UK's Chief Scientist Backs Nuclear Power Revival

Timbotronic writes "The UK government's chief scientific adviser has sent his clearest signal that Britain will need to revive its nuclear power industry in the face of a looming energy crisis and the threat of global warming. In an interview with the Guardian, Sir David King said there were economic as well as environmental reasons for a new generation of reactors." From the article: "His remarks come in the build-up to international talks in Montreal on how to address the threat of climate change when the Kyoto protocol expires in 2012. He denied suggestions - sparked by comments from Mr Blair that he was changing his mind on whether international treaties were the best way to tackle global warming - that Britain was moving closer to the stance of the US, which has refused to back Kyoto-style emission reductions."

Comments

Nuclear Power

[Cowclops]

I personally don't see a problem with this. What with modern technology, it seems like we should be able to build nuclear power plants much safer and more efficient than anything in the past. The threat of the radioactive biproducts is an issue, but it is a much less immediate (and, in the long term anyway, less of an actual threat) than dumping tons of smog in the air until we're out of coal and oil.

Re:Nuclear Power

[mordors9]

Ah, but it will only be a matter of time before the anti-Nuke people will rear their ugly heads once again.

Re:Nuclear Power

[CastrTroy]

Which brings up a question that's been on my mind. How much nuclear fuel is on earth. If we replaced all the fossil fuels we use, with nuclear fuel, how long would our supplies last? And how much nuclear waste would be created as a result? If nuclear fuel just replaces fossil fuels, and ends up creating the same problems in another 100 years, then we really should be thinking of a solution that works out better in the long term. Like wind, geothermal, and other types of clean, renewable, energy.

Re:Nuclear Power

[cblood]

We already have a Nuclear power plant that has proven reliable, effective and stable. It is at a nice safe distance and very good service record. It's called the sun.

Re:Nuclear Power

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't about safe and efficient power generation. This is about centralised control of power generation. Imagine a world where individuals and small communities had a means to generate their own clean energy and to communicate amongst themselves. The ruling elite want to stop that happening at all costs. If that means using oil, coal, or nuclear energy, then that's what they'll push. As long as it's difficult to get at it gives them control. That's what's behind the recent push for nuclear energy.

You want to bring about the demise of the ruling elite? It's actually very simple. Free energy. Free communication. But I suppose they'd fabricate a world war before too many people managed to get those two things. Or put communications jamming equipment in space or something.

Re:Nuclear Power

[aaronl]

Power in the future isn't going to be wind, geothermal, etc, because it doesn't produce enough power. Obviously, the more we can get that way the better, but they are highly inefficient, and require specific placement. That means you have a limited amount that you can put online.

We have a very large amount of uranium ore around, but it isn't easy to get. The process of creating fuel from it is also complicated. Our best bet is to use fission while we refine the passive generation (solar, hydro, etc) and research fusion. If we figure fusion out, then we don't have to worry about the other forms, though solar is a good idea to continue researching.

Re:Nuclear Power

[Anonymous Coward]

Let us know when the following hurdles have been overcome:

1. Clouds,
2. Nighttime.

Re:Nuclear Power

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, you realize that when your local Safeway ran out of aluminum foil last week, it was merely a temporary stocking oversight, and not a conspiracy. Right?

Re:Nuclear Power

[Phanatic1a]

How much nuclear fuel is on earth. If we replaced all the fossil fuels we use, with nuclear fuel, how long would our supplies last?

There's about 50 years of uranium reserves right now, a bit over 2 million tons.

Reserves are ores that are economically exploitable. In other words, reserves increase when you find a less expensive way to get the ore, or when the price of ore rises. If the price of ore goes up by 50%, we more than double our reserves to 5 million tons. If it goes up much more than that, oceanic reserves come into play, and there are 4.5 *billion* tons in the oceans.

Now, that's talking about U235 burned in a PWR. There are other things you can do which vastly increase reserves. There are reactor designs that can breed U238 into U235. That presents a proliferation concern, but you can also just burn U238 in a CANDU reactor or other design. You can breed thorium into U233 and burn that.

And the thing is that nuclear fuel is so much more energy-dense than chemical fuel. Coal has an energy content of about 24 MJ per kilogram, assuming perfect conversion to electricity, and I think good coal plants with top-of-the-line turbines and boilers and everything can get up to about 70% overall thermal efficiency, but hell, let's say 90%. Figures I found for the US in 1982 indicate that all the nuclear power plants in the US consumed 540 tons of fuel and produced 1.1E12 kilowatt-hours of electricity, which means *after* all those efficiency losses (PWRs are less thermally efficient because you've got to transfer heat across coolant loops), we were getting 8 million megajoules per kilogram of fuel.

8 million megajoules per kilogram, versus 21.6 megajoules per kilogram. What that means is that your *fuel* cost can rise significantly, but your cost per kilowatt-hour at your meter will see only a very small rise.

So to sum up, there's a hella lot of nuclear fuel available.

Re:Nuclear Power

[fredmosby]

It depends on what kind of process is used to make power. Most reactors use U235, and there's only enough of that in the current uranium mines to last 50 years. If a plutonium process were used (turning the U238 into plutonium) the same amount of uranium could power the world for around 1000 years. There's also about three times as much thorium, which can be turned into U233 to produce power.

So that's around 4000 years mining the uranium and thorium that is economical to extract at todays prices. With higher uranium costs more could be extracted.

Re:Nuclear Power

[dbIII]

Unless we go the way of fast breeders the energy cost of large amounts of nuclear power makes it pointless - processing low grade ore into fuel insn't easy (and a lot of conventional fuel will be burned in the process), and there really isn't a lot of high grade stuff about. Fast breeders have not yet succeeded on economic grounds, and there are other problems.

They should certainly put some money into research, but the nuclear power industries insistance that they are perfect since the 1950s has helped ensure that after 50 years we have nothing more promising than a tiny pebble bed prototype - and a whole pile of 1950's white elephants with other stuff tacked on the side.

Re:Nuclear Power

[LiquidCoooled]

Step one should be to conserve whatever we have now.
To stop wasting energy for EVERYTHING.

Why should we wait until we have run out of fuel to push for efficiency?

We have the technology now to create extremely low power devices which run at perfectly reasonable speeds and which cut down on wasted energy.

If everybody turned off none essential lights when they left the room or underclocked their machines when browsing, or drove a more efficient vehicle we would help to save the precious resources we have.

If everyone in the world just put their minds to it, we might actually have enough energy available from renewable sources.

Theres a group in the UK who have the right idea, they are called The Carbon Trust. Their site is well worth a visit, and it might just save you some money as well.

Re:Nuclear Power

[cluckshot]

The highland rim of Tennessee fairly cooks with Uranium. None is mined there. The stuff is a lot more common than most any calculations based on current mines say. Nuclear is safe by all measures over its competition technologies in a utility grid setup.

The whole problem with energy is an issue not of supply but of control. If the powers that be are not going to be in control of your energy supply they are going to fight you tooth and tong. The list of alternative technologies is nearly endless.

Imagine a machine at your house that pumps out useful energy without you having to pay a monthly bill. These exist and have been patiented for years. The list of ways to do this is almost endless. The problem is that they don't pay the investments of the big guys anymore. That makes them "uneconomic" for the bankers and for the investment community. I won't bother listing the tech here because the list is so long. Freeing ones self from the grid is like a Borg entity trying to be free. "Prepare for assimilation, resistance is futile."

At this momement thousands of persons on the US Gulf Coast are suffering extended power outages that may last a year or more. Similarly tens of thousands are in danger of their lives in Kashmir because the grid has failed and is not delivering energy or food for them. At every turn the centralized controlled solutions are presented to the public as "cheaper" "safer" and etc. In the end people die from their dependence.

Make no mistake, I am not one of those socialist green types. I just have eyes and can see what is going on. I do not oppose nuclear. I am seeing a network developing where a person may be laid seige to and killed in a matter of days by merely switching him off. I am seeing a world where a person is a dependent for life on a utility grid as a baby in his mothers womb is dependent on the umbilical cord. This is not a rational set of solutions.

Re:Nuclear Power

[pfdietz]

3. Extreme cost of photovoltaic modules.

Re:Nuclear Power

[pfdietz]

Fast breeders aren't the only kind of breeder. Some thermal reactor types achieve breeding ratios very close to 1 with the Th-U cycle. As an example, CANDU reactors work well with this cycle, and have excellent neutron economy, Recent advances in heavy water production will help reduce the cost of CANDU plants.

Re:Nuclear Power

[jcr]

I personally don't see a problem with this

The problem isn't nuclear power per se, it's the arbitrary limitations of liability for nuclear plant operators. In the USA, the Price-Anderson act limits that liability to $200 million. If the act were repealed, then we'd either get no nuclear power plants, or power plants whose owners have proven to the satisfaction of their insurers and investors that they're safe to operate.

I'm in favor of nuclear power in principle, but I really don't trust governments to operate them competently, or to let people who know what they're doing make the design decisions.

In the Soviet Union, Chernobyl happened because they cut corners in the design and operating procedures of the reactors. At TMI, you had probably the all-time classic case of human-factors engineering being botched by a vaudeville show of incompetent regulators.

-jcr

Re:Nuclear Power

[Anonymous Coward]

Nanocrystal solar cells have just recently been announced. Cheap, efficient and durable.

If solar had had even 2% of the R&D put into it as nukes over the past decades, think about how much farther we could have come. Even still, the advances have simply been amazing, and just get better every day.

And nukes are just another form of fossil fuel, uranium is just as limited in recoverable quantities as oil, and the prices will reflect that in the coming years. I have no doubt more reactor of various kinds will be built, and I also have no doubt it will never be as cheap and afe as the proponents have always claimed. And there's one more negative, nukes you can't own, you can merely lease the infrastructure with zero end user price warranties or guaranties. Hear that part again? forget that little gem? You get ZERO price guarantees. NONE. With wind or solar, you CAN own it outright and get a bottom line price today, with no hidden unforseen price increases in the future, a la enron scams, etc.

If you can dispute that, please provide a reference for your pesonal residential grid electric supplier you use -a URL is fine- and what the contract terms are, ie, such and such a guaranteed kw/h price for so many years, call it ten to twenty years minimum contract, what solar PVs are now shipping with as a warranty,and what terms you can get financed now, for comparison.

Re:Nuclear Power

[aaronl]

I think you just misunderstood my post. I wasn't saying that we don't need to conserve or that we shouldn't create more efficient tech, at all. I was saying, and am saying now, that our future advances *are* going to need a lot of power. Messing around on an atomic level to build molecules and nanotech, space flight, etc, require a huge amount of energy. We need to get that developed, and nuclear is just the best tech available for doing that. It takes a long time to bring a reactor online! Plus, we need to stop using fossil fuels in short order.

Actually, I already do a number of the things from that page, personally, and I push for them at my workplace. It looks like it's a good organisation. I think we *should* go for conservation and efficiency, but ultimately those are only going to give us a temporary reprieve.

I really doubt that renewable sources will give us the amount of energy we need, though. They aren't efficient and many aren't reliable for production. Solar and wind are especially bad for that, and they really are supplementary generation methods. Solar has issues of its own, with the very toxic process needed to create photovoltaic cells. The solar convection method is better for that, but it generates less power.

I think if we're getting our heads together over something, researching power productions methods is just as important as efficiency and conservation. Neither should supplant the other.

Re:Nuclear Power

[cblood]

It is called energy storage. There are houses built im Cambridge MA with no active heating. It stays at 70 degrees +-2 degrees year round.

It is not hard to heat and cool with a fraction of the energy we now consume.

Re:Nuclear Power

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, but it will only be a matter of time before the anti-Nuke people will rear their ugly heads once again.

They certainly will!

I recommend cutting their peckers off and throwing them into a shark tank. Dumb bastards have already set us back over thirty years.

Re:Nuclear Power

[SeaFox]

If nuclear fuel just replaces fossil fuels, and ends up creating the same problems in another 100 years, then we really should be thinking of a solution that works out better in the long term. Like wind, geothermal, and other types of clean, renewable, energy.

PESSIMIST MODE ON

The problem with renewable energy sources is they aren't as easy to control as non-renewable ones. There's no "reserves" to have possession of. You think the power companies would give a hoot about other energy sources if there was still plenty of what we had been using before? They're just looking for a new type of well to buy since the ones they have are drying up.

Wind and Solar are too exploitable by the common man with the right equipment. The power companies are looking to maintain their continuous revenue generating service instead of having to change to a product-based business model of selling people solar panels. It's just like the record companies trying to change from selling the music to renting it. They all want to maintain their comfortable oligarchy in their respective business, at least for their time in the big chair. Nuclear power allows that, the long term isn't considered because the board members will be pushing up daisies by the time it becomes an issue. Geothermal might allow this control too but the setup costs for the business is scaring them away.

PESSIMIST MODE OFF

Re:Nuclear Power

[Seumas]

fast breeders

What does Rob Malda's mother have to do with this discussion?

Re:Nuclear Power

[radl33t]

Combined cycle (gas + steam turbines) can push 50% TE. Theres no need to give them credit for anything higher. Average efficiency for US coal plants is around 38%. The difference is energy density is understandably obnoxious. Much more energy is tied up inside atoms then between them. Proliferation is a "concern" that serves political purposes. There is plenty of readily recoverable fissile material to power the continued growth of human economies for a long time. Certainly beyond the point where separate issues will a present larger problems.

Re:Nuclear Power

[dfn5]

I personally don't see a problem with this. What with modern technology, it seems like we should be able to build nuclear power plants much safer and more efficient than anything in the past.

I would tend to agree. However, I was reading an editorial in the latest issue of Home Power magazine which stated that nuclear power plants are not as economical as we have been lead to believe. The government (read U.S. gov) subsidizes some aspect of the operation to make it profitable.

I have never heard this before and the source is certainly not without its bias so I am somewhat skeptical. Anything that isn't strictly a renewable source to them is bad.

Re:Nuclear Power

[FleaPlus]

And how much nuclear waste would be created as a result?

Not only that, but I'm also curious as to how much waste (both radioactive and chemical) would be released into the air by the equivalent amount of fossil fuels?

Re:Nuclear Power

[pfdietz]

Yeah, we periodically hear of the big breakthrough that will reduce the cost of PV cells. This has been happening for decades, but PV sales are still overwhelmingly conventional silicon (and may be getting more expensive now that PV production has exhausted the surplus Si byproduct feed from fabs.) So don't be credulous about the latest claim; judging by history it will very likely go nowhere.

Nuclear has gotten a lot of money from the government, but then nuclear has provided a lot in return to the government, like bombs and nuclear propulsion for warships and subs.

Uranium is quite a bit more abundant than is often depicted; remember that at today's U price the cost of the natural uranium itself is a very small part of the cost of nuclear energy, so its price could go up a lot without significant impact. When and if that happens, we can build powerplants with improved breeding to extend the resource even more.

If you can dispute that, please provide a reference for your pesonal residential grid electric supplier you use -a URL is fine- and what the contract terms are

This is the Chicago are; we're supplied by ComEd. Residential rates are 8.75 cents/kWh (plus a fixed service fee of $7.13/month). There are also taxes, IIRC, but I don't remember what they are.

According to this page, PV electricity is still about 30 cents/kWh in the sunniest locations. Chicago is far from the sunniest location; let's say 50 cents/kWh here. So solar is not competitive with grid power for my by about a factor of five.

Re:Nuclear Power

[s1234d]

Nuclear power yields little to no energy, once you consider the enourmous amounts of energy needed for mining, processing, enrichment, building a reacter, discommisioning the reactor etc. They looked great when oil was cheap.

Re:Nuclear Power

[kesuki]

thank goodness i know how to build a solar cooker, to use the same solar cooker to create ice at night time, and know how to create fire from wood for heat, how to convert virtually any vegatable oil into biodiesel, know how to build a simple electric generator, know how to build a windmill, that turns said genenrator, and know how to build batteries from mason jars, lead, a strong acid and purified water, how to distill and purify water, and/or strong alchohol, basic first aid medicine, etc etc...

and most important of all, i know how to hide from the crazy sob who doesn't know how to do any of that and who would gladly try and kill me for all that i had in a post apocyliptic world. Still I would have to agree, people seem to be seeking the 'short sighted' solutions of fossil/non renewable fuels, when 2/3rds of the earth's surface is already covered in water, and could sustain enough algae 'energy' belts to convert about a thousand times our 'current' global energy reserves every year from solar energy into renewable natural oils... that when burned provided the carbon dioxide needed by the floating tracts of algae.

What's worse of all, is that we spend triple what it would cost to build an infrastructure of 'algea' belts in a year to provide all our 'renewable' energy needs in just trying to find and exploit new 'non-renewable' energy resources.

Why? in part because the economies of scale required to 'bring' the cost of algea farming down to 'reasonable prices' would virtually require completely replacing coal electric production, and oil refining combined. but it's also because 'energy' companies are run by fools who don't 'get' it. maybe con agra will 'get' it someday, and develop practical algea farming so they can crush the fools behind fossil fuel exploitation.. seriously 'growing' the entire world's energy supply is probabbly the biggest possible market anyone could 'dream' of creating and most of the technology has been developed, but they're scattered like a jigsaw puzzle now.. no one has put them together to bring a fully realistic method of 'growing' all the enegry the world needs.

Re:Nuclear Power

[Anonymous Coward]

1) PV solar electricity is certainly more expensive than grid electricity. But PV will not go up in price. Grid electricity will, as oil becomes more expensive.

2) There are other, cheaper and more 'bulk oriented' methods of producing electricity from solar power. These may not be suitable for home-installations, but rather for use by power companies.

3) Having a PV array on your roof (and a few batteries) will offset the amount of power you pay for fromthe grid, and give you power when the grid fails (storms, blackouts, etc). Many people think that is worth paying a little more.

Re:Nuclear Power

[linuxpyro]

Power in the future isn't going to be wind, geothermal, etc, because it doesn't produce enough power.

Not enough power? Current solar cell technologies (available to the average consumer) can achieve ~15% efficiency. This is at "full sun," which is rated at 1000 watts/square meter. There are even more efficient technologies used in satellites, etc. There is still a lot of room for improvement, but it is not too far off. Many people already supply all the power they need for their home with solar and other renewables. (Check out Home Power for more on that.)

The same goes for wind as well. We receive an incredible amount of energy in the form of sunshine each day. We have the technology to harness it, so why not? We could build some large scale wind and solar plants, and give tax incentives to people who set up their own systems and put their extra power back onto the grid. Extra energy could be stored on a large scale through hydrogen. I think some nuclear plants would be needed, as it would be a good idea to diversify. But we would lessen our dependence on a source of uranium ore, and keep the production of waste to a minimum. Not to mention that if we spread out our power generation more, the power quality would increase, not as much power would be lost in transmission, and the utility grid would be less vulnerable.

Of course there's no way this'll ever happen over night. But it is a good thing to work towards. Greater production of the renewable energy technologies would lead to more innovation, and new jobs. The US and other countries should work to phase in something like this over time, rather than just building a bunch of nuke plants.

Re:Nuclear Power

[blank axolotl]

In addition to what you said, it's also my understanding that 'uranium reserves' only includes discovered resources: The more good locations we discover, the more our reserves increase.

From http://www.uic.com.au/nip75.htm
Current usage is about 68,000 tU/yr. Thus the world's present measured resources of uranium in the lower cost category (3.5 Mt) and used only in conventional reactors, are enough to last for some 50 years. This represents a higher level of assured resources than is normal for most minerals. Further exploration and higher prices will certainly, on the basis of present geological knowledge, yield further resources as present ones are used up. There was very little uranium exploration between 1985 and 2005, so a significant increase in exploration effort could readily double the known economic resources, and a doubling of price from present levels could be expected to create about a tenfold increase in measured resources, over time.

From http://www.magma.ca/~jalrober/Chapter14c.htm
Large amounts of uranium exist: it is about as abundant as tin. At the current rate of consumption (35,000 tonnes per year) and prices, known uranium resources of four million tonnes represent about 65 years consumption at current rates, comparable with about 42 years for oil and 62 years for natural gas.

Iv'e seen a lot of estimates of the 'true' amount of uranium, so I'm not sure anyone really knows. Most estimates are around a couple hundred years (more than fossil fuel, but still not a long term solution)

Re:Nuclear Power

[zerus]

I'm guessing you don't mean breeding U238 into U235. The breeding reaction with uranium, that I'm assuming you meant, is where the neutron is absorbed in the U238 which makes U239 which will beta decay into Np239 which beta decays into fissile Pu239 and then upwards with each subsequently absorbed neutron. There is no way to breed U235 effectively and in great abundance. You could have a high energy neutron that knocks a neutron out of U236, but the cross section for that is on the order of nanobarns whereas the XS of first chance fission has resonances near that of the total absorption XS, so it's not too likely. You can run a thorium cycle which can produce U233 which is also fissile, but has many reprocessing steps to remove the U233 from the thorium if that's the desired fuel type, and if reprocessing is the desired route, then breeding U238 into plutonium and reprocessing the fuel into a high burn up MOX would work best. I don't quite agree with your number of 50 years of nuclear fuel either. It's more like 150 years with the gen4 reactors that have the better flux profiles and can utilize high burnup fuelsmore effectively than the modified current versions. That fuel will last even longer once reprocessing becomes economically viable. Technology-wise we can reprocess spent fuel with very little loss of burnable fuel, with Cogema's diamex or JAERI's DIDPA solvent extraction processes that can get 99.97% of U, Pu, and minor actinides with very little contamination by some of the more annoying fission products. In short, you're right, there is a whole helluva lot of nuclear fuel available for many generations

Re:Nuclear Power

[Dasher42]

Power in the future isn't going to be wind, geothermal, etc, because it doesn't produce enough power. Obviously, the more we can get that way the better, but they are highly inefficient, and require specific placement. That means you have a limited amount that you can put online.

Two things I want to question about this: define "enough power". A great deal of our problem lies in the fact that we waste so much, manufacture disposable goods using brute force methods, and that people insist on sprawling suburbs with artificially cut lawns. How much of this is actually enhancing the quality of life? We can't just insist on wasting energy reserves; at some point our consumption has to conform to the level of energy entering the system.

Modern industry society, IMHO, spends a lot of time and energy working to accomplish very little of real value. Now say you wanted a system to create perfect microscopic glass spheres? Students of biomimicry have found that a species of sponge makes them better than any process of ours, and it does so as a single living thing, not a huge energy-guzzling factory. That's just one example.

Secondly, you say the green power technologies are "highly inefficient". Compared to what? Waiting for all the solar power to be photosynthesized for millions of years, feed through the food webs and into fossil remains, for humanity to burn it all in a century or two? Or is it the amount of energy a solar panel receives that it manages to convert into usable power? Isn't 5-10% better than nothing when the input is free, especially when the technology has room to grow? And even now, if you were to compare the energy expenditure to manufacture the solar panels to what they'll create over their lifetime, I'm thinking they're a good investment. I think green power is the only game in town for civilization to last millenia into the future.

Respectfully,

Re:Nuclear Power

[WindBourne]

Power in the future isn't going to be wind, geothermal, etc, because it doesn't produce enough power.

Even though I am a fan of nukes, I have to say that is patently false. In fact, just read some of the earlier articles here to find out that wind alone can put out more than double what we use (That is total energy, not electricity), let alone the other alternative energy (solar, geo, wave, etc).

In fact, you will find a number of companies who are creating wind energy plants all over the world and then selling the energy. More importantly, they are making LOTS of profit at it.

The real issue is how to deal with varying power. Instead of focusing on power generation, we should focus on how to store it. Right now, Colorado is testing conversion of electricity to H2 and then use the H2 to drive an internal combustion engine to drive a generator (how inefficient can you get). The one nice advantage of researching storage is that it will allow a mixture of alternative a nukes to generate electricty/other energy that is stored close to the site of usage.

Re:Nuclear Power

[Anonymous Coward]

+2, Stupidly Informative.

Re:Nuclear Power

[Rei]

big breaktrough that will reduce the cost of PV cells ... happening for decades

Indeed, we have. And you know what? Solar power is, inflation-adjusted, a quarter the cost it was in the 1970s. In short, the predictions of notably reduced cost have been *accurate*. If they keep remaining accurate, solar will become the cheapest power source available.

The physics are sound, and there are many potential approaches, for not just nanocrystalline solar, but efficient organic solar. Low efficiency organic solar is due to random scattering of the electron donors and recipients. There are at least half a dozen companies out there working on nanoscale assembly, so that it's not random, and thus should get silicon-level efficiency at the cost of plastic sheeting. The odds of none of them succeeding seem extremely slim.

Uranium is quite a bit more abundant than is often depicted

False. For example SK's known deposits will be fully extracted in 25 years (Australia will last loner). At current power consumption and efficiency, if we produced all of our power from uranium, and assuming new deposits are found, we've probably got about as much uranium left as we do coal.

The problem is not only that uranium isn't an incredibly common element on the surface. The fact is that only 0.7% of natural uranium is U-235, which is what is burned in the vast majority of reactors worldwide And you'll usually only get half of that out. What we *really* need are safe breeders (for example, lead or lead-bismuth). Also, thorium breeders allow the use of a completely different, not to mention more common, fuel.

Additionally, there are many types of solar beyond PV; PV is just the most convenient for small-scale application. For large scale, your most economical options are solar thermal and (possibly) solar chimneys (it's a relatively new concept, so it's too early to say). With solar thermal, you don't need silicon - you can use any decent infrared reflector, along with a heliostat, and you point it at a dark-colored tank housing a working fluid. Even if you're just looking a PV, small-scale heliostat arrays that direct light to small high-efficiency silicon cells are just about to start hitting the market, promising rooftop-mounted grid-price PV solar (cheaper in sunnier regions, more expensive in shady regions).

Lastly, solar can displace electricity/natural gas consumption. For example, not only can you have solar water heating and solar house heating, but you can even have solar-powered air conditioning (it's currently only cost-effective for large facilities due to the cost of the evaporators, however, since they're not mass produced).

Re:Nuclear Power

[aaronl]

Green energy is inefficient compared to all the other forms of energy generation we use. Solar gets 15% at best, for example. It also requires the creation and use of large amount of toxic materials, and quite a bit of energy waste. (This is for photovoltaics.) Or you could use the oil convection style of solar, which is much less efficient, but doesn't require toxic materials or large amount of energy to put into service. Solar and wind are unreliable, so you can't use them as primary generation methods. Geothermal isn't available in most places. Hydro is the most useful one, and you can only put up so many of those.

Add to that the problem with photovoltaic panels being fragile, in addition to highly costly to manufacture, and there is another issue. They are very expensive to keep in service in large enough numbers for grid power generation. That's why solar production has so often been of the mirror and heating tower design: it's inexpensive to replace mirrors.

Even if this all was overcome, then you have to be able to store power to make solar/wind really useful, instead of a secondary generation system. There are currently no good ways to store that power, so it's a wash. You can't trust it enough to be primary, and you can't store it. Research into storage is useful, and it might change this somewhat.

As far as solar investment, if you look at the cost of high density panels, you'll find that they are very expensive and you have to hope the panel doesn't get damaged for over a decade to achieve positive return.

Given the apparent energy demands for the future, I'd say we can pretty much guarantee that green power isn't going to be sufficient. We need something with a tremendously higher energy density than those can ever reasonably offer us. You can't expect to cover the planet's surface in solar cells or wind turbines, and you do have a finite energy density, either way.

Don't you realize that lack of abundant and cheap energy hinders a lot of scientific endeavor? It cuts into a lot of physics research, materials research, etc...

Re:Nuclear Power

[aaronl]

Great, so theoretically wind can produce twice what we are using right now. Of course by placing a turbine behind a turbine you reduce the energy yield of the second. Do this enough and you have no more wind to move turbines. That energy is finite, too. Solar has problems with production waste and associated costs, as well as being fragile. Both have the issue of being unreliable. Geothermal isn't widely useable and hydro has an easily determined cap.

The next issue is that we have no way to store the energy. You mention research that might someday be good for storing power, and that is good for then. That is still finite for storage, but the risk is probably acceptable. We still have to make a good storage technique.

Just because something works on a small scale doesn't mean it works on a global scale. Getting that wrong is a large part of how we got into the energy mess we're in right now.

You also miss completely that our energy usage is only going to increase. We need higher energy density production, not lower energy density like what green power can do. Green is a step forward for waste material, and a big step backwards in output.

Re:Nuclear Power

[dbIII]

PV electricity is still about 30 cents/kWh in the sunniest locations.

Entirely true - photovolaic cells are what you use when you want something convenient and portable (like on a calculator, satellite or offshore beacon). The parent poster should realise that they are comparing an industrial scale method of generation huge amounts of steam with a small scale method of getting a few watts where it is convenient - I don't know whether it was a deliberate measure to find the most expensive non-nuclear power source in use or simple ignorance. Solar thermal in a variety of forms works on the large scale - that is where the comparison should be made instead of a comparison as meaninless as comparing rowboats to aircraft carriers.

High grade uranium is not abundant, and processing low grade ore requires a lot of energy.

Re:Nuclear Power

[dbIII]

Is there a fast breeder that has broken even economically? Please provide a link. Looks like other reactor designs would have to be used - so the fuel problem would have to be solved before a large scale implementation.

I can't see the USA going nuclear in a large way any time soon - that's a lot of money to borrow for little return.

Re:Nuclear Power

[dbIII]

Everyone is missing geothermal here, which is strange becuase there are some interesting projects going ahead now and the technology is incredibly simple. Even geologically stable Australia has a lot of hot wet rock close to the surface in one place (Cooper Basin) that could generate terawatts for decades with a few holes and turbines. In bits of the USA and Europe you even have steam reaching the surface.

A monoculture for energy is stupid anyway - anyone that tells you that something is the one true energy is selling something or a victim of advertising. Wind is good in some spots - but has high maintainance costs and a small unit size. Solar thermal is fantastic in daylight, and can work at night if you use ammonia as the working fluid and get some heat out of recombining it at night. Solar photovoltaic is great if you want something portable, but has a bad rep for costs due to it being used for token green efforts requiring little planning by power authorities that wanted to have little publicity stunts. Hydro is great when you have snow as a reserve. Tidal is good, but rarely gives you much near large population centres (having a port in an area with a big tidal range is bad news, so people live elsewhere) and is really just hydro. Coal is cheap but has carbon problems and pollution problems (not radioactivity problems - that's going into tinfoil hat land) etc etc.

The biggest problem I have with nuclear is the "too cheap to meter" and "clean" bullshit that you can't get past from fanatics to have any sort of rational discussion about the stuff.

Re:Nuclear Power

[jez9999]

You also miss completely that our energy usage is only going to increase.

Why?

Re:Nuclear Power

[Anonymous Coward]

Here in German you pay about 25 euro-cents for KW/h from the grid. That solar power is not comparable to grid power in your country is because grid power is so cheap. And why is it so cheap? Because you "burn" coal, oil or uran and do not take into account the long-term costs like wastage handling, environment pollution etc.

In addition, there is a really big grid to maintain, which often has single (or triple) point of failures. A local energy source (wind/solar/natural gas etc) would not put everyone in the danger of loosing power, just because $big_plant had a big hickup, and $big_line failes spectaculary (think earth quake, or gasp terrorism).

It is really interesting to see that in the south of Germany (lots of sunshine) you get _a lot_ solar panels on houses, especially farms, while in the north you get _a lot_ wind farms. We currently produce about 5% (or so) with alternative energy sources, and this shall rise to 12% over the next few years. Making us more independent of oil/gas/coal, and big power plants.

Re:Nuclear Power

[ces]

Nuclear power yields little to no energy, once you consider the enourmous amounts of energy needed for mining, processing, enrichment, building a reacter, discommisioning the reactor etc. They looked great when oil was cheap.

Um, no wrong. No more so for nuclear than coal.

True that gas diffusion enrichment is horribly energy intensive, but modern centerfuge processes are much more efficent. The main reason many countries who make nuclear fuel aren't currently using centerfuge processes are due to large capital costs.

The rest of the energy consumpttion for building, operating, and decomissioning a reactor is similar to a fossil fuel plant.

As for decomissioning, it is clear that many plants have more than a 20 or 30 year useful lifetime. I suspect, depending on the specifics of the plant, the lifetime is probably more in line with coal plants (50-60 years).

Even when using low-grade ore and gas difussion enrichment a nuclear plant produces far more energy over its lifetime than is consumed by building, fueling, and decomissioning the plant.

Re:Nuclear Power

[cliffski]

Whats wrong with the othe (non polluting) renewable energies such as wind, solar, wave etc? And then we have the real biggy:

ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Yup I dared mention the phrase that strikes terror into the Bush administration. It may amaze US motorists to discover that unlike the new Hummer, European cars have actually advanced their MPG since the Ford Model T. Combine a genuine demand from customers for greener vehciles with much higher fuel taxes, and its amazing how much more efficient the average vehicle can be.
Then there are all the other ways we just throw energy away. How many stores heat their storefronts with the doors open in midwinter? how many people have a 400watt PC left on 24 hours a day, and how many offices enforce the switching off of monitors and PCS overnight, or even at the weekend?
Energy efficiency is considred entirely optional, because electrivity prices dont take into effect the impact of power generation on the environment. The gradual staged introduction of a meaty carbon tax would lead to a huge ramping up of research into energy efficient appliances.

As a geek, even if there was limitless energy, seeing inefficiency and waste would bug me. Thats why I can' understand why ALL new cars arent hybrids, mandated by government. I read numerous stories of people "sitting in traffic jams escaping katrina, till we ran out of gas". How about turning off the engine when stationary or *gasp* getting a hybrid?

Tthere are better, cheaper and more effective solutions to our energy problems than nuclear.

Re:Nuclear Power

[FireFury03]

Colorado is testing conversion of electricity to H2 and then use the H2 to drive an internal combustion engine to drive a generator (how inefficient can you get).

What kind of efficiencies do you get using an internal combustian engine vs. fuel cell?

Re:Nuclear Power

[h4rm0ny]

How about population? The energy we want for research and creating cool things, etc., is probably much less than the amount we use just driving around, lighting and heating, etc. Technology has increased the capability of the individual enormously. Why can't we get by with a world population of 2 or 3 billion. That's still enough that we can all have a good social life.

Note that I'm not advocating radical population control. Native population in the developed West is dropping, with people having fewer children. It's only immigration that is off-setting this. I believe that reduced birth rate is a result of increased education and opportunity (of both genders). If you want to get the World population under control, you need to get schools out there and sexual equality. Given how much has been spent on warfare and violent means of social control, it makes you wonder what could be achieved with an equal amount of money spent on building schools, providing internet access and IT facilities. Quite a lot, is my guess.

Re:Nuclear Power

[bigdavex]

A link adds nicely to this comment.

Ah, but it will only be a matter of time before the anti-Nuke people will rear their ugly heads

once again.

Re:Nuclear Power

[danharan]

big breaktrough that will reduce the cost of PV cells ... happening for decades

Indeed, we have. And you know what? Solar power is, inflation-adjusted, a quarter the cost it was in the 1970s. In short, the predictions of notably reduced cost have been *accurate*. If they keep remaining accurate, solar will become the cheapest power source available.

Dude, you're wasting your time on all the nuke fanboys. They just don't understand economics unless it applies to their toys.

Mods: Sure, you can call this flamebait (got karma to burn, who gives a shit). The vast majority of comments are pro-nuke, and everyone is going on about safety when the REAL REASON so few nuke orders are going through is cost.

Oh, and parent is 100% correct with regards to solar prices going down. See also Earth-policy.org's Wind Power Set to Become World's Leading Energy Source and accompanying data (pay close attention to the last graph on that page). You just can't beat those types of economics- right now it's a race between solar and wind; nukes can't even come close.

Re:Nuclear Power

[pfdietz]

PV solar electricity is certainly more expensive than grid electricity. But PV will not go up in price. Grid electricity will, as oil becomes more expensive.

Almost all my electricity comes from coal and nuclear (with some gas); little comes from oil. There is an upper limit to how high it can go as the price of oil goes up, since if oil rises too much non-oil options will increasingly replace it in the powerplants where it still is used (the same is true of gas).

Prices will rise, but this will be largely due to inflation from monetary policy, not exhaustion of natural resources. Nuclear has actually been getting cheaper: the plants are operating at historically high capacity factors, and new plants will have lower capital cost (adjusted for inflation) due to experience and simplification and improved technology.

The cost of PV is also affected by expectations of inflation, since this increases the interest rate and that increases the financing cost (which is relevant even if you are paying cash, since it also reflects the investment income you could have earned elsewhere or the money you could have saved by paying down some other debt.)

Re:Nuclear Power

[pfdietz]

Solar power is, inflation-adjusted, a quarter the cost it was in the 1970s

The point I was making was not that PV prices won't come down, but that the gee-whiz silver bullet breakthroughs aren't what's been driving the price down. We still overwhelmingly use crystalline (and poly-xtal) Si, even after decades of hype about GaAs, a-Si, CuInSe2, CdTe, spheral, organic, etc. etc. cells.

So color me skeptical about the latest 'breakthrough'. Many, many attributes are necessary for a technology to be brought to market, and failing in just one of them will cause it to be left on the shelf.

False. For example SK's known deposits will be fully extracted in 25 years (Australia will last loner).

This comment reflects a common ignorance about natural resource economics. It costs a company money to characterize a mineral deposit. Unless that mineral deposit is mineable in a time scale of about 30 years, that money is wasted. So it's quite common to see only 30 years of reserves left in a mineral resource, even if the total quantity that can be found in the future is much larger.

Experts think there is much more uranium out there. According to John P. Holdren, the 'reasonably assured' terrestrial uranium resource is 100 million to 300 million tons at a price of $350/kg (about a factor of five higher than the current spot market price). Jacques Foos and team in France estimate seawater uranium (4 billion tons) can be extracted in the Gulf Stream for $210-260/kg using Japanese polymer adsorbant technology (this current carries 10 million tons of uranium per year.) (source: Garwin and Charpak, 'Megawatts and Megatons', pages 210-211.)

Re:Nuclear Power

[Spoing]

Imagine a machine at your house that pumps out useful energy without you having to pay a monthly bill. These exist and have been patiented for years. The list of ways to do this is almost endless. The problem is that they don't pay the investments of the big guys anymore. That makes them "uneconomic" for the bankers and for the investment community. I won't bother listing the tech here because the list is so long.

Do you mean total energy, or a supplement (say, a grid of pipes on the roof that water runs through that are heated by the sun)?

If you have a single example that provides much/most/all of the energy for a single house, provide a link. After all, if it's important...

Make no mistake, I am not one of those socialist green types. I just have eyes and can see what is going on. I do not oppose nuclear. I am seeing a network developing where a person may be laid seige to and killed in a matter of days by merely switching him off. I am seeing a world where a person is a dependent for life on a utility grid as a baby in his mothers womb is dependent on the umbilical cord. This is not a rational set of solutions.

Re:Nuclear Power

[pfdietz]

Reserves are ores that are economically exploitable.

Reserves are ores that are economically exploitable and have been characterized (mapped, drilled, surveyed, assayed). They do not represent all the ore that can be extracted economically at a given price, only the fraction that we know about.

Re:Nuclear Power

[mallardtheduck]

Lets see... Global population increasing, third world countries industrializing... Are you saying we should all have chinese-style population control and deny third world countries the chance to develop?

Re:Nuclear Power

[KDR_11k]

There are currently no good ways to store that power, so it's a wash.

Not necessarily.

Re:Nuclear Power

[pfdietz]

In the US, nuclear plants weren't being built primarily because burning gas or coal was cheaper. But now, natural gas prices have skyrocketed, so that leaves coal. And coal is cheaper because the cost of the emitted CO2 is not being paid by the utility.

IMO, it's a crime against humanity to build new coal-fired baseload plants, yet that is happening.

Wind suffers greatly because the power is not reliable. As a result, it needs a backup power supply unless it's only a small fraction of the total mix. Hydro can be used for that backup, but beyond that it's fossil fuels, and the cost (including CO2 emissions) of providing that backup must be included in the cost of wind. Nuclear, on the other hand, can be depended on for baseload power.

Re:Nuclear Power

[aaronl]

I forgot about that one, and it is a good option for hydro. It requires either another huge project to dig out a lower elevation reservoir, or you need the dam in a mountainous area. Where you can do this it works very well.

Re:Nuclear Power

[kilodelta]

Pebble bed designs are relatively safe. The only issue I see with nuclear is the waste.

Until the physicists figure out how to neutralize gamma radiation disposing of said waste is going to be an issue. I'm not all that concerned with alpha and beta because they aren't nearly as harmful.

ITER is a good first step to sustainable nuclear fussion. Right now we use fission and that leaves lots of nasty byproducts. Maybe we can re-fuse that crap in a type of fussion reactor so it neutralizes. But I don't think physics is quite up to that yet.

Re:Nuclear Power

[CastrTroy]

Solar panels create a little bit of toxic waste when you make them. After that, the energy is free from the sun, even if it's only 15% efficient, it's better to use 15% of free energy than 0% of the free energy we have available. Even though there is very little waste from expended nuclear fuel, you are forgetting the amount of waste needed to get at that fuel. The same thing goes for coal, oil, and natural gas. It's sad that everybody mentions the waste materials from producing photovoltaic cells, yet when they talk about other forms of energy, they never seem to think about the amount of waste just necessary in getting the fuel to the power plant. Plus, solar energy is safe enough for everyone to have a few panels on the top of their house. Which may not provide all the power they need, but would take quite a bit of stress off the grid, and would provide adequate power for cooking, lighting and refidgeration on the few times that the power grid shuts down.

Re:Nuclear Power

[sillybilly]

Wind is currently the most cost competitive of any energy technology, because it's so cheap to put up a turbine and just harness the energy. But in the long run, I don't think there is enough wind to satisfy all the energy needs of our planet (estimated at 5x current global energy consumption, covering 13% of all land area.)

You'll also have to remember that besides energy, most of our raw material productions rely on some kind of fossil fuel consumption (steel requires coal to be reduced from ore), and as our high concentration ores get used up, just like our fossil fuel sources get used up, we'll have to resort to processing low grade ores, which will need even more energy (even 10x as much as high grade ores.)

Also as human populations boom even further (imagine all of USA and Canada having the population density of Japan), there will simply not be enough energy to suit everyone's air conditioning needs, let alone produce all the hydrogen needing to bind air nitrogen to make liquid ammonia for fuel and fertilizer to feed all the hungry mouths and drive all the cars.

One of the issues with solar is that the rate of return is very slow (payback is near 5 years compared to 0.7 months on nuclear plant, note:these numbers could be inaccurate.) If you have high grade ore nothing beats the energy density of nuclear fuel, and in fact, there is even talk that moon oxygen extraction would not rely on local solar panels that get damaged by asteroids, but on a nuclear fuel device we take up there, similar to what powers submarines. With all the thorium around, do not be so quick to write off nuclear as an option. We may even end up completely relying on nuclear energy, only 150 years from the time it was invented by humankind (between 1900 and 1940.) As far as safety goes, you'd have to build these things deep into mountains, so in case they do blow up, it will be just like an underground nuclear testing. People would live in cities, then go to train station to board a super high speed train that goes inside a vacuum tube at 500km/hr to get to their work that's 250km away carved deep into the mountain, do their daily job, then go home live in the city. Just like firefighters are willing to enter a burning house, I don't think you'd have a problem finding employees for such power stations, willing to risk their own lifes if they think it's for a worthy cause. Hey, if a plant blows, it blows, it's well contained, and the other plants carved into the same mountain 10 km away are still safe and can go on churning out energy. The only issue with this scheme that I don't have a good idea for is the need for a large thermal sink with current nuclear technology. These days nuke plants are constructed near large bodies of water, with huge cooling towers and tremendous thermal pollution. That's a safety issue, and if there were only a way to not need such a thermal sink (i.e. when you got energy, is there a way you can get to it by a different route, by a non-carnot-thermal-engine to mechanical-to-electrical way, but instead, say use it to generate ions then harvest those ions through deflecting magnets to create electricity, basically some non-thermal way, so your nuke plant doesn't need so much interaction with the outside thermodynamic universe, other than two copper wires coming out of it carrying juice?

Re:Nuclear Power

[zerus]

That depends on your view of economical. If you consider breeder reactors that made plutonium for weapons programs in the US and USSR, then yes, those were very economical at the time since the contractors made so much I'd probably get any figure I would guess wrong. As far as a commercial breeder reactor that is used to make plutonium solely for use in a mixed oxide (MOX) core, then no. The US doesn't put a whole lot of money into breeder reactors when compared to advanced fuel cycle studies. You're very right when you say you can't see the nuclear industry going large for some time. The biggest reason is that we have no means of building a reactor. After the steel industry went largely overseas and the major utilities stopped building new plants, the corporations that build the major components (pressure vessels, steam generators, etc) went overseas. We don't even do reprocessing studies since we purchase our MOX fuel from Cogema (french company). You're very right by saying that the US won't go fully nuclear for some time; however, there are licenses that should be through the NRC by 2007 so expect some new plants to begin construction by 2010.

Re:Nuclear Power

[pfdietz]

Breeder reactors did not make the plutonium for weapons programs. A breeder reactor is a reactor that produces more fissionable material than it consumes. Weapons reactors do not do this. What they do is produce plutonium while consuming uranium; more U-235 is consumed than Pu is produced; however, the Pu has a smaller critical mass, and is easily separated from the fuel by purely chemical means.

Re:Nuclear Power

[deglr6328]

oh goodness, have you forgotten your little blue pill again today sweetie? now what did we talk about...?

Re:Nuclear Power

[zerus]

Actually they did. Hence what is termed as the "breeding ratio" which is plutonium produced to the u235 used to make it. You can read some on LMFBR's if you want to know some more about that. The US didn't stop their weapons research when the cyclotron was built, so they made some improvements since 1940 in terms of EBR I and II. The critical mass of plutonium is less than uranium, but that has absolutely nothing to do with a breeder reactor since you're still in the same geometry, fuel density, moderator density, temperature for doppler effect, etc etc. The plutonium breeded rods were removed to chemically separate the Pu-239 out before it created Pu241 and excess Am241, since those have much less energy per fission and aren't useful in a bomb. The HEU inside the core was around 95%, and spaced to create a high flux in the center where the U238 rods were inserted. Since the reactors were shut down when not producing, they would have a fuel cycle of about 2 months much like HFIR (Cf-252 production reactor) does, so the amount of plutonium produced would be quite a bit in relation to the HEU used.

Pu isn't easily separated either. It can be done with very little loss of desired material, but it isn't easy. The toxicity of the process is astounding when including the amount waste from degradation of the TBP and related solvents in the PUREX process. The criticality issues really aren't a problem during this process so that isn't the dangerous part. The dangerous part is the toxicity of solvent waste and off gas treatment, eventhough HEPA filters can do wonders, where are you going to store gaseous rad waste?

Re:Nuclear Power

[TClevenger]

We could also reprocess our existing nuclear waste and get some more life out of it.

Re:Nuclear Power

[Fenster Karton]

The usual nuclear power arguments are just that -- and truth has never been a significant part of it. I used to work as a radiation hardness and susceptibility engineer so I know a little bit about the real business. Advocated power systems always replace one monopoly with another. The choices aren't engineering ones. It is always --- and I emphasize ALWAYS -- about money. Profit and loss are weighed far higher than ecology or freedom for humanity. As for innovation using renewable energy, there are some excellent examples in the world. Trouble is 99% of the people don't know they exist. That is not an accident. Ask yourself why a research scientist from Hanford was placed in charge of the "Solar Energy Demonstration Act". At that time I worked at JPL and there was a lot of coffee break comments about losing projects getting demonstration funding and promising concepts being orphaned. Again -- not an accident.

Re:Nuclear Power

[cheesybagel]

You can put enough windmills to generate 100% of power requirements. The issue is: that energy will not be cost effective versus nuclear or coal. More expensive energy means people will be poorer in general, since so much in our society depends on it. Some places have more wind than others, while other places have lots of wind, but are too far away from the places which require the energy.

Even Denmark only generates 20% of its power from windmills for economical reasons, and you can hardly find a country with more favourable conditions for windpower than that.

Storage advances would be nice, but I wouldn't be holding my breath on it. H2 storage is uneconomical versus older technology like pumped storage. We need solutions we can use today, not vapour.

Re:Nuclear Power

[njh]

Why do people get so hung up about efficiency? Efficiency is only relevant to generation if you pay for the fuel, otherwise $/W is a far more useful measure. An electric heater is 100% efficient, but it's a poor way to heat a house. For stationary energy production covering everything with 5% panels costing $2/W is a much better solution than forking out for $50/W 25% panels.

Regarding density, my parents meet their unrestrained electrical demands using solar power from just the north side of their modest sized roof. If every house did this then the remainder of the demand could easily be met by existing plants.

As for cheap energy, we already have cheap energy. I can go down to the shop and buy a gigajoule of energy for the cost of a meal. The amount of research has actually gone down with reducing prices of energy, so I doubt there is a significant cause there.

No shit Einstein!

[Browzer]

About time.

right....

[Anonymous Coward]

no greenhouse gases, just a few thousand tonnes of radioactive waste. what could be the downside?

Re:right....

[AuMatar]

Radioactive waste can be contained. A trick we haven't figured out with air pollution yet.

Re:right....

[eweu]

Have you ever been to Nevada? I'm pretty sure that's why God made it.

Re:right....

[aaronl]

Yeah, that's such a bullshit statement. We generate orders of magnitude more radioactive waste with coal than we do with nuclear. And that radioactive coal waste is put out into the air.

BTW, if you have air scrubbers, where do you think the harmful removed by-products go? Do you think they're annihilated or something? You still have toxic waste to dispose of after you pull the pollutants out of the air from a hydrocarbon burning plant.

Re:right....

[Mr2cents]

There are tombs that haven't been opened in 10 000 years, surely storing a few thousand m^3 of waist can be no technological problem. It's not like it is going to cover the earth...

Re:right....

[mattotoole]

There are tombs that haven't been opened in 10 000 years, surely storing a few thousand m^3 of waist can be no technological problem. It's not like it is going to cover the earth...

But there are plenty of 10,000 year old tombs that *have* been opened. So you're right, technology isn't the problem -- human nature is.

Re:right....

[ThaFooz]

Pfft, what's the problem? Uranium's half life is only ~760 million years. It'll be gone before you know it.

Re:right....

[dbIII]

We generate orders of magnitude more radioactive waste with coal than we do with nuclear.

Here we go again - the ORNL thing, funny thing is no-one else has published anything else like that one paper over the years. To get those results you consider the most radioactive coal you can find on the planet and multiply the amount of radioactive material in that by the amount of coal used everywhere - then you list raw numbers of how much nasty stuff there is. Heavy metals are quite suprisingly heavy, the radioactive ones have high melting points, and the counds are usually stronger than your average coal so don't crush down to fine dust, so the stuff doesn't even end up getting out of the stack. Your few grams of nasty stuff end up scattered through thousands of tonnes of ash and would be very difficult ot even detect.

Burning coal to produce electricity has enough problems without making stuff up so some adverising agency idiot can say - "look, coal makes nuclear waste too, so nuclear is OK."

The whole coal is radioactive waste thing really is a scam that can be discounted by anyone the thinks about it enough with the aid of highschool chemistry and physics book. No wonder we're plagued by naturopaths and creationists with junk science pretending to be real out there.

Re:right....

[ozmanjusri]

a few thousand m^3 of waist

I know obesity is a problem in the US, but that's just extreme!

Re:right....

[aaronl]

Bub, if you want to counterpoint then please post references to primary sources, or at least quote them, instead of insulting intelligence. I haven't read anything that refutes the ORNL study, but I do take it with a grain of salt for many of the reasons you mention.

If you look at the numbers for how much nuclear material is required to generate the same amount of energy as coal, you see that you need two orders of magnitude more coal. Common sense and basic science would tell you that the coal is the worse choice of the two. Even if I just ignore the radioactive material part of the argument, the amount of harmful by-product for coal is many times the amount that fission produces.

So really, throw some links in or name a few reliable studies to refute ORNL! I don't mind being *proven* wrong, and it's a lot better than "you're wrong", "no, you're wrong". :)

Re:right....

[dbIII]

I haven't read anything that refutes the ORNL study,

Any breakdown of coal composition anywhere else on the planet - people tend not to refute stuff that goes against the basic textbooks, those who write it are expected to prove it themselves. Read it yourself with the points I made in mind and see what you think, then consider the concentration of those materials in ash heaps. Say if you have 10% ash, even increasing the concentration of the traces by ten times it's hardly anything to make hype about, same with 100 times if you have gravity separtation or something. We can't effectively mine ash heaps for nuclear fuel - the article is a beatup.

Look up background radiation - that should explain a few things, like why the sand at a nearby beach is more radioactive than your backyard or vice versa.

how much nuclear material is required to generate the same amount of energy as coal, you see that you need two orders of magnitude more coal

Unfortunately it isn't as simple as that - ore comes in a variety of concentrations and needs to be processed. Currently we can use nothing but the best stuff we can find anywhere, but that will change if nuclear power is used on a wide scale - which will push the costs up even higher. A better processing technology may fix that in a short term, but no-one is even bothering to try - so on a large scale it's currently fast breeders or nothing.

Re:right....

[Guppy06]

Yeah, but we're talking about the UK; the best they can do is Wales.

Re:right....

[aaronl]

There have been some developments that may allow the use of lower quality fuels, but I agree, right now it's all using high purity material, and a few reactors that can use weapons grade material. (Not that it isn't high purity, just not generally useful for energy production.)

It doesn't help our production methods that we so rarely are building new reactors. There also isn't a much industry push for fusion research, which would certainly speed things for superior types of energy production.

I read the ORNL study a few times and then knocked a lot of what it said down just becuase it's nearly 25 years old. I still figured that it wasn't so far off as to be useless. I didn't have any other studies that gave me any idea of the waste breakdown from a coal plant either, unfortunately.

I also admit that I wasn't using raw tonnage for mined uranium ore, but was talking about the refined fuel that goes into the reactor. I imagine that there is a similar case for the reduced pollution coal forms.

Re:right....

[Anonymous Coward]

>>Have you ever been to Nevada? I'm pretty sure that's why God made it.

Hell yeah. The only thing Nevada's good for is drinking, gambling, long bus rides and bad hangovers. Oh, and nuclear waste.

Re:right....

[EvilSS]

Considering the fact that we could (if Jimmy Carter hadn't banned it) recycle most radioactive waste back into fuel, I'd say there's not much downside at all.

Re:right....

[WindBourne]

Nah, West Texas is the right place for this shit. Nevada has some redeeming values (Las Vegas being just one of them).

Re:right....

[Mr2cents]

The spelling checker didn't catch that one 8-).

Well which is it?

[Average_Joe_Sixpack]

in the face of a looming energy crisis and the threat of global warming

If the world is facing "Peak Oil", then the "global warming crisis" will subside once production is on the decline curve.

Re:Well which is it?

[Rycross]

Except that in the US electricity is produced by burning coal, not oil. I don't think anyone actually burns oil for electricity.

Re:Well which is it?

[Phanatic1a]

Not true at all. Burning oil is not the only source of CO2 emissions.

Burning coal is a huge one, and there's a huge amount of coal still in the ground to be burned. Hundreds of years worth of reserves at current prices.

Re:Well which is it?

[Average_Joe_Sixpack]

Our ability to extract coal is entirely dependent upon cheap oil (makes/powers the mining and transportation equipment). If we pass the decline curve for oil, there will be alot of homes going without power along with other necessities.

Re:Well which is it?

[aaronl]

The US certainly does burn oil in quite a few generation plants. There are statistics for it all over the 'net.

To quote PG&E "Most electricity in the U.S. is generated using coal, oil, natural gas, nuclear energy, or hydropower. Some production is done with alternative fuels like geothermal energy, wind power, biomass, solar energy, or fuel cells."

To quote the DOE: "Coal was the fuel used to generate the largest share (50.8 percent) of electricity in 2003 1,974 billion kilowatthours(kWh). This is over one and a half times the annual electricity consumption of all U.S. households (1,273 billion kWh). Natural gas was used to generate 650 billion kWh (16.7 percent), and petroleum accounted for 119 billion kWh (3.1 percent)." They also list nuclear as accounting for 19.75% (764 billion killowatthours). The remaining 9.65% was mostly hydro (7.14%).

Re:Well which is it?

[ThaFooz]

Our ability to extract coal is entirely dependent upon cheap oil (makes/powers the mining and transportation equipment). If we pass the decline curve for oil, there will be alot of homes going without power along with other necessities.

No, gasoline is simply the most cost efficent portable fuel. There is no technical reason at the moment that it couldn't be replaced by biodesiel and/or electric power (fuel cells, etc) ... its just not cost efficent - yet.

The closer we get to the decline curve, the more cost efficent alternate fuel sources become. Anyone who thinks that we will actually pass the decline curve isn't factoring in basic economics, or they seriously believe that either a) there aren't viable alternatives or b) we have grossly over-estimated current oil reserves (ie the artifically low prices are preventing transition, and when we realize the error there will be insufficient time/fuel to replace the infrastructure).

Re:Well which is it?

[Average_Joe_Sixpack]

There is no technical reason at the moment that it couldn't be replaced by biodesiel

It takes more energy to produce biofuel than you get from the biofuel

and/or electric power (fuel cells, etc)

fuel cells are method of storage, what are you going to "charge" them with once we are on a decline curve?

Re:Well which is it?

[pfdietz]

Our ability to extract coal is entirely dependent upon cheap oil

This is simply wrong. We could mine coal with equipment powered entirely by liquid fuels derived from the coal. Fischer-Tropsch diesel from coal would actually be cheaper than the current price of diesel fuel, now that oil is close to $60/barrel.

Re:Well which is it?

[ThaFooz]

It takes more energy to produce biofuel than you get from the biofuel

That's debatable, and IMHO doubtful. Besides, the energy yield doesn't matter that much, the advantage of biodeisel is that it is a substitute for gasoline (and uses the same infrastructure, etc). The fact that it costs more energy to make is irrelevant when the other energy source in question - electricity (via coal/nuclear) - is not in short supply. Quick read

fuel cells are method of storage, what are you going to "charge" them with once we are on a decline curve?"

We have several hundred years worth of coal, more than a little bit worth of nuclear (don't know off the top of my head), and an unlimited supply of nautural renewable sources. The decline curve that we're forseeing is for gasoline, not coal, not nuclear, and not natural.

Re:Well which is it?

[Planesdragon]

It takes more energy to produce biofuel than you get from the biofuel

Yes, when you limit "biofuel" to human-edible corn.

Expand "biofuel" to, oh, the whole plant and various yard waste, and it suddenly becomes almost break-even.

Expand "biofuel" to oil-heavy algae, and you've got an amazing cost-reduction. I'd wager that the wait is partly due to the oil-industry slanted administration, but mostly due to the time and investment necessary--and a desire to wait until we can maximize profit rolling them out.

Re:Well which is it?

[Average_Joe_Sixpack]

Fischer-Tropsch diesel from coal would actually be cheaper than the current price of diesel fuel, now that oil is close to $60/barrel.

The energy inputs to the current Canadian tar sands is cheap oil pumped from the ground; that's why it's economical to mine at $45/barrel. As a self sustained system it is a much more expensive proposition, one that would price out the average suburbanite. The NAZIs used slave labor to get their system workable.

Re:Well which is it?

[Average_Joe_Sixpack]

The decline curve that we're forseeing is for gasoline, not coal, not nuclear, and not natural.

The decline curve is for light sweet crude and natural gas. Both of which are irreplaceable and critical for maintaining the world's 6.5 billion people. The green revolution in farming is based on pesticides and fertilizers made from those two resources.

Re:Well which is it?

[Average_Joe_Sixpack]

Expand "biofuel" to oil-heavy algae, and you've got an amazing cost-reduction.

Photosynthesis has a net energy efficiency of about 1%, solar irradiance is about 1000 watts per square meter = 10 watts per meter max for any biofuel. Factor in production, harvest, processing and transportation and you get a net energy loser.

Re:Well which is it?

[tehdaemon]

Error - $45!>$60 your statement does not compute.

If your breakeven point is $45/barrel (earnings=costs, selling at $45) and *worst case* all of your costs are due to oil at current $60/barrel, then you will make a profit of $15/barrel if you use your own oil.

This means that a self sustained system would be less expensive, not more.

The error in your statement stems from "cheap oil pumped from the ground" Hint. It is not cheap now. This means that either a) it is not economical at $45 any more (ie you are wrong) or b) a self sustained system is now less expensive than other oil (ie you are wrong) or c) $60/barrel outprices your average suburbanite. (possible, but has nothing to do with tar sands)

If you have more information than you posted to make sense of this mess, please post it, 'cause as of now, you are wrong.

Re:Well which is it?

[IvyKing]

Our ability to extract coal is entirely dependent upon cheap oil (makes/powers the mining and transportation equipment)

Most of the really large equipment (think shovels that can pick up 50 m^3 at a time) at coal mines are electrically powered and it wouldn't be that difficult to convert the long distance haulage to electricity as well.

What's more of an issue for home is passing the decline curve for natural gas - but as the price of gas rises enough, extracting methane from hydrates is likely to become economical - and there is an incredible amount of methane in the form of hydrates.

Re:Well which is it?

[pfdietz]

The energy input to extract tar sands is high -- the equivalent of 1 barrel of oil to extract three barrels of 'synthetic crude' -- but there's no reason for this energy to come from conventional oil. For example, it's been proposed to supply the heat for in situ liquefaction of the bitumun by using steam from nuclear reactors.

Re:Well which is it?

[Phanatic1a]

Petroleum isn't really burned in main-line plants. It comes into play in the smaller peaking plants that are generally only brought online to deal with maximum loads on the grid. They frequently take the form of gas-turbine engines burning diesel.

Re:Well which is it?

[petermgreen]

for transportation don't many of the oil alternatives (oil shale tar sands coal liquification etc) create a lot more polloution than normal oil?

and for leccy afaict coal and natural gas are generally used (the USA has quite a shortage of natural gas so they tend to use coal afaict)

Re:Well which is it?

[jonbryce]

In the US, what you say is true, because US farming is very inefficient. It is less true in Europe, and certainly not true at all in other parts of the world.

Re:Well which is it?

[jonbryce]

Expand biofuel to include wood, and people have been using it for thousands of years without any other source of energy to grow the trees.

Re:Well which is it?

[ces]

The decline curve is for light sweet crude and natural gas. Both of which are irreplaceable and critical for maintaining the world's 6.5 billion people. The green revolution in farming is based on pesticides and fertilizers made from those two resources.

There are a lot of things one can use to make feedstocks for petrochemicals such as pesticides, heavy oils, coal, agricultural waste, etc. It is mostly a matter of what is cheapest at the moment.

Same thing goes for fertilizer. Natural gas is used to make ammonia for fertilizer because it is the cheapest source, but you can make ammonia a number of different ways. Basicly all you need is a source of hydrogen.

Re:Well which is it?

[pfdietz]

Pesticides are manufactured in rather small volume that could be easily satisfied by renewable feedstocks. Fertilizer from fossil fuels is ammonia, where the fossil fuel is used to produce the hydrogen, typically by reaction of steam with methane; the hydrogen is then reacted with nitrogen at high pressure to make ammonia. Any other hydrogen source -- for example, electrolysis driven by nuclear or renewable, or hydrogen from gasified biomass -- would also do. These are not currently competitive, but they are doable.

Short Term Answer with long term repercussions

[Solr_Flare]

Better to tackle the "looming energy crisis" head on and use human ingenuity to come up with a better, more environmentally friendly, solution. Simply settling for something that works but has problems is the same attitude that has gotten the world into this rediculous oil mess, all the while destroying the very planet we live on.

I'm not saying Nuclear power might not be the best answer for a short term emergency, but short term solutions tend to become long term ones when government is concerned.

Re:Short Term Answer with long term repercussions

[Phanatic1a]

Simply settling for something that works but has problems

Oh, really?

*Everything* has problems. I mean, come on, just wave your hands and come up with your ideal hypothetical, theoretical scheme for energy production, and I guarantee it will have some sort of problem.

The suggestion that we should wait to fix our current problems until we've figured out a way to eliminate *all possible* problems is not only silly, it's dangerous.

all the while destroying the very planet we live on.

Please. The planet has withstood enormous meteor impacts, global firestorms, earthquakes, enormous floods, and devasting environmental shifts far beyond our ability to cause, like the development of organisms which excrete oxygen as a waste product (You know, "plants").

The *planet* is doing just *fine*. The planet's survival is not at issue.

Re:Short Term Answer with long term repercussions

[Anonymous Coward]

Because you know, the Fusion is just around the corner as a viable and safe source of power!

God damn hippies like you really annoy me as your so insanely uninformed. Nuclear power *is* a long term solution. Like a century long. I don't think we can wait a century for the next viable source of power to come along. Get a god damn clue, please. I mean I agree it ain't perfect, but there is nothing on the horizon that will meet our needs. Nuclear is the *only* option for the scale that we need it on.

Re:Short Term Answer with long term repercussions

[dbIII]

Nuclear power might not be the best answer for a short term emergency

It's not a short term solution by any means - plants take years to build and we still need more research to produce better designs - perhaps the first full scale pebble bed reactor could be built to see if the design actually works properly.

The worst thing about nuclear power is the vast quantities of politically driven bullshit surrounding it - anything that actually works properly is usually exagerated by an order of magnitude, and the problems that probably could actually be fixed within the advertising and lobby money budget (waste management certainly hasn't had that much attention paid to it) are almost entirely ignored. It's one thing imagining ficticious Niger Uranium getting shipped about the world, and it's another producing fuel of high enough purity in large quantities without burning more oil than you would use to generate the same quantity of electricity - more research has to be put into that before we can use a lot of nuclear power.

Re:Short Term Answer with long term repercussions

[Nick_Psyko]

I believe that all 'we' have 'caused', is not having a dramatic impact against this planet.

This planet will survive, with or without our services. We, I feel are irellivent in the planets choices.

Us humans; surviving on the other hand, will require more thought than the "my g*d they are hurting the planet" scenario.

The planet will look after itself; this (I believe at the moment) is the case if humans (as we know them) didn't occour.

Humans, (us) require the delicate balance that is nature; to survive (all considered). It just so happens (in my opinion) that we will not find <u>that</u> balance until it is beyond our immidiate control.

If someone wants to show otherwise, email <u>me</u> at "UK (united kingdom) duty paid at Google email services.com" otherwise known as no spaces, nothing in the brackets at gmail.com. [you got it!, trust yourself!].
</br>

Send me an email.

Re:Short Term Answer with long term repercussions

[Anonymous Coward]

A better solution? sure why didn't you just ask?

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Re:Short Term Answer with long term repercussions

[Studio A]

Well duh! What was meant was the environment will be destroyed to the point that humans won't be able to exist. This is what people mean when they say "destroying the planet."

Be cool.

Re:Short Term Answer with long term repercussions

[Ralph Spoilsport]

phanatic 1a wrote:

lease. The planet has withstood enormous meteor impacts, global firestorms, earthquakes, enormous floods, and devasting environmental shifts far beyond our ability to cause, like the development of organisms which excrete oxygen as a waste product (You know, "plants").

The *planet* is doing just *fine*. The planet's survival is not at issue.

Yeah- George Carlin noted that and also said "When the world gets tired of humanity, it'll shake us off like fleas..."

RS

Re:Short Term Answer with long term repercussions

[ces]

and it's another producing fuel of high enough purity in large quantities without burning more oil than you would use to generate the same quantity of electricity - more research has to be put into that before we can use a lot of nuclear power.

Actually it isn't such a problem. While it is true that gas diffusion enrichment uses massive quantities of electricity there is still less used in making a kilogram of fuel than it will generate over its lifetime. Switch to centerfuge enrichment and the energy requirement drops by a huge amount.

The nuclear fuel cycle is already net-positive.

Let's go for it!

[wheelbarrow]

Nuclear power generation is safer and less polluting than burning fossil fuels to generate power. The new pebble bed reactors offer a significant safety improvement over the old fuel rod design that is in older plants lile Three Mile Island. It's time to use the brains we have and provide the safe and cheap power that nuclear fission can offer.

Re:Let's go for it!

[jimcooncat]

Good link to a great article. If I had mod points you'd get 'em.

Does this design mean that the reactor doesn't need to be built on a coastline? This might help a lot with "environmentalist" concerns and nuts like me who don't think the coast is a great place to build an expensive project.

Re:Let's go for it!

[cblood]

The problem with nuclear power plants is scale. You need to build big plants and you need a security system around them to keep them safe from terrorists. Even the 'safe' power plants can make a big mess if attacked with conventional explosives. By the time you add up all the costs, including transporting the fuel and the waste securely, it is not a very good deal. We would have no nuclear plants at all if the government had not EXEMPTED THEM from liability. No insurance company in the world is that stupid. We need to take our government back for the oil companies and really work on fuel efficiency and conservation. We in the US have fought two wars in the middle east essentially for the right to drive SUV's around.

Re:Let's go for it!

[aaronl]

What? Nuclear is the best deal we have available. It generates substanially more power than any other type of generation and doesn't cost much more to operate. The start-up costs are large, mainly because of all the regulation to ensure safety. The costs of getting the ore, refining it, and transporting it, still are nowhere near making it unprofitable. It's about the same cost as oil when you consider all the issues and costs associated with getting oil and refining it and transporting it. You seem to be forgetting all the hidden costs involved with oil.

We need to have something to keep us going while other forms of production are researched. It's nice to say how we need to do this or need to do that, but that's down the road. If we don't have something now, then down the road doesn't matter, because we won't have the power to get there. Nuclear is what that something for today is.

Fuel efficiency is always good, but that and conservation is a temporary thing; it will stretch out what we have a little longer. This isn't to say that we shouldn't conserve, but our energy requirements *will* continue to rise, because all of our technology requires energy. We will get more and better advances, but they require more, more, more!

Re:Let's go for it!

[wheelbarrow]

You are assuming that our total cumulative energy consumption can be reduced through conservation. I don't see that happening. Even if we achieve a per capita reduction in energy usage, population increase will continue to increase our total energy consumption.

As far as security goes, let's build the new nuke plants out in the Nevada deserts. We'll bring home our oil war troops and deploy them as a security force. A remote nuclear power plant can have it's own armored battalion for security. Then, someone would have to have the resources to start a real war if they want to damage that plant. That all seems extreme but it is cheaper than invading the Middle East everytime we get nervous.

Re:Let's go for it!

[cblood]

You forgot insurance. The real cost of insurance is astronomical. If the government did not intervine no plants would ever be built.

Re:Let's go for it!

[cblood]

"You are assuming that our total cumulative energy consumption can be reduced through conservation. I don't see that happening"

Why not? You really think we all need to drive suv's and live in 50,000 sq/ft homes? People in Western Europe use way less energy than americans. The live longer, have lower infant death rates and all the same amenities we are used to.

Driving an SUV 50 miles to work and back is not nessesary for happiness.

Re:Let's go for it!

[aaronl]

Yes, insurance costs would be very high, however that hasn't stopped every first world country from operating nuclear reactors for power generation. Substaintial amounts of all energy production in the US, China, France, Germany, Japan, etc, are all from fission reactors. The US government is preventing reactor operators within the US from being hit with some types of lawsuits. The US also has one of the lowest percentages of power generation from fission.

You're also forgetting how much it costs for the US government to fight all these wars, big and small, basically over oil. How much does the military protection really cost in actual dollars? How much does all the diplomacy cost, etc? When you compare those costs to the insurance costs, the latter doesn't look so bad. Also, insurance costs would go down as fission reactors were shown to be safe for longer periods of time.

If you're going to push for higher energy efficiency and more conservation, you'll run into problems, too. In general, people don't want to conserve, and they don't want to buy a new thing that does exactly the same as the old, but just uses less power. It's inconvenient to them and costs them more money up front. You'll get many people to conserve in small ways, but it'll be difficult to really push it home.

Re:Let's go for it!

[wheelbarrow]

Ok, let's say I agree that personal energy consumption can be reduced 50%. Today I am putting you in charge of making that happen in the United States. Tell us some of the steps you would take to make that happen.

Re:Let's go for it!

[cblood]

All nuclear power has been exempt from liability. They would not be built otherwise. A failure can destroy millions of live and hundreds of square miles for hundreds of years As to conservation. The rest of the civilized world seems to do OK. We just need to get our government back from the oil industry.

Re:Let's go for it!

[cblood]

Well the biggest problem is banking. We have very conservative people who have veto power over capital spending. This is generally a good thing but it makes it hard to use new technology. Take home heating, There are many systems, ground loop heat exchangers, co-generators, solar, and wind that would pay back and be cheaper in the long run. But the banks don't loan money to people for things like that. We need hard data on the payback period for some of these technologies so that banks can help home builder to take the long view and go for lower life cycle cost as opposed to lower initial cost.

Also the civilised democracy's in western Europe have huge taxes on fuel and people have no trouble conserving.

Re:Let's go for it!

[jonwil]

Firstly, I would hold SUVs and pickups to much stricter standards for emission and fuel economy. (people are driving SUVs instead of station wagons, vans and people movers because SUVs dont have the emissions and fuel economy taxes and rules as the station wagons etc).
I am not a car designer so I dont know if this would actually be possible or how much good it would do but getting people to buy more fuel-efficient cars (via making the less fuel-efficient SUVs more expensive) has gotta have some benifit.
I dont know whats out there in the market right now but I am sure detroit can come up with cars that have enough cargo and passenger space for the "soccer moms" AND fuel-efficent engines.

Secondly, I would encourage people to use alternatives to cars as much as possible.
Such as:
Walking
Riding a bicycle
Riding a motorcycle
Riding a scooter (either the foot powered kind or the motorised kind they drive in italy etc)
Riding a Segway
Using other foot powered or motorised car alternatives (such as rollerskates/blades)
Taking busses
Taking trains or other forms of public transport (e.g. monorail, subway etc)

Thirdly, I would encourage more people (and businesses) to use more telecommuning and working from home (which means people dont need to drive their poluting cars to work as much).

Re:Let's go for it!

[wheelbarrow]

If it is all so easy then surely you can march your plans into the offices of the venture capitalists in Silicon Valley. They're always looking to fund new ventures. What's holding you back?

Re:Let's go for it!

[wheelbarrow]

What if, despite your encouragement, most people made a free and voluntary decision to drive a private vehicle instead of walking, biking, etc.?

Re:Let's go for it!

[jonwil]

Firstly, I would use economic incentives to encourage people not to drive (for example tolls and licence fees like singapore has)
And also subsidies to provide even more incentive for people to use alternatives (e.g. make public transport cheaper)

I would also invest in more public transport options including more trains and busses to the places people actually live, work and go to.

But even given this, there are people who will drive a car. So, the trick is also to get them to drive more fuel efficient cars. The answer is to have a fuel tax or emissions tax so that cars that use more fuel and spit out more emissions have higher tax (e.g. vehicle registration). And make these rules apply to the big tank SUVs and pickups just like they do to all the other cars.

Re:Let's go for it!

[cblood]

Conservation is not profitable in the conventional sense. By convincing people to do more with less, you improve there lives and improve the common good. But it would not be successful using our current common method for measuring progress. It would not result in growth. In fact it could cause the GDP to shrink. I think this underscores the shortcomings of our economic score keeping. No I don't know what a good alternative would be.

Re:Let's go for it!

[wheelbarrow]

Taxes are not encouragement. Taxes are force. You want to force people to live the way you want them to live. Why don't you try winning their hearts and minds instead of resorting to tyranny?

Re:Let's go for it!

[Anonymous Coward]

Because I can always build enough special projects and base enhancements to give me enough talents that I don't have to worry about drone riots. Besides, I usually go with free market and wealth, what's wrong with that? And cybernetic future society has some nice bonuses too...

Finally, we might catch up with the France

[FluffyWithTeeth]

Almost all of France's power comes from Nuclear, and it's the one thing they seem to be better than us in ;)

Ignoring all the many, important reasons to use nuclear (Which I agree with)..

Let's do it to beat the French!

Re:Finally, we might catch up with the France

[Anonymous Coward]

The humble Uranium atom. Finally, something the French can beat!

Re:Finally, we might catch up with the France

[ThaFooz]

Almost all of France's power comes from Nuclear, and it's the one thing they seem to be better than us in ;)

I would probably replace the word 'better' with 'more reckless', given the population density of the nation... there really aren't safe (ie uninhabited) places to put reactors in Europe. Nuclear seems to make more sense for the US/Canada/Russia/etc.

If you want a model energy grid, look at Iceland's geothermal plants or Denmark's wind generators... not France's half-assed solution.

Besides, in terms of pollution & fuel supply, the gasoline infrastructure is a much bigger problem.

Re:Finally, we might catch up with the France

[Anonymous Coward]

In defense of the French, add these to the list of things that they beat us at:
- Dressing
- Food
- Sexy Women
- Sexy Men
- Sexy Gays
- Sexy Lesbians speaking in French
- Cheese (this is included in food, but they are so much better here that it's worth saying it again)
- Condescendence
- Sarcasm
- Philosophy
- Chopping human heads
- Differential calculus (Fermat)
- Transforming continuous functions into a series of sinusoidal functions (you know who, c'mon, starts with an F!).
- Psychoanalysis (Lacan)
- Wine
- Frying potatoes
- Speaking French (you really can't argue this one)
- Building statues, specially statues that are (ironically) American icons.

Finally, they are far better colonialists than we are. So much so that they still have colonies that they exploit and opress all over and somehow they have managed to portray themselves as progressive as compared to the US.

It was really funny to see all those people with the flag of such an imperialist country in the demonstrations against the Iraq war . . . I know, I was there!

Re:Finally, we might catch up with the France

[FluffyWithTeeth]

Ah, but no you see, I'm British ;) I'ma have to say we win at most of those.. except the sexy gays and lesbians... and the maths thing (I've got no idea what the f*** that is, dropped maths at 16)... and the wine.. and the psychoanalysis,............. and speaking French... But apart from that, what have the Romans ever done for us!

Good on him

[Jonnty]

As nice as wind turbines are, you're never gonna get enough to gnerate enough power, nor are you getting enough people agreeing to have them built. Nuclear's our only option. At least, if you're that worried, build them to go on until we have enough other means of power generation. Unless, of course, Fusion becomes viable, which (I hope, at least) will probably happen in the next 25 years. Ah well. C'est la vie.

Re:Good on him

[LurkerXXX]

As nice as wind turbines are, you're never gonna get enough to gnerate enough power, nor are you getting enough people agreeing to have them built.

It might be a good time to push for them soon. It will help reduce bird flu. ;)

Re:Good on him

[swimin]

You have a really good point. Except you sort of left out that whole solar thing. Solar energy is viable now, and will be more so in the future (assuming new cheap ways to get into space). It doesn't require some big breakthrough to work.

Re:Good on him

[Anonymous Coward]

> As nice as wind turbines are, you're never gonna get enough to gnerate enough power

Actually, you're completely wrong. Nuclear power is doomed by its cost structure. If it were economically viable, believe me power companies would be churning them out. If there's one thing that energy companies are good at, it's making money.

See Amory Lovins article "Nuclear Follies Meet Market Realities"
http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid97.php

"In 2004 alone, Spain and Germany each added as much wind capacity - two billion watts - as nuclear power is adding worldwide in each year of this decade."

"Nothing can save nuclear power from its dismal economics... Not new kinds of reactors: if they were free, the rest of the plant would still cost too much.

Re:Good on him

[dakirw]

As nice as wind turbines are, you're never gonna get enough to gnerate enough power, nor are you getting enough people agreeing to have them built.

True enough there. In California, a lot of the wind turbines on the Altamont Pass have to be shutdown because of concerns that birds are getting killed. Looks like it's tough being green - support wild animals or clean power?

Re:Good on him

[Anonymous Coward]

if a windmill costs so many birdlives, how many birddeaths would be caused by traffic then ? cars move faster than the blades of a windmill and there are a lot more of them. And while the newer mill are getting higher (100m high + 40m blades/300 ft high, 130ft blades) they are much more visible and slower moving.

Re:Good on him

[dbIII]

Nuclear's our only option. At least, if you're that worried, build them to go on until we have enough other means of power generation.

So if the world nuclear energy capacity is inreased by twenty times in a short period of time, where do you get the fuel from? Recall that you want fuel that you can get more energy out of than you put in to make it. People who know far more than us have looked at this very issue and do not have answers yet - google will help far more than I can.

People also forget that nuclear is a complex and expensive way to boil water.

Re:Good on him

[pfdietz]

Solar is 'viable' in the sense of 'an order of magnitude more expensive for baseload power, even if you ignore the cost of energy storage'.

Sure, it's usable for off-grid power. That, and $3.50, will get you a mocha at Starbucks.

Re:Good on him

[sr180]

Currently in South Australia we are building more and more wind generators. However, its a whole heap of greenies thats are protesting against them. Apparently they are: ugly, noisy and they kill birds. So by their logic, we cant be allowed to build them.

What we need here in the States

[geekoid]

is a nation wide awarness campaign on how nuclear power works, why it is BETTER for the enviroment, and how it will help allow
Talk about the new technologies.

Re:What we need here in the States

[CastrTroy]

I know Canada's nuclear commission has been airing a lot of TV commercials, hyping up nuclear power, and telling you to visite their website to learn more. Nuclear power has a really bad rap, and most people think it's the worst thing in the world, when really, it's much better than our current approach.

Re:What we need here in the States

[Seumas]

Yes, because the same country that has a majority of citizens believing that some magical being in the sky created everything exactly as it is and that that is a scientific theory (and one with more merit than evolution) and the same country where a significant portion (a majority maybe?) think using stem-cells is equal to killing baby jesus, you really expect us to be capable of complex thought like exactly what nuclear power is? Hell, it wasn't until just recently that the wild numbers claimed by Chernobyl were finally debunked.

Re:What we need here in the States

[Vorondil28]

My sentiments exactly. :-P

Re:What we need here in the States

[dbIII]

is a nation wide awarness campaign on how nuclear power works, why it is BETTER for the enviroment

Haven't the nuclear lobby spent missions over the years in the USA doing exactly that, and hasn't it actually worked in that people associate the word "clean" with it despite the fact that it is not a washing powder but an industrial process using stuff that kills on contact?

Re:What we need here in the States

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, stop dissing the Flying Spaghetti Monster!

Double standards...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet is is "EVIL" (American TM) for Iran, or Venezuela, or Brazil to have peace nookular power???

Nuclear Safety

[AtomicRobotMonster]

Reactor designs have progressed a long way from the 50's. Pebble bed reactors are an inherently safe (being relative) design... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble-bed_reactor Couldn't we just make these into sealed units and run them until they stop being radioactive?

Re:Nuclear Safety

[Anonymous Coward]

They continue being radioactive thousands of years after they stop producing power. The casing and other materials that were not radioactive become radioactive when exposed to neutron flux.

so um...

[Anonymous Coward]

has greenpeace won or not? To my awareness they're against nuclear power, but because of them we have much safer nuclear power plants. I think those anti-capitalist bastards might've done us some good.

Great News

[Anonymous Coward]

This is awesome news. Nuclear reactors are the cleanest and least harmful solutions we have right now. It would be even better if Britain complimented this policy with increased funding for fusion and other clean energy research. Hopefully the US will lose its irrational fear of nuclear energy once it sees this example (fat chance!).

right....Coal Hearted.

[Anonymous Coward]

They're called "air scrubbers". It's not like we just started burning fossil fuels, yesterday.

Anyway coal (and coal towns) are making a resurgence, because the oil companies are pricing themselves out of the market, and nuclear would take too long to react to the present market, even if you ignored it's disadvantages.

Also fossil fuel technologies are more advanced than the "good, old days" of belching smokestacks. Hell I've even seen a car that burned powered coal (emmissions were terrible of course, but...).

Re:right....Coal Hearted.

[AuMatar]

Air scrubbers are good, but they don't take nearly 100% out of the air. And burning coal also releases radioactive waste- you do realise that most coal ores have some uranium in them, right?

Re:right....Coal Hearted.

[pfdietz]

They're called "air scrubbers". It's not like we just started burning fossil fuels, yesterday.

... which don't do jack to remove CO2 from the flue gas. Shame about that.

Nuclear is Expensive

[nathanh]

And nobody wants a nuclear reactor in their backyard. End of discussion.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[Persol]

And?
Nobody wants a coal plant in there back yard.
Nobody wants train tracks in there back yard.
Nobody wants a stadium in there back yard.

The only difference is that people tend to understand and trust the three things listed above. People protest them for very real and daily reasons.

People protest nuclear because NuclearIsBad(tm). Education is the only way to combat this.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[nathanh]

People protest nuclear because NuclearIsBad(tm). Education is the only way to combat this.

The more education you have regarding nuclear fission power, the more you protest.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[$RANDOMLUSER]

> Education is the only way to combat this

There: a place, not here
Their: belonging to them
They're: a contraction, meaning "they are"

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[blank101]

I'd put a nuclear power plant in my backyard if 1) I got the profits for the electricity and 2) I was the regulator (or the NRC...they know a thing or two).

As for expensive, well, not really. The prices are largely comparable to other energy sources and could be cheaper if the regulatory environment were relaxed comparable to the advances in technology.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[CastrTroy]

Even worse than a nuclear reactor is a uranium mine. It producues much more waste, which is generally just as toxic, if not worse.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[nathanh]

As for expensive, well, not really. The prices are largely comparable to other energy sources and could be cheaper if the regulatory environment were relaxed comparable to the advances in technology.

The site you link to - Nuclear Tourist, sheesh the name alone should have given away their bias - quotes the subsidized costs. If you care about the free market then you wouldn't promote a 60 year old fuel source that still can't turn a profit without subsidies.

As for "relaxing" the regulations, this is entirely the problem with nuclear power. It requires strict reglations because there are high risks associated with careless management. Trusting capitalists to run a safe nuclear plant is at best naive.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[horos2c]

People protest nuclear because NuclearIsBad(tm). Education is the only way to combat this.

The more education you have regarding nuclear fission power, the more you protest.

No offense, but this is total and utter BS. Here are just a few very well reasoned out proposals/cases for nuclear power:

here
here
here

In short, the amount of C02 that even circa 1950s nuclear power plants emit is 5 times *less* than wind, 50 times *less* than solar (where do you think all that material to make solar cells comes from anyways?). As for cost, new nuclear power plants are about the same as natural gas turbines (which are as cheap as it gets) and have orders of magnitude left for improvement with new materials. As for safety, coal with its byproducts kill about 50,000 people yearly. Since its the extraction of materials blamed for premature deaths, if solar was scaled up to the same level as coal was, it would kill about 1000-2000/yr.

Face it; every source of energy has its risks. With nuclear, most of those risks can be mitigated because you get so much bang for your buck with the fuel that you can watch the risks carefully. Passively safe systems make things even more secure. Its one of the biggest irony in history that the Greens are fighting tooth-and-nail probably the most environmentally conscious enery source of all. (outside of conservation)

horos

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[nathanh]

50 times *less* than solar (where do you think all that material to make solar cells comes from anyways?).

If you think commercial solar power has anything to do with photovoltaic cells then you really aren't educated about this topic.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[NotBorg]

And nobody wants a nuclear reactor in their backyard. End of discussion.

I do. You call'n me a nobody? eh... You might be right.

To say that no one wants a nuclear reactor in their backyard is to say that you'd never find anyone to work at one either. If you work for one chances are you are going to be living close to one.

Have there been plants shut down because no one wanted to work there by virtue of it being a nuclear reactor? Do they really build them in the middle of cities or do the cities build around them?

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[horos2c]

I used photovoltaic cells because that is the most commonly known technology. Thin-film PV cells (eg - copper indium diselenide and cadmium telluride) use less materials/square meter, but their conversion efficiencies are less and the infrastructure needed to support them is more; the amount of CO2 emissions per watt-hour (200 g/Wh) is pretty much a constant amongst the different technologies.

source: here

Now, I would suggest stopping the mouthing of empty platitudes and do some research of your own.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[Orne]

No, but plants have been shut down on account of environmentalist pressures. They do not build them in the middle of cities; they build them on a cooling water source (river / lake / etc) about 20 miles from a major city and run transmission lines nearby.

In southeastern pennsylvania, there's an odd dynamic going on... for the 20 years that my family lived near Limerick nuclear station, noone wanted to build near the plant, on account of all the (unfounded) environmentalist panic. Then the area went through a housing boom in the early '00s, and suddenly all this land became very desireable, since its all 5 minutes from the major highway in the area (route 422) which makes it the perfect commuting spot. Next thing you know, $350k houses are popping up left and right, right in the valley of the shadow of de.. I mean, the cooling towers.

Here's a map of every utility owned nuclear plant that has been built in the united states & canada, including the decomissioned ones.

Enjoy.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[Anonymous Coward]

Trusting capitalists to run a safe nuclear plant is at best naive.

Trusting capitalists to run anything is at best naive. Americans don't care about slave wages, as long as Nike does it in Singapore. Americans don't care about toxic waste killing thousands of people in India. Americans have no problem with huge plumes of smoke coming out of a power plant, as long as it is far away from them. (Americans can be swapped out for most people, with some minor variations.) Until the consumer cares about these things, the capitalists aren't going to. Until the consumer cares about these more than their bottom line, the capitalists aren't going to actually do anything.

Nuclear is expensive largely because of the heavy regulation. That regulation is also the reason for the excellent safety record we have with nuclear power in the US. If other traditional power sources were held to the same standards, they would be a lot more expensive, too (but we would save lives). Traditional power generation has been improving, but so has nuclear. Modern reactor designs can't melt down or explode. They are just as safe as any traditional plant.

If you cared about the free market you wouldn't require government regulation of nuclear plants, or of emissions from fossil-fuel plants, or of contruction details of hydroelectric dams. Let the consumers decide which risks they want to take and how much they want to hurt the environment, right?

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[nathanh]

I used photovoltaic cells because that is the most commonly known technology.

In the commercial space, superheated water and thermal towers are the most commonly used technology.

Now, I would suggest stopping the mouthing of empty platitudes and do some research of your own.

I have done far more research on this topic than you could imagine.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[horos2c]

I used photovoltaic cells because that is the most commonly known technology.

In the commercial space, superheated water and thermal towers are the most commonly used technology.

In the commercial space, solar provides far far less than one percent of TPES, and when it does it is in niche areas. Why do you think that is?

Now, I would suggest stopping the mouthing of empty platitudes and do some research of your own.

I have done far more research on this topic than you could imagine.

Great.. then spill it. Show me a counter-example study showing g/CO2 figures from cradle to grave for different solar energy technologies, and I might believe you. Otherwise, what good is your 'I have done far more research on this topic than you could imagine' statement?

Its a discussion group, so you know.. discussion might be nice...

Ed

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[nathanh]

Great.. then spill it. Show me a counter-example study showing g/CO2 figures from cradle to grave for different solar energy technologies, and I might believe you.

Why would I do that? This is why I am not wasting my time discussing this with you. My primary comment - as demonstrated in the SUBJECT - is that nuclear power is expensive. That is an indisputable fact as even the nuclear power lobby admits that it is only profitable in the US when subsidised, and is best suited for countries that do not already have cheap plentiful supplies of fossil fuels (such as France).

My secondary comment was that the majority of people - foolish ignorant Slashdotters aside - do not want a nuclear power plant in their backyard. That is also an indisputable fact, as you would know if you have ever had the opportunity to read strategy material from the nuclear industry. They cite public opposition as one of the key concerns.

You have chosen to ignore my primary comment and my secondary comment and instead rant about CO2 emissions. You harp on about CO2, as if somehow those figures were being disputed, and then demand that I take the opposing position. Did you expect I would?

Start talking about long-term costs and I might show some interest.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[horos2c]

Why would I do that? This is why I am not wasting my time discussing this with you. My primary comment - as demonstrated in the SUBJECT - is that nuclear power is expensive. That is an indisputable fact as even the nuclear power lobby admits that it is only profitable in the US when subsidised, and is best suited for countries that do not already have cheap plentiful supplies of fossil fuels (such as France).

First of all, your "original comment" was 'Nuclear is expensive and nobody wants a nuclear reactor in their backyard. End of discussion', which is just as fatuous (and empty headed) as the comment that I responded to.

Second of all, I could argue with that comment (as devoid of info as it is) in three ways. First, if you look at the countries that have large amounts of nuclear power, their energy cost per-kWh is on par with those who rely on coal, etc. Source here(look at France && Sweden && Germany for examples). And those countries which rely heavily on renewables tend to have *twice* as high an energy cost (look at the table for Denmark for example!)

Second, I could say that we already are heavily subsidizing coal, natural gas and oil in the form of military encounters, damaged productivity in agriculture, damaged health, loss of life, and so on - and that with large-scale solar power that this subsidy would continue - although not as great as it would be with coal. For it takes coal/oil/etc to *build* solar panels and solar towers, for an energy source which is highly disperse and needs a lot of infrastructure to put 'online'. That's where the figure of 200 g/kWh capacity is a killer. Its 25% that of coal - which means if we scaled up solar, and used 4 times as much electricity as we did now - which is not a stretch considering the amount of population in the world and how hungry they are for energy - we'd still be generating the same amount of greenhouse gases and associated emissions we are today. Which is not an acceptable solution.

And third - and finally - I'd say that you have a woeful misunderstanding of the economics of power plants. All the pain that we've caused ourselves on disposal and lots of the overruns on the building costs of current power plants are caused by politics, pure and simple. Its easy to make anything you want as expensive as you want if you throw hurdles, lawsuits and FUD at the problem. Take away the FUD and the things are relatively in-expensive to build - current LWR around $1000/kW to build in comparison with coal being $1100/kW. And when you turn them on, its like printing money - it costs on the order of 1.5 - 2 cents/kW to maintain and run them. The source of fuel - uranium and its preprocessing costs - is close to free because it is so energy dense. And the important thing - especially in comparison with coal/natural gas/solar/wind is that their capacity factor is *great*. Which means they run almost all the time - circa 90% around the year 2000 in the US, as compared to circa 60% for coal and circa 30% for wind. Which means they can be used easily for industrial base load.

And fourth - finally,finally, there are magnitudes of improvement left in new designs. As I said in my previous post, self-contained, automatic, passively safe breeder reactors such as the sstar are designed to slash the amount of source material by 70 times (by using U-238 instead of U-235) and to cut the capital costs in manufacture by about 2 to 3 times due to new materials manufacture.

So yes, the economics of nuclear power plants is quite cheap once you get the politics out of it. As for costs of decommission and storage, those are greatly reduced if you simply let the radioactive actinides disintegrate and then move the relatively inert radioactive waste - or do what the french do and simply reprocess the fuel, and embed the residue in volcanic glass. We produce about 2300 metric tons of waste a year to deliver about 1/5t

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[nathanh]

And when you turn them on, its like printing money - it costs on the order of 1.5 - 2 cents/kW to maintain and run them.

It costs 12c/kWh for nuclear power. I've no idea what hole you pulled your figure from, but I could take a wild guess.

First of all, your "original comment" was 'Nuclear is expensive and nobody wants a nuclear reactor in their backyard. End of discussion'

I'm glad you've finally noticed. I've no idea why you've put "First of all" in front of that sentence though, because you're the one who should be apologising for not paying attention to what I said.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[horos2c]

And when you turn them on, its like printing money - it costs on the order of 1.5 - 2 cents/kW to maintain and run them.

It costs 12c/kWh for nuclear power. I've no idea what hole you pulled your figure from, but I could take a wild guess.

First of all, your "original comment" was 'Nuclear is expensive and nobody wants a nuclear reactor in their backyard. End of discussion'

I'm glad you've finally noticed. I've no idea why you've put "First of all" in front of that sentence though, because you're the one who should be apologising for not paying attention to what I said.

I'm feeding a troll here, but here goes -

1) I said that the operating costs for nuclear energy are about 1.5-2 cents a kilowatt hour. As for the base cost, like I said its approximately $1000/kWH. And I got that figure from both an operational plant (the Vogel twin plants), and the profit figures from nations who rely on nuclear electricity (france, sweden).

2) the '12 cent/kWH' figure that you get factors in a lot of the original R&D cost which is not necessary to repeat, as well as a lot of the political costs that were associated with that R&D. It also has to do with the assumption that you are only going to be running the plant for 20 or so years, and it looks like most plants will be running for a lot longer than that (about 60 in fact). In practice, the true operating cost is about 1.5 cents/2 cents an hour. And - unlike wind - there is no subsidy for the operation of nuclear plants. Do you really thing the Vogel plants would be selling nuclear power at 5 cents per kwh, at a 7 cents loss? Do you really think that *france* would be selling 1GW-9GW nuclear power for 8 cents/hour to businesses (or to other countries like italy) for a 4 cent loss/kWh?

And that doesn't even count 3rd generation/4th generation nuclear reactors, which have orders of magnitude improvement over current, 1970s technologies.

Why isn't there more nuclear power? Again, its politics. Its ironic, because so much effort has gone into fighting nuclear power buildup that plants that to *real* damage, like coal, are sailing through and the greens are actually *retarding* sustainable development. Its no wonder that true greens (like James Lovelock) are amongst the strongest supporters of nuclear power.

3) what you *say* is worse than useless when you don't back it up with figures, references, reasoned argument and discussion. The fact of the matter is that I didn't see your original comment at first, just your second mouthed platitude (the more you look into it the more.. etc. etc.). So, you tell me to go to the first comment, which I dutifully do so, and see that its another useless mouthed platititude. Doesn't do me - or anyone else - any good.

Read some books. Please. Start with those I mentioned, and then read Vaclav Smil, Amory Lovins (although he's a bit 'pie in the sky', he's got some good ideas on efficiency), and maybe deffeys. I'm not 'nuclear zealot' - I am not in the nuclear industry, and have no vested interest (other than wanting to keep living with the comforts of civilization). And I think that wonders can be done with solar and wind - to shave load off of peak power. But *replacing* peak power is a totally different thing - Denmark is finding real barriers in doing this, even though they are under political mandates to try to totally rely on renewables - and their spot price for electricity is twice as high as the countries with supposedly 'too expensive' nuclear power.

Ed

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[nathanh]

I said that the operating costs for nuclear energy are about 1.5-2 cents a kilowatt hour.

Right, so the way you prove that nuclear is cheaper than the alternatives is by ignoring all the costs except for the one that makes your argument look good.

the '12 cent/kWH' figure that you get factors in a lot of the original R&D cost

No it doesn't. You're making stuff up again.

And - unlike wind - there is no subsidy for the operation of nuclear plants.

Hahaha, except for the 1.2c/kWh energy subsidy, the $150billion R&D subsidy, and the government's gift of limited liability without which it would be financially impossible to operate a nuclear plant. Yeah, except for those.

Why isn't there more nuclear power? Again, its politics.

No, it's due to economics. Nuclear power wouldn't exist without politics. It's not a financially sensible choice of power, and it would never have gotten off the ground if governments hadn't subsidised it every step of the way.

Read some books. Please. Start with those I mentioned, and then read Vaclav Smil, Amory Lovins (although he's a bit 'pie in the sky', he's got some good ideas on efficiency), and maybe deffeys.

I've read the books, that's why I know you're blowing smoke. You say Lovins supports nuclear power? The same Lovins that wrote "Non-Nuclear Futures: The Case for an Ethical Energy Strategy" and once said "phasing out nuclear power should make our electricity cost not more but less." Your arguments are specious. Your "facts" are fabricated. In the face of all this evidence, your condescending attitude is simply amusing. To leave you, here's a quote from Diesendorf. You might have heard of him.

"In the USA, no nuclear power stations have been ordered since 1978, primarily because of poor economics. (Initially the accident at Three Mile Island in 1979 discouraged nuke building, but memories of that accident have faded and nowadays it is economics that rules out this technology.) However, there are signs the Bush administration may be preparing to grant a new round of massive subsidies to nuclear power. A 2003 report on "The Future of Nuclear Power" from an MIT team estimated that a hypothetical new nuclear power station in the USA could produce electricity at US 6.7 c/kWh (AUD 9 c/kWh). [Ed: note he says hypothetical, in practise it's still 12c/kWh] For comparison, wind power in the USA is currently priced in the range 4-5 c/kWh, depending upon siting and size of wind farm. In the UK, when the electricity industry was deregulated, nuclear energy had to be subsidised from a levy on electricity amounting to 1.2 billion pounds sterling per year. That is equivalent to a subsidy on each unit of nuclear electricity of UK 3 p/kWh (about AUD 6 c/kWh), making the total cost of a unit of nuclear electricity almost double the price of wind power at excellent sites in the UK ." -- Mark Diesendorf

Now back in your hole, you ignorant pissant.

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[horos2c]

said that the operating costs for nuclear energy are about 1.5-2 cents a kilowatt hour.

Right, so the way you prove that nuclear is cheaper than the alternatives is by ignoring all the costs except for the one that makes your argument look good.

the '12 cent/kWH' figure that you get factors in a lot of the original R&D cost

Now you're making stuff up again.

Ok, lets talk some figures here. I'm not 'making stuff up' - my argument is that the statement 'Nuclear is Expensive' is a inherently useless, dumb statement. Its like saying 'cars are expensive' or 'computers are slow'. And that the 12 cents/kwH figure that you cite lumps everything together into one big basket, rather than looking at things critically.

Is nuclear expensive? If you're talking about 1st generation nuclear power I'd agree with you (it being done primarily for military reasons). If you're talking about 2nd generation (ie: 40 year old technology) nuclear power, it really depends on what you include in your scope. And how long the plants last. If you've got a second generation nuclear power plant (like the ones at Vogel) that are producing electricity at a cap of 2 cents/kWH, and that cost about $5000/KW to build, the economics of running the plant become pretty straightforward:

5 billion dollars + (2 cents/(kilowatt hour)) * .9 * (30 years) * (1 GW)

where .9 is the capacity factor and 5 billion dollars is the startup cost, and 1 GW is the amount of energy produced. Calculate this, and it gives approximately 10.25 billion dollars cost for running that power plant. Divide that by the number of kilowatt hours produced:

(10.25 billion dollars) / (1 GW * .9 * 30 years)

and you get about 4.33 cents / kilowatt hour (if you don't believe me, believe frink). If they last 60 years:

(5 billion dollars) + (2 cents/(kilowatt hour)) * .9 * (60 years) * (1 GW)

that's approximately 15.5 billion dollars for the running of the plant. And at a total cost of about 3.3 cents/kWH.

So - where does Diesendorf get his 12 cent/kwH number? Well, first of all, there is the insurance 'subsidy' that you talk about (which a large part is the 'Price Anderson act' which protects nuclear producers with a cap on disasters) and the R&D 'subsidy'. If you factor in that research used to develop those plants, plus failed reactors (ones that started and never completed), plus the past R&D going back to 1945, you get (I'm guessing) about 12 cents/(kilowatt hour). And that's the number that you are apparently attracted to.

But that's my point - these costs (failed reactors, botched administration) are unlikely to re-occur. The nuclear plants *themselves* are competitive. And the R&D isn't useless - like say, the cost of supporting a war to keep ourselves hooked on oil, or the cost to cleanup the environment and the damage to agriculture. Its not money wasted, its a one time charge spent for plants to come that are now being built in (ironically) india and china with our R&D. If you take the millions of man-years used in us perfecting nuclear power and put it into engineering practice, you drop the startup cost from $5000/KWH to approx $1000/KWH, and the running of the plant from 2 cents/kwH to about 1 cent, which is cheaper than your average coal station. Which is what is being built in india at this very moment (the advanced westinghouse reactor).

So, in *further* answer to your question, 'is nuclear expensive'? No, not *modern* nuclear power. I'd also argue that most of the 'subsidies' that are mentioned in these calculations aren't really subsidies; that they lead to bigger and better things, and to a point where the 'subsidies' end. Sort of like the subsidies for wind and solar energy, which you seem so fond of.

Ed

(ps - I didn't mention Lovins because he bolstered my argument; I mentioned Lovins to show that I had read more than

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[horos2c]

1 GW is the amount of energy produced.

oops.. make that the 'amount of power produced'. The calculation is still correct, though.

Ed

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[horos2c]

(ppps - wow. I just looked at the incentive bill for Comprehensive Energy Legislation. It puts nuclear power under the same umbrella as wind, solar, etc.

It doesn't give the same credit to nuclear as it does to wind - ie: getting a flat-rate 1.2 cent/kwH production credit to wind, plus a 1.8 cent/kwH tax credit, but it *does* extend the 1.8 cent/kwH tax credit to nuclear for the first 6,000 MW.

Not quite the same, but whoever builds the first advanced nuclear plants is going to get a windfall - they truly are going to be able to 'print money'. If the next gen plants generate at 1 cent/kilowatt hour operating cost, then as I see it, at 40% tax rate, they are going to be able to generate electricity for free and sell it for sheer profit...

Now if they can only streamline the hurdles for getting approved.

Ed

Re:Nuclear is Expensive

[horos2c]

so...

Do you cede defeat? ;-)

Ed

Montreal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ironic to host a conference about emission reduction in a city that would benefit so much from global warming.

Re:Montreal?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but if Montreal warms up enough to be tolerable, what will happen to Houston? And New York City better start building levees.

Re:What we need here in the States-A time warp.

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it ironic that nuclear proponents talk about "new technologies" when it's disadvantages are mentioned.* But ignore the "new technologies" that make fossil fuel burning better than in the past. Why is that?

*Note also that coal is hear, and now. Your "new technologies" will do nothing for the present crisis. Plus the US has more coal here than there is oil in Saudi Arabia.

Other environmental effects.

[failure-man]

People around here always seem to fall into one of two groups on this issue: those that dance around talking about how clean nuclear power is, and those that shout "what about the fuckin' waste?"

What about the enrichment though? What about all the noxious chemicals involved in separating the fissile isotopes from the 99+% useless U-238? What about the huge piles of toxic and somewhat radioactive U-238 that you get at the end? Nobody ever seems to bring that up.

I'd like to see what the pro-nuke side has to say about dealing with the environmental effects of this part of the system.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[JackHolloway]

"What about the huge piles of toxic and somewhat radioactive U-238 that you get at the end? Nobody ever seems to bring that up."

Three words

Depleated Uranium Rounds (for tanks, and anti-tank guns)

Jack

Re:Other environmental effects.

[colenski]

Pebble bed reactors address that issue nicely. The composition of the pebbles is such that they contain all of the nasty stuff inside and are much more stable than traditional waste whether it be vitrified or what have you. A pebble is designed to remain stable for ~1M years, way beyond the radioactivity of even plutonium. Just put it in a nice, geologically stable formation like the Canadian shield, fill it in with concrete, and forget about it.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

I'd like to see what the pro-nuke side has to say about dealing with the environmental effects of this part of the system.

They'll insist, insist mind you, that the harmful effects due to the waste are exaggerated. "It's all Hype!" they'll say. "Oil and Coal are worse" they'll say.

I'll wait to hear what Greenpeace have to say. They mightn't be the most neutral organisation in the world, but it'll be interesting to see which they think is worse.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[CastrTroy]

I grew up in a town that mined uranium. there was 0.1% uranium in the ground. For every tonne of rock they mined, they got a tonne or tailings. Which is a big chemical mess that's still not cleaned up 10 years after the mines are closed. There's a lot of waste created from mining uranium. I've seen lakes full of waste because of this stuff. I wonder if those pushing nuclear power think about this kind of stuff when they tout the advantages of nuclear power.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[m50d]

What about the enrichment though? What about all the noxious chemicals involved in separating the fissile isotopes from the 99+% useless U-238?

You can centrifuge so you don't really need any chemicals, and so little fuel is needed to get a given amount of energy that the amounts used are miniscule compared to what would be used digging up the same amount of coal/oil/etc.

What about the huge piles of toxic and somewhat radioactive U-238 that you get at the end?

Ever seen a slag heap? The amount of waste is again going to be miniscule compared to what you'd produce getting the coal or oil needed to get the same amount of energy, the radiation danger is a tiny fraction of what you get from the radon you'll release mining coal. The toxicity is overstated, it's not really any worse than lead - yes it's not something you'd want to be too near, but neither are the much larger piles of stuff used for mining and oil-drilling.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought they were made from graphite, which burns quite easily in air. Maybe you should read the criticism section on wikipedia?

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Anonymous Coward]

Varied ceramic coatings with very high temperature tolerances against capacity of material contained are also involved. Do not attempt FUD, it is useless. Aside, Wikipedia is worthless so far as certainty of justification for content is concerned.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[KylePflug]

Hell yes! I knew Canada was good for something!

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Yehooti]

The Yucca Mountain project can contain the nuclear waste, safely and easily for countless millenniums. Nevada doesn't want it in their back yard so there is much effort on their part to keep this repository from happening on the scale it was envisioned. If you've checked out the Google Earth area around 37.115, -116.050, you'll understand why contained nuclear waste in carefully laid out tunnels should never be a problem, relative to what Nevada has inherited.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[pfdietz]

What about the huge piles of toxic and somewhat radioactive U-238 that you get at the end?

Do you own a house in the suburbs? If so, the soil in your yard probably contains several pounds of U-238. It's a rather common element.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Anonymous Coward]

Enrichment methods vary. Reprocessing of waste for use as further fuel in PBMR possibly. No need for hundreds of years of storage for material with half-lives effectively measured in seconds or months.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Frogbert]

I think it comes down to whether you would like all that stuff in one place where it has a chance of being contained or just pumped into the sky where the problem "dissapears".

Re:Other environmental effects.

[failure-man]

So? You still have to enrich what goes in the pebble.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[failure-man]

Yucca mountain doesn't even seem able to handle the high-level waste at the moment. Are you proposing it as a solution to the heaps of useless uranium leftovers too?

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Anonymous Coward]

What about the enrichment though? What about all the noxious chemicals involved in separating the fissile isotopes from the 99+% useless U-238? What about the huge piles of toxic and somewhat radioactive U-238 that you get at the end? Nobody ever seems to bring that up.

Oh that's simple. We just load it all onto a rocket and shoot it into the Sun. And if one or two happen to fall back down to Earth and land on.. say, Syria, then... Oops!

Works great with the President's agenda too. My personal feelings on the subject aside, you gotta love a president that can in one press release deny that human activity is related to global warming and yet suggest we can somehow mitigate global warming by changing our energy practices. And he said Kerry was a fence sitter...

P.S. Slashbots, this is not your que to start a Dem/Rep flame war. Bush and Kerry both suck. Bush, Kerry, the Dem's and Rep's are all just fucking aristocrats out to screw you. The sooner you all recognize that fact, the better off we'll all be. BTW, you global warming whiners should get off your dead asses and start seeding the oceans with iron sulfate. Either prove you are right and fix the problem in the process, or STFU. I'm sick to death of hearing about your fucking computer models.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Yehooti]

Yes. Because for the time we've seen since its start (Yucca), it has been mostly a study. The study has apparently proven worthy since it made it through both houses with a "Go", despite many objections from powerful political foes. I fully agree that it is not a great solution, but given the alternatives, it is a very good solution.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[bersl2]

Depleted uranium is still toxic in the same manner as other heavy metals (lead, mercury, etc.), and it is still radioactive to a degree.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[G-funk]

Greenpeace is only interested in selling Greenpeace. The founder of the organisation who IIRC quit in disgust, says nuclear is the way to go. What more do you need? And the waste really is an issue, but only politically. Reprocessing most of the waste is possible, and it's really not hard to store what's left until we can afford to clean it up / launch it, but it needs to be stored above ground to be safe. Politics-through-fear and the current boogeyman of the mysterious Men-In-Towels currently blocks both reprocessing and above ground storage.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Phanatic1a]

What about the huge piles of toxic and somewhat radioactive U-238 that you get at the end?

It's a commercial substance. Depleted uranium is routinely used as counterweight for aircraft control surfaces.

The 'huge piles' won't be any worse of a problem than the huge piles of toxic heavy metals and other contaminants that are scrubbed out of the emissions from coal plants. Nobody ever seems to bring that up.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[The Master Control P]

I could likewise ask if those 'pushing' fossil fuel power think about the lakes utterly destroyed by acid rain, the contribution of global warming, and the harmful affects of the pollution on people. There is no such thing as a free lunch. Extracting mass quantities of anything from the ground has unpleasant side effects, be it uranium or coal or borax (I got to visit the mine in Boron, CA once - biggest hole in the ground I've ever seen).

But in the end, a year's spent fuel from a 1 gigawatt nuclear reactor would fit in a little bucket you could do as you wished with (Like, say, bury it in a mountain and forget about it). A year's carbon dioxide from a gigawatt coal plant is released and then uncontrollable.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[HerrGoober]

Don't forget, that coal fired power stations actually dump more radioactive material into the atmosphere than a nuclear power station. Surprising fact but the coal contains uranium, thorium and a load more nasty metals:

http://www.ornl.gov/info/ornlreview/rev26-34/tex t/colmain.html

Re:Other environmental effects.

[CastrTroy]

But to extract a years worth of fuel from the earth, you produce a lot of waste. Mostly all the rock where I grew up wasn't uranium. You had to mine 1000 tons of rock to get 1 ton of uranium. The other 999 tons is waste, toxic waste. Just because so little is coming out of the power plants, doesn't mean that there is no waste materials caused by nuclear power.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[sjames]

What about the enrichment though? What about all the noxious chemicals involved in separating the fissile isotopes from the 99+% useless U-238? What about the huge piles of toxic and somewhat radioactive U-238 that you get at the end? Nobody ever seems to bring that up.

Ideally, the U238 becomes breeder stock. The rest is nothing compared to the tons of slag produced daily from coal power.

Research is ongoing to discover processes to seperate out the long lived dangerous waste and transmute it into reletively short lived waste through neutron bombardment. Interestingly, shorter lived waste is MORE radioactive but for a shorter time. It might be interesting to see if the residual heat from that waste is enough bto generate power. If we can turn the waste into a resource, it will naturally be jealously guarded and horded rather than disposed of carelessly.

As for the waste, keep in mind that if a coal fired plant were suddenly treated like a nuclear plant, the surrounding community would be evacuated that instant due to the escaping radiation (radon and thorium) from the burning process.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Dr_Barnowl]

You can centrifuge so you don't really need any chemicals

Not true ; in order to get the material into a state which *can* be centrifuged (or other means of seperation, like gas chromatography), you do need noxious chemicals aplenty, like flourine.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[Fulcrum of Evil]

They'll insist, insist mind you, that the harmful effects due to the waste are exaggerated. "It's all Hype!" they'll say. "Oil and Coal are worse" they'll say.

Well, the waste is fairly contained, can be partially reprocessed, and contained. The worst isotopes in nuclear waste burn out in a number of decades, so the 10,000 year storage problem is more a matter of storing stuff with a half life of 100yr+. A nuke plant will also emit less radiation than an equivalent coal plant, and all that radiation is centralized, instead of spread throughout the atmosphere.

They mightn't be the most neutral organisation in the world, but it'll be interesting to see which they think is worse.

Why, because they're a big name? If they've lost their objectivity, then there's no point in listening.

Re:Other environmental effects.

[The Master Control P]

I didn't imply that there was no waste. I said that any large-scale mining produces lots of nasty tailings. And even if getting 1 ton of uranium makes 1000 tons of tailings, you have to mine 16000 times less of it (bottom of page) than you would coal to get the same amount of energy. I meant that although neither coal nor uranium are much better in terms of environmental damage caused by mining them, spent fuel rods can be dealt with more easily than millions of tons of CO2.

Solve the War on Terrorism.

[portforward]

I've been thinking about this for a long while. I wonder what would happen if the US (like some commentators have suggested) embark on a "Manhattan Project" for energy. If the US highly encouraged oil exploration, solar, wind, nuclear, hybrid (like the plug into your wall to charge the batteries), Sterling engine, biodiesel, thermal depolermersation (you know, turkey offal and sewage into oil), microwaves and mining the moon and Jupiter for fusion fuel. What would happen if through alternative energy initiatives we could drive the price of oil down to $10 a barrel. I'm not saying it will happen, or even if it could happen, but what would happen to the Saudis, Iran, Venezuela and all the other dictatorships that run on oil? What would happen if America could export its energy technology instead of importing oil?

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[ProudClod]

Hate to be a pedant, but Venezuela's not a dictatorship.

There's certainly a lot of domestic opposition to Chavez, but there's a lot of domestic opposition to Bush too - the fact remains that both were democratically elected by the people.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[Anonymous Coward]

Oil is part of the problem, but, they still have many other possible route to make cash, drug is one.

The USA is dependant from them, the oil, coal, etc. Since it cost a lot to build new plant (Be hydro, nuclear, wind, solar, geothermal, or whatever plant) it's probably not possible to drive the market price down that much in a short term.

Add to that that the american doesnt want to change there lifestyle, and all, and you've got a big mess.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[darkmeridian]

There's certainly a lot of domestic opposition to Chavez, but there's a lot of domestic opposition to Bush too - the fact remains that both were democratically elected by the people.

Not to troll, but George W. Bush and Saddam Hussein were elected by their people. Of course, Floridian optical voting machines were programmed to throw out misformed ballots in "black" areas while they asked for a new, correct ballot in "white" areas. And of course, Iraqi polls were not anonymous. So being "elected by the people" does not necessary mean you are not a dictator.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[Bandit0013]

People need to get over the 2000 election. If Al Gore had won his home state he would have been sitting in the white house regardless of Florida.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[Anonymous Coward]

Oil at $10 a barrel means a lot of supply, and not much demand. The (petroleum) supply is running out, so that side of the equation is only going to get worse. And even if everybody stopped burning petroleum for transportation overnight, that wouldn't stop all the other, non-energy uses for it: lubrication, plastics, roads, fertilizers, pesticides, solvents, ...

As I've heard chemists describe it (and IIRC), you can replace petrodiesel with biodiesel because the carbon chains you need for that are fairly short -- 12-15 carbons? -- and plants can easily build those for you. But it's going to be a long time, if ever, before we have plants that are producing 200-carbon chains that we need for, say, high-density plastics.

And then there's the economics of it. Fuel costs are not the most significant cost of owning a car, for most people. So even if you had something better that was 1/4 the cost, it wouldn't be worth it for most people to switch over right now. They'll keep running their cars on petroleum until the car dies, or until petroleum gets *way* too expensive -- which has got to be over $6/gal, because that's what some parts of the world pay today.

Don't forget that population increases exponentially. Then think how many plastic products you use in a week. The price of petroleum will *never* be as low as $10/barrel. This isn't an oil crisis -- this is the last oil crisis.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[coyote-san]

Also Hitler.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[coyote-san]

Why don't we do this? Because much of our current leadership puts their own financial interests above our national interests. There's a lot of things that only make sense when you follow the money.

Did you know that Condi Rice, current Sec. of State, has an oil tanker named after her?

As for a massive effort... totally unnecessary. There's a well-proven technology for turning coal into refined petroleum products. Several countries have used this process when they had coal reserves but no gas reserves or imported oil due to trade embargos.

It's even cleaner than refining crude oil today.

The "downside" -- it's only cost-effective when the price of crude is over $35/barrel and a large-scale conversion facility will cost $1.5b. There's also the issue of building new pipelines into Montana and Wyoming. But that cost is really not that high for oil companies and only fools think crude prices will ever drop back to the ~20/barrel that fueled our economy for the last decade. Crude oil futures have been hanging around $50/barrel for years out.

Any rational person would look at these facts, the fragility of our coastal refineries, the rapid increase of demand by China and India (which will drive prices up - we may see $100/barrel within a few years) and the chaos that would follow the collapse of the Saudi regime. It's a no-brainer... yet only the Democratic governor of Montana is calling for it to be a national priority.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[ChrisMaple]

The US Department of Energy is already spending at an annual rate twice that of the Manhattan Project (in constant dollars). While the DOE is obviously not well focussed, it is also obvious that quickly throwing money at the problem (like the Manhattan Project) is not adequate to yield a solution. "Encouraging" industry to find a solution seems like a more promising approach. Be patient; oil isn't going to vanish rapidly and it's going to take time to develop and install better systems.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[xgamer04]

(another reply has some similar points)

It would definitely be in the best interests of EVERY country (in the long run) to explore alternative energy projects, along with conservation efforts. The problem in the US is that the vested interests that control most of the strings don't want this to happen.

The problem and solution here is not necessarily intuitive. High energy prices are a definite drain on any economy, so it would be in the best interests of a government to find cheap energy, right? The difficulty in the US is that people with influence over national energy policy are ones either funded by or come from backgrounds in Big Business (tm). Energy is a big business. If new types of energy research and businesses are encouraged, it creates "instability" in the marketplace for the established powers, who might become dinosaurs and die, as they should (too bad they won't turn into fuel). It speaks volumes about the priorities that our "elected" (if you accept the legitimacy of certain elections, which I do not) officials have when they don't encourage true innovation in industry and are content with the status quo (and both major parties do this, it's not just the Republicans).

The "War on Terror" is another interesting problem. It would seem in the best interest of the world to cut off as much funding as possible to countries and organizations that fund terrorism. But if we cut off this funding, many of the people in power in the US would lose their bread and butter: their stocks would fall and their campaign contributors would not have as much money to "donate". There is also a political (and sinister) benefit to allowing "terrorism" and "the War on Terror (tm)" to continue. If people are scared, they often look to authority figures for support and direction. I'm not making a judgement on anyone here, it's just what happens. If the controlling interests have people looking to them, they can basically do whatever they want (it probably doesn't hurt their egos, either). Insane laws that take away fundamental liberties are welcomed, even if the liberties they take are ones of the kind that were meant to be preserved by those who rebelled and started this country.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[PakProtector]

Also Hitler.

Come now, as a person of German Descent, I can tell you the thing that everyone knows about Hitler's election. It was settled in the time honored German fashion: First one to burn down the Reichstag is Chancellor.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[pfdietz]

But it's going to be a long time, if ever, before we have plants that are producing 200-carbon chains that we need for, say, high-density plastics.

Plastics are made by polymerization of rather simple monomers, not by extracting 200-carbon molecules from petroleum. Think about it: there's an enormous variety of different organic molecules with 200 carbons; any single one will be a tiny fraction of the mass of a barrel of oil (especially since that chemical will probably be solid and only slightly soluble in oil.)

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hitler was not elected Chancellor by the people of Germany. He was appointed by Hindenburg in a political deal. Hitler's party had garnered votes but it isn't accurate to suggest Hitler was elected Chancellor.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[quarkscat]

If you were to eliminate most of the funding of religious fundamentalist terrorists by driving the cost of a barrel of oil down to $10, there would be (nearly universal) world peace -- a new Pax Americana.

There are powerful lobbies within the USA that would fight "tooth and nail" against either widespread semi-autonomous power generation (energy & power companies), cheap fusion power production (energy & power companies), or a reduction in worldwide conflict (military-industrial complex). Considering the influence that these groups have with the central government (both main political parties), there will be very little headway made in the USA's energy independence until either (1) these lobbies have determined that they have extracted all available monitary resources, or (2) there is a near-armageddon-like event that spawns a revolution against the status quo.

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[shutdown -p now]

Not exactly. There would be peace, sure - but not before a major, world-scale war is fought. You think those guys are just going to sit there and watch their cash cows go away? I doubt that.

Incidentially, that sequence of events (oil running out, U.S. pioneering alternative energy research and converting to fusion ahead of everyone, triggering a world war) is a background story of Fallout. I honestly hope it won't come to that...

Re:Solve the War on Terrorism.

[cheesybagel]

Actually, one group of people pushing the most for widespread semi-autonomous power generation is... guess who... the military. That is because they have a real need for heavy duty mobile power generation to carry out their tasks. The military has invested in portable nuclear reactors (US Navy: pushed for LWR reactors and uses them in submarines and carriers), fuel cells for the US Army and Navy, solar cells for military satellites, etc. The military is also a technological leader in energy and food conservation, or recycling for much the same reasons. The US Army is converting their vehicle fleet to diesel vehicles which can run on biodiesel and is investing in recycling cooking oil for use in vehicles. Napoleon gave a prize to the person which invented canned food for the army.

As for fusion, we do not have cheap fusion because fusion is bloody hard, and billions of dollars and decades of work have not managed to crack it yet.

carbon neutral

[pr0nbot]

At random I caught an interesting debate on BBC24 between 4 MEPs. They were discussing the need for nuclear power. There was an interesting claim by the Finnish chap that nuclear power produces no carbon output. The German Green countered that this was ignoring the carbon cost of plant construction, maintenance, production of rods, waste disposal, decommissioning, etc. Her general point was that those who argue that nuclear power is cheap and efficient ignore the overheads and invisible costs.

Another interesting point made was that the alternatives proposed by the anti-nuclear position have no chance of being developed and deployed on a sufficient scale and in time to meet the Kyoto targets. The greens countered that they were also trying to address the demand side of the energy problem, unlike the nuclear lobby who seek only to replace existing supply.

Re:carbon neutral

[AtomicRobotMonster]

Turning the clock back on demand is going to be impossible (unless we literally have our plug pulled). There's a correlation between quality of life and energy consumption per capita. Sure , we can and should strive to make more energy efficient devices but the energy usage genie is out of the bottle so to speak.

Re:carbon neutral

[nutshell42]

The greens countered that they were also trying to address the demand side of the energy problem, unlike the nuclear lobby who seek only to replace existing supply.

Yeah, because demand's gonna go down when countries with more than 2 billion additional people make the transition from agrarian to industrialized nations and we start to replace oil (and coal and natural gas) as energy sources for heating and transportation. We just got to remember to switch off the lights when we leave a room.

Of course they're right to a degree. If the Chinese and Indians consume energy like the Japanese instead of the USians in 50 years we're gonna be *a lot* better off and in the long run higher efficiency will save huge amounts of ressources and money but nevertheless I don't see how solar should provide all that (unless it's in space), there's a natural limit to hydroelectric and wind has some major environmental drawbacks, probably even more serious ones than the other two.

Re:carbon neutral

[msevior]

Grrr I can't stand it any longer.

We're still constructing the site but here it is anyway...

http://nuclearinfo.net/

That German Green person is way out to lunch. We prove it on the site. Scroll down to:

(There is some bug in our twiki that prevents direct links..)

http://www.nuclearinfo.net/Nuclearpower#Greenhouse _Emissions_of_Nuclear_Power

Nuclear Power emits less Greenhouse Gases than any other form Energy generation including Hydro and Wind. There are far less invisible costs in Nuclear Energy than anything else precisely because it has been so thoroughly studied.

Re:carbon neutral

[horos2c]

Just curious, I looked at your website, and you don't seem to mention 3rd/4th generation nuclear power.

In particular, I'm interested in the use of nuclear power *not* for electricity generation, but for heat generation, to replace natural gas for such activities as:

* ethanol production from cellulose
* hydrogen production from coal
* steam production for oil sands development

To me, the biggest story about nuclear is not going to be the electrical plants (although those are important too) but in the creation of portable, off-the-grid thermal generators. For example (as seen on slashdot), the sstar, which I *hope* they are planning on converting to use for thermal use. 100 MWe == 350 MWth == a *lot* of ethanol produced.

Ed

Re:carbon neutral

[msevior]

Look Harder :-)

Under advanced reactors there is a whole lot of stuff about 4th generation reactors. I agree that there are a whole lot of other uses for Nuclear Power but we haven't concentrated them together (they're scattered throughout the site).

Hmm... Good Idea! I'll put in an "Other uses of Nuclear Power" heading.

Thanks!

The public's general reaction...

[ddx Christ]

Is akin to a situation where someone tells you to lift a supposedly cold glass, but it's actually boiling. That's what initially happened with nuclear fission. Now that same person is asking us to pick it up again, but can we be sure it's inherently safe to do so and we won't receive 3rd degree burns? I'm not saying this is my point of view, but what I usually encounter when talking to others.

A bad reputation is very difficult to eliminate. Whereas a good reputation is ruined by one bad action, the same cannot be said for the converse. Nuclear power has clear advantages as well as disadvantages; technology has improved. But if we can't deal with mercury, toxic chemicals, and other pollutants, what are we going to do with nuclear waste? If we have a plan and are ready, then go ahead, but we should still look for alternatives and improvements.

Re:The public's general reaction...

[RexRhino]

Nuclear waste is so small, as to be almost insignificant. Imagine if those nuclear reactors took their waste, and incinerated the nuclear waste, sending the fumes into the atmosphere. That is coal and oil power! Coal and oil contains trace amounts of uranium, plutonium, and all kinds of nasty stuff. Even though it is extremly tiny amounts, due to the sheer amount of fossil fuels we burn, it is far more than, like I said, we incinerated our nuclear waste and pumped it into the atmosphere.

Also, nuclear waste if we recycle it, is less radioactive than when it is taken out of the ground. We have nuclear "waste" right now, all over the place... put there by mother nature. We are actually reducing the potentially dangerous nuclear waste in the ground.

We should still look for alternatives and improvements on principle... but worrying about nuclear waste from nuclear power is like worrying about nuclear waste from fossil fuels. If you aren't worried about one, you shouldn't be worried about the other!

Re:The public's general reaction...

[2ms]

What was the boiling glass? How have we been burned by nuclear fission. I hope you dont mean Chernobyl.

But then again...

[$RANDOMLUSER]

If we've got the likes of (Massachusetts Senator) Ted Kennedy opposing something as benign as offshore wind farms with obvious NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) arguments, how can we expect people to agree to deal with transportation and storage of spent fuel rods which have a half-life in the tens-of-thousands of years?

The problem with nuclear power...

[mattotoole]

The problem with nuclear power is that the nuclear industry is so enmeshed with top secret military programs that no one knows what its costs really are. They say it's cheap, but to what degree is it being subsidized? We'll never know. Also, nuclear power further encourages an overly centralized power grid, with too few, too-large power plants. For both national security and efficency, we should be moving toward a more distributed model. Smaller plants require less investment too, so they can be added/upgraded more easily as technology improves. I'm for millions of solar roofs; microturbines and fuel cells with co-generation; and everyone's meter able to run backwards.

Re:The problem with nuclear power...

[minerat]

Did you read about the pebble bed reactors on wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_bed_modular_re actor? They are significatly smaller than current reactors. China is investing heavily in them. With their modular design, they can be spread out in all reaches of their country. When demand grows in one area, they can just tack another on to meet it. While it isn't as decentralized as everyone having their own solar roof & wind turbine, it's better than the supercentralized system we have now. Scientific American had a good article about them in January of 2002 (not available for free on web).

Re:The problem with nuclear power...

[AtomicRobotMonster]

Generation diversity is essential if we're going to get out of the mess we're in right now, especially given that no one option can replace fossil fuels alone (not even fission). I heard once that there isn't enough fissionable uranium on the planet to support 30 terra watt energy demands.

Better start eating more carrots.

Re:The problem with nuclear power...

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you also read:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticality_accident
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_poisoning
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioactive_waste

It's not all roses. Dying from radiation poisoning is up there with death by paracetamol for unpleasant ways to go. Spreading reactors all of the country sounds like a fine way to maximise the chances of sickness.

Re:The problem with nuclear power...

[DigiShaman]

I'm for millions of solar roofs; microturbines and fuel cells with co-generation; and everyone's meter able to run backwards. ...and independence! Don't forget that word. The idea of selling a product that allows people to become more independent has a much broader appeal IMHO.

Re:The problem with nuclear power...

[radl33t]

Reality check. Large facilities are more efficient then small facilities. How exactly are millions of solar roofs, micro turbines, and fuel cells cheaper or easier to upgrade? How many people have the money to buy solar panels let alone a micro turbine? How long would it even take to develop the infrastructure to build to that demand? Distributing generation certainly has some interesting possibilities so long as we remember that we live on planet earth. National security concerns are imagined to satisfy agendas. Paranoia about "top secret nuclear programs" is just that. Nuclear research in the US took a nose dive 25 years ago and still hasn't recovered. There are no magic answers, just some better then others. A good answer has been available to us for a long time. The fact we do not utilize it is an unfortunate consequence of democracy.

Re:The problem with nuclear power...

[Peldor]

Japan uses nuclear power. Roughly 35% of their power is nuclear. I don't see them burying a lot of costs in a US-style military-industrial complex. See also France, the largest user of nuclear power by percent of their total consumption (75%+).

The biggest hurdles for nuclear are political and educational not economic.

Re:The problem with nuclear power...

[dbIII]

Japan uses nuclear power.

Japan is an island with no coal or oil reserves and has been nervous about potential blockade in the past. France had complementary civil and military nuclear programs. The biggest hurdles are political as said - you need a good reason to go nuclear because it still cannot justify itself for its own sake, and Carter decided the government had enough plants for it's own purposes - but was not going to stop a company that thought they could make a buck just building one to generate electricty. Funny thing is that noone thought it was worth it, and then they changed history later to blame the hippies for their own economic decisions.

Re:The problem with nuclear power...

[Anonymous Coward]

This simply isn't true. The commercial nuclear power industry has always been kept entirely seperate from the military whenever possible. Military operations will require military personel and it cannot be kept a "secret". There has always been a precident to keep DOE/Military nuke ops seperate from commercial power generating nukes, and it was only broken for the first time EVER a couple years ago with a single instance. There is one plant in the states that has one reactor operating with a few rods for generating tritium for the military.. The military has no means to replenish tritium for its weapons stockpile, as the DOE no longer has any reactors capable of producing it in operation.. No commercial operators would even allow it, but as the TVA is effectively a gov't-owned company, one of their reactors is doing the work.

not to threadjack, but it may be good to note that a large portion of our nuke stockpile is basically useless, or, at least much less powerful than it is supposed to be. Basically, tritium is to a nuke weapon as what nitrous does to your 1992 Civic.. and a lot of our bomb's Tritium has gone through a half-life or three just sitting around as we have had no way to make it since around 1989 (until recently, albeit small-scale).

Also, nuke plants are designed as baseload plants. This way they can be set out far away from large cities, and this does not promote grid centralization in and of itself. The weak point in the grid is maintainance, and with the events that unfolded in recent years.. the industry got off their ass and you can be sure they're bettering their infrastructure so these sorts of things dont happen. It should be noted that a good portion of coal plants are baseload plants as well, and because of their smaller size, they are typically located closer to (and in) metropolitain areas.

also, *EVERYBODY* is for "millions of solar roofs; microturbines and fuel cells with co-generation" .. even the "bad guy": the nuke proponent. It will take a couple more decades before we all have solar-shingles. Renewables are not cost-effective enough to go large scale anytime soon. Another 40-50 years of nuke power is our only option IF we want to move away from coal, and therefore large-scale gas emission & environmental mining damage. If environuts (teeheehee, flamebait?) dont want coal.. they better want nuke, because the only other options to get through the next 50+ years are cabins & outhouses, or a trizillion dollars to buy everybody ineffecient solar generation.. we certainly cant dam up some rivers, because the spotted trout wont be able to get to its breeding grounds, and we cant build 3 million wind turbines, because we'll kill those canadian geese that shit on my front lawn.

You want daily life to go on as we know it? accept commercial nuke power. you don't? move to bumblefuck and don't pay attention to the world (you can grow hemp, make biodiesel for your VW, and screw a chick with pit hair! its fun!1), it's not gonna change for you just yet.

right....Pine-scented nuclear.

[Anonymous Coward]

"BTW, if you have air scrubbers, where do you think the harmful removed by-products go? Do you think they're annihilated or something? You still have toxic waste to dispose of after you pull the pollutants out of the air from a hydrocarbon burning plant."

Like I said above. We didn't just start burning fossil fuels yesterday. Your complaints aren't something new. There are plants that convert coal to a more suitable fuel (lets also ignore the fact that not all coal is equal). As for the waste. What exactly do you think the end products of nuclear reactions are? Cherry-flavoured farts?

Re:right....Pine-scented nuclear.

[aaronl]

The point is that you end up with a *LOT* more radioactive waste from burning coal than you do with fission.

Coal produces large amounts of greenhouse gasses, sulfur- and nitrogen-oxides, uranium, and thorium. The last two are radioactive, the middle two are the largest contributors to acid rain. The amount of uranium and thorium actually adds more radiation than storing the spent fissionable fuels. Add to that the issue of 100s:1 for coal to nuclear for fuel amounts.

In the US, for example, more radioactive material is released into the air by burning coal *than used in nuclear reactors*!

I never said that nuclear didn't have waste, hence the term "nuclear waste". However, "clean" coal is not very clean, either, and coal waste really should be treated the same as nuclear waste. It contains the same materials, and in higher quantities. Also, for the amount of produced power, you have *less* waste from fission than you do from coal... and that includes "clean" coal.

My primary sources were DOE, ORNL, which is part of the DOE, and PG&E.

Re:right....Pine-scented nuclear.

[dbIII]

Ineresting points about acid rain are perfectly valid, which is why pollution controls went in everywhere (paticularly the USA with their sulphur rich coal) decades ago. Even where you have decent coal you get NOx, so for a very long time it has been dealt with, and it's now cheap to do so it is done everywhere.

Coal produces ... uranium, and thorium

Coal produces just about every element you can think of if you take that reasoning. The trace elements go into the ashand often end up as building materials. Concentration of these elements is almost always incredibly low, the bullshit paper on ornl (there's only one like it - that should let you know something) considers the most radioactive coal they could find, which does need to be used with care, and implies that it is all like that. The ash from that coal would most certainly not end up as a filler material in concrete, which is what is done with a lot of ash.

In the US, for example, more radioactive material is released into the air by burning coal *than used in nuclear reactors*!

If you assume that the net output of radioative material in producing nuclear fuel and using it is zero that will always be the case - since by that assumption you have cooked the books and everyone is farting more radioactive material than comes out of nuclear reactors. Heavy elements are heavy, so the ash with chunks of those hard to crush or melt compounds containing heavy elements are unlikely to make it into the air from a third world plant with little pollution controls, let alone something where you use scrubbers to get gasses like SOx and NOx out.

The whole thing was just a stupid tactic in the USA of saying "coal is bad too - why can't we be bad and get away with it?" which has has had zero success if you count the number of plants built in the USA since Carter. Coal has it's own problems - if the nuclear industry spent some of that lobby and adverising money on real research they may have solved the waste and fuel processing problems and be able to stand on their own merits instead of expensive whining and irrelevant moaning about hippies stopping them making money (Carter was no hippy (he was a nuclear engineer) and Reagan or the sensible Bush wouldn't listen to one).

Re:right....Pine-scented nuclear.

[aaronl]

Actually, I didn't know that Carter was a nuclear engineer. A little research shows he was prepping for doing training on the Seawolf. He was also the engineering officer for the nuclear plant on the Seawolf. He resigned the Navy before it was put into service, though. Certainly qualifies him to know more than most about the things. Carter was a fool about a lot of things, but yeah, he wasn't stupid nor was he a hippy.

I always have held that advertising was the biggest money sink out there, followed by big government. I don't see much nuclear advertising, but I do know there is a lot spent on lobbying.

Nuclear still does suffer heavily from the same issue as solar and wind. Many people don't want it anywhere near them.

fossil fules

[Anonymous Coward]

The mining of fossil fuels produces trace amounts of some nasty radioactives that escape into the environment. Tonnes of it! http://www.ornl.gov/info/ornlreview/rev26-34/text/ colmain.html

Subsidized dirty bombs?

[Anonymous Coward]

With all the fear about the terrorists, it's interesting that there would be interest in nukes. Perhaps this fear of terrorist is a big hoax, and *oil* really was the whole point of the Iraq thing, and now that that's not working out we turn to nukes. We've been sold a bill of goods friends. Or maybe terrorism is a "nuisance", when compared with our need for power. Otherwise, one would wonder about the logic in funding research into briefcase-size nukes, i.e. a smaller-faster-lighter-easier way to martyrdom, should it fall into the hands of the bad guys eh Rummy?

Seriously, the whole nuke thing is a dead-end. A giant Yucca Mountain size dead end. If you are for nuclear power, also - look me straight in the pixel - and tell me you wouldn't mind a nuclear dump in your back yard. Yeah, that's what I thought.

Point number 2 - security - assuming, as has been blazed on our foreheads that we are so-so-so afraid of the terrorist, well what about nuclear security? Do you trust the same keystone cops who blundered through Katrina to secure our nuclear facilities? For an example, see how inherently insecure this site at the University of Wisconsin is. Also read this fascinating book about the controversy surrounding the construction of a nuclear test reactor at Vallecitos. This was in the '60s, before Americans worried about Osama. Now think about that book from the 9/11 perspective.

what will happen to the middle east if

[CDPatten]

the world stops it's need for oil? We are starting to see many alternatives, natural gas, nuclear, current solar tech, new solar (e.g. nano-solar), fuel-cell, etc. Even harnessing the oceans waves are becoming practical. France already gets about 80% of its energy from Nuke power.

At present the Middle East doesn't do anything but sell oil (http://www.tompeters.com/entries.php?note=006683. php, 270 international patents in 20 years). There are approx. 270 million Arabs in the middle east and the majority living off of oil profit. If things like Britain's initiative spill over into all the world's nations, the Middle East could very quickly loose its primary source of income within the next 20 years. Cars are quickly moving to electric engines wich will feed fuel-cell, and I can't imagine new jet tech is far off. The new scientist has pieces on projects to conserve up to 80% fuel costs.

Since the middle east (for the most part) doesn't make anything, do you think they will turn into a society similar to the warring African nations or step up to the plate and joining the world in creating/innovating?

Re:what will happen to the middle east if

[AtomicRobotMonster]

Expect to see more nasty little theocracies.

Re:what will happen to the middle east if

[Anonymous Coward]

the world stops it's need for oil? We are starting to see many alternatives, natural gas, nuclear, current solar tech, new solar (e.g. nano-solar), fuel-cell, etc. Even harnessing the oceans waves are becoming practical. France already gets about 80% of its energy from Nuke power.

Well, that's all well and good if we only used petroleum for energy, but we also use it for lubrication, pesticides, fertilizers, solvents, asphalt, plastics, and lots of other things.

If you have a plan to replace an asphalt roadway with solar power, or a plastic bottle with nuclear power, you're smarter than you look!

It's neat that France gets 80% of their energy from nuclear; I wonder what they build 80% of their roads from. Oh, and Michelin is French -- did you know that they use 3x more synthetic rubber than natural rubber in their tires? I wonder where synthetic rubber comes from...

Re:what will happen to the middle east if

[CDPatten]

One really big flaw in your post, there is more then enough oil in other parts of the world to take care of the world's plastic needs. Canada alone could handle the worlds plastic needs for many years. The gulf, Russia, hell even the oil fields near Japan can be used to make plastics.

What eats up the oil most is cars and trucks. Not plastic/rubber.

You had gave some interesting information, but were a little misleading to anyone who isn't familiar with the numbers. The middle east won't become the worlds premium plastics supplier, but even if it did, there would be no wear near the amount of oil needed from the middle east as there is today.

So where does that leave us? At my original post.

Re:what will happen to the middle east if

[VENONA]

Actually, I'm fine with that. Many of these people seem to want to live in the 8th to 12th centuries, when the Muslim world prospered, and the Christian world was teh suck. The end of Middle East oil's their chance.

Re:what will happen to the middle east if

[AtomicRobotMonster]

Algebra (Al Jabar), astronomy, medicine were developed in the middle-east during that time period. Rather better than the jihadi nonsense that is being used to distract the people from the suckiness of their ruling elites.

Re:what will happen to the middle east if

[VENONA]

"Algebra (Al Jabar), astronomy, medicine were developed in the middle-east during that time period."

I know. That was their period of glory--when their civilization shone especially brightly compared to the state of affairs in Europe.

As their most recent technological innovation seems to have been the dumb bomb, I wish them every success in retreating from the modern world.

Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Vorondil28]

I agree. I wish this kind of attitude were more common here in the States.
Modern reactors are far safer than their more temperamental counterparts of the 70s and 80s (Chernobyl? Three Mile Island?). Unfortunately, this fear of reactors-past generates the not-in-my-backyard mentality among U.S. citizens when it comes to nuclear power. Not only has reactor technology gotten better, but the techniques for dealing with nuclear waste have advanced quite a bit as well.

I, for one, would welcome a nuclear cooling tower on my horizon. Bah, it's a damn shame.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[HanzoSpam]

Modern reactors are far safer than their more temperamental counterparts of the 70s and 80s (Chernobyl? Three Mile Island?).

It's ridiculous to even mention Chernobyl and Three Mile Island in the same breath. What people seem to ignore is that the reactor at TMI functioned exactly as designed in the event of a meltdown - it shut itself down. I'd also point out that Three Mile Island is still in operation. Only one reactor was affected. The rest of the facility has been humming along quite nicely ever since.

Three Mile Island isn't an example of how dangerous nuclear technology is, it's an example of how safe it is.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[ZombieRoboNinja]

Actually, according to a friend of mine who works as an energy consultant, only about 50 people ever died because of Chernobyl - including death from radiation poisoning, cancer, and so on. Friend might be full of it, though.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Dwonis]

What if a terrorist bombs the reactor?

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[TapeCutter]

"Social Justice: A liberal getting slugged in the teeth."

The US conservative answer to any problem is, if you don't undrestand it then beat up the nearest liberal. Also seems to be the foundation of their foriegn policy. Hooray for freedom, you fucking wanker!

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Burning1]

Minor nitpick: At least one of the 4 Chernobyl reactors was still operating until 2000.

I agree. Three Mile Island is a perfect example of how safe Nuclear Technology is. It is an example of how everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong, and how the safety measures of the plant prevented any loss of life.

As damaging as the Chernobyl desaster was, the cost of human life was relatively low. Radiation isn't the boogyman people make it out to be.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, according to a friend of mine who works as an energy consultant, only about 50 people ever died because of Chernobyl - including death from radiation poisoning, cancer, and so on. Friend might be full of it, though.

For all I know, your friend may be right about actual deaths from radiation poisoning and cancer, but he is (quite dishonestly IMHO) neglecting to mention the large numbers of children born with severe birth defects and genetic diseases. Of course, a modern reactor should never do this.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Anonymous Coward]

For all I know, your friend may be right about actual deaths from radiation poisoning and cancer, but he is (quite dishonestly IMHO) neglecting to mention the large numbers of children born with severe birth defects and genetic diseases.

So far no one has found an elevated rate of birth defects (nor genetic diseases) due to Chernobyl. There will probably be a higher risk of cancer for survivors in the long term. But their descendents should be in the clear.

If you think about it, more people were exposed to high radiation doses in the atomic bomings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I would guess there was more fallout near Chernobyl due to the nature of the accident, but as inept as the Soviet response was, they still got people out of the area within a few weeks. So this is not totally unexplored territory, medically speaking.

There was a UN-coordinated report this year which got some press. The report estimates that only around 50 people have died so far due to the accident (this deaths from the initial explosion). Of course, many people got very sick without dying.

If I understand the summary correctly, the report says that about 4,000 people will eventually die of cancer due to the accident, and that this would represent a 3% increase in the cancer rate among the exposed population.

So, definitely not a good outcome, but much better than was initially feared. Assuming this report is correct, of course...

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Anonymous Coward]

In fact, the Chernobyl reactor should never have done what it did. A whole bunch of safty interlocks were deliberatly disabled to allow them to conduct the spin-down test, and that, coupled with the flux problems and gravity driven control rod design issues, was what caused the reactor to run dry and explode.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[pnewhook]

What if a terrorist bombs the reactor?

With that altitude, why are they letting airplanes fly again?

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[VENONA]

Most people with such an imbecilic sig as 'Social Justice: A liberal getting slugged in the teeth' are the last people on earth who could actually do it. Probably just another guy overcompensating for something, or someone with far too high an opinion of himself. Certainly not worth getting upset over.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Sven Tuerpe]

What if a terrorist bombs the reactor?

More importantly: What will the terrorist do if he can't?

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Vorondil28]

TMI functioned exactly as designed in the event of a meltdown

Right, but if you ask Joe Six-Pack about it, he won't give you a glowing testament to how safe it was, he'll tell you how scared shitless he was when he first heard about it. No doubt Three Mile Island was and is safer than most reactors, but it's the images of what could have happened had the safeguards failed that direct public opinion. What we need is a campaign to get people to realize that the likelihood of those safeguards actually failing, and having a catastrophic event in their continuity is near nil when using modern reactor technology.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Anonymous Coward]

Right, but if you ask Joe Six-Pack about it, he won't give you a glowing testament to how safe it was, he'll tell you how scared shitless he was when he first heard about it.

*cough* No thanks to the media which overdramatizes everything for ratings.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Fulcrum of Evil]

What if a terrorist bombs the reactor?

With what? A truck? You can fly a plane into the cooling tower of a reactor and all you'll do is leave a stain. The terrorist threat is vastly overstated.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Fulcrum of Evil]

As damaging as the Chernobyl desaster was, the cost of human life was relatively low. Radiation isn't the boogyman people make it out to be.

That must be why you're not allowed off the roads near the plant and you need a pass to even get within several miles of it. The cost of human life at the chernobyl disaster was rather high - you're probably looking at 10s of thousands of lives cut short by cancer. The good news is that's about the absolute worst design in current operation, and even that one required the safety measures to be circumvented.

Re:Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome

[Dwonis]

With a suicidal disgruntled employee? I don't know.

I'm just pointing out that meltdowns aren't the only thing that could cause a reactor to spew hazardous materials into the air. Terrorist attacks, natural disasters, and accidents are all things to consider.

On the other hand, the risks associated with continuing to pump a zillion tons of CO2 into the atmosphere also need to be considered. :)

Environmentalists are Coming Onboard

[Quirk]

James Lovelock the framer of the Gaia theory ("...a class of scientific models of the geo-biosphere in which life as a whole fosters and maintains suitable conditions for itself by helping to create an environment on Earth suitable for its continuity...")

"Lovelock was among the first researchers to sound the alarm about the threat of global warming from the greenhouse effect. In 2004 he caused a media sensation when he broke with many fellow environmentalists by pronouncing that "Only nuclear power can now halt global warming". In his view, nuclear energy is the only realistic alternative to fossil fuels that has the capacity to both fulfill the large scale energy needs of mankind while also reducing greenhouse emissions."

As an environmentalist, though not a proponent of Dr. Lovelock's Gaia theory, I endorse the development of nuclear power. Further, I think, environmenatlist should step up, admit their error in attacking nuclear power, and, actively push a nuclear power agenda.

It's All About Money

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

I'm reading a lot about countries, Britan, Finland the US etc, pushing nuclear energy as a "safer", "cleaner" alternative. It's a PR stunt.

Nuclear energy is cheap. That's about all you can say for it.

As to safety. Well relative to single other form of electricity generation, nuclear power is the most dangerous. A coal plant's worst case scenario is a giant smog cloud. A nuclear plants worst case scenario is the permanent evacuation of the highly populated region surrounding Chernobyl, and a significant rise in lukemia rates, etc, etc. "That'll NEVER happen" I hear them say already. "Not with modern technology and computeeeerssss....". Oh Dear.

Cleaner? Coal and gas give off Carbon oxides and other nasties. Yes this is a problem. But nuclear power gives us all that lovely radioactive waste which quite simply has to be thrown in big holes and the lid sealed up for over 40,000 years!

40,000 years is just the half life of uranium! Is the UK even going to be around in 40,000 years. Offtopic, don't answer that. But riddle me this. How many engineering firms can build a nuclear waste disposal site that can be guaranteed to contain the radioactivity for 40,000 years. If you can find one, I've got this bridge...

Oh, but oil and gas are contributing to the greenhouse effect! Well yes they are, but does that justify building more reactors, generating more nuclear waste, AND more nuclear warheads? There' this thing called the sun. Provides loads of energy. The Wind! Water? Is nothing else viable? Well they work..... but Nuclear are much cheaper!

And nuclear plants ARE cheap. No question about it. Yes. Very cheap. No more oil importing. Cost reductions. Balence of Trade. What's a few nuclear drums? Yes. Very, very cheap.

Re:It's All About Money

[colenski]

Get a clue dude and at least Google a little bit before you post. Chernobyl happened because of a shit design that was made *just after* the second world war. The RMBK-1000 design is a close cousin to Enrico Femi's original reactor and was inherently flawed. Yes, I choose to say technology will advance and solve these kinds of problems. You think engineers have been sitting around with their thumbs up their ass for the past 50 years? By your logic, you shouldn't drive around in an M-class 'cause your grandpappy got waxed in his Rambler in 1964.

As to the waste, Google for "pebble bed reactor waste" and you will find it won't be an issue, if we can just convine people like you to look at the evidence rationally instead of dismissing it with a "ooooh I've heard THAT before" type of flippant comment.

Re:It's All About Money

[Cruithne]

Just a few problems with your argument.

Coal is 3-9ppm uranium. Burning coal has pumped more radioactive waste into our environment than all nuclear testing and accidents combined. Burning coal has also been the cause of millions of deaths from differing lung diseases. Coal is by far the least safe alternative.

Whats wrong with something sitting in a hole for 40,000 years? Do you honestly believe that, in as little as 200 years, we wont be able to move a few million tons of material out into space and, say, toss it into a large thermonuclear furnace (the sun perhaps?).

Sure, you can build huge windfarms, you can build huge solar arrays. The issue of cost is not one of greed. When you suggest the nation dedicate so many resources to a certain goal, that takes away from other goals. It's a question of relative worth - when the comparative benefits are.. well.. slim at best to non-existant at realistic, why waste twice as many resources?

Re:It's All About Money

[Pollardito]

Oh, but oil and gas are contributing to the greenhouse effect!

and the Exxon Valdeez effect, and the Saddam's Burning Wells effect. a little smoke in the air isn't the worst case for oil, and one could list the enrichment of Saudis as one of the bad cases

Re:It's All About Money

[Anonymous Coward]

"In September 2005, a report by the Chernobyl Forum, comprising a number of agencies including the International Atomic Energy Agency, the World Health organisation, UN bodies and the Governments of Belarus, the Russian Federation and the Ukraine, put the total predicted number of deaths due to the accident at 4,000. This predicted death toll includes the fifty workers who died of acute radiation syndrome as a direct result of radiation from the disaster, nine children who died from thyroid cancer and an estimated 3,940 people who could die from cancer as a result of exposure to radiation. The report also stated that, apart from a 30 kilometre area around the site and a few restricted lakes and forests, radiation levels had returned to acceptable levels"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_accident#Lo ng-term_effects_on_civilians

That sounds like a lot of people. But when you look at the numbers getting thrown around when attempts are made to estimate deaths to due burning coal it doesn't seem quite so big.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5174391/

  It has been said but I will say it again... The RBMK design left much to be desired and the safety standards and training at Chernobyl were not even comparable to what the NRC requires. Not to mention the massive design improvements made since. Check out the EPR or AP-1000 for some info on what the current generation of reactors being built are like (for one thing they are passively safe, meaning no electrical power is necessary for accident mitigation, instead they rely on things like gravity and natural convection.)

As for nuclear plants being cheap.... well that is flat out wrong. No one knows how much it will cost to build one in the US which is why we haven't built one in a long time. Estimates are 2 billion, but industrial infrastructure is not in place so the timeline can not be determined very accurately. When there is a chance that things may be delayed even a few months, with that kind of investment the money adds up. Once we get them built they are comparable to what we have now, and if a carbon tax were introduced they would be more economical (plants already pay a tax for their waste storage... but who knows where Yucca Mountain is headed).

It has its dangers, but it is tough to say that it is in any way inherently worse than what we are doing right now.

Re:It's All About Money

[Vexorg_q]

Approximatly 36 people have died in nuclear power related accidents. In the year 2004 *alone* 8000 people lost their lives in coal mines. (this figure is sketchy however, due to chernobyl, which was not a safely built station and due to the fact that the USSR did not initally disclose the details of what had happened. In fact, technicians working at a nuclear station in sweeder were the first to notice something went wrong when their radiation badges indicated high does of radiation).

Re:It's All About Money

[Anonymous Coward]

40,000 years is just the half life of uranium! Is the UK even going to be around in 40,000 years. Offtopic, don't answer that. But riddle me this. How many engineering firms can build a nuclear waste disposal site that can be guaranteed to contain the radioactivity for 40,000 years. If you can find one, I've got this bridge...

How about a pyramid? So far, the Egyptian ones are about 4000 years old, and they're almost totally intact. I doubt that 10 times their current lifetime will whittle them down much. At worst they'll be burried under sand. Modern engineering firms were not necessary to build those.

Oh, but oil and gas are contributing to the greenhouse effect! Well yes they are, but does that justify building more reactors, generating more nuclear waste, AND more nuclear warheads? There' this thing called the sun. Provides loads of energy. The Wind! Water? Is nothing else viable? Well they work..... but Nuclear are much cheaper!

The problem is energy density. Nuclear fuel and even coal have a much higher energy density than wind, solar, or wave energy. It's much more efficient to use the high energy density sources. If you haven't head of the Type I, II, III, and VI civilizations, you should look it up. Basically, there's only so much energy that the sun can provide to the earth, and eventually we'll need more than that. We will need alternative energy sources whether it's mining deuterium from the oceans for fusion or moving closer to the sun. It makes sense not to waste our efforts building an infrastructure based on solar energy that we will outgrow within a few hundred(!) years.

Re:It's All About Money

[Enoch Zembecowicz]

AND more nuclear warheads?
Weapons grade uranium is 90% U-235. Commercial reactor fuel is about 30% U-235.
Commercial reactors do produce small quantities of PU-239, but require extensive refining to be made usable.
Maybe you should try thinking instead of having emotional outbursts.

Re:It's All About Money

[Anonymous Coward]

40,000 years is just the half life of uranium! Is the UK even going to be around in 40,000 years. Offtopic, don't answer that. But riddle me this. How many engineering firms can build a nuclear waste disposal site that can be guaranteed to contain the radioactivity for 40,000 years.
Actually you'll find the half-life of uranium-238, 99.3% of all uranium, is approximately 4.5 billion years. Radioactivity is inversely proportional to half-life, so uranium emits extremely little radioactivity over a long period of time. In terms of toxicity, uranium isn't much more harmful than lead.

Every time I hear from an anti-nuke protester, the number of years they claim radioactive waste must be stored for always changes, from several thousand, to tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions, billions etc. little do they mention that within 40 years, 99.9% of the radiation in spent fuel disappears.

Re:It's All About Money

[Anonymous Coward]

40,000 years is just the half life of uranium!

So?

Babbling about long half-lives just demonstrates conclusively that you don't have a clue what you're talking about.

Hint: the longer the half-life, the LESS RADIOACTIVE THE SUBSTANCE IS. BY DEFINITION. Infinite half-life = not radioactive at all.

I'd have expected an "ObsessiveMathsFreak" to know that, actually. Perhaps you should review the chapter on exponential growth and decline in your elementary calculus book.

Re:It's All About Money

[ces]

One thing about the waste argument. Nuclear powerplant waste will decay down to the level of radioactivity in naturally occuring uranium in around 125 years or so. We can build stuff that lasts that long. Once the waste has cooled off how about using uranium mines to store it? We know those mines are geologicly stable for holding radionuclides over long periods of time. The waste would pose no more hazzard than the orginial uranium did.

Not to mention that fuel reprocessing greatly reduces the volume of waste that must be dealt with. Nuclear fuel is only about 5% used before a reactor is refueled.

Re:It's All About Money

[arkhan_jg]

Others have already tackled the vast amount of radioactive crap that coal stations already pump into the air. The UK, and the rest of northern europe are renowned for their lack of sunny weather, so solar's out as a major form of power - if we could find a way to generate power from rain though, we'd be set for life :) Don't forget the environmental production costs for solar cells either, doped silicon produces a lot of nasty toxic waste.

Wind and wave power are being investigated and used, but for anything other than remote areas, they're too big and too inefficient to generate anything other than minor amounts of power at the moment.

Natural gas of course produces CO2, as does coal, but we're running out of natural gas anyway, so need to find an alternative for both reasons.

Nuclear is a far more attractive prospect than coal, our current other big ticket energy method, simply because the amount of waste is much smaller and easier to control. Countries like the UK vitrify (encase in glass) their waste. Methods to dump it into dead deep sea stable zone are one option; dumping it into subduction zones so it gets sucked back down below the mantle are another possibility.

I'm all for truly clean alternative energy sources, but right now, nuclear power looks like the only affordable and least polluting short term solution.

Re:It's All About Money

[barronVonBackstabber]

does this http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/n ews/2004/09/26/nnuke26.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/09/26 /ixhome.html help with the waste storage problem? The main issue with conventional nuclear plants is not the initial cost, or even the safty of the plants, but the de-commissioning. This really does push up the cost of providing energy, but maybe we should just accept that energy costs will have to rise unless we all fancy going back to the stoneage and do without it. By thinking carefully about energy conservation (better cars, insulation in buildings, more efficient air-con, different lightbulbs, etc) we could absorb the higher costs of nuclear energy. it seems to me that most people say they care about saving the planet, global warming, etc but if solving these problems means dipping into their pocket then things suddenly look different.

Re:It's All About Money

[pfdietz]

Nuclear powerplant waste will decay down to the level of radioactivity in naturally occuring uranium in around 125 years or so.

This is wrong. Nuclear waste, if reprocessed and the actinides recycled, will decay down to the biohazard level of the original uranium in 600 to 1000 years. If you don't recycle the actinides, it takes much longer.

But the waste issue is a red herring. Put the spent fuel in armored dry casks after it's cooled a bit and seal them shut. They'll last for many centuries, even left on the surface. In the future the waste will be easy to deal with, probably by sending it into space once the cost of launch declines several orders of magnitude.

Forcing waste to be reprocessed now instead of in the future is, in effect, transfering wealth from us to our descendants. Since our descendants are likely to be far wealthier and more capable than ourselves it's like a very regressive tax.

Re:It's All About Money

[ces]

This is wrong. Nuclear waste, if reprocessed and the actinides recycled, will decay down to the biohazard level of the original uranium in 600 to 1000 years. If you don't recycle the actinides, it takes much longer.

I admit my numbers might be off. However I was under the impression that the elements that make nuclear waste 'hot' were mostly short half-life products (which is why they are 'hot'). The uranium and transuranics aren't so much of a problem.

In any case you are correct, dry cask storage is probably more than enough for now until the economics of reprocessing are more attractive.

For ultimate disposal, dropping the waste into subduction zones is probably the way to go rather than launching it into space. (besides it helps keep the core nice and toasty warm)

Nuclear energy subsidies

[kupci]

Her general point was that those who argue that nuclear power is cheap and efficient ignore the overheads and invisible costs.

In the U.S., the industry is heavily subsidized. It is a credit to wind and solar that it has achieved as much as they have, with the negligible subsidies. I've noticed that the portable construction highway signs are now powered by solar. Very cool. Maybe if just a tad bit more of that money went to other, renewable energy sources...

According to a July 2000 report by the Renewable Energy Policy Project, the U.S. government has spent approximately $150 billion on energy subsidies for wind, solar and nuclear power--96.3% of which has gone to nuclear power.

no need for conflict

[Anonymous Coward]

He denied suggestions - sparked by comments from Mr Blair that he was changing his mind on whether international treaties were the best way to tackle global warming - that Britain was moving closer to the stance of the US, which has refused to back Kyoto-style emission reductions.

Indeed international treaties (such as Kyoto emission reduction) and nuclear power are not mutually exclusive, at least not in Finland. In fact, it is argued that Finland could not meet the Kyoto requirements without it.

Viewpoint: Finland's new reactor
Finland gets first Kyoto emission reductions from Honduras hydropower project

Nuclear Debt.

[Anonymous Coward]

"The threat of the radioactive biproducts is an issue, but it is a much less immediate (and, in the long term anyway, less of an actual threat) than dumping tons of smog in the air until we're out of coal and oil."

I feel the same way about the national debt.

Hmmm

[graveyhead]

I wonder if he's being forced to say that by one of these guys who is secretly building a giant bomb on top of a time-fissure in Cardiff!

Nah, that couldn't happen. It's about as likely as hmm, a Doctor Who spinoff series starring a bisexual army captain. Oh wait, nevermind.

My concerns

[Y-Crate]

I have no problem with nuclear power, modern plants are safe and quite useful.

However, I do not exactly trust the upper management of such facilities to always do the right thing, after years of shoddy practices by some owner/operators. In the past, I've encountered many stories of rather remarkable safety oversights and downright irresponsible decisions that have made certain reactors unnecessarily dangerous. Sure we have the NRC, but history has shown that they are not always on the ball...or quite far from it.

As with virtually every major reactor incident that has ever occurred, the human element is the potential problem, not the technology.

So fellow nuclear power supporters, please understand when some of us have genuine concerns about construction of new plants, and please do not lump us all in the "OMG ATOMS!!!!" category. In fact, fellow environmentalists here in Florida are only asking for a large exclusion zone around a new plant that is being considered. Obviously, they are going to get the zone for a variety of reasons, theirs being that it makes a fantastic nature preserve.

IMBY (in my back yard)

[gsfprez]

i would love to have a nuke plant in my backyard - but alas, the environmentalists prevent any form of nuclear power in the US from growing.

i would love to get hydrogen from that plant - but alas, the envrionmentalists refuse to take SUV's out of the equation - SUV's powered by hydrogen piss them off too.

please - put a nuclear power plant in my back yard - i'm in Southern California.

Re:IMBY (in my back yard)

[narl]

I'm with you. I'm from the Phoenix area, and we already have one ~50 miles away, but I wouldn't mind one much closer.

Re:Well which is it? - both!

[erbmjw]

- first there is the large "blanket" of green house gasses that is prety tranparent and keeps heat low to the earths surface ( global warming -http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming ) - second is the blanket of particle polution that is not so transparent and is blocking the sun's energy from getting down to the earth. ( global dimming - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_dimming ) The particle polllution is decreasing rapidly because of cleaner burning technology but the greenhouse gases are not decreasing at the same rate. So the earth will get warmer sooner and because of the increasing global warming the release of more greenhouse gases may continue from natural sources. So we should decide upon a way to rapidly decrease the amount of greenhouse gases in the next 10-20 years - after that we start to hit a rapidly increasing chance of large scale temporary and permanent flooding. Wind, hydro, solar, and nuclear power plants are options that many contries will have to invistigate. As well hybrid and alternate fuel and propulsion vehicles ( not just cars but large trucks, buses, trains, boats, and ships ) will need to be produced on a masssive scale. There is a massive "ship-kite" already under development - the company beleives that the kite can cut a ship's oceanic fuel costs by up to 50% - this is not an alternate fuel - it is alternate propulsion. Honda's hydrogen car ( with its home refueling station) is an alternate fuel vehicle. In case you are wondering - I am not anti-oil, nor anti-coal. Both of these fuels have a place in this equation -it just happens that the worlds dependence on them should decrease sooner than these industries wish. British Petroleum( though they have changed their name and I can't remember what the new one is ) was very smart and a number of years started a large scale solar division.

Nuclear power at sea

[argoff]

It's already been proven that nuclear is the safest form of power time and time again, even without all these new cool designs.

It's already been proven that nuclear is the most environmentally safe power time and time again.

It's already been proven that nuclear is the cheapest if irrational regulations are left off.

It's already been proven that nuclear releases LESS radioactivity into the environment than other forms of major energy production like residue isotopes in coal.

If these haven't convinced people to embrace nuclear power, than nothing will. In my opinion, the best solution is to generate nuclear power in international waters at sea free from bureauocracy, taxes, and regulation - and sell hydrogen generated thru electrolosys back to the mainland. After all, the enxt generation of freedom is going to be at sea anyhow - so minus well make that the next frontier and make energy profites while at it too.

Re:Nuclear power at sea

[dbIII]

It's already been proven that nuclear is the cheapest if irrational regulations are left off.

I suggest you read something on the topic instead of blaming the hippies that were never actually involved in Carters decision to stop building the things at government expense. Also consider that if they are really so cheap why are there no new plants in former USSR states where there are effectivlely no rules, and why Iran has had so much trouble trying to build one?

Put down the advertising and pick up a textbook.

Re:Nuclear power at sea

[argoff]

First off, I don't blame the hyppies, I blame the oil industry who spent billions to make sure nuclear wouldn't be a comeptitive threat. The hyppies were just willing to go along with those who were being paid to lead the crowd,

Second off, I have an aunt who is involved with the project to disarm and downsizing the russian nuclear arsenal that has been going on since the end of the cold war. The russians are way on the way to retooling of their nuclear industry for energy production. They are building floating reatcors for India (it was even on slashdot), they are building or participating in building at least 20 nucelar reactors in China, not to mention Iran which has been in the news lately, and not to mention their home nuclear industry. Over the past decade uranium has gone up 10 times faster than other commodities, look up the 5 year stock chart for uranium miner: CCJ and compaire it to the NASDAQ or DOW.

An $11 pellet of standard 5% uranium the size of my thumb has the same energy of 3 barels of oil. Anyone who's been to the pump lately knows oil isn't even close.

Also, Iran has no problem trying to build one, what they have a problem with is trying to build a breeder reactor that is used to refine uranium. That's a lot different than just regular nuclear power.

Nuclear is taking off bigtime, even in the states. It is not government freebies that are driving it. It's obvious to anyone who looks.

If nuclear power is so great ...

[badfish99]

If nuclear power is so great, we should encourage every country to use it. We wouldn't want to be striving to save the world ourselves, while other countries are just pumping out pollution, would we? That would be stupid.

So we must encourage Iran, North Korea and so on to build as many nuclear power stations as they like.

Re:If nuclear power is so great ...

[Peter La Casse]

From an environmental perspective, it would be counterproductive if it resulted in a nuclear war.

Nuclear is the answer

[radl33t]

Nuclear is safe. Modern nuclear is cheap and safe. Public opinion is a travesty. Fission processes will outlast coal if reprocessing is allowed (hundreds of years). IGCC (gasification -> gas turbines -> Rankine cycle -> carbon sequestration) or similar technology will help get us there. The technical challenges of more sustainable energy futures pale in comparison with the political, economic, and societal obstacles.

Why not fusion?

[DigiShaman]

Honestly, if it wasn't for proliferation issues I would be all over this technology like a dog ready to hump. By why not nuclear FUSION? I've seen or heard little progress in its research. Sure, we've read about some technologies that can aid in the process but I have yet to read about them being applied right now. Why is it we don't have "Manhattan project" on a global scale using the worlds best scientists and engineers available to boot-strap with yet?

I admit I am naive and ignorant when it comes to fusion research. But I like many slashdotters would love to have these questions answered! Is there anything we can do in the public sector to help out? If computer modeled tests are needed and lack resources, why not someone like SETI design a distributed processing system?

Re:Why not fusion?

[Helios1182]

Because every none method of creating fusion reactions takes more energy than is produced. We are still a long way from any sort of economically viable fusion energy source. It would be nice of course. Here is some info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusion_power

Re:Why not fusion?

[Phanatic1a]

Because it's fucking hard. There's a big test reactor that's going to be built in France, and that's *still* not going to get us to commercial fusion power, simply because of the material issues involved. In DT fusion, *every single atom* in your reactor vessel is going to be displaced by flying neutrons *hundreds* of times over the life of the reactor, and that does really bad things to all known materials. Right now, we don't even have adequate neutron sources in order to begin exploring that regime; there's also supposed to be another research facility dedicated to that purpse, tagging along with the reactor in France, but it's not even on the drawing board yet.

There are aneutronic schemes, but those seem to be impossble to actually generate net energy from, because the hot fuel loses too much energy to Brehmstrahllung losses.

Fusion is very very difficult.

I generally class problems into three categories: theoretical, materials, and engineering. The theoretical problems are killers: "We don't know if this is even *possible." The materials ones *can* be killers: "We know how do to this, but we don't know how to make it, and the stuff we need to make it may be unobtainable." Engineering ones are ones that can be cured by throwing enough money and time at them, like the Manhattan project: we knew a bomb was theoretically possible, we knew how to make the materials, we just had to crank a lot of numbers and actually build the fabrication infrastructure and the device itself.

Fusion is *all three*. I find it entirely plausible that we'll never develop commercial fusion power, bootstrapping right from mass nuclear fission to solar collection satellites. There's certainly enough fissile fuel around to keep us going until we can build large-scale orbital structures.

Re:Why not fusion?

[pnewhook]

By why not nuclear FUSION? I've seen or heard little progress in its research. Sure, we've read about some technologies that can aid in the process but I have yet to read about them being applied right now. Why is it we don't have "Manhattan project" on a global scale using the worlds best scientists and engineers available to boot-strap with yet?

There is a world scale project to develop fusion and every developed country in the world is currently participating (except the U.S.)

Fusion has been researched for decades and most of the really hard stuff has been solved. First was JET in the U.K. that proved a controllable reaction could be maintained. The problem with JET was that it was too small and required more energy than it produced - but it worked.

So next on the drawing board is ITER, the first fusion reactor large enough to generate more power than it consumes. Demonstration portions of if have been built, and they're finally got enough commitment from would leaders to go ahead with the construction.

The big benefits of fusion are that its waste is reactive for a much shorter time than fission waste, you can actually use the current stored radioactive waste from fission reactors as fuel, and due to the properties of fusion it is impossible to get an uncontrollable runaway reaction. Turn off the input power and the reaction dies out.

Re:Why not fusion?

[kasin]

> Honestly, if it wasn't for proliferation issues I would be all over this technology like a dog ready to
> hump. By why not nuclear FUSION?

Indeed, later this century all our static power requirements will be from fusion power. Current estimates have fusion available in 50 years.

(tongue firmly in cheek).

Re:Why not fusion?

[amliebsch]

There is a world scale project to develop fusion and every developed country in the world is currently participating (except the U.S.)

What the hell? That's just totally baseless libel. The U.S. most certainly is a key member of ITER. Many other developed countries are not.

Re:Why not fusion?

[pfdietz]

There is a world scale project to develop fusion and every developed country in the world is currently participating (except the U.S.)

I believe the US rejoined the ITER project a few years ago. Whether that was a good idea is debatable, though; tokamaks are rather marginal economically.

Re:Why not fusion?

[pnewhook]

From the ITER site:

"In 1998, the Congress directed the DOE to conduct an orderly closeout of its ITER activities, which was done during FY1999."

Re:Why not fusion?

[deglr6328]

where have you been for the past 2 years?

Re:Why not fusion?

[pnewhook]

Read more carefully. While the U.S. had announced their return to the ITER program in 2003, funding was not approved until the new energy bill was signed in August 2005. So no, they have not been participating for several years as some have suggested.

And you can't really call the U.S. a true team member either. Funding was only approved for U.S. scientists doing research on U.S. soil. Any hardware purchased must also stay in the U.S. Hard to be a contributing team member with restrictions like that as the facility is being built in France.

Re:Why not fusion?

[deglr6328]

Riiiiight, mmmhmm, because you are incapable of ever being incorrect.

Re:Why not fusion?

[pnewhook]

Pot. Kettle. Look it up.

Depleted Uranium (DU)

[Anonymous Coward]

Just dump/bomb Iraq with the Noookuuulllaaaarrr wastes, aka Depleted Uranium like the USA have done (and is doing). Need more places to dump it, heck there's IRAN. ;)

PS: I'm being sarcastic. This is a serious violation of human rights!!!! Oooohhh ppooorrrr Mr. American......

Good on him-Single source.

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a question for you. Why do you believe the US (or any other country) should have only one source of energy? If having only one OS (Windows) is a bad idea, then why is only one source of power better?

Re:Good on him-Single source.

[Jonnty]

What I meant was that we need nuclear as a 'fill-in,' untill we get better forms of power generation.

Coal power much more radioactive than nuclear

[LPetrazickis]

A nuclear plants worst case scenario...

It's physically impossible for a pebble-bed reactor to meltdown. It does not have cooling rods. It does not have heavy water.

Cleaner? Coal and gas give off Carbon oxides and other nasties. Yes this is a problem.

Coal also gives off quite a lot of radioactivity, and it's going straight into the atmosphere. In 1982, US coal power plants released 800 tons of radioactive uranium and 2000 tons of radioactive thorium burnt straight out of coal directly into the atmosphere. Nuclear power plants, as a rule, don't do that. We need to shut down every damn coal plant as soon as humanly possible.

Other coal nasties include sulphur dioxide, the thingie that reacts with water in clouds to drop a lovely rain of sulphuric acid on our heads. Yay!

Oil and coal are obviously bad. Natural gas releases a fair bit of carbon dioxide, and it will run out sooner rather than later if we keep building more plants. Hydroelectric power drowns whole ecosystems. A pretty giant lake where there was no pretty giant lake before is very environmentally unfriendly.

Look, I support solar and wind power. I would support a proposal to make rooftop solar power panels mandated by law for all buildings. Windfarms are a good idea, even if they seem to be evoking silly NIMBYism out of some people. But we need nuclear power in the triptych, at least until we get fusion figured out.

You can't produce a lot of megawatts with solar and wind in a single location without using up a ginormous amount of space. That space isn't magically appearing out of nowhere. Something is being displaced, be it a forest, a field, or some sort of human usage. Nuclear power is relatively compact by comparison. In many cases, the choice is between either compact or nothing.

Re:Coal power much more radioactive than nuclear

[snStarter]

what is a "cooling rod"? And most modern power reactors are water-cooled, water-moderated, not heavy-water moderated/cooled.

Re:Coal power much more radioactive than nuclear

[dbIII]

US coal power plants released 800 tons of radioactive uranium and 2000 tons of radioactive thorium burnt straight out of coal directly into the atmosphere.

Funny, I thought heavy metals were heavy, that uranium and thorium oxides had high melting points and that their high compressive strength would stop it getting crushed to dust when the weak coal is broken up. Also in a plant where the NOx and SOx (gasses) are removed by scrubbers - that is every coal burning plant in the USA - how are small chunks of rock going to get past the various pollution controls and into the atmosphere? Read the ornl paper which is the only one that asserts this crap again, and you will realise the whole thing is a beatup. Coal has enough problems without making stuff up - the only purpose of this bullshit is to make nuclear look nicer by saying "look, coal is radioactive too so we don't have to get off our arses and try to solve the waste problem".

Re:Coal power much more radioactive than nuclear

[Anonymous Coward]

Coal also gives off quite a lot of radioactivity, and it's going straight into the atmosphere. In 1982, US coal power plants released 800 tons of radioactive uranium and 2000 tons of radioactive thorium burnt straight out of coal directly into the atmosphere. Nuclear power plants, as a rule, don't do that. We need to shut down every damn coal plant as soon as humanly possible.

An interesting point. Do you any references to back the claim up?

Re:Coal power much more radioactive than nuclear

[LPetrazickis]

Googling turns up this:
- Radioactive Elements in Coal and Fly Ash: Abundance, Forms, and Environmental Significance - Radioactive elements in coal and fly ash should not be sources of alarm. The vast majority of coal and the majority of fly ash are not significantly enriched in radioactive elements, or in associated radioactivity, compared to common soils or rocks. This observation provides a useful geologic perspective for addressing societal concerns regarding possible radiation and radon hazard.

- Coal Combustion:Nuclear Resource or Danger - Third, large quantities of uranium and thorium and other radioactive species in coal ash are not being treated as radioactive waste. These products emit low-level radiation, but because of regulatory differences, coal-fired power plants are allowed to release quantities of radioactive material that would provoke enormous public outcry if such amounts were released from nuclear facilities. Nuclear waste products from coal combustion are allowed to be dispersed throughout the biosphere in an unregulated manner. Collected nuclear wastes that accumulate on electric utility sites are not protected from weathering, thus exposing people to increasing quantities of radioactive isotopes through air and water movement and the food chain.

I've heard it elsewhere before. Googled for stats yesterday. Seems like 1982 is the most popular year.

Organisms are not as durable as planets.

[replicant108]

The *planet* is doing just *fine*. The planet's survival is not at issue.

Absolutely correct. The planet will be fine.

Human beings, however, may not fare quite so well.

Re:Organisms are not as durable as planets.

[Sven Tuerpe]

Human beings, however, may not fare quite so well.

So what?

Why was this posted in Hardware?

[Caspian]

While I'm fully aware that a nuclear reactor is technically a piece of "hardware", in the context of SlashDot, doesn't "hardware" usually imply "something that geeks buy to put on their desks, in their pockets, or in their cars"? ;)

Re:Why was this posted in Hardware?

[CRC'99]

While I'm fully aware that a nuclear reactor is technically a piece of "hardware", in the context of SlashDot, doesn't "hardware" usually imply "something that geeks buy to put on their desks, in their pockets, or in their cars"? ;)

Have you been reading the specs for the next generation Intel P5 chips? Nuclear power generation might fix the hardware section of Slashdot more than you think....

PEBBLE BED REACTORS

[Xrathie]

Because of humanities tendancy to become arrogant I have always been against nuclear energy. But science is science and progress has been made. The PEBBLE BED REACTORS are THE solution if they work. And apparently they do... http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.09/china.htm l They do not go nuclear. Not because people have figured out a better 'machine'. It is because the laws of physics do not allow it. And on top of that their waste is not liquid, but are actually just little balls. Which could be shot into space towards the sun. http://www.time.com/time/columnist/jaroff/article/ 0,9565,218839,00.html What about safety? The new RTGs, like their predecessors, will have their plutonium encased in layers of protective material that can withstand explosions and impacts. Indeed, in one earlier NASA failed launch, after the unmanned craft crashed back to Earth, its RTG was recovered intact and used on a later mission. And craft with reactors aboard will be launched by conventional chemical rockets, their reactors remaining inactive, or "cold" until they are a safe distance from Earth.

Re:PEBBLE BED REACTORS

[VENONA]

Wouldn't a nuclear reactor that wouldn't 'go nuclear' be rather a waste of money? :)

Re:PEBBLE BED REACTORS

[Xrathie]

No it would not because you dont want it to go nuclear. You only want it to generate heat and never EVER get so hot that it becomes uncontrolable.

Re:PEBBLE BED REACTORS

[VENONA]

I was laughing at the inappropriate use of a colloquialism. 'Going nuclear' when the correct phrase was 'criticality accident'. Or you could have used other colloquialisms, like meltdown or explosion. A way to say it with a more 'no problems here, folks' spin would probably be 'yield excursion'.

'Going nuclear' sounds like the commencement of a nuclear reaction. A reactor that couldn't do this wouldn't *be* a reactor. It would be a billion-dollar inert pile. No pun intended.

'Going nuclear', in this context, is just funny. Hence the smiley at the end of my last message.

There's a good discussion of this on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticality_accident

Re:PEBBLE BED REACTORS

[Xrathie]

I will respond with exactly what I told my English teacher in highschool... 'Proper grammar' is for pompous assbags. I dont know about you but I dont go around trying to sound like a grammar major. I communicate not nick pick rediculous unneeded rules in a hodgepodge langauge. But if you want to 'talk' about Going Nuclear let me know...

Re:PEBBLE BED REACTORS

[VENONA]

I'm not going to fight the Grammar Nazi battle, especially as I'm not really much of one. Sorry you couldn't see the humor I found in nuclear plants not going nuclear.

But this is getting to be a lot of electrons on both parts, and now insult on your part. Let's just drop the whole thing, shall we? Life is too short.

Re:PEBBLE BED REACTORS

[Xrathie]

Ya sorry

Married to the Mob

[Doc Ruby]

We're locked in a life and death battle between nuclear and petro fuel warriors. Both of whom will pump poison into the environment on which we depend. We're screwed, unless an Internet-style surprise deployment in alternative energy upsets the entrenched chiefs and their industrial bribers^Wcontributors who keep us all in the dumps with their tired old approaches.

Re:Married to the Mob

[ces]

We're screwed, unless an Internet-style surprise deployment in alternative energy upsets the entrenched chiefs and their industrial bribers^Wcontributors who keep us all in the dumps with their tired old approaches.

Given the laws of physics ... unlikely. OTOH renewables (solar, wind, etc) should be able to supply 20% or so of the grid.

Re:Married to the Mob

[njh]

Absolutely! We need to be building a pirate power supply out of alternative energy sources, perhaps with downloadable construction plans.

Re:Married to the Mob

[Doc Ruby]

More solar power falls on American roofs than Americans consume in other fuels. Why only 20%?

Re:Married to the Mob

[ces]

More solar power falls on American roofs than Americans consume in other fuels. Why only 20%?

Lets see, first of all the conversion efficency is never going to be all that great. Second there is this little problem called 'nighttime'. Thrid there is the problem of heavily overcast days. Fourth making solar panels is very energy intensive and generates large quantities of toxic chemicals.

Don't get me wrong solar is part of the answer. In most parts of the country solar hot water works just fine as do active and passive solar heating. However I don't see it ever meeting a majority of energy needs.

The 20% is somewhat arbitrary but I will note that countries with a big push for green power haven't been able to get past that point. Due to the low density of green power technology its hard to scale them up too much.

Build another 80 or so 1000 MWe nuclear plants and the US will be getting 40% of its electricity from nuclear. It isn't *that* hard from a technical standpoint to switch all of the current US baseload power over from fossil sources to nuclear.

Re:Married to the Mob

[Doc Ruby]

Why can't conversion efficiency exceed 50%? And as for nighttime and overcast days etc, they're already taken into account by my numbers. We still receive more energy on our rooftops, even at 20% conversion, than we consume from other fuels.

PV panels are energy intensive and come with toxic byproducts. That is also true of the other fuels they replace, especially nuclear. And PV panels aren't necessarily the way to harvest the energy. For example, plants and algae make up to 8-12% photosynthetic efficiency, and biomass -> biodiesel -> fuelcell -> electricity can produce up to 27W:m^2. With useful byproducts that include carbon sequestration. That is enough to replace all our other power generation without nuclear plants. Which are expensive, risky and dirty, especially when we look at their entire product lifecycle and costs.

Moreover, solar plants on the Moon would produce much more clean energy than all our power generation to date. Orbital is also possible, but why not go to the Moon? The key to solar is to think big, and different. We're bathing in more energy than we can use. Capturing it will transform our civilization, without necessarily meaning climate change, pollution or other byproducts of petro and nuclear fuels.

Re:Married to the Mob

[ces]

Note that supporting nuclear power doesn't mean that I don't support more research into renewable energy sources or conservation. Nor does it mean that I don't support programs to encourage the use of renewable energy or conservation.

However nuclear is ready today and can get rid of coal and natural gas fired plants now, especially the oldest and most polluting ones.

PV panels are energy intensive and come with toxic byproducts. That is also true of the other fuels they replace, especially nuclear. And PV panels aren't necessarily the way to harvest the energy. For example, plants and algae make up to 8-12% photosynthetic efficiency, and biomass -> biodiesel -> fuelcell -> electricity can produce up to 27W:m^2. With useful byproducts that include carbon sequestration. That is enough to replace all our other power generation without nuclear plants. Which are expensive, risky and dirty, especially when we look at their entire product lifecycle and costs.

Energy payback on a PV panel is roughly 10 times that of a nuclear plant. Net energy from nuclear really isn't that bad even using fairly pessimistic assumptions.

27W:m^2 is a *VERY* low power density. Take the energy usage of a car or house over 1 year and figure out how many square meters you will have to grow biomass in to supply energy with a biomass->biodiesel->fuel cell cycle. I bet you it ends up being a fairly large number.

Of the availible options nuclear is by far the most attractive, particularly compared to coal, natural gas, hydro, or solar PV.

Compared to gobal warming or 'freezing in the dark' nuclear isn't expensive. Compared to many other risks in modern life it isn't particularly risky. Compared to most other large-scale industry, particularly other forms of power generation or oil production it isn't very dirty.

And in case you wonder, yes I would live next door to a nuclear power plant.

Re:Married to the Mob

[Doc Ruby]

27W:m^2 isn't so low when there's lots of square meters. I'd like to see those 10% efficient plants grown in mats on the seas around the US, which would produce the energy to make petro fuels cheap enough that we'd have lots of energy to build the space platforms, while net-sequestering carbon. But those are just low efficiency systems - I've seen PV paint that's much cheaper and cleaner than PV panels, with 25%+ efficiency. Which means American rooftops would generate 100W:m^2, or 50m^2 for the 5KW high end consumption of most American houses - only 10x5m, which is smaller than most American roofs.

Even so, those are just the efficiencies today. We can boost them with more tech - why not get to 80%+ efficiency? The fact is that 1KW falls on every m^2 in America most days. The average, counting night, weather etc is something like 2-300W:m^2. That's plenty, especially when we're not actually looking at totally replacing the petro fuels immediately, just making them manageable and affordable.

I also like the idea of Fischer-Tropsch processing our huge coal reserves, using some of their vast energy to process the CO2 and other pollution into useful products - maybe feeding biomass for bioreactors. But I don't like more nuke plants. They're dirty. I've lived "next door" to several in the NYC area my whole life, and I don't like it. Millions of us don't. We shouldn't have to accept it, even if millions like you do. Their total cost, especially when considering the security of the plants, the manufacturing, and the waste, is really high - just what you'd expect from some of the rarest substances on the planet. All kinds of solar power is ready right now to phase out petro and nuclear. And by the time the phaseout is (nearly) complete, we should have space solar working. Then the fun really begins.

Re:Married to the Mob

[lemonjelo]

I looked into PV panels for the roof of my home, which is not large, and does not use electric heat. $80k to provide for my electricity requirements. I was hoping it would be 1/5 that, as loan repayments would be reasonable if I had a zero electric bill in summer and a small bill in winter. Unless the quote I had gotten was way off, it doesn't seem feasible in the short-term.

The flip-side to that, is that I live in a 30 year old home. From what I understand, new construction can be had that will greatly reduce heating and cooling costs while increasing the price of the home by small (around 10%) amount, via passive solar heating and natural cooling.

Re:Married to the Mob

[Doc Ruby]

I don't think PV panels are the way to use solar power. There's lots of solar energy, and the PV panels are too ineffecient, especially considering their manufacture/maintenance/disposal. But more solar power falls on your roof than you consume. So there's got to be another tech that will do the trick. We just need to take it as seriously as we've taken burning all the petro fuels and building an atomic bomb.

Re:Married to the Mob

[ces]

27W:m^2 isn't so low when there's lots of square meters. I'd like to see those 10% efficient plants grown in mats on the seas around the US, which would produce the energy to make petro fuels cheap enough that we'd have lots of energy to build the space platforms, while net-sequestering carbon. But those are just low efficiency systems - I've seen PV paint that's much cheaper and cleaner than PV panels, with 25%+ efficiency. Which means American rooftops would generate 100W:m^2, or 50m^2 for the 5KW high end consumption of most American houses - only 10x5m, which is smaller than most American roofs.

Covering oceans with large mats of introduced biomass has all sorts of potential ecological problems.

I'm not that familiar with PV paint, but 25% sounds really high. Also what is the energy cost to make PV paint and how much toxic waste is generated in the process? You still have the problem of where to get power when it is dark.

Even so, those are just the efficiencies today. We can boost them with more tech - why not get to 80%+ efficiency? The fact is that 1KW falls on every m^2 in America most days. The average, counting night, weather etc is something like 2-300W:m^2. That's plenty, especially when we're not actually looking at totally replacing the petro fuels immediately, just making them manageable and affordable.

I'm not sure what the theoretical maximum on PV is but I know it is far less than 100%. 60% is probably more realistic. As for averages that is all good and well, but you still have the problem of energy storage for night or other times when demand exceeds supply.

I also like the idea of Fischer-Tropsch processing our huge coal reserves, using some of their vast energy to process the CO2 and other pollution into useful products - maybe feeding biomass for bioreactors. But I don't like more nuke plants. They're dirty. I've lived "next door" to several in the NYC area my whole life, and I don't like it. Millions of us don't. We shouldn't have to accept it, even if millions like you do. Their total cost, especially when considering the security of the plants, the manufacturing, and the waste, is really high - just what you'd expect from some of the rarest substances on the planet. All kinds of solar power is ready right now to phase out petro and nuclear. And by the time the phaseout is (nearly) complete, we should have space solar working. Then the fun really begins.

I like Fischer-Tropsch as well. It is a good way to stop importing so much oil right away.

How exactly are nuke plants 'dirty'? I've only got direct experience with one. My aunt has lived across the river for one for years now. I've never seen anything terribly worrisome or dirty. Certainly nothing like the coal plants I have experience with or petrochemical plants, or even chip fabs for that matter.

You keep saying nuclear is 'expensive'. I will grant you that the upfront capital costs are high, but there are ways to lower them via standardized plant designs and whatnot. However when you look at total lifecycle costs nuclear actually looks pretty good, especially when you consider that fossil fuels don't really have to pay for the environmental damage they cause nor decomissioning, nor waste disposal.

What is the 'cost' of acid rain? Particulate pollution? Asthma deaths? Mountaintop removal mining? Coal bed methane?

FWIW Uranium isn't particularly rare. About as common as tin actually. Thorium is even more common and can be used to fuel reactors as well.

Re:Married to the Mob

[Doc Ruby]

Nuclear plants themselves are dirty only when they leak. Which isn't very often, but any time is too often. Even without considering the likelihood of leaks suppressed by operators, government and media (the pollution from other facilities like Hanford strongly suggests there's a lot), the documented ones like Three Mile Island are bad enough. And of course plants like Indian Point microseconds from NYC are targets for terrorists. But the entire industry is polluting. Not just the waste, though that would be enough. Producing the fuel produces not only lethal tailings, but the other pollution from the mines and refining are bad, too. All that is guaranteed pollution. Chernobyl of course is probably the worst pollution ever made by man, at least all at once. Other reactors are safer, but they've also got their flaws. I remember reading about the 40lbs of radioactive waste found collected in ventilation ducts at a National Laboratory. And just a few weeks ago a plant was found to have been uncertifiable due to design flaws in a "failsafe" system, though it was certified for many years. We can't rely on luck to keep us safe from these plants.

Of course, we have comparative risks in reality. Coal burners produce more radioactive pollution every year than all the accounted nuke plant leaks combined (except maybe Chernobyl). But that's more reason that replacing those coal plants is urgent, not a reason to produce more pollution. In fact, we had a deal for dirtier coal plants to be retired after their costs were amortized, but Bush has succeeded in waiving them. That's how the coal, oil and nuclear industries work in the US. Our safety isn't important, except for show. That's why we have to move to intrinsically safer technologies. Because the reality is that the nonrenewable resource energy sources are threats to us. And we have to reduce that threat. We've already taken a lot of damage, of different kinds, and can't afford any more. We certainly can't any longer claim we're ignorant. We know what we have to do, and what we get when we do something different.

Solar represents the most accessible energy source in abundance. PV, as I've said, is currently inadequate. But it's different from the current inadequate ones because its technology is immature, though its costs are more benign than the others. If we spent as much pursuing solar efficiency (both manufacturing and operation) as we do, say, invading Iraq for oil politics, we'd have solved both problems. I'm working on it myself, when I can. When it captures geek imagination the way it's already been accepted by the masses, we'll all have made a better world we can live in.

I recommend...

[Jeian]

... that everyone go check out a copy of Julian Simon's "The Ultimate Resource." He raises a lot of interesting points about the resource supply and debunks a good many popular myths.

There's been an "imminent" energy crisis for the last few decades, which still hasn't arrived. After reading The Ultimate Resource, my money's on things continuing to get better in the long run.

Re:I recommend...

[Anonymous Coward]

No need to check it out of the library. It's on the Web, at his web site.

FUD

[bluGill]

A coal plant's worst case scenario is a giant smog cloud.

Not to mention tons of radioactive waste. For a given amount of energy out, there is more waste uranium in coal than nuclear power.

A nuclear plants worst case scenario is the permanent evacuation of the highly populated region surrounding Chernobyl, and a significant rise in lukemia rates, etc, etc.

If you use stupid designs like Chernobyl the above is true. If you use intelligent designs that cannot happen. Nuclear power plants are governed by the laws of physics, not your imagination.

But nuclear power gives us all that lovely radioactive waste which quite simply has to be thrown in big holes and the lid sealed up for over 40,000 years!

Only if you are stupid and throw it into a big hole. France doesn't throw their waste into a big hole, they recycle it.

Oh, but oil and gas are contributing to the greenhouse effect! Well yes they are, but does that justify building more reactors,

Well you can go back to a hunter gather lifestyle if you want. I've considered it, and I don't want to. Nuclear power is the only long term solution so long as we remain on earth.

generating more nuclear waste,

Not a problem, see above.

AND more nuclear warheads?

Where did that come from? Nuclear warheads are a very different subjects. Governments that want one will get them, with or withour nuclear power plants.

There' this thing called the sun. Provides loads of energy. The Wind! Water? Is nothing else viable?

Well yes, the sun does provide loads of energy. Most of it is not directed at the earth though. Even then it is hard to deal with. Many question if enough strikes the earth for our use, even at 100% conversion efficiency. 40% efficiency is the max we have got from a solar cell, and to get that much required a lot of special effort which does not scale to large scale production. Everything else is much worse than that.

Re:FUD

[Just Another Poster]

If you use stupid designs like Chernobyl the above is true. If you use intelligent designs that cannot happen. Nuclear power plants are governed by the laws of physics, not your imagination.

And even then, the operators of Chernobyl had to go out of their way in order to cause the accident.

(Note: Link is from another Slashdot post.)

We're all getting dosed with X-rays anyway

[couch_warrior]

We might as well go ahead and build the nuclear plants - we're all bathed in radiation for several hours a day. No not the sun - spark plugs. The voltage that jumps across the gap in spark plugs is nearly identical to that used to generate medical X-rays, 35-40 KV. OK, so the wattage is low and the Xray dose from each spark is probably in the nano-rads. But your plugs fire thousands of times a minute, and in a few days of driving you probably get a cummulative dose of a milli-rad or so. Or about the same as a diagnostic X-ray. I bet that it is causing a lot of cancers that we are blaming on second-hand smoke and radon exposure.

Re:We're all getting dosed with X-rays anyway

[ColaMan]

I bet that it is causing a lot of cancers that we are blaming on second-hand smoke and radon exposure.

*cough* except for the fact that the spark from your spark plugs is contained inside a combustion chamber, which is normally at least 5 or 10cm of alloy steel. That amount of steel can quite easily shield X-rays 100 times as strong.

And as for all the things to do with radioactive waste - reprocess the good stuff. Seal the rest of it in concrete (or ceramic beads, or whatever) and drop it in your nearest subduction zone. A few millenia later, it's all back in the center of the earth.

Personally I believe in 50 years time only China will be left with enough generating capacity to sustain growth. The don't give a fuck about Greenpeace, or NIMBY, and in this case,good for them.

Re:We're all getting dosed with X-rays anyway

[wronskyMan]

*cough* except for the fact that the spark from your spark plugs is contained inside a combustion chamber, which is normally at least 5 or 10cm of alloy steel. That amount of steel can quite easily shield X-rays 100 times as strong.
 
*cough* except for the fact that nuclear fuel and waste are contained inside a containment vessel, which is normally at least 10-20cm of alloy steel and several feet of concrete. That amount of steel can quite easily shield X-rays 100 times as strong.

Re:We're all getting dosed with X-rays anyway

[ColaMan]

I wasn't talking about nuclear waste, dumbass. The OP was talking about the freaky x-rays from his sparkplugs interfering with his gonads (or something like that). In which I reply that the x-rays eminating from his spark plugs would easily be stopped by the amount of metal in his engine. There's a helluva difference between relatively low-energy spurts of x-rays at 40KeV than a constant high energy flood of gamma radiation from something hot.

Alright, "Blocks X-rays 100 times stronger" is probably a bit of a stretch, but perfectly allowable when you're arguing about the freaky x-rays from spark plugs.
(From various googled sites, 30cm of steel will pretty much block 4MeV X-rays. So an engine block would probably do it for 40KeV, really)

Re:We're all getting dosed with X-rays anyway

[couch_warrior]

Except that a lot of cylinder heads (which hold the spark plugs, not the engine block) are aluminum, which blocks very few X-rays.

And the core of the spark plug itself is ceramic, which is a poor shield material. Iron and steel tend to reflect X-rays rather than absorb them like lead. So if your spark plug ports face back towards the driver, you're getting beams of X-rays fired at you.

But who cares after all. We have a government that relies on revenue from alcohol taxes while drunk drivers kill 20,000 people a year (2.5 times the number killed by handguns). So what's a few hundred deaths from cancer thrown into the mix??

It's not like individual human lives have any actual value....

Re:We're all getting dosed with X-rays anyway

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay smart guy...

Get a geiger counter.

Take a background measurement in your car before the car is turned on.

Then take a measurement with the car on.

See what the difference is (if any).

Do this a few times so that you get a good statistical confidence in your results.

After you have done this, then tell us about how much of a danger spark plugs are.

Until then, you are just talking out your ass. BTW, Iron and steel don't reflect X-rays, except at very small incident angles.

Nukes please!

[uncadonna]

Greenhouse gases are a big problem and getting bigger.

A ton of uranium yields as much energy as 16000 tons of coal. We bury the nuclear wastes in a small hole. (Work out the size of a ton of metal.) We bury the much larger coal wastes in the atmosphere, where they change the radiative properties of the planet, not to mention various other toxic side effects, including radiation emissions.

It's really a no-brainer. Of course, sometimes it seems that society has no brain.

The right doesn't want to admit it was wrong about global warming and the left doesn't want to admit it was wrong about nukes. So we go on merrily pursuing a thoroughly avoidable catastrophe.

Re:Nukes please!

[be-fan]

The right doesn't want to admit it was wrong about global warming and the left doesn't want to admit it was wrong about nukes.

So true! The right doesn't believe there is a problem, and the left thinks everything is a problem and won't allow any of the solutions. Everybody is waiting for a "perfect" solution, and even if there is one of these, we're not going to find one in the next century!

Nuclear waste is not a problem.

[tuna_boat_tony]

"It's simple. Once the Planet is hurt, it gathers Spirit Energy from the Lifestrea, to heal the injury. " --Sephiroth

P.I.U.S.

[Anonymous Coward]

http://permanent.access.gpo.gov/websites/www.nrc.g ov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/next-gen -reactors.html

Process Inherent Ultimate Safety

IUS: The Process Inherent Ultimate Safe reactor is a 640 MWe advanced pressurized water reactor designed by ABB-Atom of Sweden that utilizes natural physical phenomena to accomplish control and safety functions. The PIUS design consists of a vertical pipe, called a reactor module, which contains the reactor core and is submerged in a large pool of highly borated water. The reactor core is comprised of fuel elements that are similar to current PWR fuel elements. The borated pool water is provided to shut down the reactor and to cool the core by natural circulation. Unlike most reactors, PIUS does not use control rods for controlling the nuclear chain reaction. The reaction is controlled by the boron concentration and temperature of the primary loop reactor water. The steam generating equipment of the PIUS design is similar to that of a typical pressurized light water reactor plant. One important difference in plant design is the very large, by current standards, prestressed concrete reactor vessel. This vessel holds both the reactor module and the borated pool.

Your solution's Acheilles heal is economics

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, if the US stopped using Arab oil (via trade restraints) that would make Arab oil cheaper for the rest fo the world.
That would then allow economies in China, India, and the EU to produce more for less.
China is fairly resource poor and has been quitly locking up natural resources via contracts for some time.

So, your solution creates a world where the US puts itself at a huge disadvantage for nothing more than a desire to remove itself from the Middle East.
Note that the Arabs do not get any poorer as the EU and China are still very happy to deal with them. In fact, given the EU willingness to bribe Arabs, they may get richer.
So, the Arab oil/money engine of terrorism humms right along. This could also accelerate the EU transformation into EUarbia as the EU's ties with Islamic countries increase.

Also, note that this really doesn't ge the US out of the MIddle East as we will still be called upon to solve the Isreali-Arab conflict (of course, they are reasonable people. I am sure they'll have it all worked out over the weekend).

You crater the US economy and a very little in return for it.

Re:Your solution's Acheilles heal is economics

[Harinezumi]

The point of his proposal was investing into the heavy up-front R&D needed to develop an economically effective alternative to oil.

If such were developed, it would not only be used in the US, but throughout the industrialized (and industrializing) world, and as a result lower the worldwide oil prices to the point where oil is at least as cost-effective as the new technology, which may well be $10/barrel if not less.

A better solution? sure why didn't you just ask?

[Anonymous Coward]

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This isn't a bad idea:
1 No waste to dispose of
2 Out of reach from 'terrorist' attacks
3 Feasible techonology( if the space elevator made sense\why not this?)
4 Solar energy in space is limitless
5 It is clean
6 Put it over Nevada
7 Wire the electricity long distance to grids
8 The amount of kilowatt per square feet of solar panel is tremendous do the math
9 No global warming as result
10 Cost is less in the long run (if we can send a mars probe to sniff dust, why not put this up at a fraction of the cost. hello???)

Molten salt reactors are the best

[Dezakin]

They can run on thorium, prototypes have run for years, they use 1/100th the fuel, and they produce 1/100th the waste. Economic studies show them to be cheaper than light water reactors and even coal, they dont require fuel fabrication, and they're safer than any other breeder reactor design and all light water reactor designs. But no one seems to know about them. They keep repeating pop-sci stuff that they read about, like pebble bed reactors or the integral fast reactor.

Waste Disposal

[Just Another Poster]

I've seen it mentioned elsewhere that disposing of high-level waste is actually rather simple. Take the waste to a desert, dilute it with cement and dump it into a deep hole. Jerry Pournelle's solution went something along the lines of cordoning off an area with fencing and keeping the waste above ground in watertight concrete casks. If a better solution for waste disposal is discovered in a hundred years or so, the waste is still relatively accessible.

We don't need this multi-billion dollar Yucca Mountain crap.

Re:I for one

[Guppy06]

I think this calls for mixing Matt Groening references:

I for one welcome our new British mutant atomic supermen!

Oil Powered Power Plants

[dakirw]

Actually, while there aren't many oil-powered power plants in the US, some do exist, mainly in the East. See articles for details:

Oil spill at Maine power plant
Wikipedia article about various types of power plants

I'll grant that a lot of power, particularly in the Western US, is generated by natural gas.

One of the main reasons that oil-fired plants aren't popular is that they have a lot of pollutants, such as mercury. Many oil producing countries find it cheaper to use oil for their power plants.

Interesting (if foolish!) goal!

[tkjtkj]

yes, why noT replace a " .. looming energy crisis .." with the crisis of global radiation contamination! Yup! Long Live Chernobyl!!! Hooray for 3 Mile Island! way to go, brits! tkjtkj@gmail.com

Re:Interesting (if foolish!) goal!

[Anonymous Coward]

You an ignorant sack of pig shit. Please kill yourself.

Re:Interesting (if foolish!) goal!

[Anonymous Coward]

Amen. Please kill yourself you stupid piss. You damn enviretards can eat shit and die.

Re:Well which is it? - both!

[Anonymous Coward]

>British Petroleum( though they have changed their name and I can't remember what the new one is )

It's BP; see http://www.bp.com/home.do?categoryId=1 . I'm not sure how they came up with the new name :)

Fusion could certainly hold the answer...

[trackstr777]

As a college student majoring in Nuclear Engineering, the possibilities in the near future for innovation in the nuclear field are astounding. The joint effort between Japan, France, the USA, and a few others I believe, to design the first working fusion reactor, could be our first major step into higher level energy generation. It's quite amazing to learn about these new types of reactors, stuff that I could be designing or operating within a few short years. Anyone who is still so fearful of a nuclear reactor in their backyard is not aware of the innnovations in the nuclear field, and how much safer they are as opposed to previous years.

Re:Fusion could certainly hold the answer...

[jim_deane]

I'm not fearful of a nuclear reactor in my back yard; there's one about thirty miles away, and I'd gladly build another one literally in my back yard...especially if they'll hire me to run it.

I think investment in nuclear fusion energy plants--of all kinds, utilizing all of our available nuclear resources including 'waste' fuel--is extremely important to our economic and overall future health. Fusion reactors, though, are ten to twenty years away--and they have been for at least fourty years. We can't count on fusion as an energy source; we need to concentrate on fission and other non-petroleum energy production, we need to continue to pursue new oil/organic chemical fuel sources, and we need to continue to do basic research and engineering in fusion reactor design to try to reach the point where it's a viable energy source.

Jim

as far as I know, it's easily doable...

[shummer_mc]

There is a reactor designed called an advanced breeder reactor. It's as close to an energy machine as I've ever seen... This type of reactor uses U238, which we (the US) are currently storing as waste (at huge expense). As a by-product of the consumption of this fuel it creates plutonium (the downside), as well as enough fuel to 'seed' another reactor (breeding, in a sense). This reactor was slated to be built, but due to the weapons-grade plutonium by-product, it was deemed unsafe and discontinued. According to people that I know (I used to work at the Idaho National Lab-- a cornerstone of US nuclear reactor design and development) there is enough U238 in storage-- as waste-- that we would could provide the energy needs for the US for several hundred years.

So, to answer one question, there's plenty of fuel. This is just the tip of the iceberg, as far as I'm concerned. This technology has been known for 30 years. There are bound to be technological leaps and bounds in the science of nuclear energy, but collectively we're afraid to try. As evidence of our collective fear, I point to the, IMO, over-zealous regulation/legislation, which makes it impossibly expensive to investigate making nuclear power *more* safe (I believe that it's safer/healthier than coal now).

Okay, having said that... there is a problem with our ability to improve our nuclear technology. That problem is the last 30 years-- where nothing was done in the field (due to FUD). In those 30 years the leading minds have forgottem and gotten old and sometimes have left the US in favor of work in more reasonable countries. In essence, I'm not sure that we have the expertise any longer. It will be expensive and difficult to get the US nuclear programs working again. I only guess that the UK is the same.

Is it worth it for the US, or any country? Yes. I think so. However, you've got an oil industry crony in the W.H. and trillions of lobby dollars spent by US energy corps and, according to many, the old KGB and other foreign govs, which have instilled a real fear about nuclear energy (according to the stories the old USSR didn't want us to develop *infinite* energy to feed our economy).

There is currently an initiative to build what they call the Gen 4 reactor. There has been some discussion as to which design to try. 'Pebble Bed' was discussed, but there are cooling issues to overcome (I can't speak intelligently on that... I wrote the software which tracked the nuclear waste-- IANANE). El Presidente seems enamored with hydrogen reactors, last I heard. My bets on whether we actually do it are placed on 'no.' The current project is woefully under-funded and crazily mis-managed.

Regarding waste... I know a bit about what is stored as waste... Mainly, it's PPE (personal protective equipment-- rubber gloves and the like) and junk. Anytime something even remotely (and I mean REMOTELY) connected with nuclear fuel, or waste, or contamination is discarded it becomes waste. The VAST majority (99%) of waste isn't nasty. Quite a lot can be permanently disposed of in a safe manner, but people start to freak out (FUD again). The other 1% can be stored until we figure out a cost-effective manner to send it to the sun. Right now, we store it all, and that contributes to more FUD.

I probably sound a bit like a fanboy... maybe I am. There IS an energy crisis. Renewables are nowhere near (at least as far as I know) ready to produce the amount of energy that nuclear does/can; it has been operationally tested worldwide.

Solving the political problems... That's another matter.

Re:as far as I know, it's easily doable...

[smugfunt]

This type of reactor uses U238, which we (the US) are currently storing as waste (at huge expense).

Haven't you heard, the US has hatched a cunning plan to dump it in third world countries in the form of artillery shells (at huge expense).

have you ever been to a coal mining town?

[YesIAmAScript]

TAANSTAFL.

Yes, I'm sure those tailings weren't pretty. But check out a coal mining town. Some towns are surrounded by tailings from years of mining.

i know exactly what you mean

[CiXeL]

and i had to move from southern california to south florida and now im right down the street from turkey point nuclear power plant, one of the safest plants in the united states. people need to realize nuclear is the new 'fire', sure we burned ourselves a few times in the beginning but its the next step and we have to learn to handle it with maturity.

Re:What we need here in the States-A time warp.

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it ironic that nuclear proponents talk about "new technologies" when it's disadvantages are mentioned.* But ignore the "new technologies" that make fossil fuel burning better than in the past. Why is that?

You answered your own question. They are "nuclear proponents", so they hype their advantages and dismiss the other side's. The question could just as easily be stated as, "Why has our society become black-and-white, with-us-or-against-us, totally abondoning open-mindedness and rational debate?" Just looking through the comments on this story you see a lot of one-sided comments, and links to heavily biased articles. At the end of the day you don't know any more than you did at the beginning, because you had to take everything with a so much salt that you can't taste any of it anymore.

Nuclear has disadvantages, primarily in waste. We can build a reactor here and now that has no real safety issues. (Note that since the inception of nuclear power in the US, far more people have been killed by coal or hydroelectric generation than by nuclear. We have a pretty damn good safety record. I don't know what the number would be worldwide, though. The USSR didn't have as good a safety program.) The safety regulations are one of the things that make nuclear more expensive than it could be, because they are held to a very high standard. Throw in a widespread hatred of anything nuclear by a large chunk of the public (and their congressmen), and nuclear loses a lot of luster.

Coal, or any fossil fuel, also has some waste issues. If this hurricane season is really due to CO2 levels, then those issues are becoming far more serious (equal to some worst-case nuclear scenarios). Certainly coal plants have been improving their emissions, and are even working on reducing CO2 emissions, so they become less of a problem as they do so. Fossil fuels have a lot of other issues, like being explosive or very flammible in many storage and transport conditions. While heavily regulated, their regulations haven't caught up with nuclear by a long shot, so they are rather more dangerous all around. Coal also has a negative public image, with images of trains spewing huge trails of black smoke.

Probably the biggest problem with any viable energy source is the NIMBY problem. Even the environmentalists don't want 10,000 windmills in their state, much less a traditional plant of any sort. Solar panels are great in the suburbs in the right climates, but don't have the energy density for heavy industry and high-rise buildings. Hydroelectric is neither clean nor safe in the grand scheme. Fusion would be very cool, but it is still a carrot on a stick. Nothing is perfect, but it would be nice to hear some good news one of these days.

Note also that coal is hear, and now.

If you can hear the coal, you might have bigger problems. ;)

Nobody?

[narl]

I would pay someone to put a nuclear reactor in my backyard.

In fact, I hearby offer $100 USD to any group that builds a nuclear power reactor in my backyard. (where 'backyard' is defined to be within 10 miles from my place of residence at the time of construction)

I'm proud to already live ~50 miles from the Palo Verde reactor.

Great Plains, Australian Outback, Siberia...

[Anonymous Coward]

Then put the reactors in places where they are not in anyones' back yard.

For all the talk about overpopulation in the world, there are a shitload of places where noone wants to live. About a third of the area of the United States is flat plains with noone around. I wouldn't mind filling it with nuke plants and bison herds.

Re:Great Plains, Australian Outback, Siberia...

[Creedo]

About a third of the area of the United States is flat plains with noone around. I wouldn't mind filling it with nuke plants and bison herds.

Granted, they would be three-eyed bison....

"Noo-ku-lar...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's pronounced, noo-ku-lar"

Maybe at least...

[laughingcoyote]

...this guy knows how to pronounce the word "nuclear". Has it ever bothered anyone else, having a guy with a finger on the "nukyalur" button who's too stupid to even say it correctly?

Oh, alright. Just wondering.

Re:Maybe at least...

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought all you BDS-suffering lefties were supposed to be more "nuanced" and multicultural and understanding of differences in people's speech patterns?

The pronunciation (noo'kyuh-ler), which is strongly objected to by many usage writers and others of their ilk, is an example of how a familiar phonological pattern can influence an unfamiliar one. The usual pronunciation of the final two syllables of this word is (-klee-er), but this sequence of sounds is rare in English. Much more common is the similar sequence (-kyuh-ler), which occurs in words like particular, circular, spectacular, and in many scientific words like molecular, ocular, and vascular.

..we must encourage Iran, North Korea, and so on.

[narl]

So we must encourage Iran, North Korea and so on to build as many nuclear power stations as they like.

I don't have a problem with this at all. I'm all in favor of every country getting nuclear technology, even if it means they get nuclear weapons as well.

Besides, the sooner everyone has nuclear weapons, the sooner we'll learn how to defend against them and clean up the messes.

Bad arguments much more radioactive than nuclear

[Anonymous Coward]

"Coal also gives off quite a lot of radioactivity, and it's going straight into the atmosphere. In 1982, US coal power plants released 800 tons of radioactive uranium and 2000 tons of radioactive thorium burnt straight out of coal directly into the atmosphere. Nuclear power plants, as a rule, don't do that. We need to shut down every damn coal plant as soon as humanly possible."

In 1982. Whew! I'm sure glad that coal burning technology hasn't changed in...23 years.

"You can't produce a lot of megawatts with solar and wind in a single location without using up a ginormous amount of space. That space isn't magically appearing out of nowhere. Something is being displaced, be it a forest, a field, or some sort of human usage."

Man. All those ocean dwelling humans will no longer have a home.

Yes, but...

[WindBourne]

they will be joined by those that control the oil, such as Baby Bush. His "energy" bill was anything but. It was a give away to big oil and had nothing to do with setting up long-term energy usage. I am thinking that most of the Europeans (esp. france) have it right; nukes combined with alternative energy.

So yes, there will be some anti-nukes that run around. But do not fear them. Instead fear those that can do long term damage to the direction.

About bloody time

[SysKoll]

It's about bloody time these blighters give some thought to nuclear power. You'd have to be a revolting moron not to notice that France, which produces 82% of its electricity with nukes, doesn't quite glow at night and that the French aren't floating belly up down the Seine river.

You have to remember that coal burning plants are not just belching CO2 and sulphuric acid. They are also releasing radioactive dust in the form of thorium and uranium that are present in coal (3.2 ppm thorium and 1.3 ppm uranium). Your typical burner rejects about 20 tons of uranium and thorium a year. Sure, precipitators wash the smoke and decrease the radioactive releases, but then you get to dispose of radioactive sludge. Is that much better than spent nuclear fuel?

Excerpt from the article:

Total U.S. releases in 1982 (from 154 typical plants) amounted to 801 tons of uranium (containing 11,371 pounds of uranium-235) and 1971 tons of thorium.

That's for 1982. Since then, disco died and worlwide coal consumption more than doubled. So for 2000, US coal power plants released about 5000 of thorium, versus zero-zilch-nada for the fearsome, icky nuclear plants.

It's all a matter of managing risks and futures, and frankly, when you take that problem into account on top of CO2 emission, coal plants don't look like a good solution.

Now, I'd gladly blanket the sahara with solar reflectors and generate "clean" power, but 1. The Polisario Front guerilla think they'd ruin the nice desert landscape, and their Kalashnikovs are very convincing, and 2. It cost $5000 to create a kilowatt of solar power capacity when nuclear plants cost $1500/kW including their end-of-life cleanup.

And your logic (and understanding of econ) is poor

[WindBourne]

First, you assume that oil is the cheapest form of energy out there. It is not. If it were, then America would be based 100% on just oil. Oil really only comes into its own for portable energy (and other side products). That is why little of our electricity comes from oil.

Secondly, you seem to assume that by our moving away from oil, it will actually cost us more money. That is also not known. In fact, quite often, new ideas/inventions tends to lower the price.

For whatever reason, you seem to ignore the future. Much of the research out there is showing that the world has hit the peak of oil production, which means that all future oil will only continue going up (notice what has happened with a president who is oil friendly; double in under 5 years).

Finally, where is the bulk of oil? Russia, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela (ignoring shale oil in America/Canada).
And where are they?Russia is slowly falling back to a USSR. Iraq will almost certainly continue into true civil war (who wins is anybodies guess). The house of Saud will almost certainly fall (guarenteed if Iraq continues into civil war). Venezuela is under control of an democratically voted in idiot (sound familiar).
IOW, America is trusting much of its future to a bunch of countries who are NOT friendly towards America (or western europe). The best thing for our long term interest is to not depend on wackos. Eisenhower and Carter had it right when they tried to move us to more of a nuke economy.

There's more than one kind of reactor, you know.

[Krid(O'Caign)]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_bed_reactor It promises to be a safer and more efficient method, which has natural self-limitations that reduce the reliance on mechanical failsafes. As for disposal: Anybody who suggests launching it into the sun or burying it underground is a fool; Rockets are expensive, and the last thing we need to do is have a catastrophic rocket failure in the atmosphere. It's dangerous to bury radioactive waste, since it CAN seep out and contaminate areas, and the concentrations involved are absurdly high compared to natural deposits. Grind it up, massively dilute it with sand, and send it trolling on barges out across the deepest parts of the oceans letting it slowly seep out. Water absorbs radiation very well so there would be a negligible increase over background radiation, and with the exception of plutonium all nuclear materials you would find in a reactor are naturally-occuring. Safe, cheap, and ecological.

Re:..we must encourage Iran, North Korea, and so o

[johnny cashed]

Damn straight. That is true evolutionary thinking. Survival of the fittest indeed. Damn it, if you can't learn to evolve with increasing radiation, you don't deserve to live!

I'm not sure if I'm being serious or funny. Please, narl, don't take this as a flame.

That's not necessarily the case

[Julian Morrison]

Don't forget, the last time these people made any big noise was the 1980s, and the world's moved on a lot since then. In particular, the sort of reactive luddite environmentalism that was popular then has basically overplayed its hand, reached saturation and lost the moral high ground. Sure the nutjobs will sloganize and march in papier-mache-heads as they usually do - but people will recognise it's just the usual rent-a-mob, not any sort of grassroots uprising. They'll mainly get bad press for blocking the roads. Even the BBC might tone down its traditional awed deference. Heh.

Re:That's not necessarily the case

[cliffski]

If you dont think there are legitimate concerns about nuclear energy, then you need to look a little closer:

1) proliferation - so its fine for the US and the UK to go nuclear happy, but you still reserve the right to hold a gun to the head of coutnries you dont like (such as Iran) if they try to follow suit. How does that work exactly? How will Iranian citizens feel about that policy? do we really need to generate more anti wetsern feelings there?

2) Centralisation. Nuclear requires huge concentration of power production. distributed power generation is more resiliant to attack and failure (like the USA blackouts recently), such as small scale solar and wind.

3) Security - protesters have got inot nuclear power stations often enough. you dont think AQ or some other bunch of terrorists arent planning it? I'd sleep safer at night knowing that Osama Bin Laden wasnt giving a TV interview from a nuclear power station control room.

4) Economy - nuclear generation costs a fortune. the Uk had to spend 400 million to bail out its nuclear energy industry and stop them going bankrupt. This was after the claims that nuclear would be 'too cheap to meter'. No change there.

5) Waste - heres the big one. You can probably solve the other problems, but the waste one is the biggy. You dont want to transport this stuff all over the world for security reasons, and you need somewhere to store it for a LONG time, we are talking tens of thousands of years here. Thats so long it almost seems like fantasty. If the romans had used nuclear, we'd still be guarding their waste now, long after their whole civlisation ahs crumbled. We lecture kids about not getting big debst in their teens that might take 5 years to pay off. we get scared about taking on 25 year mortagges, but we are happy to dump a serious waste problem on our descendents for the next ten thousand?

As with all nuclear power discussions, slashdot is overwhelemed with pro nuclear people dismissing everyone who opposes the technology as nutters, often in the most arrogant and dismissive way. I'm a programmer, certainly not a luddite, but I have serious and justified concerns about investing in nuclear power. Only a resoned debate will change minds on this issue.

Re:That's not necessarily the case

[EpsCylonB]

5) Waste - heres the big one. You can probably solve the other problems, but the waste one is the biggy. You dont want to transport this stuff all over the world for security reasons, and you need somewhere to store it for a LONG time, we are talking tens of thousands of years here. Thats so long it almost seems like fantasty. If the romans had used nuclear, we'd still be guarding their waste now, long after their whole civlisation ahs crumbled. We lecture kids about not getting big debst in their teens that might take 5 years to pay off. we get scared about taking on 25 year mortagges, but we are happy to dump a serious waste problem on our descendents for the next ten thousand?


I am one of those people who beleives that every problem has a solution, one possible solution for nuclear waste is vitrification. If you can turn liquid nuclear waste into a solid then it becomes a hell of a lot easier to manage.

Seems to me that energy wise fossil fuels and nuclear produce similar amounts (although different types) of waste, just that nuclear waste is highly concentrated. The status quo is not a option, we will run out of fossil fuels, if we want civilized soceity to thrive we need energy.

Re:That's not necessarily the case

[cliffski]

which can be got from solar, wind, wave or even energy efficiency measures. Theres no need for nuclear.

Re:That's not necessarily the case

[Angostura]

I'm politically of a greenish hue and while I used to be anti-nuclear, it is now my belief that nuclear powers going to be the only way that we can realistically cut C02 emissions in the medium term while other technological fixes kick in. I feel passionately that anyone who is truly green will have to support nuclear power soon if we are going to avoid global environmental catastrophe.

Your point 5 about the difficult of handling nuclear waste is right on the money, yet 180 degrees out of wack. Yes nuclear waste is difficult to contain and is very dangerous. Yet it is an absolute walk in the park compared to handling the waste being pumped out by our fossil-fuel-based generators. You can't contain CO2 (yes I know there are some fancy plans to sequester it, but those are years out).

Nuclear waste has the potential to kill people living in large areas if something goes wrong. The threat and danger is apparent. People worry about it. C02 goes up a chimney and people don't worry about it at all, yet the threat is (in my opinion much much greater) we're not talking about large areas being contaminated for 100s of years - with C02 we are talking about the globe being 'contaminated' for millenia, possibly irreversibly.

Personally, as a London resident, I';d like to see a nice big nuclear power station built in the middle of London, and other major cities. "When you reduce you energy consumption sufficiently that we don't need it we will decommission it."

In answer to your initial point - yes, I also believe that we will have to promote peaceful nuclear proliferation. It's nasty stuff, but not as nasty and pervasive as the alternative.

Oh - scrap the manned Mars mission, put the money into fusion research.

Et voila, I've transformed myself into an Internet kook.

Re:That's not necessarily the case

[wooley-one]

I'll try to respond to your points in order.
(full disclosure: I work in nuclear power)

1) I honestly don't have a good answer for this. Hopefully the new generation of reactor designs will permit more widespread use. If my information is correct, the new PBMR designs significantly decrease the proliferation concerns.

2) Centralization is not necessarily a bad thing. There are efficiency gains from economy of scale, and maintenance on one or two units is a hell of a lot easier than maintaining 10,000.

3) It's one thing to get to or even past the front gate. It's another thing entirely to get into the protected area. I haven't seen reports of this, but I would be interested to read articles if you have them. (links please?)

4) Nuke plants are base loaded. They run at 100% ouput as much as possible. The reason for this is that they produce the cheapest power we've got. It's the fossil plants that actually follow the load throughout the day.

5) The waste is initially dangerous. However, we don't need to store it for 10,000 years. The really dangerous stuff is dangerous because it decays off at a fast rate. Thus, the more dangerous the material, the faster it peters out. The longer the half-life, the less dangerous the material is. I would be more afraid of the heavy metals than the radiation in many cases.

Re:That's not necessarily the case

[cliffski]

on the protesters thing, three time protesters got inot sizewell B in the UK. some protesters even climbed on top of the reactor building, and drew slogans on the side of it.
They didnt go into the control room, and had decided ahead of time not to do that. theyt were there to protest at nuclear expansion, not security. The protesters got to several locations within the site, and onto several rooftops. This a group of 150 people (hardly stealth) and done in broad daylight. The only tools used were ladders and bits of carpet (for the barbed wire).
Switch that to a nightime attack by 3 or 4 guys with silenced pistols, bolt cutters and a suitcase full of semtex. I'm pretty sure that (in the UK at least) such an attack would be a doddle.
And this isnt even addressing the clasic 'fly a plane into the building' idea.

Re:That's not necessarily the case

[shutdown -p now]

There are many good ways to dispose of nuclear waste, and even more and better are in the development. I won't give the list here, Google & Wikipedia should provide a good starting point for such research. Not to mention that large parts of what is labeled 'waste' in mass media is not at all that; it is a material which can be reprocessed later on and made into more fuel.

The real renewable energy

[Julian Morrison]

Wind, geothermal etc are insignificant, inefficient, second-hand energy sources only of interest to luddites. They do not, can not, and never will fulfil the energy demands of the modern world. Nor will humanity permanently cap itself at steam-age energy usage to make nice with said luddites. So basically that idea can go in the dustbin, and good riddance.

There is basically only one "renewable" energy source that makes sense, namely sunlight. Not the poor, murky, filtered stuff that squeezes through earth's atmosphere, but the raw real deal, billions of megawatts pouring out uselessly into empty space.

Nuclear waste a lot better than having a war...

[hughperkins]

Nuclear waste is a lot better than having another major world war. Energy is fundamental to a modern society, and if we start to run out, or it gets really expensive, its not a Good Thing. Wars can and do happen over this sort of thing.

Energy lies at the heart of the economy of our society. We've automated things such as farming, manufacturing, and so on, so what controls prices is, yes the price of raw materials, but also: energy. Manufacturing aluminium is really expensive for example, simply because of the energy demands of electrolysing the ore. Reducing the price of energy is key to our development and progress.

Using nuclear power is critical to our society, and we should be using it as much as possible. Not to do so is almost criminal.

I'd much rather a little extra radiation each day than a major world war.

Hugh

Re:And your logic (and understanding of econ) is p

[Anonymous Coward]

Venezuela is under control of an democratically voted in idiot (sound familiar). -- quote....

Who are YOU to speak. President Hugo Chavez have done more for his people, especially the POOR then you ever will. The only reason the AMERICANS are "up-in-arms" (TM) against him is because he EXPECTS you to PAY for oil extracted from Venezuela.

Here's some advice.... Please be more informed next time you make such an arrogant and ignorant comment!

I'm from the oil industry. And geophysicist explorationist and a production accounting with management experience. The typical ROYALTY rate is 24% to 30% depending on several variables. It's like that in Canada, UK, and yes --- the USA.

Guess how much you Americans are paying in ROYALTIES???? An average of ZERO to 1%!!!!! WTF????

Guess why you guys LOVE the SAUDIS (Before the Israelis convinced you that they are the enemies by instituting 911)??? Because you get a HUGE-ASS discount!!!

mmmmm???? THINK!!!!

Same view, different reason

[Flyboy Connor]

...that Britain was moving closer to the stance of the US, which has refused to back Kyoto-style emission reductions.

Yeah, but the reason for the British is that they start doubting whether the Kyoto protocols are a good way to reduce global warming. The reason for the US is that the president and his cronies deny that global warming is taking place. Another hurricane, mr. Bush?

Re:Same view, different reason

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice revisionist history.

The Kyoto Treaty was rejected by the Senate on an advisory vote 95-0.

During the Clinton administration.

Yep, it was clearly Bush and his cronies at work.

Right.

Two Words

[Xarius]

Tech Support!

*tongue in cheek*

Re:Nuclear Power and the grid

[Tandoori Haggis]

"Freeing ones self from the grid is like a Borg entity trying to be free. "Prepare for assimilation, resistance is futile."

Indeed there are obstacles for many of us wanting to free ourselves from the grid. Local planning policies, building regulation and propery costs certainly don't help. Forcing people to accept the staus quo will only set us back several decades.

From a survival point of view, it only makes sense to have localised alternatives to being at the mercy of a centralised power policy with a unified grid distribution. For many businesses and households, their only energy supply is grid electricity.

Rather than favour one power generation technology over another, a sensible course of action is to figure out how we can use them all to best effect. This includes taking action to reduce energy losses in distribution and use.

A great deal of power is lost in transmission lines.

1. It is radiated as heat. Birds flock to a power line where an insulator has started to fail and presents itself as a resistive path to earth through the support pylon.

2. It is radiated as electromagnetic energy at the production frequency of 50Hz or 60Hz, depending on where you live, and at the harmonic frequencies. People have been prosecuted for stealing energy from overhead power lines using induction circuits. Various demonstrations of iluuminating a fluorescent tube by holding it under a power line have been televised.

Alternating Current was proposed as a solution to power loss over long distances. AC is also convenient for transforming voltages. Direct Current can be more efficient when it is produced where it is required but it needs to be transformed in to AC for grid distribution or used to do work, whether chemical or kinetic, for storage.

Nuclear is essentially an always on technology and large existing hydo schemes are extremely important in some countries, (e.g., Scotland and USA). Nuclear and Hydo generated electricity should be distributed by a grid or used to do work.
Nuclear is used off peak for pumping water back up to the header source in a pumped storage hydo electric sheme.

Localised wind, solar, mini hydro and geothermal energies should be utilised at or very close to their source.

If I had my own property with sufficient space and regulations,local planners and busybodies didn't interfere, I'd like to do what I could to reduce or remove my needs to use the country wide grid. Meanwhile, I'll just keep using energy efficient light bulbs and only use what heat I need in winter.

No problem

[t_allardyce]

Its ok we can put all the nuclear power stations in Wales.

*ducks*

Re:And your logic (and understanding of econ) is p

[Anonymous Coward]

The guy is an idiot because he is running around claiming that we are trying to invade him. The guy sees boogeymen and conspiracies like GWB sees WMD. At this time, with America fighting a 2 front war, we can not invade a country. Worse, if we did, every oil producing country would simply raise their prices and destroy us (and I suspect that the saudis would have no choice but to go along).

As to the rate, I wish they would raise it. One of the issues that I see is that cheap oil has hurt us. It has made us sloppy (esp with cars). In addition, I would prefer to see us get away from oil. If we paid what Europe does (including their taxes), then we would move away from oil.

Lets look at the bigger picture

[smoker2]

Just my observations here, not necessarily scientific fact, but based on public impressions.

Hydro-electric :
Good - clean (once constructed), naturally renewable, not necessarily land based.
Bad - Land has to be flooded, wildlife moved (or exterminated).
Conclusion - Has to be better than coal, as it uses less toxic resources, it's naturally renewable, and the argument against flooding land is moot when you consider the rising sea levels projected by continual use of fossil fuels and emmissions thereof.

Nuclear :
Good - Clean (once constructed), fairly large fuel reserves, good long term returns for less input.
Bad - Produces toxic waste which has to hidden/protected. Small possibility of accidents causing widespread pollution.
Conclusion - Has to be better than coal, as the toxic byproducts are contained, and can be used again. Also the returns are better for a given amount of fuel.

Wind :
Good - clean (once constucted), naturally renewable, not necessarily land based.
Bad - Noise issues (wtf?), might kill lickle birdies, doesn't look nice, not terribly efficient.
Conclusion - It's still better than coal, even though large areas need to be in operation to generate enough power, and also there are no waste products.

Solar :
Good - Clean (yadda yadda), (practically) unlimited reserves, no waste products, quiet, can be small (think calculator, watch, etc).
Bad - Not very efficient on a large scale and I can't think of anything else.

I think one problem thats troubling any alternative energy resource, is the fact that people dismiss them because each individual resource cannot replace the whole fossil fuel based system. Surely when combined, and used in appropriate situations, the alternatives make more sense. It has to be more productive in the long term, to localise energy prodution to the consumer of that power. Less power has to be generated to be usefully productive. Instead of huge power plants feeding a grid spanning a continent, have tiny power plants located everywhere, serving the local needs. I realise this was the dream for fusion, but it could be achieved now with natural renewables.

On another point, I see various posts describing different forms of nuclear reactor, each using different fuels, thorium, plutonium, uranium. Also it appears that waste from one type can be reprocessed to fuel plants of a different type. Well, duh ! Ok, each individual type is not going to completely replace fossil fuel, but together ....
Even the massive harmful output of coal burning which includes uranium and thorium (duh !) could be useful. If you are going to burn coal anyway, use it as a process to extract these valuable resources.

I guess my final word is this.
We worry about the environmentally _unfriendly_ aspects of contructing environmentally _friendly_ power plants/schemes, but unless we build some now, we will run out of non-renewables before we have a new infrastructure in place that is capable of taking the load. Surely if we are going to pollute, then it is better to pollute now, for the positive gain of no pollution later.

Re:Lets look at the bigger picture

[dzafez]

People talking about non-renewable and renewable energy production (I know, better is conversion), always forget to think about geothermal powerplants. Remember? More than 90% of the Earth is hotter then 1000C !!! Back, when I did work for a geothermal emergy company, I had a closer look at this and it is really a forgotten resource. With todays oil-prices, the investment should pay off within 8 Years, even earlier as the Oil-prices are going to go up more likely, then down. Of course, Island has free energy, for beeing in a lucky position, but in Europe, USA or elsewhere, you would just have to drill deeper, which increases the initial price, but hey in 20 Years, we are out of oil, and you can lay back and what the whole thing on your autark Powersupply. Also large Powerplants could power cities plus provide cheap heating to the residents.

I know, you can't build a geothermic CAR! But thin of this, standartized Batteries + standartized baterie-mounting = electric-fuel-stations, where powering up happens just by exchanging the batteries. This can even be faster then fueling by hand! So I could live with a low range! Of lets say 100 KM. Plus, you can charge your Car over night in you garage and by day at work (new perks :-)

Seriously!

needs to be contained for several * 1e4 yrs

[aurelian]

we haven't demonstrated the ability to do that either.

Hypocrisy

[Anonymous Coward]

The leftwing/academic culture PROTESTED nuclear energy for 30 years.

Now, they will no doubt claim credit for its return.

Energy efficiency

[pfdietz]

Yup I dared mention the phrase that strikes terror into the Bush administration. It may amaze US motorists to discover that unlike the new Hummer, European cars have actually advanced their MPG since the Ford Model T.

The Hummer actually reflects an unintended side-effect of energy efficiency. Many energy efficiency improvements have been made in vehicles since the Model T (or even since before the 1970s 'energy crisis'). These improvements could be used to make cars of the same size that use less gas, or they could be used to make bigger cars that are still affordable. SUVs may not have become so popular if they got only 5 miles per gallon.

A similar thing happens with air travel. More efficient planes means cheaper fares which means more passenger miles. Or with lightning: if your light bulbs are more efficient and last longer, you tend to leave them on more. It's 'elasticity of demand' -- as the cost of the activity that consumes energy declines, more of that activity will occur.

Solar Power and the cost of Photovoltaics

[some guy I know]

Not all solar power involves photovoltaics.
For example, mirrors can concentrate sunlight on a large Stirling Engine to produce eletricity.
There are several pilot projects in the works.
Google for more info.

As a matter of fact

[WindBourne]

That is what Clinton did with NK. We were helping them to build a lightwater reactor that could not be used for bomb building.
BR> In addition, America does not object to Iran's use of a reactor. What we object to, is Iran's ability to reprocess the uranium include the spent plutonium that can be used in bombs.

Re:Nuclear Power and the grid

[pfdietz]

A great deal of power is lost in transmission lines.

In the US, about 8% of the generated power is lost in the distribution system (lines, transformers, everything). Is that 'a great deal'?

Oh, and since the power in wind goes as the cube of wind speed, it makes sense to put wind turbines where the wind is strong, not where the consumers are. This also helps, to some extent, to smooth supply fluctuations (geographic diversity). So wind power is transmitted long distances just like centralized power.

mmm donuts...

[aqsv49]

I can see it now i am going to be just like Homer Simpson working in sector 7J as a safety supervisor, eating donuts and falling asleep, woo hoo. I say bring on the nuclear power plant.... and the glowing 3 eyed fish!

Solar Power Tower II - rested, ready and willing

[Jerry]

http://rhlx01.rz.fht-esslingen.de/projects/alt_ene rgy/sol_thermal/powertower.html

Here in the mid-west small communities are drying up and blowing away because of the collapse of the farming economy. All the small farms are being/have been bought up by the huge multi-national conglomerates like Cargil, etc. The ex-farmers are moving to town and applying at Walmart for jobs.

This trend could be reversed by setting up 10-50MW SPTII sites all over the mid-West, or even the entire country, in these small rural communities. The technology is similar to that of farm equipment, and the ex-farmers could begin "farming" electricity and Hydrogen. Even under overcast conditions these power stations develop 1/3rd their max power. Excess power can be stored in several forms.

While high tension power lines (450KV) could connect regional areas most power would be produced locally.
Our national electrical power would then be terrorist proof.

Power shouldn't become a tax/revenue stream...

[awfar]

Keep the big business and government control *away*, and allow independent, ad-hoc generation of energy through whatever process is feasible. (local) governments like to provide you with "Services", like water even if a well will suffice, which hooks you permanently as their revenue stream. Companies do the same as it determines how much you *must* work for them so you can heat your home or go anywhere, kindof like the healthcare slavery all Americans are exposed to now: get sick, insurance ends at the end of the month, and you are bankrupted. Don't have insurance? Die anyway because the safety nets don't work.

The Emperor has no Clothes.

Re:Nuclear Power and the grid

[Tandoori Haggis]

"In the US, about 8% of the generated power is lost in the distribution system (lines, transformers, everything). Is that 'a great deal'?"

Ok. By a "great deal of" I meant a large proportion of. Given the vast amount of power used in the US, yes that is one hell of a loss.

I would force them.

[jotaeleemeese]

But in a democracy I need to convince them first.

I would not have any qualms about plainly explaining that it would become a criminal offense to be an energy dilapidator.

Sooner or later it will not be a matter of choice anyway.

An elected politician....

[jotaeleemeese]

.... has very few effective tools in order to effectively modify people's behaviour.

Taxes is one of those tools, and yes, it is a punitive method, but if you are an elected representative you have earned the right to apply punitive tactics to orient the behaviour of the populace.

If your tactics are bad or harmful, the plebs can kick you out of office.

We are toast: megaphallic projects

[jotaeleemeese]

As usual, the big good old slashdotters' ayatollic approach to nuclear energy (yeah it is kewl!) rears it ugly head again.

They dismiss reasonably fears about how to dispose safely of waste forgetting how many industries in the past have not cared about poisoning people. Somehow, the good old little /.er believes that magically people in the nuclear industry will be better and more moral being. Yeah, sure.

They forget about terrorism, on spite of the worldwide paranoia about the issue. Sooner or later terrorists will use radioactive material in order to inflict fear. THey will not too many people, if any, but as soon as a geiger reader detects a bit of radioactive activity after a bomb blast we will be in for the scaremongering ride of our life.

They, as good gadget lovers, like big phallic infrastrucutre. PLants producing who know how many Mega, not Giga, not Tera Watts of energy. The more in on e single point of failure, the better.

And more unexplainbaly, they dismiss the value of distributed technology. Why new housing does not have roofs and walls fully covered with solar panels? Why new housing does not have small wind turbines? Why new housing does not use all the knowledge we about about heating or colling by mains of natural airflow? Why are things like the immoral SUVs allowed to even exist?

Why, I will tell you why, because the industries behind the energy are too powerful and have the politicians by the proverbial small ones.

And the general public on rich countries are addicted to an apparently unlimited supply of mind numbing energy.

The reckoning time will come, on spite of the skeptics, the planet is clearly not infinite and sooner or later we will finish the oil, the cleann air or both.

the technology needs to be renewed

[GodGell]

nuclear power plants are probably the least efficient ones of all power generating technologies in use today.
radioactive matter emits tons of energy in the form of various rays (gamma rays, neutron rays etc.). it also heats things around itself. so what nuclear power plants do is simply put cells of this material into water. the water heats up and evaporates, and from then on it's basically just an old steam engine. the tons of energy in the rays is lost. and then when a cell no longer emits enough heat, they replace it and the old one becomes radioactive waste. it's still radioactive - still emitting alot of energy that could be used.

if nuclear power plants were able to harness all of the power emitted from nuclear material completely, they'd need much less radioactive material to generate the same amount of power, and each cell could be used for the entire decay period of the material used - and that can even be in the hundreds of years range.
and since they'd only need to throw a cell away once it's completely decayed, the resulting waste would emit no more energy, aka. it wouldn't be radioactive waste. just a stable isotope, probably reusable for other things.

Longer half-lives = less danger

[Anonymous Coward]

Long half lives mean lower amounts of radioactivity. The really dangerous materials are the light element fission products with half lives less than 70 years, which produce 99% of the radioactivity of nuclear waste.