it with a modest effort & archaic technology, it is UNDENIABLE that the entire World can become A FOSSIL FUEL FREE ZONE within 50 yrs absolute max by converting to Nuclear Power.
By way of comparison, look at #1 Renewables Nation Germany and see the results of their PATHETIC EFFORT here:
http://www.iea.org/stats/pdf_graphs/DETPES.pdf
See the skinny little Red Line - that's Germany's MEGA-EFFORT no-holds-barred Solar & Wind Energy. Tiny compared to their Nuclear NON-EFFORT.
The World's Foremost Environmentalist, James Lovelock, has correctly determined that ONLY NUCLEAR ENERGY can save the Mother Earth. See:
The Natural Energy of the Universe - James Lovelock on Nuclear Power:
http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/2009/06/natural-energy-of-universe-james.html
The article, by David Biello, “Is Spent Nuclear Fuel a Waste or a Resource?” reports that the remaining uranium can sustain human needs for centuries and that spent nuclear fuel could be either a waste or a resource to humanity. While it is interesting how much uranium is still available, the article did not come to a conclusion about spent fuel or any future research on the topic.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBiello states that the United States can build many reactors without any problems, however a question remains: What about the waste? The author explains that both uranium 235 and plutonium 239 could be resources, but there is no mention of research to find an answer. These isotopes are radioactive and therefore need to be made safe for the environment. The only research planned for the future, mentioned in the article, is for water reactors. Research on water reactors will decrease the energy loss making them more productive. This will increase the percentage of power produced and therefore help the US economy; nevertheless it does not solve the problem of spent nuclear fuel.
The spent fuel will continue to accumulate and harm the environment. The land destruction and the loss of ecosystems affect our society by being able to produce less on the land as well contaminates the water. Furthermore, the damage to the land may cause the extinction of some species. More power plants will mean more money invested in nuclear fuel, which means more waste and a need to find a way to reuse it or to permanently storage it. Within the article the Yucca Mountain in Nevada, is stated as the place of storage for the United States, but World News Forecast records that this storage site was suppose to be shut down by Sept. 30th (2010). These plans will cause many problems because the United States does not have a backup site. At the moment, over 100 temporary sites are being used (2010). But how long before new sites are needed? In brief, although another site could probably be found, research to reuse the spent nuclear fuel would be opportune.
Citation taken from: http://www.newsahead.com/preview/2010/09/30/washington-dc-30-sep-2010-yucca-mountain-nuclear-waste-project-due-to-close/index.php.